Egypt's prosecutor general has ordered the detention of former President Hosni Mubarak, ahead of an investigation into corruption and abuse allegations. He is reported to be in an 'unstable condition' a day after being admitted to hospital with heart problems. He has been ordered detained for 15 days. His sons Alaa and Gamal have also been detained.

Ugandan police have fired tear gas during a walk-to-work protest in the capital, Kampala, and arrested several opposition politicians behind it. For the second time this week, people were asked to walk to work to protest against rising fuel and food prices. Police tried to arrest opposition leader Kizza Besigye, but a group of his supporters shielded him.

The man who died after being beaten by police at a service delivery protest in Ficksburg was trying to help an elderly man when he was attacked. The brutal beating and shooting of Ficksburg resident Andries Tatane, 33, was screened to millions of South Africans last night on SABC News. The footage showed police officers cornering him during the protests in the Free State, and then several police officers beating him with batons.

To what extent do South Africa's municipal participation mechanisms enable meaningful engagement in development planning and local governance by poor or marginalised women? What interventions or alternative approaches are required? This article, 'Strengthening Women's Participation in Local Governance: Lessons and Strategies', from the Community Development Journal, finds a disconnect between women's experience and knowledge and state policy and programmatic responses. It proposes the creation of women-only forums, supported by training, to enable women to develop recommendations.

'My father died when I was three years old. Armed bandits killed him one evening as he was coming home. Every night I remember this scene before falling asleep,' says Mariam Ibrahim, a 20-year-old Somali who grew up amid civil war. Mariam is one of 170,000 refugees of the Libyan conflict who were able to cross the Tunisian-Libyan border. She was nine months pregnant when she arrived in Choucha refugee camp accompanied by her husband. Mariam has since given birth to her first child, a girl, in a tent set up by the Red Crescent.

The cohesion of the coalition of 10 rebel commanders - termed 'Ouattara's forces' by the international media - may yet turn out to be fragile, says this article from the South African Institute of International Affairs. 'The former rebels will want to be rewarded for ousting Laurent Gbagbo, firstly with posts in the new army, and secondly with guarantees of impunity. And they will be reluctant to start any disarmament, a pre-requisite to any meaningful security reform.'

'Abahlali baseMjondolo Western Cape has observed with great concern...unlawful activities on demolishing people’s structures and evicting people without any order from the court. This tendency seems to be growing... this undermines the prevention of illegal eviction from and unlawful occupation of land act 1998 (Act 19 of 1998).'

A group of human rights activists led by Kenya National Commission on Human Rights commissioner Hassan Omar have been denied entry into Uganda. The four were detained at Entebbe Airport by immigration officials despite having secured an appointment with the Ugandan Chief Justice over the continued detention of activist Al-Amin Kimathi.

Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, the richest man in the Middle East, had a grand vision for turning a swath of land in southern Egypt into an agricultural marvel. Since 1998 Alwaleed has invested $127 million in 100,00 acres (40,470 hectares) of land in the Nile River delta Tushka agricultural project (also known as Toshka). Egypt’s public prosecutor’s office said Sunday (10 April) it froze the land controlled by Alwaleed because the original sale of the land violated the law, Reuters reported.

Zimbabwe's government adopted new guidelines set by the World Health Organisation (WHO) for treating people living with HIV almost a year ago, but funding constraints have made it difficult to implement them - until now. On 1 April 2011, Zimbabwe started phasing out the combination antiretroviral treatment (ARV) Stavudine, Lamivudine and Nevirapine as its first-line option for the national programme, replacing it with the less toxic Tenofovir-based regimens for adults and Zidovudine-based regimens for children, as recommended by the 2010 WHO guidelines.

The exodus of migrants streaming out of Libya due to ongoing unrest has highlighted the heavy dependence of some countries on remittances from their citizens working abroad. In several countries this flow has now become choked. 'With thousands returning home the economic impact of the unrest in Libya is that remittances will be reduced,' Dr. Mizanur Rahman, economist and research fellow at the National University of Singapore told IPS. Recent World Bank statistics indicate that developing countries got more than 325 billion dollars last year from migrant worker remittances, outstripping foreign direct investment and development assistance combined.

Two years into a supposed recovery, not only have none of the underlying contradictions that sparked the deepest economic and financial crisis since the Great Depression been resolved, but new problems are emerging, reports the World Socialist Website. The latest World Economic Outlook (WEO) report notes that 'the pace of activity remains uneven, with unemployment lagging'. Growth was 'insufficiently strong to make a major dent in high unemployment rates' with the number of jobless having increased by 30 million since 2007.

This footage from the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) posted to shows the beating of a protestor during a protest in Ficksburg in the eastern Free State.

The Second Committee of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, which focuses on economic and finance policy, released in January a draft resolution on external debt sustainability and development. The text of the draft resolution on external debt sustainability recognises the important role of debt relief, debt restructuring and debt cancellation for the purpose of debt crisis prevention as well as for mitigating the adverse impact of the world financial and economic crisis in developing countries.

The recent uprisings that have affected almost every country in the Middle East and North Africa region are indicative of deep structural issues that are facing societies in these countries. Calls for democracy, economic reforms, employment opportunities and greater accountability require us to question the development model pursued in the region by institutions like the World Bank and the underlying assumptions that may have led to the failure of this model, says this article from the Bank Information Centre.

Ravensmead brothers who are alleged to have subjected three black workers at a factory in Blackheath to sexual, verbal and physical abuse appeared in court today (14 April) amid high drama. About a hundred people protested outside the Blue Downs Magistrate’s Court. The charges relate to claims by the three workers that the brothers, owners of a timber company in Blackheath Industria, had beaten, sexually assaulted and hurled racial remarks at them after they reported for work last Tuesday night.

Mineral Resources' Minister Susan Shabangu has told Pondoland opponents of a titanium dune mining project that she needs another month to consider their appeal against the Xolobeni coastal dune mining project. Amadiba Crisis Committee spokesman Sinegugu Zukulu said the mining project 'has become an ever more menacing threat to the unique biodiversity of the Wild Coast and traditional way of life of the amaMpondo'.

In Madagascar, grassroots struggles against corporate-driven land grabbing have emerged as a political point of focus in the growing global spotlight on land grabs throughout the global south, a process that the UN special rapporteur on the right to food says has 'negative effects on the right to food as well as other human rights'. Mass scale corporate land occupations are expanding throughout Africa, and Madagascar is an example of the intensity of the corporate push for national lands but also on the ability for communities to resist such land grabbing.

Dozens of minors interviewed by Amnesty International for a new report had joined the Chadian army and armed opposition groups in the east. The report found that 80 per cent of the estimated 7,000-10,000 child soldiers recruited in Chad are associated with armed groups, while the remaining 20 per cent are involved with the country’s armed forces. These UN estimates also indicate that they may have been used as combatants.

In the two months since pro-democracy rebels rose up, eastern Libya has faced food and fuel shortages, media blackouts, power outages and the total disruption of social services. And with a long-time government prohibition on all NGOs and international humanitarian agencies barred from filling the void, the citizens of Benghazi are on their own and have set up their own structures to provide for themselves.