Free Republic

DOWA, Malawi - In February, when the food ran out, Ezlina Chambukira started selling her precious possessions one by one. First, her goat. Then an old umbrella. Then two metal plates and a battered pail. When she had nothing left, she started praying for a miracle. For the first time in a decade, severe hunger is sweeping across southern Africa. The United Nations says that two years of erratic weather - alternating droughts and floods - coupled with mismanagement of food supplies have left seven million people in six countries at risk of starvation. Here in this dusty village of...

PRESIDENTS Jacob Zuma of South Africa and Botswana’s Ian Khama angrily clashed with their Zimbabwean counterpart, President Robert Mugabe over xenophobia in South Africa, with the two demanding that instead of blaming their neighbour, Zimbabwe and other Sadc states must fix their broken economies to curb the rising tide of immigration. Hazel Ndebele/Elias Mambo While Sadc leaders met for an extraordinary summit in Harare on Wednesday to discuss an industrialisation strategy and roadmap, the major highlight of the meeting was the recent xenophobic violence and killings in South Africa which raised a storm of debate and anger across the region....

Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in Moscow on Monday where the issue of Middle East peace talks will be raised, Russian authorities announced Thursday. “The two leaders will hold talks concerning key aspects of Russian-Palestinian relations and their future, with particular attention on the trade, economy and humanitarian sectors,” the Kremlin said in a statement according to AFP. There will also be “an exchange of ideas on the process of Israeli-Palestinian talks and other problematic regional situations,” the statement continued, adding that North Africa would also be on the agenda. …

The long struggle to keep abortion out of the south African country of Mozambique has failed. President Armando Guebuza on Thursday "quietly signed into law," in the words of Agence France-Presse, a revision to the penal code that legalizes abortion-on-demand in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, or up to 16 weeks in the case of rape. Mozambique’s Parliament, just as quietly, approved the legislation to legalize abortion in July. The provision allowing abortion if a pregnancy threatens the life or health of the mother, and if a fetal abnormality is diagnosed, is also maintained. Policymakers within the Mozambique Health...

LISBON, Portugal — Eusebio, the Portuguese soccer star who was born into poverty in Africa but became an international sporting icon and was voted one of the 10 best players of all time, has died at 71, his longtime club Benfica said. He died Sunday, the club announced on its website, without providing details. Eusebio died at home of heart failure, his biographer, Jose Malheiro, said.

East Africa is in the middle of an incredible energy boom that is likely to last decades, according to energy industry executives who gathered this week in Kenya’s capital in a sign of the region’s growing prominence. The last couple of years have seen significant oil and gas discoveries in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Mozambique. Even Somalia hopes to get onboard though security woes and a lack of regulation make the likelihood still years away. “This region was definitely underexplored in the last decade,” said Martin Trachsel, the chief executive of South Atlantic Petroleum Limited. “Most companies were exploring in...

The 15 threatened animals were shot dead for their horns last month in the Mozambican part of Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park, which also covers South Africa and Zimbabwe. They were thought to be the last of an estimated 300 that roamed through the special conservation area when it was established as "the world's greatest animal kingdom" in a treaty signed by the three countries' then presidents in 2002. The latest deaths, and Mozambique's failure to tackle poaching, has prompted threats by South Africa to re-erect fences between their reserves. Wildlife authorities believe the poachers were able to track the rhinoceroses...

Syria will be suspended from the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation on Wednesday for its violent suppression of a 17-month uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, a diplomat said on Monday ahead of an emergency OIC summit in Mecca. "The resolution regarding the suspension of the Syrian membership in the OIC is not facing obstacles ... It will be approved," said the diplomat, speaking on the sidelines of a preliminary foreign ministers meeting in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. He said the decision was likely to be formally announced at the end of the second day of the summit, which was called by Saudi...

A Coast Guard inspection of a freighter docked at the Port of Longview "didn't uncover or reveal anything," a Coast Guard spokesman said Saturday, but the crew members are not allowed off the ship and security will be maintained until the ship leaves. "We were not expecting to find anything," Lt. Cmdr. Glynn Smith, the Coast Guard's public affairs officer for the Pacific area, said Saturday by telephone from his office in Alameda, Calif. The search was routine, according to the Coast Guard, but Longview officials said the security crackdown is the most port activity since the Sept. 11, 2001,...

Having recognized that successful early reading education programs contribute to future student success both in and out of the classroom, the Obama Administration intends to execute a new program to build upon those successes. And it intends to carry out that task in the African nation of Mozambique. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which will carry out this endeavor with private sector assistance, late last week issued a Request for Proposals (RFP) from vendors capable of launching such an initiative. The Early Grade Reading Assessment Plus Quality Instruction and Management (EGRA+QIM) Project, as it is known, "will be...

