Weekly World Bank Briefings on Sub-Saharan Africa
2008/02/07
2008/01/24
Displaced in Darfur- Amnesty International
The security situation for internally displaced people is on a knife-edge as the UN forces end their third week of operations in Darfur. Launching a new report on the country, Amnesty International warned that a generation of Darfuris is growing up in extreme fear and insecurity in camps awash with weapons - a potentially explosive combination. Displaced in Darfur - A generation of anger outlines the current state of insecurity in camps for internally displaced people (IDPs) in Darfur and the potential consequences and possible remedies. "Almost all of the camps in Darfur are flooded with weapons. The security situation in and outside of the camps continues to deteriorate, as hopes of a political resolution to the Darfur conflict recede and hostilities between the government and armed groups continues to escalate," said Tawanda Hondora, Deputy Director of Amnesty International's Africa Program. "The welfare of displaced people continues to be ignored while armed groups and the government bicker and impede the complete deployment of UNAMID forces [UN forces in Darfur]. There can be no durable peace without ensuring that the security and human rights of these people are respected and upheld."
To learn more, please go to:
http://www.amnesty.org/en/alfresco_asset/72ab3ef3-c516-11dc-a9b5-492269ca2e38/afr540012008eng.pdf.
An international study into the situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) shows that each month 45,000 of its citizens die from the consequences of war, disease and malnutrition. The fighting in the east of the DRC has claimed 5.4 million lives in the past ten years, more than any other conflict since World War II, according to a survey released by the International Rescue Committee (IRC) carried out with Australia's Burnet Institute. Half the victims were children under five. Although the DRC is officially at peace, government forces are still fighting rebels in the east, leading to chronic shortages of food and medicine.
The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has launched projects in five West African countries, considered to be among the world's poorest, to help increase agricultural output and create new markets for products. Launched as part of the U.N. agency's Trust Fund for Food Security, the projects are taking place in Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Senegal and Sierra Leone, thanks to a USD 10 million contribution from the Italian Government. All five countries suffer from "alarming" levels of poverty and malnutrition, FAO noted in a news release, adding that that in some cases, up to 70 percent of the population is living below the poverty line.
The World Bank and African Development Bank (AfDB), acting to “raise an alarm" over the turmoil in Kenya, said on Jan. 22 they may have to adjust lending programs if unrest persists following a disputed poll. In a speech to diplomats in Tunisia, AfDB President Donald Kaberuka said it was important that African countries took “ownership" of the task of ensuring political stability so that the development effort did not “go forward three steps and march backwards four steps." “The current situation could drive two million Kenyans into poverty, reversing the gains made over the last few years," the joint statement said. “The impact on other countries in eastern Africa from the fallout in Kenya, in particular the disruption of transit routes, is high and will increase as the problems persist," the lending institutions said.
Central African Republic (CAR)
President Francois Bozize has appointed the rector of the University of Bangui as premier. Faustin Archange Touadera will succeed PM Elie Dote who tendered the resignation of his cabinet last week. Touadera has been ordered to form a new cabinet to address the social crisis in the CAR. Government workers and teachers have been on strike since early this year to force the government to pay their back wages. Despite the change in government, the unions called for a national protest Jan. 23 and a general strike Jan. 24. Bozize has threatened to use violence if necessary to suppress the protests. (Radio Netherlands)
Congo (DRC)
World Bank forestry projects in the Congo (DRC) ignored the rights of indigenous pygmies and overestimated the benefits of industrial logging in reducing poverty, the bank itself said in a report that concluded internal guidelines had been breached. The report followed complaints by indigenous pygmy groups that the reforms had disregarded the rights of millions of forest-dependent people and ignored the existence of between 250,000 and 600,000 pygmies whose lives depend on the forests. The reforms, the complainants argued, would also lead to violations of their rights to occupy ancestral lands, and use their forests according to traditional practices. (IRIN)
Ethiopia
UN peacekeepers monitoring the disputed border between Ethiopia and Eritrea may have to halt operations within weeks because Eritrea has cut diesel fuel supplies, said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Ban said that as a result of the Dec. 1 stoppage, the mission had only enough fuel to last until early March. Ban called on Afwerki to address the issue "on an urgent basis," otherwise a U.N. decision would have to be taken in early February to begin withdrawing the 1,700-strong United Nations Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE). (Reuters)
Kenya
Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga has said for the first time that he is prepared to share power. On the German television station ARD, he says President Mwai Kibaki can stay in office as long as an opposition candidate becomes prime minister. Another condition would be a strengthening of parliament and the judiciary. Odinga's comments come as former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan is in Kenya in an attempt to mediate a solution to the crisis. He says people should not expect miracles from his visit. (Radio Netherlands)
Liberia
One of Liberia's most notorious rebel commanders has returned home to confess his crimes, saying his fighters killed 20,000 people during the country's civil war. Joshua Milton Blahyi, also known as General Butt Naked, acknowledges the atrocities in an interview with the Associated Press published this past weekend. Blahyi returned from exile in Ghana to testify before Liberia's Truth and Reconciliation Commission last week. The commission began hearing testimony on the civil war in 2006 with the goal of establishing a full account of wartime atrocities. (VOA)
Mozambique
The World Food Program (WFP) has begun relief flights to central Mozambique, where some 76,000 people have been affected by widespread flooding this month along the Zambezi River valley. A helicopter chartered by the agency flew its first mission yesterday morning, delivering 2.2 tons of mosquito nets, tents and plastic sheeting to the town of Mutarara for use and distribution by UNICEF. The helicopter transported its first consignment of WFP food assistance Jan. 22, carrying 2.5 tons of cereals and pulses to the town of Goligoli, where more than 13,000 people have been displaced from their homes because of floodwaters. (UN News)
Nigeria
Nigerian authorities are searching for the families of 105 abducted children found packed into a minibus. The children, aged between five and 13, were taken from Kano state in the north and discovered by anti-trafficking agents crammed into a 15-seat bus in the northern city of Kaduna, after the driver was stopped at a police checkpoint. The children were piled on top of each other "like sardines" say officials. It is the largest number of trafficked children the authorities have rescued in one incident since efforts began to stop the trade in 2003. (BBC)
Rwanda
Rwanda has launched a campaign to encourage all men to be circumcised, to reduce the risk of catching HIV/AIDS. A health minister told the BBC that soldiers, policemen and students would be asked to come forward first for circumcision. The U.N. World Health Organization (WHO) has said male circumcision reduces the risk of heterosexual HIV infection. But correspondents say it is rare in Rwanda where the Christian population, who make up the majority, do not practice it. (BBC)
Senegal
Dubai World Group's Jafza subsidiary signed a USD 800 million deal on Jan. 21 to build and run a special economic zone in Senegal, the latest in a series of Arab investments in the West African country. Dubai World Chairman Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem said construction would start before the end of the year on the first phase of the project, covering 650 hectares next to a planned international airport 45 km (28 miles) from Dakar. (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
A newborn in Sierra Leone has the lowest chance in the world of surviving until age 5, and the prospects are almost as bad for children in Angola and Afghanistan, UNICEF said in its annual report. In 2006, nearly 9.7 million children worldwide died before their fifth birthdays, mostly from preventable causes like diarrhea, malaria or malnutrition, it said, and on average more than 26,000 children under age 5 died each day. Sierra Leone had the highest child mortality rate, with 270 deaths per 1,000 births. Angola was second with 260 deaths, followed by Afghanistan with 257. (NY Times)
Sudan
Armed robberies and bandit attacks on aid convoys are threatening deliveries of food to more than 2 million people in Darfur, the World Food Program (WFP) said on Jan. 23. Around two-thirds of the population of Darfur depends on the world's largest aid operation, but a collapse in law and order in the vast region has made life difficult for humanitarian workers. Five years of fighting in Darfur has claimed an estimated 200,000 lives and driven 2.5 million from their homes. WFP officials are calling on the Sudanese government to make sure the roads are safe. (Reuters)
Zambia
Zambia has mobilized its army to clear drainage systems in major cities amid fears torrential rains and flooding may lead to outbreaks of cholera and other deadly diseases, a government official said on Jan 23. Zambia, like Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi, has been lashed by heavy rains for several weeks. Swollen rivers have burst their banks, killing dozens and forcing thousands of villagers to flee flooded homes. Floods also have destroyed bridges and roads and swept away livestock and crops. (Reuters)
Zanzibar
Using a cocktail of drugs may help doctors more effectively treat three of the world's most common parasitic diseases, researchers working in Zanzibar reported on Jan. 23. The drugs treat elephantiasis, soil-transmitted worms and schistomiasis. All the treatments are known to be effective but the impact of delivering them all at once was not known. The WHO has long recommended the coordinated delivery of drugs to tackle neglected tropical diseases, but the number of treatments has so far been limited to two because of safety concerns over potential side-effects. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
A Zimbabwe court on Jan. 23 upheld a police ban on an opposition demonstration to press President Robert Mugabe to adopt a new constitution ahead of presidential and parliamentary elections scheduled for March. The court ruled they could hold a rally in a stadium, after police had said street protests could turn violent. Police released Zimbabwe's main opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, hours after taking him away in the middle of the night for questioning about the planned demonstration, his lawyer said. His group, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), launched a legal challenge to the police ban. (Reuters)
2008/01/17
UN, NGO and general news Round-Up
As mediation talks in Kenya's disputed presidential elections turned to address the country's worsening humanitarian situation in, Catholic aid agency CAFOD has pledged an initial GBP 120,000 for vital humanitarian aid to help the immediate needs of tens of thousands of people. CAFOD is providing items essential for survival to over 53,000 Kenyan citizens who have been driven from their homes as a result of the political and ethnic violence. The Northwest-based global relief and development agency Mercy Corps is dispatching an emergency team to Kenya's conflict-wracked western region to meet with displaced families and assess critical needs. Displaced survivors face food shortages, lack of clean drinking water and abysmal sanitary conditions in which infectious diseases can spread rapidly.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Feb. 6 he had appointed veteran Algerian diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi to head a worldwide review of UN security after a deadly December bomb attack in Algiers. Brahimi, 74, was previously Algeria's foreign minister and has worked for the United Nations in countries including Haiti, Congo, Yemen, Liberia, Nigeria and Sudan. Most recently he was the U.N. special envoy for Afghanistan and later Iraq. Ban, asked by a reporter if the choice was aimed at winning over Algiers, said: "I have very closely consulted with the Algerian government. We have thought that Mr. Brahimi would be a very appropriate person to lead this independent panel."
Two earthquakes struck parts of Rwanda and neighboring Congo (DRC) Feb. 3, leaving nearly 40 people dead and hundreds injured. In Rwanda, a World Vision relief team has been dispatched to the hardest-hit, southeastern district of Rusizi to assess the situation and determine how the aid agency can best respond. The Christian aid agency World Vision 's current programs benefit more than 600,000 people and cover food aid and food security, health and nutrition, education, child protection, advocacy and human rights awareness building, and peace building and reconciliation.
Thousands of Somalis have been displaced by fighting between government troops and insurgents. The African Union has warned that forces opposed to the government have expanded their insurgent activities to areas that were previously peaceful. The prevailing insecurity has resulted in civilian causalities and massive displacement and constrained the delivery of assistance to needy people. Action By Churches Together (ACT), members the Norwegian Church Aid, and Christian Aid are planning to respond to the crisis based on recent field assessments that both members conducted in the affected areas of Mogadishu.
The UN refugee agency's (UNHCR) operations chief, Judy Cheng-Hopkins, believes there is an end in sight to the problem of hundreds of thousands of Burundian refugees in Tanzania. Cheng-Hopkins was in the neighboring African countries to assess the prospects for finding durable solutions for the almost 340,000 Burundian refugees in Tanzania. Some 118,000 of them who left their homeland in the 1990s live in three UNHCR-assisted camps, which the Tanzanian government has said it would like to consolidate this year. The rest, who fled Burundi in 1972, have been living in three self-sufficient settlements in central Tanzania.
Although basic health care is granted to all in South Africa, including undocumented migrants, lack of information and fear of arrest and deportation hinders Zimbabwean migrants' access to health care. Following a raid at the Central Methodist Church in Johannesburg, the international humanitarian organization Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) is extremely concerned about the health conditions of Zimbabwean migrants living in South Africa. MSF believes that the raid and detention conditions experienced by the Zimbabwean migrants will further jeopardize their mental and physical health. (MSF)
Central African Republic (CAR)
The top UN humanitarian official voiced grave concern today that about 50,000 Central African refugees who have been living in Chad will be uprooted again because of the widespread violence. Nearly 6,000 people have fled the CAR for southern Chad in the past two months alone, escaping violent clashes between Government forces and armed opposition groups and brutal attacks by bandits in the north of their homeland. "These are people who have lost everything. The current crisis in Chad means that they risk being uprooted and displaced again," said John Holmes, the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator. (UN News)
Chad
President Idriss Deby says his government is in" total control" of the entire country after an assault by rebels on the capital, N'Djamena, that left more than 100 civilians dead. Deby made the comment Feb. 6 in his first public appearance since the rebel assault began late last week. An exiled Chadian rebel spokesman, Makaila Nguebla, says the insurgents are 30 kilometers outside the capital and could carry out new attacks over the next days. International aid groups in Chad say more than 100 civilians have been killed in the fighting and another thousand have been injured. (VOA)
Congo (DRC)
A cholera epidemic has killed at least 76 people and infected nearly 3,000 in Democratic Republic of Congo's (DRC) southeastern province of Katanga since the start of the year, health officials said on Feb. 6. Outbreaks of the waterborne disease swept across rural areas and urban centers in the mineral-rich province, where a mining boom has triggered major population growth in recent months, according to the Health Ministry and World Health Organization. "This year is worse (than most)," said Katanga's provincial health minister, Augustin Ilunga. (Reuters)
Kenya
Former UN chief Kofi Annan has called on Kenya to establish a truth and reconciliation commission to help end the crisis following disputed polls. Annan also said UN investigators should look into alleged human rights abuses in Kenya, where political and ethnic violence has left hundreds dead and thousands homeless. The unrest threatens humanitarian and commercial operations throughout the Great Lakes region, potentially affecting more than 100 million lives, analysts say. Parts of Sudan, Uganda, Burundi, Rwanda and Congo (DRC) have had shortages of fuel and other essential supplies due to insecurity along the Kenyan section of the Northern Corridor transport route. (BBC, IRIN)
Liberia
World Bank President Robert Zoellick said on Feb. 6 that Liberia's debts of more than USD 900 million to international financial institutions have been forgiven. "Because the civil conflict lasted so long, Liberia built up arrears to the tune of USD 300 million from the IMF, USD 400 million from the World Bank, USD 240 million from the African Development Bank - so those sums add up," he said. He said the institutions "are in the closing stages of clearing those arrears" and as a result will soon be able to lend freely to Liberia once more. (AP)
Mozambique
World Bank President Robert Zoellick said on Feb. 4 that the Bank is willing to assist the Mozambican government to avoid the problems of a dual economy. Speaking to reporters immediately prior to leaving Mozambique at the end of a three day visit, Zoellick stressed the importance of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI). Mozambique has not yet joined EITI, but Zoellick claimed the Mozambican government is moving towards it, and that the Mozambican government is fully aware of the dangers of a dual economy. (Xinhua)
Nigeria
Thousands of refugees who fled weekend fighting in the Chadian capital have arrived in Nigeria after a grueling journey through Cameroon and are camping in the open in remote border towns. In Gamboru-Ngala, a dusty outpost near Nigeria's northeastern border with Cameroon, a Reuters reporter saw hundreds of haggard refugees sitting in the shade of trees awaiting help. Many had not eaten for days. Most were women and children with few possessions apart from the clothes they were wearing. Some had walked for days while others had paid to ride on open-top trucks. (Reuters)
Rwanda
A powerful earthquake of magnitude 6 on the Richter scale hit the border area between the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Rwanda on the morning of Feb. 3. The epicenter was located in Birava in the Bukavu province of DR Congo, and the earthquake has also severely affected the Rusizi and Nyamasheke districts of Rwanda. At least 33 people died in Rwanda and about 400 people have been injured. They all have been transferred to hospitals in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, as the earthquake has also caused great structural damage in Rwanda, including the hospital in Nyamasheke. (IFRC)
Senegal
Police in Senegal have arrested several men following the publication of pictures claiming to depict a wedding ceremony between two men. The pictures were published in Icone magazine, whose editor, Mansour Dieng, has since received death threats. Dieng has also been questioned by police over the issue. Homosexuality is illegal in Senegal but it is not clear whether the arrests were in connection with the ceremony or the death threats. (BBC)
Somalia
Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) says it is withdrawing all its international staff from Somalia after three of its workers were killed by a bomb this week. The medical agency said it was outraged by what appeared to be an organized attack on its staff in Kismayo. MSF says the quality of its health care will drop - for example there will be less access to free surgery in Kismayo. The pull-out comes shortly after a member of the Mogadishu regional government was shot dead. (BBC)
Sudan
A dramatic rise in whooping cough cases has been reported near El Geneina, capital of the Sudanese state of West Darfur, but insecurity has made it difficult for medical personnel to reach the affected populations, according to an international NGO. Two cases of the disease (also known as pertussis) were reported in Kondobe, a remote village 20 km north of El Geneina, a fortnight ago, according to the NGO, Medair. But by last week, the number had risen to 147 while another 11 cases were reported in Bir Dagaig village, 10km further north. (IRIN)
Zimbabwe
A senior member of Zimbabwe's ruling party, Simba Makoni, will run for president against Robert G. Mugabe, the man who has kept a mighty hold on power for nearly 30 years and presided over one of the world's most horrific economic free falls. Makoni, a former finance minister, said that though he would run as an independent in the March 29 election, he had held "intensive consultations" with fellow members of the Zimbabwe ANU-Patriotic Front, ZANU-PF, and others before deciding. This is a significant twist. Mugabe had been expected to coast to victory, especially after the nation's main opposition group, the Movement for Democratic Change, failed last weekend to unite behind one presidential candidate. (NYT)
As mediation talks in Kenya's disputed presidential elections turned to address the country's worsening humanitarian situation in, Catholic aid agency CAFOD has pledged an initial GBP 120,000 for vital humanitarian aid to help the immediate needs of tens of thousands of people. CAFOD is providing items essential for survival to over 53,000 Kenyan citizens who have been driven from their homes as a result of the political and ethnic violence. The Northwest-based global relief and development agency Mercy Corps is dispatching an emergency team to Kenya's conflict-wracked western region to meet with displaced families and assess critical needs. Displaced survivors face food shortages, lack of clean drinking water and abysmal sanitary conditions in which infectious diseases can spread rapidly.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Feb. 6 he had appointed veteran Algerian diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi to head a worldwide review of UN security after a deadly December bomb attack in Algiers. Brahimi, 74, was previously Algeria's foreign minister and has worked for the United Nations in countries including Haiti, Congo, Yemen, Liberia, Nigeria and Sudan. Most recently he was the U.N. special envoy for Afghanistan and later Iraq. Ban, asked by a reporter if the choice was aimed at winning over Algiers, said: "I have very closely consulted with the Algerian government. We have thought that Mr. Brahimi would be a very appropriate person to lead this independent panel."
Two earthquakes struck parts of Rwanda and neighboring Congo (DRC) Feb. 3, leaving nearly 40 people dead and hundreds injured. In Rwanda, a World Vision relief team has been dispatched to the hardest-hit, southeastern district of Rusizi to assess the situation and determine how the aid agency can best respond. The Christian aid agency World Vision 's current programs benefit more than 600,000 people and cover food aid and food security, health and nutrition, education, child protection, advocacy and human rights awareness building, and peace building and reconciliation.
Thousands of Somalis have been displaced by fighting between government troops and insurgents. The African Union has warned that forces opposed to the government have expanded their insurgent activities to areas that were previously peaceful. The prevailing insecurity has resulted in civilian causalities and massive displacement and constrained the delivery of assistance to needy people. Action By Churches Together (ACT), members the Norwegian Church Aid, and Christian Aid are planning to respond to the crisis based on recent field assessments that both members conducted in the affected areas of Mogadishu.
The UN refugee agency's (UNHCR) operations chief, Judy Cheng-Hopkins, believes there is an end in sight to the problem of hundreds of thousands of Burundian refugees in Tanzania. Cheng-Hopkins was in the neighboring African countries to assess the prospects for finding durable solutions for the almost 340,000 Burundian refugees in Tanzania. Some 118,000 of them who left their homeland in the 1990s live in three UNHCR-assisted camps, which the Tanzanian government has said it would like to consolidate this year. The rest, who fled Burundi in 1972, have been living in three self-sufficient settlements in central Tanzania.
Although basic health care is granted to all in South Africa, including undocumented migrants, lack of information and fear of arrest and deportation hinders Zimbabwean migrants' access to health care. Following a raid at the Central Methodist Church in Johannesburg, the international humanitarian organization Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) is extremely concerned about the health conditions of Zimbabwean migrants living in South Africa. MSF believes that the raid and detention conditions experienced by the Zimbabwean migrants will further jeopardize their mental and physical health. (MSF)
Central African Republic (CAR)
The top UN humanitarian official voiced grave concern today that about 50,000 Central African refugees who have been living in Chad will be uprooted again because of the widespread violence. Nearly 6,000 people have fled the CAR for southern Chad in the past two months alone, escaping violent clashes between Government forces and armed opposition groups and brutal attacks by bandits in the north of their homeland. "These are people who have lost everything. The current crisis in Chad means that they risk being uprooted and displaced again," said John Holmes, the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator. (UN News)
Chad
President Idriss Deby says his government is in" total control" of the entire country after an assault by rebels on the capital, N'Djamena, that left more than 100 civilians dead. Deby made the comment Feb. 6 in his first public appearance since the rebel assault began late last week. An exiled Chadian rebel spokesman, Makaila Nguebla, says the insurgents are 30 kilometers outside the capital and could carry out new attacks over the next days. International aid groups in Chad say more than 100 civilians have been killed in the fighting and another thousand have been injured. (VOA)
Congo (DRC)
A cholera epidemic has killed at least 76 people and infected nearly 3,000 in Democratic Republic of Congo's (DRC) southeastern province of Katanga since the start of the year, health officials said on Feb. 6. Outbreaks of the waterborne disease swept across rural areas and urban centers in the mineral-rich province, where a mining boom has triggered major population growth in recent months, according to the Health Ministry and World Health Organization. "This year is worse (than most)," said Katanga's provincial health minister, Augustin Ilunga. (Reuters)
Kenya
Former UN chief Kofi Annan has called on Kenya to establish a truth and reconciliation commission to help end the crisis following disputed polls. Annan also said UN investigators should look into alleged human rights abuses in Kenya, where political and ethnic violence has left hundreds dead and thousands homeless. The unrest threatens humanitarian and commercial operations throughout the Great Lakes region, potentially affecting more than 100 million lives, analysts say. Parts of Sudan, Uganda, Burundi, Rwanda and Congo (DRC) have had shortages of fuel and other essential supplies due to insecurity along the Kenyan section of the Northern Corridor transport route. (BBC, IRIN)
Liberia
World Bank President Robert Zoellick said on Feb. 6 that Liberia's debts of more than USD 900 million to international financial institutions have been forgiven. "Because the civil conflict lasted so long, Liberia built up arrears to the tune of USD 300 million from the IMF, USD 400 million from the World Bank, USD 240 million from the African Development Bank - so those sums add up," he said. He said the institutions "are in the closing stages of clearing those arrears" and as a result will soon be able to lend freely to Liberia once more. (AP)
Mozambique
World Bank President Robert Zoellick said on Feb. 4 that the Bank is willing to assist the Mozambican government to avoid the problems of a dual economy. Speaking to reporters immediately prior to leaving Mozambique at the end of a three day visit, Zoellick stressed the importance of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI). Mozambique has not yet joined EITI, but Zoellick claimed the Mozambican government is moving towards it, and that the Mozambican government is fully aware of the dangers of a dual economy. (Xinhua)
Nigeria
Thousands of refugees who fled weekend fighting in the Chadian capital have arrived in Nigeria after a grueling journey through Cameroon and are camping in the open in remote border towns. In Gamboru-Ngala, a dusty outpost near Nigeria's northeastern border with Cameroon, a Reuters reporter saw hundreds of haggard refugees sitting in the shade of trees awaiting help. Many had not eaten for days. Most were women and children with few possessions apart from the clothes they were wearing. Some had walked for days while others had paid to ride on open-top trucks. (Reuters)
Rwanda
A powerful earthquake of magnitude 6 on the Richter scale hit the border area between the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Rwanda on the morning of Feb. 3. The epicenter was located in Birava in the Bukavu province of DR Congo, and the earthquake has also severely affected the Rusizi and Nyamasheke districts of Rwanda. At least 33 people died in Rwanda and about 400 people have been injured. They all have been transferred to hospitals in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, as the earthquake has also caused great structural damage in Rwanda, including the hospital in Nyamasheke. (IFRC)
Senegal
Police in Senegal have arrested several men following the publication of pictures claiming to depict a wedding ceremony between two men. The pictures were published in Icone magazine, whose editor, Mansour Dieng, has since received death threats. Dieng has also been questioned by police over the issue. Homosexuality is illegal in Senegal but it is not clear whether the arrests were in connection with the ceremony or the death threats. (BBC)
Somalia
Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) says it is withdrawing all its international staff from Somalia after three of its workers were killed by a bomb this week. The medical agency said it was outraged by what appeared to be an organized attack on its staff in Kismayo. MSF says the quality of its health care will drop - for example there will be less access to free surgery in Kismayo. The pull-out comes shortly after a member of the Mogadishu regional government was shot dead. (BBC)
Sudan
A dramatic rise in whooping cough cases has been reported near El Geneina, capital of the Sudanese state of West Darfur, but insecurity has made it difficult for medical personnel to reach the affected populations, according to an international NGO. Two cases of the disease (also known as pertussis) were reported in Kondobe, a remote village 20 km north of El Geneina, a fortnight ago, according to the NGO, Medair. But by last week, the number had risen to 147 while another 11 cases were reported in Bir Dagaig village, 10km further north. (IRIN)
Zimbabwe
A senior member of Zimbabwe's ruling party, Simba Makoni, will run for president against Robert G. Mugabe, the man who has kept a mighty hold on power for nearly 30 years and presided over one of the world's most horrific economic free falls. Makoni, a former finance minister, said that though he would run as an independent in the March 29 election, he had held "intensive consultations" with fellow members of the Zimbabwe ANU-Patriotic Front, ZANU-PF, and others before deciding. This is a significant twist. Mugabe had been expected to coast to victory, especially after the nation's main opposition group, the Movement for Democratic Change, failed last weekend to unite behind one presidential candidate. (NYT)
2008/01/24
Displaced in Darfur- Amnesty International
The security situation for internally displaced people is on a knife-edge as the UN forces end their third week of operations in Darfur. Launching a new report on the country, Amnesty International warned that a generation of Darfuris is growing up in extreme fear and insecurity in camps awash with weapons - a potentially explosive combination. Displaced in Darfur - A generation of anger outlines the current state of insecurity in camps for internally displaced people (IDPs) in Darfur and the potential consequences and possible remedies. "Almost all of the camps in Darfur are flooded with weapons. The security situation in and outside of the camps continues to deteriorate, as hopes of a political resolution to the Darfur conflict recede and hostilities between the government and armed groups continues to escalate," said Tawanda Hondora, Deputy Director of Amnesty International's Africa Program. "The welfare of displaced people continues to be ignored while armed groups and the government bicker and impede the complete deployment of UNAMID forces [UN forces in Darfur]. There can be no durable peace without ensuring that the security and human rights of these people are respected and upheld."
To learn more, please go to:
http://www.amnesty.org/en/alfresco_asset/72ab3ef3-c516-11dc-a9b5-492269ca2e38/afr540012008eng.pdf.
An international study into the situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) shows that each month 45,000 of its citizens die from the consequences of war, disease and malnutrition. The fighting in the east of the DRC has claimed 5.4 million lives in the past ten years, more than any other conflict since World War II, according to a survey released by the International Rescue Committee (IRC) carried out with Australia's Burnet Institute. Half the victims were children under five. Although the DRC is officially at peace, government forces are still fighting rebels in the east, leading to chronic shortages of food and medicine.
