The Togo League for the Defence of Human rights has submitted an independently compiled list of prisoners it claims have been detained by the Togolese authorities to the EU fact-finding mission, which has just completed a four-day evaluation tour of Togo. The Togo government gave a pledge to the EU in April to carry out wide ranging democratic reforms including the release of political prisoners, and persons detained by reason of their belonging to the opposition parties or for criticisms of the Togo government.

The Reform Agenda has established a human rights desk to handle reports of torture and harassment of their supporters, an official has said. Naboth Muhairwe, the assistant secretary general in charge of research and policy said this on Sunday while addressing sub county delegates at Kasese catholic social services hall. This follows reports that the group's supporters were being intimidated by government agents.

Corporate sectors worldwide have been in denial of their obligation to ensure that human rights are upheld within their company, argues Steve Ouma, Deputy Executive Director of the Kenya Human Rights Commission. "Until recently, the Government had been given full responsibility for building an environment conducive to ensuring non-punitive laws absolving investors from responsibility. At the same time, the Government was supporting their business. This lack of accountability was fuelled by the non-profit sector's narrow interpretation of their obligation to protect and promote human rights. Human rights activists, theoreticians, and practitioners left it to the state to ensure a human rights order from within itself and the non-state actors within its sphere."

The Nigerian government said on Wednesday that it planned to start repatriating more than 17,000 people who fled from eastern Nigerian into Cameroon following ethnic clashes two years ago. The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), in a statement obtained by IRIN, said that the return of the mainly pastoralist Fulani people to a mountainous frontier area in Taraba state would start next week. Salisu Makarfi, the director general of NEMA, said in the statement that four reception centres for the returnees had already been set up in the towns of Mbang, Dorafi, Mayo Bule and Kan Iyaka in the Sarduana local government area.

"We, the undersigned, are organisations from around the world that campaign for human rights, the alleviation of the HIV epidemic and women's rights to reproductive choices. We are deeply disturbed by the actions and policies of the Bush Administration that undermine the prevention and treatment of AIDS. The effect of the US government's unlawful war in Iraq has been to divert international attention away from global health and poverty."

Predicted shortages and recruitment targets for nurses in developed countries threaten to deplete nurse supply and undermine global health initiatives in developing countries. A twofold approach is required, involving greater diligence by developing countries in creating a largely sustainable domestic nurse workforce and their greater investment through international aid in building nursing education capacity in the less developed countries that supply them with nurses.

Through an open letter delivered this week in Rome, hundreds of civil society organisations from across the world denounced that a recent report by FAO (the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation) was a disgraceful public relations tool for the genetic engineering industry. The FAO report ("Agricultural biotechnology: meeting the needs of the poor?") was publicly presented on the 17th of May, and in the space of a few weeks more than 650 civil society organisations and 800 individuals from 120 countries have drafted and supported the letter which strongly condemns its bias against the poor, against the environment and against food production in general. Amongst them are many peasant organisations, social movements and scientists.

As Africa observes the Day of the African Child, as many as 120,000 children under 18 years old, some as young as eight, may be compelled to spend the day as child soldiers across the continent, Amnesty International said. Despite the growing dynamic of peace in many conflict areas in Africa, the inadequate and insufficient response of African governments and the international community to solve the problem of child soldiering is encouraging the continued ruthless exploitation of Africa's children by leaders of armed forces and armed political groups to further their own material and political ends.

Millions of the world's refugees are children. Joyce Ihuju's parents were killed fleeing Sudan when she was four. She is now 14, and lives in a refugee camp in Uganda. Along with other young people, she tells her story in a book published by NGO International Rescue Committee (IRC) to coincide with Britain's Refugee Week -- June 14 to 20. In "Making It Home", children aged six to 15 describe their experiences of war in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Iraq, Kosovo, Liberia and Sudan.

This decade has seen more of the world's people than ever before seeking refuge from war, persecution or disaster. At the end of 2002, 10.4 million people around the world had refugee status, according to the UN High Commission for Refugees. Human rights campaigners claim that the Geneva Convention on Refugees does not address the realities of modern conflicts, where millions are being displaced within their own countries. But some governments say the convention is being abused by economic migrants, seeking a better life in rich countries

Calm has returned to Kalehe in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) province of South Kivu after government troops regained control of the town from dissident soldiers, Sebastien Lapierre, a spokesman for the UN Mission in the country, known as MONUC, told IRIN on Tuesday. The dissident troops, led by Gen Laurent Nkunda, had on 8 June retreated to Kalehe from the South Kivu capital of Bukavu, following a weeklong occupation of the latter town that left nearly 100 people dead.

