The charges announced Monday in The Hague, Netherlands, immediately stirred controversy — not so much over whether they were factually justified, as whether they would help or hurt diplomatic efforts to end the crisis in Sudan.

Bashir is accused of masterminding an effort to destroy key ethnic groups in southern Sudan and Darfur. The court's chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, announced the list of charges, saying Sudan's leader is also accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity, "including murder, extermination, forcible transfer of the population, torture and rape."

Moreno-Ocampo requested the court issue an arrest warrant for Bashir. The Sudanese leader's arrest could prevent retaliation against the more than 2 million people who have been forced from their homes and targeted by a government-backed militia.

John Norris of the Enough Project, an activist group, says Moreno-Ocampo is simply pointing out "the elephant in the room." Norris says it is an unacknowledged fact "that President Bashir really is the person most directly culpable for the tragedy that has been Sudan in recent years."

Some observers question the court's move, saying that while they might agree Bashir should face charges, they were unsure of the strategic value of indicting the Sudanese president at the same time the United Nations is trying to negotiate with him.

Alex de Waal of the Social Science Research Council says there would be no point in having an International Criminal Court if it could not make indictments that attempt to hold leaders like Bashir accountable. But he says the U.N. is still trying to clear the way to send more peacekeepers to Sudan and get the government involved in serious peace talks with rebel groups.

"These aims cannot be successfully pursued," de Waal says, "if there is simultaneously an attempt to arrest the head of state, an approach that criminalizes the entire governmental apparatus."

Norris dismisses such concerns, saying the situation is so dire and President Bashir has proven so intransigent in the past, that the indictments are unlikely to make matters worse.

"I think it's a little bit akin to being worried that calling a fire truck will upset the arsonist," Norris says.

In fact, Norris says, the indictments could give the U.N. Security Council more leverage to get Sudan's government to take the peace process seriously. The Security Council has the power to quash the indictments against Bashir if he changes his behavior.

Additionally, Norris says, the charges might help undermine Bashir's support if his backers think his grip on power may not be so secure.

On Monday in Sudan's capital, Khartoum, government supporters staged a small demonstration denouncing the charges against their president. But Bashir's response was comparatively low-key. In a statement aired on government TV, he merely repeated his previous stand that the International Criminal Court has no jurisdiction in his country, and said the charges of genocide were lies.

Judges in The Hague are expected to take months to study the evidence against the Sudanese president.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=92529370

"Zimbabwe needs the assistance of the international community..."

HARARE, Zimbabwe - Zimbabwe's opposition leader fears that President Robert Mugabe is preparing a "war against the people" in his bid to hold on to power.

Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai told a news conference Saturday that his party was reluctant to take part in an election runoff because of the growing risks of violence.

He said there is no need for such a runoff because he won presidential elections last Saturday.

The opposition will mount a new bid in the High Court on Sunday for the election results to be published. Armed police prevented lawyers from entering the court Saturday to force the release of presidential election results.

A Reuters correspondent on the scene said three police officers blocked Alec Muchadehama and Andrew Makoni from entering the High Court building.

"We can't go in. They are threatening to shoot. They are saying no one enters the court," Muchadehama told reporters.

A Reuters journalist said the police appeared to have come from the president's offices opposite the High Court where they were on guard duty. More officers then arrived.

They were later allowed into the building but the court postponed the case after the electoral commission asked for more time to prepare its response.

The opposition believes a long delay in issuing results from the election a week ago masks attempts by Mugabe to buy time for a fight-back.

His ruling ZANU-PF party lost control of parliament in the election for the first time in his 28-year rule.

Independent projections show the MDC candidate, Morgan Tsvangirai, won most of the votes cast in the election but not enough needed for an outright victory over Mugabe.

The ruling ZANU-PF party announced Friday it was endorsing Mugabe in a runoff election.

Signs of crackdown
Chamisa said there were signs that Mugabe, 84, was preparing to use violence to keep his hold on power. He pointed to a march in Harare by war veterans loyal to Mugabe who have beat up opponents in the past; a raid on opposition party offices; and the detention of foreign journalists by armed police in full riot gear.

"They are trying to intimidate people, they are trying to set up the context for unleashing violence. The vampire instincts of this regime are definitely going to come out," Chamisa charged.

Zimbabwe needs the assistance of the international community, he said.

"The U.N. has to make sure that there is no violence in this country. ... They should not (wait to) come when there is blood in the street, blood in the villages."

80 per cent unemployment
Mugabe has ruled since his guerrilla army helped bring about an independent Zimbabwe in 1980. His popularity has been battered by an economic slide that followed the often-violent seizures of white-owned commercial farms since 2000. A third of the population have fled the country, 80 percent of those who remain are jobless and inflation is more than 100,000 percent.

The U.S. and other Western nations also have been pressing for the presidential results to be announced.

The law requires a runoff within 21 days of the first elections. But diplomats in Harare and at the United Nations said Mugabe was planning to declare a 90-day delay to give security forces time to clamp down.

An African Union election observer team found no evidence of fraud during voting last weekend, according to the delegation's leader, former Sierra Leone president Ahmed Tejan Kabbah.

On Friday, police escorted about 400 war veterans as they paraded silently through downtown Harare. The feared veterans of the bush war that helped end white minority rule are used to intimidate opposition supporters and spearheaded the often-violent takeover of white farms in recent years.

The hardening of the ruling party's position has punctured the guarded optimism that had emerged among the opposition and Mugabe's critics in the West, who hoped he would concede defeat.

'Hand of peace'
The MDC said in advertisements placed in South African newspapers on Saturday that it wanted peace.

"At this stage we offer the hand of peace to the current regime, and will recognize and respect their rights if the transition is expedited without further ado, but this offer will not remain open indefinitely," the MDC said.

New York Times journalist Barry Bearak was among those detained Thursday by heavily armed riot police who surrounded and entered a Harare hotel frequented by foreign reporters, lawyers said. The U.S.-based National Democratic Institute said one of its staff, American Dileepan Sivapathasundaram, was detained at Harare's airport as he tried to leave the country Thursday.

