Tuesday, June 1, 2010

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I'm Brad Dubbelman.

Making headlines:

Mosiuoa Lekota was on Monday officially served notice of the Congress of the People's (Cope's) vote of no confidence in him as its president. Party spokesperson Sipho Ngwema said that Cope had also filed notice of its intention to urgently appeal against the High Court in Johannesburg's ruling on Saturday, that no elections could take place at the meeting.
Lekota's spokesperson Phillip Dexter was also served with an official notice of a vote of no confidence in him as Cope's head of communication. Ngwema explained that Lekota and Dexter are no longer members of any national leadership structures within Cope. Cope general secretary Charlotte Lobe is to convene a Congress National Committee (CNC) meeting, where the decision and the possible future deployment of Lekota and Dexter will be discussed.
Lekota is adamant, however, that he remains party president and will challenge his removal in court. He said that he will soon call a CNC meeting to map a way forward for the party, but would first ensure that there is no confusion over his position.

United Nations (UN) climate talks opened on Monday in Bonn, exposing familiar rifts between rich and poor countries, which delegates said were likely to delay a restart of formal negotiations.
Several countries said that they could not give the green light to formal negotiations on a new text published in mid-May, which outlines a huge range of options for fighting climate change.
Differences re-emerged when a clutch of Latin American countries said that they could not start negotiations on the new text. The US said that it did not think the new text was intended as a basis for negotiations and South Africa said that the document put too much burden on developing countries.

United Nations (UN) secretary-general Ban Ki-moon on Monday urged all States to sign up to the International Criminal Court (ICC) and rejected criticism that the body was a court only for African crimes.
Delegates from member States are meeting in Kampala over the next ten days to discuss the achievements of the ICC, set up in 2002 as the world's first permanent war crimes court, and to seek to give it extra powers to prosecute crimes of State aggression.
Ban welcomed the presence of the US, which is not a member of the ICC, but has started to re-engage with the court and is attending the conference as an observer. The ICC has been ratified by 111 member States, but not by large powers such as the US, Russia, China and India. Former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan said that doubts about the ICC's credibility will persist as long as three members of the Security Council refuse to sign up.

Also making headlines:

The World Bank warns that developing countries will suffer if Europe's governments fail to deal with their debt problems.
The World Wide Fund for Nature says that that June will be a "watershed" month for climate talks, as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change begins in Bonn.
Three renegade army officers coordinate attacks on the south's Sudan People's Liberation Army.
And, French President Nicolas Sarkozy says that Africa should be represented on the United Nations Security Council and promises to back reforms.

That's a roundup of news making headlines today.