IN JUST TWO DAYS I WILL BE IN KENYA ON HOLIDAY .....
SEE YOU WHEN i GET BACK!
Posted by: Mara at February 10, 2009 21:14 |
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"IN JUST TWO DAYS
TOMORROW
WILL BE YESTERDAY" !
Posted by: Mara at February 10, 2009 21:11 |
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sayings
Some 1,500 people died in the clashes that erupted after the elections
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Kenya's government has delayed a parliamentary vote on creating a tribunal to try those implicated in the 2008 post-election violence.
The court should begin hearings by 1 March, or a sealed list of suspects is to be handed over to the International Criminal Court.
The government missed a deadline to pass the bill on 30 January, stipulated by an inquiry into the violence.
Some 1,500 people were killed as rival political and ethnic groups clashed.
Reports say the government withdrew the bill, which has caused deep divisions among MPs, to lobby for support ahead of the crucial vote.
Some MPs have opposed the establishment of a local tribunal, saying that the Kenyan justice system cannot be trusted to try the ringleaders of the violence.
Opponents have also raised concerns that the tribunal will not be independent.
President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga chaired a cabinet meeting on Tuesday to marshal support for the government-sponsored bill.
The bill requires support from at least 148 of the 222 MPs to pass the parliamentary vote.
Mr Odinga claimed he had been cheated of victory in the December 2007 election, officially won by President Kibaki.
The two leaders signed a power-sharing deal in February to bring an end to the violence and formed a coalition government.
The commission of inquiry into the violence, chaired by Justice Phillip Waki, recommended the establishment of the special tribunal.
Justice Waki handed over a sealed list of suspects to the chief mediator, former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan, which would be forwarded to the ICC if the Kenyan government did not implement the probe team's recommendations.
Mr Annan has previously said that he is satisfied with the efforts made to set up the tribunal but correspondents say his position may change if the government fails to meet the March deadline.
In December 2008, parliament dissolved the electoral commission, following recommendations by another inquiry into the voting process during the 2007 general elections.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Police in Uganda have arrested seven suspected witchdoctors after the headless body of a woman was found in a bush in the capital Kampala.
A police spokeswoman told the BBC that shrines and fetishes had been destroyed in the operation.
The spokeswoman said a special unit had been set up to deal with ritual murders and dissuade both traditional healers and the public from the practice.
Some people believe potions made from human body parts will bring them luck.
In neighbouring Tanzania, people with albinism have been targeted for such ritual killings.
But the body found in the Kampala suburb of Bwaise was not believed to have been an albino.
Spokeswoman Judith Nabakooba also said that the police had had to protect the suspected leading witchdoctor after a lynch mob formed to kill him.
The headless body was found near his residence, she said.
She told the New Vision newspaper that the police had been tipped off after two legs had been found in a pit latrine.
Ms Nabakooba said ritual murders had become a problem in Uganda in recent months.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Jacob Zuma is to face corruption charges in August
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South Africa's President Kgalema Motlanthe has announced that general elections will take place on 22 April.
The elections are set to be the most interesting since Nelson Mandela became president in 1994, ending white minority rule.
African National Congress (ANC) leader Jacob Zuma is the favourite to become president but he is beset by charges of corruption, which he denies.
A group of disillusioned ANC members left and formed a rival party in 2008.
The party was deeply divided between supporters of Mr Zuma and former President Thabo Mbeki.
Mr Mbeki was forced from power in September 2008 after a judge accused his government of interfering in the prosecution of Mr Zuma for political reasons.
However, an appeal court in January 2009 ruled that the first judge had been wrong to reach this conclusion.
But some of Mr Mbeki's supporters had already formed the Congress of the People (Cope), which analysts say could win enough votes to prevent the ANC from getting a two-thirds majority in parliament.
Mr Motlanthe was named president after Mr Mbeki stood down, as Mr Zuma was ineligible, as he was not an MP.
"We believe that April 22 will be an appropriate date," President Motlanthe told parliament, adding that the date had already been agreed with the electoral commission, reports the AFP news agency.
The elections were due before July.
However the Pretoria High Court has ruled that South Africans living abroad should be able to vote - a ruling which, if implemented, could lead to a delay in the elections.
Mr Zuma's corruption trial has been set for August. He has said he would only step down if convicted.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Mr Biti is one of President Mugabe's most vocal critics
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Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has named Tendai Biti as his choice for finance minister in a unity government with Robert Mugabe.
Mr Biti is secretary general of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), Zimbabwe's main opposition party.
