2010-04-14
DJIBOUTI (Reuters) - Lawmakers in Djibouti on Wednesday approved an amendment to the constitution that paves the way for the president of the Horn of Africa nation to run for a third term.

Djibouti's parliament voted unanimously on the constitutional reforms which remove term limits, cut the presidential mandate to five years from six, create a senate and abolish capital punishment.

President Ismail Omar Guelleh's second term expires in 2011 and speculation has surrounded his plans for a third mandate.

Djibouti, a former French colony which separates Eritrea from Somalia, hosts France's largest military base in Africa and a major U.S. base. Its port is used by foreign navies patrolling busy shipping lanes off the coast of Somalia to fight piracy.

Dubai World has a deep-sea base at Djibouti port, which serves as the principle access point for goods entering and exiting land-locked Ethiopia.

Last month, Guelleh told Reuters China would be Djibouti's biggest investor next year and in 2012 and that he planned to make Djibouti port the biggest hub in the region at a cost of nearly half a billon U.S. dollars.

2010-04-14
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who had gallbladder surgery in Germany last month, will hold a cabinet meeting on Thursday, his first since he returned to Egypt, the cabinet spokesman said.

"President Mubarak will host the cabinet meeting tomorrow morning in Sharm El Sheikh, God willing," Magdy Rady told Reuters. Mubarak has been recovering in the Red Sea resort since returning to Egypt on March 27.

Mubarak, 81, handed over presidential powers to Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif just before his operation and reassumed them upon his return to Egypt.

He has not made a public appearance since his longest absence in almost three decades in power.

Egypt's stock market fell sharply in the days after the president's operation on March 6, before steadying when images of him sitting and chatting with doctors were broadcast on state television.

The president's absence has also fuelled uncertainty about who will lead Egypt after Mubarak, who has never named a successor and has not said whether he plans to run for a sixth six-year term in a presidential election due in 2011.

Mubarak's 46-year-old son Gamal has been widely seen as being groomed to succeed him, a plan that both father and son deny.

U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei, 67, has also surfaced as a possible presidential candidate, although the conditions he has set for running, which include changes to the constitution, are unlikely to be met.

2010-04-14
KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Sudan's ruling party on Wednesday said it would invite opposition groups to join the government if it won elections, in an apparent bid to heal rifts over fraud accusations and faltering peace deals.

Sudan is four days into presidential and legislative polls that were supposed to bring the oil-producing state back to democracy more than two decades after a military-led coup.

The poll's credibility was cast in doubt after some major parties decided to boycott large parts of the poll, accusing incumbent president Omar Hassan al-Bashir and his northern National Congress Party (NCP) of widespread rigging.

"If we are declared winners in the elections ... we would extend the invitation to all parties, even those who have not participated in the elections, to join the government because we believe this is a critical moment in our history," senior NCP official Ghazi Salaheddin told reporters.

"We are facing important decisions like self-determination in the south and would like to garner as much support and as much consensus as we can."

The elections were set up under a 2005 peace accord that ended more than two decades of north-south civil war and also promised southerners a referendum in January 2011 on whether they should declare independence.

The overwhelming majority of southerners are thought to favour separation. But many have warned there is a risk of conflict in the build-up to the vote.

Bashir's NCP and other northern parties have vowed to campaign against separation, with some analysts saying the north is reluctant to lose control of oil fields in the south.

CAUTIOUS RESPONSE

Salaheddin said one of the first jobs of a new "inclusive" government would be to take a fresh look at policy on the conflict in the western Darfur region -- negotiations between Khartoum and a major Darfur rebel group are currently stalled.

He said another priority of the new government would be to resolve a dispute over the position of the county's north-south border -- a remaining sticking point in the 2005 accord.

Salaheddin said the offer to join the government went to all parties, mentioning in particular the opposition Umma, which is boycotting most voting, and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), which threatened a boycott then re-joined the race.

Parties who did not join the government risked isolation, he said. "Any politician in his right mind would not decline such an offer," he said in a recording of the briefing to journalists heard by Reuters.