Western observers barred
The government had rejected most foreign journalists' applications to cover the elections and had barred Western election observers.

Lawyer Beatrice Mtetwa said the attorney general decided there was no case against the two Americans and a third person who was not identified. However, police decided to hold them. It was not clear whether new charges would be filed.

State Department Tom Casey said four Americans were detained Thursday, but two had been released and were leaving the country. He said one of the two still in custody was a reporter and had been seen by U.S. officials. The other had not been located by U.S. officials, he said.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23951840/

Harare, Zimbabwe — Zimbabweans cast ballots Saturday with a mix of hope and dread, many longing to end the 28-year reign of President Robert Mugabe but fearful that no matter how they vote, he will declare himself the winner.

Lines formed before dawn and were long throughout the day in urban opposition strongholds. Dozens of voters at some polling stations discovered they had been struck from official rolls. Though the election proceeded mostly peacefully, such logistical barriers are among the many tools Mugabe's opponents say he has to skew the results, which are expected to be announced in the next few days.

“I'm fed up with the way things are in Zimbabwe,” said Abigail Magombedze, 26, an unemployed woman whose name was missing from the voter list in Chitungwiza, a bedroom community south of Harare, the capital. “This doesn't surprise me because these guys have always been rigging.”

The expectation of manipulation so infuses discussion of this election that debate has turned to how voters will react if results show that Mugabe has won yet again despite a decade-long national collapse so complete that schools lack teachers, stores lack food and the few still with jobs lack bus fare to work. Many Zimbabweans insist that the official inflation rate of 100,000 percent is an underestimate.

The legions of supporters of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai have sorted themselves into two categories: those who are preparing to swallow election results they don't believe, and those who are planning to resist. The past few days have featured bold pronouncements that major street protests, all but unprecedented here, will materialize. Tsvangirai has urged voters to mass at the 9,000 polling stations across the nation to “protect our votes.”

“The people's victory is assured despite the attempts of the regime to subvert the people's will,” Tsvangirai told reporters after casting his ballot.

But a University of Zimbabwe political analyst, Eldred Masunungure, said his study of the national political culture shows that voters are strongly disinclined to challenge Mugabe, who has made clear his willingness to use the police, military and intelligence services to crush dissent. Over the past two days, officers have been posted at urban intersections and countless highway roadblocks in this country of 12 million.

Masunungure said that an overwhelming turnout by the opposition might persuade Mugabe and his inner circle to step aside. But if they don't, he said, Tsvangirai and his supporters have few options.

“People will be frustrated. There will be a sense of foreboding, and a sense of helplessness,” Masunungure said. “But that sense of helplessness will not be translated into political action. ... I don't think so.”

Yet some opposition figures have warned that a rigged outcome — coming off widely denounced elections in 2000, 2002 and 2005 — would tip the nation into violence resembling the slaughter in Kenya after that nation's flawed presidential election in December. Police reported Saturday that a gasoline bomb was found at the home of a ruling party legislator in Bulawayo, an opposition stronghold, suggesting that tensions are not far from the surface. There were no injuries.

“We should do something about Mugabe,” said Tsvangirai supporter Robert Wilson, 35, a former truck driver, in the town of Marondera, about 45 miles east of Harare. “If Mugabe wins, there will be civil war like the Kenya one.”

Former Mugabe finance minister Simba Makoni, who defected from the ruling party in February to run for president, has been joining Tsvangirai's warnings in recent days that Mugabe, 84, intends to steal his way to another term in office.

Mugabe has repeatedly denied the allegations.

“We don't rig elections. We have a sense of honesty. I cannot sleep with my conscience if I have cheated,” Mugabe told reporters Saturday.

Mugabe's supporters expressed confidence in the fairness of the electoral system and predicted he would win fairly. They blamed Zimbabwe's economic troubles on U.S. and European sanctions rather than government economic mismanagement.

“We have faith in him,” said Bigknock Marikopo, 55, a farmer. “You can't blame your father because he's poor.”

http://www.theday.com/re.aspx?re=c75137ba-94f3-47d9-93f9-e9a3094dbe8a

Monrovia, Liberia (AP) — Liberia's government is giving away specially programmed cell phones so citizens in the country impoverished by civil wars can report rapes and other violence as crime soars amid a shortage of police officers.

The 1989-2003 civil wars killed some 250,000 Liberians and ravaged institutions including the police force, which is now being revived with U.N. help.

Crime is such that the 3,500 Liberian police in this country of 3 million only venture into dangerous areas with the backing of armed U.N. police.

In the capital Monrovia, there are still too few officers to patrol the city's sprawling slums.

The government is giving up to 10 cell phones to each of 400 neighborhoods in and around Monrovia so people can summon police to crimes in progress.

In each case, the phones will be given to people the government has identified as neighborhood leaders. These leaders will then identify people within their communities who are most likely to have jobs that keep them up at night or who live in strategic spots within the neighborhood, making them more likely to see and report crimes.

Authorities are even offering prizes for the communities reporting the most crimes.

The cell phones are programmed to allow free calls to a police hot line. Although mobile phone usage is widespread in Liberia, people had not been alerting police because of the call's cost.

By nightfall in Monrovia, a city with a population of up to 1.5 million, shopkeepers close their shutters and commuters hasten to get off the streets. Roaming thieves snatch purses and run off into unlit alleys.

“Every nook and corner of the country is not covered as yet. So criminals are using this as an avenue to get into communities in which we are not present,” Monrovia's police spokesman Alvin Jask said.

But not everyone is sure the plan makes sense.

“When armed robbers break into your home, the first thing they ask for is your cell phone,” said Martin Lombeh, who lives in a densely populated neighborhood that has seen a spike in armed robberies.

Now, he says, robbers will be looking for even more cell phone booty.

Nairobi, Kenya — Dozens of people seeking refuge in a church in Kenya were burned to death by a mob on Tuesday in an explosion of ethnic violence that is threatening to engulf this country, which until last week was one of the most stable in Africa.

