The Nation – Willice Onyango is an enterprising university student in western Kenya who is traveling the country with an unusual offer for women living with HIV. It goes like this: you join a cohort of ten to fifteen other HIV-positive women, together you come up with a viable plan for a small business, and you get an intrauterine device (IUD) to serve as long-term birth control. In return, you will be paid $40. Read Article
AFP – The International Criminal Court chief prosecutor on Monday sought new war crimes charges against Bosco “Terminator” Ntaganda and another notorious Democratic Republic of Congo warlord. Ntaganda and Sylvestre Mudacumura are two of the “most dangerous” men in a region where millions have been killed in the past 20 years, chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo said in announcing the charges. Read Article
CBC – At least 72 civilians, a third of them under the age of 18, were killed by NATO airstrikes, according to a report released Monday by Human Rights Watch — one of the most extensive investigations into the issue. The New York-based advocacy group called on the Western alliance to acknowledge the casualties and compensate survivors. Read Article
AFP – About 4,000 accused supporters of former dictator Moamer Kadhafi are still being held in Libyan militia detention centers, often in secret and many are tortured, a UN envoy said Thursday. Ian Martin, head of the UN mission to Libya, said good progress was being made toward the country’s first democratic election, but militia prisons were one of a number of “serious obstacles” to establishing the rule of law. Read Article
BBC – Heavy fighting broke out in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo when a deadline expired for army mutineers to surrender. Thousands of Congolese villagers fled over the Ugandan border overnight, officials in Uganda told the BBC. Last weekend, the army gave the hundreds of fighters who defected last month five days to turn themselves in. They are loyal to Bosco Ntaganda, who is known as the “Terminator” and wanted by the ICC for alleged war crimes. The International Criminal Court accuses Gen Ntaganda of recruiting child soldiers for the same rebel group as Thomas Lubanga, who in March became the first person to be convicted by the court of war crimes. Read Article
BBC – South Africa must investigate Zimbabwean officials over allegations they tortured opposition figures in 2007, a Pretoria high court has ruled. Under international law, South Africa has a duty to investigate crimes against humanity, the judge said. Prosecutors had previously refused to investigate the officials, who had travelled to South Africa. Read Article
Reuters – Residents grieve after several civilians are killed in an Islamist rebel attack on African Union forces in Mogadishu. Sarah Sheffer reports.
Business Day – John Auta, the Acting Director of Forestry Department, Federal Ministry of Environment has decried the illegal production of charcoal in the country, saying it aggravate the process of deforestation in the country. He appealed to marketers of kerosene to make it accessible to all Nigerians so as to reduce the over-dependence on forestry products as alternative energy sources. Read article
IpNews – The Brazilian government of Dilma Rousseff is taking firm steps towards stronger relations with Africa, such as the creation of a special fund to finance development projects together with multilateral lenders like the World Bank. Read article
Independent – Islamist rebels armed with mortars and machine guns attacked African Union forces in Somalia’s capital Mogadishu overnight, sparking a battle that killed at least nine people, officials and residents said today. The al Shabaab militants, who are allied to al-Qa’ida, were forced out of most of the city last year but have kept up sporadic bomb and suicide attacks. “It was heavy fighting last night … Two al Shabaab dead bodies are lying here,” said Captain Ndayiragije Come, a spokesman from the Burundi contingent of the AU’s AMISOM peacekeeping mission in Somalia. “From our side two were injured. They were also shelling our position – they missed their target,” he added. Witnesses said shelling from the fighting hit two houses, killing at least seven civilians, four of them from one family. Read Article
PressTV – Egypt’s ruling military has declared a new overnight curfew in the defense ministry district for a second successive night after deadly clashes with protesters. Read article
Telegraph – Almost 300 people were also hurt in the clashes, which took place three weeks ahead of presidential elections, according to the official MENA news agency. The Egyptian army also arrested 170 people. On the day Egypt’s ousted leader Hosni Mubarak turned 84, hardline Islamists were in the forefront of street fighting with the troops for the first time, a shift for groups that previously had largely stayed out of direct confrontation with the ruling military. Read article
TheGlobeAndMail – A Canadian spymaster’s business card was recovered last year in a trove of intelligence documents in Libya, providing a physical link between Canadian security agencies and Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi’s spy services. William “Jack” Hooper, a globetrotting deputy director for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, was apparently among the Western intelligence officials who had cultivated ties with Libya, raising new questions about possible Canadian involvement in the arrests and interrogations of Arab-Canadians in their homelands following the 2001 al-Qaeda attacks on the United States. Read article
