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France and Rwanda have agreed to re-open diplomatic relations severed in 2006 after a French judge issued arrest warrants for senior Rwandan officials, including President Paul Kagame, in connection with the country's 1994 genocide.



AFP - France and Rwanda plan to restore diplomatic ties cut in 2006 when Paris issued arrest warrants for aides to President Paul Kagame over the genocide in the African state, French officials said Sunday.

President Nicolas Sarkozy's chief of staff Claude Gueant met Sunday with Rwandan President Paul Kagame in Kigali and after that meeting the two leaders decided to restore relations, Sarkozy's office said in a statement.

Ties between the two countries have been strained since the 1994 genocide, owing to Kigali's accusation that French forces trained extremist Hutu militia that carried out the killings.

Paris has repeatedly denied the charge.

Rwanda broke off relations after a French investigating judge issued arrest warrants for nine Rwandans suspected of plotting the downing of president Juvenal Habyarimana's plane in April 1994.

That event sparked the violence that led to the slaughter of more than 500,000 people, mainly Tutsis and moderate Hutus, in less than 100 days.

Kigali has repeatedly accused France of having evacuated or facilitated the departure from Rwanda of high-ranking figures implicated in the genocide.

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Rwanda on Sunday announced that it had been admitted into the Commonwealth, becoming its 54th member and only the second never to have been under British rule.

AFP - Traditionally francophone Rwanda on Sunday announced that it has been admitted into the Commonwealth, becoming only the second nation which was not once part of the British empire to join the bloc.

A Rwandan government spokeswoman in Kigali told a national newspaper Sunday that its bid for membership had been accepted at the organisation's summit in Trinidad and Tobago.

"My government sees this accession as recognition of the tremendous progress this country has made in the last 15 years," said Information Minister Louise Mushikiwabo, quoted by the online edition of the Rwandan daily New Times.

"Rwandans are ready to seize economic, political, cultural and other opportunities offered by the Commonwealth network," she added.

A former colony of Germany and then Belgium, Rwanda like Mozambique becomes a Commonwealth member without a British colonial past or any constitutional link to Britain.

However, the central African nation has moved closer towards the English-speaking world over the past few years. Rwanda adopted English as an official language in 2008 alongside French and Kinyarwanda, and last year English replaced French as the language taught in public schools.

In 2007 Rwanda, along with francophone Burundi, joined the East African Community, an economic bloc which until then had included only the anglophone countries of Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.

These moves by Rwanda came as ties with France deteriorated.

Kigali suspended diplomatic relations with Paris in 2006 when a French judge issued arrest warrants for aides close to Rwandan President Paul Kagame. The court accused them of being involved in the assassination of former president Juvenal Habyarimana in 1994.

Habyarimana's death is blamed for sparking the country's 1994 genocide where 800,000 people, most of them Tutsis, lost their lives in inter-ethnic fighting led by Hutu militants.

Rwanda has also accused France of providing support to the Hutus throughout the conflict.

The candidacy of Rwanda, a central African country of less than nine million people, had the support of several influential members of the Commonwealth, but was opposed by a human rights group.

The Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative said in a report in July that "the state of governance and human rights in Rwanda does not satisfy Commonwealth standards."

It raised concerns about constraints on freedom of speech and political expression in Rwanda, which "created a climate of fear in civil society," and concluded that Rwanda did not qualify for admission to the Commonwealth.

However, some Commonwealth members like Canada argued that admission would help alleviate those concerns.

"The Commonwealth is well positioned to assist Rwanda in strengthening its democratic institutions," a spokesman for the Canadian foreign ministry told AFP.

KINSHASA, Nov. 29 (Xinhua) -- The arrival of about 12,000 families in the last few months in the territory of Masis and Rutshuru, in the province of North Kivu, in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has aroused doubts about their origin and raised fear of infiltration of foreigners.

The authorities indicated that they may pose as Congolese refugees from Rwanda.

The coordinator of the national commission for refugees in North Kivu (CNR), Laingulia Njewa, told local radio this week that these people came in illegally through the border from Kibumba to around 20 km north of Goma along Ritshuru road.

Accompanied by their families and animals, they settled in a Congolese village and 80 percent of them said they came from refugee camps in Byumba and Kibuye in Rwanda, he pointed out.

Njewa asked the local population to be calm, pledging the government was thinking about the issue in order to identify these suspicious refugees, whose real figure had not yet been established.

The UNHCR also has doubt whether or not these people are Congolese refugees.

"We honestly do not know the history of these people. In any case, the majority did not have with them documents to prove that they were refugees and the authorities must now start the identification process to establish the origin of these people," Francesca Fontanini, administrator in charge of external relations of the UNHCR in the DRC said on Wednesday in Kinshasa after a mission in North Kivu.