According to witnesses and Red Cross officials, as many as 50 people died inside the church in a small village in western Kenya after a furious crowd doused it with gasoline and set it on fire.

In Nairobi, the capital, tribal militias squared off against each other in several slums, with gunshots ringing out and clouds of black smoke wafting over the shanties. The death toll across the country is steadily rising, with witness reports indicating more than 250 people killed in the past two days in bloodshed connected to a disputed election Kenya held last week.

The European Union said Tuesday that there was clear evidence of ballot rigging, and European officials called for an independent investigation. Kenya's president, Mwai Kibaki, who won the election by a razor-thin margin, has refused.

Government officials on Tuesday said they would crack down on anyone who threatened law and order, and they banned all political rallies. Meanwhile, Raila Odinga, the opposition leader who lost the election, vowed to hold a million-person march on Thursday, which many Kenyans fear could blow up into a blood bath.

The Kenya celebrated for its spectacular wildlife and robust economy is a land in distress. Tens of thousands of people have fled their homes, and some are so frightened they have even crossed into Uganda.

“We've had tribal fighting before, but never like this,” said Abdalla Bujra, a retired Kenyan professor who runs a democracy-building organization.

As for the people burned alive in the church, Bujra echoed what many Kenyans were thinking: “It reminds me of Rwanda.”

While the bloodshed of the last few days in Kenya has fallen far short of the Rwandan genocide in 1994, many Kenyans are worried that it is spiraling out of control.

The violence has been a mix of hooliganism, political protest and ethnic bloodletting. Most of the victims have been Kikuyus, the tribe of the president and Kenya's traditional ruling class. Kikuyus have dominated business and politics since independence in 1963. They run shops, restaurants, banks and factories all across Kenya, from the Indian Ocean coast to the scenic savannah to the muggy shores of Lake Victoria in the west.

But they make up only 22 percent of the population and are part of Kenya's mosaic of roughly 40 ethnic groups, which have intermarried and coexisted for decades.

However, the election controversy has created a new dynamic where many of Kenya's other tribes, furious about the ballot rigging that may have kept Kibaki in power, have vented their frustrations against them.

“We are easy targets,” said Stephen Kahianyu, a Kikuyu, staring at the embers of his home in Nairobi that was burned to ground on Saturday.

Over the past few days, Kikuyus have fled to police stations and churches for protection.

On Monday night, several hundred Kikuyus barricaded themselves inside the Kenya Assemblies of God church in Kiambaa, a small village near the town of Eldoret. The next morning, a rowdy mob showed up.

According to witnesses, the mob was mostly Kalenjins, Luhyas and Luos, Odinga's tribe, which makes up about 13 percent of the population. They overran Kikuyu guards in front of the church. Then they pulled out cans of gasoline. There were no police around, witnesses said, and no water to put the fire out.

Most people escaped. But many did not. In addition to those killed, dozens were hospitalized with severe burns. Witnesses said that most of the people hiding inside were women and children.

The Eldoret area has become a killing zone. According to residents, dozens of Kikuyus have been hacked to death, including four who were beheaded Monday.

In Nairobi, a much-feared Kikuyu street gang called the Mungiki seems to be taking revenge. According to residents in a Luo area, the Mungiki, who are said to take an oath in which they drink human blood, were sweeping through the slums and killing Luos.

The government is blaming Odinga for the violence.

“This isn't random,” said Alfred Mutua, a government spokesman. “This is part of Raila's plan to create hysteria and trouble and make us declare a state of emergency,” which Kenya seems to be rapidly approaching, with curfews in several areas and a ban on live news media coverage.

Western diplomats have been urging the political leaders to reconcile, but the lines between those leaders seem to be only hardening.

Odinga said he would not talk to Kibaki until he admitted that he had lost the election.

Still, he urged his followers to calm down.

“This is tarnishing our image as democratic and peaceful seekers of change,” Odinga said.

Odina and Kibaki ran together in 2002, in what was considered Kenya's first free election. The tribal alliance they built steamrolled Kenya's ruling party and marked a watershed moment, with the opposition finally taking control. But the two fell out soon afterward, and diplomats here said that it has been very difficult trying to broker a truce.

“We just want them to meet,” said Bo Jensen, the Danish ambassador to Kenya. “But at the moment they're quite far from each other.”

The election did not start badly. A record number of Kenyans, nearly 10 million, waited in lines miles long on Thursday to scratch an X next to their chosen candidate.

Kibaki, 76, vowed to keep growing Kenya's economy, one of the strongest in Africa, partly because of its billion-dollar tourist trade. Odinga, 62, ran as a champion of the poor and promised to end the tradition of Kikuyu favoritism.

Voting followed tribal lines, with the vast majority of Luos going for Odinga and up to 98 percent of Kikuyus in some areas voting for Kibaki.

Tribes, obviously, do matter in Kenya. But for the most part, the country has escaped the widespread ethnic bloodletting that has haunted so many of its neighbors, like Rwanda, Congo, Sudan and Ethiopia. In Kenya, the Kikuyu elite has shared the spoils of the system with select members of other tribes, which has helped defuse resentment.

This has led to decades of stability and is a reason why most Kenyans, including Bujra, the retired professor, do not think their country will end up like Rwanda, where nearly one million people were killed. Clearly, Kenya is a long way from that.

“In Rwanda, the conflict was between a small minority and a large majority,” he said, referring to the history of Tutsis dominating the Hutu majority. “Here, it is different, because many tribes have a stake.”

But election time, especially in a country where politics and tribe are so intertwined, is often bloody in Kenya. Hundreds of people were killed in tribal clashes surrounding the 1992 and 1997 elections.

The early results showed Odinga well ahead and more than half of Kibaki's cabinet losing their Parliament seats and therefore their jobs.

But when Odinga's lead began to vanish as further results were announced over the weekend, his supporters suspected something was amiss. It was slow-motion theft to them and they began to riot. And even before Kenya's election commission declared Kibaki the winner on Sunday, election observers were saying that the president's party changed voting tally sheets to reflect more votes than were cast on election day. In some areas, there were more votes for the president than registered voters.