Last week a Zimbabwean judge dropped treason charges against Mr Biti over an alleged coup plot, citing lack of progress in the case against him.
The cabinet in the new coalition government will be sworn in on Friday.
Mr Biti's new position will be a key one, given the country's economic collapse.
It was once considered the breadbasket of southern Africa, but now suffers some 90% unemployment with inflation running at the last estimate at 231m%.
Under the terms of last September's power-sharing deal, Mr Tsvangirai was given the choice of finance minister.
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TENDAI BITI
Age: 44
Lawyer
Former student leader
Football fan
Speaks his mind
Seen as brains behind MDC
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Once in the job, Mr Biti would focus on creating economic stability and attracting foreign investment, said Mr Tsvangirai - who is himself set to become prime minister on Wednesday.
"This [finance] ministry's mandate is to create a stable economic environment for all Zimbabweans... and to establish Zimbabwe as a strong investment centre," Mr Tsvangirai told a news conference, according to Reuters news agency.
Mr Tsvangirai also demanded that political detainees in Zimbabwe's jails be released prior to his swearing in - though he did not say what he would do if they were not.
Mr Biti - a lawyer and founding member of the MDC - is one of Mr Mugabe's most trenchant and vocal critics, say observers.
Shortly after the treason charges were dropped against him, he renewed his commitment to "finish this job that we started of removing the dictatorship of Robert Mugabe".
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Journalists have condemned the reported abduction on Saturday of four women reporters by supporters of female genital mutilation.
Reports say the female kidnappers accused the women of insulting their traditions by criticising the practice.
Witnesses said the women were stripped and marched through the street in the city of Kenema before being released.
Sierra Leone's government said last year it would ban female circumcision but it has done nothing to date.
The Sierra Leone Association of Journalists said: "We condemn in the strongest of terms these illegal arrests and detention of the journalists and reiterate our appeal to the public that formal and civilised channels exist for seeking redress which must be respected."
According to UN figures, some 94% of women and girls aged 15 to 49 years in Sierra Leone have undergone circumcision, traditionally believed to control female sexuality and make girls more "marriageable".
BBC NEWS REPORT
Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed was elected last month
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Somalia's new President, Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, has offered an olive branch to Islamist hardliners during a tour of the capital, Mogadishu.
He told cheering crowds he was prepared to discuss peace with any group opposed to UN-sponsored peace efforts.
The moderate Islamist also visited a police base and held discussions with traditional and civil society leaders.
Mortars were fired at the presidential palace after the new leader arrived in the capital on Sunday.
President Ahmed told large crowds on Monday: "The new period the country is going through is for peace.
"We will say to everyone who is opposing us: 'We are ready to discuss with you about our problems, we are open to peace, we welcome peace and no-one's role will be ignored.'"
The BBC's Mohammed Olad Hassan in Mogadishu says President Ahmed's remarks were aimed at the hardline Islamist al-Shabab militia.
The group recently seized Baidoa, the seat of parliament, and controls much of southern Somalia. It has been holding protests against the new president.
Our correspondent says security was provided on Monday by African Union peacekeepers, government troops and forces from the president's party, the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS).
The 44-year-old former teacher was elected by MPs in January in neighbouring Djibouti, replacing President Abdullahi Yusuf, who resigned a month earlier after a power struggle.
Mr Ahmed used to lead an Islamist movement that took control of Mogadishu before being ousted by Ethiopian-led forces in late 2006.
Somalia has had no stable central government since 1991.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
The BBC, in conjunction with Medecins Sans Frontieres, is following the lives of seven people from the community of St Rodrigue, in Lesotho, who will share their hopes and fears as they each struggle to live with and work through the country's HIV/Aids crisis.
Mahlape Moiloa | Orphan | St Rodrigue
I take medication because I have the HIV infection. I have been sick for a year. I was infected when my mother gave birth to me.
I walked very far to get St Rodrigue. I ran so it took me about 2 hours. It takes about four hours to walk. My cousin came here with me to keep me company.
I live with my grandmother and two brothers. One is 37 and the other is 18 years old.
My mother died. It was a very long time ago, when I was very little. At the time I didn't know that she died of HIV/Aids, but I learned as I grew up.
I got sick. I got headaches. I couldn't sleep well. I also had diarrhoea. And that's when my grandmother brought me here.
They did a test. After the test, they gave me counselling and taught me about taking the medication.
It feels OK when I take my medication and the diarrhoea is gone.
I am happy when I take the tablets.