"We compared the lists that the authorities gave us with our Rwandan UNHCR office, but they do not correspond with the names of the people who were in the Rwandan refugee camps. Therefore these people are not in our data base," Fontanini added.

"According to the UNHCR figures, today we still have 52,000 Congolese refugees living in Rwanda," she said.

During a press conference held on Thursday in Kinshasa, the Congolese minister for communication and media, Lambert Mende Omalanga, talked of some refugees coming from Rwanda through illegal routes, declaring that "the government was well aware of movements of people from Rwanda to the DRC."

"The DRC and Rwanda are having contacts over this issue and they are both monitoring the situation," he told reporters.

"What has happened was done in a more or less anarchical manner. But if they are Congolese, they have a right to stay in their country. If they are Congolese, we shall know them after verification. If they are foreigners, they will be repatriated to their country of origin," the Congolese government spokesman said.

Mende, who did not disclose the figure of illegal refugees, said it was difficult to establish the definite number of Congolese refugees in Rwanda by using only the UNHCR figures because the UNHCR only counts people who are living in camps.

"We know that there are refugees who are living with families. It's the work of the Congolese interior minister with his Rwandan counterpart and the UNHCR, which will begin this week. They will give us a report and in all honesty, we shall make this information public," he explained.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a national member of parliament from North Kivu expressed fear that the arrival of the refugees in the Congolese territories of Masisi and Rutshuru could become a new cause of tensions between Rwanda and the DRC.

"A number of these refugees are simply Rwandese nationals who will cause a lot of trouble when they will be told to go back to their country," he said.

He blamed the situation on the Rwandese government, indicating every time the DRC attempts to find peace, Kigali "provokes a situation that can lead to destabilization because it is aided by foreign powers."

The issue has led to a "sine die" of a meeting planned for Nov.23 between the UNHCR, Rwanda and the DRC on the repatriation of Congolese refugees.

The postponement of the tripartite meeting was confirmed on Wednesday by Fontanini.

"I think that the repatriation of Congolese refugees from Rwanda will begin next year," she declared.

JOHANNESBURG, Nov. 29 (Xinhua) -- Next year's World Cup will leave a carbon footprint nearly nine times that of Germany in 2006, and that is before calculating the footprint for international flights to South Africa, the Cape Argus reported on Sunday.

The event will send 896,661 tons of global-warming carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, with international travel contributing another 1,856,589 tons.

This is the conclusion of a study commissioned by the Department of Environment and Tourism, conducted by Swedish consultants and the Norwegian Embassy, financed by the Norwegian government.

Although the point of the study, completed in February, was to identify what should be done for a carbon-neutral World Cup, sources involved in the project say they are not aware much has been done.

The study said it would cost between 5.4 million U.S. dollars and 9 million dollars for carbon offset projects to counter the effect of the World Cup carbon output.

Certainly President Jacob Zuma did not seem to know whether anything had been done yet.

During a press conference with visiting Norwegian King Harald Vin Pretoria this week, he thanked the Norwegians for helping South Africa to host a green World Cup.

But when a journalist pressed him for details, Zuma scrumhalfed the question to the king, who frankly admitted he did not know. However, it appears that Norway financed the study and is waiting for a response from South Africa.

"The FIFA 2010 World Cup will have the largest carbon footprint of any major event with a goal to be 'climate neutral'," the study found.

It attributes the huge carbon output largely to the size of South Africa compared to Germany and therefore the distances players, officials and fans will have to travel between matches.

South Africa's relatively unsophisticated transport infrastructure is also blamed. The lack of fast trains means most people will fly between cities, notching up large amounts of CO2. And within cities, most people will travel by carbon-heavy car or bus rather than light trains as in Germany. If international transport is taken into account, the footprint will be 2,753,250 tons. The study says proposed greening measures "will only affect the smaller components of the carbon footprint" because they deal only with emissions from stadium and precinct energy use and intra-city transport - just 9 percent of the domestic carbon footprint.

YAOUNDE, Nov. 29 (Xinhua) -- Equatorial Guinea opened the presidential elections on Sunday morning to choose the leader of the oil rich central African country, with the current head of state, Teodoro Obiang Nguema, seen as the front runner of the five contenders, according to reports monitored here.

Obiang, 67, has declared that he does not expect anything less than 97 percent of the votes cast in the elections being unfolded.

Election officials said the polling stations were set to close at 6 p.m. (1700 GMT). African monitors were deployed to follow the process.

The final outcome is expected within a week, although initial results could be known in one or two days.

The candidate for the ruling Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea (PDGE), Obiang, who has been in power for three decades, won the last election in December 2002 with 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.

