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/ 19 February 2008
The United Nations refugee agency said on Tuesday it had withdrawn a team caring for refugees from the Chad/Darfur border after aerial bombing. Seven refugees from Darfur crossed the border into Chad on Monday night, carrying with them a 55-year-old woman who had lost both her legs during an alleged bombardment.
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/ 19 February 2008
Kenya’s feuding parties resumed talks on Tuesday after a torrent of calls from home and abroad to solve a post-election crisis that has killed 1 000 people and jeopardised the East African nation’s reputation. ”The time for a political settlement was yesterday,” United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said at the end of a lightning trip.
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/ 19 February 2008
When Joyce Mandela’s cellphone beeped to signal she had a SMS, the 27-year old Kenyan expected a note from a friend. Instead, she found a message of hate. ”If your neighbour is a Kikuyu, just kick him or her out of that house. No one is going to ask you anything,” the SMS read.
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/ 19 February 2008
United States President George Bush on Tuesday recognised the independence of Kosovo from Serbia and said it would bring peace to the Balkans. Bush said during an African tour in Dar es Salaam that the United States would soon establish full diplomatic relations with the majority Albanian country.
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/ 18 February 2008
Europe’s biggest states recognised the independence of Kosovo on Monday, ending hours of suspense after Prime Minister Hashim Thaci assured his new republic that Western recognition would come ”any minute”. France was first to announce its move after a European Union foreign ministers’ meeting in Brussels.
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/ 18 February 2008
The South African government is still deciding whether to recognise Kosovo as an independent country, Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said on Monday. It is expected that the decision would have to be taken soon as it would again be discussed by the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday afternoon.
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/ 18 February 2008
United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived in Kenya on Monday to push talks to end the post-election crisis but can expect a lukewarm welcome from the government, bristling at Western pressure for a quick deal. Rice, who was sent by President George Bush, is the highest-ranking US official to visit the country since a December 27 vote triggered ethnic clashes.
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/ 18 February 2008
Kosovo looked forward on Monday to recognition by the Western powers who went to war to save its Albanian majority, but Russia served notice the new state will never be forced on its Serb allies in the territory. Fireworks brought to a close a day of celebration in the Kosovo capital Pristina, where Parliament adopted a declaration of independence from Serbia.
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/ 17 February 2008
Kosovo declared independence from Serbia on Sunday, ending a long chapter in the bloody breakup of Yugoslavia. Serbia responded immediately by calling its mainly Albanian breakaway province a false state and condemning the United States for supporting it.
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/ 17 February 2008
United States President George Bush on Sunday met Tanzania’s leader to discuss Africa’s political crises before signing a nearly -million grant to help stimulate economic growth. On the second stop of a five-nation trip where he has received a warm welcome, Bush will spend the day discussing projects to fight HIV/Aids and malaria.
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/ 16 February 2008
The United Nations must deploy more troops quickly in west Sudan’s war-torn Darfur region, even without their full equipment, or risk losing Darfuris’ trust, a senior United Nations commander said on Saturday. The most important first step is to give displaced Darfuris confidence that the troops will protect them, said Balla Keita, the UN-African Union commander of West Darfur.
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/ 16 February 2008
President George Bush began a five-nation tour of Africa on Saturday that will highlight United States health, education and pro-democracy projects there and also seek to advance efforts to end Kenya’s post-election crisis. Bush, accompanied by his wife Laura, arrived in the small West African state of Benin.
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/ 16 February 2008
Just before dawn on one of Kosovo’s last mornings as a Serbian province, young military cadets are being put through their paces on a concrete drill field. The 38 young men and women in matching tracksuits represent Kosovo’s hopes for the future, at least for its Albanian majority. As dense clouds of jackdaws swoop and wheel above them, they run in perfect formation, chanting their determination to defend the new nation.
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/ 16 February 2008
Two-thirds of the Taliban-led insurgents in Afghanistan can be persuaded to abandon violence, according to a British aid worker expelled from the country for opening talks with some of those allied to the militant group. Michael Semple said he was confident that most Taliban-linked insurgents could be absorbed into Afghanistan’s reconciliation process.
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/ 16 February 2008
President George Bush set off on Friday on a five-nation tour of Africa, touting American compassion for the poor on a continent where he already basks in high approval ratings. Bush aims to use the week-long Africa voyage, likely his last as US president, to bolster his legacy and highlight efforts to resolve regional disputes.
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/ 15 February 2008
Former United Nations chief Kofi Annan said on Friday that a deal to end Kenya’s post-election turmoil was ”very close” and voiced hope that the ”last difficult and frightening step” would be taken next week. Annan has been leading talks between negotiators for President Mwai Kibaki and the opposition to end weeks of violence since a disputed December 27 election.
