SUDAN ACCEPTS OIL BORDER TOWN RULING

North and south Sudan say they accept a border ruling by judges in The Hague that gives a big oilfield to the north.

The Permanent Court of Arbitration has redrawn the boundaries of Abyei region, which became a flashpoint during a 22-year-long war between north and south.

The judges decided not to abide by the borders proposed after the 2005 peace deal, which the north had rejected.

Instead it ruled that several areas – including the Heglig oilfied – were not part of Abyei.

Although The Hague court was deciding where Abyei’s borders lay rather than who owned the land, analysts say the ruling was crucial in determining the ownership of the oilfields.

Abyei’s inhabitants will be asked in a referendum in 2011 whether they want to be a part of north or south Sudan – and analysts say they are likely to opt for a union with the south.

By reducing the size of Abyei compared with the 2005 proposals, the court has effectively awarded more land and mineral wealth to the north.

The BBC’s James Copnall in the capital, Khartoum, says the reaction on the ground to the judges’ ruling will be a key test of the peace between north and south.

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NIGERIEN LAWYERS DOWN WIGS IN PROTEST

Niger’s lawyers said on Sunday they would strike this week in protest at the president’s plan to hold a referendum on extending his rule, a day after the European Union delayed an aid payment over the vote row.

Despite mounting opposition at home and abroad, President Mamadou Tandja is pushing ahead with an August 4 vote to allow him to hold on to power for another three years in the uranium producing country after his second term expires in December.

“The General Assembly of the Order of Lawyers has decided to lay down its robes and not work on Monday, July 13, 2009 in solidarity with the Constitutional Court,” the lawyers said in a statement referring to Niger’s top court.

The court was dissolved last month after it declared Tandja’s plans illegal. The president has also dissolved parliament, assumed emergency powers and imposed restrictions on the private press in his bid to hold the poll.

The 71-year-old president addressed the nation on Sunday evening, saying only the people of Niger could decide whether he should stay on as president but they should vote “yes” to consolidate progress and build a better future.

He called for people to judge him by the progress he had delivered and said he welcomed debate, but warned the state would take measures to ensure law and order was maintained.

Critics including regional body ECOWAS, the United Nations and donors, have called the referendum a step backwards after some progress towards democracy over the last decade, but the EU is the first body to impose financial sanctions.

“Because of the influence this could have on the management of public finances, it has been decided to postpone the payment of a tranche of budget support,” a European Commission official in Brussels told Reuters on Sunday

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RAI STAR DOCKED 5 YEARS FOR ABORTION BID

A French court has jailed the Algerian singer Cheb Mami for five years for abducting a former partner and forcing her to undergo an attempted abortion.

Cheb Mami, whose real name is Mohammed Khalifati, was found guilty at a trial in Bobigny, a Parisian suburb.

He had denied the charges, telling the court that he had been “manipulated” by his entourage.

The singer is credited with bringing Algeria’s popular Rai folk music to an international audience.

The maximum sentence was 10 years and the prosecution had asked for seven.

Prosecutors had said that Cheb Mami was one of a group who abducted and beat the woman, a French photographer, in the Algerian capital, Algiers, in 2005.

They said she came to Algeria believing she was on a business trip, a few days after telling Cheb Mami, 42, that she was pregnant.

She said that she was drugged and taken to a villa in Algiers. There, three people tried to perform an abortion.

On her return to France, she discovered she was still pregnant and later gave birth to a daughter, now aged three.

France issued an international arrest warrant for Cheb Mami after he skipped bail in Paris in May 2007 and fled to Algeria.

He returned to Paris on Monday, saying he wanted to attend the trial, and was arrested at Orly airport.

He had denied involvement in the attempted abortion and said he was being persecuted because he was a successful Arab star.

The star showed no emotion as the verdict was read out.

But during the trial he had expressed remorse and asked for the woman’s forgiveness.

He broke down in tears and admitted making a “serious mistake” but said he did not love the woman and felt “trapped” when she told him she was pregnant.

Cheb Mami blamed his former manager Michel Lecorre – also known as Michel Levy – saying he was behind the plot.

“I was in a panic and I agreed,” he said. “I did nothing to stop him.”

Michel Lecorre was sentenced to four years for plotting and organising the assault.

The court also issued arrest warrants for two of the singer’s aides, Hicham Lazaar and Abdelkader Lallali.

They were convicted in absentia of involvement in the case and were sentenced to three and six years in jail respectively.

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RAVALOMANANA’S PRIME MINISTER ARRESTED

Madagascar security forces arrested the man named prime minister by ousted leader Marc Ravalomanana during a raid on a hotel in the capital Antananarivo on Wednesday, witnesses said. More than a dozen armed troops loyal to new President Andry Rajoelina’s military-backed administration stormed the city’s plush Carlton Hotel before seizing Manandafy Rakotonirina.

