The process of statement taking from security chiefs has been suspended, meaning the Kenya chaos case will now be filed without their testimony. Judge Kalpana Rawal put the process on hold Tuesday to await the outcome of an application filed by the security bosses' lawyers at The Hague. The lawyers want assurances from the ICC that any evidence provided by their clients will not be used against them as the court's prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo puts together his case on post election violence.

Senegal is in talks with Saudi Arabia to lease farmland to grow food of an area nearly four times the size of Manhattan, an official in Senegal involved in the deal told Reuters. Like other wealthy Gulf states Saudi Arabia has been buying farmland in Asia and Africa to secure food supplies after inflation had nearly doubled the price of food in 2008.

Furious demonstrations continued across Haiti last Wednesday following the 28 November highly contested election in which thousands found themselves unable to vote. Rock-throwing and road-barricading protests were reported in Les Cayes, Hinche, Petit Goave and Archaie. On Tuesday, demonstrators clashed with United Nations peacekeeping troops in St. Marc and Gonaives. The UN mission issued several alerts to its personnel restricting movement.

Bloggers have reacted to documents published by WikiLeaks (Cablegate) that disclosed classified communication between the US State department and its embassies worldwide. The documents make reference to African countries and its leaders. In this Global Voices post, the views of bloggers are summarised, but there are also lists of stories related to Africa and relevant WikiLeaks documents.

The Guinea Supreme Court last Thursday confirmed Alpha Conde, leader of the Rally of the People of Guinea (RPG), winner of the 7 November presidential run-off vote in the country. The 72-year-old Conde therefore becomes the fifth president of the Republic of Guinea, following the Supreme Court announcement which barely beat the Thursday midnight dateline set for the release of the results.

Reporters Without Borders has deploreed the fact that a climate of hostility towards the French news media is being encouraged by Côte d’Ivoire’s state-owned radio and TV stations and certain privately-owned newspapers in Abidjan that support President Laurent Gbagbo, such as Le Temps and Notre Voie. 'Our priority is respect for the safety of journalists,' Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Jean-François Julliard said. 'We are very disturbed that the national radio and TV have named foreign media and some of their staff and have blamed them for the current turmoil. This is dishonest and dangerous.'

The United States is worried about a 'considerable deterioration' in press and other freedoms in Madagascar. A sharply worded critique by the US Embassy expressed concern about 'the constant harassment of political dissidents and journalists' on the Indian Ocean island. The statement also referred to reports of arbitrary arrests and mistreatment of suspects linked to a failed military mutiny last month.

Sudan's army has said that rebel leader Minni Minnawi's Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) - the only Darfur insurgent group to sign a peace deal with Khartoum - is now a military target. Any clashes between the army and the SLA would be a severe major blow to Darfur's stalling peace process, with other rebel groups sceptical of Khartoum's willingness to honour any accord they may sign.

Makerere University has phased out 80 departments following its move to become a collegiate institution next academic year. The 88-year-old institution had 22 faculties, schools and institutes but will now operate under eight colleges and two schools after the University Council approved the recommendations last month. James Okello, the deputy academic registrar in-charge of Senate, said the current structure was overloaded and the new development would help fight red tape, reduce duplication of roles and optimise the available resources.

A Saudi Arabian investor plans to invest in a 5,000 hectare farm and a fruit-processing plant in Zambia, the African country’s Finance Minister Situmbeko Musokotwane said. The contract will be signed in the next three months for the land, which will be leased, Musokotwane told reporters in Riyadh at a conference today. He didn’t identify the Saudi investor.

In an interview with The Africa Report, the founder of the Niger Delta People’s Volunteer Force. explains why the Niger Delta's troubles remain central to Nigeria's politics. 'The NDPVF was formed after the 2003 elections when the government threatened that they wanted me dead because of my views. I had offered to be a witness at Muhammadu Buhari’s election tribunal hearing. They were shocked that as close as I was to Odili, I would be willing to give evidence against his party’s conduct of the 2003 election in Rivers State.'