Obiang led a coup in August 1979 which toppled the then leader Francisco Macias Nguema. In 1982, He was elected president for a seven-year term.

Obiang was re-elected in 1989, 1996 and 2002, each time with more than 90 percent of vote.

Mico Abogo is the only CPDS deputy in the Chamber of People's Representatives (parliament). His party won one out of the 100 seats in the parliamentary elections in 2008, while the PDGE and its allies took all the rest.

The Central African country 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.

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Polling stations in Namibia have closed after two days of voting, with the ruling the South West African People's Organisation, or Swapo, expected to stay in power.

Voting in presidential and parliamentary elections ended on Saturday and with final results in the diamond and uranium-producing nation expected on Wednesday, the Electoral Commission of Namibia (ECN) said.

"First results should come in around noon on Sunday ... but it may take until Wednesday to know the total numbers," Theo Mujoro, the ECN's deputy director of operations, said.

Hifikepunye Pohamba, Namibia's president, is seeking a second five-year term and hoping for a decisive win for Swapo, the country's former guerilla movement.

Yet the vote may see the Swapo's long hold on power in the southern African desert nation weakening with the emergence of a new opposition party, the Rally for Democracy and Progress (RDP).

The RDP, the main opposition party headed by Hidipo Hamutenya, a former foreign minister, is capitalising on growing dissatisfaction with Swapo after a spate of corruption scandals, including one involving the son of China's president.

'Nepotism and corruption'

Emile van Zyl, executive director of research for financial services company Simonis Storm Securities, said: "If you enjoy an absolute majority with no resistance from opposition for too long, problems such as nepotism and corruption may become major issues."

He said a stronger opposition would be good for the country as long as it does not lead to instability.

Swapo and the RDP are the biggest of the 14 parties contesting the election, with the latter claiming about 250,000 supporters from an estimated 1.1 million voters.

Analysts believe that a landslide victory for Swapo, which won the last elections with 75 per cent of the vote, may be less convincing this time round.

"While the RDP won't be able to challenge Swapo's rule, it will be able to take a few votes, minimizing the percentage of parliamentary seats the former liberation movement has," Judy Smith-Hohn, from the South African-based Institute for Security Studies, said.

There were clashes between Swapo and the RDP supporters prior to the poll.

High unemployment

Namibia, a former German colony that was governed by neighbouring South Africa during the apartheid era, is seen as a peaceful and stable democracy.

Although rich in diamond and uranium deposits, about 40 per cent of the nearly two million Namibians live below the poverty line.

Unemployment is high and Aids has had a devastating effect especially on the indigenous San Bushmen.

But the government has been praised for its sound economic policies and for making strides in broadening access to education and health care.

aljazeera

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At least 73 people have been killed after a boat sank on a lake in the west of the Democratic Republic of Congo, it has emerged.

DR Congo's bracnh of the Red Cross said on Saturday that a logging boat that was not authorised to take passengers sank during bad weather on Wednesday.

"We are at 272 survivors and 73 dead. These are bodies that we have found along the shores of the lake," Dominic Lutula, president of the Congolese Red Cross told the Reuters news agency.

"There are still some people missing. But we don't know how many because there was no ship's manifest," he said.

Bodies had been found on the shores of Lake Mai Ndombe.

'People missing'

The boat had been transporting logs on Lake Mai Ndombe in Bandundu province, the United Nations-sponsored Radio Okapi said.

Radio Okapi said the boat, owned by a logging company called Sodefor, sank at around 8:00pm (19:00 GMT) on Wednesday.

Despite its vast mineral wealth, roads are almost non-existent outside Congo's main towns.

Travel is often limited to aircraft and the boats that ply its huge network of rivers.

Accidents are frequent due to overloading, lack of maintenance, and lax enforcement of safety standards.

At least 14 people died in September after their boat sank on an isolated stretch of the Lualaba river in the southern province of Katanga.

aljazeera

Windhoek — The Electoral Commission of Namibia (ECN) has again suspended the observer status of a human rights watchdog it accuses of lying about mistakes on the voter's roll.

Earlier this week the ECN stripped the National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) of this status because it had pointed out mistakes in the voter's roll, which the ECN maintains are 'lies'. Mistakes found included instances of: double registration; the registration of voters after the official cut-off date; names being incorrectly struck off; and the registration of voters younger than 18 years.

But on Friday a court ruled that the NSHR had to be admitted as an election observer. The court ruled that the ECN unlawfully withdrew the watchdog's observer status without conducting a proper hearing. The NSHR's status was reinstated. But only temporarily.

"The NSHR continues not to comply with the guidelines for election observers, so we decided to suspend them today. Under the Electoral Act this is a different measure than withdrawing accreditation," ECN chairman Victor Tonchi tells IPS.

