The idea of litigation against companies allegedly complicit in abuses committed by repressive regimes is beginning to shape the international human rights agenda. In recent years, a coalition of rights advocates in the developed world and plaintiffs from the developing world have begun using a litigation-based strategy to enforce global human rights. The litigation tests whether a U.S. corporation can be penalized for knowingly standing by while its overseas commit abuses, even if the company did not actually direct the abuses itself.

An attack Sunday by rebels in northern Ugandan on a camp for internally displaced persons killed 39 people and drove thousands from the camp, the United Nations said, calling it an "appalling atrocity." Representatives of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, UNICEF and the World Food Program travelled to Pagak camp on Monday and found that 544 huts had been burned and that one-third of the camp's 11,000 inhabitants had fled. According to Ugandan army spokesman Shaban Bantariza, members of the rebel Lord's Resistance Army struck the camp Sunday evening in a three-pronged attack targeting residents, guards and patrol units.

On March 21 the state-run Herald Newspaper ran a lengthy analysis explaining why Zimbabwe's ruling party beat its rival, the Movement for Democratic Change, in a by-election in Zengeza township, one of the opposition's urban strongholds in Harare. With characteristic zeal, the newspaper stated: 'African liberation movements which freed people from the yoke of imperialism and colonialism would always get support from the people and that, in Zimbabwe's case, Zanu-PF has that solid track record.' Political parties justify their claim to power in different ways. Some promote a vision, others recite accomplishments in office. African liberation movements often evoke the struggle they waged against foreign or minority oppression, especially when they have been in office too long to remember the ideals they once espoused or can no longer defend the record they have built.

Togo's Justice Minister Foli Bazi-Katare has said there are no political prisoners in the country. "All these prisoners were convicted by the courts as common criminals," he said after talks with the European Union on ending a ban on economic aid. "None of the prisoners had been jailed for expressing divergent political opinions," he said. The EU froze aid to Togo in 2003 over the country's lack of democracy and poor human rights record.

The human rights situation in Eritrea has continued to deteriorate, according to a new report by Amnesty International. Torture, arbitrary detentions and political arrests are widespread, says the human rights organisation. Religious persecution and ill treatment of those trying to avoid military service are increasing, Amnesty adds. Next week Eritreans will come together to celebrate 13 years of independence from Ethiopia.

Nigeria's parliament was set to debate the state of emergency in the central state of Plateau declared by President Olusegun Obasanjo on Tuesday. The emergency decree must be ratified by the National Assembly within two days to remain in effect. The president ordered the measure to control continuing violence between the state's Muslims and Christians. He said serious action was needed to deal with a situation that he called "near mutual-genocide".

The Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation is looking for two dynamic professionals to fill two posts in its Peace Building in Southern Africa Project. This exciting project aims to build partnerships for peace in Angola, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and South Africa. The project aims to operate as a flagship for CSVR’s vision to develop an integrated approach to peacebuilding which builds on CSVR’s 13 years of experience in violence prevention, transitional justice, trauma healing and reconciliation.

Dominant conceptualizations of conflict tend to posit it as a temporal state of abnormality. Within the context of the Middle East and Africa this is further nuanced by discourses of belatedness (e.g. Palestinian negotiation of settler-colonialism) or failed projects of modernist statecraft altogether (e.g. sub Saharan Africa). This workshop begins with a premise that questions these temporal modes of understanding conflict. Positing (post) conflict as a non-linear continuum that marks the articulation of diverse modernity projects in these two regions, the workshop seeks to explore ways in which economies, spatialities, sociality, and subjectivity are produced by and negotiate (post) conflict.

The Public Health in Complex Emergencies training program (PHCE) is a two-week residential course that focuses on critical public health issues faced by NGO/PVO personnel working in complex emergencies. The goal of the course is to enhance the capacity of humanitarian assistance workers and their organizations to respond to the health needs of refugees and internally displaced persons affected by these emergencies.

A refugee who has been away from his motherland is usually preoccupied with survival and would not normally think of education. However, some refugees have realised that education is important regardless of one’s status. No doubt, education is a universal human right that should not be denied to anyone, for whatever reason. This is more so especially in a world where almost everything particularly things such as employment opportunities seem to hinge on educational qualifications. And for countries that have been at war, and are now coming out of it through the re-construction process, highly trained manpower is very much a necessity.

