The toolkits were removed from the Blombos sediment in 2008

But apart from some engravings on the blocks, there was little hard evidence to determine the precise purpose of the Blombos ochre. The new items seem to have had a much more obvious use – as the equipment to process paints.

The finds include abalone shells with ochre residues inside. There are tools made of quartzite that were presumably employed to hammer and grind ochre into a powder in the shells. And there is evidence that charcoal and oil from seal bones were being added to the mix. It seems bone implements were also being used to turn and lift the paint pastes.

All these artefacts were found together, almost as if someone had put them down intending to retrieve them at a later time, but then never coming back. Sands blown in through the cave entrance subsequently buried the kits and locked them away until they were excavated in 2008.

In the intervening three years, the finds have been subjected to a series of tests and assessments.

Ochre can have non-artistic applications such as an additive in glues, but co-researcher Francesco d'Errico from the University of Bordeaux says the analysis of the residues in the shells points strongly to the production of paints.

Francesco d'Errico examining the components of the toolkits under a microscope

“The absence of a resin or a wax suggests the ochre was not used to make a glue or a mastic. We think it may have been used to make a paint or a design,” he explained.

Prof Henshilwood added: “It's possible the paint was used to paint bodies, human skin. It could have been used to paint designs on leather or other objects. It could have been used for paintings on walls, although the surfaces of southern African caves are not ideal for the long-term preservation of rock art.”

The mere fact though that paints are being manufactured in a systematic way is indicative of a level of advanced thinking.

It would have required a high degree of planning to bring together all of the elements of the kits; and if art really was the purpose, it suggests the cave dwellers of Blombos were capable of symbolic thought – the ability to let one thing represent another in the mind.

This ability has been posited as the giant leap in human evolution that set our species apart from the rest of the animal world.

Understanding when and where this behaviour first emerged is a key quest for scientists studying human origins.

Until now, arguably the earliest examples of conceptual thinking were the pieces of shell jewellery discovered at Skhul Cave in Israel and from Oued Djebbana in Algeria.

The Blombos ochre blocks announced by scientists in 2002 had etchings on them

These artefacts have been dated to 90,000-100,000 years ago. The Blombos paint kits now sit alongside these other finds.

Prof Chris Stringer from London's Natural History Museum commented: “Twenty or 30 years ago, there was a view that Europe was really the place where all the big action was taking place – wonderful painted caves 30,000-35,000 years ago, and people decorating their bodies.

“We now know that this behaviour goes back far further in Africa; it goes back to 100,000 years, perhaps even more than 100,000 years.

“People were starting to express social identity in completely new ways. And there is a view that this behaviour is linked with complex language. So, it may indicate these people were communicating in a fully modern way,” he told BBC News.

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk

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Situated on the equator on Africa's east coast, Kenya has been described as “the cradle of humanity”.

In the Great Rift Valley palaeontologists have discovered some of the earliest evidence of man's ancestors.

In the present day, Kenya's ethnic diversity has produced a vibrant culture but is also a source of conflict.

After independence from Britain in 1963, politics was dominated by the charismatic Jomo Kenyatta. He was succeeded in 1978 by Daniel arap Moi, who remained in power for 24 years. The ruling Kenya African National Union, Kanu, was the only legal political party for much of the 1980s.

Violent unrest – and international pressure – led to the restoration of multi-party politics in the early 1990s. But it was to be another decade before opposition candidate Mwai Kibaki ended nearly 40 years of Kanu rule with his landslide victory in 2002's general election.

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At a glance

Politics: Presidential elections in 2007 led to widespread unrest, denting the country's reputation for stability. A power-sharing government was eventually formed. A referendum on a new constitution in August 2010 produced a resounding “yes” vote

Economy: The economy has been recovering over recent years

International: Kenya has mediated in conflicts in Somalia and Sudan

Country profiles compiled by BBC Monitoring

Despite President Kibaki's pledge to tackle corruption, some donors estimated that up to $1bn had been lost to graft between 2002 and 2005.