"The reasons for our decision haven't changed; they are the same as before," says Tonchi. The ECN also accuses the organisation's director Phil ya Nangoloh of discrediting the electoral body abroad.

Otherwise, Tonchi says the elections ran smoothly. "We haven't received any major complaints that could jeopardise the election process." Tonchi expects results to be in by early next week.

Polling in Namibia will continue till 9pm on November 28. While observers say voting is slow in the Caprivi Strip, packed polling stations are reported in the north. Extra ballots were flown into this area on Saturday morning.

According to analysts the high turnout is related to the power struggle in this area between the ruling South-West African People's Organisation (SWAPO) and the breakaway movement the Rally for Democracy and Progress (RDP). Three election officials in Oshakati, in the north of the country, were arrested for tampering with ballot boxes.

"We have been here since four in the morning, my baby is tired," says Melisia Shinedhimha (24) on the first day of voting outside the polling station in Okuruyangava, one of Windhoek's poorest townships.

Shinedhimha and other mothers sit in a circle around their sleeping infants and keep a weary eye on the queue that snakes past the building, through the gate and out onto the street.

At some polling stations people spent the night to make sure they could vote before work. Shinedhimha is lucky though, it only took eight hours of queuing for her to cast her ballot. Others had to wait much longer.

"Sure you can stay at home, but what's the point? It won't get you a job. Voting keeps the politicians on their toes and might create employment."

Yes, she will probably vote for the ruling SWAPO party, she says. But that doesn't mean everyone should. "We need a strong opposition, or SWAPO will abuse its power."

About a million Namibians - half the population - will flock to the 3,259 polling stations on November 27 and 28. Given the size of the country, the vast majority of polling stations are mobile moving from village to village. Helicopters and 4x4's will bring ballot boxes to areas cut off by rains.

President Hifikepunye Pohamba yesterday asked Namibians for "calm, peaceful and exemplary conduct," in the run up to an election that as been more controversial than normal. This is largely because the breakaway party, the RDP, has divided SWAPO's constituency for the first time.

Across town unemployed Loide Amadhila (33) just voted for the third time in her life. "SWAPO," she says with conviction, as she shows the coveted purple stain on her left thumb. "In 1998 they brought water to this township and in 2001 we got electricity. They put up a clinic and a school and now I hope they will bring many jobs."

Enok Injala (33) disagrees firmly. "I will be voting for change, definitely change," he nods. Also a third time voter, he awaits his turn, at ease in the burning sun. "It doesn't look like there will be violence today."

A shiny Toyota Prado spews out a team of election observers. "So far so good," confirms one observer from Nigeria. "This is the fourth polling station we are visiting and we haven't seen any irregularities or tensions. For us it is a learning experience, because Nigeria has elections in April 2011."

Red Cross volunteer Obed Geingob and his mates have their first aid kid at the ready since 7am, but also have little to do. Their biggest concern is the heat, not violence.

"A cut from sealing a ballot box is all the blood that was shed so far," Geingob grins.

allafrica

(Xinhua) -- Equatorial Guinea will hold its presidential elections on Nov. 29, as President Teodoro Obiang Nguema, who has been in power for 30 years, will run for another term and opposition leader Placido Mico Abogo tries to challenge the long-time rule.

An ethnic Fang, Obiang Nguema was born on June 5, 1942 in Mongomo, Equatorial Guinea. He attended the Military Academy in Saragoza, Spain during 1963 to 1965. After graduation, he went back to Equatorial Guinea and joined the local Guard forces.

Since the independence of Equatorial Guinea in 1968, Obiang has successively served as army chief of the Bioko Island in 1969, director of supply and planning for the Ministry of Defense in 1970, secretary general of the Defense Ministry in 1976 and deputy minister of the Defense Ministry in 1979.

In August, 1979, Obiang led a coup that overthrew then-leader Francisco Macias Nguema, and was later chosen to be president of the Supreme Military Council. He served as head of state, head of government and commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces in October, 1979.

In 1982, Obiang was elected as Equatorial Guinea's president for a seven-year term.

He founded the Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea (PDGE) in 1986 and became president of the party in 1988.

Obiang has been continuously re-elected as president of the country in 1989, 1996 and 2002, each time with more than 90 percent of the votes.

Mico Abogo, secretary-general of the major opposition party Convergence for Social Democracy (CPDS), will also run for the presidency. He was chosen as secretary-general of the party in 1994, and was re-elected to the post twice in 2001 and 2005.

