Botswana Bushmen win legal rights to land.

• Author: Herro, Alana
• Position: EYE ON EARTH - Brief article

The San people of Botswana, a hunter-gatherer group also known as the Bushmen, have won a historic court case granting them rights to ancestral lands from which they were driven in 2002. In December, Botswana's High Court ruled that it was illegal for the government to cut the water supply to the San's traditional homeland in the Kalahari game reserve and to forcibly relocate residents to outside settlements.

The government had claimed the settlements afford the tribe better access to clinics and schools, and that the San's presence in the reserve interfered with conservation efforts. It denied accusations that the evictions had been orchestrated to allow for diamond mining.

More than 1,000 San were forcibly evicted from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve four years ago, following similar relocations in previous years. The group's leader...