Umma gave the offer a cautious welcome, saying it was interested in holding talks with the NCP and other parties, although it was too early to commit to joining a coalition.

"Let us talk about dialogue first, how to solve Sudan's problems," said Umma vice-president Fadlalla Burma Nasir.

Salaheddin's statement was dismissed by Yasir Arman, the former presidential candidate for south's dominant Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), who pulled out of the race last month along withe most of the party's northern candidates.

Arman accused the NCP of jumping the gun by offering deals before the results were known.

"This is proof that they know the results in advance ... We don't need an invitation from Ghazi."

The SPLM, predicted to win most positions in south Sudan, was always likely to join a coalition after the election. Under Sudan's constitution, the president of south Sudan automatically becomes first vice president of the whole country.

Salaheddin's offer came amid further signs of confusion in the elections which observers say have already been by hit missing ballot boxes and gaps in voters lists.

The country's National Elections Commission said it was considering re-running ballots in a few constituencies to correct errors in voting forms.

2010-04-14
HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe will press on with its drive to transfer control of foreign firms to local blacks, a minister said on Wednesday, contradicting an announcement by a senior official that the process had been suspended.

Youth, Indigenisation and Empowerment Minister Saviour Kasukuwere -- of President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF party -- issued regulations last month ordering foreign firms to give details of shareholding structures and their plans to achieve majority local control.

But on Tuesday, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's spokesman James Maridadi said the cabinet had agreed to suspend and review the rules.

The regulations took effect on March 1 and gave foreign-owned firms, including banks and mines, 45 days to file proposals on how they planned to sell 51 percent of their shares to black Zimbabweans within five years.

The deadline for submitting proposals is Thursday, April 15.

Kasukuwere told Reuters in a telephone interview that the process had not been frozen -- underlining the power struggle under way between Mugabe's ZANU-PF and Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change in the one-year-old unity government.

"That statement is at variance with the position taken by Cabinet. Someone is trying to play politics here," Kasukuwere said.

"The regulations have not been suspended. It's business as usual and businesses are encouraged to continue furnishing us with their empowerment proposals."

GOVERNMENT DIVIDED

Kasukuwere said the government would continue consulting businesses over the law, which would be applied differently to different sectors of the economy.

"The correct position is that we continue to interact with business, but we also continue to receive proposals," he said.

"We are not insisting on these companies becoming indigenous today. We are getting them to state how they propose to achieve compliance, then we will deal with their proposals, sector by sector."

The proposal for black Zimbabweans to take over foreign firms has divided the coalition government, with Mugabe and Tsvangirai publicly differing on the issue.

Mugabe's ZANU-PF government passed an indigenisation and economic empowerment law in 2007, well before he formed a power-sharing administration with Tsvangirai last year.

Analysts say the law would discourage investment and hurt efforts to rebuild an economy that shrank by more than 40 percent during a crisis-ridden decade before rebounding in 2009.

The government says Zimbabwe needs at least $10 billion to rebuild the economy, but foreign donors and investors are holding back aid and investments, waiting for reforms and signs that Mugabe is ready genuinely to share power.

Key foreign players in Zimbabwe's mining industry include Anglo Platinum and Impala Platinum Holdings, and Rio Tinto has gold and diamond mines in the country.

Britain's Standard Chartered Plc, Barclays Bank Plc and a unit of South Africa's Standard Bank are foreign-owned banks with operations in Zimbabwe.

Critics blame Mugabe, Zimbabwe's ruler since independence from Britain in 1980, for the country's economic woes, which worsened after his drive to seize white-owned farms to resettle landless blacks in 2000.

The veteran ruler denies the charge and blames Western sanctions for the economic crisis.

2010-04-14
MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Islamist rebels warned private radio stations to stop playing music in the Somalian capital of Mogadishu, while at least 11 people were killed in fighting, residents in the south of country said on Wednesday.

A fragile western backed government controls just a few blocks in the capital, while militant Islamist groups, some linked to al Qaeda, control large swathes of southern and central Somalia.

