20091130

YAOUNDE (Reuters) - The developed world should pay African countries to preserve their vast forests to help the fight against climate change, some of the continent's governments will argue at next month's summit in Copenhagen.

The position of the group of equatorial African countries -- home to the world's second-largest rainforest after the Amazon -- underscores rifts between industrialised nations responsible for the bulk of greenhouse gas emissions and the developing world seeking compensation to keep development in check.

"African countries of the Congo Basin are not part of the problem, but they are part of the solution by preserving the rainforest which acts as a defence against global warming," said co-chair of the Congo Basin Forest Fund (CBFF) and former Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin.

"In so doing, they deprive millions of their people who depend on the forest for their livelihoods. The rest of the world, particularly the industrialised North, must recognise this and understand that somebody has to pay the price for preservation," he said.

The Congo Basin forests cover an estimated 200 million hectares and provide food, shelter and livelihood for more than 50 million people.

CBFF is associated with the Congo Basin Forest Partnership, a U.N. registered group with ten member states -- Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Equatorial Guinea, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Republic of Congo, Rwanda, and Sao Tome and Principe.

According to the CBFF, the forests have been storing an estimated 500 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year, offsetting about 1.7 percent of global emissions of the gas widely blamed for global warming.

But growing populations, expanding subsistence agriculture, road construction, mining and rising Asian demand for hardwood lumber have intensified pressure on the Congo Basin, which has been depleted at a rate of 1 percent per year.

20091130

NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya has seized 1,100 kg of ivory and arrested 65 people in the past three months in a major international operation stretching across six African nations, its director of wildlife said on Monday.

Julius Kipng'etich of the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) said the seizures and arrests were carried out in an international operation aimed at tackling wildlife crime in Africa.

"Kenya's elephant population, like those of other African countries, continues to suffer from intensified poaching to supply increasing amounts of ivory to international markets," he said in a statement.

Rising complexity of wildlife crime required a sophisticated law enforcement response, he said, adding the operation involved KWS and Interpol operating across Kenya, Burundi, Ethiopia, Uganda, Rwanda and Tanzania.

"(This) is among the biggest hauls ever recorded... it shows the ability and will of law enforcement to tackle wildlife crime effectively," said Peter Younger, Manager of Interpol's Africa wildlife crime program in a statement.

Interpol has been working with African police forces and customs, wildlife and security agencies to target local ivory markets, airports, border crossings and known smuggling points.

Six of those arrested in the exercise, dubbed Operation Costa, were foreign nationals. Firearms, ammunition, vehicles, big cat skins and other illegal wildlife products were also seized.

Almost half the ivory confiscated in Kenya was seized at Nairobi's main airport, Jomo Kenyatta, and authorities believe huge quantities were destined for markets in the Far East.

20091130

MADRID (Reuters) - Three Spanish aid workers who disappeared in Mauritania on Sunday appear to have been kidnapped by a group linked to al Qaeda, Spain's Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said.

"Although we still can't be completely sure of anything, everything indicates that it was a kidnapping, and, if so, as I fear it was, everything indicates that it was a kidnapping by AQIM, al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb," Rubalcaba told Spanish radio on Monday.

Albert Vilalta, Alicia Gamez and Roque Pascual disappeared from a convoy run by a Barcelona-based humanitarian aid organisation to deliver computers and other equipment to poor communities.

Mauritanian security sources said an attack took place on the road between the capital Nouakchott and the coastal trading city of Nouadhibou.

"I heard my colleagues in one of the cars, specifically I was talking to Roque Pascual, who said 'soldiers, soldiers, machine guns, machine guns'," Joseph Carbonell, head of the aid group Barcelona-Accio Solidaria, told Reuters.

"We found the vehicle empty, well, empty of people but their personal belonging or any money, was still there, nothing else had been touched," said Carbonell, who was travelling in another car ahead of the convoy and talking with his colleagues by telephone at the time of the attack.

There has been no communication yet from the kidnappers, Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos told a news conference in Portugal.