Mico Abogo is the only CPDS member in the Chamber of People's Representatives, the country's parliament. His party won one out of the 100 seats in the parliamentary elections in 2008, while the rest were secured by the PDGE and the small opposition parties allied to it.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Sudan may be unable to hold credible elections in coming months because the ruling party and opposition cannot agree on ground rules for the polls, the U.S. State Department said on Friday.

At the end of a trip to Sudan by President Barack Obama's special envoy Scott Gration, the State Department said it saw little movement on issues such as voter registration and border delineation between Khartoum and the semi-autonomous South -- endangering plans for national elections in April 2010 and a referendum on southern succession in 2011.

"Without immediate resolution of these disputes, we are concerned about the chances for conducting credible elections and referenda," it said in a statement.

"Unfortunately, the parties have not yet demonstrated the political will necessary to achieve resolution on these difficult and sensitive issues."

Gration's trip to Sudan was his first since Washington announced in October it would keep economic sanctions on Sudan but would also offer Khartoum new incentives to end violence in Darfur and the South.

The Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), former southern rebels who are now junior partners in the governing coalition under the terms of a 2005 peace deal, have accused the North of stalling on a democratic transformation and undermining plans for free elections.

The SPLM and other parties said on Wednesday they would delay a decision on whether to boycott April's elections in part due to a week-long extension of the voter registration period.

The strains have raised fears the north-south civil war -- fueled by issues including religion, ethnicity, oil and ideology between mostly Christian southern rebels and the Islamist Khartoum government -- could reignite.

Gration visited voter registration centers and urged people to sign up for the polls "as it is the only way for the Sudanese people to maintain their right to participate in the national elections in April 2010," the statement said.

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LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's navy chief hit back on Friday at claims his sailors were "cowards" for failing to intervene after a British couple were captured by Somali pirates saying they could not have put the civilians' lives at risk.

Pirates have demanded a $7 million ransom for Paul and Rachel Chandler, who were kidnapped while they sailed their 38-foot (12-metre) yacht Lynn Rival in international waters north of the Seychelles at the end of October.

The couple said in a film broadcast on November 20 their captors were losing patience and they feared being killed within a week.

The Ministry of Defence said the Royal Navy's Wave Knight ship had located the couple's yacht in the Indian Ocean days after their capture, and had watched them being transferred to another boat.

However the crew had not intervened in case they endangered the hostages, leading to criticism from some commentators.

"Once you have a hostage situation, your military options are inevitably limited," Admiral Mark Stanhope said.

"Had there been the opportunity to intervene while being at all sure of guaranteeing Rachel and Paul Chandlers' safety, they would have done so," he said, adding the decision not to intervene was the "right one" in the circumstances.

A headline accompanying an opinion piece by commentator Max Hastings in the Daily Mail newspaper this week described Britain's seaborne service as a "cowardly navy".

"What is the purpose of the Royal Navy's presence in the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea if it shows itself toothless?" Hastings wrote.

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HARARE (Reuters) - The trial of a top ally of Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai on terrorism charges has been adjourned to January next year after a key prosecution witness failed to attend court on Friday.

Roy Bennett, a senior official in Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party who was nominated deputy agriculture minister, was arrested in February on charges of illegal possession of weapons for terrorism, banditry and insurgency.

Bennett denies the charges, which the MDC says are politically motivated to keep him out of the unity government formed with President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF party. The charges carry a death penalty upon conviction.

The MDC says Mugabe is frustrating efforts to swear in Bennett, along with other senior MDC officials, as required by a political agreement signed last year between the rival parties.

Arms dealer Peter Hitschmann, a state witness prosecutors allege was paid by Bennett to buy weapons to assassinate government officials, was not present to take to the stand on Friday, prompting the adjournment.

Hitschmann was acquitted of terrorism charges in 2006 but served jail time for possessing dangerous weapons -- including six sub-machine guns and two machine guns -- which have also been produced in Bennett's trial.

Police say Hitschmann implicated Bennett in the procurement of the arms, but Bennett's lawyers argue that the gun dealer had been tortured into making that submission.

"He (Hitschmann) did not come because we thought he would not (be required to) take to the witness stand. This is a situation we did not anticipate," Zimbabwe's attorney-general Johannes Tomana, leading the prosecution team, told the court.

"The way forward is to adjourn to the next available date."

Presiding judge, Chinembiri Bhunu, set January 12 as the date for the continuation of the trial. The High Court's judicial year ended on Friday and the court resumes sitting on January 11.

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SHANGHAI (Reuters) - A Zimbabwean-registered cargo plane en route to Kyrgyzstan crashed on take-off in Shanghai on Saturday, killing three U.S crew on board and triggering a fire, state media and a U.S. spokesman said.

