Just when I thought I was recovering, somewhat (for one never really or fully recovers from such inevitably traumatic events), from the recent passing of Eskia (Ezekiel) Mphahlele, the South African literary giant, now comes […]

Kilifi, 12 November, 2008— Under normal circumstances, 14-year-old Paul Katana would be in school, but not today. Katana is instead flagging down vehicles along the Mombasa-Malindi highway, hoping to sell sacks of charcoal he is […]

Goma, 12 November, 2008— Tens of thousands of civilians forced from their homes by fresh fighting in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo are still beyond the reach of international aid, two weeks after the launch […]

Cairo, 9 November, 2008— On 5 October, farmer Muhammad Tulaib woke up to the news that red palm weevils – a large species of beetle locally known as ‘sussit el-nakhil’ – were found in one […]

Accra, 7 November, 2008— A long queue of trucks loaded with timber, freshly sawed from Ghana’s fast-depleting forests, lines up at Accra’s Tema Harbour to offload to ships bound for Europe. No one at the […]

New York, 6 November, 2008— The financial crisis is expected to have a severe impact on humanitarian funding, with some analysts projecting cuts in official development assistance (ODA) of up to a third or more. […]

Kabul, 6 November, 2008— Hundreds of thousands of livestock could be lost in Afghanistan in the next six months unless aid agencies urgently provide animal feed, vaccines and water, the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and […]

Kinshasa, 6 November, 2008— Tens of thousands of internally displaced people (IDPs) fled fresh fighting on 6 November between the army and fighters loyal to renegade general, Laurent Nkunda, in two areas of North Kivu, […]