On Tuesday, nearly 100 Chinese nationals were detained in Nigeria, accused of living and working illegally in the country. The Chinese embassy has met with officials from Nigeria’s foreign ministry and its immigration department, to lodge a representation.

China urges Nigerian authorities to make sure of the safety of detained Chinese nationals and ensure their humane treatment.

Hong Lei, Spokesperson of Chinese Foreign Ministry, said, "The Chinese Embassy in Nigeria and General Consulate in Lagos have paid great attention to the incident and made prompt inquiries concerning the case. For those Chinese who have been confirmed to have stayed and worked illegally and are facing repatriation, the Chinese embassy will continue to offer consular assistance for their legal rights and safety."

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The US also said though the constitution provides for an independent judiciary, the Nigerian judiciary "remained susceptible to pressure from the executive and the legislative branches, and the business sector".

These verdicts were contained in a new report titled: "Department of State's Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2011", which was submitted to the Congress Thursday by the Secretary of State, Mrs Hillary Clinton.

The report lamented that, "Official corruption and lack of will to implement court decisions also interfered with due process. The law provides for access to the courts for redress of grievances, and courts can award damages and issue injunctions to stop or prevent a human rights violation. However, the decisions of civil courts were difficult to enforce."

In the report, US also noted last year's suspension of the President of the Court of Appeal (PCA), Justice Ayo Isa Salami, by the National Judicial Council (NJC) over his refusal to apologise to the NJC and the then Chief Justice of Nigeria (NJC), Justice Aloysius Katsina-Alu, and his compulsory retirement by President Goodluck Jonathan, who acted under his constitutional authority.

The report however noted that, "The case raised questions regarding the partisan nature and level of independence within the judiciary."

Giving details of the case, the report said: "Salami had accused Katsina-Alu of interfering in the proceedings of the 2007 Sokoto State gubernatorial court case. In an attempt to settle the dispute, the NJC set up three panels to investigate the disagreement.

"The panels declared neither justice was at fault, declared the issue resolved, and requested that Salami apologise to the NJC and Katsina-Alu. The Nigerian Bar Association reached contrary findings, and Salami refused to apologise."

It specifically noted that, "Massive, widespread and pervasive corruption affected all levels of government and the security forces."

While noting that the government brought few persons to justice for abuses and corruption, it said despite the arrest of several high-ranking officials by the EFCC, allegations continued that the agency's investigations targeted individuals who had fallen out of favour with the government, while those who were in favour continued their activities with impunity.

On the anti-corruption crusade of government, the report said that since 2005, the EFCC prosecuted 26 nationally prominent public officials and recovered N1.7 trillion ($10.5 billion).

It however noted that "only four of these officials - former Inspector General of Police Tafa Balogun, former Bayelsa State Governor Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, former Edo State Governor Lucky Igbinedion, and PDP chieftain and former Nigerian Ports Authority chairman Olabode George - were convicted", while the courts granted bail to all the others.

The report also identified the harsh and life threatening conditions in Nigeria's prison and detention centres as one of the human rights problems in the reporting year, adding, "Most of the country's 234 prisons, built 70 to 80 years earlier, lacked basic facilities."

It said the prison system included 11 maximum security prisons, 80 satellite prisons, 10 farm centres, eight zonal offices, and six directorates - all of which held prisoners and detainees.

Quoting statistics released by the Nigerian Prison Service last year, it said the country's prisons held 48,124 inmates, with individual prisons holding as much as 500 per cent of their designed capacity.

Citing examples, it said Owerri Federal Prison had a capacity of 548 prisoners but held more than 1,635, Ogwuashi-Uku prison in Delta State, with a capacity of 64 prisoners, held 358 inmates, while Port Harcourt Prison, with a capacity of 804 prisoners, held 2,594.

The report said other serious human rights problems identified included arbitrary arrest and detention; prolonged pre-trial detention; sporadic abridgement of citizens' right to change their government due to some election fraud and other irregularities; infringements on citizens' privacy rights; restrictions on freedom of speech, press, assembly, religion, and movement; official corruption; violence and discrimination against women; child abuse; and female genital mutilation.