The rebels want to impose a harsh version of sharia law on the anarchic nation on the Horn of Africa, and the threat to radio stations in Mogadishu demonstrated their growing reach.

Hizbul Islam -- which is allied with al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab rebels -- had given a 10-day ultimatum to Mogadishu's radio stations, a media rights group said.

"We could do nothing else but obey the order," said Mohamed Barre Fiyore, director of Danan, a radio station in the capital.

He said his station was using the sound of crowing of roosters, traffic and recitation of traditional poems instead of music to link programmes.

Similar actions had been taken elsewhere outside the capital, and the Islamists routinely ban what they call social vices like music or women not wearing veils.

"No music and no jingles made all our favourite programmes monotonous. I don't listen to the radio anymore. There is no interest. Pop music was my favorite and I am left without music now," said Asha Salad, an 18 year old in the capital.

Last week, al Shabaab said they had taken the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) off the air in regions they controlled because it spread Christian propaganda. It also took action against the U.S.-funded Voice of America.

WAR

Somalia has been enmeshed in civil war since the 1991 ousting of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. Since then, tens of thousands have died from famine, war and disease. The anarchy has also seen the rise of rampant piracy off Somalia's shores.

In the latest violence in the south -- some 250 km north of Mogadishu -- fighters from a moderate Sufi Islamist group, called Ahlu Sunna Waljamaca, aligned to the government, engaged in heavy clashes with al Shabaab rebels, residents said.

"So far, we have seen 11 dead bodies scattered along frontlines and 14 others wounded. The casualties might be more," Mohamud Abdi, an elder in Ali Gurey village, told Reuters.

President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed's government has promised Ahlu Sunna five ministerial positions, and the post of deputy chief of staff in the army.

The Sufis' quarrel with the rebels is mainly ideological.

Somalia has a rich Sufi tradition going back more than five centuries. Sufis have been angered by the desecration of graves, the beheading of clerics, and bans on celebrating the birth of the Prophet imposed by the hardline Wahhabi insurgents.

2010-04-14


Yar'Adua's health status remains a mystery in Africa's most populous country as the president has not made a public appearance since receiving treatment for a heart ailment last November.

Jonathan, who has assumed executive powers in Yar'Adua's absence, has quickly asserted his authority in the oil producer by installing a new cabinet and replacing some of Yar'Adua's key allies.

"He left in the early hours of the 24th of November, then on the 26th we spoke extensively. Since then, we have not really had any sustained discussion," Jonathan, who is in Washington on his first foreign trip as acting president, told the BBC in a report published on Wednesday.

Asked if he has seen or spoken to Yar'Adua since his return to Nigeria two months ago, Jonathan said "No, I have not."

Yar'Adua's inner circle, led by his wife Turai, has allowed select groups of guests to meet the ill leader, including two religious delegations this month.

But Jonathan and the heads of parliament have yet to have their own meeting with the president, reviving concerns of a possible power struggle in sub-Saharan Africa's second biggest economy.

2010-04-14
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama announced an executive order on Tuesday blocking the U.S. assets of an Islamic Somali insurgent group that professes loyalty to al Qaeda, and 11 individuals he linked to conflict and piracy in the anarchic country.

Obama targeted al-Shabaab, whose control of much of central and southern Somalia has left the Western-backed government in possession of little more than the capital, Mogadishu.

Gangs operating from Somalia have seized dozens of ships in the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden in the last few years, defying western powers and the United Nations.

NAIROBI (Reuters) - The United Nations on Tuesday urged Somali troops, African Union peacekeepers and Islamist militants not to indiscriminately shell densely populated areas of the capital Mogadishu.

Thousands of civilians have been killed in fighting between the Western-backed Somali government and Islamist rebels in the last several years in the Horn of Africa nation, which has been mired in civil war since the ousting of a dictator in 1991.

The death toll from the latest bout of violence on Monday rose to at least 26, a rights group said, with scores wounded.