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/ 15 February 2008
Pointing out that Thursday February 21 is International Mother Language Day, the president of the African National Congress, Jacob Zuma, has called for the new schools’ pledge drawn up by the Department of Education to be recited in the different languages of the country — depending on the region.
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/ 15 February 2008
President George Bush, ahead of a trip to Africa, said on Thursday he asked Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to go to Kenya with a message that there must be a full return to democracy. Kenya’s feuding political parties adjourned talks for the weekend, dashing chief mediator Kofi Annan’s hopes to have a final political settlement this week.
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/ 15 February 2008
United States President George Bush cited the London July 7 bombings in an interview broadcast on Thursday night to justify his support for waterboarding, an interrogation technique widely regarded as torture. In an interview with the BBC he said information obtained from alleged terrorists helped save lives
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/ 15 February 2008
Art collectors opened their wallets on Thursday and shelled out ,6-million at a Valentine’s Day charity auction spearheaded by rocker Bono and British artist Damien Hirst to benefit the fight against HIV/Aids in Africa. Spirited bidding and prices far in excess of pre-sale estimates marked ”The (Red) Auction” at Sotheby’s, where all but one of the 83 contemporary works found buyers.
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/ 15 February 2008
Kenya’s ethnic bloodshed has scared away hundreds of thousands of tourists. Nairobi’s seedy nightclubs think they know just how to bring them back. Curvaceous Kenyan women in skimpy outfits slowly, and then rapidly, gyrate to Egyptian tunes during belly-dancing theme night at the Casablanca club.
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/ 14 February 2008
A second big earthquake in less than two weeks brought down houses and left at least 60 people injured in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Rwanda on Thursday, officials said. The quake measured 5,5 on the Richter scale, according to monitors, and caused panicked residents to rush from their homes.
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/ 14 February 2008
A new, leaner Cabinet for Tanzania was sworn in Wednesday, its predecessor having fallen apart last week amid a corruption scandal. President Jakaya Kikwete dissolved his last Cabinet on February 7 after Edward Lowassa stepped down as prime minister. He and other lawmakers were implicated in a $179-million corruption scandal.
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/ 14 February 2008
The United Nations climate chief on Thursday called for rich and developing nations to reach a compromise as they held talks in Japan in their bid to forge a new deal on fighting global warming by the end of next year. Officials from the United Nations and 21 countries opened two days of closed-door talks in Tokyo to help find common ground.
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/ 14 February 2008
United States President George Bush travels this week to Africa, one of the few regions where he can claim globally recognised successes for efforts on Aids and development in a foreign-policy legacy dominated by the Iraq war. But conflicts in Kenya and Darfur will intrude on a trip intended to show the positive impact from US investment.
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/ 14 February 2008
Chief mediator Kofi Annan on Wednesday put Kenya’s crisis talks back on course toward a deal after defusing a row over his plan for a ”grand coalition” government to end post-election turmoil. Annan had irked negotiators for President Mwai Kibaki when he told Parliament on Tuesday that a power-sharing government could be a way out of the crisis.
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/ 14 February 2008
China was facing a major international crisis linked to the Olympics on Thursday amid mounting pressure over its role in Darfur after United States filmmaker Steven Spielberg severed his links to the Games. So far neither the Foreign Ministry nor the Olympic organising committee has responded to the decision by Spielberg.
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/ 13 February 2008
Kenya is a land of stark contrast: the rich drive gleaming luxury cars and can afford to enrol their children in top British schools. But most live a hand-to-mouth existence and some Kenyans believe the bloody post-election crisis that has exposed the country’s tribal divisions could also inflame the gulf between classes and further exacerbate instability.
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/ 13 February 2008
When the world’s largest merchant ship ferries its monthly cargo of 13Â 000 containers between China and Europe it burns nearly 350 tonnes of fuel a day. The Emma Maersk supplies Britain with everything from toys and food to clothes and televisions, but its giant diesel engine can emit more than 300Â 000 tonnes of carbon dioxide a year.
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/ 13 February 2008
Former leader of the Democratic Alliance Tony Leon, who now speaks for the party on foreign affairs, has launched a scathing attack on South Africa’s plan to host a second World Conference against Racism in Durban next year. "Quite what good will come of this exercise remains open to serious question," he said.
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/ 13 February 2008
The creation of a power-sharing government in Kenya appeared imminent on Tuesday after a parliamentary briefing in which former United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan spoke of a possible "grand coalition" to end the country’s political crisis. He has also noted that a deal would hopefully be made by the weekend.
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/ 13 February 2008
Film director Steven Spielberg and actress Mia Farrow joined activists worldwide on Tuesday in using the Olympics as a backdrop to address human rights concerns, urging Beijing to exert political leverage on Sudan’s government to help end the crisis in Darfur.