On Tuesday, Samuel Kivuitu, the election chairman said he had been “under undue pressure” to certify the results.

Western governments, including the United States, are calling for Kenyan officials to re-tally the votes. “It's the only way forward,” said Graham Elson, the deputy chief of the European observer delegation.

http://theday.com/re.aspx?re=b4a19073-bb2b-4ed5-a2a9-f71f02ff1855

KAMPALA, Uganda - For more than a week, Dr. Scott Myhre didn’t wear a mask or other protective gear when treating the listless patients who were flocking to his hospital in western Uganda.

Only now does the American physician know the risk he took. The patients were suffering from a new strain of Ebola, a highly contagious disease that has already killed 22 people, including four health workers, among them a doctor Myhre counted as his best friend.

“I’m not in the clear yet, but I’m hopeful,” Myhre told The Associated Press by telephone from Bundibugyo Hospital, which is at the epicenter of the outbreak. Myhre, who has lived in Uganda for 14 years, must wait 21 days from his last unprotected contact with an Ebola patient to be declared clear of the disease.

For now, he is studiously following the recommended precautions: gowns, gloves, goggles, masks and boots.

No cure, no treatment
Ebola typically kills most of those it strikes through massive blood loss, and has no cure or treatment. It is spread through direct contact with the blood or secretions of an infected person, or objects that have been contaminated with infected secretions.

On Friday, the Ministry of Health said there are 101 suspected cases of Ebola in Bundibugyo district and 22 victims have died.

Doctors and nurses did not at first know what they were facing, so failed to protect themselves. Experts say the Ebola subtype that sparked the outbreak is new and the classic Ebola symptoms were not always present, slowing diagnosis. The outbreak began on Aug. 20, but the disease was not confirmed as Ebola until Nov. 29.

The four-month delay between the start of the outbreak and confirmation last week that it was Ebola has raised suspicions the government covered it up so as not to scare delegates — Britain’s Queen Elizabeth and 53 heads of government — who met in Kampala two weeks ago for a Commonwealth summit.

The government denies it hid information. “Confirmation of this epidemic took a long time because we had to go to (the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in) Atlanta,” said Dr. Emmanuel Otaala, Minister of State for primary health care.

The last Ebola outbreak in Uganda was in 2000, when 425 people caught it and more than half died.

Since the confirmation, health workers have fled their jobs in Bundibugyo. Hospital officials have been urging staff to return, to little avail. Meanwhile, the 100-bed hospital is trying to discharge all non-emergency patients and is operating very limited services.

“Many of the staff are not coming in but there aren’t many patients either,” said Myhre, of Vienna, Va. “The hospital is pretty much empty except for the isolation ward where the Ebola patients are being treated.”

The ward houses 24 patients — some of whom are on mattresses on the floor — and is separated from the rest of the hospital by an orange mesh fence. Ebola is not airborne so the fence is designed to stop people from wandering in accidentally.

Fear in nearby countries
The outbreak has caused health officials in neighboring countries to fear that the deadly virus might be spread. The independent Daily Monitor said Congo had sealed its border with the district. Congolese officials denied this.

“We have just informed people in the region they need to be vigilant,” Congolese Health Ministry official Dr Benoit Kabela told Reuters by telephone from Kinshasa. Kabela said medical staff had been deployed and given protective gear.

Meanwhile, southwestern neighbor Rwanda said it had set up mobile clinics and isolation wards at border posts with Uganda.

“The Ministry of Health has deployed trained medical personnel at the borders,” spokeswomen Ines Mpambara said.

Kenya is also screening Ugandans at its western border.

But two teams, including infection control doctors from the World Health Organization and the United States’ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, recently arrived in Uganda to help local officials contain the outbreak. In previous Ebola outbreaks, the virus has often spread in health care centers where doctors and nurses are not properly protected.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22149219/

Maasai - Kenya

How do they live? For the Maasai, cattle are what make the good life, and milk and meat are the best foods. Their old ideal was to live by their cattle alone - other foods they could get by exchange - but today they also need to grow crops. They move their herds from one place to another, so that the grass has a chance to grow again; traditionally, this is made possible by a communal land tenure system in which everyone in an area shares access to water and pasture. Nowadays Maasai have increasingly been forced to settle, and many take jobs in towns. Maasai society is organised into male age-groups whose members together pass through initiations to become warriors, and then elders. They have no chiefs, although each section has a Laibon, or spiritual leader, at its head. Maasai worship one god who dwells in all things, but may manifest himself as either kindly or destructive. Many Maasai today, however, belong to various Christian churches.

What problems do they face? Since the colonial period, most of what used to be Maasai land has been taken over, for private farms and ranches, for government projects or for wildlife parks. Mostly they retain only the dryest and least fertile areas. The stress this causes to their herds has often been aggravated by attempts made by governments to 'develop' the Maasai. These are based on the idea that they keep too much cattle for the land. However, they are in fact very efficient livestock producers and rarely have more animals than they need or the land can carry. These 'development' efforts try to change their system of shared access to land. While this has suited outsiders and some entrepreneurial Maasai who have been able to acquire land for themselves or sell it off, it has often denuded the soil and brought poverty to the majority of Maasai, who are left with too little and only the worst land.

The Bushman Tribe - Botswana

In the middle of Botswana lies the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, a reserve created to protect the traditional territory of the 5,000 Gana, Gwi and Tsila Bushmen (and their neighbours the Bakgalagadi), and the game they depend on.

In the early 1980s, diamonds were discovered in the reserve. Soon after, government ministers went into the reserve to tell the Bushmen living there that they would have to leave because of the diamond finds.

In three big clearances, in 1997, 2002 and 2005, virtually all the Bushmen were forced out. Their homes were dismantled, their school and health post were closed, their water supply was destroyed and the people were threatened and trucked away.

They now live in resettlement camps outside the reserve. Rarely able to hunt, and arrested and beaten when they do, they are dependent on government handouts. They are now gripped by alcoholism, boredom, depression, and illnesses such as TB and HIV/AIDS.

Unless they can return to their ancestral lands, their unique societies and way of life will be destroyed, and many of them will die.