Other pressing challenges include high unemployment, crime and poverty; most Kenyans live below the poverty level of $1 a day. Droughts frequently put millions of people at risk.

Kenya has been a leading light in the Somali and Sudanese peace processes.

With its scenic beauty and abundant wildlife, Kenya is one of Africa's major safari destinations.

The lucrative tourist industry has bounced back following the slump that followed bomb attacks in Nairobi in 1998 and Mombasa in 2002. And in 2006 tourism was the country's best hard currency earner, ahead of horticulture and tea.

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Thor Halvorssen has published extensively on the subject of lobbying

For Public Relations (PR) companies and their government clients, “reputation management” can be a euphemism of the worst sort. In many cases across Africa, it often means whitewashing the human rights violations of despotic regimes with fluff journalism and, just as easily, serving as personal PR agents for rulers and their corrupt family members.

But they also help governments drown out criticism, often branding dissidents, democratic opponents and critics as criminals, terrorists or extremists.

Today, with the preponderance of social media, anyone with an opinion, a smart phone and a Facebook account can present their views to an audience potentially as large as any major political campaign can attract.

This has raised citizen journalism to a level of influence unknown previously. Yet, this communication revolution has also resulted in despotic governments smearing not just human rights advocates, but individuals with blogs as well as Twitter, YouTube and Facebook accounts. This undermines the power and integrity of social media.

And as PR firms help regimes “astroturf” with fake social media accounts, they do more damage than just muddling legitimate criticism with false comments and tweets linking back to positive content – they also make the general public sceptical about social media.

It is no surprise that ruthless governments that deny their citizens basic freedoms would wish to whitewash their reputations. But PR professionals who spin for them should be exposed as amoral.

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It is no surprise that ruthless governments that deny their citizens basic freedoms would wish to whitewash their reputations”

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For instance, Qorvis Communications, a PR and lobbying firm in the United States, represents Equatorial Guinea – among other allegedly repressive governments – for a reported $55,000 a month. The firm is said to have amassed more than $100 million by helping their clients with “reputation management”.

By burying opposing public opinions or spinning false, positive stories of stability and economic growth on behalf of President Teodoro Obiang Nguema's brutal regime, the firm is seriously hampering the progress of human rights in the country.

In response, Qorvis says that customers with troublesome human rights records are a very small part of its client base, and that these governments are using Qorvis as a means to be heard in the “court of public opinion”.

Washington Media Group, another American PR firm, was hired in 2010 by the Tunisian government. The autocracy was subsequently described in various media outlets as a “stable democracy” and a “peaceful, Islamic country with a terrific story to share with the world”. Only after the regime's snipers began picking off protesters did Washington Media Group end its $420,000 contract.

‘Limited engagement’

When a PR firm spins a dictator's story, it does not just present a different viewpoint, as the firm might want you to believe; rather, it undermines the resources from which people can draw opinions. If a website or magazine commends the government, how is an average citizen to know for certain if the information is accurate or true?

Teodoro Obiang Nguema is accused of leading a brutal regime in Equatorial Guinea

Many firms that operate, or have done, on behalf of kleptocracies in Africa are based not only in the US but also in the United Kingdom. They include Bell Pottinger (Hosni Mubarak's Egypt), Brown Lloyd James (Muammar Gaddafi's Libya) and Hill & Knowlton (Yoweri Museveni's Uganda).

There are likely many more that continue to do this work under the cover of corporate secrecy. When firms get caught or criticised for their activities many say it is “limited engagement” for only a few months or that the task only involved “tourism” or “economic progress”.

If, for instance, a firm served the questionable government in the Democratic Republic of the Congo they would probably insist they are “consultants” helping to create “economic opportunity” and, no doubt, providing a “guiding hand” to the current president as he improves the lot of the Congolese poor.

Yet the spin doctors most probably ignore the fact that President Joseph Kabila's security forces killed Floribert Chebeya, arguably the DR Congo's leading human rights defender, and likely “disappeared” his driver (he is still missing). Only after an international uproar were the policemen directly responsible for the killing brought to justice.