"These are clear violations of the law of war," Mark Bowden, the U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia, said.

"I am deeply disturbed by the plight of civilians in Mogadishu, who are caught amidst the warring parties," he said.

Monday's fighting saw shelling by insurgents, triggering return volleys of artillery from the A.U.-backed Somali forces. A school, a crowded market, a U.N. compound as well as residential areas were hit, the United Nations said.

Al Shabaab rebels, who profess loyalty to al Qaeda, have been fighting Somalia's government since 2007 and Western powers say the anarchic nation is a breeding ground for extremism.

The U.N. World Health Organisation (WHO) said that medics in Mogadishu's hospitals were being overwhelmed by casualties.

"STRETCHED TO LIMIT"

"In March 2010 alone, at least 900 conflict-related injuries and 30 deaths were reported at Mogadishu's three main hospitals," WHO spokesman Paul Garwood told reporters in Geneva.

The United Nations estimates some 100,000 people have been displaced from Mogadishu since the beginning of the year.

Children aged under 5 accounted for 10 percent of reported injuries which included shrapnel and gunshot wounds, fractures and crush injuries, he said.

Garwood told Reuters: "Health care workers are struggling to cope, they are overwhelmed with the huge increase in wounded. It is stretching an already weak health care system to the limit."

Only 250 qualified doctors, 860 nurses and 116 midwives work today in Somalia, home to the lowest number of health workers of any country in the Horn of Africa or Middle East, WHO said.

Somalia had 300 doctors as recently as 2006, but some have fled the country, part of a "brain drain", while others have been victims of violence, including some killed by a blast at a graduation ceremony last December, Garwood said.

2010-04-14
NIAMEY (Reuters) - Niger's state power company said on Tuesday it was investigating the cause of a power cut across the west of the country that has ground business in the capital to a virtual standstill.

The blackouts since Sunday have added to public frustration in the impoverished West African country, already facing severe food shortages and ongoing political upheaval that culminated in a military coup in February.

"Our teams have been on foot, working day and night to identify and fix the problem," Abdoulaarim Noma Kaka, head of the state power company Nigelec told Reuters.

Some 90 percent of electricity supply in Niger comes from power plants in neighbouring Nigeria, and is moved through a 264-km (164-mile) transmission line.

"We've been in touch with our counterparts in Nigeria and have verified that the problem is not on their side," Noma Kaka said. "I'd bet on a technical problem somewhere on the line."

Bakeries, cybercafes, laundromats and other businesses in Niamey have closed down since Sunday, while retailers have made losses on stocks of milk and fish.

"We can't continue like this punishing people," said Maman Abou, who runs a printing shop.

The government said it has been able to continue minimal power supplies to hospitals and other essential services using local generators.

20100413
CAIRO (TheEastAfrican) - The Common Market for Eastern and Southern African states converge in Cairo this week with more than 500 industry leaders, international investors and ministers from more than 19 countries in the continent to weigh emerging opportunities and challenges for doing business among member states.

The Comesa Investment Forum, whose primary aim will be to identify and assess the investment opportunities and implications associated with doing business in East and Southern Africa, will seek to encourage investment in these regions by addressing issues that are critical for doing business and define action-oriented strategies to mitigate risks facing it.

According to the Comesa Secretary General Sindiso Ngwenya, the business landscape in Africa is continuously undergoing change, and the Comesa region, as a vibrant emerging investment destination, is the least understood market, where information is generally scarce or even stale.

“It is this that the investment summit will intend to address, specifically the opportunities on offer,” he said.

Mr Ngwenya said the Comesa region and Africa in general could be the last frontier for development since the continent will soon be driving the world’s economic expansion.

He cites the expanding level of consumption and per capital income as some of the drivers of growth.

With a population of more than 430 million as at 2008 and an annual import bill of around $152 billion and an export bill of over $157 billion, Comesa forms a major marketplace for both internal and external trading.

Research shows that by 2015, Comesa which is Africa’s largest economic community will be commanding a market size of over 500 million customers.

