TRADE-KENYA: ”Creating Designs for Chinese Traders to Copy”

‘‘We are crying,’’ laments Millicent Otok, as I take a seat next to her at her stall. ‘‘Why are you crying?’’ I enquire. ‘‘They come and copy our items,’’ she says, in reference to Chinese traders in the Kenyan market.

COLOMBIA-ECUADOR: Coca Spraying Makes for Toxic Relations

Ecuador is making its final preparations to bring suit against Colombia in the International Court of Justice at The Hague over anti-coca spraying carried out by Colombia along their shared border. Quito had already given notice of its intentions.

SECURITY-BRAZIL: Oedipus Caught in the Crossfire

A child mown down by a hail of bullets from a rifle aimed by an unseen gunman is one of the drawings kept on file by psychologist Ricardo Parente, and produced in evidence to support his claim that Freudian theory must be revised when treating cases in the violent shantytowns of Brazil.

ECONOMY-MALAWI: Uranium Mining Sparks Controversy

Malawi will have its first-ever modern mining project located in the northern town of Kayelekera in Karonga by early next year if plans by an Australian mining company, Paladin (Africa) Limited, are successful. In April this year, the Malawi government granted the mining company a licence to exploit up to 34,5 million tons of uranium.

DEVELOPMENT-ZIMBABWE: Maternal Deaths, The Neglected Tragedy

''It is a nasty experience which I do not want to be reminded of. But if you try to keep it to yourself it will remain a shock for a long time. I cannot even explain the pain I felt after being told that I was carrying dead bodies in my womb,’’ said Sesedzai Manzanga, a Harare teacher, as she recounted giving birth to a dead set of twins two years ago.

HEALTH-MOZAMBIQUE: Enter Malaria, Another Companion of HIV/AIDS

Anita Elena looks frail after months of chronic diarrhoea. ‘‘I prefer this illness to malaria because malaria kills you rapidly,’’ says Elena, sitting on a reed mat in front of her makeshift two-roomed stick and mud home, which she shares with her husband and three children. ‘‘My older brother died of malaria five years ago. He went rapidly.’’

ENVIRONMENT: UNEP Faults Asian Development Bank Project

A sharp difference of opinion between the Asian Development Bank (AsDB) and the United Nations Environment programme (UNEP) has surfaced over a flagship venture of the Manila-based financial institution.

/UPDATE*/POLITICS: U.N. Chief Faulted for Undermining General Assembly

The largest single coalition of developing nations is accusing Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon of undermining the General Assembly - the U.N.'s highest policy-making body - by his proposed unilateral action to make structural changes in programmes relating to Asia, Africa and Latin America.

SIERRA LEONE: Caught Between Leaving the Kitchen and Putting Food on the Table

When Iyesha Josiah told people last year that after the August 2007 general elections, she would stand before them as a new member of parliament for Sierra Leone, they thought she was joking.

TRADE-SENEGAL: Africa &#39&#39Will Not Be the Winner&#39&#39 of the EPAs

''I do not know if a winner will emerge from the signing of the economic partnership agreement under the current conditions but I know for sure that Africa cannot be the winner,'' says Amadou Ba, who heads the international negotiations division at Senegal’s ministry of commerce.

CORRUPTION: World Bank Debars Indian Firms in Fraud Probe

The World Bank ended a several-year investigation Monday by debarring two Indian pharmaceutical companies, citing corrupt procurement practices in a controversial Bank-funded reproductive health programme.

DEVELOPMENT: Too Many Donors Spoil the Aid

An excessive number of aid donors is hampering efforts to make development assistance more effective, a new study has found.

FINANCE: World Bank Moves into the Middle East

The Middle East and North Africa region has become the fastest-growing area for investments from the World Bank's private sector arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), which surpassed one billion dollars for the first time last year, according to the Bank Information Centre, a Washington-based research group on international public lenders.

POLITICS: UN Chief Faulted for “Undermining” General Assembly

The largest single coalition of developing nations is accusing Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon of "undermining" the General Assembly - the U.N.'s highest policy-making body - by his proposed unilateral action to make structural changes in programmes relating to Asia, Africa and Latin America.

LATIN AMERICA: Catholic Church Renews &#39Option for the Poor&#39

The Roman Catholic Church plans to undertake concrete projects in the next four years to help overcome poverty in Latin America, the region with the most glaring income inequalities in the world.

CULTURE-ZIMBABWE: &#39&#39It Is Unlawful to Speak the Truth&#39&#39

"If I am going to change anything in my script it will be punctuation marks. I am not changing anything else,’’ said Cont Mhlanga, a prominent Zimbabwean playwright and founder of Bulawayo-based Amakhosi Theatre Production House. He was responding to the banning of his play entitled ‘‘The Good President’’.

MALAWI: ”All-Day Electricity”-As Long As It Is Not Peak Time

Patients have over many years frequently been denied scheduled surgical operations at the Holy Family Hospital in Malawi’s southern region due to abrupt power cuts.

RIGHTS-MOROCCO: Childhood Being Stolen

Habiba Hamrouch describes her daughter, Sanaa, as her "revenge" - her blow against the mixture of abuse, tradition and indifference that enables thousands of girls to be exploited as domestic servants in Morocco.

DEVELOPMENT: New EU Contract Could Fail MDGs

Anti-poverty campaigners are concerned that a new European Union proposal for improving development aid may not result in sufficient extra money for health and education in poor countries.

AFRICA: Child Bride Symbolises Reasons Why MDGs Will be Missed

The woes of the child bride in many ways illustrate the conditions underlying the failure of African countries to achieve many of the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

HEALTH-AUSTRALIA: &#39Earmark More HIV/AIDS Funds for Research&#39

Organisers of the fourth International AIDS Society (IAS) conference have called for donors to set aside 10 percent of funding for HIV prevention, treatment and care to research.