No image available
/ 31 May 2008

UN racism expert condemns SA violence

The United Nations independent expert on racism urged South Africa on Friday to bring to justice those responsible for recent xenophobic violence that claimed more than 50 lives this month. ”I condemn these acts in the strongest terms,” special rapporteur Doudou Diene said as he called on South African authorities to bring the perpetrators to justice.

No image available
/ 23 May 2008

Sarkozy to mend fences with Angola

French President Nicolas Sarkozy arrived in Angola on Friday in a bid to improve relations following an arms scandal that provoked tensions between the two countries. Sarkozy was to hold talks with Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos on Friday morning at the presidential palace.

No image available
/ 26 November 2007

Not all rape is the same

In 2005 I spoke to a traumatised filmmaker who had returned from the Democratic Republic of Congo where he interviewed a 19-year-old woman who 18 months before had been raped by 49 soldiers, one after the other. The pregnant teenager was then shot in the belly by the soldiers, killing her baby and rendering her sterile, writes journalist Charlene Smith.

No image available
/ 30 October 2007

UN extends sanctions on Côte d’Ivoire

The United Nations Security Council renewed arms and diamond sanctions against Côte d’Ivoire on Monday in a bid to make the West African country stick to the terms of a peace process. A resolution passed by the council extended the sanctions for a further year but promised to review them during that period.

No image available
/ 25 October 2007

UN on climate: It’s now or never to save the planet

Humanity is changing Earth’s climate so fast and devouring resources so voraciously that it is poised to bequeath a ravaged planet to future generations, the United Nations warned on Thursday in its most comprehensive survey of the environment. The fourth <i>Global Environment Outlook</i> is compiled by 390 experts from observations, studies and data garnered over two decades.

No image available
/ 29 September 2007

Rwanda joins push for moratorium on executions

Rwanda joined other countries on Friday in appealing for a global moratorium on executions, saying that if its government could abolish the death penalty while perpetrators of the 1994 genocide still await sentences, no country should use it. About 500 000 people, mostly ethnic Tutsis, were massacred in 100 days of frenzied killing led by radical Hutus.

No image available
/ 27 September 2007

Forces intensify Burma crackdown

Troops cleared protesters from the streets of central Yangon on Thursday, giving them 10 minutes to leave or be shot as the Burma junta intensified a two-day crackdown on the largest uprising in 20 years. At least nine people were killed, state television said, on a day when far fewer protesters took to the streets after soldiers raided monasteries in the middle of the night.

No image available
/ 27 September 2007

Riot police charge Yangon crowd

Burma riot police charged a crowd of more than 1 000 protesters after they pelted soldiers with rocks and water bottles in central Yangon on Thursday and at least one person collapsed as shots were fired, witnesses said. One man was on the ground, unconscious, but it was not clear whether he was alive or dead.

No image available
/ 27 September 2007

Junta raids Burma monasteries

Burma’s generals launched pre-dawn raids on rebellious monasteries on Thursday in their crackdown on the biggest anti-junta protests in 20 years, defying desperate international calls for restraint. It was unusually quiet on the streets of Yangon, where troops killed an estimated 3 000 people in the ruthless suppression of a 1988 uprising.

No image available
/ 26 September 2007

Tutu ‘devastated’ by Mugabe’s rule

South African Nobel Peace Prize laureate Desmond Tutu said on Tuesday he was ”devastated” by the human rights abuses of President Robert Mugabe’s government in Zimbabwe. Tutu said he struggles to understand how Mugabe changed so drastically after steering the country to independence in 1980.

No image available
/ 13 September 2007

Mbeki to lead SA delegation to UN

President Thabo Mbeki will lead the South African delegation to the 62nd session of the United Nations General Assembly, which starts in New York next week, the Department of Foreign Affairs said on Thursday Speaking in Pretoria, ambassador George Nene, head of the multilateral section in the department, said several issues would be discussed.