Weekly anb06071.txt #7

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WEEKLY NEWS ISSUE of: 07-06-2001      PART #1/7

* Africa. Growing problem of Africa's child workers  -  The number of 
children in Africa who are forced to work -- sometimes in conditions 
described as modern-day slavery --could rise to a hundred million within 15 
years. A conference on the future of African children was told that more 
youngsters aged between five and 14 are working in Africa than in any other 
region of the world. The conference, in Cairo, also heard that trafficking 
in child labour was a growing and highly lucrative trade. A speaker from 
the International Migration Organisation said the traffickers used the 
children as prostitutes, beggars, construction workers and in mines. She 
said many of the children were denied food, medicines and wages, and were 
subjected to physical and mental abuse.   (BBC News, UK, 31 May 2001)

* Afrique. Air Afrique  -  La protestation des employés de la compagnie Air 
Afrique s'accentue dans tous les pays africains où elle est présente. Le 31 
mai, des manifestations organisées par le comité intersyndical du personnel 
de la compagnie se sont tenues dans plusieurs capitales. Un cortège de 500 
syndicalistes a parcouru les rues de Dakar (Sénégal) et a remis une lettre 
au siège de la Banque mondiale de la capitale, demandant de résoudre la 
crise. Selon la Banque mondiale, ont-ils déclaré, deux solutions sont 
envisageables: la liquidation de la société ou sa forte réduction. A Bamako 
(Mali), une manifestation du personnel d'Air Afrique a sévèrement contesté 
la stratégie de la Banque mondiale en critiquant surtout le projet de 
"privatisation sauvage" qui est en cours. Depuis 1993, Air Afrique connait 
une grave crise financière. La compagnie, constituée par la Convention de 
Yaoundé au début des années 60, est une compagnie publique à laquelle 
adhèrent onze pays africains.   (Misna, Italie, 1er juin 2001)

* Afrique. Le trafic des enfants  -  "Le trafic d'enfants rapporte près de 
7 milliards de dollars par an aux organisations du crime organisé", a 
affirmé Tim Demeyeur, juriste auprès du Bureau international du travail, 
lors du Forum panafricain réuni au Caire par l'OUA et l'Unicef. Il a 
précisé que le trafic des enfants d'Afrique noire augmentait sur ce 
continent et rappelé qu'en Afrique de l'Ouest et du Centre, des milliers de 
petites domestiques de 5 ans sont livrées à la prostitution.   (La Croix, 
France, 1er juin 2001)

* Afrique. Enfants soldats - Symposium au Vatican  -  Le 3 juin, jour de la 
Pentecôte, le pape Jean-Paul II a instamment demandé que la communauté 
internationale se mobilise pour que l'on mette fin au scandale des enfants 
sodats que l'on continue de recruter dans une cinquantaine de pays. A la 
fin de la messe, le pape a voulu faire mémoire de "tous les jeunes qui sont 
victimes de la violence qui règne malheureusement dans plusieurs pays". 
Pour inciter la communauté internationale à faire davantage d'efforts pour 
protéger et réhabiliter ceux qui vivent dans ces situations dramatiques, la 
Mission permanente des observateurs du Saint-Siège et le Bureau du 
sous-secrétariat général de l'Onu pour les enfants et les conflits armés, 
ont organisé un symposium qui aura lieu le 5 juin et qui aura comme thème: 
"Les enfants dans les conflits armés: une responsabilité de 
tous".   (Zenith, Vatican, 3 juin 2001)

* Afrique. La conférence sur le racisme dans l'impasse  -  Deux semaines 
d'âpres tractations n'auront pas suffi à surmonter les sérieuses 
divergences qui subsistent dans le cadre de la préparation de la Conférence 
mondiale des Nations unies contre le racisme, prévue du 31 août au 7 
septembre à Durban, en Afrique du Sud. Les représentants des 125 Etats 
participant à ce qui devait être la dernière réunion préparatoire à Genève 
se sont séparés, le 1er juin, sans parvenir à un consensus sur le projet de 
déclaration et le programme d'action devant être adopté par la conférence. 
La principale pierre d'achoppement demeure la demande de réparation avancée 
par les pays africains pour l'esclavage et le colonialisme. Ils souhaitent 
que la traite soit reconnue comme un "crime contre l'humanité" et que les 
Etats impliqués assument leurs responsabilités en leur accordant des 
compensations.   (Le Monde, France, 5 juin 2001)

