Fewer Zimbabweans are getting infected with AIDS, and researchers speculate it's due in part to a battered economy that's leaving men short of money to be sugar daddies and keep mistresses. Presenting a study of the infection rate among pregnant women at a major international AIDS conference in South Africa this week, Dr. Michael Silverman said the prevalence of the virus that causes AIDS fell from 23 percent in 2001 to 11 percent at the end of 2008.

China is not the only power to begin to engage with Africa in recent years. The number of such emerging powers has increased to include Brazil, India, the Arab states and others, notwithstanding South Africa as a strategic African actor and Russia’s resurgence in this analysis. For this reason we have modified the name of the China–Africa Watch section of Pambazuka News to include analyses on the range of emerging powers. China–Africa Watch will now be called . Articles and news items previously published in China–Africa Watch will still be found in the section, while news summaries from other sites on the actions of emerging powers in Africa will be found in a new section, Emerging powers news.

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Once again the heavy-handedness of the Kenyan police has resulted in the arrest of 27 young members of Bunge La Wananchi this week in Limuru. They were locked up for simply voicing their concern as citizens of Kenya for the accountable use of CDF funds in Kenya. Solidarity Network Kenya calls for their immediate release.

United Nations humanitarian agencies have stepped up their relief efforts in the West African country of Benin, where more than 20,000 people have been displaced or affected and numerous farms destroyed by floods. Mosquito nets, water purification tablets, blankets, tents and mats are being distributed and assistance is being provided with water and sanitation and with maternal health care in the wake of the floods.

Angola's move to hold its elections this year are doubtful following the absence of a Constitution. Media reports in the rich oil nation said the country's body in charge of drafting a new constitution said preparations of the document would take longer than expected.

Further evidence has emerged that a substantial proportion of switches to second-line treatment in a resource-limited setting, triggered in the absence of viral load testing, are unnecessary and result in an avoidable inflation in drug costs as people switch to more expensive regimens. The findings, published in the August 1st edition of Clinical Infectious Diseases, are likely to lend further support to calls for viral load testing to be made more accessible in resource-limited settings to confirm cases of suspected treatment failure.

Nigeria's gas flare-out date has once again been extended - this time to 2011. The decision follows 25 years of political procrastination by the federal government and illegal behaviour on the part of major oil multinationals engaged in flaring associated gas (AG), the byproduct of oil production in the Niger Delta.

This report seeks to provide an overview of existing social protection policy and programming initiatives in the West and Central Africa and to assess the extent to which these address the particular manifestations of childhood poverty and vulnerability that characterise different countries in the region. It highlights challenges in the design and implementation of child-sensitive social protection and offers a number of policy recommendations based on the analysis and lessons learned.

As commercial sex workers in South Africa are fighting for the legalization of sex working, a report by Open Society Institute has revealed harrowing human rights violations inflicted to this minority group by society. Compiled by Open Society Institute’s Sexual Health and Rights Project together with Open Society’s Initiative for Southern Africa this report states that trans women sex workers faced not only physical and sexual violence from police but also public taunting and humiliation for their sexual orientation, gender identity and the kind of work they do.

eBrain, the national ICT4D network in Zambia and IICD partner since 2002, will play a key role in organising the 2010 eLearning Africa Conference in Lusaka, Zambia. This annual international conference is the biggest event in digital learning in Africa.

The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) is continuing to kill and kidnap civilians in northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), according to the UN. In the first fortnight of July alone, the Ugandan rebel group carried out 33 attacks in the districts of Upper and Lower Uele, killing 26 civilians and abducting 144, according to a report by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has announced plans to invest up to US$97 million over 10 years in improving antiretroviral (ARV) treatment for children and adults in sub-Saharan Africa. The world's second largest drug manufacturer has pledged $16 million in seed funding to a public-private partnership that will develop new paediatric formulations of ARV drugs, GSK said in a statement this week.

The United Nations agency tasked with promoting adequate shelter for all has committed to ensuring better protection of land and property rights for people uprooted from their homes in Africa, which hosts nearly half of the total number of displaced persons worldwide. UN-HABITAT and the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) signed a Memorandum of Understanding last week committing them to this common goal.

Finance Minister Tendai Biti used a budget presentation Thursday to announce that civil servants will now be paid salaries, in place of the current flat US$100 allowance. He also scrapped import duty on all Information Communication Technology (ICT) products like computers and cell phones. Duty on capital investment equipment will be scrapped while duty on basic commodities will be waived until November this year. Those importing passenger type motor vehicles of 15-20 passengers will pay duty of 15 percent beginning August.

With at least one election result annulled and several candidates arrested, Moroccans are seeing courts take a more active role in dealing with cases of electoral fraud. On Monday (July 13th), the Marrakech administrative court annulled election results in the Menara district, following an appeal by the Front of Democratic Forces (FFD) over irregularities. The ruling overturned the election of PAM candidate Fatima Zahra Mansouri as Marrakech mayor.

A public presentation of the "Progress of the World's Women" report by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) in Pretoria, South Africa this week suggests that one of the most powerful constraints on realising women's rights and achieving the Millennium Development Goals is a lack of accountability to women's needs.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and subsequent instruments of international human rights law and international humanitarian law play a vital role in providing protection for refugees and IDPs. Yet the claim to universality has been disputed and not all states have acceded to these legal instruments. It seems that a particular point of controversy or dispute in the Islamic world is their compatibility with sharia. This publication aims to enhance debate and understanding of the concepts and instruments of international human rights in the Islamic world.

Gay rights organisations in Cameroon have accused the country’s Catholic Church and the media of deliberately causing confusion about the Maputo Protocol with the intention to influence the public to have negative attitudes towards homosexuality. This comes after Cameroonian President Paul Biya ratified the Maputo Protocol, known in full as, the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights of Women in Africa, during the sixth anniversary of the Maputo Protocol on 11 July this year.

During the 1990s, the Republic of Congo, like most countries, experienced significant growth in the telecommunications sector. However, the liberalisation of the telecommunications market in 1997, when the monopoly held by the National Office of Posts and Telecommunications (ONPT) gave way to free competition among multiple operators, was not free of problems, and the country continues to suffer the effects today.