The plane, which had seven people on board, left the runway and crashed into a storage building, China's national broadcaster, CCTV, reported, starting the fire and sending a large plume of black smoke over the airport.

The accident happened at Pudong airport. The plane, registered in Zimbabwe, was scheduled to fly to Bishkek, capital of Kyrgyzstan, Xinhua news agency said.

Richard Buangan, deputy spokesman at the U.S. embassy in Beijing, said there were four Americans on board. "Three of them are confirmed dead, and one is injured," he said.

The other crew members were also taken to hospital with injuries.

Airport authorities declined to comment on the accident but said there were delays in flights leaving Shanghai. The Zimbabwe Embassy could not be reached for comment.

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LUSAKA (Reuters) - Zambia on Saturday denied reports that it had failed to help Rwandan authorities find and arrest 1994 genocide suspects believed to be living in Zambia.

Acting Foreign Minister Ronnie Shikapwasha said Zambia had offered vital information to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), directly and through the International Committee on the Great Lakes region, to ensure that genocide suspects were handed over to prosecutors.

Shikapwasha was reacting to media reports that the head of the Rwandan unit tracking genocide suspects, Bosco Mutangana, had said that Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique were not willing to extradite suspects of the genocide in which some 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered over three months in 1994.

"It will be important that we are informed of the specific cases that they are talking about. Let them tell us the people we are unwilling to extradite," Shikapwasha told Reuters.

"This highly sensitive issue has been addressed neither to me nor to our ambassador in Tanzania, who is accredited to Rwanda," Shikapwasha said.

Mutangana was quoted as saying hundreds of "fugitives" were living in southern Africa despite several diplomatic attempts to have them extradited to face prosecution.

He said Rwanda's chief prosecutor had visited Zambia and Mozambique twice, in 2007 and 2009, and was still waiting for an appointment with Malawi authorities. Authorities in all three nations had the names and addresses of the suspects but were apparently not willing to have them extradited, he said.

He was quoted as accusing African countries of "dragging their feet" compared with the way Europe had dealt with requests from Rwandan prosecutors.

Officials of the three countries had been handed files on the suspects and invited to Rwanda, but had failed to come and carry out their own investigations, Mutangana was quoted as saying.

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WINDHOEK (Reuters) - Namibians voted for the second day on Saturday in presidential and parliamentary elections that looked set to keep the ruling party SWAPO in power and hand President Hifikepunye Pohamba five more years at the helm.

Voting closes at 1900 GMT.

The Rally for Democracy and Progress (RDP), which emerged as a breakaway faction of the ruling South West African People's Organization in 2007, is expected to become the new official opposition and could threaten SWAPO's two-thirds majority.

The RDP has tackled some traditional SWAPO strongholds and may present the ruling party with its sternest political challenge yet. Analysts said this would make for a more accountable and transparent government.

"It will be the whole country that will benefit because investors will see stability and no threat of policy reversal, as was the case with Zimbabwe where a single party dominated politics. This will lead to more foreign investment," said Chibamba Kanyama, a political analyst in Zambia.

SWAPO has until now faced little opposition since leading the former German colony and South African protectorate to independence, but criticism of corruption could also threaten its solid majority.

Melissa Basson, a 29-year-old receptionist at a guesthouse in Windhoek, said she voted for the first time this year because she felt that a change in direction was possible.

"We need to ensure that development policies get implemented and Namibians get the services they need including housing, water and health... in all parts of the country," she said.

Rich in resources and located between economic powerhouse South Africa and oil-producing Angola, Namibia has enjoyed a long period of political and economic prosperity that has made its 2.2 million people the envy of many in Africa.

RISE IN POVERTY, UNEMPLOYMENT

Namibia is a big diamond producer and home to 10 percent of the world's uranium output, but the global slowdown has exacerbated poverty and unemployment and widened cracks in the healthcare and education systems.

The economy is expected to contract by 0.6 percent in 2009, before recovering in 2010 on higher commodity prices and a rise in mining output.

Voters said they expected the new government to improve access to clean water, make it possible for children in villages to attend schools beyond primary education and, most important, create more jobs.

While agreeing that the programmes the ruling party has been trying to implement are good, opposition and voters alike have criticised SWAPO's lack of progress.

"SWAPO has been going in the right direction, but we need more of that... especially jobs," said Kennecky Angula, a 46-year-old public service worker.

Voting stations opened on time on Saturday and no problems were reported. "Everything seems to be going very smoothly, very peaceful and according to plan," said Tanki Mothae, a member of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) observer team.

The Electoral Commission of Namibia (ECN) said that for the first time votes would be counted at the polling stations and results would be posted outside them to ensure transparency.

During elections in 2004 in which SWAPO took 55 of the 72 seats, four opposition parties demanded a recount, alleging fraud. The recount confirmed SWAPO as the winner.