Although the Bushmen won the right in court to go back to their lands in 2006, the government has done everything it can to make their return impossible. It has:

Banned them from using their water borehole,
Refused to issue a single permit to hunt on their land (despite Botswana's High Court ruling in December that its refusal to issue permits was unlawful),
Arrested more than 50 Bushmen for hunting to feed their families,
Banned them from taking their small herds of goats back to the reserve.

Its policy is clearly to intimidate and frighten the Bushmen into staying in the resettlement camps, and making the lives of those who have gone back to their ancestral land impossible.

Mbororo - West Africa

Survival presently works with those Mbororo who live in Cameroon; there are approximately 1.85 million Mbororo in Cameroon, of whom about 120 - 130,000 live on the Bamenda plateau grassland in Northwest Province.

How do they live? Unlike most of the Fulani, the Mbororo have kept their pastoral way of life, herding their cattle in the wide grasslands. They have been moving from what is now Nigeria into northwestern Cameroon ever since the 19th century; at first there was plenty of space, and they lived alongside the local farmers without widespread conflict, as they herded their cattle between the mountain and the plains. They have a great pride in their identity, and an inherited code of behaviour (pulaaku) which teaches independence, discretion and self-control. They have become Muslims during the last century.

In the past they have kept themselves separate from other peoples, but they are now undergoing a period of change, with many of them wanting schools for their children, and taking up farming as well as herding. The Mbororo organisation MBOSCUDA was created by the Mbororo in 1992 to defend their social and cultural rights.

Pygmies

How does Survival help? Since 1993 Survival has assisted several Maasai groups in their struggle for their land. In Kenya we found funds for a programme of consciousness-raising against land sales, and supported the people of Iloodoariak and Mosiro, who are resisting the theft of their land through a legal fraud. In Tanzania, we have backed the demand of the Maasai of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area for a proper say in its administration, and supported attempts to defend the sacred hill Endoinyo Ormoruwak ('hill of elders').

KINSHASA, Congo - Authorities in Congo say a government official suspected of ordering up to 17 tons of radioactive waste dumped into a river has been arrested.

The country's Environment Minister declined to identify the person who was arrested because investigations are continuing. He says the waste belonged to a Chinese company, but that the company had not asked for the waste to be dumped in the river.

Authorities have issued calls over local radio stations asking people to avoid using the river to drink or bathe.

The river is not far from a mine that provided the uranium used for the atomic bombs U.S. forces dropped on Japan at the end of World War II. Although the main mine shaft was closed decades ago, uranium is still found in the area and thousands of local diggers have continued working there.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21717584/

FREEDOM PARK, South Africa (AP) -- Mona Miller's life will change this weekend. For the first time, she will have a real roof, solid walls and glass windows.

Lights will come on at the flick of a switch, water will flow from the tap and she will enjoy the dignity of a toilet.

Miller will move into her first proper home thanks to a building blitz by nearly 1,400 Irish volunteers who completed their mission Friday to build 200 houses in a week in the depressing and dusty -- and hopelessly misnamed -- Freedom Park slum.

"It's a solid home, not something that people can drive through," says Miller, shuddering at the memory of the drunken driver who rammed into her shack four years ago, injuring her two young children in the sprawling Cape Town suburb.

"I look forward to hearing the rain on the roof because I will no longer have to get up and put buckets underneath the holes. I'm going to close my doors and sleep for a week," she said, grinning as she looked proudly at the builders putting finishing touches on her new mustard-colored house.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/africa/11/09/SAfrica.building.ap/index.html

Conflict diamonds are diamonds illegally traded to fund conflict in war-torn areas, particularly in central and western Africa. The United Nations (UN) defines conflict diamonds as "...diamonds that originate from areas controlled by forces or factions opposed to legitimate and internationally recognized governments, and are used to fund military action in opposition to those governments, or in contravention of the decisions of the Security Council." These diamonds are sometimes referred to as "blood diamonds."

Conflict diamonds captured the world's attention during the extremely brutal conflict in Sierra Leone in the late 1990s. During this time, it is estimated that conflict diamonds represented approximately 4% of the world's diamond production. Illicit rough diamonds have also been used by rebels to fund conflicts in Angola, Liberia, Ivory Coast, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Republic of Congo (also known as Congo Brazzaville).

Today, the flow of conflict diamonds has been reduced to considerably less than 1%.

There are three diamond producing countries that account for this small percentage. Firstly, the Republic of Congo has been suspended from participation in the Kimberley Process owing to areas of non-compliance. Secondly, Liberia and the Ivory Coast are under United Nations Security Council Resolutions to prohibit the extraction and trading of diamonds. Despite both the Republic of Congo and Liberia benefiting from internationally recognized peace agreements, diamonds from these countries may be referred to as "conflict diamonds".

• Only use suppliers who can provide a guarantee that their diamonds are from sources free of conflict
• Have a conflict diamond policy
• Be able to answer a customer's questions about the topic

For further reassurance from a jeweler, a customer can ask the following suggested questions:

• How can I be sure that none of your jewelry contains conflict diamonds?
• What is your company's policy on conflict diamonds?

Map of conflict diamond countries

http://www.diamondfacts.org/conflict/index.html

Zales - Conflict Free Diamonds

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LONDON - African babies — the group most at risk of dying from malaria — may be protected against the mosquito-borne disease by an experimental vaccine, researchers said on Wednesday.

The finding clears the way for final-stage testing of GlaxoSmithKine Plc’s shot and increases the chance that the world will have a usable vaccine within five years.

Malaria kills one person every 30 seconds, most of them young African children. Doctors believe a vaccine, given as part of routine infant immunization, is the best hope in fighting the disease.

A clinical trial in Mozambique of 214 infants aged 10 to 18 weeks found the vaccine was safe and reduced new infections by 65 percent over a three-month period after treatment. Clinical illness was cut by 35 percent over six months.

Although such efficacy rates are not as good as for some childhood vaccinations, experts believe the huge burden of malaria means the new shot can still save millions of lives.