The Burundian Agency for Cooperation and Research in Development (ACORD) has found that the country's internally displaced persons (IDPs) and returning refugees frequently experience psychological trauma due to the severe living conditions they endure. Presenting ACORD's findings at a conference in Bujumbura, researcher Julien Nimubona said the psychological problems the IDPS and refugees experience was compounded by their state of dependence on humanitarian aid and their inability to participate in decision-making.

Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano said in Baton Rouge, in the USA state of Louisiana, that the struggle of slave descendants and others for their political and civic rights inspired many nationalists in Africa who, between the 1950s and 1990s, were fighting to decolonise their countries and eradicate racial discrimination. Chissano was invited to the university to be awarded the degree of "Doctor Honoris Causa", in acknowledgement of his role in the fight against colonialism and racism.

The Zambian government Monday expressed its worries about the slow progress made in the return of Rwandan refugees to their home country. "There is not much progress made in the repatriation program of Rwandan refugees. This lack of progress is mainly attributed to the unwillingness of the refugee population in Zambia to voluntary return to their country of origin," said Peter Mumba, permanent secretary in the Ministry of Home Affairs. The official attributed the Rwandan refugees' unwilling return home to "unfounded false messages" that there is still war in their country.

An estimated 20,000 people have been displaced in Burundi's western province of Bujumbura Rural, following fresh fighting between the army and Forces nationales de liberation (FNL) rebels loyal to Agathon Rwasa. Most of the displaced have sought refuge in schools and at a health centre in the commune of Kabezi, where the administrator, Felix Ntahombaye, said another 30,000 displaced people had sought refuge in April.

Hospitality and Tourism employees in the North West District have appealed for government's immediate intervention against abuse and maltreatment from their employers. At Sedie Hotel, in Maun, employees accused management of racism and that one of the directors, a foreigner, has a habit of insulting them. Maun Lodge staff also singled out one of the managing directors for insulting them and harbouring racist tendencies.

Almost 30 of the militias which have been destabilising the Democratic Republic of Congo's (DRC) north-east Ituri province with ethnic and political violence, agreed at the weekend to lay down arms and join the national peace process. They signed a disarmament agreement in Kinshasa after four days of negotiations with the power-sharing DRC transitional government and the United Nations peacekeeping mission Monuc.

The children of Liberia have been killed, made orphans, maimed, abducted, deprived of education and health care - and recruited and used as child soldiers, Amnesty International said in a new report released this week. The report, entitled "Liberia: The promises of peace for 21,000 child soldiers", calls on the National Transitional Government of Liberia (NTGL), leading representatives of parties to the conflict and the international community to ensure an end to the use of child soldiers and also that the needs of former child soldiers are met fully as the peace process unfolds.

A third and final round of peace talks for East Africa’s most beleaguered country - Somalia - is scheduled to begin on May 20 amidst funding shortfalls and frustration at the antics of faction leaders. The talks, to be held in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, are taking place under the auspices of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), a five-member regional organisation. Somalia is currently the only country in the world without a central government, having been ruled by faction leaders since January 1991 when dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was toppled.

Few academics can expect to reach the professional heights scaled by the women's rights expert Fareda Banda. Educated in racially segregated schools in Zimbabwe, Dr Banda, 37, became the first black African woman from her country to be awarded a doctorate in law from Oxford University in 1993. But last year, she made an alarming discovery. After a casual enquiry about her pay, she uncovered evidence that, for the six years she had been employed by SOAS, she had been paid up to £10,000 less than her white colleagues. It was a shocking moment in Dr Banda's career and one she says she will never forget.

At least 57,000 people have fled their homes following sectarian violence involving Christians and Muslims in northern and central Nigeria, officials said on Friday. More than 30,000 Christians have been displaced from their homes in Kano, the largest city in northern Nigeria, which was racked by religious violence on Tuesday and Wednesday, they said. A further 27,000 displaced people had sought refuge in Bauchi state in east central Nigeria following a massacre of Muslims by Christian gangs in neighbouring Plateau state earlier this month, the officials added.