The naming of several ‘ministers’ by allies of Ravalomanana, who quit power last month under pressure from the army but insists he remains president in exile, has increased confusion over who controls the Indian Ocean island. “The soldiers arrived in at least five 4×4 vehicles and searched the hotel for close to an hour. I heard one shot fired,” local journalist Hery Rakotondrazaka told Reuters.

Police and government sources declined to comment. Tensions have risen in the capital in the last two weeks as Rajoelina’s transitional authority cracks down on alleged political opponents and supporters of the exiled Ravalomanana. At least five people have died in clashes between forces loyal to Africa’s youngest president and Ravalomanana’s supporters.

On Monday, the military stormed the Constitutional Court and arrested four people.

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AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL CONDEMNS HANGING OF 9 SUDANESE

Lobby group Amnesty International has condemned as “outrageous” the hanging of nine Sudanese men convicted of beheading a newspaper editor in 2006.

“They were arbitrarily arrested, tortured and then subjected to an unfair trial,” said the body’s deputy Africa director Tawanda Hondora.

They were hanged in a prison in the capital, Khartoum, in front of relatives of the editor, Mohammed Taha.

The men, from Darfur, were apparently upset by an article in Mr Taha’s paper.

His decapitated body was found on a dirt road a day after he had been abducted from his home in Khartoum.

Groups of women were wailing outside the jail after the executions, reports the Reuters news agency.

Ten people were initially convicted of the murder but one was later acquitted.

A defence lawyer said an article in Mr Taha’s al-Wifaq newspaper had angered members of the Darfur community by downplaying the scale of rape in the Darfur conflict and insulting women from the region.

Despite being an Islamist himself, Mr Taha had sparked angry demonstrations when in 2005 he reprinted an article questioning the roots of the Prophet Muhammad.

He was put on trial for blasphemy but the charges were later dropped.

Mr Taha had been the target of an assassination attempt five years previously after writing an article which criticised the ruling National Congress Party.

Despite his controversial past, thousands of weeping mourners attended Mr Taha’s funeral in September 2006.

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PILOT WHO PRAYED WHILE PLANE CRASHED JAILED FOR 10 YEARS

A Tunisian pilot who paused to pray instead of taking emergency measures before crash-landing his plane, killing 16 people, has been sentenced to 10 years in jail by an Italian court along with his co-pilot.

The 2005 crash at sea off Sicily left survivors swimming for their lives, some clinging to a piece of the fuselage that remained floating after the ATR turbo-prop aircraft splintered upon impact.

A fuel-gauge malfunction was partly to blame but prosecutors also said the pilot succumbed to panic, praying out loud instead of following emergency procedures and then opting to crash-land the plane instead trying to reach a nearby airport.

Another five employees of Tuninter, a subsidiary of Tunisair, were sentenced to between eight and nine years in jail by the court, in a verdict handed down on Monday.

The seven accused, who were not in court, will not spend time in jail until the appeals process has been exhausted.

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FINLAND REFUSES TO EXTRADITE RWANDAN GENOCIDE SUSPECT

Finland will not extradite a genocide suspect to Rwanda because it fears he will not get a fair trial, the government said on Friday.

Rwandan authorities had requested that Francois Bazaramba, a former pastor at a Baptist church in Rwanda, be extradited to face charges for his alleged role in the planning and carrying out the 1994 genocide. During 100 days of slaughter in Rwanda in 1994, 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed.

Bazaramba has been in detention in Finland since April 2007.Finland and Rwandan authorities recently finalised a joint investigation into Bazaramba’s role in the genocide and a Finnish prosecutor is now considering pressing charges. If he is charged, the trial will be held in Finland, the government said in a statement.

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ZIMBABWEAN COURT CHARGES BENNETT FOR TERRORISM

A Zimbabwe court on Tuesday charged a senior MDC party official over a plot involving terrorism and insurgency, just days after the party joined a unity government with President Robert Mugabe.

Roy Bennett was charged with illegally possessing firearms for the purposes of trying to commit acts of insurgency, banditry and terrorism and violating the Immigration Act for trying to leave the country illegally last Friday.

Bennett, who was meant to be deputy farm minister in the administration, was arrested before ministers were sworn in on Friday after entering the country from South Africa and the case raised doubts among political analysts about the new government.

But a senior party official said the MDC may be reluctant to quit the new unity government formed to lead the country out of economic crisis despite Bennett’s arrest.

Wearing a white T-shirt and three-quarter khaki shorts, Bennett looked composed at his court appearance.

The prosecution, with the consent of the defence, agreed that the charges should be changed from treason to illegal possession of firearms for insurgency, banditry or terrorism purposes and violating immigration laws. Bennett, a founding MDC member, is a former white farmer and legislator is of Mugabe’s most outspoken critics.

SOURCED FROM REUTERS