Fourteen parties are competing for the 72 seats this year and 12 presidential candidates have been listed.

Initial results will be known a few hours after the polls close. But the ECN said it may take until Wednesday to count all the ballots from the 1.18 million registered voters scattered across the largely desert country, bigger than Texas.

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MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Rebels suspected of links to al Qaeda seized a Somali town near the Kenyan border on Saturday, sending civilians fleeing towards the neighbouring country.

Al Shabaab insurgents, who Washington says are a proxy in Somalia for Osama bin Laden's group, drove into the town of Dhobley after rival insurgents, Hizbul Islam, fled.

"I see a lot of battle wagons and heavily-armed militia. They came into the town a few minutes ago and they have captured the police station ... without any fighting," said Dhobley resident Nor Yusuf Ali by telephone.

Together, the two rebel groups have been fighting the Western-backed government in the capital Mogadishu, but a battle for control of the lucrative southern port of Kismayu has pitted the former allies against each other.

Violence has plagued Somalia since 1991 and about 19,000 civilians have been killed since the start of 2007 when Islamists launched an insurgency to topple the government.

Western nations and neighbouring countries fear regions under al Shabaab's control are a haven for militants hoping to launch attacks in developed countries or destabilise the region.

"We got Dhobley without any war against us. Now it is under the control of the mujahideen. We will continue our fight against the infidels till we eradicate them from the region," an al Shabaab official told Reuters by telephone from Dhobley.

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

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KINSHASA (Reuters) - At least 73 people were killed and others missing after a logging boat sank in a lake in western Democratic Republic of Congo, a Red Cross official said on Saturday.

The boat sank in bad weather and had been transporting logs on Lake Mai Ndombe in Bandundu province with no authorisation to take on passengers, United Nations-sponsored Radio Okapi said.

"We are at 272 survivors and 73 dead. These are bodies that we have found along the shores of the lake," Dominic Lutula, president of the Congolese Red Cross told Reuters.

"There are still some people missing. But we don't know how many because there was no ship's manifest," he added.

Radio Okapi said the boat, owned by a logging company called Sodefor, sank at around 8 p.m. (1900 GMT) on Wednesday.

Despite its vast mineral wealth, roads are almost non-existent outside Congo's main towns. Travel is often limited to aircraft and the boats that ply its huge network of rivers.

Accidents are frequent due to overloading, lack of maintenance, and lax enforcement of safety standards.

At least 14 people died in September after their boat sank on an isolated stretch of the Lualaba river in the southern province of Katanga.

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THE United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) public information assistant, Kelvin Shimo has said the number of Congolese refugees Zambia is repatriating back to their home country has continued to rise with a total of 33,424 since 2007.

Mr Shimo said in a statement yesterday that the Congolese voluntary repatriation started in 2007 and was being undertaken by the Government and the UNHCR with the support from the International Organisation for Migration (MOI) and World Food Programme (WFP).

He said in 2007, about 7,323 Congolese refugees were repatriated from Zambia, while in 2008, about 9,700 returned home.

Mr Shimo said in 2009 alone, about 16,401 had been repatriated from Zambia, bringing the total number of Congolese refugees repatriated in three years to 33,424 as of 24 November 2009.

He said on November 24, 442 Congolese refugees repatriated by road from Mwange and Kala camps in Northern Zambia for Pweto and Mbola in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), bringing the total number of refugees repatriated from Zambia in 2009 alone to 16,401.

"The convoy on Tuesday November 24 marked the 34th convoy this year in the Congolese voluntary repatriation programme. We have helped to make the lives of many refugees more humane by finding durable solutions for a considerable number of them through the voluntary repatriation, as these returnees are able to restart their lives back home," Mr Shimo said.

He said two weeks ago, a high level delegation of senior DRC government officials and UNHCR staff from Kinshasa and Katanga visited Kala and Mwange refugee camps emphasising the need for the refugees to go home now that there was peace in their home country.

The DRC officials appealed to their nationals to return and help rebuilding their country and most of Congolese refugees from Zambia who fled their home country a decade ago were returning to Katanga Province.

Mr Shimo said the refugees were given a return package upon arrival in DRC which consist of food and non food items.

He said in addition, in 2009 alone, a total number of 1,854 Angolans had been repatriated from Zambian's Mayukwayukwa and Maheba refugee settlements in Western and North-Western Provinces respectively, to Angola.

This was in addition to 74,000 Angolans repatriated between 2003 and 2007.

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20091128

Nouakchott — Mauritania formally adopted the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women in 2001, but in the eight years since, it has had limited effect on the status of women.

