The Disasters Emergency Committee has recently raised a staggering £72million for famine victims in Eastern Africa. The DEC has been involved in raising funds since an appeal was launched in July this summer to help Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia and the Republic of South Sudan, after they suffered from one of the worst droughts recorded in [...]
There is a basic assumption that we are constantly being told about the Millennium Development goals (MDGs). That most countries, and the world in general, are way off track for meeting the set targets and are therefore failing drastically. This has been caused in part by some countries adopting high targets to fit in with [...]
President Mwai Kibaki has challenged participants in a regional Anti-Illicit Trade Conference on Wednesday 6th Oct, to identify gaps existing in national and regional legislations that encourage illicit trade to flourish. Kibaki also urged the participants to formulate an action plan that would enable East African Community member States to implement a more focused and [...]
The head of the United Nations-African Union peacekeeping endeavour met with government authorities in Darfur to discuss the peace process, currently in effect in the troubled west Sudanese region. Discussions were led by UN-African Union Joint Special Representative in Darfur, Ibrahim Gambari, Sudanese Presidential Advisor Ghazi Salahuddin Atabaani, AU High Level Implementation Panel chairman Thabo [...]
Efforts to raise the campaign profile of the African Union’s 2010 Year of Peace and Security have stepped up a notch. This is demonstrated by the esteemed individuals and celebrities who are now backing the exercise. Individuals such as Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Dr Mo Ibrahim, Hon. Amara Essy and Professor Wangari Maathi are supporting the [...]
The 2010 Year of Peace and Security in Africa initiative, established by the African Union (AU), has received vital attention from those leaders attending the AU summit. The AU is actively seeking more sustainable domestic resources as a means to fund Africa’s peace and security agenda, while there is confirmation that the strategy is set [...]
After nine days of intense deliberations, decisions and policy formulation, the 15th summit of the African Union (AU) rounded up on July 27th in Kampala, Uganda. The theme of this most recent assembly was the incredibly important and pressing yet often marginalised issue of Maternal, Infant and Child Health and Development in Africa. The matter [...]
As heads of state gather in Kampala this week for the African Union summit my mind wandered back to 1975 when heads of state also gathered in Kampala for the OAU (Organisation of African Unity as it was then known) Summit. This was by any measure a remarkable meeting, not least for the presence of [...]
The ECOWAS council of ministers has adopted the West African Common Industrial Policy (WACIP), its action plan and supplementary acts and called on the Commission to take all necessary steps to ensure their speedy implementation. WACIP, in particular, seeks to diversify and broaden the region’s industrial production base by progressively raising the local content of [...]
Two Ugandan soldiers serving in the African Union’s peacekeeping force in Somalia (AMISOM) died in fighting with rebels for control of north Mogadishu last week, an AMISOM spokesman said Saturday 5th June. At least 11 people died when the al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab rebels and government forces shelled each other’s positions in the north of [...]