Despite the squeeze on world economies from the global financial crisis, Comesa economies last year grew by an average of five per cent, way above the world’s average of one per cent.

For the past 10 years, though, the region’s economy has been between six and seven per cent, a clear indication that the fundamentals are on track.

A year ago, a conference on the North-South Corridor was held in Lusaka where more than $2.5 billion was raised to finance road and energy projects.

Currently, studies are being carried out on the establishment of the Central Corridor that will run through Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda and Eastern Congo.

The Northern Corridor is expected to cover Djibouti, and Addis Ababa.

Only last month, Comesa and the European Commission, during a meeting in Nairobi, committed more than $23 million to support the region’s infrastructure.

JOHANNESBURG, April 13 (Xinhua) -- Up to 60,000 members of the South African Municipal Workers' Union (SAMWU) continued their strike in South Africa's major cities on Tuesday, overturning dustbins and setting refuse alight.

In some towns which are trying to spruce themselves up ahead of the FIFA World Cup, strikers overturned dustbins.

The South African Local Government Association (SALGA) failed in its labor court bid to prohibit the industrial action. Its application was withdrawn and SALGA ordered to carry the strikers' costs of opposing the application.

In Port Elizabeth, a FIFA World Cup host city on South Africa' s east coast, a group of SAMWU members overturned dustbins and scattered litter around the municipal office.

However, the South African Press Association (SAPA) reported that police kept their distance as there was no damage to property.

In Durban, another FIFA World Cup host city further north on South Africa's east coast, about 30 people picketed outside the city hall,dressed in red union t-shirts, dancing and singing with placards cannot afford to pay for their water and electricity, salaries not affording" and "municipalities must pay same salaries for grades."

They marched into the city's treasury department and demanded people in the building stop working, but a security guard closed the doors, leaving them singing outside.

According to SAPA, about 12,000 people are expected at Durban's SAMWU march, planned for Thursday.

In Kimberley in South Africa's Northern Cape province, municipal spokesman Sello Matsie said streets were again strewn with litter and other services such as meter reading and vehicle registration services disrupted.

Northern Cape Samwu provincial secretary Duma Lebakeng said after handing over a memorandum at the municipality refuse was set alight before police put out the fire.

In South Africa's biggest city Johannesburg, refuse was not collected, and commuters who used council buses had to make alternative arrangements.

SAPA reported that the strike is a bid by Samwu to resolve seven-year negotiations to make middle and lower income municipal workers' salaries market related.

KHARTOUM, April 13 (Xinhua) -- Two voters were killed and a candidate was wounded in the Unity State in South Sudan on Tuesday, the third polling day in Sudan's general elections, an opposition leader said.

"Two voters were killed and a candidate was wounded when the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) soldiers opened fire on the voters at a polling station in the Unity State," Lam Akol, the chairman of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-Democratic Change (SPLM-DC), told Xinhua here on Tuesday.

The SPLA is the military arm of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), the dominant party in South Sudan.

Akol, the only candidate contesting against SPLM Chairman Salva Kiir Mayardit for the post of South Sudan government president, went on saying that "the SPLA opened fire randomly, which resulted in the deaths of two voters and injury of one candidate."

Akol slammed at the SPLM, saying "the ministers and commissioners belonging to the SPLM and SPLA are intervening in the polling operations and threatening the citizens."

He added that commissioners of western and eastern Bahral- Ghazal states took the ballot boxes to their homes.

He called on Sudan's National Elections Commission (NEC) to take necessary measures to protect the voters and prevent the harassment made by the SPLM supporters.

No comment so far has been made by the South Sudan government or the SPLM on the incident.

The former rebel SPLM in South Sudan signed the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) with Khartoum in 2005 to end a two-decade civil war between the north and the south, and has become a partner of the ruling National Congress Party in the current Sudanese government.

2010-04-13
ABUJA (Reuters) - Nigeria's anti-corruption police said on Tuesday it wanted to question former Delta state governor James Ibori, one of the OPEC member's most influential politicians, in its probe into money laundering.