* Africa. Action against the Media  -  Algeria: In a letter to the Interior 
Minister (1 June), Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) protested the attack on 
Nadir Bensebaa on 25 May, a journalist with the daily Le Matin, by members 
of the anti-riot forces in Tizi-Ouzou. Congo RDC: On 23 May, André 
Kisangani, a journalist with the daily La Référence Plus, was summoned to 
appear on 5 June before the Court of Kinshasa/Pont Kasa-Vubu by the former 
Education minister, Yérodia Abdoulaye Ndombasi. On 31 May, it was reported 
that a video tape containing a 24 April 2001 interview given by Etienne 
Tshisekedi wa Mulumba, to the private television chain RAGA TV, for its 
programme "A vous la parole", has been confiscated for a month in the 
office of the President. This interview, which was to be broadcast on 29 
April, has not been shown to this day. In a 1 June letter to the 
Director-General of the Migrations Department (DGM), the organisation 
Journalists in Danger (JED) protested the attempt by DGM agents at Kinshasa 
International Airport to prevent JED's Secretary-General from boarding a 
flight to Bangkok via Brussels. Egypt: On 1 June, the Writers in Prison 
Committee of International PEN said it was seriously concerned about the 
prison sentence handed down to writer and researcher Dr. Saad El-Din 
Ibrahim. Liberia: In a letter addressed to the Minister of Information on 1 
June, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) expressed its preoccupation about the 
deterioration of working conditions for journalists in Liberia. Namibia: On 
31 May, The Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) said it noted with 
serious concern the deteriorating commitment of the Namibian government to 
the fundamental democratic values of freedom of expression. On 4 June, the 
Southern Africa's Editors Forum said it was deeply shocked by the punitive 
economic war waged by the Namibian Government against The Namibian. 
Swaziland: In a letter to the Minister for Public Service and Information, 
(4 June) MISA officials said they had been trying unsuccessfully for three 
weeks to set up an appointment to meet him personally, to deliberate on 
issues that have become a source of concern regarding the state of the 
Media in Swaziland. Togo: In a letter addressed to the Interior Minister on 
1 June, RSF has protested the arrest of Lucien Messan, editorial director 
of the weekly Le Combat du Peuple". Zimbabwe: During a four-day mission to 
Harare, organized by the World Press Freedom Committee, it was apparent 
that journalists and news media there are under intense pressure, 
especially in the run-up to presidential elections in 2002. (Report 
received 5 June).   (ANB-BIA, Brussels, 6 June 2001)

* Africa. Fears on debt plan  -  The heavily indebted poor countries' 
debt-relief initiative is in jeopardy of failing to deliver a sustained 
exit from poverty for many countries, finance ministers from sub-Saharan 
Africa gave warning on 5 June. Ministers attending a conference of HIPC 
countries in London complained of donor countries holding up debt relief 
and said that they would need much higher foreign direct investment and 
trade access to rich-country markets. Gerald Ssendaula, the finance 
minister of Uganda, told the Financial Times that his country might miss 
its targets for debt reduction. Debt relief under the initiative is based 
on reducing the net present value of external debt to 150 per cent of 
exports. Mr Ssendaula said that recent falls in the price of coffee, one of 
Uganda's main exports, meant that the debt relief on offer - calculated 
when coffee prices were much higher -- might be inadequate to hit the 
target. "We are worried that with these poor terms of trade the 
sustainability of our achievements in health and education will be placed 
in question," Mr Ssendaula said. He said that the World Bank was agreeing a 
credit of $300m to tide Uganda over the next three years. "But we need to 
be in a position where we can add value to our exports and other 
commodities," he said. "Debt relief is a good thing. But for developing 
countries to get out of the cycle we need more investment in the 
economy."   (Financial Times, UK, 6 June 2001)

* Africa. AIDS plays havoc with Africa's children  -  HIV/AIDS has reached 
"catastrophic" proportions and is unravelling decades of gains in child 
survival and development, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, the UN 
secretary general, Kofi Annan, warns in a new report. The social profile of 
the AIDS pandemic has been gradually shifting, the report warns, with the 
disease increasingly affecting the young, poor and illiterate. Above all, 
its victims are adolescent girls. Elsewhere, too, deepening poverty and 
"increasingly obscene disparities" shame commitments made by the world 
community at a summit a decade ago to improve children's lives across the 
world, the report says. In a major study prepared by UNICEF for a UN 
special session on children in September which will bring dozens of heads 
of state to New York, Mr Annan challenges them to find it "unacceptable 
that 600m children in developing countries have to struggle to survive on 
less than $1 a day". But children with deep problems caused essentially by 
poverty are not only in the developing countries; in the world's richest 
countries, one in six children -- 47m --live below the poverty line, he 
says.   (The Guardian, UK, 6 June 2001)

* Afrique. Sida: un médicament gratuit  -  Le 6 juin, le géant 
pharmaceutique Pfizer a annoncé qu'il allait offrir gratuitement dans 50 
pays en voie de développement un médicament, le Diflucan, traitant deux 
affections touchant souvent les malades du sida. Cette offre sera mise en 
oeuvre en partenariat avec les Nations unies et l'Organisation mondiale de 
la santé.   (La Croix, France, 7 juin 2001)

* Africa. AIDS drug giveaway extended  -  On 6 June Pfizer extended the 
giveaway of one of its medicines to AIDS patients in Africa as 
pharmaceutical companies continued to respond to attacks over the 
availability of their products in the developing world. Pfizer, the world's 
largest pharmaceutical group, has already this year started to give away 
Diflucan, its anti-fungal medicine, to patients in South Africa. On 
Wednesday it extended that to the 50 least-developed countries, as 
identified by the United Nations. The decision is part of public relations 
efforts by western companies to deal with an onslaught over the prices they 
charge for their drugs. This year, a group of drug companies backed down in 
a landmark dispute over intellectual property rights in South Africa. 
Pfizer has also come under fire over alleged irregularities in the testing 
of an antibiotic in Nigeria. It says it is working with Nigerian 
authorities to resolve the problem, which involves charges that it tested 
the drug without proper approval. Drug companies say that, without the 
profits they make from drugs, they could not fund research and development 
of new treatments. But they are under fire over prices and drug 
availability, particularly in the fight against AIDS, which has become a 
humanitarian tragedy in sub-Saharan Africa. A number of companies have 
announced deep price discounts on AIDS drugs in Africa. Diflucan, not 
itself a treatment for AIDS, treats two infections --cryptococcal 
meningitis and oesophageal candidiasis -- that afflict patients with 
weakened immune systems.   (Financial Times, UK, 7 June 2001)

Weekly anb0607.txt - #1/7