Switzerland says it has frozen nearly $1bn worth of assets linked to Libya's Muammar Gaddafi and the deposed leaders of Egypt and Tunisia. Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey said some 830m Swiss francs (£580m; $960m) had been discovered. Of that, the largest proportion - 410m SFr - was linked to former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and his circle, the minister said.

Every minute, somewhere in the world, a child goes blind according to the World Health Organisation. Three in five poor children who go blind are likely to die within two years of losing their sight - yet half of cases of childhood blindness are avoidable. Sub-Saharan Africa is the region with the highest prevalence of blindness in the world - 1.24 per 1,000 children, compared to 0.8 in India and 0.3 in Europe.

A new article from the Bank Information Centre's Paulina Garzon looks at the current status of the World Bank's energy strategy review, which has run into controversy at the Board of Directors. The article notes the politics surrounding the policy. 'The WB has spent almost two years developing the new Energy Sector Strategy (EsE),[1] expected to be approved in July 2011. The EsE will be the guiding instrument in modernizing the energy sector with two main objectives: 1) to increase access to modern and reliable energy, especially for the poor, and 2) to facilitate the transition into an energy sector that is environmentally sustainable and with low carbon emissions.'

Some 21 villagers from Nyambeya in Cashel Valley have been forced to flee their village after ZANU PF militia carried out an early morning raid on Sunday (01 May) and burned down seven houses owned by MDC-T officials. Homes belonging to MDC ward chairman Moses Chemwanyisa, ward youth chairman Admire Chizikani and his mother Naomi were torched.

Tunisia has denied requesting foreign military aid to confront the escalating crisis on its border with Libya. The country's 'territorial integrity is a red line that no one can touch', Deputy Tunisian Foreign Minister Radouane Nouicer said Sunday (1 May) on state television. But Libyan rebels have been chased across the border, sending at least a dozen shells onto Tunisian soil.

President Goodluck Jonathan has again stated that his promise made on the 35 per cent representation of women in governance will be fulfilled. Jonathan said recently: 'In Nigeria, today, we have many competent and credible women who have built capacities in thousands of lives, contributed immensely to building the civil, public, and private service sectors. Women have championed debt relief, grew the stock exchange, waged war against fake drugs, ensured justice and human rights and so on. These facts made me to promise during my campaigns that the 35 per cent representation of women in governance will be fulfilled.'

Thousands of ethnic Berbers from Libya have fled into Tunisia after a brief hiatus in their exodus last week because of fighting between Libyan government troops and opposition forces for control of a border crossing point. 'This past weekend, more than 8,000 people, most of them ethnic Berbers, arrived in Dehiba in southern Tunisia. Most are women and children,' a UNHCR spokesperson said. The latest arrivals bring the number of people to have fled fighting in Libya's Western Mountains region to almost 40,000 in the past month.

'Sonke Gender Justice Network condemns the murder of Noxolo Nogwaza who was raped and brutally murdered in the early hours of Sunday morning over the Easter weekend in Kwa-Thema township, outside of Johannesburg. We offer our condolences to Noxolo’s family and to our comrades at EPOC and to the Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL).'

The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) says he has unearthed 'enough evidence' to pursue up to five warrants for crimes against humanity committed by forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader. Luis Moreno-Ocampo made the announcement a day before he was to brief the UN Security Council on his investigation into alleged crimes commited by Gaddafi's forces. 'We have security forces shooting civilians at demonstrations and evidence of security forces arresting people in different cities, including Tripoli, even today, because they think these people are not loyal,' the prosecutor said.

The Jury of the Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders (MEA), meeting in Geneva, selected Kasha Jacqueline Nabagesera as the Laureate for her work for LGBT rights and marginalised people in Uganda. Kasha Jacqueline Nabagesera, a Ugandan woman, is the founder and Executive Director of Freedom and Roam Uganda, a lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights organisation. Kasha has had the courage to appear on national television in Uganda, she has issued press statements on behalf of the gay community, and spoken on several radio stations.