Initially when I found out that I was HIV-positive, I was very hurt and miserable. But since I started taking the medication, it's much better.
It was hurtful because my brothers stigmatized me, saying that I had HIV/Aids. My brother said I had pimples on my face and that it made me look ugly.
It really hurt me when he said that. And that my grandmother laughed at what they were saying.
But I don't care what they say any more. I am used to taking my medication so I feel better now. That's why I don't care what they say.
Here at the clinic, nurse Me Lucy (Lerata) has made me feel better. Me Lucy told me not to listen to them.
I visit the clinic once a month. I come to pick up medication and to see the nurse.
I don't have any friends at school because I am afraid. I feel that they may stigmatize me more than at home.
I used to have friends at school before I knew I was HIV-positive, but I stopped spending time with them because I thought they might find out that I'm taking medication.
Now, I am happy to see new faces here at St Rodrigue because they talk to me appropriately. Some encourage me to take my medication.
I am also happy knowing that my whole story will be told to the world, because HIV is not a secret any more.
It's important to talk about it because I have accepted it, and I am used to it.
When I grow up, I want to be a nurse and help people get well, like I have been helped to get well. 
South African male choir Ladysmith Black Mambazo have won their third Grammy Award at a Los Angeles ceremony.
They scooped best Traditional World Music Album for their LP Ilembe: Honoring Shaka Zulu. They have also picked up Grammys in 1987 and 2005.
But another South African group - the Soweto Gospel Choir - lost out in their bid to win three Grammys in a row.
They had been nominated for best Contemporary World Music Album, which was instead won by Global Drum Project.
Global Drum Project is a group of four drummers, including Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead and Nigerian talking drum master Sikiru Adepoju.
Ladysmith Black Mambazo were founded in 1964 by lead singer Joseph Shabalala.
The acapella group came to international attention in the late 1980s after working with Paul Simon on his celebrated Graceland album.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Posted by: Mara at February 09, 2009 15:46 |
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africa
Where clean water is a pipedream
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By Richard Black
Environment correspondent, BBC News website
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For nearly one billion people, clean drinking water is still a mirage
If you want a graphic demonstration of the health impacts of poor drinking water, look no further than Zimbabwe.
Three thousand people dead, at least 60,000 ill - all from a disease that is almost completely preventable.
In general, with very few exceptions, people simply do not get cholera when the water supply works. It is almost unknown in the west for that single, simple reason.
As the World Health Organization (WHO) puts it: "Measures for the prevention of cholera have not changed much in recent decades, and mostly consist of providing clean water and proper sanitation."
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 The provision of safe water and sanitation… remains the critical factor in reducing the impact of cholera outbreaks 
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In Zimbabwe, political and economic circumstances have created a situation where the availability of clean water and proper sanitation is no longer routine.
People are now feeling the impacts of that lack of investment - investment that research shows is well worthwhile.
"Research shows that if you invest $1 in clean water and sanitation, the return is between $5 and $28," says Yves Chartier of WHO's water, sanitation, hygiene and health unit.
The cholera bacterium is far from being the only infectious microbe lurking in dirty water. Typhoid, cryptosporidium, giardia… the list continues.
"About 10% of the total global burden of disease is down to poor water, sanitation and hygiene," says Dr Chartier.
It was this kind of statistic that led governments to sign up in the year 2000 to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) - a set of targets on issues such as maternal health, education and poverty.
The water target is straightforward - to halve the proportion of the world's population without access to clean water and proper sanitation by 2015.
following the signing of the MDGs, water and sanitation were seen as "poor cousins", attracting less aid money and interest than some of the other issues.
But on water, at least, that has changed.
"The world as a whole is now on target to meet the water MDG, but a number of countries and regions are still off track," says Andrew Hudson of the UN Development Programme's (UNDP) water governance programme.
"Most of the countries that have made impressive progress were poor countries, and that to me is a tremendous message because it shows it's less about the money and much more about the political will."
Statistics are compiled on the basis of "reasonable" access to "improved" supplies of drinking water. This means that within a kilometre or so there should be a source such as a standpipe, a borehole, a protected well or spring - or, of course, it can come straight into your house.
The "protection" element is aimed at making sure that unwanted things including the cholera bacterium do not get into the water source - especially preventing people and animals from defecating in the vicinity.
That is sometimes easier said than done, especially in city slums, where the sheer lack of space often means latrines have to sit next to supply streams - or even, in extreme cases, that the outflow from the latrines becomes the supply stream.