The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has launched projects in five West African countries, considered to be among the world's poorest, to help increase agricultural output and create new markets for products. Launched as part of the U.N. agency's Trust Fund for Food Security, the projects are taking place in Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Senegal and Sierra Leone, thanks to a USD 10 million contribution from the Italian Government. All five countries suffer from "alarming" levels of poverty and malnutrition, FAO noted in a news release, adding that that in some cases, up to 70 percent of the population is living below the poverty line.
The World Bank and African Development Bank (AfDB), acting to “raise an alarm" over the turmoil in Kenya, said on Jan. 22 they may have to adjust lending programs if unrest persists following a disputed poll. In a speech to diplomats in Tunisia, AfDB President Donald Kaberuka said it was important that African countries took “ownership" of the task of ensuring political stability so that the development effort did not “go forward three steps and march backwards four steps." “The current situation could drive two million Kenyans into poverty, reversing the gains made over the last few years," the joint statement said. “The impact on other countries in eastern Africa from the fallout in Kenya, in particular the disruption of transit routes, is high and will increase as the problems persist," the lending institutions said.
Central African Republic (CAR)
President Francois Bozize has appointed the rector of the University of Bangui as premier. Faustin Archange Touadera will succeed PM Elie Dote who tendered the resignation of his cabinet last week. Touadera has been ordered to form a new cabinet to address the social crisis in the CAR. Government workers and teachers have been on strike since early this year to force the government to pay their back wages. Despite the change in government, the unions called for a national protest Jan. 23 and a general strike Jan. 24. Bozize has threatened to use violence if necessary to suppress the protests. (Radio Netherlands)
Congo (DRC)
World Bank forestry projects in the Congo (DRC) ignored the rights of indigenous pygmies and overestimated the benefits of industrial logging in reducing poverty, the bank itself said in a report that concluded internal guidelines had been breached. The report followed complaints by indigenous pygmy groups that the reforms had disregarded the rights of millions of forest-dependent people and ignored the existence of between 250,000 and 600,000 pygmies whose lives depend on the forests. The reforms, the complainants argued, would also lead to violations of their rights to occupy ancestral lands, and use their forests according to traditional practices. (IRIN)
Ethiopia
UN peacekeepers monitoring the disputed border between Ethiopia and Eritrea may have to halt operations within weeks because Eritrea has cut diesel fuel supplies, said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Ban said that as a result of the Dec. 1 stoppage, the mission had only enough fuel to last until early March. Ban called on Afwerki to address the issue "on an urgent basis," otherwise a U.N. decision would have to be taken in early February to begin withdrawing the 1,700-strong United Nations Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE). (Reuters)
Kenya
Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga has said for the first time that he is prepared to share power. On the German television station ARD, he says President Mwai Kibaki can stay in office as long as an opposition candidate becomes prime minister. Another condition would be a strengthening of parliament and the judiciary. Odinga's comments come as former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan is in Kenya in an attempt to mediate a solution to the crisis. He says people should not expect miracles from his visit. (Radio Netherlands)
Liberia
One of Liberia's most notorious rebel commanders has returned home to confess his crimes, saying his fighters killed 20,000 people during the country's civil war. Joshua Milton Blahyi, also known as General Butt Naked, acknowledges the atrocities in an interview with the Associated Press published this past weekend. Blahyi returned from exile in Ghana to testify before Liberia's Truth and Reconciliation Commission last week. The commission began hearing testimony on the civil war in 2006 with the goal of establishing a full account of wartime atrocities. (VOA)
Mozambique
The World Food Program (WFP) has begun relief flights to central Mozambique, where some 76,000 people have been affected by widespread flooding this month along the Zambezi River valley. A helicopter chartered by the agency flew its first mission yesterday morning, delivering 2.2 tons of mosquito nets, tents and plastic sheeting to the town of Mutarara for use and distribution by UNICEF. The helicopter transported its first consignment of WFP food assistance Jan. 22, carrying 2.5 tons of cereals and pulses to the town of Goligoli, where more than 13,000 people have been displaced from their homes because of floodwaters. (UN News)
Nigeria
Nigerian authorities are searching for the families of 105 abducted children found packed into a minibus. The children, aged between five and 13, were taken from Kano state in the north and discovered by anti-trafficking agents crammed into a 15-seat bus in the northern city of Kaduna, after the driver was stopped at a police checkpoint. The children were piled on top of each other "like sardines" say officials. It is the largest number of trafficked children the authorities have rescued in one incident since efforts began to stop the trade in 2003. (BBC)
Rwanda
Rwanda has launched a campaign to encourage all men to be circumcised, to reduce the risk of catching HIV/AIDS. A health minister told the BBC that soldiers, policemen and students would be asked to come forward first for circumcision. The U.N. World Health Organization (WHO) has said male circumcision reduces the risk of heterosexual HIV infection. But correspondents say it is rare in Rwanda where the Christian population, who make up the majority, do not practice it. (BBC)
Senegal
Dubai World Group's Jafza subsidiary signed a USD 800 million deal on Jan. 21 to build and run a special economic zone in Senegal, the latest in a series of Arab investments in the West African country. Dubai World Chairman Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem said construction would start before the end of the year on the first phase of the project, covering 650 hectares next to a planned international airport 45 km (28 miles) from Dakar. (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
A newborn in Sierra Leone has the lowest chance in the world of surviving until age 5, and the prospects are almost as bad for children in Angola and Afghanistan, UNICEF said in its annual report. In 2006, nearly 9.7 million children worldwide died before their fifth birthdays, mostly from preventable causes like diarrhea, malaria or malnutrition, it said, and on average more than 26,000 children under age 5 died each day. Sierra Leone had the highest child mortality rate, with 270 deaths per 1,000 births. Angola was second with 260 deaths, followed by Afghanistan with 257. (NY Times)
Sudan
Armed robberies and bandit attacks on aid convoys are threatening deliveries of food to more than 2 million people in Darfur, the World Food Program (WFP) said on Jan. 23. Around two-thirds of the population of Darfur depends on the world's largest aid operation, but a collapse in law and order in the vast region has made life difficult for humanitarian workers. Five years of fighting in Darfur has claimed an estimated 200,000 lives and driven 2.5 million from their homes. WFP officials are calling on the Sudanese government to make sure the roads are safe. (Reuters)
Zambia
Zambia has mobilized its army to clear drainage systems in major cities amid fears torrential rains and flooding may lead to outbreaks of cholera and other deadly diseases, a government official said on Jan 23. Zambia, like Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi, has been lashed by heavy rains for several weeks. Swollen rivers have burst their banks, killing dozens and forcing thousands of villagers to flee flooded homes. Floods also have destroyed bridges and roads and swept away livestock and crops. (Reuters)
Zanzibar
Using a cocktail of drugs may help doctors more effectively treat three of the world's most common parasitic diseases, researchers working in Zanzibar reported on Jan. 23. The drugs treat elephantiasis, soil-transmitted worms and schistomiasis. All the treatments are known to be effective but the impact of delivering them all at once was not known. The WHO has long recommended the coordinated delivery of drugs to tackle neglected tropical diseases, but the number of treatments has so far been limited to two because of safety concerns over potential side-effects. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
A Zimbabwe court on Jan. 23 upheld a police ban on an opposition demonstration to press President Robert Mugabe to adopt a new constitution ahead of presidential and parliamentary elections scheduled for March. The court ruled they could hold a rally in a stadium, after police had said street protests could turn violent. Police released Zimbabwe's main opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, hours after taking him away in the middle of the night for questioning about the planned demonstration, his lawyer said. His group, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), launched a legal challenge to the police ban. (Reuters)
2008/01/17
| Global Development Briefing - Pyramid Scheme | |
| "I appreciate very much the long and proud tradition that you've had for a vibrant civil society." -- U.S. President George W. Bush, lavishing praise on his Egyptian counterpart Hosni Mubarak at the end of an eight-day trip through the Middle East in which he highlighted democratic change as the foundation for peace and security throughout the region. Bush emphasized Egypt's role in regional security and the Israeli-Palestinian peace process while publicly avoiding mention of the government's actions in jailing or exiling opposition leaders and its severe restrictions on opposition political activities. The government has waged a heavy crackdown on its strongest domestic opposition, the Muslim Brotherhood, arresting hundreds of the Islamic fundamentalist group's members, as well as some secular opponents and Bush has in the past criticized Egypt for arresting political dissidents. Activists say the U.S. democracy push has taken a back seat to politics and blame Washington for easing its pressure on Mubarak to win his support on key regional issues such as Iraq and the Israeli-Arab peace process. | |
| | |
Sudan's top military officer and his counterpart from the new U.N.-African Union (AU) hybrid mission, known as UNAMID, met Jan. 15 to discuss issues pertaining to the deployment of the joint peacekeeping force which seeks to end the violence in the war-ravaged Darfur region. In the talks between UNAMID General Martin Luther Agwai and Lieutenant General Ismat, Chief of the Sudanese Armed Forces, the Government "expressed its commitment to facilitate the deployment of UNAMID and to avoid misunderstandings in the future, by keeping the channels of communication open through regular meetings," UN spokesperson Michele Montas said.
The European Union should freeze all aid to the Kenyan government until the crisis over President Mwai Kibaki's disputed re-election is solved, members of the European Parliament said on Jan. 16. The lawmakers, who criticized the EU executive for disbursing EUR 40.6 million (USD 60.2 million) of aid a day after the election, said the result was not credible and called for a fresh vote if a fair recount was not possible. (Reuters)
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon ordered an independent probe of security conditions at UN offices in Algiers before a Dec. 11 terrorist bombing that was the deadliest against the world body in four years, Bloomberg reports. Seventeen UN workers, including the security chief for the organization in the Algerian capital, were killed in the attack. A separate bombing the same day in Algiers killed as many as 50 people at the Constitutional Council building. Ban decided last week to establish a panel of "international experts" to determine whether appropriate security precautions were taken in Algiers and to improve the protection of UN workers worldwide.
Congo (DRC)
The insurgency led by dissident general Laurent Nkunda in Congo (DRC) has spelt out its demands at a peace conference to end the conflict in the troubled North and South Kivu provinces in the east, where, according to the UN, insecurity and human rights abuses have displaced at least half a million people in the past 12 months. Nkunda's National Congress for the Defense of the Congolese People (CNDP) demanded talks with the government, the repatriation of Rwandan Hutu rebels active in the country, the return of refugees and the release of political prisoners. (IRIN)
Ethiopia
The UN Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) has allocated nearly USD 600,000 to provide Ethiopians in the country's strife-torn Somali region with food aid. The funds will be used by the World Food Program (WFP) to help Ethiopian authorities deliver WFP food to the Somali region, where conflict between Government forces and the Ogaden National Liberation Front has intensified this year. To date, WFP has provided almost 17,000 metric tons of food for the five zones under military operations, though it notes that a shortage of military escorts continues to hamper timely deliveries. (UN News)
Ghana
A former U.K. Home Office minister says the case of a terminally ill African woman who was sent home is an issue about "health services in her own country." Cardiff MP Alun Michael said he delayed the removal of Ghanaian Ama Sumani, 39, from the city last year to ensure her status was examined "in great detail." First Minister Rhodri Morgan said the Home Office should re-examine the case and "draw a different conclusion." Sumani, whose visa had expired, cannot afford treatment in Ghana. (BBC)
Ivory Coast
The Security Council renewed the mandate of nearly 8,000 U.N. peacekeeping troops in Ivory Coast for six months on Jan. 16 in a bid to ensure that post-civil war elections are held as planned by mid-year. The 2002-03 war left the West African country, the world's top cocoa producer, divided between a government-held south and rebel-controlled north. But a peace pact last March between the former foes boosted hopes for stability. Rebel leader Guillaume Soro became prime minister in April. (Reuters)
Kenya
Kenyan police battled hundreds of opposition protesters on Jan. 16, killing two, as the opposition defied a ban on rallies against President Mwai Kibaki's disputed re-election, witnesses said. From the western opposition stronghold of Kisumu to the coastal city of Mombasa, in the capital Nairobi and the Rift Valley town of Eldoret, police clashed with gangs of youths, some of whom erected roadblocks and burnt tires. Police in Kisumu shot in the air and used teargas and batons to disperse a 1,000-strong crowd. Two men were shot dead, witnesses said. (Reuters)
Mozambique
Flood waters are continuing to rise in Mozambique, forcing thousands of families to leave their homes to look for refuge in emergency camps. A Save the Children assessment has reported that families are arriving in resettlement camps. They are carrying their belongings and enough food for about 2-3 weeks. But with most of the farm land now under water a shortage of food could soon become a problem. Reports from Caia, from where the relief operation is being coordinated, indicate that thousands of people are on river banks and "islands," and countless houses are under water. (International Save the Children Alliance)
Nigeria
Nigeria plans to set up a new body to monitor suspicious transactions to strengthen its fight against corruption in the public sector, President Umaru Yar'Adua said on Jan. 15. The new body, modeled on similar systems in the US and China, will monitor money flows by sharing information among prosecutors, police and banks, Yar'Adua said. "You must tackle the system and leave no room for people to be tempted," a statement from the presidency quoted Yar'Adua as saying at a meeting with the World Bank Vice President for Africa, Oby Ezekwesili, in Abuja. (Reuters)
Sudan
Since the introduction of a prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission (PMTCT) program in August 2007 at Port Sudan Hospital in Sudan's northeastern Red Sea State, 1,620 pregnant women have received information about HIV and the offer of an HIV test; only 24 have taken up the offer. The numbers are an indication of the long road ahead for Sudan's AIDS prevention efforts. Mother-to-child HIV infection is almost completely preventable - one dose of the antiretroviral (ARV) drug, nevirapine, can halve the chances of a mother infecting her child during delivery. (IRIN)
Uganda
Two weeks after violence erupted in Kenya over a disputed election, refugees are still trickling over the border into Uganda to reverse a tide of thousands that have fled bloodshed in the other direction. The Kenyans joined those waiting for food aid in makeshift camps near the hilly town of Malaba. Officials say around 6,000 refugees have so far crossed into Uganda, from where tens of thousands fled civil war and brutal dictatorship in the 1970s and 80s into Kenya, once regarded as a beacon of stability in the region. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's main opposition said on Jan. 16 it planned a protest next week to demonstrate against a crumbling economy and press for a new constitution it says will guarantee free and fair elections scheduled for March. The MDC secretary general told journalists the opposition had notified the police as required by law and would meet law enforcement agents later on Jan. 16 to discuss the protest march, which has been set for Jan. 23. In other news, the Zimbabwe Women's Resource Center Network says three-quarters of all women on ARV treatment are from urban areas, yet most of those who need it live in rural areas and are often forced to rely on herbal remedies. (Reuters, IRIN)
2008/01/10 The European Union should freeze all aid to the Kenyan government until the crisis over President Mwai Kibaki's disputed re-election is solved, members of the European Parliament said on Jan. 16. The lawmakers, who criticized the EU executive for disbursing EUR 40.6 million (USD 60.2 million) of aid a day after the election, said the result was not credible and called for a fresh vote if a fair recount was not possible. (Reuters)
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon ordered an independent probe of security conditions at UN offices in Algiers before a Dec. 11 terrorist bombing that was the deadliest against the world body in four years, Bloomberg reports. Seventeen UN workers, including the security chief for the organization in the Algerian capital, were killed in the attack. A separate bombing the same day in Algiers killed as many as 50 people at the Constitutional Council building. Ban decided last week to establish a panel of "international experts" to determine whether appropriate security precautions were taken in Algiers and to improve the protection of UN workers worldwide.
Congo (DRC)
The insurgency led by dissident general Laurent Nkunda in Congo (DRC) has spelt out its demands at a peace conference to end the conflict in the troubled North and South Kivu provinces in the east, where, according to the UN, insecurity and human rights abuses have displaced at least half a million people in the past 12 months. Nkunda's National Congress for the Defense of the Congolese People (CNDP) demanded talks with the government, the repatriation of Rwandan Hutu rebels active in the country, the return of refugees and the release of political prisoners. (IRIN)
Ethiopia
The UN Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) has allocated nearly USD 600,000 to provide Ethiopians in the country's strife-torn Somali region with food aid. The funds will be used by the World Food Program (WFP) to help Ethiopian authorities deliver WFP food to the Somali region, where conflict between Government forces and the Ogaden National Liberation Front has intensified this year. To date, WFP has provided almost 17,000 metric tons of food for the five zones under military operations, though it notes that a shortage of military escorts continues to hamper timely deliveries. (UN News)
Ghana
A former U.K. Home Office minister says the case of a terminally ill African woman who was sent home is an issue about "health services in her own country." Cardiff MP Alun Michael said he delayed the removal of Ghanaian Ama Sumani, 39, from the city last year to ensure her status was examined "in great detail." First Minister Rhodri Morgan said the Home Office should re-examine the case and "draw a different conclusion." Sumani, whose visa had expired, cannot afford treatment in Ghana. (BBC)
Ivory Coast
The Security Council renewed the mandate of nearly 8,000 U.N. peacekeeping troops in Ivory Coast for six months on Jan. 16 in a bid to ensure that post-civil war elections are held as planned by mid-year. The 2002-03 war left the West African country, the world's top cocoa producer, divided between a government-held south and rebel-controlled north. But a peace pact last March between the former foes boosted hopes for stability. Rebel leader Guillaume Soro became prime minister in April. (Reuters)
Kenya
Kenyan police battled hundreds of opposition protesters on Jan. 16, killing two, as the opposition defied a ban on rallies against President Mwai Kibaki's disputed re-election, witnesses said. From the western opposition stronghold of Kisumu to the coastal city of Mombasa, in the capital Nairobi and the Rift Valley town of Eldoret, police clashed with gangs of youths, some of whom erected roadblocks and burnt tires. Police in Kisumu shot in the air and used teargas and batons to disperse a 1,000-strong crowd. Two men were shot dead, witnesses said. (Reuters)
Mozambique
Flood waters are continuing to rise in Mozambique, forcing thousands of families to leave their homes to look for refuge in emergency camps. A Save the Children assessment has reported that families are arriving in resettlement camps. They are carrying their belongings and enough food for about 2-3 weeks. But with most of the farm land now under water a shortage of food could soon become a problem. Reports from Caia, from where the relief operation is being coordinated, indicate that thousands of people are on river banks and "islands," and countless houses are under water. (International Save the Children Alliance)
Nigeria
Nigeria plans to set up a new body to monitor suspicious transactions to strengthen its fight against corruption in the public sector, President Umaru Yar'Adua said on Jan. 15. The new body, modeled on similar systems in the US and China, will monitor money flows by sharing information among prosecutors, police and banks, Yar'Adua said. "You must tackle the system and leave no room for people to be tempted," a statement from the presidency quoted Yar'Adua as saying at a meeting with the World Bank Vice President for Africa, Oby Ezekwesili, in Abuja. (Reuters)
Sudan
Since the introduction of a prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission (PMTCT) program in August 2007 at Port Sudan Hospital in Sudan's northeastern Red Sea State, 1,620 pregnant women have received information about HIV and the offer of an HIV test; only 24 have taken up the offer. The numbers are an indication of the long road ahead for Sudan's AIDS prevention efforts. Mother-to-child HIV infection is almost completely preventable - one dose of the antiretroviral (ARV) drug, nevirapine, can halve the chances of a mother infecting her child during delivery. (IRIN)
Uganda
Two weeks after violence erupted in Kenya over a disputed election, refugees are still trickling over the border into Uganda to reverse a tide of thousands that have fled bloodshed in the other direction. The Kenyans joined those waiting for food aid in makeshift camps near the hilly town of Malaba. Officials say around 6,000 refugees have so far crossed into Uganda, from where tens of thousands fled civil war and brutal dictatorship in the 1970s and 80s into Kenya, once regarded as a beacon of stability in the region. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's main opposition said on Jan. 16 it planned a protest next week to demonstrate against a crumbling economy and press for a new constitution it says will guarantee free and fair elections scheduled for March. The MDC secretary general told journalists the opposition had notified the police as required by law and would meet law enforcement agents later on Jan. 16 to discuss the protest march, which has been set for Jan. 23. In other news, the Zimbabwe Women's Resource Center Network says three-quarters of all women on ARV treatment are from urban areas, yet most of those who need it live in rural areas and are often forced to rely on herbal remedies. (Reuters, IRIN)
Global Development Briefing -- Nairobi Nightmare
"It will be seen as a sign of bad faith ahead of the discussions about to begin."
-- Kenya's main Daily Nation paper on the appointment by President Mwai Kibaki of 17 ministers on Tuesday, including several figures hated by the opposition, adding that the might "poison the atmosphere" further. Kibaki announced the core of a new cabinet that ignored Raila Odinga's party and triggered a night of riots in the western opposition stronghold, Kisumu. African Union chief John Kufuor shuttled between Kenya's president and opposition leader on Wednesday to try to break a political impasse behind post-election turmoil that has killed 500 people. Odinga says Kibaki supporters cheated him out of the Dec. 27 vote by rigging. Washington and London have said the vote counting was flawed.
U.N. and NGO Round-Up
The British Red Cross said that over 3,500 people who have fled violence in Kenya have crossed the border into Uganda. The refugees have taken shelter in schools which are closed for the holidays. "It is a miserable sight - people are just sitting silently in groups in the shade under trees," said Laurence Lutaaya, head of communications at Uganda Red Cross. Lutaaya had visited the Malaba Jan. 9, which is the site of a teacher training institute. A total of 3,704 people have been registered by the Uganda Red Cross with the majority in Malaba, Busia and Bukwa and now receiving support from the Ugandan Red Cross.
The UN has lodged a protest with Khartoum after a peacekeeping supply convoy in Darfur was ambushed by what the UN said were Sudanese troops. A civilian Sudanese driver is in a critical condition after being shot seven times in the attack, the joint UN and African Union force, UNAMID, said. It said its peacekeepers had not fired back and there were no UN casualties. The convoy had been carrying fuel and food to a joint United Nations-African Union outpost in the West of Darfur.
Congo (DRC)
Four days after the opening ceremony, a major conference aimed at restoring peace and stability in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo's (DRC) Kivu provinces finally got off the ground on Jan. 9 at the University of the Great Lakes in Goma, with the region's humanitarian "catastrophe" topping the agenda. Civil wars that plagued the country between 1996 and 2003 and continuing clashes in North and South Kivu have, according to the minister of social and humanitarian affairs, led to the deaths of five million people, the internal displacement of six million, and the rape of half a million women. (IRIN)
Guinea
The head of Guinea's employers' federation and religious leaders said they believed a general strike could be averted in the world's top bauxite exporter as talks with union leaders went into a third day. The West African country's powerful unions last week called the general strike from Jan. 3 in protest at President Lansana Conte's dismissal of a member of a consensus government put in place to end unrest almost a year ago. The protests in January and February 2007, which came on the back of a union-led national strike, killed more than 130 people and damaged an already fragile economy. (Reuters)
Kenya
The UN has diverted aid intended for refugees from anarchic Somalia to help Kenya, a country which until less than two weeks ago was widely seen as a bastion of stability in a turbulent region. About 500 people have died and at least 255,000 fled their homes in Kenya since chaos erupted after the disputed Dec. 27 election, leaving aid agencies struggling. Emmanuel Nyabera, spokesman for the UNHCR, said on Jan. 9 the agency would start distributing to families in various parts of Nairobi, where riots and political killings, mostly in the slums, have left many homeless. (Reuters)
Malawi
Malawian civil servants with HIV are to be given a pay rise by the government. Health Minister Marjorie Ngaunjeb said all civil servants affected by the disease would receive an extra USD 35 a month to help them buy more food. "We thought [it] would go a long way in improving their nutritional requirements which are essential to their wellbeing," she told Reuters. Tens of thousands of Malawians die of Aids every year with about 7 percent of the 13 million population infected. Another government official said that the extra money should help those with HIV prolong their lives. (BBC)
Niger
The security forces in Niger defused a second landmine in the capital Niamey on Jan. 9, hours after the director of a private radio station was killed when his vehicle ran over a similar device. The attacks were the first of their kind in the capital since the start of a Tuareg-led rebellion in the former French colony's desert north almost a year ago, an uprising which has mainly targeted army patrols and remote garrisons in the Sahara. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Acts of ocean piracy rose 10 percent in 2007, the first increase for three years, with waters off Nigeria and Somalia topping a list of the world's most dangerous, a ship piracy watchdog said on Jan. 9. The International Maritime Bureau (IMB) said in its yearly report that attacks globally on shipping rose to 263 from 239 in 2006. The IMB said armed attacks on merchant ships had increased, with well-armed robbers showing no hesitation in assaulting and injuring crew. Guns were the weapons of choice in 72 attacks - an increase of 35 percent in 2007. (Reuters)
Somalia
Officials with the Libyan embassy in Somalia say two Libyan diplomats kidnapped in the capital, Mogadishu, have been released unharmed. The officials say the two men are back in the embassy and are safe after they were seized earlier Saturday while shopping in the Bakara market, which is a stronghold of Islamists fighting government forces allied with Ethiopian troops. The Islamists have been conducting an Iraq-style insurgency since the joint government forces routed them from their strongholds throughout Somalia last year. The fighting is believed to have killed 6,000 people since then. (VOA)
South Africa
South African business confidence fell to its lowest in more than four years last month as higher interest rates and inflation boosted business costs, the South African Chamber of Commerce and Industry said. The Business Confidence Index declined to 94.8 in December, the lowest since November 2003, from 95.8 in the previous month. The chamber "foresees that 2008 will be economically more difficult than 2007," it said. "The business mood will be affected accordingly" and confidence is likely to continue to moderate in 2008. (Bloomberg)
Sudan
It was rebel forces and not Sudanese government soldiers who attacked a clearly marked UN/African Union supply convoy in Sudan's war-torn Darfur region this week, Sudan's UN ambassador said on Jan. 9. "They were not the government," Ambassador Abdelmahmoud Abdelhalim Mohamed told reporters before a meeting of the U.N. Security Council on the situation in Darfur. He accused the Justice and Equality Movement, a Sudanese rebel group, of carrying out the attack late on Jan. 7. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
The number of households affected by flooding across southern Africa has risen with widespread destruction of homes and livestock, displacement of families and outbreaks of disease. Flooding in Zimbabwe has continued to generate potentially fatal illnesses in children and adults, with more cases of acute respiratory infection, bilharzias, diarrhea and skin conditions reported. According to a World Vision Zimbabwe assessment team, more people are now suffering malaria and dysentery in flood-affected areas. It is feared that cholera could also be present. (World Vision International)
2008/01/03
Rights at Risk in Libya -- HRW
Despite some improvements in recent years, Libyan citizens still suffer serious human rights abuses, Human Rights Watch said Jan.3 ahead of a visit to the United States by Libya's foreign minister. Human Rights Watch cited the absence of a free press, the ban on independent organizations, the torture of detainees, and the continued incarceration of political prisoners. Libyan Foreign Minister Abdelrahman Shalgam is meeting his US counterpart, Condoleezza Rice, in Washington on January 3, 2008. Relations between the United States and oil-rich Libya have warmed, centering on business ties and counterterrorism, since Libya renounced terrorism and its weapons of mass destruction programs. The countries resumed full diplomatic relations in 2006 after a 27-year hiatus.
We welcome improved relations between Libya and the US, but not at the expense of political prisoners, torture victims, and other Libyans who suffer abuse," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Human Rights Watch's Middle East and North Africa director. "The relationship may be driven by oil contracts and counterterrorism efforts, but it should include serious talk on improving human rights and the rule of law." Human Rights Watch has documented three cases of political prisoners who have been "disappeared" in the past 18 months. Their cases and other human rights violations are detailed in a briefing paper released by Human Rights Watch today, "Libya: Rights at Risk."
To read the report, please go to: http://hrw.org/english/docs/2008/01/03/libya17674.htm
U.N. and NGO Round-Up
The UN sent a record number of disaster assessment teams to emergencies in the Americas in 2007, offering a potential glimpse at the future of climate change. Nine of the 14 teams dispatched this year by the UN went to Central and South America, the highest number in history, including the first ever to Mexico. This year, UN teams were sent to Mexico, Uruguay and Bolivia twice to deal with severe floods. Teams were also dispatched to the Dominican Republic following Tropical Storm Noel, Honduras after Hurricane Felix, Belize and Jamaica after Hurricane Dean, and Peru following an earthquake in August, OCHA said. The five other UN teams went to Madagascar, Pakistan, and Ghana in response to floods, the Solomon Islands following an earthquake and tsunami in April, and Laos to help the country's disaster preparedness efforts, OCHA said.