Mauritania has been a source of growing security concern since Islamist gunmen claimed responsibility for the slaying of four French tourists in late 2007 and then a September 2008 beheading of Mauritanian soldiers on a patrol.

Al Qaeda's North Africa wing claimed responsibility for a botched suicide bomb attack on the French embassy in Mauritania in August which injured three people.

20091130

GENEVA (Reuters) - The United Nations called on richer governments on Monday to provide a total of $7.1 billion in 2010 to fund urgent humanitarian assistance for 48 million people in 25 countries.

It was the largest sum sought for such aid, in what is known as the annual Humanitarian Appeal, since the world body started making consolidated calls for funding to tackle crises in different parts of the world in 1991.

"Our aim is to help people survive the coming year, and start working their way out of vulnerability towards the dignity, safety and self-sufficiency to which every human being has a right," said U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon.

Ban's remarks, in a foreword to the text of the appeal issued in Geneva, was coupled with a call from his top humanitarian relief coordinator John Holmes for major governments not to cut aid because of the economic crisis.

Funds collected in the Consolidated Appeal Process are shared among some 380 aid organisations, including U.N. agencies, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and other international bodies working in the relief field.

All have worked together to compile the appeal and detail the needs of the countries and regions it targets, which include Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, the occupied Palestinian territories, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.

"We are here to ask for a response to the urgent call of people whose lives have been wrecked by conflict and natural disasters," Holmes, U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, told a Geneva news conference.

He noted that many governments were engaged in financial bail-outs and economic stimulus packages on the domestic front, putting pressure on other budget needs.

20091130

MALABO (Reuters) - Equatorial Guinea's President Teodoro Obiang Nguema won 96.7 percent of the vote in the central African country's election, according to provisional results on Monday of a poll criticised for falling short of democratic standards.

The figure was published on the government's website after returns from around a quarter of voting stations.

Sunday's election was the latest in a string of polls in Africa this year entrenching a ruling party or legitimising a military takeover amid accusations of fraud, raising concerns of a trend away from democracy on the continent.

Obiang came to power 30 years ago and is now set for a further seven-year term in which he is expected to pursue his goal of transforming the tiny country of 650,000 into a major energy producer despite mounting human rights concerns.

"Provisional results -- overwhelming victory for the candidate of the PDGE (ruling party), Obiang Nguema Mbasogo," the website said of Sunday's election, using Obiang's full name.

The provisional result was just short of Obiang's 2002 score of 97.1 percent and will come as little surprise to analysts and critics who noted the lack of credible rivals, and the lack of access to the elections for foreign media.

NO SURPRISES

"The result was never in any kind of doubt," said independent Africa risk analyst Antony Goldman.

"The president has always been fairly keen on continuity in policy, and it would be a surprise if there were any significant change in the short term."

20091130

ISIOLO, Kenya (Reuters) - Hundreds of Somali refugees have fled to Kenya after rebels suspected of links to al Qaeda seized a Somali town near the border, residents said.

Al Shabaab insurgents, who Washington says are a proxy for Osama bin Laden's group in Somalia, took control of Dhobley on Saturday after chasing rival Hizbul Islam rebels out of town.

Al Shabaab said a number of Hizbul Islam leaders had also sought shelter across the border in Kenya after the fighting.

"A group of Somalis sneaked in late last night but three trucks with more than 200 Somalis were intercepted by patrol officers at dawn today and all those on board taken back to the border," said Abdirizak, a Kenyan resident near the border.

There were also fears among Kenyan residents that al Shabaab might carry the fight across the border.

"We are worried. Al Shabaab has threatened to attack Kenya. They are very close and some of us might leave the border area."

A senior al Shabaab official said in June the insurgents might "invade" Kenya unless it reduced troop numbers along the border near places such as Dhobley.

Police deputy commander for the region, Paul Kuria, said security officials were patrolling the frontier.

20091130

ATHENS (Reuters) - Somali pirates have seized a Greek-flagged oil tanker near the Seychelles, more than 700 miles off the coast of Somalia, Greece's coastguard said on Monday.

