Although Al-Shabab insurgents announced their withdrawal from the Somali capital, Mogadishu, in August 2011, insecurity in the city has continued, as evidenced by the targeted killing of a journalist and a bomb blast in the past week. Abukar Hassan Kadaf, the director of the private Somaliweyn Radio station, was 'killed in front of his home at around Magrib time [sunset prayer, 3pm GMT] on 28 February', according to Ahmed Mahamud, a journalist in Mogadishu. 'Security will not be achieved in government-controlled areas until those who are responsible for attacks on media workers and activists are held to account,' said Michelle Kagari, deputy director for Amnesty International's Africa programme.

Nigeria has repatriated around 11,000 foreigners mainly from Niger and Chad over the past six months to curb a growing Islamist insurgency, the Immigration services said. 'The latest number of foreigners repatriated as at this morning is 11,000,' immigration services spokesman Joachim Olumba told AFP, updating an earlier figure.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has announced that it would deliver its first-ever verdict, a judgment in the war crimes trial of Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, a Congolese accused of participating in the recruitment of child soldiers. 'The verdict in the trial of Mr. Dyilo will be made in open court on 14 March. His trial started in January 2009 and the closing statements were presented by the parties and participants in August last year,' ICC said in a statement.

The of the Fahamu Refugee Legal Aid newsletter produced by the Fahamu Refugee Legal Aid Network is now available on their blog. The latest issue includes the following highlights:

- How to apply for asylum in Brazil
- Practice Advisory on Interim Memo regarding law students, graduates and other representatives appearing before United States Citizenship and Immigration Services
- The importance of psychosocial support in the refugee status determination process
- Asylum approval rate in Japan still shockingly low
- Changes to refugee system in Canada further undermine refugees
- Italy rebuked by European Court after deportations of Somali and Eritrean asylum seekers
- Statement on Kenyan Government plan to relocate refugees back to Somalia
Deportation news
- Syrian refugees in Europe: news from Belgium and Sweden
- Syrians in Jordan: Guests, not refugees
- Democratic Republic of Congo London embassy staff resign and claim asylum
- Open letter from Eritrean refugees and asylum seekers in Djibouti
- Letter from the Rwandan Refugee Community in Zambia to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
- Refugees in Brazil denounce ‘exploitation network’

In addition to these articles, the edition also includes: Request for Sahrawi COI expert; Publications; Country of Origin and legal news; Conferences and courses; Info links; Resources; Vacancy announcements; Announcements; and Scholarships for African Commonwealth candidates for University of Oxford part-time masters in International Human Rights Law.

Visit http://frlan.tumblr.com/ to read the edition.

Côte d’Ivoire’s national commission of inquiry investigating the 2010-2011 post-election violence should extend its mandate by six months to August 2012, Human Rights Watch said. The extension would better ensure an impartial and comprehensive investigation into crimes committed by all sides, Human Rights Watch said. In meetings with Human Rights Watch, Ivorian civil society representatives, United Nations officials, and diplomats highlighted serious problems with the commission. They cited its failure to include representation from pro-Gbagbo groups and to consult sufficiently with civil society, and said the commission appears to have rushed its work.

Uganda is to set up a new camp to cope with a influx of refugees from eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, the government has said. At least 100 people a day are now crossing the border to escape an upsurge in violence, Uganda's refugee minister told the BBC. Women said they had been raped by armed militias, who broke into their homes at night and stole food and property. Up to 3,000 people have fled since DR Congo's chaotic elections in November.

Insecurity in the north of Central African Republic (CAR) has caused thousands of people to flee their homes. 'Villages have been violently destroyed and looted, including some health centers,' says Pablo Marco, head of mission for Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in CAR. Since the end of January, fighting around Gondava and Ouandago, along the border with Chad, has brought instability to the region. The Chadian rebel group, the Popular Front for Recovery (FPR) is fighting against Chadian and Central African forces. Some 3,000 displaced people have arrived in the villages of Farazala, Ouandago, and Nana-Outa, in addition to the 3,000 people already sheltering in Kabo.

At least five Somali-owned shops in Khayelitsha were forced to close recently as the Zanokhanyo Business Association enforced a 2008 agreement that no new foreign-owned shops should operate in the township following the May 2008 xenophobic attacks. The two Somali-owned shops in Harare that stayed open were looted. David Mohamed, owner of Brothers shop in Harare, said he lost all his stock to the thieves.