It said other serious human rights problems included killing of children suspected of witchcraft; child sexual exploitation; ethnic, regional, and religious discrimination; trafficking in persons for the purpose of prostitution and forced labour; discrimination against persons with disabilities; discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity; vigilante killings; forced and bonded labour; and child labour.

It however identified the abuses committed by Boko Haram, which was responsible for killings, bombings, and other attacks throughout the country; abuses committed by security services with impunity, which included killings, beatings, arbitrary detention, and destruction of property; and societal violence - including ethnic, regional, and religious violence, as the most serious human rights problems during the reporting year.

On the importance of the report, Clinton noted that Congress mandated these country reports more than three decades ago to help guide lawmakers' decisions on foreign military and economic aid.

She said: "Today, governments, intergovernmental organisations, scholars, journalists, activists, and others around the world rely on these reports as an essential update on human rights conditions around the world."

It was also noted in the report that, while political leaders influenced the judiciary, particularly at the state and local levels, also identified understaffing, underfunding, inefficiency, and corruption as problems which continued to prevent the judiciary from functioning adequately.

It further gave a harsh verdict on operators in the judicial arm as it said: "Judges frequently failed to appear for trials, often because they were pursuing other sources of income and sometimes because of threats against them."

Apart from that, it noted that, "court officials often lacked the proper equipment, training, and motivation to perform their duties, with lack of motivation primarily due to inadequate compensation."

The report also said: "There was a widespread perception that judges were easily bribed and that litigants could not rely on the courts to render impartial judgments. Citizens encountered long delays and alleged requests from judicial officials for bribes to expedite cases or obtain favourable rulings."

Assessing civil judicial procedures and remedies, the report noted that although the constitution provides for independent judiciary in civil matters, "the executive, the legislature, and business interests, however, exerted undue influence and pressure in civil cases".

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They made their request at the end of a series of meetings with senior White House officials. Nigeria fears that including Boko Haram in the US watch list could make it more difficult for Nigerian citizens to travel to the US and further affect bilateral trade between the two countries.

Nigerian authorities said they would manage to counter the threat posed by Boko Haram, as they did in the past with other terrorist or rebel groups operating in the country. Over the past few days, President Barack Obama has come under increased pressure from the US Congress to include Boko Haram in the terrorist watch list.

A group of US Senators and House Representatives also wrote a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, criticising the Obama administration for acting "too slowly" on this issue and claiming that "ten years after 9/11, we cannot allow bureaucratic stovepipes and interagency turf battles to prevent us from protecting the US homeland and US global interests".

The letter mentioned some recent attacks carried out by Boko Haram against Christian churches in Nigeria and against the UN headquarters in the capital Abuja (August 2011) in which 25 people were killed. Early this morning, a group of Boko Haram militants attacked a police station in the town of Sokoto, in north-western Nigeria, killing a police officer and a civilian. Italian engineer Franco Lamolinara was killed in a failed rescue attempt in Sokoto on March 8, after being held hostage by Boko Haram militants for 10 months.

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Speaking when she received a delegation from Holland at the National Assembly yesterday led by the Dutch Ambassador for Human Rights, Veer Lionel, Lar said condemnation of the anti-gay bill by some western countries in the name of human rights was uncalled for.

He said Nigerian should not be sanctioned because of the anti gay bill by cutting or stopping aids.

Responding, Mr. Lionel said they were in Nigeria to dialogue with the committee on human rights in Africa and how to promote it.

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In addition to the mass arrest, the NIS also said it was set to repatriate the arrested Chinese nationals to their country of origin.

The state Comptroller of Immigration, Dr. Emmanuel Brasca Udo Ifeadi, said the move was a national issue directed by the Controller General of the Immigration service and stated that it was for Kano, Lagos and Ibadan where Chinese nationals were engaged in textile trading.

Addressing journalists in his office, the controller said: “Out of the arrested Chinese nationals, 11 of them are women and it’s an exercise to make the economy of the country getting healthier, but only with quality foreign expatriate that can be allow but those that economic scavengers will be deport back to their country.”

Ifeadi said: “Chinese nationals are selling textile in market, but that of Kano is worrisome, so the comptroller General feels that enough is enough and its going to be a continuous exercise until when they economic revive.”

He said those arrested will be send back to their country, adding that:“Its continuous exercise, all those foreign nationals trading in the market who are causing economic havoc to our country will be  arrested and deport back to their country.

