LIBREVILLE, GABON – The Zambian Copper Bullets triumphed over the pre-match favourites Ivory Coast in the final of the African Cup of Nations in Gabon, Sunday 12 February. The Chipolopolo win was at the scene of Zambia’s greatest sporting tragedy, the 1993 plane crash that killed all 30 on board, including most of the national team. The final ended 0-0 after extra time, with Didier Drogba missing a penalty for Ivory Coast in the second half. The penalty shoot out saw both sides scoring with their first seven penalties, although the Zambian goalkeeper was unlucky when a saved penalty was retaken after the ref’s assistant ruled he had stepped off his line too early when making a save. After that Ivory Coast missed one only to see Zambia return the failure by shooting over the bar. Another miss followed before Zambia finally won 8-7.
In other competitionss the two Manchester teams carried on their winning ways in the Premier League. United won a bad-tempered encounter with Liverpool notable mainly for the refusal of Liverpool’s Luiz Suarez to shake hands with Patrice Evra before the game. United won 2-1 with both goals coming from Wayne Rooney. Man City won the Sunday encounter at Aston Villa 0-1 to take a two point lead in the premiership. Chelsea lost to Everton 2-0, Spurs thumped Newcastle 5-0, and Thiery Henry said goodbye again to his beloved Arsenal team with a last minute winner against Sunderland.
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Women volunteers gather in Zambia - Photo UN
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Amid concerns of corruption in the management of public health grants in Zambia, the Geneva-based Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, has stopped disbursing funds to the country’s Ministry of Health.
On a written statement, the Global Fund confirmed it had stopped disbursing funds to Zambia since August 2009 after finding “evidence of expenditures that could not be accounted for.”
In order not to disrupt services, the Global Fund channeled $17 million through other venues, and soon, the UN Development Programme, UNDP, will take over the Ministry of Health’s grants.
An additional $180 million in grants implemented by civil society organizations in Zambia are not affected by the freeze.
Danger sign for landmines
Updated 17:20 Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The goal of the Cartagena Summit on a Mine-free World, meeting in Colombia 29 November to 4 December, is to eradicate the suffering caused by anti-personnel mines once and for all.
Colombia has had the dubious distinction until recently of being the country with the most casualties from anti-personnel mines. It was overtaken by Afghanistan in 2009. Colombia alone counts 8,081 casualties of landmines since 1990, but it also has 6,285 survivors, people who have lost a limb. Landmines caused almost 5,200 casualties worldwide in 2008, one-third of them children. The 2009 Landmine Monitor Report points out that deaths from landmines are steadily decreasing, down from an average of 7,300 a year for the previous 10 years. Landmine ban groups are keen to get rid of the mines but they are also focusing more on helping survivors.
In Colombia, too, the number of casualties has been falling: 777 deaths in 2008, compared to 895 the previous year.
In Colombia, rebel groups such as Farc and the ELN, as well as paramilitary groups, have planted anti-personnel mines on an estimated 60 percent of the territory. Insurgents increasingly finance themselves through the drugs trade, reported Human Rights Watch in a section on Colombia in its World Report 2009, published in January. They have been invading peripheral regions in the south of the country on the border with Ecuador, ejecting the indigenous populations, and protecting their territories from army incursions by the simple means of sowing anti-personnel mines, many home-made and attractive to children.