The chairman of the African Union, John Kufuor, is traveling to the Kenyan capital Nairobi to mediate in the bloody conflict over the country's elections. He will talk with the head of the Commonwealth observers, former president of Sierra Leone, Ahmen Tejan Kabbah, who has labeled the elections fraudulent. The chairman of the Kenyan election committee, Samuel Kivuitu, has now also expressed his doubts over the victory of President Mwai Kibaki. Kivuitu has said that he was forced by Kibaki's party to announce the result of the election as soon as possible, despite growing evidence of fraud. Kibaki's government accused rival Raila Odinga's backers on Jan. 2 of responsibility for an explosion of tribal violence over a disputed election that has killed more than 300 Kenyans.
Sudan has condemned an attack in which a US diplomat and his driver were shot dead in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum. Sudan's foreign ministry ruled out a terrorist attack, though a US official said it was too early to determine a motive for the shooting. The diplomat, who has been named as John Granville, died of his wounds after his car was shot at during the early hours of Jan. 1. Granville's Sudanese driver died instantly in the attack. Meanwhile, the BBC reports the UN has taken control of the peacekeeping mission for Darfur in Sudan after months of negotiations but it remains seriously under strength. The UNAMID force, which replaces the African Union mission, is supposed to become the world's largest peacekeeping force with 26,000 troops.
The World Health Organization (WHO) is warning of the possibility of above average malaria transmission levels in the region this season prompted by unusually high wet conditions because of the climate phenomenon called La Nina. La Nina is characterized by unusually cold ocean temperatures in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean, recorded every three to four years, which causes a ripple effect felt across the globe, making wet regions wetter and dry ones even drier. As a result of La Nina's impact, which lasts for nine to 12 months, rains were unusually heavy in parts of eastern Africa in 2007.
African countries grappling with dangerous airplanes and lax aviation rules are banding together to improve air safety. Passengers flying in Africa are roughly 75 times more likely to die in a crash than fliers in North America. As a result, several African countries are cooperating to boost their aviation industries. Kenya and four neighbors are establishing a common aviation-oversight body. In a separate initiative, seven West African countries are pooling scarce air-regulation resources through the Banjul Accord Group. Three other groups of nations in central and southern Africa are following these leads and starting to coordinate aviation oversight. Aviation specialists from the UN, World Bank, the US and the EU are endorsing the cooperative approach and providing funding, training and model texts of aviation regulations that meet global standards.
Angola
President Jose Eduardo dos Santos says parliamentary elections will take place on 5 and 6 September: the first elections since 1992. Elections have been expected and repeatedly delayed since 2002, when the government ended a 27-year conflict with the Unita rebel movement. This is the first time Angola has given a precise date for new elections. The ruling MPLA narrowly won the 1992 polls, part of a peace plan, but war resumed as UNITA rejected the results. (BBC)
Gambia
President Yahya Jammeh announced a 20 percent pay increase for all civil servants on Jan.1, two weeks after multilateral donors approved debt relief for the country. Jammeh said in his New Year's message that government revenues freed by the debt cancellation would be used on social spending and to retain capacity in the public administration. Jammeh said the economy had grown by about 7 percent in 2007. He pledged to tighten public spending to contain inflation and press ahead with an anti-corruption campaign, .Operation No Compromise." (Reuters)
Kenya
President Mwai Kibaki said political parties must meet immediately to halt post-election violence in the east African nation that has killed hundreds of people. Kibaki, who was sworn in Dec. 30 after a ballot opponents say was rigged, appealed for calm and said the rule of law must be respected. Violence has swept through Kenya, East Africa's biggest economy, since the Dec. 27 election. Opposition presidential candidate Raila Odinga, who was beaten by 231,728 votes, alleges electoral fraud and has called a rally in the capital, Nairobi, on Jan 3. (Bloomberg)
Liberia
The UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) has released its latest report on sexual exploitation and abuse which reveals a decrease in the number of allegations against its own staff in the last half of 2007 as compared to the same period in 2006. Only two allegations involving UNMIL personnel were reported from July to December 2007, the period covered by the latest report - which is part of UNMIL's efforts to implement the Organization's policy of keeping the public informed about measures taken to eradicate any incidents of such abuse by UN personnel. (UN News)
Nigeria
At least 13 people have been killed in attacks by gunmen on two police stations and a hotel in the Nigerian oil city of Port Harcourt. Four police officers and six attackers died along with three civilians who were hit by stray bullets in an attack on one of the police stations. Several other people are reported to have been killed in an attack on a night club in the city. Niger Delta militants have reportedly said they carried out the attacks. (BBC)
Somalia
A Spanish doctor and an Argentine nurse kidnapped in northern Somalia on Dec. 26 were released by their captors."They are morally and physically well. Their health is very good," AFP cited Bile Mohamud Qabowsade, an official from the Puntland information ministry, as saying. The two women, working for the medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres, or Doctors Without Borders, were transferred to a hotel in Bosasso, Qabowsade said. Gunmen abducted Mercedes Garcia, the Spanish doctor, and Pilar Bauza in Bosasso, the main port in the breakaway state of Puntland that abuts the Gulf of Aden. (AFP).
Sudan
Child malnutrition rates have increased sharply in Darfur, even though it is home to the world's largest aid operation, according to a new UN report. The report showed that 16.1 percent of children affected by the conflict in Darfur are acutely malnourished, compared with 12.9 percent last year. For the first time since 2004, the malnutrition rate, a gauge of the population's overall distress, has crossed what UN officials consider to be the emergency threshold. Malnutrition was highest among young children, between 6 months and 29 months old, and in the North Darfur state, which is sparsely populated and very dry. (IHT)
Uganda
Economic growth in Uganda, Africa's biggest producer of robusta coffee, rose 7 percent in 2007, boosted by the manufacturing, construction and agriculture industries, President Yoweri Museveni said. The country's construction industry expanded by 11.8 percent, electricity supply improved and agricultural production recovered from the effects of a 2005 drought, Museveni said in a statement published in the New Vision newspaper. Output of coffee, tea, cotton and cocoa, the east African nation's main commodity exports, rose during the year, he said. The economy may expand 7 percent this year, with the transport, telecommunications, wholesale and trade industries expected to grow, Museveni said. (Bloomberg)
2007/12/06
Angola
Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), or Doctors without Borders, has denounced the pervasive and systematic use of rape and violence perpetrated by the Angolan army during the expulsions of Congolese migrants working in diamond mines in the Angolan province of Lunda Norte. MSF teams arrived in Western Kasai, a Congolese province bordering Angola, in October and are providing care to victims of sexual violence. They have also collected 100 testimonies exposing collective rape and physical abuse widely perpetrated by the Angolan military. (MSF International)
Cameroon
A wildlife conservation group in Cameroon said on Dec. 5 it was considering suing Ethiopian Airlines for complicity after it caught smugglers trying to take 1,000 African Grey parrots out of the country. The Yaounde-based Last Great Ape Organization (LAGA), working with Cameroon's security forces, seized a consignment of 500 African Grey parrots on Dec. 4 aboard an Ethiopian Airlines plane shortly before it was due to leave Douala airport. The discovery came just over a week after the authorities arrested two Ghanaians for trying to illegally export a first batch of 500 parrots out of Douala to Bahrain. (Reuters)
Central African Republic (CAR)
Legislators in the CAR have unanimously approved a new law guaranteeing refugees protection and many other fundamental rights. The National Assembly adopted the Law on the Status of Refugees on Nov. 29, some six months after the draft was given a green light by the government's Council of Ministers. The law must now be signed by President Francois Bozize to come into force. CAR has ratified several international instruments pertaining to refugee matters, but refugee issues have been dealt with through decrees and ordnances. (UNHCR)
Chad
With renewed fighting that has killed hundreds in eastern Chad, and signs of more hostilities to come, aid workers there are adjusting how they assist the hundreds of thousands of civilians who depend on aid for their survival. "All international staff have been pulled out of Guereda (close to the current fighting)," said the head of the UN World Food Program (WFP) in Chad, Felix Bamezon. Under UN security regulations UN staff are prohibited from going to areas along the border with Sudan. "So we have to rely on NGOs there to provide services and give us information," Bamezon said. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
International donors promised USD 4 billion in funds for the DRC between 2008 and 2010 at a meeting in Paris, three quarters of which was new money, the World Bank said in a statement on Nov. 30. Around 140 representatives from 15 different countries and international organizations attended the two-day conference to discuss funding for the former Belgian colony. The statement also said the government hoped to benefit from the HIPC debt relief program for poor countries administered by the World Bank and IMF. The country's debt stood at around USD 11.5 billion at the end of last year. (Reuters)
Ethiopia
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived in Ethiopia on Dec. 5 for talks with African leaders aimed at tackling long-running conflicts in the volatile Great Lakes region, Somalia and Sudan. On only her second trip in two years to sub-Saharan Africa, Rice said she wanted to move international efforts forward to resolve those conflicts in a string of meetings with African leaders during her 24-hour trip to Addis Ababa. (Reuters)
Gabon
Gabon has just 25 years in which to diversify its oil-dependent economy before its dwindling reserves of petroleum completely run out, World Bank Country Manager Olivier Fremond said on Dec. 4. Unless a major deepwater discovery was made on new acreage to be tendered to oil companies soon, the central African country would become a .mature province' in oil terms (Reuters)
Ivory Coast
Cocoa farmers in Ivory Coast, the world's biggest producer of the chocolate ingredient, suspended a planned strike over high export taxes and low prices pending talks with the government. "We're not calling a strike yet,'' Joseph Yao Kouame, head of the National Union of Individual Cocoa Producers and Cooperatives (Sapicoci) said. Sapicoci suspended the strike for 48 hours on Dec. 3. Its members will now await the outcome of talks between the country's main farmers union, known as Anaproci, and the Agriculture Ministry, Kouame said. (Bloomberg)
Kenya
Land clashes in Kenya's fertile Rift Valley highlands have killed 16 people, uprooted hundreds and fuelled fears of a bloody campaign ahead of a Dec. 27 election, police said on Dec. 5. Some 14 million Kenyans are eligible to vote in presidential and parliamentary elections in east Africa's biggest economy but many are braced for violent skirmishes in a race shaping up to be Kenya's closest ever. Police have arrested 102 suspects, of which 60 have been charged and the others questioned and released, he said. (Reuters)
Mali
Niger and Mali have secured more than USD 400 million from mainly Islamic donors to build dams on West Africa's Niger river to generate power and help grow food for the largely desert countries, officials said. Donors at a summit organized by the Islamic Development Bank last week in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, pledged USD 236 million to build a dam in Niger, and nearly USD 200 million for a similar project in neighboring Mali, the two countries' governments said. (Reuters)
Niger
Tuareg-led rebels in Niger's desert north attacked a military convoy carrying food and provisions to the oasis town of Iferouane, killing at least three soldiers, the government said late on Dec. 4. The rebel Niger Movement for Justice (MNJ), which has killed at least 49 soldiers since launching a revolt in February, said its fighters destroyed nine military vehicles and all those on board in the attack between the towns of Arlit and Iferouane. But the Defense Ministry said three soldiers had been killed and 10 injured when their vehicles ran over land mines. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Nigeria is losing USD 2.5 billion per annum to continuous flaring of gas by oil exploration companies in the Niger Delta, the Chairman of Senate Committee on Gas, Senator Osita Izunaso said speaking at the opening session of the Gas Stakeholders Forum. Izunaso said the country also flares 2.5 billion cubic feet of gas daily, which is equivalent to 40 percent of the total gas consumption for the continent of Africa per day. (All Africa)
Sierra Leone
In a bid to make sure more Sierra Leoneans benefit from the diamond industry, new president Ernest Bai Koroma is pushing to create laws that will ensure more of the precious stones are polished in country. The president has said building polishing factories in Sierra Leone will also create jobs. Unemployment estimates in Sierra Leone top 70 percent. Sierra Leonean activist Abu Brima, president of the Network Movement for Justice and Development, says these laws have been a long time coming. (VOA)
South Africa
South African business confidence fell to its lowest in more than three years last month as higher interest rates and gasoline prices boosted business costs, the South African Chamber of Commerce and Industry said. The Business Confidence Index declined to 95.8 in November from 96.9 in the previous month, the Johannesburg-based chamber said in a statement. November's level is the lowest since February 2004. The confidence index is compiled from economic indicators such as retail sales and inflation, and financial indicators including the stock index and the rand. (Bloomberg)
Sudan
Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir and southern leader Salva Kiir have agreed a plan to heal the row which had threatened their peace deal. The two men set up a committee with a seven-day deadline to submit proposals on the most contentious issue, the control of oil-rich Abyei state. And a timetable is to be drawn up for the withdrawal of northern troops from three other southern states. These issues led southern ministers to leave a national unity government. (BBC)
Uganda
Uganda will plant millions of trees in the next four years at a cost of USD 253 million, as it tries to restore dwindling forest cover to 30 percent of its area from 22 percent, the government said on Dec. 5. Like many African countries, Uganda suffers from rampant deforestation that dries up rivers, triggers soil erosion and threatens wildlife, especially birds and primates. But officials in the east African country also want the massive tree planting exercise to establish a recognized carbon sink that would enable it to earn credits aimed at meeting CO2 emissions targets. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
A group of writers has criticized European and African leaders for not putting Zimbabwe and Darfur at the heart of an upcoming summit. The writers, who include Vaclav Havel and Nadine Gordimer, said the two crises should be on the agenda of next weekend's EU-Africa summit in Portugal. In an open letter, they called the omission "political cowardice." Also, the US has announced new sanctions on Zimbabweans close to President Robert Mugabe. (BBC)
2007/11/29
U.N. and NGO Round-Up
The United Nations says it is concerned that drug trafficking is putting the stability of West Africa at risk. The UN anti-drugs chief told the BBC that drugs money could help finance insurgents and lead to further suffering in the region. Antonio Maria Costa made the comments ahead of a series of high-level meetings in Guinea-Bissau, which has become a major center for the trafficking of cocaine from South America to Europe. Cocaine seizures have more than doubled in West Africa in the last five years.
The European Commission on Nov. 27 initialed an interim trade accord with five east African nations that will replace preferential tariff agreements due to expire this year. Under the accord, East African Community (EAC) states Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda will enjoy duty-free, quota-free access to the EU for all products - except sugar and rice - from January 1. A deal on services and investments, not covered in the interim agreement, will be negotiated next year. After 15 years, 80 percent of the exports from the EU will enter the EAC market free of duties.
A consortium of companies planning an undersea cable linking eastern Africa with Europe on Monday won the funding it needed to start construction, a move organizers said will bring this part of the world affordable and reliable telecommunications for the first time. Five development finance institutions agreed to loan the consortium a total of USD 70.7 million. The East African Submarine Cable System (EASSy) has been working on the USD 235 million fiber-optic cable project for five years, said Lars Thunell, the Executive Vice President of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private sector lending arm of the World Bank
Chad
The EU plans to send a 3,700-strong peacekeeping force to eastern Chad faced further delays on Nov. 28 after nations again refused to make up shortfalls in vital resources such as helicopters. The first troops were due to have arrived by the end of the rainy season in late October. Fighting between rebels and government forces is already on the increase, disrupting humanitarian supplies to refugees from neighboring Darfur. Yet efforts to launch the mission by early next month are in deeper doubt after a fruitless meeting of EU envoys on Nov. 27. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
A group of rebels loyal to renegade General Laurent Nkunda has surrendered to UN forces in the Congo (DRC). The UN says the 15 insurgents approached their positions with orders the peacekeepers to retreat. But after more than an hour of discussion, the rebels accepted to "lay down their arms and surrender" to be reintegrated into the regular army. There have been weeks of fighting between the army and Gen Nkunda's men. Meanwhile, authorities in the northwestern province of Equateur have imposed a nighttime curfew in the area until further notice in a bid to curb insecurity, including murder and extortion by armed men. (BBC, IRIN)
Ethiopia
UN humanitarian chief John Holmes said on Nov. 28 there was international anxiety at a possible humanitarian crisis and accusations of rights abuses in Ethiopia's Ogaden region. Holmes went to the remote eastern region on Nov. 27, the most high profile visit since Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) rebels killed 74 people in an attack on an oil field in April, provoking a government offensive. Both sides say they have killed hundreds of the others' fighters since then, and aid agencies say people in the region are suffering severe food and medical needs. (Reuters)
Ivory Coast
Cocoa farmers in Ivory Coast, the world's biggest grower of the chocolate ingredient, may block trade of the beans next week to protest against high export taxes and low prices. Joseph Yao Kouame, head of the National Union of Individual Cocoa Producers and Cooperatives (Sapicoci) said in an interview from the southwestern port of San Pedro the unions will block trade from Dec. 3. Growers have threatened twice since September to stage strikes over a lack of government funding and low prices. The stoppages were called off to allow for negotiations with industry authorities. (Bloomberg)
Kenya
A Kenyan court on Nov. 28 summoned the country's police chief after the family of a man in custody on suspicion of belonging to the fearsome Mungiki gang asked for his release. The suspect's family says he was arrested by police in a village on the outskirts of the capital Nairobi in July and is being held incommunicado in an unknown place. Rights activists accuse Kenyan police of killing hundreds of members of the murderous terror gang during a crackdown this year. But police deny carrying out any extrajudicial killings. (Reuters)
Liberia
The UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) is supporting efforts by the government to create more than 1 million days of work for laborers from small communities in the country, where the end of the civil war returned thousands of former fighters to the civilian workforce. The joint road rehabilitation initiative is being led by UNMIL with the World Bank, the UN Development Program (UNDP), the World Food Program (WFP) and the International Labor Organization (ILO) and aims to generate 1 million days of work for 50,000 locally recruited laborers by the end of June 2008, which marks the end of the dry season. (UN News)
Mozambique
Mozambique will finally take control this week of the biggest dam in Sub Saharan Africa which had remained in Portuguese hands for more than three decades after the former colonial power's departure. In order to finance the purchase, Mozambique launched an international appeal for funds in coordination with the World Bank and some of HCB's clients, including South Africa's state energy supplier Eskom and Zimbabwe. (AFP)
Rwanda
A UN tribunal reduced the jail terms on Nov. 28 of three Rwandan journalists convicted of fanning the 1994 genocide by inciting Hutu extremists to slaughter Tutsis. The Tanzania-based International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in 2003 handed defendants Ferdinand Nahimana and Hassan Ngeze life imprisonment sentences while a third one, Jean-Bosco Barayagwiza, got 35 years. Nahimana's and Ndeze's sentences were cut to 30 and 35 years respectively while Barayagwiza got his reduced by three years. (Reuters)
Senegal
Mango farmers in Senegal are learning how used plastic water bottles and a few dollars could save hundreds of dollars they lose annually to a fruit-destroying fly. Government agriculture officials and aid groups are training producers in the use of a trap made of local and recycled materials - far cheaper and more accessible than imported traps. In turn the producers will train other farmers. The effort is expected to provide considerable relief to mango producers who for at least four years have seen the fly gut their livelihoods. (IRIN)
Somalia
An international media watchdog condemned as "ridiculous" and illegal on Nov. 28 the Mogadishu mayor's banning of media interviews with Somali insurgents and other tough restrictions on local journalists. Mayor and former warlord Mohamed Dheere called media heads in this week to impose the restrictions, which also include prohibitions on reporting government military operations or the Somali capital's massive refugee exodus. (Reuters)
Sudan
The UNHCR has resumed the repatriation of Sudanese from the Kakuma refugee camp in northwest Kenya after poor weather and road conditions and insecurity in return areas halted the operation for three months. About 200 refugees were flown to the town of Bor in South Sudan's Jonglei state last week and many more are keen to follow them. More than 8,000 of the 50,000 Sudanese refugees in Kakuma have registered to return from Kenya. In other news, a British teacher has been charged in Sudan with insulting religion, inciting hatred and showing contempt for religious beliefs. She was arrested in Khartoum after allowing her class of primary school pupils to name a teddy bear Muhammad. (UN News, BBC)
2007/11/22
Paying Taxes
More than a third of countries have improved their business tax systems in the past three years, according to the World Bank. But the 20-year trend for lowering the tax burden on business is being bucked in much of Africa, some Latin American countries and parts of the former Soviet Union. The study "Paying Taxes" by the World Bank and consultancy PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) found four countries - Burundi, Gambia, Sierra Leone and the Democratic Republic of Congo - in which even companies making a profit margin of 20 percent could not afford to pay all their business taxes. In seven countries, businesses had to pay taxes at least once a week. The study said even the most highly rated countries could do more to reduce business taxes, simplify the tax structure and cut the compliance burden. Creating a simpler tax system particularly helped smaller businesses, especially in the service sector, the study found. This year, 31 economies improved their business tax systems, and 65 have done so over the past three years. Bulgaria was the top reformer, and Turkey was runner-up. The 10 economies where it is most to pay taxes difficult are Panama, Jamaica, Mauritania, Bolivia, the Gambia, Venezuela, the Central African Republic, the Republic of Congo, Ukraine, and Belarus, according to the study.
To read the report, please go to: http://www.pwc.com/gx/eng/tax/paying_taxes_2008.pdf
The US this week pledged to provide up to USD 250 million to jump-start three new African investment funds aimed at developing the continent's capital markets so African businesses can more easily raise money. The announcement came on the final day of a five-day African visit by US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who said Africa needs all the investment it can get from anywhere in the world.
Chad
The head of a French charity arrested in Chad on child abduction charges has said that the French government has let him and his colleagues down. The French authorities knew of his charity's plan to take children to France, Zoe's Ark head Eric Breteau told the French news agency AFP. He said his charity was trying to rescue orphans from Darfur. Aid agencies have said most of the 103 children are from Chad and have at least one parent or other guardian. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
An estimated 10,000 people who fled October clashes between militias and government troops in the Ituri district of northeastern Congo (DRC) have this week started receiving relief from humanitarian organizations, the UN said. Some of those displaced fled from clashes on Oct. 8 and Oct. 29 between the FARDC and fighters of the FNI, according to MONUC, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and the UN mission in Congo. (IRIN)
Ethiopia
Eritrea said on Nov. 21 arch-foe Ethiopia had "long since declared war" on Asmara by refusing to implement a five-year-old border ruling marking their shared frontier. Analysts and diplomats fear heightened tensions on the Horn of Africa rivals' frontier could erupt into a new conflict seven years after they fought a war that killed some 70,000 people. Ethiopia has insisted it has no plans to start a war, and says Eritrea is sponsoring insurgents in Ethiopia and also Somalia. Asmara denies those claims. (Reuters)
Kenya
With only a month to Kenya's general election, UNICEF is asking the country's citizens to support politicians who will respect, protect and fulfill children's rights. Under its campaign, "Look Out For Leaders Who Look Out for Children," UNICEF Kenya has obtained pledges from the three leading presidential candidates to invest in quality education, child survival and social protection for vulnerable children should they win the election. In other news, some 30 Somali refugees held at Nairobi airport awaiting deportation have gone on hunger strike. (IRIN, BBC)
Nigeria
Nigeria is willing to write-off USD 13 million of the total debt stock Liberia owes it, President Umaru Yar'Adua said. In a letter sent to the Senate in Abuja to seek approval to forgive the debt, he said Nigeria made "enormous sacrifices to bring peace to Liberia and writing off the debt would assist the country in its rebuilding program." Senate President David Mark read the letter on the floor of the Senate Nov. 21. Yar'Adua added that Liberia owed Nigeria USD 48 million and said the government in Monrovia had pleaded with Nigeria to write off the debt. (Dow Jones)
Rwanda
The Security Council commended the recent agreement of the Congo (DRC) and Rwanda to work together against threats to peace and stability in the region, calling it "an important milestone towards the definitive settlement of the problem of illegal armed groups" operating in the turbulent far east of the DRC.Ambassador Marty Natalegawa of Indonesia, which holds the rotating Council presidency this month, read out a statement calling on authorities in the DRC and Rwanda to now implement fully the commitments they made in their joint communique, which was signed in Nairobi on Nov. 9. (UN News)
Senegal
Police fired tear gas at stone-throwing protesters who rampaged through the Senegalese capital Dakar on Nov. 21, smashing cars and looting government offices after authorities cleared away street vendors. The worst riots to hit Senegal in many years erupted after President Abdoulaye Wade's government ordered police last week to move on street sellers in Dakar, where thousands of people earn a living peddling goods on the crowded, potholed streets. (Reuters)
Somalia
One million people are now homeless in Somalia, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) says. The figure includes 60 percent of Mogadishu residents who have fled their homes - 200,000 in the past two weeks - due to renewed conflict between Islamist insurgents and Ethiopian-backed government forces. Meanwhile, Kenya's government has been strongly criticized for deporting 18 failed Somali asylum-seekers, and the UN Security Council says it will continue to plan for a peacekeeping mission to Somalia, despite the secretary-general's opposition. (BBC)
South Africa
The pressure group War on Want says it wants the British government to force mining companies operating in Africa to honor their social responsibilities. The group says companies with UK links such as Anglo American, AngloGold Ashanti and Vedanta are failing to live up to a voluntary code of conduct. It accuses the firms of human rights violations and environmental damage. Anglo American and AngloGold Ashanti say the allegations are inaccurate and out of date. In the past the British government has declined to intervene in what it says are "business matters." (BBC)
Sudan
President Omar Hassan al-Bashir promised there would be no return to civil war in Africa's biggest country on Nov. 21 in a speech that sought to calm tensions over a growing stand-off with the south. He called on his political opponents to work with him "for the homeland" during his opening address at the annual conference of his dominant National Congress Party (NCP). A growing confrontation between Khartoum and south Sudan's main party, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), has already torn apart the country's coalition government and threatened a north-south peace deal. (Reuters)
Uganda
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni opened a three-day Commonwealth business forum in Kampala on Nov. 20 with promotion of intra trade and international trade high on agenda. The forum - that attracted over 1,000 business executives from 30 of the 53 Commonwealth member states - is followed by other two forums, Youth Forum and People's Forum, ahead of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) starting on Nov. 24. (Xinhua)
Zimbabwe
Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second city, already reeling from a diarrhea outbreak as a result of water shortages, has been told by its fuel-strapped city council that it can only collect refuse once a month. Garbage has been piling up around the city center and a stench has now enveloped most high-density suburbs, where refuse has not been collected for the past 3 weeks. Bulawayo has recorded 3,600 cases of diarrhea since the disease hit the city in August 2007. (IRIN)
2007/11/15
Something decidedly new is on the horizon in Africa, something that began in the mid-1990s. Many African economies appear to have turned the corner and moved to a path of faster and steadier economic growth, according to the World Bank's Africa Development Indicators 2007 (ADI) report. Their performance in 1995-2005 reverses the collapses in 1975-85 and the stagnations in 1985-95. And for the first time in three decades, they are growing in tandem with the rest of the world, it says. Average growth in the Sub-Saharan economies was 5.4 percent in 2005 and 2006, and the consensus projections are that growth will remain strong. Leading the way are the oil and mineral exporters, thanks to high prices. But 18 nonmineral economies, with 36 percent of Sub-Saharan Africa's people, have also been doing well, the World Bank report says. The report looked at more than 1,000 indicators covering economic, human and private-sector development, governance, the environment and aid. It concludes that growth in many African countries appears to be fast and steady enough to put a dent on the region's high poverty rate and attract global investment.
To read the report, please go to:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/14_11_07_africa_dev.pdf
IMF, World Bank & IFI Round-Up
Liberia reached a comprehensive arrears plan Monday with international agencies for debt relief under the Heavily Indebted Poor Country Initiative and the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative. The agreement, which covers Liberia's arrears to the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the African Development Bank, will permit Liberia to rapidly clear much of its arrears to smaller multilateral creditors and, with the Paris Club assistance, to clear much of its arrears to bilateral debtors, said a statement released by the World Bank.