Meanwhile, political opponents routinely disappear, journalists are arrested for criticising the government and any comprehensive human rights report contains appalling anecdotes and painful analysis about a country with little judicial independence and respect for the rule of law.

PR agents do not create “economic opportunities” – they alter reality so that certain deals and foreign aid can flow faster and in larger quantities – all the while being rewarded handsomely.

‘Briefcase bandits’

Africa's spin doctors (mostly American and European) deliberately choose to represent what the Free Africa Foundation's George Ayittey so refreshingly describes as “Swiss-bank socialists”, “crocodile liberators”, “quack revolutionaries”, and “briefcase bandits”.

Mr Ayittey – a former political prisoner from Ghana – pulls us a lot closer to the truth.

If the mainstream media adopts Mr Ayittey's language, the free governments of the world would be forced to face the truth and take necessary steps to tie their aid and trade deals to democratic reform for the benefit of Africa's population.

Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and we must combat the work of firms that provide “reputation management” to oppressive states by exposing their role in abetting injustice.

Those firms may want to consider atoning by volunteering for the civil society groups, human rights' defenders and economic opportunity organisations working to make Africa free and prosperous.

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A largely semi-desert country, Chad is rich in gold and uranium and stands to benefit from its recently-acquired status as an oil-exporting state.

However, Africa's fifth-largest nation suffers from inadequate infrastructure and internal conflict. Poverty is rife, and health and social conditions compare unfavourably with those elsewhere in the region.

Chad's post-independence history has been marked by instability and violence stemming mostly from tension between the mainly Arab-Muslim north and the predominantly Christian and animist south.

In 1969 Muslim dissatisfaction with the first president, Ngarta Tombalbaye – a Christian southerner – developed into a guerrilla war. This, combined with a severe drought, undermined his rule and in 1975 President Tombalbaye was killed in a coup led by another southerner, Felix Malloum.

Mr Malloum, too, failed to end the war, and in 1979 he was replaced by a Libyan-backed northerner, Goukouki Oueddei. But the fighting continued, this time with a former defence minister, Hissen Habre, on the opposite side.

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At a glance

Politics: Crises on several fronts: President Deby, in power since 1990, faces an armed rebellion by several groups and incursions from neighbouring Sudan. He survived a coup attempt in 2006

Humanitarian issues: 140,000 people are internal refugees; 200,000 refugees are from Sudan

Economy: Chad is enjoying an oil boom. Changes to rules governing how revenues can be spent have been controversial. Chad ranks as the world's most corrupt state

International: Chad cut ties with Sudan in 2006, accusing it of supporting rebels, but since 2009 efforts have been made to resolve the countries' differences. Chad hosts large numbers of refugees from Central African Republic and Sudan's Darfur

In 1982, with French help, Mr Habre captured the capital, N'Djamena, and Mr Oueddei escaped to the north, where he formed a rival government. The standoff ended in 1990, when Mr Habre was toppled by the Libyan-backed Idriss Deby.

By the mid-1990s the situation had stabilised and in 1996 Mr Deby was confirmed president in Chad's first election.

In 1998 an armed insurgency began in the north, led by President Deby's former defence chief, Youssouf Togoimi. A Libyan-brokered peace deal in 2002 failed to put an end to the fighting.

From 2003 unrest in neighbouring Sudan's Darfur region spilled across the border, along with hundreds of thousands of Sudanese refugees. They have been joined by thousands of Chadians who are fleeing rebel fighting as well as violence between ethnic Arab and ethnic African Chadians.

Chad and Sudan accuse each other of backing and harbouring rebels, and the dispute led to severing of relations in 2006. However, since then, progress has been made towards normalising ties, with the two countries' presidents meeting for the first time in six years in 2010.

Chad became an oil-producing nation in 2003 with the completion of a $4bn pipeline linking its oilfields to terminals on the Atlantic coast. The government has moved to relax a law controlling the use of oil money, which the World Bank had made a condition of its $39m loan.