On the 23 May 2011, 14 men were abducted from their cells by military police at the central prison in Nouakchott, the capital city of Mauritania. All of them were convicted on charges related to terrorism and at least six of the men were tortured while in police custody before their abduction. None of them have been seen or heard from since; no one but their captors knows if they are dead or alive. If they are alive, there are major concerns for their safety.

Two weeks ago the Institute for Race Relations published a letter from Yorshire academics protesting that a contract for housing asylum seekers had been awarded to G4S. The company responded to its critics and in reponse to this, the group have released a further letter. 'We sent our original letter because of sheer outrage that a vast private sector security company feared and distrusted by asylum seekers should be considered as suitable to manage asylum seeker housing. We could see immediately that such a contract would mean up to 900 asylum seekers in Yorkshire facing eviction and displacement over the next few months.'

The Obama administration has been complicit in the support for the expansionist policies of Israel. In this current economic and financial crisis a war with Iran will not only be about Iran: It will have global implications.

I read Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe's essay in your Issue 571 with dismay. It would be hard to exaggerate the horrors of the Biafran War, but Mr. Ekwe-Ekwe does an excellent job of it.

It is regrettable that Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe seems to have become the sole commentator on the appalling pogroms of 1966 and the civil war in Nigeria between 1967 and 1970. He is right that those directly responsible for the series of pogroms against Igbos, or for war crimes, have never been held to account and that Nigerians have not yet come to terms with the history of these events and of the war itself.

Herbert Ekwe Ekwe continues to disseminate his tenaciously held views about what many of us call the Biafran War of the late 1960s. It's important for Pamabazuka readers to know that much of his argument is challenged by most detached students of that terrible war. I hope others will jump into this debate to take on Mr. Ekwe in detail, so let me make only a few points here.

Shortly after Michel Sidibe became executive director of the United Nations’ AIDS prevention agency, a court in Senegal sentenced nine gay men, all AIDS educators, to eight years in prison for 'unnatural acts'. Sidibe flew to Senegal to ask its aging president, Abdoulaye Wade, to pardon the men. Sidibe, the son of a Muslim politician from Mali and a white French Catholic, asked the president – who is married to a white Frenchwoman – if he had ever suffered discrimination. 'Oh, Sidibe, you have no idea,' came the reply. 'And for not marrying a Muslim.' 'Then, Uncle,' Sidibe said, 'why do you accept that men here are put in jail for eight years just for being gay?'

South Sudan’s plan to start collecting some 20,000 weapons from civilians in Jonglei state in March, by force if necessary, is likely to worsen the volatile security situation there and complicate efforts to deliver essential humanitarian aid, the UN and several analysts have warned. 'Disarmament efforts could contribute to increasing tensions in an already tense environment,' the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a 23 February bulletin. 'Jonglei’s rival communities are wary of relinquishing their weapons, regardless of government promises to carry out disarmament simultaneously in each area,' it added.

Sudan has threatened military action against the neighbouring state of South Sudan, accusing its troops of involvement in rebel attacks along the border. The Sudanese foreign ministry, in a statement, said the government would file a complaint with the UN Security Council and the African Union after attacks on Sunday in which Sudanese rebels said they killed 150 government soldiers along the disputed border.

Officials say they will not rule out using force to regain control of Bani Walid after it was recently taken over by forces loyal to the deposed Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi. Bani Walid, south of the capital Tripoli, was considered a Gaddafi stronghold during the revolution and was supposedly 'liberated' by revolutionary fighters four months ago. But now they say their families have been forced out.

A renewed offensive against Al-Shabab insurgents by Somali government forces, backed by Ethiopian, Kenyan and African Union troops, has sparked another influx of civilians to the capital Mogadishu, locals told IRIN. 'Since 18 February, we estimate that between 10,000 and 11,000 families [60,000-66,000 people] have arrived in Mogadishu, fleeing fighting or the fear of fighting in their home areas,' said Abdullahi Shirwa, head of the government's National Disaster Management Agency.

An influx of refugees fleeing a mix of increased post-election related violence and continued militia activity in parts of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is stretching the capacity of refugee camps in western Uganda to host them, say officials. 'We are kind of overwhelmed; there are many Congolese pouring and crossing into Uganda daily,' Stephen Malinga, Uganda’s Minister for Relief, Disaster Preparedness and Refugees, told IRIN. 'So far, we have received about 3,700 new arrivals into the country through three western Uganda border points; we expect many more to come.'