“This is a very major breakthrough,” lead investigator Dr Pedro Alonso of the University of Barcelona told reporters in a conference call.

“These tantalizing and unprecedented results further strengthen the vision that a vaccine may contribute to the reduction of the intolerable burden of disease and death caused by malaria.”

Malaria, caused by a parasite carried by mosquitoes, kills more than 1 million people every year and makes 300 million seriously ill.

The latest findings, published online in the Lancet, are broadly in line with a 45 percent reduction in new infections reported in 2004 when Glaxo’s vaccine, known as Mosquirix or RTS,S/AS02, was given to children aged 1- to 4-years old.

Mosquirix will now go into a large-scale Phase III trial in the second half of 2008, involving 16,000 infants and young children in seven African countries.

If all goes well, the vaccine — which is the most advanced of a number in development — will be submitted for regulatory approval in 2011, suggesting it could be commercially available in 2012.

Glaxo has promised to sell Mosquirix at low prices in developing countries. The exact price will be negotiated with purchasers, who are likely to be multilateral groups who would cover the cost on behalf of countries where malaria is endemic.

Glaxo has spent $300 million developing Mosquirix and expects to spend another $50 million to $100 million in future.

But the trials program is also being financed by the nonprofit PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, helped by a $107 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Mosquirix — which is given in three doses — targets just one stage in the malaria parasite’s life cycle and its success has surprised some scientists, given the complexity of the disease.

The fact that it works suggests an improved vaccine, targeting multiple elements in the life cycle, might be even more effective.

www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21346625/

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THE HAGUE, Netherlands - A former Congolese militia leader and army general accused of masterminding the massacre of 200 villagers was taken into custody Thursday at the International Criminal Court on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Germain Katanga was the commander of the Patriotic Resistance Force in the lawless Ituri region of northeastern Congo when his fighters went on a murderous rampage in Bogoro village in February 2003, prosecutors at the war crimes tribunal have said.

As well as killing 200 civilians, they raped women and girls before forcing them into sexual slavery, conscripted children to use as soldiers, and imprisoned villagers in a room full of corpses, according to evidence presented to the court. The evidence prompted judges at The Hague-based court to issue an arrest warrant for Katanga, who went by the nom de guerre "Simba."

Judges at the court said there were "reasonable grounds to believe" that the attack on Bogoro was part of a systematic attack on members of the Hema ethnic group in Ituri carried out by Katanga's militia and an allied group between January and March 2003.

Witnesses have also accused ethnic Lendu fighters in Katanga's militia of eating the still-warm hearts and livers of their dead.

Once controlled by rival rebel factions who eventually signed a peace deal in 2002 to end a four-year civil war, eastern Congo has been wracked by fighting between local militias, renegade soldiers and the army for years.

Connected to peacekeeper killings
Katanga was made a general in the Congolese army by President Joseph Kabila in January 2005 as part of a power-sharing deal that ended the war. But two months later, he was arrested in connection with the killing of nine U.N. peacekeepers in northeastern Congo.

Katanga is believed to have been in custody ever since, although he has never been tried for those slayings. He was turned over to ICC representatives in Congo on Wednesday, then put on a plane bound for the Netherlands, court spokeswoman Sonya Robla said.

After arriving in the Netherlands, Katanga's warrant was unsealed at the court and he was transferred to a detention unit near the country's North Sea coast. He next has to appear before judges Monday to confirm his identity and hear the allegations against him.

The only other suspect in the cell block is Thomas Lubanga, head of a rival militia from the same region of Congo, whose trial on charges of recruiting and using child soldiers in Ituri is expected to start early next year. It will be the first trial at the ICC, which was set up in 2002.

More brutality investigated
ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo said the court was investigating more brutal crimes in Congo.

"Today a second person from (Congo) is in custody, and he will not be the last one to face justice in the ICC," he said.

The court has had problems executing arrest warrants in the past because it has no police force and is forced to rely on the cooperation of other states to detain suspects.

The court has issued warrants for a Sudanese minister and Arab militia leader that prosecutors say are responsible for war crimes in Darfur, but Khartoum has refused to arrest them.

And in Uganda, leaders of the Lord's Resistance Army are involved in faltering peace talks with the government despite being the target of arrest warrants issued by the ICC.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21368260/

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KINSHASA, Congo - A warlord in eastern Congo is recruiting child soldiers in violation of international law, U.N. and government officials said Wednesday.

Nephtali, a deputy in Congo’s national assembly, said that forces loyal to former army general Laurent Nkunda raided 10 secondary schools and four primary schools in the past week “where they took the children by force in order to make them join their ranks.”

The U.N. has also confirmed that children are being recruited by different armed groups, “especially by the rebel forces of warlord Laurent Nkunda,” said Michel Bonnardeaux, a spokesman for the U.N. Mission in Congo.

It was not known how many children have been forcibly recruited, Bonnardeaux said. He said girls are being taken to serve as sex slaves, while boys are used as fighters. Those who try to escape are often recruited by rival armed groups based in the lawless eastern part of the country.

Nkunda’s rebels clashed with Congo’s army last month in North Kivu province, leading thousands of villagers to flee their homes.

Once controlled by rival rebel factions who eventually signed a peace deal in 2002 to end a four-year war, eastern Congo has been wracked by fighting between local militias, renegade soldiers and the army.

Nkunda quit the army after the war and launched his own rebellion, claiming the country’s transition to democracy was flawed and excluded the country’s ethnic Tutsi minority. Nkunda has also said he is fighting to protect ethnic Tutsis from Rwandan Hutu rebels who took refuge in eastern Congo following Rwanda’s 1994 genocide.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20876937/

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KARUBA, Congo - Forced to sleep in the jungle for fear of being attacked in their homes at night, the residents of this east Congo village are crying out for peace.

Government soldiers forced fighters loyal to renegade General Laurent Nkunda out of Karuba and two nearby villages this week but only pushed them back to Mushake, 15 km (9 miles) away, meaning the front line is still dangerously close.

"We've been sleeping in the bush at night for a month now. We return to the village by day to see the situation. We've nothing to eat, no clothes," said Karuba resident Jerome Lali.