The 300,294-dwt Maran Centaurus was sailing from Kuwait to the Gulf of Mexico with a crew of 28 when it was seized early on Sunday.

"About nine armed pirates attacked the tanker and seized it, 700 miles off the Somali coast, near the Seychelles," said a coastguard official who requested anonymity.

The official said there were nine Greeks, two Ukrainians, one Romanian and 16 Filipinos on board the tanker.

Maran Tankers Management, the Greek managing company, said the ship was now heading towards the Somali coast. "We only know that the crew is well," a company official who did not want to be identified told Reuters.

A Greek navy frigate, taking part in the EU naval operation against piracy in the region, was shadowing the tanker, the Greek Defence Ministry said.

Heavily armed gangs from Somalia have made tens of millions of dollars in ransoms by seizing ships using the strategic shipping lanes that link Europe to Asia.

20091130

GENEVA (Reuters) - Developing countries called on Sunday for a quick deal in the World Trade Organisation's Doha round of talks to help poor nations by removing unfair distortions in the global trading system.

Trade ministers from Brazil, India and Indonesia issued the call after a meeting on the eve of a WTO conference in Geneva.

"We want to keep this round alive and we want to conclude it early and successfully, and by successfully we mean friendly to development," Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim told a news conference.

Indian Trade Minister Anand Sharma and Indonesian Trade Minister Mari Pangestu echoed his words, while ministers from other developing nations from Argentina to China sat with them.

"The developing countries ... have much at stake, most to gain and much to lose," Sharma said.

NOT ON THE AGENDA

The Doha round was launched eight years ago to open markets and help developing countries prosper through more trade.

WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy says the agreement is 80 percent there, but big differences remain on exactly how the WTO's 153 members will cut agricultural and manufacturing tariffs, slash farm subsidies and open trade in services.

20091130

MADRID (Reuters) - A West Saharan activist on hunger strike at a Spanish airport has rejected the country's offer of a Spanish passport in a bid to help her return home, the activist's lawyer said on Sunday.

Aminatou Haidar has been at Lanzarote airport in the Canary Islands refusing food for two weeks, ever since she was expelled from her desert homeland by Moroccan authorities who say she refused to sign a paper saying she was a Moroccan citizen.

Surviving on sugared water, Haidar's deteriorating condition has become an embarrassment for the Spanish government which has tried to find ways to get her to eat again and also to allow her to return home.

Haidar, who has campaigned for independence of Western Sahara from Morocco, cannot travel because Moroccan authorities took her passport away from her before putting her on a flight to Spain.

Spain's latest attempt to find a solution ended in failure on Sunday, when a senior Foreign Ministry official failed to convince her to accept a Spanish passport and travel back.

"She doesn't want to be a foreigner in her own country," Haidar's Spanish lawyer, Ines Miranda, told reporters at Lanzarote airport, according to newspaper El Pais.

Haidar is angry with Spain, which she says collaborated with Morocco by accepting her after she was expelled from the Western Sahara. She wants her old Moroccan passport returned but refuses to ask Moroccan authorities for a new one.

Her cause has been adopted by celebrities including film director Pedro Almodovar and actor Javier Bardem, who have called on Spain's Socialist Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero to find a way for her to go home.

Morocco took control of most of the Western Sahara in 1975 after Spain withdrew from the desert territory.

20091130

GENEVA (Reuters) - Countries should phase out the use of Stavudine, the most widespread antiretroviral, because of "long-term, irreversible" side-effects in HIV patients including wasting and a nerve disorder, the World Health Organisation said on Monday.

In sweeping changes to its guidelines, the WHO also recommended that people with HIV, including pregnant women, should start taking antiretroviral drugs earlier to live a longer and healthier life.

For the first time it advised HIV-positive women and their babies to take the drugs while breastfeeding to prevent mother-to-child transmission of the virus that causes AIDS.

Stavudine, also known as d4T, is marketed as Zerit by U.S. drugmaker Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. Generic versions are made by Cipla Ltd, Aurobindo Pharma Ltd and Strides Arcolab Ltd, all of India.

