Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, one of Africa's longest serving leaders, won election to a fourth term in office by a huge margin on Sunday but the opposition rejected the outcome. Electoral commission results handed Museveni 68 per cent of the vote against challenger Kizza Besigye's 26 per cent.

IDPs (Internally Displaced Persons) travelling to Southern Sudan before and after the recent referendum on independence have faced difficulties during and after their journey. Between November 2010 and January 2011, around 200,000 Southern Sudanese IDPs living in the north returned to the south. There have been various reports of convoys of returning southerners being attacked in the disputed region of Abyei during and in the weeks following the January referendum, according to some reports by Misseriya tribal militias loyal to the government in Khartoum.

Environmental activists are hopeful that negotiations at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to curb fisheries subsidies, especially those on fuel, can produce a deal that will help end overfishing. Agreement would not only help reverse the alarming depletion of global fish stocks and contribute to a broader trade deal in the WTO’s long-running Doha round, but would provide a template for tackling global problems such as climate change that have a trade dimension.

Twenty four per cent of adults living in urban centres are now using the internet, according to the latest Zimbabwe All Media Products and Services Survey (ZAMPS). The figure represents a two per cent increase in the last three months alone.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has backed calls for reform of the media law in Rwanda following the ruling of the High Court in Kigali which sentenced the editor and a journalist of the private newspaper, Umurabyo, to lengthy jail terms for 'ethnic discrimination, genocide ideology, defamation and inciting civil disobedience'. 'The need for reforming the Rwandan media law to decriminalize press offences is urgent in the light of this harsh ruling against the two journalists,' said Gabriel Baglo, Director of IFJ Africa Office.

Closing arguments in a civil case initiated by foreign nationals seeking compensation from the state for damages suffered during the May 2008 xenophobic attacks were heard in the Western Cape High Court last Thursday. A group of 11 Somali, Ethiopian and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) nationals are suing the Safety and Security Ministry, claiming police did not protect them during the 2008 attacks.

Algerian students staged a two-day sit-in last week outside the higher education ministry in Algiers in order to demand that authorities not lessen the value of their degrees under a new system. The sit-in, which ended on Thursday (17 February), sought greater prestige for engineering degrees by granting them the same status as a Level 2 masters degree, enabling students who hold them to progress to PhD studies.

South African President Jacob Zuma’s facilitation team is due to travel to Harare, to meet with representatives from Zimbabwe’s three main political parties. Zuma’s international advisor, Lindiwe Zulu confirmed the trip, saying the parties had given her 'people to work with'. She explained that her team would meet with the parties separately, and collectively, to draw up a framework and discuss what is to be included in the roadmap for elections.

In a a sign that the first cracks are starting to show in the Libyan regime, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's son warned in a lengthy and rambling address broadcast live last night that the overthrow of the regime would lead to civil war and the break-up of the country, reports the UK's Independent. The address by Saif Gaddafi, who is viewed as reform-minded in the West, came as the first major anti-government protests spread to the capital, Tripoli, striking at the heart of the regime and making Colonel Gaddafi's 42-year hold on power appear increasingly precarious.

Libya has handed out more than $2 billion in loans to dozens of governments across the globe, according to an internal document that shows the oil exporter's diplomatic ambitions and its struggles to recover its debts. The biggest debtor mentioned in the document is Libya's neighbour Sudan with an outstanding balance of $1.287 billion, part of Sudan's debilitating external debt of almost $40 billion.

Jean Paul Noel Abdi, President of the Ligue Djiboutienne des Droits Humains, has been arrested on 9 February 2011 and is detained at the prison of Gabode. Jean Paul Noel Abdi is unfairly accused of 'participation in an insurrectionary movement' on the basis of Articles 145 and 146.4 of the Djiboutian Penal Code for having carried out his activities as human rights defender by denouncing the repression, on 8 February 2011, of a student demonstration by the security forces.

Bloomberg reports that Djiboutian authorities released three opposition leaders as opponents of President Ismail Guelleh clashed with police in the second day of protests against his rule, a party head said. Mohamed Daoud Chehem, head of the Djibouti Party for Development; Ismael Guedi Hared, president of the Union for a Democratic Alternative; and Aden Robleh Awaleh, leader of the National Democratic Party, were detained yesterday morning (18 February), Awaleh said in a telephone interview from the capital, Djibouti.

Tidiane Kassé

Eric Toussaint

Firoze Manji

« Intervention chirurgicale » en Cote d’Ivoire : la stratégie du pire ?
Pierre Sané

This briefing relies on new research into how new technologies are being used by abusers and by women fighting back. The cases were uncovered in research commissioned by the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) in 12 developing countries in 2009, unless an additional website reference is included.

The Algerian government has said it will end its 19-year-old state of emergency 'within days'. Mourad Medelci, the foreign minister, made the announcement on Monday, echoing a similar promise made by Abdelaziz Bouteflika, the president, earlier this month. A state of emergency has been in place in Algeria since 1992 and the government has come under pressure to remove the laws following popular uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia.

Human Rights defenders are outraged after Malawian President Bingu wa Mutharika passed a Bill outlawing lesbianism. The new Section 137A, titled 'Indecent practices between females', states that any female person who, whether in public or private, commits 'any act of gross indecency with another female', shall be guilty of an offence and liable to a prison term of five years.

Bertha Hamases is a tall, lanky woman with a weathered face and a friendly sparkle in her eyes. A few years ago she was one of the many people circling the drain in Otjivero, a dead end settlement one hundred kilometres from the capital. Here evicted farm workers gathered in misery. For Hamases, a single mom with four kids aged between 9 and 16, life looked hopeless. Until a coalition of civil society organisations picked Otjivero for a privately-funded pilot project to show that a universal basic income grant can make all the difference.

On Sunday, 13 February - just 48 hours after the resignation of Hosni Mubarak as president of Egypt in response to 18 days of street demonstrations - physician, novelist and former political prisoner Nawal El Saadawi welcomed 12 other women's rights activists into her Cairo apartment. They joined to celebrate and look forward and backward. 'We need to guarantee that there is no abortion of the revolution,' she told Women's eNews, adding that she had already been in touch with women and men as to how to proceed in this new Egypt. 'I have confidence in the revolution. I am optimistic by nature. I believe in the collective power of women and men.'

In Ghana’s capital city, Accra, a commotion stirs along the train tracks near the central railway station. Dozens gather to hear the news - that soon, their homes and workplaces will be razed for a new rail system. 'Last year we came to warn you to leave the railway lands. Last week we came again. And today, too, we have come,' Accra’s mayor, Alfred Vanderpuije, tells the crowd in Twi, a local language as he tours the site. 'I can’t tell you if I will come tomorrow or tomorrow next. But we will come and we will demolish all of the structures.'

The Communication Initiative (The CI) and the BBC World Service Trust (WST) invite entries for their first contest on the role of media in democratic development. This contest solicits persuasive critiques and encouraging discussion on the relationship between media, communications, and international development policy. CI Network members from around the world (as well as those who wish to become CI Network members) are requested to submit their opinion pieces to the collaborative blog at Communication, Media, and Development Policy.