Chad
Hundreds of Chadian schoolchildren shouting anti-French slogans demonstrated in the capital N'Djamena on Nov. 14 to protest against an attempt by a French group to fly children out of the country to Europe. The protesters marched through the dusty capital as lawyers for six French nationals charged with abducting the children and fraud said a Chadian judge had rejected a bail application for the members of the humanitarian activist group Zoe's Ark. A Chadian court has rejected a bail application by six French nationals. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
A court in northeast Congo (DRC) has found a former militiaman guilty of the 2003 murder of two UN military observers and sentenced him to life in prison. Agenonga Uforunyu, alias Kwisha, who fought with the armed FNI group in Ituri, was sentenced by a court in the regional capital, Bunia, on Nov. 12. He was found guilty of shooting to death Major Saswat Oran, a Jordanian serving with the UN mission in DRC, MONUC, and his Malawian colleague, Captain David Banda. (Reuters)
Guinea-Bissau
The press freedom group, Reporters Without Borders says that Guinea-Bissau is a putative narco-state where news of the cocaine trade is a national taboo. In a report, the group says there is evidence that some of the military are linked to the drugs trade. Journalists who dare to investigate the cocaine trade, have faced death threats, been forced into hiding or have even fled the country, it says. And it details specific instances of press harassment by senior officers. (BBC)
Liberia
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is ready to start canceling Liberia's debt to the agency after securing sufficient funding for the process. The IMF says donor nations have pledged USD 842 million which will start the process once the pledges are honored. IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn said it was a "critical step... toward comprehensive debt relief" for Liberia. Liberia is struggling with the legacy of 14 years of brutal civil war, which ended in 2003, with 270,000 dead. (BBC)
Malawi
As crude oil prices hit a record high, the Malawi government has launched a project to ensure that all vehicles in the country switch to the cheaper and greener alternative fuel - ethanol - in a few years. Besides promoting the production of ethanol from sugar molasses, the 5-year USD 1 million project, funded by the Malawi government, is investigating the possibility of converting conventional vehicles into dual-fuel vehicles, or "flex-fuel" vehicles (FFVs), which can run on a combination of fuels. (Reuters)
Mozambique
Mozambique plans to invite private companies to build hotels and other facilities around the Maputo Reserve to try to spur tourism, a Tourism Ministry official said on Nov. 14. The government will soon launch an international tender for the nature reserve, which is 120 km (75 miles) south of the capital Maputo and about 10,000 hectares in size. In July, the government said it would invest USD 54 million to revamp national parks and wildlife that have struggled to recover from a 17-year civil war which ended 15 years ago. (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
Widespread corruption and mismanagement are revealed in a confidential presidential audit in Sierra Leone exclusively obtained by the BBC. Newly-elected President Ernest Bai Koroma commissioned the report. It catalogues grave inadequacies in key areas such as health care, tax collection and the security services. And it provides a unique and searingly frank insight into the sometimes opaque business of running a poor African nation through years of war and chaos. (BBC)
Somalia
Somali insurgent leader Sheikh Aden Hashi Ayrow has ordered fighters to attack African Union troops based in the capital, Mogadishu. He also asked foreign fighters to join his al-Shabab group's war against the foreign forces in an audio clip posted on Somali websites. President Abdullahi Yusuf blames the militant group for the recent violence. Uganda has some 1,700 soldiers in Somalia as part of the planned 8,000-strong AU peacekeeping mission. (BBC)
South Africa
South Africa on Nov. 14 slammed Burundi's Forces of National Liberation (FNL) as the last obstacle to peace in the central African nation, saying the Hutu rebels' position was "intransigent." The FNL is the only insurgent group that has not joined the government of President Pierre Nkurunziza, elected in 2005 as part of a peace process to halt a tribal conflict that has raged since 1993. The Hutu rebels have, among other things, insisted that the current Burundi army be dismantled and that government positions be given to FNL members before the agreement is implemented. (Reuters)
Sudan
Rift Valley Fever has killed 92 people in Sudan since reports of an outbreak surfaced a week ago and it is still spreading, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Nov. 14. The UN body has started holding daily meetings to monitor the spread of the disease, which can kill as many as half of those who contract it, has no effective human vaccine and can devastate livestock. A WHO spokeswoman said the latest figures showed 314 known human cases in Sudan, with a death rate of just below 30 percent. (Reuters)
2007/11/08
IMF, World Bank & IFI Round-Up
Sub-Saharan Africa is expected to achieve a growth rate of 6 percent in 2007 and 6.8 percent in 2008, driven notably by oil exporting countries, Benedicte Vibe Christensen, International Monetary Fund (IMF)'s African department [Deputy Director] said in Dakar last week. The rate of inflation, with the exception of Zimbabwe, is expected to reach 7.5 percent in 2007 and 6.8 percent in 2008, she said. Christensen attributed these "favorable" prospects to increased investments and "improved trade terms," as well as transparent management of public revenues and good governance.
Angola
International health officials are investigating the emergence of a mysterious disease in Angola that has killed at least four people and sickened more than 200. The illness, which leads to weakness, muscular spasms, mental confusion and speech impairment, surfaced in Cacuaco, near Luanda, in early October, the World Health Organization (WHO) said Nov. 6. It has since spread to seven neighborhoods in the municipality, about 20 kilometers north of the Angolan capital and home to some 200,000 people. (Reuters)
Chad
Four Chadian nationals have appeared in court in Ndjamena, charged in connection with the attempted airlift of 103 children to France. The four, officials from the border town of Tine, were charged with "fraud and complicity to kidnap minors." Six French members of the charity Zoe's Ark, three Spaniards and a Belgian are in jail awaiting trail. A French lawyer, Gilbert Collard, arrived in Ndjamena Nov. 6 to take charge of the charity workers' defense. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
Growing impatience over aid deliveries to displaced civilians in the Congo's (DRC) province of North Kivu has sparked another demonstration against the UN mission MONUC, which blamed the unrest on deliberately-spread false rumors. According to the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), civilians' resentment against UN agencies, NGOs and MONUC has escalated. In other news, authorities have launched an inquiry into the suspected dumping of 18 tons of radioactive minerals into a river in Katanga province. (Reuters)
Kenya
The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights has released post mortem reports on some of the 500 Mungiki sect members they allege were executed by police. KNHRC's Njonjo Mue said the reports confirming the men were shot had been done by Kenyan government doctors. Kenyan police commissioner Mohammed Hussein Ali denies the force is to blame and says they are investigating. But the commission called for a probe led by international experts and the UN to verify their investigations. (BBC)
Liberia
As West African officials gathered Nov. 7 in Liberia for a meeting on issues of common concern, the senior UN envoy to the country stressed the importance of effective regional collaboration in ensuring security in the area. The UN Mission in Liberia Force Commander, as well as the Force Commander of the UN Mission in Cote d'Ivoire (UNOCI) were to brief the gathering, which aims to promote cooperation and integration in order to create an economic and monetary union for encouraging economic growth and development in West Africa. (UN News Service)
Mauritania
At least 47 African migrants died of hunger and thirst after their boats drifted into Mauritanian waters. Mauritanian soldiers who discovered the two vessels off the northern port of Nouadhibou also found more than 90 survivors on board, officials said. Police found 42 bodies in the sea and five survivors later died in hospital. The authorities believe the boats, carrying Senegalese, Gambians and Malians, were trying to reach Spain's Canary Islands when they encountered problems. (BBC)
Nigeria
Nigeria will drop criminal charges against an American peace worker, her Nigerian associate and two German filmmakers, who had been accused of endangering national security, the country's top prosecutor said on Nov. 7. The peace workers were arrested on Sept. 26 and accused of helping the Germans film sensitive oil industry facilities in the violent Niger Delta region and advising them to lie to obtain visas. All four had pleaded not guilty to the charges. (Reuters)
Senegal
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has approved a key non-financial aid scheme on good economic governance for Senegal as the country proposed huge pay cuts to try tackle the rising cost of living. The policy support instrument (PSI) deal which aims at assuring foreign donors and lenders that the country's economy is well managed, was adopted by the IMF board of governors last Friday, the IMF said in a statement Nov. 5. (AFP)
South Africa
South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki remains an "AIDS dissident" - doubting the link between the HIV virus and AIDS, according to his new biographer, Mark Gevisser. Gevisser said Mbeki thinks he has "failed on the issue of Aids" and regrets dropping the debate. He also said Mbeki believes that anti-AIDS drugs, now distributed in South Africa, are toxic and doubts their efficacy. But the president's spokesman refused to comment on the book's claims, saying the cabinet and Mbeki were united. (BBC)
Sudan
Medair has now completed construction of a permanent Primary Health Care Center (PHCC), to be staffed with eight support staff and 12 health professionals, including clinical officers, community health workers, and nurse midwives, which will provide access to a wide range of health services for up to 50,000 vulnerable Sudanese. In March of 2007, Medair opened a temporary PHCC in Melut Town, in partnership with the Health Ministry and local community authorities. Large tents were set up, and over the course of 34 weeks, 13,000 patients were seen and treated. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
More than 3,000 cases of diarrhea have been reported in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second city, in the last two months, as residents struggle with water shortages. Since the outbreak was first reported in August, the city has experienced a 10-fold increase in cases, up to the second week of November. Low rainfall and an inability to keep up with the demands of a growing population in a depressed economic environment have left many of Bulawayo's 1.5 million residents in the grip of water shortages and often having to obtain water from unprotected sources. (Reuters)
Sub-Saharan Africa is expected to achieve a growth rate of 6 percent in 2007 and 6.8 percent in 2008, driven notably by oil exporting countries, Benedicte Vibe Christensen, International Monetary Fund (IMF)'s African department [Deputy Director] said in Dakar last week. The rate of inflation, with the exception of Zimbabwe, is expected to reach 7.5 percent in 2007 and 6.8 percent in 2008, she said. Christensen attributed these "favorable" prospects to increased investments and "improved trade terms," as well as transparent management of public revenues and good governance.
Angola
International health officials are investigating the emergence of a mysterious disease in Angola that has killed at least four people and sickened more than 200. The illness, which leads to weakness, muscular spasms, mental confusion and speech impairment, surfaced in Cacuaco, near Luanda, in early October, the World Health Organization (WHO) said Nov. 6. It has since spread to seven neighborhoods in the municipality, about 20 kilometers north of the Angolan capital and home to some 200,000 people. (Reuters)
Chad
Four Chadian nationals have appeared in court in Ndjamena, charged in connection with the attempted airlift of 103 children to France. The four, officials from the border town of Tine, were charged with "fraud and complicity to kidnap minors." Six French members of the charity Zoe's Ark, three Spaniards and a Belgian are in jail awaiting trail. A French lawyer, Gilbert Collard, arrived in Ndjamena Nov. 6 to take charge of the charity workers' defense. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
Growing impatience over aid deliveries to displaced civilians in the Congo's (DRC) province of North Kivu has sparked another demonstration against the UN mission MONUC, which blamed the unrest on deliberately-spread false rumors. According to the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), civilians' resentment against UN agencies, NGOs and MONUC has escalated. In other news, authorities have launched an inquiry into the suspected dumping of 18 tons of radioactive minerals into a river in Katanga province. (Reuters)
Kenya
The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights has released post mortem reports on some of the 500 Mungiki sect members they allege were executed by police. KNHRC's Njonjo Mue said the reports confirming the men were shot had been done by Kenyan government doctors. Kenyan police commissioner Mohammed Hussein Ali denies the force is to blame and says they are investigating. But the commission called for a probe led by international experts and the UN to verify their investigations. (BBC)
Liberia
As West African officials gathered Nov. 7 in Liberia for a meeting on issues of common concern, the senior UN envoy to the country stressed the importance of effective regional collaboration in ensuring security in the area. The UN Mission in Liberia Force Commander, as well as the Force Commander of the UN Mission in Cote d'Ivoire (UNOCI) were to brief the gathering, which aims to promote cooperation and integration in order to create an economic and monetary union for encouraging economic growth and development in West Africa. (UN News Service)
Mauritania
At least 47 African migrants died of hunger and thirst after their boats drifted into Mauritanian waters. Mauritanian soldiers who discovered the two vessels off the northern port of Nouadhibou also found more than 90 survivors on board, officials said. Police found 42 bodies in the sea and five survivors later died in hospital. The authorities believe the boats, carrying Senegalese, Gambians and Malians, were trying to reach Spain's Canary Islands when they encountered problems. (BBC)
Nigeria
Nigeria will drop criminal charges against an American peace worker, her Nigerian associate and two German filmmakers, who had been accused of endangering national security, the country's top prosecutor said on Nov. 7. The peace workers were arrested on Sept. 26 and accused of helping the Germans film sensitive oil industry facilities in the violent Niger Delta region and advising them to lie to obtain visas. All four had pleaded not guilty to the charges. (Reuters)
Senegal
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has approved a key non-financial aid scheme on good economic governance for Senegal as the country proposed huge pay cuts to try tackle the rising cost of living. The policy support instrument (PSI) deal which aims at assuring foreign donors and lenders that the country's economy is well managed, was adopted by the IMF board of governors last Friday, the IMF said in a statement Nov. 5. (AFP)
South Africa
South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki remains an "AIDS dissident" - doubting the link between the HIV virus and AIDS, according to his new biographer, Mark Gevisser. Gevisser said Mbeki thinks he has "failed on the issue of Aids" and regrets dropping the debate. He also said Mbeki believes that anti-AIDS drugs, now distributed in South Africa, are toxic and doubts their efficacy. But the president's spokesman refused to comment on the book's claims, saying the cabinet and Mbeki were united. (BBC)
Sudan
Medair has now completed construction of a permanent Primary Health Care Center (PHCC), to be staffed with eight support staff and 12 health professionals, including clinical officers, community health workers, and nurse midwives, which will provide access to a wide range of health services for up to 50,000 vulnerable Sudanese. In March of 2007, Medair opened a temporary PHCC in Melut Town, in partnership with the Health Ministry and local community authorities. Large tents were set up, and over the course of 34 weeks, 13,000 patients were seen and treated. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
More than 3,000 cases of diarrhea have been reported in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second city, in the last two months, as residents struggle with water shortages. Since the outbreak was first reported in August, the city has experienced a 10-fold increase in cases, up to the second week of November. Low rainfall and an inability to keep up with the demands of a growing population in a depressed economic environment have left many of Bulawayo's 1.5 million residents in the grip of water shortages and often having to obtain water from unprotected sources. (Reuters)
2007/10/25
Ituri: Civilians Still the First Victims
Despite an overall decrease in the intensity and recurrence of conflicts in the district of Ituri in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), civilian populations there are still subjected to high levels of violence. Based upon four years of medical work in the region, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) has issued a report titled "Ituri: Civilians Still the First Victims," emphasizing the persistence of sexual violence as well as the direct humanitarian consequences of military operations in 2007 during a "pacification process" in the region. More than 16,000 refugees have returned to their home districts in the DRC's Equateur province so far this year - almost as much as in the three previous years combined. The surge in the number of returns to the rainforests of northwest DRC - almost all from the neighboring Republic of Congo (RoC) - comes as the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) prepares to phase out assisted voluntary repatriation to this area in mid-2008. (Reuters)
To learn more, please go to: http://www.msf.org/source/countries/africa/drc/2007/Ituri_report/Ituri_report.pdf
U.N. Round-Up
A boycott by Darfur rebel movements of United Nations-backed negotiations to end the four-and-a- half-year war in the western Sudanese region is growing, two days before the talks are due to open in Sirte, Libya. The latest rebel group to announce it won't attend the meeting is the Justice and Equity Movement, an Islamist group. JEM, joining at least six factions of the main rebel force, the Sudan Liberation Movement, or SLM, said Oct. 24 ''the UN and African Union mediators lack a clear and specific vision to boost the peace process'' and had no agenda for the talks.
African states have begun tapping some of the USD 300 billion held by domestic pension funds to finance economic development, at a time when sub-Saharan countries are experiencing unprecedented rates of growth but also a slowdown in foreign aid. Some 260 participants from 30 African countries alongside international development partners will participate in the annual UN-backed African Governance Forum in Ouagadougou aimed at building capable states on the continent in the symposium. The seventh edition of the Eurafric-Partners Forum started in Lyon on Oct. 22 with the attendance of over 700 participants drawn from 20 countries.
At least three Ugandan soldiers have been injured in an attack on African Union troops in Somalia's capital where the 1,600 peacekeepers are based. AU spokesman Paddy Ankunda told the BBC that soldiers were guarding Mogadishu's port when mortars were fired at them. He called for more peacekeepers to enable them to take over positions under the command of Ethiopian troops. Somalia has seen a surge in violence since Ethiopian-backed government troops ousted Islamists last December.
Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd. will pay USD 5.5 billion for a 20 percent stake in Standard Bank Group Ltd., Africa's largest bank, the Financial Times reported, citing an unidentified banker close to the deal. It would be the biggest overseas acquisition by a Chinese company, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Beijing-based ICBC is the world's largest bank by market value. State-controlled ICBC is making the biggest foreign investment in South Africa since apartheid ended in 1994. Barclays Plc spent 30 billion rand (USD 4.5 billion) in 2005 to take control of Absa Group Ltd., the nation's biggest consumer bank.
Congo (DRC)
Congolese renegade General Laurent Nkunda said he would start sending his troops on Oct. 24 to an integration center so they could rejoin the national army as part of a peace process. Congo's government has threatened to launch a military offensive to forcibly disarm Nkunda's Tutsi fighters, who have battled the army in North Kivu since August when they abandoned a January peace deal. Nkunda said he was in contact with the UN mission in the Congo (MONUC), which he said had prepared the logistics to receive his men. (Reuters)
Kenya
Kenya's USD 1 billion tourism industry was urged on Oct. 24 to introduce energy-saving and other environmentally friendly steps to fight climate change. The head of a trade association representing hotels, lodges, tour operators and local communities, said it was vital the lucrative sector adopt sustainable practices. The group's certification scheme lets foreign visitors and Kenyans compare the green credentials of the east African country's many tourist facilities, as well as the assistance those businesses provide to local residents. (Reuters)
Liberia
Top international officials ramped up the pressure on a group of middle income countries to approve a debt relief package for Liberia following the twice-annual Development Committee meeting of world finance and development ministers. World Bank president Robert Zoellick said the Bank was being held back from expanding its aid for Liberia because a number of countries that were seeking a greater say in international institutions had not yet approved the plan. People familiar with the negotiations say that the countries are not necessarily opposed to the plan, but feel they have not yet had time to examine related legal and other issues. (The Financial Times, UK)
Mozambique
Former Mozambique President Joaquim Chissano won a USD 5 million leadership prize Oct. 22 that promoters hope will encourage other African heads of state to rule wisely, without overstaying their welcomes. Chissano, who just turned 68, helped bring "peace, reconciliation, stable democracy and economic progress to his country," former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, who headed the prize committee for the Mo Ibrahim Foundation, said during a ceremony in London. In 2005, Chissano stepped down at a time when political analysts believed he could have won another five-year term. He is seen as having led the country through a treacherous era by ending a 16-year civil war and overseeing the transition to democracy. (The Washington Post)
Nigeria
Nigeria's top energy adviser, Rilwanu Lukman, has said deals with foreign companies to extract Nigerian oil should be reviewed. Nigeria produces billions of dollars worth of crude oil every year in partnership with Western companies such as Mobil and Shell. Lukman said he wanted to improve the conditions of oil deals to be even more beneficial to both sides. Nigeria is Africa's top oil exporter and a key supplier of crude to the US, yet few of its people have access to clean water or electricity. (BBC)
Somalia
The Somali transitional government is systematically harassing journalists and has failed to protect the fledgling independent media in the war-ravaged country, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW). The closure of media houses and failure to investigate the killing of eight journalists has also damaged independent reporting in Somalia, the human rights watchdog added. Somali minister of information Madobe Nuunow Mohamed downplayed the criticism, saying the difficulties faced by journalists were common to all prominent Somalis, and caused by general insecurity. (Reuters)
South Africa
South Africa's health ministry has recalled millions of condoms, after thousands of the contraceptives failed a safety test. All of the condoms that failed the test were supplied to the South African government by Kohrs Medical Supplies. This is the second recall of free government-distributed condoms in South Africa in recent months. The recalls are a blow to HIV/Aids prevention. More than five million South Africans are HIV positive. (BBC)
Sudan
The Darfur peace talks should go ahead in Libya this weekend in spite of rebel boycotts, Sudan's representative to the UN has told the BBC. Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamad said the peace process for Sudan cannot be held to ransom by the rebel factions. At least seven Darfuri groups say they will not attend because their request to be given more time to form a common position has been ignored. UN chief Ban Ki-moon is due to brief the UN Security Council on the matter. (BBC)
Uganda
A senior commander of the Lord's Resistance Army, the northern Ugandan rebel group, has surrendered in the northeast of the neighboring Congo (DRC), the United Nations peacekeeping mission to that country reported. Patrick Opiyo Mayasi and his wife gave themselves up, along with their weapons and ammunitions, to Congolese border police earlier this month and have been transferred to the DRC capital, Kinshasa. No known criminal charges are pending against Makasi, who is believed to be operations and logistics commander of the LRA. (UN News Service)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's opposition MDC has said that "bread is as scarce as gold" in the country. "It is now clear that Zimbabwe's crisis has reached the tipping point," said MDC's spokesman Nelson Chamisa. The Consumer Council of Zimbabwe says there has been a 30 percent rise in the cost of living for a family of six in the last month despite price freezes. There have been acute food shortages since the policy was imposed in June. Meanwhile, Zimbabwe will investigate accusations of political violence against opposition activists by security forces and ruling party supporters, the MDC said. (BBC)
2007/10/18
Congo (DRC)
The DRC's army has orders to forcibly disarm soldiers loyal to renegade General Laurent Nkunda, President Joseph Kabila said on Oct. 17, but he declined to say when the offensive would begin. Kabila said the operation would not necessarily begin immediately but made clear he hoped to definitively pacify the violence-torn province on the DRC's eastern border with Uganda and Rwanda by the end of the year. (Reuters)
Eritrea
Bloggers are now finding themselves prey to censorship from repressive governments as much as journalists in traditional media, a report says. Reporters Without Borders' annual study of press freedom says China is one of the worst offenders, having imprisoned 50 people for postings on the internet. The report says governments realize the Internet is now a key tool in promoting democracy and are moving to curb it. Eritrea was ranked bottom on overall press freedom by the pressure group.
Ivory Coast
Cocoa farmers in Ivory Coast, the world's biggest producer of the chocolate ingredient, threatened to block trade unless buyers raise prices. The group, an alliance of unions and cooperatives that says it represents tens of thousands of cocoa farmers, wants buyers to pay farmers 500 west African CFA francs (USD1.08) a kilogram, Stephane Mane, its spokesman, said in an interview. (Bloomberg)
Kenya
The Kenyan electoral commission is investigating politicians involved in widespread buying of voting cards ahead of general elections due in December. Commissioner Jack Tumwa said opposition and government leaders are participating in the scheme that will disenfranchise many voters. Opposition leaders have intercepted hundreds of voting cards allegedly purchased from their strongholds. (BBC)
Mauritania
The U.N. refugee agency has succeeded in dispatching a truck convoy from Liberia to Mauritania in a 25-day journey aimed at redeploying resources as part of a broader cost-saving effort that will benefit thousands of people. The 20 trucks from the UNHCR, which arrived in southern Mauritania on Monday, will be used to support the voluntary repatriation and reintegration of Mauritanian refugees from Senegal and Mali. (UN News)
Nigeria
A Nigerian MP collapsed and then died during a rowdy confrontation in parliament over a high profile corruption scandal. It is believed Aminu Safana suffered a heart attack as members shouted, scuffled and exchanged punches. The House of Representatives had been due to consider the findings of an inquiry into the conduct of the speaker, Patricia Etteh. She was found guilty of breaking house rules in the awarding of contracts. (BBC)
Senegal
The formal sector in Senegal accounts for only three percent of the jobs created every year in the west African country where unemployment rates hover above 25 percent, the World Bank said last week. World Bank Lead Economist Jacques Morisset said 100,000 people get employed every year, 97,000 of them in the informal sector. A report on the state of employment in Senegal released two weeks ago, said "it is when workers are not able to find jobs in the formal companies that they seek refuge in the informal sector." (AFP)
Somalia
Up to 60 armed Somali intelligence officers stormed a U.N. compound in Mogadishu on Oct. 17 and seized the World Food Program's (WFP) local chief of operations at gunpoint, taking him to intelligence headquarters where he was detained in a cell. In response, the WFP suspended aid distribution to more than 75,000 people in Mogadishu, a U.N. statement said. (Reuters)
South Africa
South Africa is in danger of losing the battle against HIV/AIDS, the UN children's agency has warned. UNICEF's South Africa representative Macharia Kamau said that infection and death rates in the country are outpacing treatment. This was having a devastating effect on children whose parents die of Aids and sent out a dire message for the future. Kamau said if present trends continued there could be five million orphans in South Africa by 2015. (BBC)
Sudan
Sudan's former southern rebels the SPLM said on Oct. 17 they would rejoin the national government to work through a stalemate on implementing a 2005 peace deal which ended Africa's longest civil war. In other news, armed men shot dead three World Food Program (WFP) drivers in southern Darfur. The drivers were killed in two incidents, one near the towns of Haskanita and Muhajiriya where recent assaults on civilians and African Union peacekeepers left dozens dead. The other was shot last week near the state capital Nyala. (Reuters)
Uganda
The World Food Program (WFP) has been forced to air drop food for the first time in Uganda after the nation suffered its worst flooding in 35 years. In a statement Oct. 16, the WFP said the operation was a desperate last resort to help tens of thousands of people after flooding washed away vital roads. The agency said it urgently needs around USD 20 million for food and trucks to transport September rations to around 250,000 people. In other news, Uganda has agreed to scrap an unpopular plan to give a swath of the protected Mabira rainforest to a sugar planter. (Reuters)
The DRC's army has orders to forcibly disarm soldiers loyal to renegade General Laurent Nkunda, President Joseph Kabila said on Oct. 17, but he declined to say when the offensive would begin. Kabila said the operation would not necessarily begin immediately but made clear he hoped to definitively pacify the violence-torn province on the DRC's eastern border with Uganda and Rwanda by the end of the year. (Reuters)
Eritrea
Bloggers are now finding themselves prey to censorship from repressive governments as much as journalists in traditional media, a report says. Reporters Without Borders' annual study of press freedom says China is one of the worst offenders, having imprisoned 50 people for postings on the internet. The report says governments realize the Internet is now a key tool in promoting democracy and are moving to curb it. Eritrea was ranked bottom on overall press freedom by the pressure group.
Ivory Coast
Cocoa farmers in Ivory Coast, the world's biggest producer of the chocolate ingredient, threatened to block trade unless buyers raise prices. The group, an alliance of unions and cooperatives that says it represents tens of thousands of cocoa farmers, wants buyers to pay farmers 500 west African CFA francs (USD1.08) a kilogram, Stephane Mane, its spokesman, said in an interview. (Bloomberg)
Kenya
The Kenyan electoral commission is investigating politicians involved in widespread buying of voting cards ahead of general elections due in December. Commissioner Jack Tumwa said opposition and government leaders are participating in the scheme that will disenfranchise many voters. Opposition leaders have intercepted hundreds of voting cards allegedly purchased from their strongholds. (BBC)
Mauritania
The U.N. refugee agency has succeeded in dispatching a truck convoy from Liberia to Mauritania in a 25-day journey aimed at redeploying resources as part of a broader cost-saving effort that will benefit thousands of people. The 20 trucks from the UNHCR, which arrived in southern Mauritania on Monday, will be used to support the voluntary repatriation and reintegration of Mauritanian refugees from Senegal and Mali. (UN News)
Nigeria
A Nigerian MP collapsed and then died during a rowdy confrontation in parliament over a high profile corruption scandal. It is believed Aminu Safana suffered a heart attack as members shouted, scuffled and exchanged punches. The House of Representatives had been due to consider the findings of an inquiry into the conduct of the speaker, Patricia Etteh. She was found guilty of breaking house rules in the awarding of contracts. (BBC)
Senegal
The formal sector in Senegal accounts for only three percent of the jobs created every year in the west African country where unemployment rates hover above 25 percent, the World Bank said last week. World Bank Lead Economist Jacques Morisset said 100,000 people get employed every year, 97,000 of them in the informal sector. A report on the state of employment in Senegal released two weeks ago, said "it is when workers are not able to find jobs in the formal companies that they seek refuge in the informal sector." (AFP)
Somalia
Up to 60 armed Somali intelligence officers stormed a U.N. compound in Mogadishu on Oct. 17 and seized the World Food Program's (WFP) local chief of operations at gunpoint, taking him to intelligence headquarters where he was detained in a cell. In response, the WFP suspended aid distribution to more than 75,000 people in Mogadishu, a U.N. statement said. (Reuters)
South Africa
South Africa is in danger of losing the battle against HIV/AIDS, the UN children's agency has warned. UNICEF's South Africa representative Macharia Kamau said that infection and death rates in the country are outpacing treatment. This was having a devastating effect on children whose parents die of Aids and sent out a dire message for the future. Kamau said if present trends continued there could be five million orphans in South Africa by 2015. (BBC)
Sudan
Sudan's former southern rebels the SPLM said on Oct. 17 they would rejoin the national government to work through a stalemate on implementing a 2005 peace deal which ended Africa's longest civil war. In other news, armed men shot dead three World Food Program (WFP) drivers in southern Darfur. The drivers were killed in two incidents, one near the towns of Haskanita and Muhajiriya where recent assaults on civilians and African Union peacekeepers left dozens dead. The other was shot last week near the state capital Nyala. (Reuters)
Uganda
The World Food Program (WFP) has been forced to air drop food for the first time in Uganda after the nation suffered its worst flooding in 35 years. In a statement Oct. 16, the WFP said the operation was a desperate last resort to help tens of thousands of people after flooding washed away vital roads. The agency said it urgently needs around USD 20 million for food and trucks to transport September rations to around 250,000 people. In other news, Uganda has agreed to scrap an unpopular plan to give a swath of the protected Mabira rainforest to a sugar planter. (Reuters)
2007/10/11
Sudan - Final report of the UN Panel of Experts
The Sudanese Government and rebel groups in Darfur continue to violate the Security Council arms embargo, sending heavy weapons, small arms, ammunition and other military equipment into the war-torn region over the past year, a panel of experts set up to monitor the ban says in a new report. The panel finds that the Government has shipped arms and equipment - including military airplanes and helicopters - by air into the airports of Darfur's three provincial capitals, El Fasher, Nyala and El Geneina. This occurred even though the Government did not submit any requests for approval or exemption to the Security Council committee set up in 2005 as part of the arms embargo, the report states, covering the period from the end of September last year to the end of August this year.
