A micro finance bank, Equity Building Society, which caters for the low-income population of Kenya the majority of whom live in the rural areas, has been catapulted into success through seed money provided by UNDP. The micro-credit company has transformed the lives of many Kenyan entrepreneurs.

A clothes designer, Jane Njuguna, for example, applied for a business loan and was granted Shs. 20,000 ($ 250), which she used to purchase a second sewing machine and materials. Within one year she was able to repay the loan and she went on to borrow more and more money to expand her business. Two loans later, she currently has six employees and her machines have grown to nine. "The loans I obtained from Equity Building Society have had a significant effect on my business and my life generally", she says.

Jane is representative of hundreds of individuals whose business fortunes have changed through micro credit facilities advanced by Equity Building Society. The society has especially targeted individual women and women groups who now form 47% of its active loan portfolio.

The society now boasts of 15 branches and 30 mobile units servicing a client base of 270,000. Since inception it has grown from strength to strength with total deposits valued at $ 55 million, with a loan portfolio of $ 28.9 million. Its profit level has risen over the years from $90,000 in 1994 to $1.3 million today.

For more information contact Anjimile Mtila Doka, e-mail: anjimile.mtila.doka@undp.org

Ms. Nardos Bekele-Thomas has joined UNDP Kenya as the Deputy Resident Representative, Programmes. She will head all UNDP programmes in Kenya. Her previous work experience includes assignments as the desk officer for 16 countries at the Regional Bureau for Africa at UNDP headquarters. Ms. Bekele-Thomas is an Ethiopian national and has served in India, Bhutan, Senegal, Thailand and Uganda.

Mr. Innocent Kayihura, a citizen of Rwanda, has also joined UNDP Kenya as the new Deputy Resident Representative (Operations). Mr. Kayihura has worked in UNDP for about 20 years in various countries, mainly in West Africa. He comes to Kenya from the Bukina Faso UNDP country office where he served in a similar position.

Meanwhile, Isaac Chivore, who headed UNDP Kenya programmes, moves from Kenya to South Africa (Pretoria) where he will serve as a Deputy Resident Representative. He joined the UNDP Kenya country office in 2000, having served in the same capacity in Ghana. Dr. Chivore, is from Zimbabwe and has served with UNDP for more than 20 years.

Other newcomers include Ms. Rubina Marivonne Haroon, who joined UNDP Kenya in May 2004 as the Senior Assistant Resident Representative and Head of the Strategic Outreach Unit, and Ms. Elaine Yong who joined the Opportunities Unit as UNV/Programme Officer in May for a 12 months assignment.

For more information contact David Maingi, e-mail

The United Nations Development Programme for Somalia has launched its first project facilitating the transfer of diaspora expertise to Somalia. Qualified Expatriate Somali Technical Support (QUESTS) is a modified version of the UNDP global initiative Transfer of Knowledge Through Expatriate Nationals (TOKTEN) that encourages expatriate nationals to volunteer their expertise in the service of their homelands for short periods of time.

QUESTS will initially focus on priority sectors identified by the Somali authorities and local and international humanitarian organizations, which are health, education and agriculture. The project will engage Somali institutions operating in these sectors by encouraging them to identify immediate, short-term capacity needs and diaspora professionals to fulfill them. By supporting 10-15 institutions annually to bring interested diaspora professionals to Somalia on a voluntary basis, UNDP aims to address three major needs: the reversal of brain drain, support lasting peace in Somalia and increased participation of the Somali diaspora in the creation of a conducive environment for sustainable human development.

“We encourage professionals in the diaspora to contact local hospitals, clinics, schools, universities and other facilities operating in their sector of expertise,” says Maxwell Gaylard, UNDP Somalia Resident Representative. “By communicating directly with the institutions and assisting them in identifying needs and how you can assist, we can improve the standard of living of ordinary Somalis, and create a unified effort and revitalized spirit needed to rebuild Somalia.”