The village of shacks nestles in the hills of North Kivu, a thickly-forested province on Democratic Republic of Congo's border with Uganda and Rwanda, long a crucible of violence.

Nkunda, an ethic Tutsi, says President Joseph Kabila's government and armed forces are supporting Rwandan Hutu rebels, accused of involvement in Rwanda's 1994 genocide in which 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed.

Nkunda's men, who say they are defending the interests of Congolese Tutsis in ethnically mixed North Kivu, have been battling government forces on and off since August, when they walked out of a peace deal agreed at the start of the year.

The government has set an October 15 deadline for Nkunda to disband his rebel forces and send his fighters for integration into army brigades that would be stationed outside North Kivu.

Nkunda said this week he was ready to integrate his men. But fighting was still raging on Thursday near Mushake -- around 40 km (25 miles) west of the provincial capital, Goma -- and government forces have beefed up their presence there.

"They are testing each other. Neither wants to be blamed for bringing the situation to the brink," said David Mugnier, central Africa director for International Crisis Group.

"There is a risk of maybe not a major conflict but certainly a worsening of the current situation," he said.

DIPLOMATIC EFFORTS

Artillery and machinegun fire have forced hundreds of families from their homes in recent days. Some 10,000 people had already been displaced in Mushake before the latest unrest, out of 370,000 who have fled fighting in North Kivu this year.

"What we're worried about with the expanding and intensifying of fighting is that we're seeing people who have already had to flee for the second or third time," said Patrick Lavand'homme, head of U.N. humanitarian agency OCHA in Goma.

"The problem is reaching these areas to distribute medical and surgical supplies. It's now impossible," he said.

Mugnier said Jendayi Frazer, the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, and the U.N. envoy for East Africa had been in contact with Nkunda for weeks as part of broader efforts to ease tense relations between Congo and Rwanda.

"They are trying to mediate. They want a rapprochement between Kinshasa and Kigali, and they know North Kivu is a big problem for the two countries," Mugnier said.

Rwanda has twice invaded Congo in pursuit of Hutu rebels it blames for the 1994 genocide. The second invasion triggered a 1998-2003 war in Congo which killed some 4 million people.

Rwandan President Paul Kagame said last month that Nkunda, whom Amnesty International accuses of war crimes, had legitimate grievances and called for a political deal to end the fighting.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21266487/

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FREETOWN, Sierra Leone - Sierra Leone held its first presidential elections Saturday since U.N. peacekeepers withdrew two years ago, a historic poll that many hope will show this country can transfer power peacefully after being ravaged by coups and a long, diamond-fueled civil war. Voters arrived before dawn, weathering a light drizzle and long lines, for a chance to choose from seven candidates. Electoral officials said balloting had gone smoothly and vote counting began after the polls closed.The most crucial period for the war-battered nation may come months down the road, when the public begins expecting real change from a new government. Despite progress since the 10-year war ended in 2002, analysts say many of the root problems that caused the conflict — corruption, poverty and unemployment — remain."There are high expectations for these elections, which is encouraging," said Carolyn Norris, the West Africa director for International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think tank. But "when the euphoria dies down, the public will want to see real change. ... If the new government doesn't perform as people demand, the patience people have shown could run out," she said.

There were no reports of violence during the voting, but police used tear gas to disperse crowds of youths setting up makeshift roadblocks in part of the capital, Freetown. It was unclear what sparked the incident or whether was related to polling.Saturday's victor must take more than 55 percent of the vote to avoid a run-off between the top two finishers. Final tallies are expected within 12 days of voting. In other races, some 572 contenders vied for 112 parliamentary seats. About 2.6 million of the nation's 5 million people are registered to vote."I want change and development," said Jaclin Johnson as he waited to vote at a public school in Freetown. "If the elections go on peacefully, there will be development."That's the hope, at least.

Sierra Leone is one of the poorest countries in the world, ranked 176th of 177 nations on the U.N. Human Development Index. Although its infrastructure has been restored to prewar levels and donors last year forgave $1.6 billion in crippling debt, the country has struggled to fight poverty and corruption, which is considered a serious drag on economic growth. Transparency International ranks Sierra Leone one of the most corrupt nations on earth, 148th out of 163 surveyed. Sierra Leone exported $125 million worth of diamonds in 2006. Those are official figures, however, and advocacy groups believe real export levels are two to three times that, with the rest being ferreted out of the country via smugglers. In a report issued prior to the vote, International Crisis Group singled out corruption within the diamond industry as "extremely dangerous," noting that impoverished diamond diggers were among the most enthusiastic rebel recruits during the war.

Civil war broke out in Sierra Leone in 1991 when a rebel group backed by Liberian warlord Charles Taylor launched fighting near the border of the two countries. Revolutionary United Front rebels were infamous for brutal tactics, burning villages, raping women and abducting and drugging children to turn them into teenage fighters. Tens of thousands of civilians died and countless victims live today with the legacy of the rebels' trademark atrocity — the lopping off of arms, feet, hands and lips with machetes. U.N. and British forces defeated the rebellion, and a U.N. force stayed on, swelling to 17,500 troops before departing in December 2005. British troops have helped train a new 17,500-strong army, which, together with 9,500 police, is responsible for national security. In July, a U.N.-backed war crimes court issued its first sentences since being set up five years earlier, handing down half-century jail terms to three former junta leaders. On Aug. 2, two former members of the Civilian Defense Forces militia, a pro-government group that fought against the rebels, were also sentenced for torturing and mutilating civilians. Sierra Leone has held two elections since the war ended: a presidential vote in 2002 and municipal elections two years later. President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah, 75, is on the verge of completing his second five-year term and cannot run again. Solomon Berewa, the 69-year-old ruling party candidate, is considered a front-runner to replace him. His toughest competition is considered 54-year-old opposition party chief and businessman Ernest Bai Koroma.            