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) said it was investigating allegations from the Delta Elders Forum that 44 billion naira was looted from the Delta state government while Ibori was governor.

"Following persistent public enquiries over the status of the case involving the former governor, we will like the public to know that Chief James Ibori is wanted by the Commission for interrogation," the EFCC said in a statement.

Ibori, a senior member of the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP) and close associate of President Umaru Yar'Adua, said he not been contacted by the EFCC for questioning.

"Ibori maintains that EFCC's action is just political and not criminal," said Ibori's spokesman Tony Eluemunor.

He is among several former state governors to have been charged by the EFCC since 2007, and several of his associates are facing money laundering charges in the United Kingdom.

A Nigerian court in December dismissed charges against Ibori of looting more than $85 million during his eight-year tenure. The EFCC has said it would appeal the ruling.

Nigeria's 36 state governors have discretionary powers over millions of dollars of public funds. Critics say they sometimes behaved like feudal monarchs, doling out cash as perks to political supporters and persecuting opponents.

The cases against the former governors were seen as a test of Nigeria's commitment to fighting graft, but they have made little progress, moving from one adjournment to another in the past two years.

Acting President Goodluck Jonathan, who assumed executive powers in the absence of ailing President Yar'Adua, has made fighting graft one of his top priorities.

KHARTOUM, April 13 (Xinhua) -- Four peacekeepers belonging to the United Nations-African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) have been kidnapped by unknown gunmen in the restive western Sudanese region of Darfur, a UNAMID source told Xinhua on Tuesday.

The anonymous source said the four South African peacekeepers, two male and two female, were stopped by some 10 gunmen when they were driving from their working site to their private accommodation near Nyala, the capital city of the South Darfur state, on Sunday.

The source quoted witnesses as saying that the four policemen were forced to step off their vehicle at gunpoint.

No armed group in Darfur has made contacts with the UNAMID to claim responsibility for the kidnapping, the source noted.

UNAMID spokesman Noureddine Mezni has refused to confirm or deny the kidnapping, noting that the four peacekeepers were reported missing since Sunday.

"I can not confirm or deny this report (of the kidnapping), I have no confirmations on what had happened," the spokesman said on Tuesday.
Earlier, the UNAMID said four peacekeepers of the mission were missing since Sunday evening in Darfur.

"The peacekeepers' last movement was reported at 4:00 p.m. (1100 GMT) on April 11, 2010, as they departed their team site just outside of Nyala, South Darfur, on a 7-km journey back to their private accommodation," the peacekeeping mission said in a statement.

"There have been no sightings of our staff and we are deeply concerned for their well-being," said UNAMID Joint Special Representative Ibrahim Gambari, who had held direct contacts with Sudanese government officials over this issue.

UNAMID has mobilized its resources in the region and is working closely with the Sudanese government and local authorities in the search for the missing peacekeepers, according to the statement.

More than 20 peacekeepers of the 26,000-strong UNAMID have been killed since the UNAMID took over from the African mission on Dec. 31, 2007.

The incident occurred while a three-day polling has been taking place since Sunday in the troubled region as part of the multi-party general elections, the first of its kind in the country in more than 20 years.

KHARTOUM, April 13 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations-African Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) said on Tuesday that four peacekeepers of the United Nations-African Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) are missing since Monday evening in the restive western Sudanese region of Darfur.

"The peacekeepers last movement was reported at 16:00 (1100 GMT) on April 11, 2010, as they departed their team site just outside of Nyala, South Darfur, on a 7 km journey back to their private accommodation," the peacekeeping mission said in a statement issued in Khartoum.

"There have been no sightings of our staff and we are deeply concerned for their well-being," said UNAMID Joint Special Representative Ibrahim Gambari, who has held direct contacts with Sudanese government officials over this issue.

UNAMID has mobilized its resources in the region and is working closely with the government of the Sudan and local authorities in the search for the missing peacekeepers, according to the statement.