To learn more, please go to: http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N07/491/00/PDF/N.pdf?OpenElement
Chad
With an upsurge in interethnic violence in eastern Chad, record numbers of people may soon be unable to secure find food, aid analysts warn. "Crops have been growing exceptionally well this season but if farmers end up fleeing before they are able to harvest there will still be a big food crisis," said Salif Sow, West African Representative of the network of organizations providing food security analysis, Famine Early Warning Systems Network. (FEWS NET).
Congo (DRC)
Aid agencies in the Congo (DRC) say they are struggling to deliver aid to hundreds of thousands of civilians displaced by fighting. The UN says it is hard to reach 300,000 people in the east who rely on food aid, while 150,000 remain out of reach. Battles have resumed between the army and fighters loyal to a renegade general forcing more people to flee. Both the army and General Laurent Nkunda accuse the other of breaking a recent ceasefire. (BBC)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia's government is launching a commodity exchange to help alleviate food shortages and encourage the commercialization of agriculture. The Ethiopia Commodity Exchange (ECEX), which is due to open in December, will sit at the hub of new price dissemination and quality control systems designed to improve liquidity and transparency and reduce transaction risk. (Financial Times, UK)
Kenya
Some 15,000 wildebeest have drowned in the Mara river during their annual migration between Tanzania and Kenya, shocking tourists and baffling conservationists, officials said on Oct. 10. The mass death of the animals was the first of its kind in recent memory, officials said, and struck during peak season at the globally renowned Maasai Mara Game Reserve, which attracts some 300,000 tourists each year. (Reuters)
Liberia
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said she will push for Liberia's large foreign debts to be canceled. "We have a big interest in Liberia being able to follow its own economic path, and so we will make every effort to waive the debts Liberia still has, both internationally and bilaterally," Merkel told reporters. She said some creditor nations still needed convincing, within the framework of the IMF, to help Liberia. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Nigeria is fighting a rare outbreak of a vaccine-derived form of polio, says the UN's World Health Organization (WHO). It says 69 children in the north have caught the paralyzing disease from others who had already been immunized. The WHO says such rare outbreaks have occurred where immunization campaigns did not reach enough of the population. In 2003 Islamic leaders brought a temporary halt to the vaccine campaign in the north saying it was a Western conspiracy to sterilize Muslim women. (BBC)
Sao Tome and Principe
Members of Sao Tome and Principe's elite police corps, known as the "Ninjas," who seized the West African state's police headquarters two days ago have freed some 20 captive officers, their leader said on Oct. 10. The Angolan-trained commandos released the policemen after President Fradique de Menezes' government agreed to negotiate over their demands for a bonus and their own headquarters. (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone's UN-backed war crimes court has jailed two ex-leaders of a pro-government militia during the war. Moinina Fofana and Allieu Kondewa were given six and eight-year jail sentences to run from 2003 for offences including murder and cruel treatment. The case has been controversial as some saw the Civil Defense Force (CDF) as defending civilians against rebels in the 10-year war that ended in 2002. Some 50,000 people were killed and many more maimed and raped during the war. (BBC)
Somalia
Fresh violence has claimed seven lives in Somalia, most of them in Mogadishu where the Ethiopian-backed government began security sweeps this week to find guns and insurgents, witnesses said on Oct. 10. In the provincial town of Baidoa, President Abdullahi Yusuf and Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi were meeting supporters amid rumors among legislators that the president wants to push a no confidence vote in his prime minister through parliament there. (Reuters)
South Africa
Motor fuels company Sasol Ltd sold a fifth of its mining unit to black investors for 1.9 billion rand. Ixia Coal Ltd., a venture comprising Women Investment Portfolio Holdings Ltd. and Mining Women Investments Ltd., will get 20 percent of Sasol Mining by buying new shares, Sasol said in a statement issued to the Johannesburg stock exchange. The government is pushing companies from banks to miners to sell stakes to black investors to compensate for discrimination under apartheid, which ended in 1994. Sasol said the deal with Ixia will increase black ownership of its mining unit to about 26 percent, which meets government requirements. (Bloomberg)
Sudan
Sudan's army has denied attacking the only Darfur rebel faction to sign a peace deal with Khartoum, saying tribal clashes were to blame for the fighting which killed 45 people in Muhajiriya town. The Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) led by Minni Arcua Minnawi was the only one of three negotiating rebel factions to sign the May 2006 deal and become part of government. Muhajiriya in South Darfur is the largest town under their control. (Reuters)
Uganda
A factory producing low-cost drugs to treat HIV/AIDS and malaria has opened in Uganda. The factory is a 50-50 partnership between privately owned local manufacturer Quality Chemicals and Indian pharmaceuticals giant Cipla. Quality Chemicals' marketing director George Baguma said the drug may cost less than USD 15 a month. Baguma said the factory was an entirely private sector initiative and is expected to turn a modest profit. But he added that it would seek support from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. (Reuters)
Zambia
Zambia's state-owned power utility is preparing for possible electricity shortages in southern Africa by investing USD 305 million in upgrading existing power plants and adding new capacity, it said in a statement yesterday. The Zambia Electricity Supply Corporation (ZESCO) had turned to international development financial institutions to finance its expansion, Managing Director Rhodnie Sisala said. (Daily News)
The Sudanese Government and rebel groups in Darfur continue to violate the Security Council arms embargo, sending heavy weapons, small arms, ammunition and other military equipment into the war-torn region over the past year, a panel of experts set up to monitor the ban says in a new report. The panel finds that the Government has shipped arms and equipment - including military airplanes and helicopters - by air into the airports of Darfur's three provincial capitals, El Fasher, Nyala and El Geneina. This occurred even though the Government did not submit any requests for approval or exemption to the Security Council committee set up in 2005 as part of the arms embargo, the report states, covering the period from the end of September last year to the end of August this year.
To learn more, please go to: http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N07/491/00/PDF/N.pdf?OpenElement
Chad
With an upsurge in interethnic violence in eastern Chad, record numbers of people may soon be unable to secure find food, aid analysts warn. "Crops have been growing exceptionally well this season but if farmers end up fleeing before they are able to harvest there will still be a big food crisis," said Salif Sow, West African Representative of the network of organizations providing food security analysis, Famine Early Warning Systems Network. (FEWS NET).
Congo (DRC)
Aid agencies in the Congo (DRC) say they are struggling to deliver aid to hundreds of thousands of civilians displaced by fighting. The UN says it is hard to reach 300,000 people in the east who rely on food aid, while 150,000 remain out of reach. Battles have resumed between the army and fighters loyal to a renegade general forcing more people to flee. Both the army and General Laurent Nkunda accuse the other of breaking a recent ceasefire. (BBC)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia's government is launching a commodity exchange to help alleviate food shortages and encourage the commercialization of agriculture. The Ethiopia Commodity Exchange (ECEX), which is due to open in December, will sit at the hub of new price dissemination and quality control systems designed to improve liquidity and transparency and reduce transaction risk. (Financial Times, UK)
Kenya
Some 15,000 wildebeest have drowned in the Mara river during their annual migration between Tanzania and Kenya, shocking tourists and baffling conservationists, officials said on Oct. 10. The mass death of the animals was the first of its kind in recent memory, officials said, and struck during peak season at the globally renowned Maasai Mara Game Reserve, which attracts some 300,000 tourists each year. (Reuters)
Liberia
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said she will push for Liberia's large foreign debts to be canceled. "We have a big interest in Liberia being able to follow its own economic path, and so we will make every effort to waive the debts Liberia still has, both internationally and bilaterally," Merkel told reporters. She said some creditor nations still needed convincing, within the framework of the IMF, to help Liberia. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Nigeria is fighting a rare outbreak of a vaccine-derived form of polio, says the UN's World Health Organization (WHO). It says 69 children in the north have caught the paralyzing disease from others who had already been immunized. The WHO says such rare outbreaks have occurred where immunization campaigns did not reach enough of the population. In 2003 Islamic leaders brought a temporary halt to the vaccine campaign in the north saying it was a Western conspiracy to sterilize Muslim women. (BBC)
Sao Tome and Principe
Members of Sao Tome and Principe's elite police corps, known as the "Ninjas," who seized the West African state's police headquarters two days ago have freed some 20 captive officers, their leader said on Oct. 10. The Angolan-trained commandos released the policemen after President Fradique de Menezes' government agreed to negotiate over their demands for a bonus and their own headquarters. (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone's UN-backed war crimes court has jailed two ex-leaders of a pro-government militia during the war. Moinina Fofana and Allieu Kondewa were given six and eight-year jail sentences to run from 2003 for offences including murder and cruel treatment. The case has been controversial as some saw the Civil Defense Force (CDF) as defending civilians against rebels in the 10-year war that ended in 2002. Some 50,000 people were killed and many more maimed and raped during the war. (BBC)
Somalia
Fresh violence has claimed seven lives in Somalia, most of them in Mogadishu where the Ethiopian-backed government began security sweeps this week to find guns and insurgents, witnesses said on Oct. 10. In the provincial town of Baidoa, President Abdullahi Yusuf and Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi were meeting supporters amid rumors among legislators that the president wants to push a no confidence vote in his prime minister through parliament there. (Reuters)
South Africa
Motor fuels company Sasol Ltd sold a fifth of its mining unit to black investors for 1.9 billion rand. Ixia Coal Ltd., a venture comprising Women Investment Portfolio Holdings Ltd. and Mining Women Investments Ltd., will get 20 percent of Sasol Mining by buying new shares, Sasol said in a statement issued to the Johannesburg stock exchange. The government is pushing companies from banks to miners to sell stakes to black investors to compensate for discrimination under apartheid, which ended in 1994. Sasol said the deal with Ixia will increase black ownership of its mining unit to about 26 percent, which meets government requirements. (Bloomberg)
Sudan
Sudan's army has denied attacking the only Darfur rebel faction to sign a peace deal with Khartoum, saying tribal clashes were to blame for the fighting which killed 45 people in Muhajiriya town. The Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) led by Minni Arcua Minnawi was the only one of three negotiating rebel factions to sign the May 2006 deal and become part of government. Muhajiriya in South Darfur is the largest town under their control. (Reuters)
Uganda
A factory producing low-cost drugs to treat HIV/AIDS and malaria has opened in Uganda. The factory is a 50-50 partnership between privately owned local manufacturer Quality Chemicals and Indian pharmaceuticals giant Cipla. Quality Chemicals' marketing director George Baguma said the drug may cost less than USD 15 a month. Baguma said the factory was an entirely private sector initiative and is expected to turn a modest profit. But he added that it would seek support from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. (Reuters)
Zambia
Zambia's state-owned power utility is preparing for possible electricity shortages in southern Africa by investing USD 305 million in upgrading existing power plants and adding new capacity, it said in a statement yesterday. The Zambia Electricity Supply Corporation (ZESCO) had turned to international development financial institutions to finance its expansion, Managing Director Rhodnie Sisala said. (Daily News)
2007/10/04
U.N. Round-Up
Sudan's government has promised USD 300 million to "help rebuild and repair" Darfur, tripling a previous pledge, said ex-US President Jimmy Carter. But a faction of the Sudan Liberation Movement told the BBC "security not compensation" was needed more urgently. Carter said President Omar al-Bashir was also willing to have international observers at planned elections in 2009. Meanwhile, Nigeria has said pledges of troops and equipment to a joint African Union-United Nations peacekeeping force must be honored. The new, combined AU-UN force of 26,000 troop and police is supposed to be deployed by January 1, 2008.
The United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) reports that attacks against humanitarian personnel are continuing in Darfur, where some 13,000 relief workers are trying to assist nearly four million people affected by violence. A vehicle belonging to a non-governmental organization (NGO) was hijacked by armed bandits Oct. 1 in the area of the Kassab camp for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in North Darfur. Meanwhile, in South Darfur, three armed men hijacked a NGO vehicle in Nyala on Sept. 30. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), attacks against the relief community have increased by 150 percent in the past year.
The UN World Food Program (WFP) has appealed for urgent new funding to feed 470,000 people in Mauritania, warning that flooding is putting greater pressure on its dwindling supplies for both flood victims and returning refugees. WFP needs USD 3.8 million or 4,440 metric tons of food to head off a three-month break in supplies for Mauritania from this month. The flooding in Mauritania is part of a larger crisis affecting a wide swath of sub-Saharan Africa, where the agency is struggling to feed some 5 million flood victims from Mali and Niger in the west to Ethiopia and Uganda in the east.
IMF, World Bank & IFI Round-Up
Africa is seeing its strongest economic growth since the 1970s, but this is largely driven by booming commodity prices and the continent needs targeted help to expand trade, a regional forum heard Oct. 1. Donald Kaberuka, head of the African Development Bank (AfDB), said African economies grew on average 5 percent this year, and that was expected to rise to 6 percent next year. "Much of the recovery has been spurred by the price effects (of) rising demand for commodities," Kaberuka told some 300 delegates at the "Aid for Trade" meeting organized by the AfDB, WTO, UN and World Bank. In the last decade, he said, the world had seen trade and private sector investment almost vanquish poverty in Asia. But many African nations lacked the capacity or infrastructure to benefit fully from the opportunities of global trade.
Central African Republic (CAR)
A senior official from the CAR has welcomed the recent establishment of a UN-mandated, multidimensional presence in the country but said it must be accompanied by assistance to bolster national capacity there. Addressing the General Assembly's annual high-level debate, CAR Minister for Foreign Affairs Come Zoumara hailed the adoption of Security Council resolution 1778. Unanimously passed Sept. 25, it set up a mission to help protect civilians and facilitate humanitarian aid to thousands of people uprooted due to insecurity in CAR, Chad and neighboring Sudan. (UN News)
Chad
The Foreign Minister of Chad has welcomed the recent creation of a UN-mandated, multidimensional presence in the country, pledging full support for its work on behalf of the thousands of people who have been uprooted by insecurity in the region, including the conflict-torn Darfur region of Sudan. Ahmad Allam-Mi told the General Assembly's annual high-level debate that the mission (MINURCAT) will help lighten the heavy burden that until now has been borne by Chadian gendarmes working to help alleviate the plight of refugees, displaced persons and others victimized by the conflict. (UN News)
Congo (DRC)
The International Monetary Fund warned the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) on Oct. 3 to beware of the macroeconomic effects of a planned USD 5 billion loan from China to modernize the vast African country's decrepit infrastructure and mining industry. President Joseph Kabila's government announced plans last month for the huge loan from China, which would be paid back partly in mining concessions and tolls from road and railways. (Reuters)
Eritrea
Ethiopia seems to be planning to renounce the accord that ended its border war with Eritrea so that it can renew hostilities, the latter's Foreign Minister told the General Assembly Oct. 1, accusing some UN Security Council members of accommodating the interests of Ethiopia despite its repeated breaches of international law. Osman Saleh said "the simple truth is that Ethiopia has refused to cooperate" since 2002 with the binding decisions of a boundary commission charged with demarcating the border between the two countries. (UN News)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia has strongly criticized a U.S. law moving through Congress that links continued aid to democratic reforms, calling it a threat to regional stability and its close military ties with Washington. The U.S. House of Representatives on Oct. 2 passed the Ethiopian Democracy and Accountability Act, which demands Washington's top counter-terrorism partner in the Horn of Africa make a host of democratic changes or face security aid cuts. The bill would also deny U.S. entry visas to any Ethiopian government officials involved in what it calls human rights violations. (Reuters)
Gambia
A court in Gambia sentenced a Guinean man to death Oct. 3 for murdering his housemate by beating him with an iron bar, the second death penalty handed down in the West African country in a week. Death sentences in Gambia are rare and require the signature of President Yahya Jammeh, who has ruled the country of 1.5 million people since seizing power in a bloodless military coup in 1994. Although permitted under the 1996 constitution, only one person has been executed since independence from Britain in 1965. (Reuters)
Kenya
President Mwai Kibaki has launched his re-election campaign, saying he deserves a second term on the basis of the improved economy. But there was no mention of his anti- corruption war which has failed to make much impact, despite being a central plank of his 2002 election triumph. Meanwhile, U.K. police have confirmed they are investigating Anglo Leasing, one of Kenya's biggest graft inquiries. (BBC)
Nigeria
Two German journalists held for two weeks suspected of espionage in the oil rich Niger Delta have been released by the Nigerian State Security Service. An American-born aid worker who facilitated the visit, Judith Burdin Asuni, is still being held. Florian Alexander Opitz and Andy Lehmann had been filming masked youths from the Ijaw community in Delta State. Delta militants have been conducting a violent campaign for a larger share of oil revenues. (BBC)
Somalia
Somalia's transitional government urged the world on Oct. 2 to support "a nation in dire need of help" and complained of international reticence to help solve what other African countries dubbed a "forgotten crisis." It came to power after ousting militant Islamists with the help of Ethiopian troops at the start of this year and persistent violence has displaced thousands of people from Mogadishu, despite the convening of a peace congress between Somalia's many clans and factions. (Reuters)
South Africa
South Africa's Scorpions crime unit is in the political spotlight again amid reports it was preparing to arrest the nation's police commissioner, the latest high-profile official targeted by the elite force. Unease over the activities of the Directorate of Special Operations, the official name of the Scorpions, has been building within the ruling African National Congress (ANC) since President Thabo Mbeki announced the formation of the FBI-style crime unit in 1999. (Reuters)
Sudan
Sudan's president has promised to pay USD 300 million in compensation to the country's war-torn Darfur region, tripling a previous pledge, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said on Oct. 3. Carter spoke during a tour of Darfur marred by a heated exchange between the 83-year-old former president and Sudanese security, who tried to prevent him from visiting a tribal leader. (Reuters)
Uganda
A crucial meeting between senior Congolese (DRC) and Ugandan energy officials over oil was suddenly canceled after Kinshasa withdrew its delegation, a Ugandan spokesman said. The meeting was called by Uganda to defuse tensions with the DRC after two shootings in as many months along their border on Lake Albert - an important new frontier in the search for oil in Africa. The talks to review a 1990 oil exploration and exploitation agreement between the two countries were due to start on Oct. 3 in Kampala. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Reports from Zimbabwe say bakeries have run out of flour and there will be no bread in the foreseeable future. The Agriculture Ministry has confirmed that this year's wheat harvest yield is only one third of the country's requirements and Minister Rugare Gumbo is quoted as blaming the shortages on the failings of what he called the "new farmers" created by the land reforms. The Central Bank meanwhile announced measures to help restock empty store shelves by end October, including offering cheap loans to manufacturers to restore productivity, and hard currency payments to farmers to keep them in business. (BBC, AP)
Sudan's government has promised USD 300 million to "help rebuild and repair" Darfur, tripling a previous pledge, said ex-US President Jimmy Carter. But a faction of the Sudan Liberation Movement told the BBC "security not compensation" was needed more urgently. Carter said President Omar al-Bashir was also willing to have international observers at planned elections in 2009. Meanwhile, Nigeria has said pledges of troops and equipment to a joint African Union-United Nations peacekeeping force must be honored. The new, combined AU-UN force of 26,000 troop and police is supposed to be deployed by January 1, 2008.
The United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) reports that attacks against humanitarian personnel are continuing in Darfur, where some 13,000 relief workers are trying to assist nearly four million people affected by violence. A vehicle belonging to a non-governmental organization (NGO) was hijacked by armed bandits Oct. 1 in the area of the Kassab camp for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in North Darfur. Meanwhile, in South Darfur, three armed men hijacked a NGO vehicle in Nyala on Sept. 30. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), attacks against the relief community have increased by 150 percent in the past year.
The UN World Food Program (WFP) has appealed for urgent new funding to feed 470,000 people in Mauritania, warning that flooding is putting greater pressure on its dwindling supplies for both flood victims and returning refugees. WFP needs USD 3.8 million or 4,440 metric tons of food to head off a three-month break in supplies for Mauritania from this month. The flooding in Mauritania is part of a larger crisis affecting a wide swath of sub-Saharan Africa, where the agency is struggling to feed some 5 million flood victims from Mali and Niger in the west to Ethiopia and Uganda in the east.
IMF, World Bank & IFI Round-Up
Africa is seeing its strongest economic growth since the 1970s, but this is largely driven by booming commodity prices and the continent needs targeted help to expand trade, a regional forum heard Oct. 1. Donald Kaberuka, head of the African Development Bank (AfDB), said African economies grew on average 5 percent this year, and that was expected to rise to 6 percent next year. "Much of the recovery has been spurred by the price effects (of) rising demand for commodities," Kaberuka told some 300 delegates at the "Aid for Trade" meeting organized by the AfDB, WTO, UN and World Bank. In the last decade, he said, the world had seen trade and private sector investment almost vanquish poverty in Asia. But many African nations lacked the capacity or infrastructure to benefit fully from the opportunities of global trade.