Stavudine, widely available in developing countries as a first-line therapy, is relatively cheap and easy to use, according to the United Nations agency.

But it causes a nerve disorder leading to numbness and burning pain in the hands and feet, and loss of body fat known as lipoatrophy or wasting, it said, conditions that are "disabling and disfiguring".

LESS TOXIC ALTERNATIVES

The WHO recommended "that countries progressively phase out the use of Stavudine as a preferred first-line therapy option and move to less toxic alternatives such as Zidovudine (AZT) or Tenofovir (TDF)". These are "equally effective alternatives."

NAIROBI, Nov. 30 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations said Monday it would seek 689 million U.S. dollars for 174 humanitarian projects for Somalia in 2010.

A statement from the UN humanitarian agency, OCHA, said the Consolidated Appeal to be launched later this week in Nairobi reflects the most urgent needs in Somalia.

OCHA said there has been a 19 percent reduction of the amount requested from 849 million dollars in 2009 to 689 million dollars in 2010.

"This is the result of a reassessment of the food aid requirements and a revised estimate of target populations and the scale of rations required. This reduction is also the result of improved coordination structures and rigorous project vetting," it said.

According to OCHA, some 3.64 million Somalis, more than half the population, will continue to be in need of livelihood and or humanitarian support. This is a 13 percent increase since January 2009.

Malnutrition levels have also increased, with one in five children under five years acutely malnourished and one in 20 are severely malnourished.

The low funding from key donors has also exacerbated the situation and has had a negative impact on operations of key sectors especially food aid, water sanitation and hygiene, health and shelter items.

DAKAR, Nov. 30 (Xinhua) -- Four Spanish nationals working for an NGO were taken hostage on Sunday evening some 150 km north of Nouakchott, the Mauritanian capital, the African News Agency reported.

It is the first time that Spanish nationals have been abducted in Mauritania.

The four Spanish nationals including a woman were in a convoy of five vehicles before they were intercepted by turbaned youths.

The Spanish hostages were driven to an unknown destination while the rest of the convoys were allowed to go ahead to Nouakchott, the report said.

Army units were dispatched on the ground but until now, no official communication has been made.

Mauritania has been a target of the Maghreb Al-Qaeda network since 2005.

HARARE, Nov. 30 (Xinhua) -- Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has reiterated his party's commitment to the inclusive Government saying that the arrangement was the only viable option the country could have.

He he was quoted by The Herald as saying that it was pertinent that the inclusive Government overcomes challenges that it is facing in implementing the Global Political Agreement.

"While we are currently involved in another round of negotiations to overcome obstacles on the implementation of the GPA signed by the three political parties in September 2008, we remain committed to the framework of the inclusive Government," said PM Tsvangirai.

"The vast majority of Zimbabweans see the GPA as the only viable alternative in moving our country forward. Therefore, it is essential that we overcome these current challenges as the legitimacy of this new government is based solely on its ability to deliver prosperity and freedoms to the people of Zimbabwe," he said.

The PM hailed SADC for its role in Zimbabwe and said regional solidarity was important for prosperity. "Indeed it is regional groupings such as this that help us to overcome the historic arbitrary demarcation of nations from the colonial times and allow us to think of ourselves more as a united people with a collective future," he said.

The MDC-T leader, who has over the years denied the existence of economic sanctions on Zimbabwe, has also made a major climb-down and acknowledged the existence of the ruinous embargo, according to local media on Monday.

He acknowledged this while addressing a rally in Harare to mark his party's 10th anniversary. The MDC-T leader had preferred to call the illegal sanctions "restrictive measures" despite their ruinous effects on ordinary Zimbabweans.

Tsvangirai told his supporters that the economic sanctions were imposed to coerce Zanu-PF to comply with the party's demands. "It's an issue which they (Zanu-PF) have raised in the ongoing negotiations and we are addressing that," Tsvangirai said.

Tsvangirai's admission that his party called for the illegal economic sanctions means that he is now singing from the same hymnbook with the rest of Zimbabwe and his party's secretary-general Tendai Biti, who had earlier confirmed that sanctions were affecting his job as Finance Minister.

