A newly-formed Black coalition has announced a rally and march on the White House to take place November 7, 2009 beginning in Washington, D.C.’s historic Malcolm X Park. The Rally and March are to protest the expanding U.S. wars and other policy initiatives that unfairly target African and other oppressed people around the world. Known as the Black is Back Coalition for Social Justice, Peace and Reparations, the coalition formed on September 12, 2009 during a meeting in Washington, D.C. of more than fifteen activists from various Black organizations, institutions and communities.

The resource-based corruption and international greed that has typified so much of the West's interactions with African countries has now arrived in the tiny and impoverished West African country of Gabon. Only this time, the external predator, working in tandem with a venal, autocratic local ruler, isn't the West - it's China.

The Kibaki administration is ruffled by the United States Government latest actions on Kenya and it has nothing to do with travel bans. Money is at stake and the soft underbelly of the regime is exposed. Although it touts itself as financially self-reliant, in truth the Grand Coalition Government of Mwai Kibaki and Raila Odinga cannot afford to ignore the International Community and especially the United States’ stated intention of scrutinising all loans and financial programmes for Kenya by the International Financial Institutions.

Slum Dwellers International (SDI) echoes the outrage that has been widely expressed in response to the violent attacks perpetrated against AbM in Kennedy Road over the weekend. These attacks come as no surprise. They mirror similar acts of violence that are regularly perpetrated against slum dwellers throughout the world. Only last month shack dwellers in Old Fadama, Accra, Ghana, also had to deal with an outward manifestation of ethnic violence, which was in fact an attack launched by vested political and property interests against organized communities of the urban poor. Almost two years ago SDI members were seriously affected by the violence against the urban poor that ripped through Kenya's informal settlements. At this very moment SDI linked groups in Gauteng and Cape Town face similar threats. SDI groups in Zimbabwe had to deal with devastating evictions in 2005. The list goes on and on.

Ramakrishna Karuturi does not feature on any international power list. Perhaps he should. A new UNCTAD (UN Conference on Trade and Development) report names Karuturi Global Ltd as one of the top 25 agri transnational corporations in the world. Another report, by the International Food Policy Research Institute, says he owns one of the world's largest landbanks — over 3,000 sq km. In a conversation with The Times of India, he claimed, "I'm the largest landbank holder in the world."

The Zimbabwe Social Forum (ZSF) will be hosting the 5th edition of its annual commemoration in Harare, on the 2nd of October 2009. The theme for this year’s activities is, “Reclaiming the Political Transition for People-Centered Governance; and Sustainable Social and Economic Reform.”

In the past several years, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has bolstered its diplomatic presence and garnered international goodwill through its financing of infrastructure and natural resource development projects, assistance in the carrying out of such projects, and large economic investments in many developing countries. This report examines China’s economic impact in three regions — Africa, Latin America (Western Hemisphere), and Southeast Asia — with an emphasis on bilateral foreign assistance.

Since its founding 60 years ago, the People's Republic of China has been transformed from a centrally planned economy to a market economy. The journey has been fraught with twists and turns on a road paved with hardship, upheavals and reversals. It's been an important process, however, as any search for direction in the course of human development. And it's taught us valuable lessons about the entire process of a planned-to-market economy transformation.

Willy Jackson

Pierre Calame

The refugees are arriving at an overwhelming average rate of 6,400 a month, adding more pressure on the already overstretched facilities and resources in Dadaab camps in northern Kenya, which currently host three times the population they were designed to hold.

A comprehensive land audit to establish who owns what after almost a decade of often chaotic land transfers in Zimbabwe is being stalled by a lack of money. President Robert Mugabe launched the fast-track land reform programme in 2000 to redistribute white-owned commercial farms to landless blacks.

Kenya's older citizens are not safe from the HIV/AIDS epidemic, according to the final report of the 2007 Kenya AIDS Indicator Survey. The survey, released on 24 September, also showed that the country's epidemic varies greatly from region to region, while HIV testing remains low due to low risk perception among the population.

In latest report from the SAIIA China in Africa project, Chris Alden and Cristina and Alves argues that China’s energy policy, particularly continues remains a strategic focus in Beijing’s foreign policy making and underpins China’s economic foray into Africa’s natural resources.

The World Food Programme says that, for the first time, the number of people facing hunger worldwide has topped one billion, but who is to blame for this and what can be done to stem the flow of starvation? Inside Story speaks to Bettina Luescher, Christina Schiavoni, and Pambazuka's Firoze Manji.

Reporters Without Borders reiterates its call for the release of Rodrigo Angue Nguema, the Malabo correspondent of Agence France-Presse and Radio France Internationale, who has been held in the capital’s Black Beach prison for the past 100 days. He was tried on a defamation charge on 1 September but the court has yet to issue a verdict.

A six-year clinical trial in Thailand has yielded the first ever evidence that an AIDS vaccine can provide some protection against HIV infection. The trial team in Bangkok, Thailand's capital announced on 24 September that rates of HIV infection were 31 percent lower in trial participants who got the vaccine than in those who received a placebo.

Eritrea ranks last place on the latest Reporters Without Borders (RSF) index measuring the level of press freedom in 173 countries. Privately owned press have been banished by the authoritarian President Issaias Afeworki since 2001, and the few journalists who dare to criticise the regime are thrown in prison, says RSF. Four journalists have died in detention and, currently, at least 30 journalists and two media workers are believed to be in prison without trial.

Sixty years ago, as Mao Zedong declared the founding of a new communist nation, considered a pariah state. Today t is a world power with sweeping influence -- it is financing America's debt, snapping up access to natural resources in Africa and Latin America, and making its voice heard on major diplomatic issues.

Google Inc.’s recent restrictions on ads for abortion services in fifteen countries raises questions about the influence of search engine provider policies on freedom of information. In withholding access to this kind of information, are women’s rights being violated?

In Liberia citizens’ reaction has been mixed to a 16 September UN Security Council decision extending the UN peacekeeping mission (UNMIL) to assist with the planned 2011 presidential and legislative elections.