The 26,000-strong UNAMID have been the target of several attacks where more than 20 soldiers were killed since the African Union United Nation operation took over from the African mission on Dec. 31, 2007.

The incident occurred while a five day polling is taking place in the troubled region like the other parts of the country.

2010-04-13
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South African municipal workers will expand their national strike over a pay dispute, further disrupting public services in Africa's biggest economy and increasing fears of chaos in cities ahead of the World Cup.

Thousands of members of the South African Municipal Workers Union (SAMWU) took to the streets on Monday, hitting basic services like street sweeping, rubbish collection and vehicle licensing, and reminding worried residents of last year's action when streets were littered with trash and burning tyres.

"Workers want to see matters resolved speedily," SAMWU Secretary General Mthandeki Nhlapo said on Tuesday. "But there will be no compromise from our side."

SAMWU said it planned to intensify existing strikes and to organise strikes in new areas in addition to the present ones.

It has put forward a number of demands including changes in the way the South African Local Government Association (SALGA) evaluates employees and its disciplinary codes.

The municipal workers' strike is not expected to have a major economic impact, but it will embarrass the government at a time of international scrutiny, when preparations are under way to host the soccer World Cup in June.

Workers began striking after the Labour Court dismissed on Saturday a legal attempt by SALGA employers to block the stoppage. SALGA withdrew its case earlier on Tuesday.

SAMWU said its second major protest march in Johannesburg would take place on Thursday.

2010-04-13
KAMPALA (Reuters) - A Ugandan court has blocked the local subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell PLC from selling its assets in the country until it pays about $16 million to settle debts with Mercator Enterprises Limited, legal papers showed.

Earlier this month, Royal Dutch Shell said it was considering selling most of its service stations and other downstream assets in 21 African countries as part of a wider effort to reduce its global refining and marketing exposure.

The court order, seen by Reuters on Tuesday, was obtained by Mercator Enterprises, a real estate management firm, which has been locked in a longstanding dispute with Shell Uganda Limited over unpaid rent.

The order, dated April 9, prohibits Shell Uganda from transferring majority control of its shareholding or majority control of its assets until it pays Mercator Enterprises at least 35 billion Uganda shillings.

Shell Uganda country manager, Ivan Kyayonka, said that he was aware of the dispute but would not comment on an ongoing court case. There was no immediate comment from Shell UK.

A source familiar with the case told Reuters the money was for rent and interest accrued since 1972 for use of a property by Shell. The two parties agreed in 2001 to settle out of court but have never arrived at a common figure.

2010-04-13
KINSHASA (Reuters) - Congo army commandos rescued a Spanish doctor held by rebels in Democratic Republic of Congo, army spokesman Colonel Leon Kasonga told Reuters on Tuesday.

Mario Zarza Manresa was seized on April 1 while travelling down the Congo River on a boat that was overrun by rebels, who later attacked the capital of northern Equateur Province. During his captivity, the rebels shaved all of Manresa's body hair in the hope it would give them magic powers in battle, a Congolese government minister had said.

2010-04-13
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Genetically engineered crops are profitable for farmers and may help protect people and the environment from an overload of pesticides, a panel of experts reported on Tuesday.

But there is a risk that weeds are developing resistance to Roundup, a weedkiller that is used to treat fields planted with certain genetically modified crops, the researchers said.

And genetic engineering is not being exploited enough, given its potential benefits, the National Research Council panel concluded.

"We do see good, hard evidence that weed resistance is growing to glyphosate. That needs serious attention," said David Ervin of Portland State University in Oregon, who chaired the panel.

Glyphosate is the main ingredient in Monsanto's widely used Roundup herbicide. The weedkiller is considered safer for people than other pesticides. "It in general replaces more toxic chemicals," Ervin, a professor of environmental studies, said in a telephone interview.

Monsanto also has genetically engineered a range of crops to resist its effects.

That means farmers can use more Roundup without fear of damaging their crops. But the practice may have allowed weeds to develop their own natural resistance, the expert committee found.