Central African Republic (CAR)
A senior official from the CAR has welcomed the recent establishment of a UN-mandated, multidimensional presence in the country but said it must be accompanied by assistance to bolster national capacity there. Addressing the General Assembly's annual high-level debate, CAR Minister for Foreign Affairs Come Zoumara hailed the adoption of Security Council resolution 1778. Unanimously passed Sept. 25, it set up a mission to help protect civilians and facilitate humanitarian aid to thousands of people uprooted due to insecurity in CAR, Chad and neighboring Sudan. (UN News)
Chad
The Foreign Minister of Chad has welcomed the recent creation of a UN-mandated, multidimensional presence in the country, pledging full support for its work on behalf of the thousands of people who have been uprooted by insecurity in the region, including the conflict-torn Darfur region of Sudan. Ahmad Allam-Mi told the General Assembly's annual high-level debate that the mission (MINURCAT) will help lighten the heavy burden that until now has been borne by Chadian gendarmes working to help alleviate the plight of refugees, displaced persons and others victimized by the conflict. (UN News)
Congo (DRC)
The International Monetary Fund warned the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) on Oct. 3 to beware of the macroeconomic effects of a planned USD 5 billion loan from China to modernize the vast African country's decrepit infrastructure and mining industry. President Joseph Kabila's government announced plans last month for the huge loan from China, which would be paid back partly in mining concessions and tolls from road and railways. (Reuters)
Eritrea
Ethiopia seems to be planning to renounce the accord that ended its border war with Eritrea so that it can renew hostilities, the latter's Foreign Minister told the General Assembly Oct. 1, accusing some UN Security Council members of accommodating the interests of Ethiopia despite its repeated breaches of international law. Osman Saleh said "the simple truth is that Ethiopia has refused to cooperate" since 2002 with the binding decisions of a boundary commission charged with demarcating the border between the two countries. (UN News)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia has strongly criticized a U.S. law moving through Congress that links continued aid to democratic reforms, calling it a threat to regional stability and its close military ties with Washington. The U.S. House of Representatives on Oct. 2 passed the Ethiopian Democracy and Accountability Act, which demands Washington's top counter-terrorism partner in the Horn of Africa make a host of democratic changes or face security aid cuts. The bill would also deny U.S. entry visas to any Ethiopian government officials involved in what it calls human rights violations. (Reuters)
Gambia
A court in Gambia sentenced a Guinean man to death Oct. 3 for murdering his housemate by beating him with an iron bar, the second death penalty handed down in the West African country in a week. Death sentences in Gambia are rare and require the signature of President Yahya Jammeh, who has ruled the country of 1.5 million people since seizing power in a bloodless military coup in 1994. Although permitted under the 1996 constitution, only one person has been executed since independence from Britain in 1965. (Reuters)
Kenya
President Mwai Kibaki has launched his re-election campaign, saying he deserves a second term on the basis of the improved economy. But there was no mention of his anti- corruption war which has failed to make much impact, despite being a central plank of his 2002 election triumph. Meanwhile, U.K. police have confirmed they are investigating Anglo Leasing, one of Kenya's biggest graft inquiries. (BBC)
Nigeria
Two German journalists held for two weeks suspected of espionage in the oil rich Niger Delta have been released by the Nigerian State Security Service. An American-born aid worker who facilitated the visit, Judith Burdin Asuni, is still being held. Florian Alexander Opitz and Andy Lehmann had been filming masked youths from the Ijaw community in Delta State. Delta militants have been conducting a violent campaign for a larger share of oil revenues. (BBC)
Somalia
Somalia's transitional government urged the world on Oct. 2 to support "a nation in dire need of help" and complained of international reticence to help solve what other African countries dubbed a "forgotten crisis." It came to power after ousting militant Islamists with the help of Ethiopian troops at the start of this year and persistent violence has displaced thousands of people from Mogadishu, despite the convening of a peace congress between Somalia's many clans and factions. (Reuters)
South Africa
South Africa's Scorpions crime unit is in the political spotlight again amid reports it was preparing to arrest the nation's police commissioner, the latest high-profile official targeted by the elite force. Unease over the activities of the Directorate of Special Operations, the official name of the Scorpions, has been building within the ruling African National Congress (ANC) since President Thabo Mbeki announced the formation of the FBI-style crime unit in 1999. (Reuters)
Sudan
Sudan's president has promised to pay USD 300 million in compensation to the country's war-torn Darfur region, tripling a previous pledge, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said on Oct. 3. Carter spoke during a tour of Darfur marred by a heated exchange between the 83-year-old former president and Sudanese security, who tried to prevent him from visiting a tribal leader. (Reuters)
Uganda
A crucial meeting between senior Congolese (DRC) and Ugandan energy officials over oil was suddenly canceled after Kinshasa withdrew its delegation, a Ugandan spokesman said. The meeting was called by Uganda to defuse tensions with the DRC after two shootings in as many months along their border on Lake Albert - an important new frontier in the search for oil in Africa. The talks to review a 1990 oil exploration and exploitation agreement between the two countries were due to start on Oct. 3 in Kampala. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Reports from Zimbabwe say bakeries have run out of flour and there will be no bread in the foreseeable future. The Agriculture Ministry has confirmed that this year's wheat harvest yield is only one third of the country's requirements and Minister Rugare Gumbo is quoted as blaming the shortages on the failings of what he called the "new farmers" created by the land reforms. The Central Bank meanwhile announced measures to help restock empty store shelves by end October, including offering cheap loans to manufacturers to restore productivity, and hard currency payments to farmers to keep them in business. (BBC, AP)
2007/09/27
Angola
A key road that was heavily mined and destroyed during Angola's civil war has reopened, the latest sign of progress in rebuilding infrastructure in the oil-rich southwestern African nation. The road linking Lumbala N'guimbo with other parts of the country was deemed safe for traffic again as a result of an USD 8 million bridge-building project carried out by the UN's World Food Program (WFP). Now people in the region will no longer be cut off from essential government services and markets. (Reuters)
Chad
An Oxfam aid worker says he fears the peace force for Chad and the Central African Republic may contain too many French troops to be seen as neutral. The UN Security Council approved the force to protect civilians bordering Sudan's Darfur region. The peacekeepers, to be made up of 3,000 EU troops and 300 UN police, will have the right to use force to end cross-border incursions. A Chadian rebel group has already warned that the peacekeepers should not act as an intervention force. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
Six people have been killed in an exchange of gunfire between troops from Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) on the oil-rich Lake Albert. Tension has been growing since the discovery of oil beneath the lake that borders both countries. Disagreements over the precise border now have huge political and commercial significance. The UN says shooting started after two Congolese soldiers refused to hand over weapons when challenged by Ugandans. (BBC)
Eritrea
Eritrea maintains its demand that Ethiopia implement a border ruling agreed under a pact to end their war, a minister said on Sept. 26 after Ethiopia threatened to call off the peace agreement. In a letter to Eritrea's Foreign Minister Sept. 25, Ethiopia accused Asmara of violating the deal on several fronts including coordinating "terrorist activity." Addis Ababa said as a result it was considering terminating or suspending all or part the Algiers agreement that ended the two-year border conflict that killed 70,000 people. (Reuters)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia's Ministry of Water Resource said Sept. 25 it is implementing a plan to attain 100 percent clean water service coverage across the nation by the year 2012. According to the plan, 21,289 new clean water service facilities will be constructed in different parts of the nation in the coming years. The fund for the success of the plan is expected to be secured from foreign donors, the World Bank, the public and other sources. (Xinhua)
Ghana
Ghana, the world's second-biggest cocoa grower, expects disease to reduce its harvest by 5 percent next year, exacerbating an expected shortfall in global supplies, said Charles Ntim, deputy head of the Cocoa Board of Ghana. Cocoa since January has posted its best performance in five years, after dry weather and hot winds damaged crops in West Africa. Black pod fungus, a disease which can reduce the yield of cocoa trees by half, has since emerged in the region. Meanwhile, Ghana plans to raise as much as USD 750 million in a debut sale of Eurobonds this week. (Bloomberg)
Kenya
Kenyan politics is marred by tribalism, violence and graft and this year's election will be the true test of how far the country has come since single-party rule, its election commission said on Sept. 26. Polls in 2002 that removed longtime ruler Daniel arap Moi were seen as broadly free and fair. But Samuel Kivuitu, the chairman of the Electoral Commission of Kenya (ECK), said there were major challenges before the nation votes again in elections expected in December. (Reuters)
Rwanda
Rwanda is the most improved sub-Saharan nation according to a survey looking at performances over the past five years. The Ibrahim Index, financed by Sudanese mobile phone magnate Mo Ibrahim, names Mauritius as the best-governed and Somalia as the worst-governed state. Countries are measured under categories like "Safety and Security" and "Human Development." Harvard University academics analyzed the criteria used to rank countries. (BBC)
Somalia
UN emergency coordinator John Holmes said last week that malnutrition and disease, combined with political insecurity and drought, have made conditions worse in Somalia than in Darfur and Chad. UNICEF said 83,000 children in Somalia are malnourished, with about 13,500 so malnourished they are at risk of starvation. About 1.5 million people require humanitarian aid. Somalia's transitional government has tried to tax incoming humanitarian assistance, and set up roadblocks that hindered food deliveries, while accusing charities of supporting terrorists. (LA Times, UPI)
South Africa
Powerful countries dominate global forums such as the UN to the detriment of freedom, justice and equality, ensuring that lofty talk translate into little action, South African President Thabo Mbeki told the General Assembly. He said "the skewed distribution of power in the world - political, economic, military and technological and social - replicates itself in multilateral institutions, much to the disadvantage of the majority of the poor people in the world." While the UN proposes good solutions, he said, wealthy nations respond positively only if it coincides with their own narrow interests. (UN News)
Sudan
Sudan is illegally holding 25 opposition figures without charge, the Arab Organization for Human Rights (AOHR) said, urging the UN to take action. Two months ago, national security forces took at gunpoint from their homes leaders of the opposition Umma Party for Reform and Renewal, members from the opposition Democratic Unionist Party, and other retired army, police and security officers. Accused of plotting a coup, none has been charged. Meanwhile, three Action by Churches Together (ACT)-Caritas staff have been released after being detained by an armed group over the weekend in Zalingei, west Darfur. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe has ordered 120,000 tons of wheat from South Africa to ease food shortages, the country's state security minister said on Sept. 26. Once a regional bread basket, the country is experiencing acute shortages blamed on President Robert Mugabe's policies. Food shortages have worsened since June when Mugabe's government imposed price controls on all goods and services, leaving shop shelves virtually empty of basic foodstuffs. Meanwhile, Zimbabweans in South Africa may be remitting to their homeland as much as USD 500 million a year, according to the first detailed survey of the Diaspora. (Reuters, FT)
A key road that was heavily mined and destroyed during Angola's civil war has reopened, the latest sign of progress in rebuilding infrastructure in the oil-rich southwestern African nation. The road linking Lumbala N'guimbo with other parts of the country was deemed safe for traffic again as a result of an USD 8 million bridge-building project carried out by the UN's World Food Program (WFP). Now people in the region will no longer be cut off from essential government services and markets. (Reuters)
Chad
An Oxfam aid worker says he fears the peace force for Chad and the Central African Republic may contain too many French troops to be seen as neutral. The UN Security Council approved the force to protect civilians bordering Sudan's Darfur region. The peacekeepers, to be made up of 3,000 EU troops and 300 UN police, will have the right to use force to end cross-border incursions. A Chadian rebel group has already warned that the peacekeepers should not act as an intervention force. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
Six people have been killed in an exchange of gunfire between troops from Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) on the oil-rich Lake Albert. Tension has been growing since the discovery of oil beneath the lake that borders both countries. Disagreements over the precise border now have huge political and commercial significance. The UN says shooting started after two Congolese soldiers refused to hand over weapons when challenged by Ugandans. (BBC)
Eritrea
Eritrea maintains its demand that Ethiopia implement a border ruling agreed under a pact to end their war, a minister said on Sept. 26 after Ethiopia threatened to call off the peace agreement. In a letter to Eritrea's Foreign Minister Sept. 25, Ethiopia accused Asmara of violating the deal on several fronts including coordinating "terrorist activity." Addis Ababa said as a result it was considering terminating or suspending all or part the Algiers agreement that ended the two-year border conflict that killed 70,000 people. (Reuters)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia's Ministry of Water Resource said Sept. 25 it is implementing a plan to attain 100 percent clean water service coverage across the nation by the year 2012. According to the plan, 21,289 new clean water service facilities will be constructed in different parts of the nation in the coming years. The fund for the success of the plan is expected to be secured from foreign donors, the World Bank, the public and other sources. (Xinhua)
Ghana
Ghana, the world's second-biggest cocoa grower, expects disease to reduce its harvest by 5 percent next year, exacerbating an expected shortfall in global supplies, said Charles Ntim, deputy head of the Cocoa Board of Ghana. Cocoa since January has posted its best performance in five years, after dry weather and hot winds damaged crops in West Africa. Black pod fungus, a disease which can reduce the yield of cocoa trees by half, has since emerged in the region. Meanwhile, Ghana plans to raise as much as USD 750 million in a debut sale of Eurobonds this week. (Bloomberg)
Kenya
Kenyan politics is marred by tribalism, violence and graft and this year's election will be the true test of how far the country has come since single-party rule, its election commission said on Sept. 26. Polls in 2002 that removed longtime ruler Daniel arap Moi were seen as broadly free and fair. But Samuel Kivuitu, the chairman of the Electoral Commission of Kenya (ECK), said there were major challenges before the nation votes again in elections expected in December. (Reuters)
Rwanda
Rwanda is the most improved sub-Saharan nation according to a survey looking at performances over the past five years. The Ibrahim Index, financed by Sudanese mobile phone magnate Mo Ibrahim, names Mauritius as the best-governed and Somalia as the worst-governed state. Countries are measured under categories like "Safety and Security" and "Human Development." Harvard University academics analyzed the criteria used to rank countries. (BBC)
Somalia
UN emergency coordinator John Holmes said last week that malnutrition and disease, combined with political insecurity and drought, have made conditions worse in Somalia than in Darfur and Chad. UNICEF said 83,000 children in Somalia are malnourished, with about 13,500 so malnourished they are at risk of starvation. About 1.5 million people require humanitarian aid. Somalia's transitional government has tried to tax incoming humanitarian assistance, and set up roadblocks that hindered food deliveries, while accusing charities of supporting terrorists. (LA Times, UPI)
South Africa
Powerful countries dominate global forums such as the UN to the detriment of freedom, justice and equality, ensuring that lofty talk translate into little action, South African President Thabo Mbeki told the General Assembly. He said "the skewed distribution of power in the world - political, economic, military and technological and social - replicates itself in multilateral institutions, much to the disadvantage of the majority of the poor people in the world." While the UN proposes good solutions, he said, wealthy nations respond positively only if it coincides with their own narrow interests. (UN News)
Sudan
Sudan is illegally holding 25 opposition figures without charge, the Arab Organization for Human Rights (AOHR) said, urging the UN to take action. Two months ago, national security forces took at gunpoint from their homes leaders of the opposition Umma Party for Reform and Renewal, members from the opposition Democratic Unionist Party, and other retired army, police and security officers. Accused of plotting a coup, none has been charged. Meanwhile, three Action by Churches Together (ACT)-Caritas staff have been released after being detained by an armed group over the weekend in Zalingei, west Darfur. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe has ordered 120,000 tons of wheat from South Africa to ease food shortages, the country's state security minister said on Sept. 26. Once a regional bread basket, the country is experiencing acute shortages blamed on President Robert Mugabe's policies. Food shortages have worsened since June when Mugabe's government imposed price controls on all goods and services, leaving shop shelves virtually empty of basic foodstuffs. Meanwhile, Zimbabweans in South Africa may be remitting to their homeland as much as USD 500 million a year, according to the first detailed survey of the Diaspora. (Reuters, FT)
2007/09/20
Paying the Price
Humanitarian action in Darfur - OCHA report
The humanitarian situation inside Darfur deteriorated further last month, with thousands of civilians fleeing their homes, camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs) becoming increasingly crowded and recent heavy rains only adding to the misery of many locals in the war-ravaged Sudanese region, according to a United Nations report released Sept. 17. The August overview by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) also finds that violence inside the IDP camps scattered across Darfur is worsening, making it harder for aid workers to reach people in need and carry out their work. More than 240,000 Darfurians are newly displaced or have been re-displaced this year, which means over 2.2 million people have fled their homes since the conflict between rebels, Sudanese Government forces and allied Janjaweed militia groups began in 2003. At least 200,000 people have also been killed in that period. Many aid workers are also coming under direct attack. During August seven vehicles belonging to the humanitarian community were hijacked or stolen and four convoys were attacked.
To learn more, please go to: http://ochaonline2.un.org/Default.aspx?alias=ochaonline2.un.org/sudan
U.N. Round-Up
The new United Nations envoy for Somalia has arrived in the region with a call to the conflict-torn country's political, business and religious elite both at home and abroad to rebuild a nation that has not had a functioning central government for 16 years. "The humanitarian and human rights situations, the worst on the continent, are unacceptable," said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's Special Representative Ahmedou Ould Abdallah, who until this month headed the UN Office in West Africa. He called on the elite to rise beyond personnel and other short-term considerations, and to come together to rebuild the country.
Prosecutors at the UN war crimes tribunal for the Rwandan genocide Sept. 17 urged its judges to sentence to 12 years imprisonment a former mayor who has pleaded guilty to a charge of extermination as a crime against humanity. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), sitting in Arusha, Tanzania, heard closing arguments from both prosecutors and defense lawyers in the case of Juvenal Rugambarara, who served as mayor of Bicumbi commune in Kigali-Rural Prefecture from September 1993 to April 1994. In July Rugambarara made the guilty plea after two years of negotiations with prosecutors, who agreed to withdraw eight other charges that included genocide, torture and rape.
Scores of African scientists will be trained to develop crops for Africa's conditions under a program launched on Sept. 19 which is also aimed at keeping their expertise at home. The program, set up by former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), will help crop specialists at national research institutions obtain their PhDs and stay in Africa to work. Most African crop scientists have been educated at European or U.S. universities, and many stay there after graduation. (Reuters)
A local human rights group accused Ethiopia's government on Sept. 19 of manipulating a visit by United Nations aid officials and human rights investigators to the country's remote and violent eastern Ogaden region. Reuters reports that hours before the UN was expected to publish its report in New York detailing the mission, the local group said Ethiopian authorities had detained critics for its duration and coached officials to pose as clan elders in U.N. interviews. The Ogaden Human Rights Committee says it deplores investigators' inability to visit real crime scenes where gross human rights violations took place.
Burundi
Hundreds of asylum seekers from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) who had been camping in a playground in front of the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) offices in the Burundian capital, Bujumbura, have been moved to Northern Ngozi province, officials said. Some 300 of the Congolese who were boarding trucks early on Sept. 19, were being taken to Musasa transit site; while others who follow will be taken to another site in Bujumbura, according to a UNHCR information officer. (Reuters)
Central African Republic (CAR)
Increased violence has driven tens of thousands of people from their homes in the north of the Central African Republic (CAR) near the border with Chad, the UN's OCHA said Sept. 14. Some 12,000 people - the entire population of the area between the towns of Markounda and Silambi - have been uprooted. Civilians have been caught in fighting between various armed groups, including both State and non-State factions from CAR and neighboring Chad, in recent months. Late last month, it was reported that the population had escaped the violence into the bush. (UN News)
Chad
Heavy rainy season downpours have left areas of eastern Chad flooded and seriously hampered efforts by UNHCR and other aid agencies to help tens of thousands of Sudanese refugees and displaced Chadians. The rains have eased over the past week but flooding continues to cut land access in the south-east and has forced locals and displaced people in the area to head for higher ground. Goz Amir, one of 12 UNHCR-run camps housing some 230,000 Sudanese refugees in east Chad, is in the flooded area. There are also 170,000 displaced Chadians in the area. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
The situation of children in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has gone from bad to worse, with 60,000 people newly driven from their homes by fighting in North Kivu province, exposing youngsters to the dangers of forced recruitment and sexual exploitation, according to UNICEF. More than 8,000 children have been separated from militias. In most cases, these former child soldiers are returned to their communities, but UNICEF has received a report of 54 cases of children recruited in northeast Kivu and believes the number may range into the thousands. (UN News)
Ethiopia
Distribution of food for more than 60,000 Ethiopian flood victims has started amid some overcrowding in temporary shelters and the threat of an outbreak of water-borne diseases, the UN World Food Program (WFP) reported Sept. 14. More than180,000 people in Amhara, Afar and Tigray in northern Ethiopia, in Gambella in the west and in the Southern Nations region in the south were hit by the seasonal floods and 42,000 people have been displaced. Some are living in temporary shelters, while others have been taken in by relatives or friends. (UN News)
Ghana
The UN has deployed a six-member disaster assessment and coordination (UNDAC) team to north-eastern Ghana, which has been hit hardest by the floods that have followed a week of torrential rains across West Africa late last month. Thousands of homes in Ghanas Upper East Region were destroyed after the rains struck, several major bridges have collapsed and large areas of cropland have been destroyed, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported Sept. 14. More than 260,000 Ghanaians have been affected. (UN News)
Ivory Coast
In Ivory Coast (Cote d'Ivoire) five years after a rebellion carved up a country and a people already burdened by ethnic strife, the government is set to begin an operation to tackle the grievance at the heart of the revolt: granting undocumented Ivorians ID papers and the rights that go with them. Observers say the long-overdue identification process is crucial, and acknowledge that the open hostilities that marked the early days of the rebellion are far-off, but also say a return to violence is not impossible. (Reuters)
Mali
Tuareg rebels in northern Mali have agreed to free military hostages as government forces encircle their positions in a remote desert garrison town, a government source said on Sept. 19. Fighters loyal to insurgent chief Ibrahima Bahanga have besieged Tin-Zaouatene since last Friday following a flurry of raids against military targets in what appears to be a limited revival of the region's 1990s Tuareg rebellion. The army set up a cordon, while local officials from neighboring Algeria extracted guarantees including the release of government soldiers and access for a demining team. (Reuters)
Nigeria
The Nigerian president has ordered an investigation into alleged links between government officials in the Niger Delta and violent criminal gangs. Rivers State officials - including the Deputy Governor - are accused of being secretly in control of the gangs. Turf wars between rival gangs in the state capital, Port Harcourt, last month left around 40 people dead. The city has been under night curfew since 17 August and last week the army sent in troops and helicopter gunships. (BBC)
Rwanda
Several of Africa's poorest countries are in need of assistance due to severe floods that have killed more than 200 people and affected a million in recent weeks. The latest victims were reported in Rwanda, where officials from the northern region said floods killed 15 people and destroyed more than 500 homes since Sept. 12. Meanwhile, German authorities have detained a former Hutu minister wanted in connection with Rwanda's 1994 civil war and genocide, Germany's federal police said. The statement did not name the man but said he had been a planning minister at the time of the civil war. (AFP, Reuters)
Somalia
Heavy fighting between insurgents and Somali government troops around Mogadishu's Bakara market overnight killed at least two civilians, a witness said on Sept. 19. In the worst violence since the formation of a new opposition alliance, suspected insurgents fired rocket-propelled grenades and automatic gunfire into the Mogadishu slum at the center of the city near where government troops are garrisoned. (Reuters)
Sudan
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Sept. 18 he had raised with Sudan's president Khartoum's refusal to hand over two suspected Darfur war criminals to an international court. The Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) in May charged Ahmad Harun with organizing, funding and arming militia to stop rebels from attacking the Sudanese army. Harun is now the minister of state for humanitarian affairs, which the ICC says is akin to having named the man who helped foment the crisis in charge of managing it. (Reuters)
Tanzania
Tanzanian health authorities have cautioned people living in regions neighboring the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) following the outbreak of Ebola hemorrhagic fever in the central African country. Meanwhile the UN World Health Organization (WHO) clarified that while the latest figures released by various sources mention 375 cases and 167 deaths in western Kasai Province of DRC, the cause of death cannot be confirmed yet. (Reuters)
Uganda
The WFP appealed Sept. 18 for USD 64.6 million to feed up to 1.7 million people in Uganda until March to stave off hunger for victims of severe floods, refugees and others displaced by conflict and civil strife. WFP teams are on the ground distributing food to flood victims, but access is difficult and, without new funds, everything is in jeopardy. Widespread flooding recently affected at least 300,000 people, and Uganda is also trying to cope with an influx of thousands of potential asylum-seekers fleeing the Congo (DRC) as well as with 1.4 million refugees and IDPs. (UN News)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's government backtracked on a wage freeze, the official media reported, just days before labor unions hold a national strike protesting it. The main labor organization, the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, called a countrywide strike for Sept. 20-21 to protest the wage controls and other economic policies that have led to record unemployment and chronic food shortages. Meanwhile, Desmond Tutu, the former Archbishop of Cape Town, has called for tougher action to end the crisis in Zimbabwe, calling South Africa's "softly-softly" diplomatic approach a failure. (AP, BBC)
| "It leads to violations of human rights. It erodes public trust in government. It can even kill - for example, when corrupt officials allow medicines to be tampered with, or when they accept bribes that enable terrorist acts to take place." -- UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, speaking at the inauguration of the Stolen Asset Recovery (StAR) Initiative, a new partnership between the United Nations, the World Bank, and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) to help developing nations to recover assets stolen by corrupt leaders and invest those funds in development programs. "Corruption undermines democracy and the rule of law," Ban said. The proceeds from criminal activities, corruption and tax evasion worldwide is estimated to be between USD 1 trillion and USD 1.6 trillion, and one quarter of the gross domestic product (GDP) of African States - or USD 148 billion - is lost to corruption yearly, according to the UN. Additionally, public officials from developing and transition countries collectively receive bribes worth between USD 20 billion and USD 40 billion every year, which is equivalent to 20 to 40 percent of flows of official development assistance. "Many developing countries are hemorrhaging money desperately needed to try to support the attack against poverty," World Bank president Robert B. Zoellick said. "Of course, the development impact of theft on such a massive scale is devastating.' |
Humanitarian action in Darfur - OCHA report
The humanitarian situation inside Darfur deteriorated further last month, with thousands of civilians fleeing their homes, camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs) becoming increasingly crowded and recent heavy rains only adding to the misery of many locals in the war-ravaged Sudanese region, according to a United Nations report released Sept. 17. The August overview by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) also finds that violence inside the IDP camps scattered across Darfur is worsening, making it harder for aid workers to reach people in need and carry out their work. More than 240,000 Darfurians are newly displaced or have been re-displaced this year, which means over 2.2 million people have fled their homes since the conflict between rebels, Sudanese Government forces and allied Janjaweed militia groups began in 2003. At least 200,000 people have also been killed in that period. Many aid workers are also coming under direct attack. During August seven vehicles belonging to the humanitarian community were hijacked or stolen and four convoys were attacked.
To learn more, please go to: http://ochaonline2.un.org/Default.aspx?alias=ochaonline2.un.org/sudan
U.N. Round-Up
The new United Nations envoy for Somalia has arrived in the region with a call to the conflict-torn country's political, business and religious elite both at home and abroad to rebuild a nation that has not had a functioning central government for 16 years. "The humanitarian and human rights situations, the worst on the continent, are unacceptable," said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's Special Representative Ahmedou Ould Abdallah, who until this month headed the UN Office in West Africa. He called on the elite to rise beyond personnel and other short-term considerations, and to come together to rebuild the country.
Prosecutors at the UN war crimes tribunal for the Rwandan genocide Sept. 17 urged its judges to sentence to 12 years imprisonment a former mayor who has pleaded guilty to a charge of extermination as a crime against humanity. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), sitting in Arusha, Tanzania, heard closing arguments from both prosecutors and defense lawyers in the case of Juvenal Rugambarara, who served as mayor of Bicumbi commune in Kigali-Rural Prefecture from September 1993 to April 1994. In July Rugambarara made the guilty plea after two years of negotiations with prosecutors, who agreed to withdraw eight other charges that included genocide, torture and rape.
Scores of African scientists will be trained to develop crops for Africa's conditions under a program launched on Sept. 19 which is also aimed at keeping their expertise at home. The program, set up by former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), will help crop specialists at national research institutions obtain their PhDs and stay in Africa to work. Most African crop scientists have been educated at European or U.S. universities, and many stay there after graduation. (Reuters)
A local human rights group accused Ethiopia's government on Sept. 19 of manipulating a visit by United Nations aid officials and human rights investigators to the country's remote and violent eastern Ogaden region. Reuters reports that hours before the UN was expected to publish its report in New York detailing the mission, the local group said Ethiopian authorities had detained critics for its duration and coached officials to pose as clan elders in U.N. interviews. The Ogaden Human Rights Committee says it deplores investigators' inability to visit real crime scenes where gross human rights violations took place.