A three-year plan to address the quality of education in Africa was launched in Tunis on Friday with various education officials from Africa calling for radical reforms to set guidelines for the sector. The programme, which begins in 2011, to be hosted in the Burkina Faso capital, Ouagadougou, is on the theme, 'Education and training in service of Africa’s sustainable development.' Organisers say that the goal is to adapt education mechanisms to train competences to meet the needs expressed by companies and the job market.

The military Joint Task Force (JTF) battling militants in Nigeria's oil producing Niger Delta region last Wednesday raided and destroyed three camps operated by militant John Togo, seizing several weapons, a military spokesman said. The JTF spokesman, Lt.-Col Timothy Antigha, however said Thursday it was too early to give casualty figures, while denying rebels' claim that 100 people, mostly civilians, were killed in the attack, in the creeks of Delta state.

Forum for the Empowerment of Women (FEW) a Johannesburg based organisation that advocates for lesbians’ rights, strongly condemns the vicious attack of 21-year-old Ncumisa Mzamelo in an apparent hate crime. According to reports, Mzamelo’s lifestyle could have been why she was murdered, dumped in a disused toilet and her body set on fire. The circumstances and the severe brutality of the attack are indicative that the victim may have been targeted because of her sexual orientation. The intersectionality of black lesbians identities continue to put them at risk of being 'corrected' of their sexuality.

Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has said that elections could not take place in his country without reforms and a constitutional review, despite President Robert Mugabe's threat to call one next year. Tsvangirai formed a power-sharing government with Mugabe after disputed 2008 elections, and both promised to work together to reform the Constitution and organise a referendum to approve it before new elections.

A report into conditions at the De Doorns safety camp, set up to house victims of xenophobic violence in the Western Cape town, has found that conditions did not meet international guidelines for disaster victims. 'Too often have the narratives surrounding the xenophobic attacks in De Doorns centred around the causes of the attacks, which has inadvertently lent some legitimacy to the an underlying opinion that xenophobic violence is justified in some cases, for some causes. This, in turn, seems to have given rise to the sentiment that the victims of these xenophobic attacks are not entitled to the same rights and assistance as other disaster victims.'

Some cried. Some were confused. They looked on in disbelief as a local female surgeon tried in vain thrice, probably using a very blunt knife, to cut off a girl’s clitoris. Once cut, the girl was pushed aside. Then seven other girls were circumcised. The eight are part of over 120 girls who have been mutilated in Sebei region since the Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) season kicked off in Sebei in eastern Uganda. The government passed a law prohibiting FGM in December 2009 but nobody in the FGM areas seems to care.

The United States and its allies should give much more attention - and resources - to ensuring that weak West African governments along the oil- and gas-rich Gulf of Guinea can protect their territory and coastal regions from terrorists, drug and human traffickers, and other threats, according to new report by an influential think tank released here this week. The 80-page report, published by the Washington-based Atlantic Council, warns that current economic and political conditions, as well as regional demographic trends are 'creating a fertile environment where illicit groups including acolytes of radical Islam can readily win new adherents'.

Egypt does not want to see a divided Sudan after the 9 January 2011 referendum, fearing an independent South will threaten its stranglehold on the River Nile waters, a leaked US embassy cable has revealed. In the cables published by online whistleblower WikiLeaks, Egypt had even asked the US government to help postpone the referendum by four to six years. The position is radically divergent from that of Intergovernmental Authority on Development (Igad) which on behalf of African Union has been pushing the Sudan parties to adhere to the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) and hold the referendum next year as scheduled.

Mauritanian newspapers this week devoted a large part of their analysis and comments to President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz's offer of dialogue to the opposition during the 50th anniversary of the country’s independence. In its Wednesday 1 December edition, 'Le Quotidien de Nouakchott' asked if the Coordination of Democratic Opposition (COD), which brings together nine political parties, has swallowed the precondition of the points included in the Dakar agreement. The Dakar agreement led to the holding of the 18 July, 2009 presidential election, which helped the country return to the rule of law after the 6 August, 2008 coup.