Zimbabwe's 29 March 2008 elections opened a new chapter in the country's long-running political crisis. For the first time since independence in 1980, Robert Mugabe came in second in the presidential voting, and the opposition - the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) – won control of parliament. Instead of allowing democracy to run its course, Mugabe fought back by withholding the presidential results and launching a vicious countrywide crackdown ahead of a 27 June run-off against MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai. But severe state repression led Tsvangirai to withdraw, and Mugabe ran as the sole candidate in a poll condemned by African observers as neither free nor fair. With Mugabe having started his sixth term in office on 29 June, the international community must now move quickly to support a new regional effort to halt the violence and broker a political solution. As we headed to press talks aimed at forming a government of national Unity were on life support.

A field trial of a Genetically-Modified (GM ) banana variety in Uganda has failed to defeat the occurrence of banana diseases. The variety was attacked by Black Sigatoka disease, which can cut a banana tree’s fruit production by half.