Burundi
Hundreds of asylum seekers from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) who had been camping in a playground in front of the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) offices in the Burundian capital, Bujumbura, have been moved to Northern Ngozi province, officials said. Some 300 of the Congolese who were boarding trucks early on Sept. 19, were being taken to Musasa transit site; while others who follow will be taken to another site in Bujumbura, according to a UNHCR information officer. (Reuters)
Central African Republic (CAR)
Increased violence has driven tens of thousands of people from their homes in the north of the Central African Republic (CAR) near the border with Chad, the UN's OCHA said Sept. 14. Some 12,000 people - the entire population of the area between the towns of Markounda and Silambi - have been uprooted. Civilians have been caught in fighting between various armed groups, including both State and non-State factions from CAR and neighboring Chad, in recent months. Late last month, it was reported that the population had escaped the violence into the bush. (UN News)
Chad
Heavy rainy season downpours have left areas of eastern Chad flooded and seriously hampered efforts by UNHCR and other aid agencies to help tens of thousands of Sudanese refugees and displaced Chadians. The rains have eased over the past week but flooding continues to cut land access in the south-east and has forced locals and displaced people in the area to head for higher ground. Goz Amir, one of 12 UNHCR-run camps housing some 230,000 Sudanese refugees in east Chad, is in the flooded area. There are also 170,000 displaced Chadians in the area. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
The situation of children in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has gone from bad to worse, with 60,000 people newly driven from their homes by fighting in North Kivu province, exposing youngsters to the dangers of forced recruitment and sexual exploitation, according to UNICEF. More than 8,000 children have been separated from militias. In most cases, these former child soldiers are returned to their communities, but UNICEF has received a report of 54 cases of children recruited in northeast Kivu and believes the number may range into the thousands. (UN News)
Ethiopia
Distribution of food for more than 60,000 Ethiopian flood victims has started amid some overcrowding in temporary shelters and the threat of an outbreak of water-borne diseases, the UN World Food Program (WFP) reported Sept. 14. More than180,000 people in Amhara, Afar and Tigray in northern Ethiopia, in Gambella in the west and in the Southern Nations region in the south were hit by the seasonal floods and 42,000 people have been displaced. Some are living in temporary shelters, while others have been taken in by relatives or friends. (UN News)
Ghana
The UN has deployed a six-member disaster assessment and coordination (UNDAC) team to north-eastern Ghana, which has been hit hardest by the floods that have followed a week of torrential rains across West Africa late last month. Thousands of homes in Ghanas Upper East Region were destroyed after the rains struck, several major bridges have collapsed and large areas of cropland have been destroyed, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported Sept. 14. More than 260,000 Ghanaians have been affected. (UN News)
Ivory Coast
In Ivory Coast (Cote d'Ivoire) five years after a rebellion carved up a country and a people already burdened by ethnic strife, the government is set to begin an operation to tackle the grievance at the heart of the revolt: granting undocumented Ivorians ID papers and the rights that go with them. Observers say the long-overdue identification process is crucial, and acknowledge that the open hostilities that marked the early days of the rebellion are far-off, but also say a return to violence is not impossible. (Reuters)
Mali
Tuareg rebels in northern Mali have agreed to free military hostages as government forces encircle their positions in a remote desert garrison town, a government source said on Sept. 19. Fighters loyal to insurgent chief Ibrahima Bahanga have besieged Tin-Zaouatene since last Friday following a flurry of raids against military targets in what appears to be a limited revival of the region's 1990s Tuareg rebellion. The army set up a cordon, while local officials from neighboring Algeria extracted guarantees including the release of government soldiers and access for a demining team. (Reuters)
Nigeria
The Nigerian president has ordered an investigation into alleged links between government officials in the Niger Delta and violent criminal gangs. Rivers State officials - including the Deputy Governor - are accused of being secretly in control of the gangs. Turf wars between rival gangs in the state capital, Port Harcourt, last month left around 40 people dead. The city has been under night curfew since 17 August and last week the army sent in troops and helicopter gunships. (BBC)
Rwanda
Several of Africa's poorest countries are in need of assistance due to severe floods that have killed more than 200 people and affected a million in recent weeks. The latest victims were reported in Rwanda, where officials from the northern region said floods killed 15 people and destroyed more than 500 homes since Sept. 12. Meanwhile, German authorities have detained a former Hutu minister wanted in connection with Rwanda's 1994 civil war and genocide, Germany's federal police said. The statement did not name the man but said he had been a planning minister at the time of the civil war. (AFP, Reuters)
Somalia
Heavy fighting between insurgents and Somali government troops around Mogadishu's Bakara market overnight killed at least two civilians, a witness said on Sept. 19. In the worst violence since the formation of a new opposition alliance, suspected insurgents fired rocket-propelled grenades and automatic gunfire into the Mogadishu slum at the center of the city near where government troops are garrisoned. (Reuters)
Sudan
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Sept. 18 he had raised with Sudan's president Khartoum's refusal to hand over two suspected Darfur war criminals to an international court. The Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) in May charged Ahmad Harun with organizing, funding and arming militia to stop rebels from attacking the Sudanese army. Harun is now the minister of state for humanitarian affairs, which the ICC says is akin to having named the man who helped foment the crisis in charge of managing it. (Reuters)
Tanzania
Tanzanian health authorities have cautioned people living in regions neighboring the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) following the outbreak of Ebola hemorrhagic fever in the central African country. Meanwhile the UN World Health Organization (WHO) clarified that while the latest figures released by various sources mention 375 cases and 167 deaths in western Kasai Province of DRC, the cause of death cannot be confirmed yet. (Reuters)
Uganda
The WFP appealed Sept. 18 for USD 64.6 million to feed up to 1.7 million people in Uganda until March to stave off hunger for victims of severe floods, refugees and others displaced by conflict and civil strife. WFP teams are on the ground distributing food to flood victims, but access is difficult and, without new funds, everything is in jeopardy. Widespread flooding recently affected at least 300,000 people, and Uganda is also trying to cope with an influx of thousands of potential asylum-seekers fleeing the Congo (DRC) as well as with 1.4 million refugees and IDPs. (UN News)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's government backtracked on a wage freeze, the official media reported, just days before labor unions hold a national strike protesting it. The main labor organization, the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, called a countrywide strike for Sept. 20-21 to protest the wage controls and other economic policies that have led to record unemployment and chronic food shortages. Meanwhile, Desmond Tutu, the former Archbishop of Cape Town, has called for tougher action to end the crisis in Zimbabwe, calling South Africa's "softly-softly" diplomatic approach a failure. (AP, BBC)
2007/09/13
King takes Bishop
2007/09/06| "He fought the regime and the regime fought back." -- Tendai Biti, the secretary general of one faction of Zimbabwean opposition Movement for Democratic Change, on the resignation of Pius Ncube, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Bulawayo, a prominent critic of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe, over an adultery scandal. Zimbabwe's state media in July published photographs of what it said was Bishop Ncube in bed with a married woman who worked for his parish. His lawyers called the allegations an orchestrated attempt to discredit him. He said he would work with ordinary people and would not be "silenced by the crude machinations of a wicked regime." In March, Bishop Ncube said he was prepared to stand in front of "blazing guns" at the front of street protests to bring down the government and urged other Zimbabweans to do the same. The news comes as the EU debates whether or not to invite Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe to a planned summit with Africa. The EU and Africa want to hold their first summit in seven years this December in Portugal, but must first overcome the problem of whether to invite Mugabe, who is accused of human rights violations. Plans for the summit were on hold because some EU countries have refused to attend if Mugabe is there, while African countries have refused to come if he is barred. U.N. Round-Up With the whole of sub-Saharan Africa currently off track for meeting a single one of the ambitious goals the world has set itself for slashing poverty, hunger, disease and illiteracy by 2015, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is convening an unprecedented meeting of development leaders Sept. 14 to put the continent back on the rails to progress. The MDG Africa Steering Group was set up by Mr. Ban after a report in June showed that despite faster growth and strengthened institutions, Africa at its present rate would fail to achieve any of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) adopted by the UN Millennium Summit in 2000. People-smuggling boats from Somalia have once again taken to the Gulf of Aden in the perilous annual exodus to Yemen, despite bad weather conditions, amid reports of new deadly atrocities committed by smugglers against the migrants, the UNHCR said Sept. 11. "Twelve died on the high seas under horrific circumstances. At least five of them were beaten and stabbed by smugglers and thrown overboard, while another six died of asphyxiation and dehydration in the hold of a boat." UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond said. In the past week, 324 Somalis and Ethiopians have landed in Yemen as the new people-smuggling season gets underway with the anticipated arrival of better weather, in an annual ritual which sees tens of thousands of migrants risking their lives in rickety vessels at the hands of often unscrupulous and brutal traffickers. Congo (DRC) A vaccination campaign targeting thousands of displaced children and pregnant women is to commence next week in a camp in North Kivu, eastern Congo (DRC), health officials said. At least 6,400 children aged between one and five years will also be given deworming medicine. In addition, 2,000 pregnant women are expected to be vaccinated against maternal and neo-natal tetanus during the seven-day exercise beginning Sept. 17 under the government's extended vaccination program in partnership with UNICEF. Meanwhile, an outbreak of Ebola fever has been confirmed in West Kasai province. (Reuters) Ethiopia Fireworks burst over Addis Ababa and couples kissed as crowds cheered the "end of the dark ages" in Millennium celebrations, seven years after the rest of the world according to their ancient calendar. Whistles, car horns and sirens shook the air on the stroke of midnight as Ethiopia, following a calendar long abandoned by the West, entered the 21st century. Tens of thousands of revelers swarmed the capital's main Meskel Square where soldiers stood guard over festivities that Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said marked Ethiopia's renaissance. (Reuters) Ivory Coast One week into a nationwide strike, the union of state doctors in Ivory Coast has again rebuffed a call by the heath ministry to reinstate at least minimum services. The Minister of Public Health condemned the strike, in which people in ambulances have been turned away from hospitals, others dying on stretchers with no medical workers in sight. On Sept. 11, Amichia Magloire, secretary general of the national union of senior health executives (SYNACASS-CI) told the Ivorian press that after a meeting the union had decided "to pursue the strike without minimum services... until its demands are satisfied." (Reuters) Kenya Kenya and its development partners are due to launch a five-year joint assistance strategy this week in a bid to make aid more effective, according to a World Bank statement. The World Bank said the new strategy will address the challenges that Kenya and donors have experienced in ensuring development assistance makes an impact on the livelihoods of Kenyans, especially the poor. Meanwhile, a Kenyan human rights group has condemned the killing of 14 people by Tanzanian police, who claim they were suspected bank robbers. On Sept. 11, 12 of the dead were identified as Kenyan nationals - including one woman. (Xinhua, BBC) Liberia Liberia has exported its first batch of diamonds since the lifting of a UN embargo imposed to stop the gems being used to finance the country's civil war. Diamonds worth USD 200 million were sent abroad in recent days, Information Minister Laurence Bropleh said. In other news, Liberian officials say the government must reinstate its agency responsible for responding to natural disasters, which has been defunct since the height of the war. "The National Disaster Relief Commission is inactive," Arthur Tarlue, head of the commission told IRIN. "It exists in name only." Tarlue said that since 1990 when Liberia's war intensified no resources have been allocated for the commission's operations. (AFP, IRIN) Malawi Malawi's parliament Sept. 11 passed the 2007/08 national budget, which had been delayed by a political row. Delays in passing the USD 1.2 billion budget had threatened to cut off essential services in the country, which relies heavily on donor support for its public spending. Malawi's parliament approved the budget after nearly five months of political impasse that held up key development programs in one of the world's poorest countries. The budget was supposed to take effect July 1, the beginning of the official financial year. But opposition lawmakers blocked its discussion, saying that lawmakers who defected to join President Bingu wa Mutharika's ruling Democratic Progressive Party should first be expelled. (AP) Mauritius In the 1980s, there were only about 10 Echo Parakeets left alive. But, in a rare success story, a two-decade conservation program in a wooded corner of Mauritius has brought the endangered bird back from the brink of extinction. Evolving over millions of years on the once-uninhabited Indian Ocean island best known as the site of the dodo's demise, the green-feathered Echo Parakeet was hit hard by rats, monkeys and the loss of forest that came with the arrival of humans. But careful breeding, supplementary feeding and the protection of nests have boosted numbers in the wild to more than 320 birds. (Reuters) Nigeria Niger Delta kidnappers have freed two of the 11 governing officials seized in Ondo State at the weekend in a row over payments for alleged vote-rigging. The militants say the Ondo state governor, Dr Olusegun Agagu, reneged on an agreement to pay them for helping rig the April election. The kidnappers are demanding a ransom of nearly USD 4 million. But a People's Democratic Party (PDP) official denied the polls were rigged, and said the gunmen would get nothing. (BBC) Senegal Two decades after the death of her daughter in a pre-marriage ceremony known as "female circumcision," Marietou Ndiaye has become a leading campaigner for the eradication of genital mutilation. Her village is one of many being educated in human rights by local aid group Tostan, which will receive the world's largest humanitarian award, the USD 1.5 million Conrad N. Hilton Prize, at a ceremony in New York late on Sept. 12. Tostan uses traditional song, poetry, theater and dance to educate some of the region's poorest villagers. (Reuters) Somalia Child malnutrition in Somalia is at critical levels due to violence and lack of access for aid workers, UNICEF said Sept. 12. It said 83,000 children in central and southern parts of Somalia were suffering from malnutrition and 13,500 of those were severely malnourished. Clashes between Islamist-led insurgents and government forces backed by Ethiopian troops have raged since January, when a sharia court group was ousted from the capital Mogadishu. In other news, unknown assailants Sept. 11 shot and killed a local employee of the WHO in an Abudwak district. (Reuters) Sudan A senior Darfur rebel leader Sept. 12 accused the Sudanese government of trying to grab land ahead of October peace talks, and threatened to pull out of the talks unless attacks stopped. Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) leader Khalil Ibrahim said the violence would make it impossible for him to travel to negotiations with Khartoum, due to take place in Libya on Oct. 27. A JEM field commander said government aircraft had bombed villages in north Darfur on Sept. 11, killing six civilians. Ibrahim said he was calling on the UN to step up its pressure on the Sudanese government to stop the attacks. (Reuters) Uganda Any attack on Ugandan rebels based in eastern Congo will be an invitation for the group to resume its war in northern Uganda, the fugitive Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) said on Sept. 12. The LRA terrorized the north for 20 years but are now based in northeastern Congo and their representatives are in peace talks with the government. In other news, residents of a camp for internally displaced people (IDPs) in northern Uganda sang and ululated at a ceremony to mark the formal closure of the settlement and the return of most of the 18,000 inhabitants to their villages now that prospects for peace seem promising. (Reuters) Zimbabwe The EU should invite Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe to a planned summit with Africa because barring him would jeopardize relations between Africa and Europe, the Commonwealth's secretary general said. The EU and Africa want to hold their first summit in seven years this December in Portugal, but must first overcome the problem of whether to invite Mugabe, who is accused of human rights violations. Plans for the summit were on hold because some EU countries have refused to attend if Mugabe is there, while African countries have refused to come if he is barred. (Reuters) |
Burundi
Burundi peace negotiators condemned on Sept. 5 the latest clash between rival rebel factions and urged all parties to respect a ceasefire in place to end more than a decade of ethnic conflict. The fighting pitted Burundi's last active rebel group, the Forces for National Liberation (FNL), against a group who have broken away from the FNL in opposition to the leadership of Agathon Rwasa. On Sept.4, at least 20 were killed in the clashes. The government and FNL rebels signed a peace deal last September stirring hopes of lasting peace in the nation where more than a decade of civil war has killed 300,000 people. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
A rebel general in eastern DRC has called on the government to return to a peace process, after intense fighting. The U.N. says it is backing Congolese government troops in their intensifying fight against rebels led by General Laurent Nkunda. The Congolese army has deployed a helicopter gunship against the rebels. Clashes are continuing in two parts of North Kivu province, including in a park inhabited by mountain gorillas. Some 170,000 people have fled the area this year, says the UN refugee agency. (BBC)
Ethiopia
The government has denied as baseless reports by Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) of a growing humanitarian crisis in the Ogaden region where government forces and ONLF rebels have been fighting for months. MSF said that it was blocked from entering areas worst affected by the fighting. Two of the aid agency's expatriate staff spoke of seeing burned and deserted villages and a dire health situation. The government said the reports were an attempt to project an image of instability. Meanwhile, Ethiopia has stepped up recruitment and training of primary healthcare providers and is building more health centers in an effort to make such care available for all by 2010. (Reuters)
Somalia
Two international media watchdogs said Sept. 5 Somali reporters were in danger after unidentified gunmen threatened the life of an official in the country's journalists union. The International Federation of Journalists said a leader of the National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ), Ali Moallim Isak, received threatening telephone calls and two armed men went in search of him at the group's offices on Tuesday. Reporters Without Borders said at least 13 journalists had fled Mogadishu, with 10 stuck at a border crossing into Kenya because of restricted entry visas into the more stable neighboring country. (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
State media authorities are trying to tone down party political broadcasts alleging executions and machete attacks to try to defuse tensions ahead of a presidential run-off vote on Saturday. The poll, the culmination of the first elections since U.N. peacekeepers left, pits opposition leader Ernest Bai Koroma against VP Solomon Berewa, the two frontrunners in the Aug. 11 round. Since then, party-run radio stations have fuelled violence between their respective supporters, while the local Awareness Times newspaper has accused U.N. staff of engaging in "criminal conduct" and rigging the election. (Reuters)
South Africa
Two South African women were burnt to death by a group of students who suspected the victims had bewitched their high school with evil spirits, the South African Press Association reported on Sept. 5. The 60-year-old women were dragged from their homes near Manguzi in KwaZulu-Natal province and taken to a sports field by students from Manhlenga High School, police told SAPA. There they were doused with petrol and set alight, police said. One died at the scene and the other later in hospital. (Reuters)
Sudan
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon visited the Darfur region of western Sudan on Sept. 5, promising to step up pressure for a political solution to the conflict. Ban said he would push for progress in peace talks between the government and rebel groups, while laying the ground for deployment of a 26,000-strong "hybrid" force of U.N. and African Union peacekeepers. Ban met officials from the AU Mission in Sudan (AMIS), which will be replaced by the hybrid troops. The official strength of the AU force is 7,000, but there are now 5,915 troops. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's main bread producer has warned it only has two days' supply of flour, state media have reported. The company, Lobels Bread, said a flour shortage had already forced it to scale back its operations by 80 percent. Reports say 36,000 tonnes of imported wheat are blocked in a Mozambican port owing to foreign exchange shortages. A foreign currency crisis caused inflation to rise to 7,638 percent in July. Government price controls have been blamed for worsening shortages. (BBC)
2007/08/30Burundi peace negotiators condemned on Sept. 5 the latest clash between rival rebel factions and urged all parties to respect a ceasefire in place to end more than a decade of ethnic conflict. The fighting pitted Burundi's last active rebel group, the Forces for National Liberation (FNL), against a group who have broken away from the FNL in opposition to the leadership of Agathon Rwasa. On Sept.4, at least 20 were killed in the clashes. The government and FNL rebels signed a peace deal last September stirring hopes of lasting peace in the nation where more than a decade of civil war has killed 300,000 people. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
A rebel general in eastern DRC has called on the government to return to a peace process, after intense fighting. The U.N. says it is backing Congolese government troops in their intensifying fight against rebels led by General Laurent Nkunda. The Congolese army has deployed a helicopter gunship against the rebels. Clashes are continuing in two parts of North Kivu province, including in a park inhabited by mountain gorillas. Some 170,000 people have fled the area this year, says the UN refugee agency. (BBC)
Ethiopia
The government has denied as baseless reports by Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) of a growing humanitarian crisis in the Ogaden region where government forces and ONLF rebels have been fighting for months. MSF said that it was blocked from entering areas worst affected by the fighting. Two of the aid agency's expatriate staff spoke of seeing burned and deserted villages and a dire health situation. The government said the reports were an attempt to project an image of instability. Meanwhile, Ethiopia has stepped up recruitment and training of primary healthcare providers and is building more health centers in an effort to make such care available for all by 2010. (Reuters)
Somalia
Two international media watchdogs said Sept. 5 Somali reporters were in danger after unidentified gunmen threatened the life of an official in the country's journalists union. The International Federation of Journalists said a leader of the National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ), Ali Moallim Isak, received threatening telephone calls and two armed men went in search of him at the group's offices on Tuesday. Reporters Without Borders said at least 13 journalists had fled Mogadishu, with 10 stuck at a border crossing into Kenya because of restricted entry visas into the more stable neighboring country. (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
State media authorities are trying to tone down party political broadcasts alleging executions and machete attacks to try to defuse tensions ahead of a presidential run-off vote on Saturday. The poll, the culmination of the first elections since U.N. peacekeepers left, pits opposition leader Ernest Bai Koroma against VP Solomon Berewa, the two frontrunners in the Aug. 11 round. Since then, party-run radio stations have fuelled violence between their respective supporters, while the local Awareness Times newspaper has accused U.N. staff of engaging in "criminal conduct" and rigging the election. (Reuters)
South Africa
Two South African women were burnt to death by a group of students who suspected the victims had bewitched their high school with evil spirits, the South African Press Association reported on Sept. 5. The 60-year-old women were dragged from their homes near Manguzi in KwaZulu-Natal province and taken to a sports field by students from Manhlenga High School, police told SAPA. There they were doused with petrol and set alight, police said. One died at the scene and the other later in hospital. (Reuters)
Sudan
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon visited the Darfur region of western Sudan on Sept. 5, promising to step up pressure for a political solution to the conflict. Ban said he would push for progress in peace talks between the government and rebel groups, while laying the ground for deployment of a 26,000-strong "hybrid" force of U.N. and African Union peacekeepers. Ban met officials from the AU Mission in Sudan (AMIS), which will be replaced by the hybrid troops. The official strength of the AU force is 7,000, but there are now 5,915 troops. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's main bread producer has warned it only has two days' supply of flour, state media have reported. The company, Lobels Bread, said a flour shortage had already forced it to scale back its operations by 80 percent. Reports say 36,000 tonnes of imported wheat are blocked in a Mozambican port owing to foreign exchange shortages. A foreign currency crisis caused inflation to rise to 7,638 percent in July. Government price controls have been blamed for worsening shortages. (BBC)
Angola
As a direct result of the road clearance and verification undertaken by the NGO Mines Advisory Group (MAG) since early 2005, it is possible for the first time in decades to travel safely on 250 kilometers of primary road running deep into the interior of Moxico Province. Along with Angolan authorities, international NGOs, the UN, and EU states, MAG has been integral to an international bridge construction project which has included opening corridors into Congo (DRC), Namibia and Zambia and resulted in the construction of over 30 bridges. (Reuters)
Botswana
Botswana has reduced the rate of HIV transmission from mother to child to less than 4 percent - approaching levels in rich nations and providing fresh evidence that hundreds of thousand of babies can be saved annually from acquiring the deadly virus. Botswana's success, specialists say, is due to political support and several policy decisions, including the testing of all pregnant women for HIV unless they refuse; providing HIV test results in 20 minutes to the expectant mothers; and for HIV-positive women, giving dual drug treatment. (IHT)
Burkina Faso
The government will distribute millions of free books to primary school students and launch a pilot project to give no-fee schooling in a push to curb the number of people in the country growing up without even basic education. Some 10.5 million books for primary school children have already been ordered, according to Odile Bonkoungou, minister of basic education and literacy. The project is in line with a push from the World Bank and the UN to encourage free education in developing countries worldwide. (Reuters)
Djibouti
President Ismail Omar Guelleh accused French magistrates of politicizing an investigation into the death of a French judge in the Red Sea state 12 years ago. In a ruling made public on August 27, a Versailles court ordered the trial of two of Guelleh's close aides in connection with the death of Bernard Borrel, whose charred corpse was found in Djibouti in 1995. Local authorities initially ruled it a suicide, but his widow has accused high-ranking local officials of involvement. The Borrel case is sensitive for France because Djibouti is home to its biggest military base in Africa. (Reuters)
Ethiopia
The UN plans to send a fact-finding mission Aug. 30 to Ethiopia's Ogaden region where separatist rebels who killed 74 people in an April attack say they are facing the toughest government crackdown in years. The UN will assess allegations by ONLF rebels and rights groups of human rights abuses as well as the basic needs of Ogaden's ethnic Somalis. ONLF says a trade blockade is choking food supplies and causing starvation in the region inhabited mostly by nomadic herders. Meanwhile, Six Norwegian diplomats will have to leave Ethiopia because of alleged interference in the country's internal affairs. (Reuters, BBC)
Ivory Coast
Rural areas in Ivory Coast seem to have fallen off the map in HIV/AIDS prevention efforts, and although the HIV prevalence rates are still lower than those found in cities, experts fear they could climb. The country's political and military crisis has led to huge population movements, disrupted social and health services, and the slowdown of prevention and control programs. The country's HIV prevalence stood at 7 percent in 2005, according to UNAIDS, one of the highest rates in West Africa. (Reuters)
Rwanda
The World Bank's Board of executive Directors has approved an International Development Association (IDA) grant of USD 11 million for the Transport Sector Development Project in Rwanda. Estimated to cost a total of USD 69 million, the project is supported by a complementary Africa Catalytic Growth Fund (ACGF) grant in the amount of USD 38 million (which was approved by the Regional Vice President for Africa last July 27), while the remaining USD 20 million will be provided by the government of Rwanda through the Road Maintenance Fund. (World Bank)
Sierra Leone
The risk that Sierra Leone could again descend into the chaos and civil war of the 1990s remains unlikely ahead of the second round of presidential elections on Sept. 8, international officials say – even after outgoing president Ahmad Tejan Kabbah threatened to impose a state of emergency following election-related riots in the main diamond town of Kono on August 27 and the stabbing of several people in Freetown. Presidential spokesman Christain Stohmann said tensions are high as the second round is going to be close. (Reuters)
Sudan
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon set ambitious goals Aug. 28 for a tour he will make next week of Sudan, Chad and Libya, saying he aimed to lay the foundations of lasting peace in Darfur. But cautioned that a massive peace mission due to go to Darfur would fail without the government's full support. An estimated 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million have been displaced in Darfur. Meanwhile, Sudanese opposition politician Mubarak al-Fadil met his lawyers for the first time since being detained without charge more than 40 days ago, for allegedly plotting a coup. (Reuters)
As a direct result of the road clearance and verification undertaken by the NGO Mines Advisory Group (MAG) since early 2005, it is possible for the first time in decades to travel safely on 250 kilometers of primary road running deep into the interior of Moxico Province. Along with Angolan authorities, international NGOs, the UN, and EU states, MAG has been integral to an international bridge construction project which has included opening corridors into Congo (DRC), Namibia and Zambia and resulted in the construction of over 30 bridges. (Reuters)
Botswana
Botswana has reduced the rate of HIV transmission from mother to child to less than 4 percent - approaching levels in rich nations and providing fresh evidence that hundreds of thousand of babies can be saved annually from acquiring the deadly virus. Botswana's success, specialists say, is due to political support and several policy decisions, including the testing of all pregnant women for HIV unless they refuse; providing HIV test results in 20 minutes to the expectant mothers; and for HIV-positive women, giving dual drug treatment. (IHT)
Burkina Faso
The government will distribute millions of free books to primary school students and launch a pilot project to give no-fee schooling in a push to curb the number of people in the country growing up without even basic education. Some 10.5 million books for primary school children have already been ordered, according to Odile Bonkoungou, minister of basic education and literacy. The project is in line with a push from the World Bank and the UN to encourage free education in developing countries worldwide. (Reuters)
Djibouti
President Ismail Omar Guelleh accused French magistrates of politicizing an investigation into the death of a French judge in the Red Sea state 12 years ago. In a ruling made public on August 27, a Versailles court ordered the trial of two of Guelleh's close aides in connection with the death of Bernard Borrel, whose charred corpse was found in Djibouti in 1995. Local authorities initially ruled it a suicide, but his widow has accused high-ranking local officials of involvement. The Borrel case is sensitive for France because Djibouti is home to its biggest military base in Africa. (Reuters)
Ethiopia
The UN plans to send a fact-finding mission Aug. 30 to Ethiopia's Ogaden region where separatist rebels who killed 74 people in an April attack say they are facing the toughest government crackdown in years. The UN will assess allegations by ONLF rebels and rights groups of human rights abuses as well as the basic needs of Ogaden's ethnic Somalis. ONLF says a trade blockade is choking food supplies and causing starvation in the region inhabited mostly by nomadic herders. Meanwhile, Six Norwegian diplomats will have to leave Ethiopia because of alleged interference in the country's internal affairs. (Reuters, BBC)
Ivory Coast
Rural areas in Ivory Coast seem to have fallen off the map in HIV/AIDS prevention efforts, and although the HIV prevalence rates are still lower than those found in cities, experts fear they could climb. The country's political and military crisis has led to huge population movements, disrupted social and health services, and the slowdown of prevention and control programs. The country's HIV prevalence stood at 7 percent in 2005, according to UNAIDS, one of the highest rates in West Africa. (Reuters)
Rwanda
The World Bank's Board of executive Directors has approved an International Development Association (IDA) grant of USD 11 million for the Transport Sector Development Project in Rwanda. Estimated to cost a total of USD 69 million, the project is supported by a complementary Africa Catalytic Growth Fund (ACGF) grant in the amount of USD 38 million (which was approved by the Regional Vice President for Africa last July 27), while the remaining USD 20 million will be provided by the government of Rwanda through the Road Maintenance Fund. (World Bank)
Sierra Leone
The risk that Sierra Leone could again descend into the chaos and civil war of the 1990s remains unlikely ahead of the second round of presidential elections on Sept. 8, international officials say – even after outgoing president Ahmad Tejan Kabbah threatened to impose a state of emergency following election-related riots in the main diamond town of Kono on August 27 and the stabbing of several people in Freetown. Presidential spokesman Christain Stohmann said tensions are high as the second round is going to be close. (Reuters)
Sudan
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon set ambitious goals Aug. 28 for a tour he will make next week of Sudan, Chad and Libya, saying he aimed to lay the foundations of lasting peace in Darfur. But cautioned that a massive peace mission due to go to Darfur would fail without the government's full support. An estimated 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million have been displaced in Darfur. Meanwhile, Sudanese opposition politician Mubarak al-Fadil met his lawyers for the first time since being detained without charge more than 40 days ago, for allegedly plotting a coup. (Reuters)
2007/08/23
Angola
Two types of tankers compete for space on the roads lined with shacks that lead to the docks in Luanda, the Angolan capital: water and oil. More than half the people living in informal settlements, called musseques, depend on private tankers for their daily water in the oil-rich country. More than 300 privately owned trucks bring water into the city every day from a pumping station in Kifangondo, 20km outside Luanda on the Bengo River. Despite impressive revenues from oil and diamonds, only a privileged minority in Luanda have access to running water, Medecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said in a briefing paper. (IRIN)
Congo (DRC)
Some 10,000 Congolese have fled into Uganda fearing fresh fighting in their own country after a protest organized by a renegade general turned violent, the Ugandan army said Aug 22. A Ugandan military spokesman said the refugees feared renewed clashes between DRC troops and forces loyal to General Laurent Nkunda after Nkunda organized an anti-U.N. demonstration that turned into a riot. Refugees told officials in Uganda's Kisoro District that they expected more fighting after villagers, urged on by Nkunda's men, rioted Aug. 21 in protest against U.N. troops they said failed to protect them from militias. (Reuters)
Guinea
Guinea's government says commercially viable reserves of uranium have been discovered for the first time. Information Minister Justin Morel Junior announced that samples of uranium were extracted by a mineral company in Firawa. Guinea is hoping to cash in on the strong global demand for uranium as a nuclear fuel, which has led prices to boom. The West African nation already has a third of the world's bauxite reserves. (BBC)
Kenya
Kenyan authorities have signed a deal with a Japanese firm, to upgrade the country's geothermal power plants by an extra-35 megawatts. The Kenya Electricity Generating Company (KenGen), a state-run power firm, signed an agreement with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Joint Venture, for the installation of new machines at the country's second geothermal power plant to boost generation. As a clean energy, the geothermal expansion project has qualified for carbon credits of about USD 13 million under the World Bank sponsored Clean Development Mechanism program. (Xinhua)
Liberia
The court trying ex-Liberian President Charles Taylor for war crimes has postponed the case until January 2008. His defense team had asked for a delay until 7 January saying it needed more time to evaluate new evidence. Taylor, the first former African head of state to face an international war crimes court, is accused of responsibility for atrocities committed by rebels during the war in neighboring Sierra Leone. (BBC)
Niger
Tuareg-led rebels from the Niger Movement for Justice (MNJ) said late Aug. 21 they had killed 15 government soldiers in a clash at Gougaram in the West African country's remote Saharan north, where uranium is mined. The rebel group, which before the latest reported fighting had already killed at least 44 government troops since February, said a large convoy of military vehicles had advanced towards the town of Iferouane on Aug.21, prompting the following day's clash. The MNJ is demanding a fairer share in its mineral wealth and more development assistance. (Reuters)
Rwanda
The UN is investigating claims that a general set to head its force in Sudan's Darfur region, participated in the Rwandan genocide. UN spokesman Yves Sorokobi said human rights groups should submit evidence inking Rwandan General Karenzi Karake to any alleged crimes. The African Union approved General Karake to become the deputy commander of the AU-UN hybrid force in Darfur. A Belgium-based Rwandan exile group has accused General Karake of supervising the killings of civilians during the genocide in Rwanda and the DRC Congo. (BBC)
Somalia
Allegations that humanitarian operations fuel insurgency in the Somali capital Mogadishu by the city's mayor have been slammed as "irresponsible" by a minister in the fragile transitional government as analysts expressed concern. Mayor Mohamed Umar Habeb said Aug. 20 that the international community was feeding "terrorists" and warned that they would have to deal with the consequences. Justice Minister Hassan Dhimbil Warsame told IRIN to say not to give food to displaced people, mainly women and children, call them terrorists is irresponsible. (IRIN)
South Africa
Neither food nor food supplements are alternatives to drug therapy in treating people with HIV/AIDS, South Africa's top scientific advisory panel said Aug. 21, amid a controversy over the nation's AIDS policies. The Academy of Science of South Africa report was issued as President Thabo Mbeki faced new criticism over support for his health minister, who promotes nutritional treatment for AIDS, and the firing of a deputy minister who backed drug treatments. The inter-disciplinary scientific panel began studying nutritional influences on the human immune system in October 2005. (Reuters)
Sudan
Some 89 people have died in flooding in Sudan as heavy rains that washed away homes and spread water-borne disease continue to batter the country. Officials have described this year's floods as the worst in living memory with unexpectedly early rains destroying more than 70,000 homes. A UN statement said the world body was giving Sudan a grant of USD 8.7 million for flood relief. (Reuters)
Uganda
Construction of Uganda's much- needed Bujagali Hydropower Plant has finally kicked off in a bid to address the deepening power crisis that is threatening the country’s economic growth. The construction of the USD 750 million project was launched on Aug. 21. The 250 MW power project is considered an integral component of the country's strategy to close an energy supply gap that constrains social and economic development. The project is being financed by the government, the World Bank and a consortium led by Kenya-based Industrial Promotions Services Ltd. (Xinhua)
2007/08/16
| "We are back where we started; sending raw materials out, bringing cheap manufactured goods in. This isn't progress. It is colonialism." -- Wilfred Collins Wonani, head of the Zambian Chamber of Commerce, sighing at the loss of one of the city's biggest employers after the factory was bought by a Chinese firm and renamed the Zambia China Mulungushi Textiles factory in an interview with the New York Times. The vast compound used to spool out millions of yards of brightly colored African cloth. Today, only the cotton gin still runs, with the company's Chinese managers buying raw cotton for export to China's humming textile industry. This year, China pledged USD 20 billion to finance trade and infrastructure across the African continent over the next three years and in Zambia alone, China plans to invest USD 800 million in the next few years. But critics say China is also exporting huge volumes of finished, manufactured goods to those same countries, from T-shirts to flashlights, radios to socks, hampering Africa's ability to make its own products and develop healthy, diverse economies. |
Angola
Two types of tankers compete for space on the roads lined with shacks that lead to the docks in Luanda, the Angolan capital: water and oil. More than half the people living in informal settlements, called musseques, depend on private tankers for their daily water in the oil-rich country. More than 300 privately owned trucks bring water into the city every day from a pumping station in Kifangondo, 20km outside Luanda on the Bengo River. Despite impressive revenues from oil and diamonds, only a privileged minority in Luanda have access to running water, Medecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said in a briefing paper. (IRIN)
Congo (DRC)
Some 10,000 Congolese have fled into Uganda fearing fresh fighting in their own country after a protest organized by a renegade general turned violent, the Ugandan army said Aug 22. A Ugandan military spokesman said the refugees feared renewed clashes between DRC troops and forces loyal to General Laurent Nkunda after Nkunda organized an anti-U.N. demonstration that turned into a riot. Refugees told officials in Uganda's Kisoro District that they expected more fighting after villagers, urged on by Nkunda's men, rioted Aug. 21 in protest against U.N. troops they said failed to protect them from militias. (Reuters)
Guinea
Guinea's government says commercially viable reserves of uranium have been discovered for the first time. Information Minister Justin Morel Junior announced that samples of uranium were extracted by a mineral company in Firawa. Guinea is hoping to cash in on the strong global demand for uranium as a nuclear fuel, which has led prices to boom. The West African nation already has a third of the world's bauxite reserves. (BBC)
Kenya
Kenyan authorities have signed a deal with a Japanese firm, to upgrade the country's geothermal power plants by an extra-35 megawatts. The Kenya Electricity Generating Company (KenGen), a state-run power firm, signed an agreement with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Joint Venture, for the installation of new machines at the country's second geothermal power plant to boost generation. As a clean energy, the geothermal expansion project has qualified for carbon credits of about USD 13 million under the World Bank sponsored Clean Development Mechanism program. (Xinhua)
Liberia
The court trying ex-Liberian President Charles Taylor for war crimes has postponed the case until January 2008. His defense team had asked for a delay until 7 January saying it needed more time to evaluate new evidence. Taylor, the first former African head of state to face an international war crimes court, is accused of responsibility for atrocities committed by rebels during the war in neighboring Sierra Leone. (BBC)
Niger
Tuareg-led rebels from the Niger Movement for Justice (MNJ) said late Aug. 21 they had killed 15 government soldiers in a clash at Gougaram in the West African country's remote Saharan north, where uranium is mined. The rebel group, which before the latest reported fighting had already killed at least 44 government troops since February, said a large convoy of military vehicles had advanced towards the town of Iferouane on Aug.21, prompting the following day's clash. The MNJ is demanding a fairer share in its mineral wealth and more development assistance. (Reuters)
Rwanda
The UN is investigating claims that a general set to head its force in Sudan's Darfur region, participated in the Rwandan genocide. UN spokesman Yves Sorokobi said human rights groups should submit evidence inking Rwandan General Karenzi Karake to any alleged crimes. The African Union approved General Karake to become the deputy commander of the AU-UN hybrid force in Darfur. A Belgium-based Rwandan exile group has accused General Karake of supervising the killings of civilians during the genocide in Rwanda and the DRC Congo. (BBC)
Somalia
Allegations that humanitarian operations fuel insurgency in the Somali capital Mogadishu by the city's mayor have been slammed as "irresponsible" by a minister in the fragile transitional government as analysts expressed concern. Mayor Mohamed Umar Habeb said Aug. 20 that the international community was feeding "terrorists" and warned that they would have to deal with the consequences. Justice Minister Hassan Dhimbil Warsame told IRIN to say not to give food to displaced people, mainly women and children, call them terrorists is irresponsible. (IRIN)
South Africa
Neither food nor food supplements are alternatives to drug therapy in treating people with HIV/AIDS, South Africa's top scientific advisory panel said Aug. 21, amid a controversy over the nation's AIDS policies. The Academy of Science of South Africa report was issued as President Thabo Mbeki faced new criticism over support for his health minister, who promotes nutritional treatment for AIDS, and the firing of a deputy minister who backed drug treatments. The inter-disciplinary scientific panel began studying nutritional influences on the human immune system in October 2005. (Reuters)
Sudan
Some 89 people have died in flooding in Sudan as heavy rains that washed away homes and spread water-borne disease continue to batter the country. Officials have described this year's floods as the worst in living memory with unexpectedly early rains destroying more than 70,000 homes. A UN statement said the world body was giving Sudan a grant of USD 8.7 million for flood relief. (Reuters)
Uganda
Construction of Uganda's much- needed Bujagali Hydropower Plant has finally kicked off in a bid to address the deepening power crisis that is threatening the country’s economic growth. The construction of the USD 750 million project was launched on Aug. 21. The 250 MW power project is considered an integral component of the country's strategy to close an energy supply gap that constrains social and economic development. The project is being financed by the government, the World Bank and a consortium led by Kenya-based Industrial Promotions Services Ltd. (Xinhua)
2007/08/16
U.N. Round-Up
African nations have pledged enough troops for Darfur's 26,000-strong peacekeeping force and non-Africans are not needed, the African Union's top diplomat Alpha Oumar Konare said. "I can say ... that we have enough pledges from African nations so that we do not need to turn to forces from non-African countries," Konare said, according to an AU statement issued Aug. 13. The UN Security Council authorized the joint UN-African Union force last month to police the remote region of western Sudan, where mostly non-Arab rebels and the Khartoum government have been fighting for four years.
