Some donors would be willing to cancel Zimbabwe's 5.4 billion dollar foreign debt, if the strained unity government presents a united proposal to settle it, the finance minister said Thursday.

Some Zanu PF PF youths on Wednesday detained freelance photo-journalist Andrison Manyere for filming a demonstration held in the capital, Harare. Manyere was seized at the corner of Fourth Street and Jason Moyo Avenue whilst covering the demonstration organized by the Zanu PF youths to protest against the imposition and maintenance of targeted travel sanctions on the party’s leaders.

Four white students accused of making a racist video in South Africa will face trial, after attempts failed to resolve the matter out of court. The video, which caused a racial storm in 2008 allegedly shows the four forcing five black cleaners to eat meat soaked in urine

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has agreed to restore Zimbabwe's voting rights after a seven-year suspension for unpaid debts. But the fund said the country was still ineligible for loans until it had paid off more of the $1.3bn (£841m) it owes to creditors. In the meantime, Zimbabwe can take part in IMF decision-making.

Fighting between militia groups and Congolese armed forces supported by the UN, as well as attacks and violence against civilians, caused the displacement of around a million people in the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in 2009. As a result of these and earlier episodes, over 2.1 million people were displaced in North and South Kivu and Orientale Province as of the end of 2009.

Nearly a fifth of the population in Chad will suffer food shortages this year, part of a broader hunger problem looming in the Sahel region, the United Nations said on Thursday. "Two million Chadians, or 18 percent of the population, are in a situation of food insecurity," said Michele Flavigna, the U.N.'s representative in Chad told a news conference.

The Third Meeting, Third Session of the Second East African Legislative Assembly sitting at the Chambers of the Parliament of Uganda in Kampala has today adopted a common strategy for food security in the region. In a lively plenary session chaired by the Speaker of EALA, Hon. Abdirahin Haithar Abdi, Members adopted the Report on common strategy for food security in the EAC as presented by the Chair of the Committee on Agriculture, Tourism and Natural Resources, Hon. Dr. George Francis Nangale (Tanzania).

Nigeria's much-bashed electoral umpire Maurice Iwu is under fire again, after the country's main opposition party Sunday demanded his sack over a series of allegations. Iwu heads Nigeria's Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), and has been widely vilified for organising what local and foreign observers consider to be the worst elections in the country's history in 2007.

SADC tribunal rulings against the seizure of farmers land in Zimbabwe should be registered, recognised and enforceable by the South African government, the High Court in Pretoria has ordered. Judge Garth Rabie ruled in favour of white farmers - represented by AfriForum - who have argued that the seizure of their land without compensation was a human rights abuse.

Ivory Coast authorities have announced a new election commission, key to ending disputes that have threatened the country's peace process. The crisis began two weeks ago, when President Laurent Gbagbo dissolved the previous body, accusing it of fraud and being controlled by the opposition.

South African trade unions are threatening strikes after the country's government allowed state-owned power firm Eskom to raise prices by 24.8%. Both consumers and businesses will struggle with significantly higher electricity bills, unions argue. The Johannesburg Chamber of Commerce and Industry said firms were already struggling to cope with the fallout of recession and slow economic recovery.

In the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the West moved quickly to crack down on the money laundering and secret banking systems that fund much of the terrorism in the world. But as evidence in both the U.S. and Europe suggests, illicit finances continue to circulate around the globe — and quite often the money has nothing to do with violence, but plain greed.

The World Bank’s private investment arm, the International Finance Corp., won’t make new commitments in Democratic Republic of Congo until a dispute over a canceled mining contract is resolved, an IFC spokesman said. The IFC owns 7.5% of a $553 million copper and cobalt project led by Canada’s First Quantum Minerals Ltd. that Congo canceled in August after a review of mining contracts. The case is now before an international arbitration court in Paris.

A three-day seminar to discuss ways to strength en cross-border co-operation for the protection of children at risk and to better regulate inter-country adoption has opened in Pretoria, South Africa. South Africa's Department of International Relations and Cooperation and the Hag ue Conference on Private International Law based in the Netherlands are co-hosting the seminar, which opened Tuesday.

South Africa's land reform minister said on Friday it would be impossible for the government to meet its own target of acquiring farm land to restore to blacks after it was taken from them during apartheid.

The process of drafting a new Zimbabwean constitution has been further delayed, meaning the country’s new charter is now running seven months behind schedule. A co-leader of parliament’s constitutional committee Munyaradzi- Paul Mangwana told journalists in Harare this week that Zimbabwe would not have a new constitution before February 2011 at the earliest.

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) has sentenced the former head of legal affairs at the Ministry of Defence to 25 years in prison. Lieut-Col Eprem Setako was found guilty of genocide and crimes against humanity.
He was convicted of ordering the killing of at least 30 people at a military camp in 1994.

Members of Niger's military junta and the interim administration it is setting up will not be allowed to run future democratic elections. Junta spokesman Abdoul Karim Goukoye reiterated that the coup leaders' priorities were to hold transparent polls and restore democracy.

The Angolan government should promptly release three human rights defenders who were arrested on apparently political grounds following the January 8, 2010 attack on Togolese footballers in Cabinda, Human Rights Watch has said. Human Rights Watch also expressed concern about the continued detention without charge of five other people.

The Secretary General of the General Agriculture and Plantation Workers Union of Zimbabwe (GAPWUZ) is back in hiding this week after police raided the union’s offices on Wednesday. Gertrude Hambira fled to safety after five men and one woman, who identified themselves as officers from the Criminal Investigation Department, raided the union’s office in Harare apparently looking for her. Hambira, who wasn’t in the office at the time, is now in hiding fearing for her safety.