Nine weed species in the United States have developed resistance to glyphosate since the introduction of genetically engineered crops, compared with seven in areas where genetically modified crops are not used, the report found.

But in general the use of gene-engineered crops is beneficial, the experts found.

LOWER COSTS, HIGHER YIELDS

"Farmers who have adopted genetically engineered crops have experienced lower costs of production and obtained higher yields in many cases because of more cost-effective weed control and reduced losses from insect pests," reads the report from the Council, one of the independent National Academies of Science that advise the federal government.

"Farmers and their employees not only face reduced exposure to the harsh chemicals found in some herbicides and insecticides used before the introduction of genetically engineered crops but have to spend less time in the field in applying the pesticides."

Ervin said the panel did not address safety or health issues, which were covered in previous reports. "We attempted to navigate a middle ground on this. We were not intending to be pro or con," Ervin said.

Using crops engineered to resist pesticides allows farmers to rely less on tilling the soil, a practice that can reduce soil quality and worsen erosion, the report found.

Other types of genetic modification have also been helpful, the experts found. "Insecticide use has decreased with the adoption of insect-resistant crops," the report reads.

So far, these engineered genes have not spread to the wild to create super weeds, the report found -- at least not in the United States. But the risk remains.

The National Research Council report said that crops engineered for pest control now cover more than 80 percent of the acres planted to soybean, cotton and corn, or almost half of U.S. cropland.

If anything, genetically engineered crops are not used enough, the report said.

"With proper management, genetic-engineering technology could help address food insecurity by reducing yield losses through its introduction into other crops and with the development of other yield protection traits like drought tolerance," it concludes.

2010-04-13
LONDON (Reuters) - A new generation of well-organised Somali pirates is targeting ships and aims to use ransoms from hijackings for further criminal activities, a senior ship industry official said on Tuesday.

Seaborne gangs have already increased their attacks in recent months, making tens of millions of dollars in ransoms from seizing ships, including tankers and dry bulkers, in the Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Aden.

Better weather is expected to lead to further attacks.

Jan Kopernicki, president of the UK Chamber of Shipping industry association and also vice president of Shell Shipping, a unit of Royal Dutch Shell, told Reuters an "industrialisation of piracy" was taking place.

"It certainly seems from the shipping industry point of view that it's a more structured and organised approach that is developing and that is worrying because it's much more in the area of solid criminality," he said in an interview.

Kopernicki, who was appointed UK Chamber of Shipping president last month, said there had been a "substitution" of groups involved.

"The first generation pirates have been succeeded by a second generation which are different and from different groups and from what I understand connected differently," he said.

"I absolutely don't want to suggest this is linked to terrorism from what I am aware of."

The previous generation of pirates had divided up ransoms to fund their villages in Somalia, Kopernicki said, adding there was better-organised use now of mother ships and small speed boats known as skiffs.

"We are now seeing structured organisation with material apparently being brought down a supply line to supply these boats and skiffs," said Kopernicki, who leads Shell's shipping business.

"The impression we have is that the money flows are leaving Somalia and going into criminal elements."

WEST AFRICA

Foreign navies have been deployed off the Gulf of Aden since 2009 and have operated convoys, as well as setting up a transit corridor across dangerous waters. But their forces have been stretched over the vast waterways, leaving ships vulnerable.

While West African pirates have not attracted the same amount of international attention as their Somali counterparts, maritime analysts say they pose an increasing risk in a region with weak surveillance and a growing number of oil finds.

Cameroon's state oil company said last week crude oil production fell by 13 percent last year in part because piracy off the coast cut investment.

"The situation in West Africa is beginning to have the elements that would give concern of a copy cat developing more generically in that area," Kopernicki said.

Shell declined to comment on how many vessels the group had operating off East and West Africa citing "security reasons".

Kopernicki said consultation on "an urgent basis" was needed between governments, the military and industry to review plans for protecting merchant traffic off West Africa to ensure the situation did not escalate. "We are early enough in the piece to be able to do something constructive."