African Ambassadors in Venezuela described the ridicule of Zimbabwean President, Robert Mugabe in a local TV show as “a grotesque and indecent spectacle full of racist content”. A letter by representatives of several diplomatic missions, including Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Saharawi, South Africa and Nigeria expressed deep rejection of what they consider to be offensive remarks “against the African people and human dignity”.

The United Nations has begun investigating whether an airplane's flight data recorder - known as a "black box" - that has been sitting in a U.N. file cabinet for a decade may be the missing device from the plane crash that killed the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi, an act that triggered the Rwandan genocide in 1994. Secretary General Kofi Annan said the discovery of the black box was "a first-class foul up." Annan's spokesman, Fred Eckhard, said the black box is in the possession of the Peacekeeping Department's Air Safety Unit and that Annan had "instructed the Office of Internal Oversight Services to look into exactly what happened 10 years ago."

A meeting of church leaders in Kenya has been called to discuss how they can remove a clause in the draft constitution that recognises Muslim courts - also referred to as Kadhi's courts. Church leaders say Islam is the only faith explicitly mentioned in the draft, and that the provision for Muslim courts gives Islam precedence over other religions.

Sierra Leone's war crimes court has opened in the capital Freetown to try persons who bear the greatest responsibility for the atrocities committed during the country's 1991-1999 conflict. Sierra Leone's civil war was characterised by horror and brutality. Some people fear the court might become a new flashpoint for renewed hostilities. “Our war has ended and every factional fighter disarmed. Putting people on trial at this stage may ignite fresh conflict,” says Abraham Conteh, a 46-year old father of three. “My house was burnt and three of my relatives killed. I fear that this court may not end well.”

The 20th March 2004 will mark a year since the United States of America and its allies declared war on Iraq. Hundreds of thousands of people all over the world will be demonstrating on this day against the continued exploitation and harassment of peoples by the United States of America and big corporations, in whose interests the USA works. In Johannesburg, the Anti-War Coalition (AWC) will be joining masses of people across the world by holding a march against wars and occupations and a "Festival of life against wars and occupation".

One of the main promises of the Obasanjo administration when it kicked off in 1999 was to fight corruption. One of the first bills presented to the National Assembly was the Independent Corrupt Practices (and Other Related Offences) Bill. The bill was duly passed. Many human rights activists condemned that Act which was considered too harsh. They argued that the law could be a potent weapon for a dictator to hunt the opposition. On the other hand, the President and the ruling party argued that existing law had too many loopholes which offenders were exploring to escape punishment. Four years after, Nigeria is still deemed the most corrupt country in the world.

Protection of children's rights was the focus of a UN interagency workshop held from 24-27 February in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Christina Linner, senior coordinator for refugee children of the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees, UNHCR, served as one of the workshop's principal organizers. Originally from Sweden, Linner has worked with UNHCR for more than 20 years. She spoke with IRIN about her experience with regard to protection of refugee children's rights, in particular, but also about the rights of refugees in general.

Two politicians have so far been killed, a woman got shot in the stomach and hundreds of people were displaced from a site at an Ogiek ancestral forest in Western Kenya along the Uganda Border. The attackers are said to be from the Pok (Bok) ethnic group of the Sabaot tribe, which belongs to the Kalenjin group of nilotic tribes and who live also across the border in Uganda, from where it is said the assault weapons used in the attack derive.

At least 2,500 people have fled Plateau State in central Nigeria following a fortnight of violence between Muslims and Christians that has left 62 dead and more injured, the Red Cross said last Thursday. Patrick Bawa, a spokesman for the Red Cross in Nigeria, told IRIN that his organisation had registered 2,500 displaced people in neighbouring Bauchi State by Wednesday afternoon and more were still arriving.

For the first time in years multiple opportunities exist throughout Africa for the potential repatriation of up to 2 million refugees, and millions more internally displaced people, a senior UN official said this week. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Ruud Lubbers, was upbeat at a meeting in Geneva on Monday to discuss the prospects for repatriation in several countries, including Angola, Sierra Leone, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in war-ravaged northern Uganda face critical problems of waste management, inadequate access to safe water, high disease prevalence and widespread dependency on food hand-outs, an NGO reported on Monday. Action Against Hunger, USA, said in a statement that the camps were mostly made up of huts with thatched roofs, called tukuls. Because families cooked inside the huts, fumes from the fires had increased the rates of acute respiratory infections among children.