UNDP data shows that in many countries, as the urban population increases, the proportion of that urban population with access to safe water declines; infrastructure investment does not keep up with a growing urban population.
And whereas investment in water has put the world on target for the water element of MDG 7, sanitation is a different matter.
"There's still a stigma of talking about sanitation," comments Dr Hudson.
"But countries such as India, that have mounted massive community-led campaigns on things like elimination of open defecation, have made really big strides."
In eastern India, however, and in neighbouring Bangladesh, another way that poor water causes poor health has come into dramatic relief in recent years.
In the 1980s, tales of illness in Bangladeshi villages began circulating - an illness that was eventually traced to arsenic in the water they were drinking.
With surface water sources likely to harbour disease-causing microbes, aid agencies had initiated a programme of digging wells to provide safer drinking water - not realising that the water would bring with it enough arsenic to constitute a chronic poison.
The problem has now been detected in other countries, and according to one recent estimate, about 140 million people are at risk from drinking water containing the toxic metal, which causes cancers and lung disease.
Industries such as tanning can leave their trace in water
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Compared with water-borne microbes, water-borne pollution has received little attention, according to the Blacksmith Foundation, a charity whose aim is to clean up pollution hotspots in developing countries.
Cleaning up the India/Bangladesh arsenic problem is probably beyond anyone's capacity right now - although agencies are looking at it - but industrial pollution is a different matter.
In the slums of many developing world cities, you find water of hues that water does not naturally assume - blues, yellows, purples and greens that speak of industrial outflows not very far upstream.
"So we've been running pilot projects in India trying to clean up hexavalent chromium, which is produced by the country's huge tanning industry," says Blacksmith's executive director Meredith Block.
(Hexavalent chromium, the pollutant involved in the Erin Brockovich case in the US that was immortalised on celluloid by Julia Roberts, is a known carcinogen.)
"And by injecting a chemical (an "electron donor" into the groundwater we could turn it to the [non-toxic] trivalent form; analysis suggests it's working, with no side-effects."
One of these pilot projects, in Kanpur, was on a site that Ms Block says is typical of many developing world cities - an industrial estate, home to perhaps 50 or more small factories, working with or producing a mix of hazardous substances such as heavy metals and pesticides.
The health impact of water pollution globally is unknown.
A 2007 study from Cornell University estimated that 40% of deaths worldwide were associated with some kind of pollution - though how much of this is water-borne is another question.
But, says Ms Block, it is proving hard to interest agencies in polluted water.
"The environmental causes aren't related to climate change or global warming," she says. "And it seems that people in the US couldn't care less if you can't relate an issue to global warming."
Diseases such as cholera, by contrast, do have a climate link. The cholera bacterium (Vibrio cholerae) appears to survive better in warmer waters, leading to fears that it could emerge in regions such as the southern coasts of the US as sea temperatures increase.
But for the mass of humanity, climate is likely to be a minor determinant of the water quality they get, and the disease burden that implies.
To quote the WHO on cholera: "Since 2005, the re-emergence of cholera has been noted in parallel with the ever-increasing size of vulnerable populations living in unsanitary conditions.
"The provision of safe water and sanitation… remains the critical factor in reducing the impact of cholera outbreaks" - as it does for many other diseases of water.
It sounds easy - but for the 100 or so countries off target with MDG 7, most spectacularly Zimbabwe, it is proving anything but.
Richard.Black-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk
BBC NEWS REPORT.
The tanker caught fire as people were trying to collect its spilt fuel
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At least 100 people who died in an oil tanker fire have been buried in a mass grave in the Kenyan town of Molo.
More than 130 people were killed when an overturned petrol tanker caught fire and exploded as hundreds of people collected the spilled fuel.
Police and Red Cross workers struggled to hold back the large crowd which had gathered to witness the burial.
Women wailed and fainted as bulldozers covered the massive grave, before President Mwai Kibaki laid a wreath.
Some family members had protested against the decision to bury their kin in a mass grave, saying this is against their traditional beliefs.
The victims were buried in a mass grave less than 100m from the spot where the tanker caught fire.
President Kibaki warned the public against trying to siphon fuel from petrol tankers involved in accidents.
"What has happened in Molo has been a great lesson for Kenyans and we will help each other," Mr Odinga said.
The tanker fire occurred several days after a supermarket blaze killed at least 25 people in Nairobi.
The authorities were criticised over the failure to address public safety in the fatal incidents.
President Kibaki is to preside over a fund-raising service for victims of the two fires on Tuesday.
About 200 people were injured during the tanker fire and at least 148 are still undergoing treatment.