A major resettlement operation of Angolan refugees in Zambia has started. By October this year, 40,000 refugees are to be repatriated in Angola only from Zambia. Another 50,000 Angolans residing in the region may also be returned this year. Returnees are to be brought to a reception centre at Cazombo, where they will stay for several days to attend sessions on mine and HIV/AIDS awareness and get medical assistance if required, the UN says.

"I am deeply concerned about the current humanitarian situation in Darfur. Millions of internally displaced persons and other civilians are in desperate need of humanitarian assistance and protection. The crisis is not over and the right to life of all these people is seriously threatened. The Government must ensure that immediate and complete access is provided to humanitarian actors as well as human rights monitors, so that the international community is given every opportunity in cooperation with the Government to protect the life of vulnerable populations in Darfur. The International Community must continue to generously provide humanitarian assistance to the affected people of Sudan." This is according to a statement by Asma Jahangir, the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights. She was speaking at the end of a visit to Sudan that started on 1 June.

Amnesty International has expressed extreme concern at news reports that the UK government has begun forcibly returning failed Somali asylum-seekers to the Somali capital Mogadishu, despite widespread violence in the city that continues to claim hundreds of civilian lives. In a little-publicised policy change, the government has been forcibly returning male Somalis to Mogadishu since 31 March 2004, with six people known to have been sent there by early June.

“Home” signifies family, love and security in the minds of people everywhere, yet for more than 20 million men, women and children living as refugees around the world, home is nothing more than a distant dream or a fleeting memory. In commemoration of World Refugee Day 2004, the American Red Cross International Services Department hosted a special panel presentation at National Headquarters in Washington, D.C. on June 15. The event included a personal resettlement story from Nee Allison, a refugee from war-torn Liberia, along with accounts from Red Cross staff members who are involved extensively with refugees and resettlement issues.

Semyon Tokmakov points to a thick scar he got from assaulting a black U.S. Marine 6 years ago. The attack cost him 1 1/2 years in jail, but Tokmakov says he has no regrets. The Marine was badly beaten in a Moscow market, one of several foreigners targeted in recent years. The last few months have seen an especially shocking series of brutal racial attacks, such as the stabbing to death of a Guinea-Bissau student in Voronezh.

At the root of the human rights disaster in Darfur, western Sudan, is the Sudanese government’s policy of repression, including incommunicado detentions, summary trials, 'disappearances' and torture, Amnesty International said in a 8 June Memorandum to the Sudanese government. "The rule of law and traditional mechanisms for resolving conflict between different ethnic groups have been destroyed by the government’s support for the ‘Janjawid’ militia groups, its failure to arrest anyone accused of attacking and killing villagers from sedentary groups, and its persecution of those thought to be critical of the government," said Amnesty.

Ghana is traditionally known as a hospitable country and, has throughout its post-independence era from 1957 periodically hosted thousands of people who are either fleeing famine or war. Since 1990, however, Ghana has experienced one of the most sustained and largest refugee inflows as a result of the multiple conflicts occurring in the West Africa sub-region. The largest of these groups are the Liberians, whose horrific war experiences during their 8 years civil war from 1989 to 1997 initially resulted in their sojourn to Ghana. Although Liberian refugees have been domiciled in Ghana for over ten years, there is a huge scholarly gap and disparity in the quality of the knowledge base concerning refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) in general and the survival strategies and coping mechanisms in particular in Ghana.

Sudan is at the brink of peace and in the depths of war. The internal repercussions of the war in Darfur are proving far more destabilising than the Government of Sudan (GoS) had ever anticipated. This instability interacts with international condemnation, which is increasingly vociferous. The IGAD peace process has been hanging in the balance, but under considerable pressure made progress towards resolution on most of the outstanding issues. The conflict in Darfur threw the GoS peace efforts into disarray, dividing its political and diplomatic energies.

The Zimbabwe Cricket Union has dismissed allegations of racism levelled against them by a group of rebellious contracted players. ZCU chairman Peter Chingoka told a media conference that the allegations came from those who were against the unions integration policy, which they started implementing in 2001.