Beijing reacted angrily to the White House meeting with a person it considers a separatist. This came on the heels of China’s indignation over America’s decision in January to sell $6 billion in arms including sophisticated weaponry to Taiwan prompting Beijing to suspend military contacts with Washington.

Over the past year a number of issues have complicated ties between China and America. These have ranged from the divergent positions they have taken at the Copenhagen summit on climate change to the row over the Google affair. More significantly they include frictions over trade, the value of China’s currency, as well as on tougher sanctions against Iran.
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The BBC has evidence that millions of dollars, earmarked for victims of the Ethiopian famine of 1984-85, went to buy weapons.

The investigation found claims that a rebel movement in Ethiopia diverted the aid to fund its attempt to overthrow the government of the time. Rebel soldiers said that they posed as merchants as "a trick for the NGOs"...

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The widow of former Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana, whose assassination triggered the Rwandan genocide, has been arrested in France.

Agathe Habyarimana is accused by the current Rwandan government of helping to plan the 1994 genocide, and has long been sought by prosecutors there.
Mrs Habyarimana, who has been living in France for several years, denies the accusations.

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Even before the earthquake, one option for Port-au-Prince's homeless children was Restavek, an underground system that some call foster care, and others call child slavery. Now their numbers swell.
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KIRUNDO, 23 February 2010 (IRIN) - Jacqueline Kabagirwa, 35, lives in the northern Burundi commune of Busoni but because of failed harvests following a drought, she commutes to neighbouring Rwanda, where a day’s work in the fields earns her just enough to feed her family. She tells IRIN of her experience:

“My husband often goes to Rwanda and stays there a week or more but his pay is not enough to sustain the whole family. As I have nothing here, I cannot wait for his return. One of my children is lucky because he gets food at school but how can I tell the others there is nothing to eat for a day or two?
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(Goma) - Fifty Congolese human rights and civil society organizations, along with Human Rights Watch, lodged a formal complaint today against Colonel Innocent Zimurinda, a senior army officer based in North Kivu province, eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

The four-page formal complaint describes a litany of serious abuses - including massacres of civilians, summary executions, rape, and the recruitment of children - committed by troops under Zimurinda's command from 2007 to the present. The groups requested the immediate suspension of Zimurinda and his removal from North Kivu pending the outcome of judicial investigations...
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Al-Shabab,the Somali Islamist opposition group, has announced it will stop World Food Programme (WFP) operations in Somalia.The armed group said on Sunday that food distributed by the UN agency had disadvantaged local farmers and accused the WFP of being politically motivated.
"Given the problems caused by the food WFP distributed, the movement of Shabab Al-Mujahideen banned the operations of the agency in Somalia generally starting from today", the statement read...
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President acknowledges that 'errors' were made but stops short of formal apology
By John Lichfield in Paris

President Nicolas Sarkozy admitted yesterday that French "errors" had contributed to the Rwandan genocide which killed an estimated 800,000 people in 1994.
On the first visit by a French leader to Rwanda for 25 years, Mr Sarkozy did not formally apologise. Nor did he accept allegations that France had played an active role in training and arming the Hutu militias and troops who led massacres of Tutsis and moderate Hutus.

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The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) has sentenced the former head of legal affairs at the Ministry of Defence to 25 years in prison.

Lieut-Col Eprem Setako was found guilty of genocide and crimes against humanity. He was convicted of ordering the killing of at least 30 people at a military camp in 1994.Hutu extremists killed some 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus during the 100-day genocide...
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Islamist militants in Somalia are stopping convoys of food reaching more than 360,000 displaced people, the UN's World Food Programme (WFP) says.

The agency says trucks travelling from the capital Mogadishu to camps in Afgoye have been stopped by armed men. Insurgent group al-Shabaab says the WFP is ruining local farming by forcing Somalis to rely on imports.
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Oxfam Hong Kong has suspended a programme training young graduates in mainland China.

The move comes after notices attributed to China's education ministry appeared at several universities saying the aid agency was trying to infiltrate China. The notices said Oxfam Hong Kong had ill intentions and that graduates should not sign up to be trained.

The agency says the programme will be suspended until it receives an explanation from the Chinese ministry.
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Bangladesh's army has been sent to the south-eastern Chittagong Hill Tracts following violent clashes between Bengali settlers and tribal people.

Officials say at least 30 people were injured in violence centred around the town of Khagrachari. At least two people were killed in clashes in other parts of the Hill Tracts over the weekend. One unconfirmed report put the toll higher.The violence is the worst in the area since a peace deal was signed in 1997.
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The sharp sound of loading and unloading weapons and the barked orders of the sergeant-major cut through the mountains of northern Burma as the young cadets are put through their morning drills.

Their discipline is good, their uniforms smart and there is little doubting their sense of purpose or patriotism towards the red and green flag with crossed machetes they proudly wear on their right shoulders.
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Several people have been killed in Ivory Coast during clashes between security forces and demonstrators.

Security forces fired live bullets into the crowd of thousands of protesters, a demonstrator told the BBC.
The violence in the town of Gagnoa is the latest in a series of protests against President Laurent Gbagbo.
Last week, Mr Gbagbo dissolved the government and the electoral commission following a row over voter registration.
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The government of Sudan has signed a ceasefire agreement with one of the main rebel factions in Darfur.The deal with the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem) includes a framework for further talks, and the cancellation of death sentences for 100 fighters. It is being seen as an important step towards peace, though the other main rebel group has refused to enter talks.
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China Upset at Dalai Lama-Obama Meeting
BBC: February 19, 2010

China has expressed "strong dissatisfaction and resolute opposition" to the meeting between US President Obama and the Dalai Lama.
China views Tibet's spiritual leader as a separatist and said the US should "take effective steps to eradicate the malign effects" of the meeting. It summoned the US ambassador in Beijing in protest about the meeting.
Washington kept the Dalai Lama's meeting low-key to emphasis it was private rather than political.
The Vice-Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai summoned Ambassador Jon Huntsman to lodge a "solemn representation"..

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India Maoist Attack Kills 11 in Bihar Village

BBC February 18, 2010

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