The government has pledged to pay the hospital bills for those injured, including covering fees for specialised surgery.
The causes of the two fires have not been established and investigations are underway.
Reports say the tanker fire was either caused by a lit cigarette or started deliberately by people who had been prevented from collecting spilt fuel.
Prime Minister Raila Odinga blamed the accident on prevalent poverty, saying it was "pushing our people into doing desperate things".
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Britain has a large South African diaspora community
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South Africans abroad should be allowed to vote, according to a ruling by Pretoria High Court.
The decision could mean a delay to elections, due in April or May, to allow time for the law to be changed.
The court found current laws breached the rights of South Africans living abroad and referred the judgment to the Constitutional Court for confirmation.
The electoral commission was ordered to change its procedures to let South Africans living abroad to vote.
The Afrikaner nationalist Freedom Front Plus party had brought the legal application on behalf of a South African school teacher living in the UK.
Speaking outside the court, party spokesman Willie Spies told Sapa news agency it was still possible the Constitutional Court, the country's highest court, could overrule the judgment.
The party said it was filing an application for the proclamation of election day to be postponed to allow the Constitutional Court ample time to consider the matter.
The date for the elections was expected this week.
Currently certain groups, including government employees and people on holiday and business trips, are entitled to vote while out of the country.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Christian Ganczarski said he had "nothing to do with the attack"
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A French court has sentenced a German convert to Islam to 18 years over an attack on a Tunisian synagogue that killed 21 people in 2002.
Christian Ganczarski, who prosecutors believed had links with al-Qaeda, was arrested in France in 2003.
The court also sentenced Walid Nouar, the brother of the suicide bomber, to 12 years for his part in the attack on the synagogue in Djerba.
Both men denied the charges and are expected to appeal against the verdict.
The Djerba bombing - which killed 14 German tourists, five Tunisians and two French nationals - was claimed by al-Qaeda.
French prosecutors believe it was organised by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed - the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks on the US - who is being held at the Guantanamo detention centre.
Under French law the death of the two French nationals means the three men could be tried in France.
But the French court decided not to rule on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's alleged role in the attack until he could appear in person.
According to court documents, suicide bomber Nizar Nouar called Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Christian Ganczarski just before he drove a gas-laden truck into the synagogue.
The calls were allegedly made on a telephone brought into Tunisia by the bomber's brother, Walid Nouar.
The bomber's uncle, Belgacem Nouar, was jailed in 2006 for his role in the attack.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Hundreds of people turned out to see the new president
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Somalia's new president, Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, has arrived in Mogadishu for the first time since his election by MPs a week ago.
Crowds lined the route as Sheikh Sharif, viewed as a moderate Islamist, headed to the presidential palace.
Later, mortars were fired at the palace but no casualties were reported.
Sheikh Sharif aims to form an inclusive government and extend a hand to armed groups still opposed to UN-sponsored efforts to end civil war and turmoil.
Somalia has had no effective central government for nearly 20 years.
Tens of thousands of people have been killed in successive waves of violence over the years.
Sheikh Sharif, 44, was elected president on 31 January at a meeting of Somali MPs held in neighbouring Djibouti, replacing President Abdullahi Yusuf who resigned a month earlier after a power struggle.
He was appointed as part of a UN-brokered plan to try to form a unity government and bring peace to Somalia for the first time since 1991.
The new president arrived back in Somalia from Ethiopia, where he attended an African Union summit.
The former teacher used to lead an armed opposition movement ousted by Ethiopian-led forces in late 2006.
"My trip to Mogadishu is aimed at having consultations with elders, politicians and Islamic resistance groups," he said as he arrived in Mogadishu accompanied by MPs.
He appealed in Addis Ababa for foreign military help to deal with "extremists" against the peace process.
The Islamist al-Shabab militia - which last week seized Baidoa, the seat of the Somali parliament - has been holding protests against the new president.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
From the Times Newspaer today I read an article written by Martin Fletcher in Harare which makes for
such grim and heartbreaking reading !
I quote -
"In Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe 3,000 people a week die from Aids alone, life expectancy is the lowest
in the world and 94 per cent are unemployed. It has become a country where millions can barely afford
to live, but the cost of dying is even more prohibitive." ............
"For many a death in the family is financially an absolute disaster" said Oscar Wermeter a Jesuit Priest.