With no politically motivated killings or incarcerations in 2003, Swaziland is a haven of stability in a troubled continent, say defenders of the country's absolute monarchy. But a report released this week by the US State Department has criticised the country's human rights record, alleging the government "continued to commit serious abuses". "Citizens were not able to change their government peacefully. Police used excessive force on some occasions, and there were reports that police tortured and beat some suspects," the US government's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labour said in its annual country report.

A total breakdown of law and order is reported in Darfur, western Sudan, as militias roam the region in gangs of hundreds, attacking one village after another. The entire Jabal Si area, previously home to about 70,000 people living in over 119 villages, had been cleared of civilians, the UN said following an assessment. Many of the displaced, over 90 percent of whom are women and children, have fled to Kabkabiyah town in Northern Darfur.

A clash between troops and unidentified ethnic militants on Tuesday in Nigeria's oil city of Warri left a soldier and four others dead, military officials said. Skirmishes between ethnic militants and soldiers occur frequently in the oil-rich Niger Delta, where militants steal crude oil from pipelines and sabotage oil facilities in a bid to export payoffs from the government and oil multinationals.

The chief prosecutor at the UN's new court for Sierra Leone has repeated claims that the Libyan leader is behind the past decade of war in West Africa. The accusation against Muammar Gaddafi was made by David Crane in an interview with the BBC. Mr Crane said there was a detailed plan by Mr Gaddafi to destabilise several West African countries which had caused widespread suffering in the region.

South African Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma confirmed on Wednesday that the plane held by Zimbabwean authorities and an alleged coup plot in Equatorial Guinea were linked. "Indeed there was a link between the plane and Equatorial Guinea," Dlamini-Zuma was quoted as saying by the South African news agency (SAPA). Zimbabwean authorities on Sunday detained a Boeing 727 carrying 20 South Africans, 18 Namibians, 23 Angolans, two Democratic Republic of Congo citizens and one Zimbabwean with a South African passport, Zimbabwean police spokesman, Wayne Bvudzijena, told IRIN on Wednesday.

Hundreds of Sudanese schoolchildren have marched to the presidential palace in the capital Khartoum to demand an end to the 21-year civil war. The children, from around the country, held hands and lit torches. In an appeal for peace the children said the war was depriving them of "milk, food and medical treatment". The organisers - Sudan Peace and Dignity - plan to fly five children to Kenya, where peace talks are taking place, to hand over the appeal.

The Rwandan Government has dismissed press speculation that the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) shot down President Juvenal Habyarimana's plane in April 1994 as "baseless propaganda". In a lengthy article, published on 1 March, the Canadian daily, The National Post, said it had obtained a confidential United Nations report which provided detailed testimony from RPF informants on their own involvement in the attack on the plane.
Related Link:
Kgame triggered genocide, claims French probe
http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=58&story_…

The United Nations and the United States should explicitly call on Nigeria to turn former Liberian President Charles Taylor over to the Special Court for Sierra Leone, Human Rights Watch says. On Wednesday, the Special Court will officially open its newly constructed courthouse in the Sierra Leonean capital Freetown. The first trials of senior officials are expected to begin shortly. The opening ceremony will be attended by high-ranking officials from the United Nations and donor countries.

The Sudanese government has arbitrarily detained two human rights activists, apparently for their work in the war-torn region of Darfur in western Sudan, Human Rights Watch has said. Both are feared to be at risk of inhumane treatment, miscarriage of justice and possible execution. Dr. Mudawi Ibrahim Adam, the head of a voluntary organisation that provides humanitarian assistance and human rights training, was arrested on December 28 and has been charged with a variety of capital offences against the state. Saleh Mahmud Osman, a human rights lawyer, was arrested on February 1, 2004 and has been held without charge.