Media rights group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has said Robert Mugabe is among the seven worst ‘press freedom predators’ on the African continent. In a statement released to mark World Press Freedom Day the group also named leaders Yahya Jammeh (Gambia), Issaias Afeworki (Eritrea), Teodoro Obiang Nguema (Equatorial Guinea), Paul Kagamé (Rwanda), King Mswati III (Swaziland) and Somalia’s Islamist militias, Al-Shabaab and Hizb-Al-Islam. Despite the formation of a coalition government in Zimbabwe, Reporters Without Borders, said because of Mugabe, 'Zimbabwe’s privately-owned print media are constantly harassed and that the state-owned Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) has a monopoly of radio and TV broadcasting'.

IkamvaYouth's head office in Makhaza, Khayelitsha was petrol-bombed on 27 April and the organisation is appealing for donations and help. IkamvaYouth is a non-partisan, non-governmental organisation that was established in 2003 in Makhaza, Khayelitsha with the objective of enabling disadvantaged youth to pull themselves out of poverty and into university and employment through peer-to-peer learning and support. The programme's success (87-100 per cent matric pass rate since 2005 and over 70 per cent of learners accessing tertiary for the past three years) has led to the model's replication in five townships in three provinces, and numerous accolades include winning the Mail and Guardian / Southern Africa Trust Drivers of Change award in 2010.

A three-day strike beginning 4 May has been announced by the Uganda Law Society as an expression of displeasure at the government’s high-handed clampdown on the walk-to-work protests against high fuel prices. At an extra-ordinary meeting of the Law Society held in Kampala, it was also agreed that other professionals be asked to join in this show of disapproval against the excessive and disproportionate use of force by the police, army and other security agencies in breaking up peaceful protests.

Minister Louis Farrakhan warns Barack Obama about the US's intervention in Libya and CIA activity [Information Clearing House video], while Cornel West discusses the failure of the Obama administration to tackle the root causes of injustice in the US and beyond [Al Jazeera video].

Morocco's Tourist hub city of Marrakech was hit by a bomb blast in late April that ripped through a popular restaurant at lunchtime, the Argana, overlooking Jamaa Lefna Square. The blast, according to officials killed 16 people most of whom were foreigners. The attack occurred as the country witnesses a wave of peaceful demonstrations calling for democratic change. Bloggers and netizens have been quick to react, sending instant eyewitness accounts, as reported by Global Voices.

Sierra Leone re-introduced local government councils in 2004 after a 30-year absence; the experience of the last six years is prompting questions about how to successfully introduce effective democratic authority and responsiveness at the local level in a country where few have experience of active participation in governance. Devolution of responsibility to local councils is behind schedule, with responsibility for key services such as water and waste management and infrastructure like roads among the important areas remaining under the central government's control.

Dozens of people have reportedly been killed in the main city of Abidjan in fighting between Ivory Coast troops and the remnants of a militia loyal to deposed leader Laurent Gbagbo. 'We have seen many dead. We recovered 40 bodies over two hours, but we were forced to stop because he had no room left in our van,' said Franck Kodjo, an official at the International Committee of the Red Cross, adding at least five corpses were from last Tuesday's fighting. A commander for the Ivorian army, known as the FRCI, said the remaining pro-Gbagbo fighters in the Abidjan neighbourhood of Yopougon were mostly Liberian mercenaries hired in the aftermath of the November election dispute.

A gay couple, Akwasi Boakye and Kwame Amankwa, got married on Easter Sunday in Kumasi, Ghana. The wedding, attended by hundreds of members of LGBTI community, started at 10am on Sunday and lasted all night. The couple have been banished from the town. The couple has allegedly disappeared on a honeymoon to Accra.

A controversial Facebook game developed by the Danish Refugee Council (DRC) with funding from ECHO, the European Commission’s humanitarian agency, and designed to raise awareness of Dadaab camp on the Kenyan-Somali border has been pulled from the internet just days after the launch amid claims that it is in bad taste and dehumanizes refugees. Julie Laduron, ECHO’s communications officer, confirmed that the European humanitarian body had removed the game from its Facebook page and main site. 'Of course everyone has some different sensibilities about the game so for the moment it is suspended,' she said.

The Jadaliyya website is an independent ezine produced by ASI (Arab Studies Institute), a network of writers associated with the Arab Studies Journal (www.ArabStudiesJournal.org). It is motivated by the need to discuss the 'Arab World' or the 'Middle East'.