Human rights lawyer Oumoulkhairy Kane spoke to IPS by phone from Nouakchott about conservative resistance, politicians fearful of crossing powerful clerics, and the work that lies ahead in achieving women's empowerment and gender equality in Mauritania.

IPS:It is 30 years now since CEDAW came into being. What is the situation of Mauritanian women in light of the Convention?

OUMOULKHAIRY KANE: Well. The truth is that Mauritanian women - like women in many if not all African countries - continue to face a lot of challenges. There are a lot of barriers and obstacles that impede the progress of women. These barriers include cultural, religious and social norms that are used to abuse women.

IPS: What are examples of these barriers?

OK: Mauritania is a highly conservative society where Islam is used as a determinant factor in everything we do as a people. Now it just happens that Islam is misinterpreted and misapplied when it comes to dealing with women and women's issues.

Women are battered and abused at home and whenever they complained often they are blamed for adopting lifestyles that are foreign to Mauritania.

Despite Mauritania being a signatory to the CEDAW convention, our constitution still maintains that the state and society are the protectors of the family. This explains the predicament of some of us involved in the fight against discrimination of women, because most of the time when it comes to deciding women's issues, the state leans towards conservative thinking. This is because male politicians often don't want to anger the conservative Muslim clerics who still command loyal following among ordinary people.

Culturally, girls in some parts of Mauritania are forced to marry at an extremely early age when they should be going to school. Often these girls are force-fed to prepare them for marriage. This is in effect a form of modern slavery as most parents fatten their child with the hope that a rich man will marry her.

However the children who go through this practice endure a lot of suffering, and physical abuse like beating, mutilating their feet and hands. The abuses can be so cruel that some children faint. Despite these and other real health problems associated with force-feeding, successive governments have been dragging their feet in enforcing the law banning the practice because politicians don't want to anger their constituents.

IPS: In the light of what you've said, do ordinary people - especially women in Mauritania - even know about the existence of CEDAW?

OK: I will be honest with you: very few women know about CEDAW.

One of the principal reasons for this is that everybody, including women themselves, treat campaigns against discrimination of women as something foreign to Mauritanian culture and way of life. Thus despite serious efforts by women's rights groups to raise popular awareness about this important convention, very little has been achieved in terms of making people aware of the important elements in the convention.

Interestingly most Mauritanians don't watch the national TV channel, or listen to the national radio. Instead everybody is listening to international radio or watching TV that broadcasts in Arabic like Al-Jazeera, BBC and others.

Some rights groups have started using other means to inform people about women's rights issue, organising community meetings at village centres as well as going from door to door. The problem with this last option is that sometimes when you visit some communities, men don't allow their wives to attend because they accused the campaigners of corrupting the minds of the village women.

IPS: So what do you think needs to be done to reverse the unfortunate trend with regards to the status of women?

OK: I have to admit that Mauritania is very good at signing conventions. I think the country has ratified almost all the conventions that aim to eliminate discrimination against women.

What is however lacking is the will to enforce what is contained in these international instruments.

On most occasions governments are eager to implement those issues in the CEDAW convention that pose few problems or controversy to their political existence. It is time now for government to act sincerely to ensure that the (whole of the) CEDAW convention is enforced regardless.

There is also the need for serious sensitisation of the population on the various instruments regarding women's rights issues. The government should therefore facilitate access for NGOs to the national media to help in this drive.

The government should also introduce programmes in schools to fight against discrimination and all forms of violence against women and setup an inter-governmental body that will monitor how international conventions on women are enforced.

The government should also protect and support women and girls who have fled domestic violence in their homes by putting them under the guardianship of an institution or official authority.

Finally, and I think most importantly, the government should not be consulting with clerics alone when it comes to matters dealing with women's issues... because most of the time these clerics give a conservative interpretation of issues that is not necessarily correct

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Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has condemned the shooting attack on a United Nations helicopter on Thursday in Dongo in western Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) that left three peacekeepers, a civilian pilot and one member of the Congolese national police wounded.

Personnel with the UN Mission in DRC, known as MONUC, have been tasked with assisting the Government to protect civilians affected by the violent clashes in the village of Dongo in Equateur province that have displaced tens of thousands of civilians, and left scores of villagers and policemen dead since late October.

"The Secretary-General calls on the Government of the DRC to ensure that the perpetrators of the attack against MONUC are held accountable," his spokesperson said in a statement.

Mr. Ban also encouraged the Government to take steps to peacefully resolve the issues underlying these clashes, and pledged MONUC's assistance in this regard.

The fighting, thought to be over disputes based on farming and fishing rights in Dongo, have not only displaced an estimated 14,000 people inside DRC, but have also sent over 38,000 people fleeing into neighbouring Republic of Congo.