“For Chinese to come to our country and be selling textiles in our market we will not allow it and we will continue checking them, arresting them and deport them back to their country.”

He said: “Chinese select basic areas in the country, but basically the exercise three major areas of Kano, Lagos and Ibadan their activities is worst, so we will fish them out and repatriate them.”

Emmanuel added that the Chinese national invaded the Kano market, but the government decided to stop them from trading in the market and deport them back to their countries.

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Minister of Mines and Steel Development, Musa Muhammad Sada, made this known in Lokoja when he visited Governor Idris Wada, said a statement yesterday by the ministry's spokesman, Marshal Gundu.

He said everything was being done in the sector to achieve that through collaboration with investors and stakeholders.

Sada was on a working visit to the coal mine of Eta-Zuma Group West Africa Limited at Okobo in Anpka Local Government Area of Kogi State.

"We are ready to partner with anybody who has the wherewithal towards the actualisation of that mandate. We can talk to such persons and they can talk to us," he said.

Responding, Wada said the state was ready to partner with the Federal Government, Eta-Zuma Group West Africa Limited and other investors for the development of the solid mineral endowments in the state.

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Empowering girls and women is not a threat but one of the smartest social and economic decisions that a nation can make, Minister of Finance and Coordinator of the Economy, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has said.

She made the remark in Abuja at a National Gender Policy Dialogue jointly hosted by the World Bank Nigeria and the Department For International Development (DFID).

She said that the World Bank gender report argues that empowering girls and women is a resource that adds to a nations GDP growth.

She said "We talk about natural resources and sources of growth, what this report is telling us are that girls and women are sources of growth for the economy. So it's actually a matter of vital economic growth of this country that we focus on girls and women.

"I am saying in addition to the fact that we are 80.2 million women in this country but because men are used to hearing this, we have got to find a better way to deliver this powerful message that its more than about our being half of the population of this country but it's about the fact that a country will fall behind if it does not see its girls and women as a growth opportunity for the economy."

She explained that any serious discussion about Nigeria's future must entail discussion about girls and women on the role they play and the barriers they face in making the future a good one for the country.

Women have made progress in the country but the fact still remains that they lack behind men in many areas she said, adding that gender inequality have direct effect in economic growth, poverty reduction and the welfare of the next generation.

"We have just heard that figures on female mortality and education level particularly in parts of our country are not at par with what you find in any of the poorest countries of the World and that's why we find it shocking and unacceptable,"

She said that her ministry is targeting to launch a special competition strictly for women in the You Win programme where about 80,000 to 100,000 entrepreneurs are being targeted.

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A UN-backed scheme to provide safe, energy-saving stoves to the poor of Nigeria aims help curb the thousands of deaths caused each year by inhalation of toxic fumes or burning from firewood blazes.

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The Nigeria Football Federation has congratulated Nigeria international midfielder John Mikel Obi for winning the UEFA Champions League title with English Premiership club Chelsea in Munich on Saturday night.

NFF President, Alhaji Aminu Maigari said yesterday that Mikel Obi is a pride to the Nigerian nation, and deserves plaudits from all and sundry not only for his club's victory, but for his personal commitment and high performance in the campaign.

Maigari said: "We are all very proud of Mikel Obi, and we congratulate him for this sweet victory. More gladdening is the fact that he was not a docile member of the team, or a bench-warmer. He was very active and played his part brilliantly in ensuring a magnificent triumph for Chelsea.

"The whole nation should praise the young man. He fought hard and showed dedication all through the campaign and in the process, lifted our country's name high in international football," said Maigari.

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Bassey, a senior lecturer Faculty of Arts, was said to have died in his office Saturday night after watching the UEFA champions League final between Chelsea and Bayern Munich football clubs.

A top management source, who confirmed the demise to Daily Trust, declined to give further details, saying it would be too early to ascertain the actual cause of the death.

"Except there is a medical report or an official statement from the management, it may be too difficult for me to say precisely whether his death has anything to do with match or otherwise," the source said.

Bassey's profile on the University's website, showed that he has authored and co-authored four books as a Senior Lecturer in the department of Creative Art. Prominent among such books include, Creative Art, Definitions, Material and The beginning, UNILAG in the eye of a visual artist.

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