"Democracy is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequal alike" Plato (BC 427 - 374BC). Open rigging and clinging brazenly to power have become common features of emerging democracies in the world today especially in Africa. Many Countries in Africa have become accustomed to "sit-tight dictators" or military style of leadership, with democracy being propelled by the West for their replacement. This is at the centre of the on-going conflict in many emerging democratic nations. Democratization of the world today as being championed by United States of...

Male genitalia tops witchcraft list May 6 2011 at 08:14am By Nompumelelo Magwaza flickr.com Male genitalia are the most sought-after human body part for use in harmful traditional practices, including witchcraft, in South Africa and Mozambique. This is according to a research report released by the Mozambican Human Rights League in partnership with Childline South Africa in Durban on Thursday. The study also found South Africa had created a market for body parts trafficked from Mozambique. The research showed that at least one mutilation occurred in both countries every two weeks during the 14 months of the study between 2008...

Recent events in Tunisia, Lebanon and Egypt spell a dangerous new trend in the region. There have been major developments in Tunisia, Lebanon and Egypt, each of which is of tremendous importance. In Tunisia, a popular uprising fueled by unemployment, economic suffering and long-term discontent has overthrown the dictator, but not necessarily the dictatorship. In 55 years of independence, the country has been governed by two dictators, the current one being Zine al-Abedin Ben Ali, who has been president for 23 years and was a key power in the regime even before that. Is this going to spread? Does it...

Two men were sentenced to 20 years in prison for cutting off a nine-year-old boy's testicles, penis and eyes to sell to a Malawian witchdoctor, Mozambican state radio reported Thursday. One of the men was the boy's uncle, who lured him with crackers to go rat-hunting in woods near the Malawi border, while the accomplice hid nearby, the court sentence read. One attacker covered the youth's mouth while the other hit him on the chest with a rock. They then cut off his organs and left him for dead, while one took the body parts in a bag to a...

MAPUTO, Mozambique, Sept. 3 (UPI) -- A 30 percent rise in bread prices triggered riots in Maputo, Mozambique, that killed at least seven people and injured 228, government officials said. The riots Wednesday and Thursday in the country's capital prompted fears that food protests could spread across poorer African countries relying on agricultural imports, similar to the riots of 2007-08, the Financial Times reported Thursday. Wheat prices rose in reaction to Russia's extension of its grain export ban for another year, increasing the potential of more riots over food shortages, officials said. "Bread is the key item in the basket...

Russia announced a 12-month extension of its grain export ban on Thursday, raising fears about a return to the food shortages and riots of 2007-08 which spread through developing countries dependent on imports. The announcement by Vladimir Putin came as the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation called an emergency meeting to discuss the wheat shortage, and riots in Mozambique left seven dead. The unrest in Maputo, in which 280 people were also injured, followed the government’s decision to raise bread prices by 30 per cent. Police opened fire on demonstrators after thousands turned out to protest against the price hikes,...

Starting in the late 1990s, China's presence on the African continent experienced a phenomenal expansion. Far more profound changes, however, have been underway and may only become apparent in the next decade. These changes are likely to transform the regional economic landscape of the African continent in ways never seen before. Chinese experts apparently believe that Africa is entering an era of relative stability and that the time to explore its untapped resources has arrived [1]. Chinese policymakers see in Africa possible solutions to some of China's most pressing problems, for instance, Beijing's need to secure access to energy resources...

HARARE - A ZIMBEBWEAN woman killed her infant son and sold one of his ears for US$20 (S$27.95) to a traditional healer wanted for ritual murders in neighbouring Mozambique, police said on Thursday. 'We can confirm that the woman Christine Hofisi from Chipinge (near the Mozambican border) strangled her 18-month-old son to death and cut off his left ear,' deputy national police spokesman Oliver Mandipaka told AFP. 'Hofisi sold the ear to a traditional healer notorious for ritual murders in Mozambique. She sold the ear for US$20 but was given US$10 with the balance to be paid later. 'She is...

Sniffing out landmines Rat sniffing landmine. Photo by Xavier Rossi, courtesy of Apopo's Herorats It costs as little as €2 to place a landmine, but it can cost as much as €700 to clear one. That difference underscores the challenge in clearing antipersonnel mines. Some traditional methods, such as using metal detectors and trained dogs, are still expensive and time consuming. But in southern Mozambique a more cost and time-effective approach is being used with remarkable success: rats. Bart Weetjens, a Belgian product engineer with a lifelong love of rodents, first thought about it after reading a scientific article on...

The Great Rift Valley extends some 4,000 miles southward from Syria north of Israel, through the Gulf of Aqaba, through Ethiopia, and all the way to Mozambique in southeast Africa. It harbors a giant fault, which has been under investigation as a model for sea floor spreading. A recent geologic event rent a gaping crack through the desert of Ethiopia, causing safety concerns for locals. These crustal plate motions may foreshadow rifting events further north in the Great Rift Valley...