Since the formation of the inclusive Government, MDC-T had been reluctant to admit the existence of economic sanctions having misrepresented them to their supporters even though the party's commitment in the Global Political Agreement is that it would take the front seat in calling for the lifting of the embargo.

"We only have nine months in Government but we now have experience and our responsibility as MDC is to deliver to the people of Zimbabwe," he said.

Tsvangirai also announced his party's promises for the coming year. He said MDC would ensure that the education and health sectors were fully resuscitated to benefit the people of Zimbabwe.

NAIROBI, Nov. 30 (Xinhua) -- Suspected Somali pirates have hijacked a Greek tanker off the coast of the Horn of Africa country, a regional maritime official confirmed on Monday.

Andrew Mwangura, the East Africa Coordinator of Seafarers Assistance Program (SAP) said the Piraeus-registered Maran Centaurus was seized late Sunday with its 28 crew members on board, including Greeks, Filipinos and a Romanian.

Mwangura said the Greek vessel which was traveling from Kuwait to the United States was hijacked off the eastern coast of Somalia.

"This is the biggest vessel to have been hijacked by Somali pirates recently and followed that of Sirius Star. Maran Centaurus was heading to United States from Kuwait when she was hijacked off the eastern coast of Somalia," Mwangura told Xinhua by telephone from Mombasa.

Reports say the Maran Centauros has a crew consisting of nine Greek nationals, 16 Filipinos, two Ukrainians and one Romanian.

The vessel's first mate informed the ship-owner Christen Navigation of the incident, saying the crew was well. He also told the owner that the pirates had directed the tanker to sail to a Somali port.

Piracy has become rampant off the coast of Africa, especially in the waters near Somalia, which has been without an effective government since 1991.

Ransoms starting out in tens of thousands of dollars have climbed into millions.

Somalia is at the entrance to the Gulf of Aden, which leads to the Red Sea and the Suez Canal, one of the world's most important shipping channels.

The Gulf of Aden, off the northern coast of Somalia, has the highest risk of piracy in the world. About 25,000 ships use the channel south of Yemen, between the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea.

KAMPALA, Nov. 30 (Xinhua) -- Ugandan distance runner Moses Kipsiro has been voted the national Athlete of the Year for the third year running by the Ugandan Athletics Federation (UAF) over the weekend, local media reported on Monday.

The Standard Club athlete, who had to battle several injuries during the season, had a one-man run on Saturday evening to the top accolade that comes with a 1 million Ugandan shillings (about 533 U.S. dollars) cash prize.

Kipsiro's silver medal at the World Cross Country Championships in Amman, Jordan, the fourth place finish at the World Championships in Berlin and the national record of 9:30.45 he set over the 3,000m were too big an achievement for his rivals. He is also the national cross country champion.

"Winning it this year is a surprise. I did not compete much. I promise to give my best to win the accolade next year," Kipsiro was quoted by the state-owned New Vision daily as saying while receiving the crown from National Council of Sports general secretary Jasper Aligawesa.

Aligawesa hailed UAF for its unity saying that this has helped them achieve results. He also cautioned them against taking their matters to court as it destroys the sports spirit.

First runner-up Geoffrey Kusuro was noted for his gold at the World Mountain Running Championships in Italy. Haadi Nsamba and Agnes Aneno were crowned upcoming male and female athletes respectively.

Ballot-counting has begun in Equatorial Guinea following Sunday's presidential election, after opposition claims of widespread vote rigging.

The election is widely expected to see the incumbent president, Teodoro Obiang Nguema, return to power in a landslide, extending his 30-year rule over the oil-rich central African nation.

Speaking ahead of the polls Obiang said he expected to take at least match the 97 per cent of the vote he took in the last poll in 2002, which was widely criticised for fraud.

Preliminary election results are expected on Thursday.

Sunday's vote has been widely criticised for irregularities, with claims that election observers were given scant access and that foreign media were barred from covering the election.