Turning coats inside out
Saturday 7th February 2009
Dear Family and Friends,
These hot, humid and rainy February days are ones that will never be forgotten in the years ahead. We can still hardly even dare to hope that this unity government is going to work and trust is very thin on the ground. It still sticks in our throats that the losers of the March 2008 elections have simply refused to leave power for the last ten months and have got away it. How crazy is this! Suddenly we are seeing the very people who persecuted a population, looted the country's assets and bought starvation and disease to the land appearing on television saying: "we must be tolerant of our differences and work together."
Hello! you find yourself shouting at the TV, are we seeing people turning their coats inside out and so soon? Do they really think that a few utterances now will undo everything they have done, and been seen doing?
Each day we tiptoe forward politically by a fraction of a millimetre and yet each miniscule gain appears as a gigantic leap because we have sunk so terribly low in the last decade. We now have the 19th amendment to our constitution which will enable the formation of a unity government and allow for the winner of the March 2008 election to be sworn in as Prime Minister. We also now have the news that a Magistrate has thrown out treason charges against MDC Secretary General Tendai Biti.
In the next few days, for the first time in three decades we will have someone other than Zanu PF looking into civil service books and you can only imagine how worried some people must be. A friend said he imagined the paper shredders must be working overtime in some of those government offices. You can almost hear them now! You can almost see those little strips of paper mounting up on our roadsides alongside all the other stinking garbage. You can almost smell the smoke from bonfires of burning paper!
Meanwhile ordinary people are in wait and see mode and while we wait a last desperate orgy of pocket filling is well underway. In just two days the price of petrol, in US dollars of course, went from 65 cents to 95 cents a litre and is still going up as I write. All other prices, in US dollars, are soaring as a result.
Twelve zeroes were removed from our currency this week and we went from being trillionaires to paupers overnight. This is the third time this has happened. First it was 3 zeroes, then 10, now 12. Another worthless set of bank notes is being introduced and thanks to a friend who can get her head around all the "illions", 1 New dollar =10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 10 Septillion Old Old dollars!
I don't know how we'll ever explain any of this to our children in the years ahead, or if we'll ever even understand it ourselves.
Until next time, thanks for reading,
love cathy.
"TIME IS TO STOP
EVERYTHING HAPPENING AT ONCE" !
_________
Posted by: Mara at February 07, 2009 10:14 |
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sayings
Gen Mohamed Ould Abdelaziz launched a coup in August after he was sacked
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The African Union (AU) has imposed sanctions, including a travel ban and a check on bank accounts, on Mauritania's military junta, it has announced.
The AU says it will urge the United Nations to extend the measures so they are applied by every country.
The move comes amid speculation that General Mohamed Ould Abdelaziz could contest elections, set for 6 June.
He seized power in August 2008 from Mauritania's first democratically elected president.
After the coup, Sidi Mohamed Ould Cheikh Abdallahi was held under house arrest until December 2008.
The African Union's Peace and Security Council Chairman Manuel Domingos Augusto told the AFP news agency that the sanctions included "a travel ban on civilian and military members of the junta, the systematic refusal of visas and checks on their bank accounts".
Spanish news agency Efe quotes sources close to Mauritania's military leader as saying that he told ministers on Thursday that he would contest the June poll.
There has been intense international pressure on the coup leaders to return the country to democracy.
Former colonial power France and the US had cancelled their aid, pending Mr Abdallahi's release.
The AU also suspended the country following the 6 August coup.
Mr Abdallahi became Mauritania's first democratically elected leader in 2007 after a coup two years earlier, partly instigated by Gen Abdelaziz.
On 6 August, Mr Abdallahi, as president, tried to dismiss four senior army officers, including Gen Abdelaziz, the head of the presidential guard, who responded by launching the coup.
Mauritania has a long history of coups, with the military involved in nearly every government since its independence from France in 1960.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Mr Biti had faced the death penalty if he had been found guilty
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A Zimbabwean judge has dropped charges of treason against the secretary general of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, Tendai Biti.
He had faced a possible death sentence after being accused of plotting a coup against President Robert Mugabe.
But Magistrate Olivia Mariga said prosecutors appeared unprepared to proceed against Mr Biti.
It could be a sign that the ruling Zanu-PF wants a proposed coalition government to work, say correspondents.
Ms Mariga also ruled Mr Biti had been improperly arrested when he was detained in June, in part over a document purporting to lay out opposition plans to overthrow the government.
The document has since been widely dismissed as fraudulent.
But Ms Mariga said prosecutors could still revive the case by issuing a summons.
"God has prevailed," Mr Biti told MDC supporters gathered at the court, according to the South Africa-based website ZimOnline.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