NZ Herald – In an attempt to avert a new war in Africa, the UN Security Council unanimously approved a resolution Wednesday threatening non-military sanctions against Sudan and South Sudan if they don’t halt escalating violence and return to negotiations. The legally binding resolution endorses an African Union roadmap with strict timelines for concrete actions by both countries to get them to step back from the brink of major hostilities and resolve differences over their border and oil resources and revenues. Addressing the council after the vote, South Sudan’s Minister of Cabinet Affairs Deng Alor stated his government’s “solemn commitment” to comply with the resolution. But Sudan’s UN Ambassador Daffa-Alla Elhag Ali Osman expressed reservations, saying peace will only be achieved if South Sudan stops “all forms of support and sheltering of proxy and rebel armed groups.” Read Article
BBC – The unknown attackers used rocks, clubs, firebombs and shotguns. The protesters retaliated, beating some assailants. Soldiers and police have now intervened to stop the clashes, but as long as six hours after the violence started. Two leading presidential candidates have suspended campaigning in protest at the way authorities handled it. Read article
BBC – Junta forces are going through the camp looking for any remaining troops, a witness told the BBC. The shooting broke out late on Monday after reports that the leaders of the presidential guard would be arrested. The army toppled President Amadou Toumani Toure in March but officially stepped aside three weeks later. However, the junta still wields considerable influence and holds three cabinet posts. Read article
BBC – Seven people, including two MPs, have been killed in a suicide attack in central Somalia, authorities in the town of Dusa Mareb have said. Eyewitnesses told the BBC the attack targeted a group of about 20 politicians at an outdoor cafe. They had travelled to Dusa Mareb in Galgadud region – which is controlled by a pro-government militia – to promote reconciliation. The Islamist militant group al-Shabab has said it was behind the attack. Al-Shabab is under pressure on a number of military fronts in the south of Somalia – but still mounts frequent attacks and controls much of the country. Read Article
BBC – Mali’s coup leaders have said they are in control of the situation in Bamako, after hours of fighting in the capital. In a message on TV, they said they held the state broadcasting building, the airport and army barracks after a counter-coup attempt by loyalists of ousted President Amadou Toumani Toure. Read article
BBC – The body of Libya’s former Oil Minister Shukri Ghanem has been found in the River Danube in Vienna, Austrian police say. A spokesman said there were no signs of violence to his body. The former prime minister, 69, worked as a consultant for a Vienna-based company. He apparently left his home early on Sunday, police said. Read article
BBC – At least 16 people have been killed in a gun and bomb attack at a university in Nigeria’s northern city of Kano, Nigerian Red Cross officials say. Six others were in a serious condition following the attack at Bayero University campus where Christian worshippers were holding a service. Police are searching for the gunmen. No group has said it launched the attack, but the violent Islamist Boko Haram group is active in Kano and has recently attacked churches. Nigeria’s central government has struggled to contain the militant group, which operates mainly in the predominantly Muslim north, but has also struck as far south as the capital, Abuja. Read Article
AP – Sudan has declared a state of emergency in areas bordering South Sudan, giving authorities wide powers of arrest a day after they detained three foreigners in a flashpoint town along the frontier. The detentions and Sunday’s state of emergency declaration heightened tensions even further along the border between the old rivals, who in the past month came to the brink of an all-out war because of renewed fighting in disputed areas. Read Article
Reuters – Saudi Arabia said on Saturday it had recalled its ambassador in Cairo for security reasons after protests in Egypt against the kingdom’s arrest of an Egyptian lawyer, marking a diplomatic rupture between the long-time allies. Read article
PhysOrg – As many as 8 million people living in the valley are estimated to be at risk of dental and skeletal fluorosis as a result of their long-term exposure to high levels of naturally occurring fluoride in the region’s groundwater. Fluoride is essential for healthy tooth enamel development, but consuming too much of it can damage enamel and bones, particularly in children between the ages of 3 months and 8 years. Mild to moderate fluorosis typically results in permanent discoloring and disfiguration of tooth enamel. Severe fluorosis can cause chronic pain and lead to tooth and bone loss. Most efforts to combat fluorosis in the region have focused primarily on treating drinking water to reduce its fluoride content. Read article
Editorial Note: Flouride occurs naturally in many places in India in DEEP water wells that are relied on for clean water. A similar situation occurs in parts of Africa, made worse by malnutrition in populations.
Related articles: Pakistan: Vicious circle of fluoride contamination, illness and poverty
BBC – Officials in South Sudan say China has agreed to loan it $8bn (£4.9bn) for major development projects. A government spokesman said funds would be used to build roads, bridges and telecom networks, and to develop agriculture and hydro-electric power. However, there was no mention of plans to build a new pipeline to export oil from the newly independent state. Read article
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