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MOGADISHU, Somalia – Al-Qaida-linked militants claimed to have killed 70 foreign African Union peacekeepers but an eyewitness said many of the bodies put on display were likely Somali government soldiers. An AU spokesman said Friday that the insurgents had stolen uniforms and dressed up scores of their own dead.

The militants said the bodies were proof they are still capable of putting up a fight despite coming under attack on two fronts.

African Union troops and government soldiers pushed the al-Shabab militia from their last bases in the capital on Thursday, AU spokesman Lt. Col. Paddy Ankunda said. And Kenyan troops supporting a pro-government militia have pushed at least 60 miles (100 kilometers) inside Somalia in the past week.

Al-Shabab has retreated before the Kenyan forces so far, but the militants have struck back in the capital with a series of bombings — including a truck bomb that killed over 100 people. On Thursday, they put up a bloody fight when AU forces arrived in Deynile, al-Shabab’s last base in Mogadishu.

The militants showed around 60 bodies after the fierce fighting, according to several eyewitnesses. Photos show that some of those displayed wore flak jackets and helmets — equipment that is issued to AU soldiers but not common among government troops or insurgents. But many other bodies were only dressed in green camouflage uniforms.

One eyewitness, a photographer at the scene, said he counted 58 bodies. There were about 30 men in the line who were clearly Somali and some wore tattered government-issued uniforms, he said. The origin of nine bodies was unclear because their faces were down in the sand or for other reasons, he said.

But 19 others wore the type of uniform given to Burundian troops and looked like foreigners, he said. The militants also displayed a Bible and some crucifixes, items unlikely to be carried by Muslim Somalis. He did not see any identity documents, he said.

The eyewitness spoke on condition of anonymity, fearing reprisals because his observations contradicted the militants’ account.

Ankunda said that 10 soldiers had been killed and two were missing after Thursday’s battle. The bodies of the 10 dead soldiers were safely in AU hands, he said. An internal AU document seen by The Associated Press said that 38 soldiers also had been wounded.

“It’s a manipulated picture,” Ankunda said. “They dressed up their own casualties … I think they’ve been keeping some uniforms.”

Later, he said that the uniforms were so new that the Burundians had not even been issued them yet.

The AU has previously underreported casualties and al-Shabab routinely exaggerates the number of people it has killed.

An al-Shabab spokesman insisted that all the bodies displayed were Burundian soldiers. The 9,000-strong AU force is made up of Burundians and Ugandans.

“You see their dead bodies here, our mujahedeen killed 70 of them today,” spokesman Sheik Ali Mohamud Rage said on Thursday. “Allah punished them in the hands of the mujahedeen when they tried to attack us.”

AU soldiers have steadily pushed al-Shabab back over the past year and the insurgents withdrew from most of the city overnight in August.

On Monday, Rage said al-Shabab would send suicide bombers to Kenya in retaliation for their excursion into Somalia. Kenya originally said it was pursuing gunmen who kidnapped four foreigners from Kenyan soil in the past six weeks. But later a military spokesman said they planned to push onto Kismayo, an insurgent stronghold and a complex, long-term operation that would have required far more advance planning.

Currently, the Kenyan forces are not far from the town of Afmadow, a strategically important cross roads where al-Shabab executed two men for spying on Friday.

The two men were brought into an open ground, tied to a pole and shot by masked men, said eyewitness Ahmed Mohamed.

“Some of the spectators vomited, and women cried when they saw the men being shot. They were well known to us,” said Halima Abdi. “They told us to come out for a religious sermon then they brought the two boys and executed them. Those who wanted to flee were ordered to stay. It was awful,” she said.

Al-Shabab has been weakened by internal divisions and a famine in its strongholds in the south that has claimed tens of thousands of lives. Many Somalis also have expressed disgust with the suicide bombings and harsh punishments that are key tactics of the insurgency.

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Houreld reported from Nairobi, Kenya.

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