Pro-democracy groups have also complained about the lack of media time given to rivals.

Corruption

"In recent weeks it [the government] has stifled and harassed the country's beleaguered political opposition ... [and] imposed serious constraints on international observers," New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a statement.

Critics have accused Obiang, who has ruled Equatorial Guinea since 1979, of attacking and harassing opposition politicians, and having the election organised by his own ministers.

"Elections here have become a game," said Wenceslao Mansogo Alo, a human rights representative of the main opposition Convergence for Social Democracy.

Western governments are also accused of ignoring widespread rights abuses and repression, in favour of dealings in the West African nation's oil and gas reserves.

"We feel isolated and disappointed because we are doing what little we can while those who have interests in this country should be putting pressure on this regime," Mansogo Alo said.

"Countries like the United States and the European Union have the power to intervene with this dictatorship."

Crippling poverty

Equatorial Guinea is the third largest producer of oil in sub-Saharan Africa, aiding the country's annual per capita income rise to $31,000, the highest in the region.

However, more than 60 per cent of its about 600,000 citizens still live on less than $1 per day.

US firm Exxon Mobile first discovered oil in the country in 1994, and US companies continue to dominate the market there.

Speaking to Al Jazeera ahead of Sunday's vote, Obiang rejected claims of corruption and said his government was committed to holding free and fair elections.

"I ask myself, where is this corruption, how is it found, where is it discovered?" he said.

"I don't have knowledge of that. There is none whatsoever."

aljazeera

The Commonwealth group of nations has accepted Rwanda as its 54th member.

The move was announced at the end of a biannual summit of body, which is made up mostly of former British colonies, in Port of Spain in Trinidad and Tobago on Sunday.

It has been seen as an indication of the central African nation's emergence from its recent violent history.

"My government sees this accession as recognition of the tremendous progress this country has made in the last 15 years," Louise Mushikiwabo, the minister of information, was quoted as saying in the state-run New Times newspaper.

It came on the same day that France and Rwanda agreed to restore diplomatic ties in Kigali, Rwanda's capital, three years after they were severed.

French-speaking Rwanda's acceptance into the Commonwealth - a grouping symbolically headed by Britain's Queen Elizabeth II - had been anticipated.

Kigali has been rebuilding its economy and working towards political stability since an ethnic genocide in 1994 in which about 800,000 people died.

Core values

Since then the country has "made progress towards meeting the Commonwealth's core values" in areas of democracy, rule of law and human rights, a British foreign office spokesman said after the three-day summit.

However, some human rights groups objected to Rwanda's inclusion, doubting the level of political freedom in the country.

Rwanda has no ties to Britain's colonial past, being an ex-German and Belgian colony, formerly with close relations with France.

It is only the second nation from outside Britain's former colonies to gain admission after Mozambique joined 14 years ago.

The decision was announced in a statement that also stressed the prescience of the 60-year-old body which represents about one-third of the world's population.

The Commonwealth expresses human rights, democracy and good governance among its key values.

Meanwhile, Australia was selected to host the next summit in 2011, with a bid by Sri Lanka opposed by nations such as the UK and Canada.

Colombo has been critcised over its conduct of its civil war against Tamil separatists and subsequent treatment of refugees caused by fighting in the island nation.

Yet, Stephen Harper, the Canadian prime minister, said that Sri Lanka could host the summit in 2013 if these issues were addressed.

aljazeera

Three Spanish aid workers have been abducted while delivering supplies to impoverished villages in northwestern Mauritania, Spanish and Mauritanian officials said.

The aid workers, two men and a woman, were travelling on a road linking the capital, Nouakchott, to the city of Nouadhibou in the north, when they were seized on Sunday, a Spanish diplomat said.

They were transporting donations to various towns as part of a convoy along the route when they were attacked by armed men.

A Mauritanian security official confirmed the incident, and said the attackers opened fire to force the vehicle to stop.

"The Spaniards ... had gone to distribute humanitarian aid to the poorest of the poor of Nouadhibou when the unknown gunmen started shooting at them before kidnapping them," The Associated Press news agency quoted a senior police official in Nouakchott as saying.