For more information contact Sandra Macharia, e-mail sandra.macharia@undp.org

Condemning continuing violations of the 12-year-old arms embargo against Somalia, the Security Council on 17 August called for a six-month extension of the latest mandate of an expert group monitoring the sanctions. The action came in a unanimously adopted resolution, which called on Secretary-General Kofi Annan to re-establish the group within a month to identify and report on violators and recommend ways of strengthening compliance with the measures.

Noting the 11 August report on the situation that the experts recently submitted, the Council said their recommendations would be given "due consideration" so that steps cam be taken to improve compliance with the embargo.

The resolution called on the experts to "continue refining and updating information on the draft list of those who continue to violate the arms embargo inside and outside Somalia, and their active supporters, for possible future measures by the Council and to present such information to the Committee as and when the Committee deems appropriate."

The August report recommends postponing the deadline for submitting names of alleged violators to be considered for a blacklist while they work out the duration of the violations by both previously named warlords and faction leaders and the new violators, who are businesspeople. The report carries some names from all three groups. For more information visit http://www.un.org/News

United Nations agencies today stepped up operations in Burundi after last week's apparently ethnic massacre of more than 150 Congolese, reinforcing helicopter patrols along the border, increasing security in refugee camps and accelerating the transfer of survivors to safer sites far from the frontier area.

But the UN Operation in Burundi (ONUB), set up only two months ago, said that until additional peacekeeping forces arrived, staffing constraints would prevent a more robust presence throughout the small Central African country.

Peacekeepers from UN missions in Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have heightened security precautions on either side of the border and troops have been deployed at refugee transit centers in Burundi.

The Head of the Human Rights Unit at the UN Organization Mission in the DRC (MONUC), Roberto Ricci, has gone to Burundi to assist the Head of Onus’s Human Rights Unit, Demeter Chalev, to immediately launch a fact-finding mission in light of the possible need to set up an international commission of inquiry.

The deputy director of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Africa Bureau, Zobida Hassim-Ashagrie, arrived in Bujumbura, Burundi's capital, today to discuss with the Government arrangements for the immediate transfer of survivors to a new camp at Giharo, 120 kilometres to the south-east and far away from the Gatumba transit camp where Friday night's slaughter occurred.

Even though all venues at the 2004 Olympic Games have been declared smoke-free, the Olympic organizers and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) started distributing on 14 August some 40,000 portable paper ashtrays to those best equipped to spread the anti-cigarette message: the journalists.

As the competition begins in earnest, many of the 10,000 representatives of the international media will certainly feel the need to escape the International Broadcast Centre or the Main Press Centre for a smoke. The Organizing Committee and UNEP wanted to make sure they too are targeted in the large public awareness campaign on the environment currently under way in Greece.

“Cigarette smoking is a major public health problem worldwide. It is also an environmental issue,” said UNEP's Communications Director Eric Falt. “We certainly don't want to be seen as promoting smoking, but since we know it is not possible to stop all journalists from lighting up, we would like to make sure they do so in a way that will be less detrimental to the environment."

Every year an estimated 4.5 trillion (4,500,000,000,000) cigarette butts are discarded. As well as being an eyesore they are a significant pollutant. The residue in a cigarette filter contains a cocktail of toxic chemicals, which generally find their way into the water supply, and eventually the seas oceans, once the butt has been discarded.

The health and rights of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Miloševic could be jeopardized if the United Nations war crimes tribunal trying him for genocide forces him to accept defence counsel, rather than represent himself, according to lawyers appointed by the tribunal to ensure he receives a fair trial.

In a submission to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague, made public ON 16 August, two amici curiae, or "friends of the court," said Mr. Miloševic has the right to prepare his own case - "even if he knowingly risks his own health in the process."

They also said medical experts should examine the former Yugoslav leader to determine if he is fit enough to stand trial at all and, if so, whether his health can stand having to give evidence for possibly weeks at a time.

The trial of Mr. Miloševic is scheduled to resume on 31 August with the opening of his defence case, after several adjournments by judges because of the accused's health problems, which include heart trouble and exhaustion.

The health and rights of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Miloševic could be jeopardized if the United Nations war crimes tribunal trying him for genocide forces him to accept defence counsel, rather than represent himself, according to lawyers appointed by the tribunal to ensure he receives a fair trial.