I got this article from http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070811/ap_on_re_af/sierra_leone_elections

Eight years of protracted war have forced close to half a million of Sierra Leone's people to flee the country - turning them into Africa's largest refugee population. Countless Sierra Leoneans have lost their lives, and the country's economy has been shattered. The war, which broke out in 1991, is a complex and brutal conflict that has its roots in years of misrule, and the civil war in neighbouring Liberia. It is fuelled by diamond wealth and a long-standing resentment among the people of the poor rural interior against the richer ruling class in the coastal capital, Freetown. It is being fought, in large part, by children and teenagers. Both the rebels and the pro-government self-defence militias, known as the Kamajors, have recruited child soldiers. The RUF rebel movement which is waging the war against President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah and the Nigerian-led West African peacekeeping force which backs him has no clear political ideology. But rural poverty and a resentment of a distant government has been a driving force.

'Operation no living thing' Its guerrilla war has been accompanied by horrific attacks on civilians - many of whom have had their limbs cut off as part of a terror campaign. The names of the rebel offensives speak for themselves: Operation Burn House, was a series of arson attacks. Operation Pay Yourself, a programme of looting, and - most sinister of all - Operation No Living Thing. Sierra Leone, a former British colony, enjoyed 30 years of relative stability after it won independence in 1961. But anger was building over corruption among the ruling elite, and questions were being asked about how the country's diamond wealth was being spent. President Kabbah was elected in 1996 - in the fairest elections seen in Sierra Leone for years. But his time in office was to prove short-lived. In May 1997, he was overthrown by a combined force of junior soldiers and fighters of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF). The RUF was set up in 1991, by a former army corporal, Foday Sankoh, who formed an alliance with a Liberian militia, the National Patriotic Front for Liberia, led by Charles Taylor, who last year became President of Liberia. For years, the RUF fought against successive Sierra Leonean armies. But in 1997, it joined ranks with the military junta, which called itself the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council or AFRC.

Short-lived success story The junta was ousted by the West African Intervention Force, Ecomog, last February and President Kabbah returned triumphantly from exile in Guinea. The operation was hailed as a major success for Ecomog - and for the philosophy of finding African solutions to African problems. Some AFRC soldiers surrendered, but thousands of others retreated, along with the RUF, into the bush. The rebels were regrouping with assistance from Liberia, and according to the rebels, Burkina Faso. Rebel attacks intensified in October, after 24 soldiers of the former junta were executed and the RUF leader, Foday Sankoh, was sentenced to death for treason. In December, the rebels announced they would advance on Freetown to force the government to release Mr Sankoh. In the first week of January, they entered the capital, and another battle for the city began.

I got this article from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/special_report/1999/01/99/sierra_leone/251377.stm

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How far would you go to put food on the table? Would you take your life in your hands - wading through crocodile-infested waters, and walking unprotected through land where leopards roam? That is what Monica has just done, for the sake of her three-year-old daughter. She has joined the exodus of Zimbabweans crossing illegally into South Africa - the so called "border jumpers". They travel in the dead of night, guided by traffickers. The going rate is 200 rand (£14 or $28). We met Monica shortly after dawn, as she emerged from the bush about 6km (3.7 miles) inside South Africa. She was on foot with four other women - their faces showing the strain. Monica told us they had been travelling for four days with traffickers who abandoned them when their money ran out. "They called us baboons," she said. "They told us if you have no money we will leave you here and call the police to come and arrest you. "We have nowhere to go right now. We have no money and the police are all over. We don't know what to do."

Ordeal-Monica was driven out of her homeland by poverty, hunger, and concern for her little girl. "The situation is very bad," she said. "We will try by all means to get jobs. We can't go back. We are starving in Zimbabwe." Mary, one of her travelling companions, is a mother of four. She also talked of starvation. "We've got no jobs," she said. "We can't do anything in Zimbabwe. We are suffering." After resting for a few moments the women picked up the few belongings they were carrying, and began walking towards the highway. With no money and no place to go, their ordeal may be just beginning. A short distance away a group of taxi drivers were waiting at a favourite rendezvous point - under a baobab tree. They are part of a highly organised and lucrative trafficking network. The taxi drivers have spotters with mobile phones, who warn if the police or army are near. A ride to Johannesburg costs a fortune for a Zimbabwean - 1300 rand (£92 or $184).

Panic -No-one knows for sure how many border jumpers arrive every day, but the estimate from the taxi drivers is more than a thousand. "Even pregnant women or women with a baby on their backs are jumping a 2m high razor-wire fence," one driver said. "Some are carrying newborns. It's bad." The taxis leave with their human cargo within three to five minutes. "We phone the guy at the corner," he says. "If he says the place is safe, we take everyone. If not, we offload them quickly." For some the journey involves jumping fences, or cutting holes in them to crawl underneath. But there are easier places to cross the border, if you know where to look. We found an area protected by only a single fence. There is no need to cut a hole, because there is an unlocked gate. Once through the gate, the Limpopo River is just ahead, and beyond it, Zimbabwe.

Risking everything - The Limpopo is low now, but border jumpers have drowned when the river is in flood. Just downriver another group was making their crossing, holding their valuables above their heads.They arrived safely on dry land, but there was a reception committee of local thugs. They often lie in wait to rob or rape the new arrivals, sometimes tipped off by the traffickers. The border jumpers spotted them in the distance. There was panic as they rushed to squeeze back through the fence, and return to the river. They got away this time, but the thieves are a constant threat. Zimbabwe is haemorrhaging some of its brightest and best. In Johannesburg these days you find doctors, lawyers and head masters from Harare ready to work as cleaners. Plenty of illegal migrants are arrested and sent home. So far this year, 57,600 have been deported to Zimbabwe, according to the International Organisation for Migration. But many attempt the crossing again and again, unable to survive in a country with 80% unemployment and the world's highest inflation rate - now 2,200%. The price of corn, the staple food in Zimbabwe, has just risen by a staggering 680%. That may drive many more desperate men and women into the arms of the traffickers. Along the border between Zimbabwe and South Africa, a tragedy is unfolding - though its victims usually pass unseen. They are women like Monica and Mary - mothers risking everything for a chance to feed their children.

I got this article and these pictures from this BBC article.

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