Motives unknown

The attack took place outside the town of Chelkhett Legtouta, 170km north of the capital, and Mauritanian military forces in the area were searching for the attackers, officials said.

A spokesman for Barcelona-Accio Solidaria, a Spanish humanitarian organisation, named the three as Albert Vilalta, Alicia Gamez and Roque Pascual and said they were members of their group.

"They found all the supplies, only the people were gone," the AFP news agency quoted him as saying.

"We don't know anything more, if they were bandits or had any political motives."

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

Security has been a growing concern in the country since armed men killed four French tourists in 2007, while 12 Mauritanian soldiers were ambushed and shot dead north of the capital by suspected al-Qaeda fighters in 2008.

aljazeera

ABIDJAN, Nov. 30 (Xinhua) -- The presidential election in Cote d'lvoire, initially scheduled for Nov. 29, will be postponed for some weeks, according to a communique released by the Independent Electoral Commission (CEI) on Sunday.

The postponement is motivated by technical reasons which are beyond the electoral body, CEI said in the communique, while congratulating Ivorians for the passion, discipline and patience they have demonstrated at the ongoing phase of filing complaints about the voter list.

"All cases of complaints will be handled with compassion, love, respect and strictness so that every lvorian can get his elector's card and the national identity card," the CEI pledged.

The authorities will make sure there is no registration of people who are not supposed to be registered, the communique said.

Admitting the electoral process as very sensitive, the CEI asked politicians to stop talking to the media in a manner which can destabilize the prevailing good social climate.

"The civil society organizations should also note their role in the electoral process and reduce their attacks on the actors of this process," the communique said.

After the display of the provisional electoral list, the CEI has entered into the phase of solving complaints that arose due toerrors on names, omissions and other anomalies.

The presidential election, eagerly awaited by the lvorians and the international community, is expected to bring long-lasting peace to the West African country after the political crisis broke out in 2002.

YAOUNDE, Nov. 30 (Xinhua) -- Official results of the presidential elections in Equatorial Guinea are expected on Dec. 7, the electoral commission said after Sunday's vote came to a close.

Voters in Equatorial Guinea cast their ballots under tight security to choose their president among five candidates who include the current head of state Teodoro Obiang Nguema.

Some 290,000 voters were asked to come to about 1,300 polling centers which were opened between 7:30 a.m. (0630 GMT) and 6 p.m. (1700 GMT).

In Malabo, the capital of this central African country, security forces were deployed outside the polling centers. The turnout was thought to be low, a witness told Xinhua by telephone.

Under a government order, no one was allowed to move around in a car or drink alcohol in Malabo from 6 p.m. on Saturday to 6 a.m. on Monday.

According to the national electoral commission, the final results will be known on Dec. 7.

Obiang, 67, has been in power since 1979. He is the candidate of the ruling Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea (PDGE), which holds 99 out of the 100 seats in parliament. He expressed confidence that he would score even more support than in 2002, when he got 97.1 percent of the votes cast.

The four other candidates are Placido Minko Abogo of the Convergence for Social Democracy (CPDS), Carmelo Mba Bacale of the Popular Action for Equatorial Guinea, Achivaldo Montero of the People's Union and Bonaventura Monsuy Asumu of the Coalition of Social democrats Party.

The elections are seen as a race mainly between Obiang and Minko Abogo, although the president is widely expected to win another landslide victory.

Equatorial Guinea covers 28,051 square km with a population of one million. It is made up of two parts: the mainland part which borders Cameroon and Gabon, and islands in the Gulf of Guinea. The capital city Malabo is located in the Bioko Island.

Equatorial Guinea is third oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa with a double digit economic growth recorded for several years.

The mineral rich country attracts big foreign companies such as Exxon Mobil of the United States, E.ON Ruhrgas of Germany, Union Fenosa of Spain and Galp Energia of Portugal.

Other natural resources of the country include natural gas, timber, gold, bauxite, diamond, tantalum and clay.