African nations pressed the UN on Aug. 13 to supply peacekeeping backup for turbulent Somalia similar to that initially provided for Sudan's war-torn Darfur region. A Security Council meeting on Somalia heard a request from the African Union to match one of two support packages, known as "light" and "heavy," that were voted through to try to end the Darfur violence, Reuters reports diplomats said. The council responded with a draft resolution that called for more contingency planning for a UN peacekeeping operation to replace an AU force in Somalia, but without committing itself to sending one.
Southern African Development Community (SADC) is poised to launch the Free Trade Area by January 2008 to accelerate the regional agenda of the grouping. SADC Deputy Executive Secretary Joao Samuel Caholo said at a weekend media briefing to highlight the status of the regional integration. Most member countries had met the targets except for a few countries that were yet to agree on the SADC trade protocols as well as in the gazetting of tariff phase down, according to Caholo. SADC head of trade, finance and investments Nokokure Murangi told a news conference Madagascar, Malawi and Mozambique had presented tariff phase-down proposals, which SADC leaders will examine during a 3-day summit starting in Lusaka on Aug. 16.
Chad
Chad's ruling presidential majority and opposition parties signed a deal Aug 13 to create an independent elections commission and delay parliamentary elections due in December by two years. The political parties, representing a broad range of affiliations, also called on President Idriss Deby's government and armed rebels operating in the east to resolve their differences through peaceful negotiation. "The agreement … is a code of good conduct for political life in Chad," Deby said after a signing ceremony. (Reuters)
Eritrea
The US said Aug. 13 it had ordered closed an Eritrean consulate, which Asmara called the latest "unjust and unfriendly" U.S. action in a worsening diplomatic relationship. The US and the UN accuse Eritrea of funneling weapons to Islamist insurgents in Mogadishu fighting the Ethiopian-backed Somali interim government. A US embassy official in Asmara who spoke on condition of anonymity said the Eritrean consulate in Oakland, California, last week was given 90 days to close down, in response to restrictions placed on the embassy in Eritrea. (Reuters)
Kenya
The IFC has launched a program to support the construction and equipping of local schools in Kenya and will partner with local banks by providing risk cover to enable them to lend out money to private schools. In other news, Kenyan journalists have staged a silent protest through the streets of the capital against a media law that would compel them to disclose their sources. Hundreds of journalists carried placards asking President Mwai Kibaki to reject it. (East African Standard, BBC)
Liberia
Former Liberian President Charles Taylor's war crimes trial has been postponed again after his new defense team asked for a delay until January 2008 to prepare fully. The trial was due to resume on Aug. 20, but judges are expected to set a new date for the case to continue, a court spokesman said. Taylor, accused of instigating murder, rape and mutilation in a quest for diamonds during Sierra Leone's civil war, boycotted the opening of his trial in June in a dispute over the resources allocated his defense. (Reuters)
Malawi
Malawi's parliament met for the first time in nearly three weeks on Aug 13 but failed to reach an agreement on the country's budget as a political standoff threatened to cut off key services. The budget debate was indefinitely suspended in July over a dispute on the poaching of opposition members by the ruling party. The opposition is offering to adopt a temporary three-month budget, but the government insisted it needed the USD 1.2 billion annual budget now. The proposed budget allocates more resources to poor rural areas, higher spending on health care and food production. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Nigerian gunmen kidnapped the mother of a state legislator in the southern oil producing Niger Delta while in a separate case the 11-year-old son of another legislator was released on Aug. 14. There have been three abductions in recent weeks targeting relatives of Bayelsa legislators. In other news, Nigeria's central bank has said it will make the country's currency convertible by 2009. The change should help increase flows of money into the banking system and encourage investment. (Reuters, BBC)
Rwanda
Rwanda has criticized the Congo (DRC) for halting military operations against Hutu rebels who fled there after the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Rwanda's foreign minister told the BBC the rebels were attempting to gather strength in eastern DR Congo to launch attacks on his country. Earlier this week, DR Congo said it stopped the seven-month offensive to avoid further bloodshed. The UN says more than 160,000 people have been displaced by fighting. (BBC)
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone's outgoing president has appealed for calm and placed the police on alert as the results of Saturday's polls are counted. "I have instructed the police... to deal firmly with any threats to the peace and security," Ahmad Tejan Kabbah said in a statement on national radio. He made the comments as supporters of rival candidates used unofficial results to claim victory. The poll is the second since the end of a civil war that killed thousands. (BBC)
Somalia
The Somali government is trying to create a Baghdad-style safe "Green Zone" in Mogadishu to protect senior officials and foreign visitors from insurgent attacks, Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi said Aug 14. In an interview with Reuters, the Somali premier also accused U.S.-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) of "abusing" his government and siding with radical Islamists in a report alleging war crimes against Mogadishu's population. (Reuters)
Sudan
A cholera outbreak in eastern Sudan, which has spread due to devastating floods across the region, has killed 49 people and affected some 710 others, a World Health Organization (WHO) official said Aug 14. Last year a cholera outbreak throughout Sudan killed 700 people and affected 25,000. It was the first time in many years the water-borne disease had been reported in Sudan. All recent cases were reported in the eastern Gedaref state and Kassala town, with the first reported on April 19. (Reuters)
African nations have pledged enough troops for Darfur's 26,000-strong peacekeeping force and non-Africans are not needed, the African Union's top diplomat Alpha Oumar Konare said. "I can say ... that we have enough pledges from African nations so that we do not need to turn to forces from non-African countries," Konare said, according to an AU statement issued Aug. 13. The UN Security Council authorized the joint UN-African Union force last month to police the remote region of western Sudan, where mostly non-Arab rebels and the Khartoum government have been fighting for four years.
African nations pressed the UN on Aug. 13 to supply peacekeeping backup for turbulent Somalia similar to that initially provided for Sudan's war-torn Darfur region. A Security Council meeting on Somalia heard a request from the African Union to match one of two support packages, known as "light" and "heavy," that were voted through to try to end the Darfur violence, Reuters reports diplomats said. The council responded with a draft resolution that called for more contingency planning for a UN peacekeeping operation to replace an AU force in Somalia, but without committing itself to sending one.
Southern African Development Community (SADC) is poised to launch the Free Trade Area by January 2008 to accelerate the regional agenda of the grouping. SADC Deputy Executive Secretary Joao Samuel Caholo said at a weekend media briefing to highlight the status of the regional integration. Most member countries had met the targets except for a few countries that were yet to agree on the SADC trade protocols as well as in the gazetting of tariff phase down, according to Caholo. SADC head of trade, finance and investments Nokokure Murangi told a news conference Madagascar, Malawi and Mozambique had presented tariff phase-down proposals, which SADC leaders will examine during a 3-day summit starting in Lusaka on Aug. 16.
Chad
Chad's ruling presidential majority and opposition parties signed a deal Aug 13 to create an independent elections commission and delay parliamentary elections due in December by two years. The political parties, representing a broad range of affiliations, also called on President Idriss Deby's government and armed rebels operating in the east to resolve their differences through peaceful negotiation. "The agreement … is a code of good conduct for political life in Chad," Deby said after a signing ceremony. (Reuters)
Eritrea
The US said Aug. 13 it had ordered closed an Eritrean consulate, which Asmara called the latest "unjust and unfriendly" U.S. action in a worsening diplomatic relationship. The US and the UN accuse Eritrea of funneling weapons to Islamist insurgents in Mogadishu fighting the Ethiopian-backed Somali interim government. A US embassy official in Asmara who spoke on condition of anonymity said the Eritrean consulate in Oakland, California, last week was given 90 days to close down, in response to restrictions placed on the embassy in Eritrea. (Reuters)
Kenya
The IFC has launched a program to support the construction and equipping of local schools in Kenya and will partner with local banks by providing risk cover to enable them to lend out money to private schools. In other news, Kenyan journalists have staged a silent protest through the streets of the capital against a media law that would compel them to disclose their sources. Hundreds of journalists carried placards asking President Mwai Kibaki to reject it. (East African Standard, BBC)
Liberia
Former Liberian President Charles Taylor's war crimes trial has been postponed again after his new defense team asked for a delay until January 2008 to prepare fully. The trial was due to resume on Aug. 20, but judges are expected to set a new date for the case to continue, a court spokesman said. Taylor, accused of instigating murder, rape and mutilation in a quest for diamonds during Sierra Leone's civil war, boycotted the opening of his trial in June in a dispute over the resources allocated his defense. (Reuters)
Malawi
Malawi's parliament met for the first time in nearly three weeks on Aug 13 but failed to reach an agreement on the country's budget as a political standoff threatened to cut off key services. The budget debate was indefinitely suspended in July over a dispute on the poaching of opposition members by the ruling party. The opposition is offering to adopt a temporary three-month budget, but the government insisted it needed the USD 1.2 billion annual budget now. The proposed budget allocates more resources to poor rural areas, higher spending on health care and food production. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Nigerian gunmen kidnapped the mother of a state legislator in the southern oil producing Niger Delta while in a separate case the 11-year-old son of another legislator was released on Aug. 14. There have been three abductions in recent weeks targeting relatives of Bayelsa legislators. In other news, Nigeria's central bank has said it will make the country's currency convertible by 2009. The change should help increase flows of money into the banking system and encourage investment. (Reuters, BBC)
Rwanda
Rwanda has criticized the Congo (DRC) for halting military operations against Hutu rebels who fled there after the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Rwanda's foreign minister told the BBC the rebels were attempting to gather strength in eastern DR Congo to launch attacks on his country. Earlier this week, DR Congo said it stopped the seven-month offensive to avoid further bloodshed. The UN says more than 160,000 people have been displaced by fighting. (BBC)
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone's outgoing president has appealed for calm and placed the police on alert as the results of Saturday's polls are counted. "I have instructed the police... to deal firmly with any threats to the peace and security," Ahmad Tejan Kabbah said in a statement on national radio. He made the comments as supporters of rival candidates used unofficial results to claim victory. The poll is the second since the end of a civil war that killed thousands. (BBC)
Somalia
The Somali government is trying to create a Baghdad-style safe "Green Zone" in Mogadishu to protect senior officials and foreign visitors from insurgent attacks, Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi said Aug 14. In an interview with Reuters, the Somali premier also accused U.S.-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) of "abusing" his government and siding with radical Islamists in a report alleging war crimes against Mogadishu's population. (Reuters)
Sudan
A cholera outbreak in eastern Sudan, which has spread due to devastating floods across the region, has killed 49 people and affected some 710 others, a World Health Organization (WHO) official said Aug 14. Last year a cholera outbreak throughout Sudan killed 700 people and affected 25,000. It was the first time in many years the water-borne disease had been reported in Sudan. All recent cases were reported in the eastern Gedaref state and Kassala town, with the first reported on April 19. (Reuters)
2007/08/09
Benin
President Boni Yayi of Benin denounced the corruption and mismanagement crippling his country and Africa in general, in an interview with AFP as the former French colony celebrated its independence day. Yayi was speaking as Benin celebrated Wednesday the 47th anniversary of its own independence from France. (AFP)
Burundi
Police in Burundi arrested central bank governor Isaac Bizimana at the weekend for allegedly embezzling state funds. Officials said the government lost millions of dollars when an oil importing firm was overpaid. The payment was to reimburse the firm, Interpetrol, for losses it incurred prior to 2002 when Burundi was under blockade because of a military coup. (BBC)
Central African Republic (CAR)
Some 26,000 refugees who have fled insecurity in the Central African Republic and are now living in Cameroon will soon receive much-needed help from several United Nations agencies joining forces to alleviate their plight. On Aug. 8, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), along with other UN agencies, launched a relief operation to aid the refugees who are scattered along the eastern border of Cameroon and living in very precarious conditions. (UN News)
Chad
A joint report by the UN refugee agency and its Sudanese Government counterpart has recommended that the estimated 30,000 Chadians who have fled to neighboring Darfur to escape a worsening security situation in their homeland be classified as refugees. But the report also warned that anyone in that group who is an active or former combatant in the clashes in Chad should not be granted refugee status, UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) spokesperson Jennifer Pagonis said Aug. 7. (UN News)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia said Aug. 8 it had killed more than 500 rebels and captured 170 in the past two months during an offensive in the volatile but energy-rich Ogaden region bordering Somalia. The Ogaden rebel group ONLF dismissed the statement as an attempt by the government to lull oil companies interested in the region into a "false sense of security," and urged foreign firms to stay away. ONLF carried out a deadly attack on a Chinese-run oilfield in the area in April. (Reuters)
Guinea
Guinea, home to a third of the world's bauxite reserves, expects large investment projects to total USD27 billion by 2015, an official of a national anti-poverty program said Aug. 6 at the launch of Guinea's Poverty Reduction Strategy document. (Reuters)
Ivory Coast
President Laurent Gbagbo says Ivory Coast can organize twice postponed elections by the end of the year. He was speaking in a televised address on the eve of the country's Independence Day holiday Aug. 7. Ivory Coast has been split in half since rebels seized the north nearly five years ago. But a recent peace deal, and the appointment of a former rebel leader as prime minister, has boosted hopes of a peaceful end to the crisis. (BBC)
Kenya
Kenyan women have launched a campaign to collect 1 million signatures to lobby MPs to reserve 50 seats in parliament for women before elections later this year. Some 10,000 women attended a rally in the capital, Nairobi, calling for the Affirmative Action Bill to be passed. Health Minister Charity Ngliu said that women face bias and financial drawbacks when seeking nomination, but they were ready to take up positions. In the current parliament, only 18 out of 224 MPs are women. (BBC)
Mauritania
Mauritania's parliament has unanimously passed legislation making the practice of slavery punishable by up to 10 years in prison. The new law also stipulates that anyone found guilty of promoting or being an apologist for slavery could face two years in jail. Slavery persists in parts of Mauritania even though it was banned in 1981. A Mauritanian anti-slavery group, SOS Slavery, said there could be up to 600,000 slaves in Mauritania, many of them used as bonded labor. (BBC)
Nigeria
Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua has ordered the suspension of a multi-million dollar contract awarded by his predecessor Olusegun Obasanjo. The USD 145 million contract to build health clinics across the country was awarded to a company believed to be owned by a former aide to Obasanjo. In other news, Shell British Petroleum has dragged the Nigerian Federal Government to the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), an arm of the World Bank, over a dispute concerning hydrocarbon concession. (BBC, All Africa)
Senegal
Senegal's budget deficit for 2006 reached almost six percent of its GDP, nearly twice the previous year's figure, the regional office of the World Bank estimated in its monthly review. To help correct that deficit, the World Bank analysis called on Senegal to resolve the crisis in its energy sector as a matter of urgency. (AFP)
South Africa
An eight-day strike by workers in the fuel industry ended Aug. 6 after a deal was reached with employers. Unions had been demanding a 10 percent pay rise but settled for 8.5 percent, as well as some extra benefits. The strike shut down South Africa's largest refinery, causing fuel shortages. In other news, the economy is booming, leading to higher inflation and wider trade deficits, the IMF said in its latest annual review of South Africa's economy. (BBC, Dow Jones)
Sudan
The UN has released details of the countries that have pledged troops or police for a peacekeeping force in the Sudanese region of Darfur. The proposed force, backed by the UN and the African Union, will comprise up to 26,000 members, most of them drawn from eight African nations. Some Asian nations have also promised forces. No Europeans or Americans are participating at this stage. A UN official said the force needed more specialized military equipment. (BBC)
Uganda
Uganda's government has announced it will pay a USD 10 monthly allowance to the country's "chronically poor." Any Ugandan who was born, raised or has lived in poverty all their life will be eligible, officials said. An additional USD 6 a month will be given to families who care for needy orphans and children with disabilities. The government has already received USD 4 million from international aid agencies including Help The Aged to fund the scheme, minister Sulaiman Madada said. (BBC)
President Boni Yayi of Benin denounced the corruption and mismanagement crippling his country and Africa in general, in an interview with AFP as the former French colony celebrated its independence day. Yayi was speaking as Benin celebrated Wednesday the 47th anniversary of its own independence from France. (AFP)
Burundi
Police in Burundi arrested central bank governor Isaac Bizimana at the weekend for allegedly embezzling state funds. Officials said the government lost millions of dollars when an oil importing firm was overpaid. The payment was to reimburse the firm, Interpetrol, for losses it incurred prior to 2002 when Burundi was under blockade because of a military coup. (BBC)
Central African Republic (CAR)
Some 26,000 refugees who have fled insecurity in the Central African Republic and are now living in Cameroon will soon receive much-needed help from several United Nations agencies joining forces to alleviate their plight. On Aug. 8, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), along with other UN agencies, launched a relief operation to aid the refugees who are scattered along the eastern border of Cameroon and living in very precarious conditions. (UN News)
Chad
A joint report by the UN refugee agency and its Sudanese Government counterpart has recommended that the estimated 30,000 Chadians who have fled to neighboring Darfur to escape a worsening security situation in their homeland be classified as refugees. But the report also warned that anyone in that group who is an active or former combatant in the clashes in Chad should not be granted refugee status, UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) spokesperson Jennifer Pagonis said Aug. 7. (UN News)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia said Aug. 8 it had killed more than 500 rebels and captured 170 in the past two months during an offensive in the volatile but energy-rich Ogaden region bordering Somalia. The Ogaden rebel group ONLF dismissed the statement as an attempt by the government to lull oil companies interested in the region into a "false sense of security," and urged foreign firms to stay away. ONLF carried out a deadly attack on a Chinese-run oilfield in the area in April. (Reuters)
Guinea
Guinea, home to a third of the world's bauxite reserves, expects large investment projects to total USD27 billion by 2015, an official of a national anti-poverty program said Aug. 6 at the launch of Guinea's Poverty Reduction Strategy document. (Reuters)
Ivory Coast
President Laurent Gbagbo says Ivory Coast can organize twice postponed elections by the end of the year. He was speaking in a televised address on the eve of the country's Independence Day holiday Aug. 7. Ivory Coast has been split in half since rebels seized the north nearly five years ago. But a recent peace deal, and the appointment of a former rebel leader as prime minister, has boosted hopes of a peaceful end to the crisis. (BBC)
Kenya
Kenyan women have launched a campaign to collect 1 million signatures to lobby MPs to reserve 50 seats in parliament for women before elections later this year. Some 10,000 women attended a rally in the capital, Nairobi, calling for the Affirmative Action Bill to be passed. Health Minister Charity Ngliu said that women face bias and financial drawbacks when seeking nomination, but they were ready to take up positions. In the current parliament, only 18 out of 224 MPs are women. (BBC)
Mauritania
Mauritania's parliament has unanimously passed legislation making the practice of slavery punishable by up to 10 years in prison. The new law also stipulates that anyone found guilty of promoting or being an apologist for slavery could face two years in jail. Slavery persists in parts of Mauritania even though it was banned in 1981. A Mauritanian anti-slavery group, SOS Slavery, said there could be up to 600,000 slaves in Mauritania, many of them used as bonded labor. (BBC)
Nigeria
Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua has ordered the suspension of a multi-million dollar contract awarded by his predecessor Olusegun Obasanjo. The USD 145 million contract to build health clinics across the country was awarded to a company believed to be owned by a former aide to Obasanjo. In other news, Shell British Petroleum has dragged the Nigerian Federal Government to the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), an arm of the World Bank, over a dispute concerning hydrocarbon concession. (BBC, All Africa)
Senegal
Senegal's budget deficit for 2006 reached almost six percent of its GDP, nearly twice the previous year's figure, the regional office of the World Bank estimated in its monthly review. To help correct that deficit, the World Bank analysis called on Senegal to resolve the crisis in its energy sector as a matter of urgency. (AFP)
South Africa
An eight-day strike by workers in the fuel industry ended Aug. 6 after a deal was reached with employers. Unions had been demanding a 10 percent pay rise but settled for 8.5 percent, as well as some extra benefits. The strike shut down South Africa's largest refinery, causing fuel shortages. In other news, the economy is booming, leading to higher inflation and wider trade deficits, the IMF said in its latest annual review of South Africa's economy. (BBC, Dow Jones)
Sudan
The UN has released details of the countries that have pledged troops or police for a peacekeeping force in the Sudanese region of Darfur. The proposed force, backed by the UN and the African Union, will comprise up to 26,000 members, most of them drawn from eight African nations. Some Asian nations have also promised forces. No Europeans or Americans are participating at this stage. A UN official said the force needed more specialized military equipment. (BBC)
Uganda
Uganda's government has announced it will pay a USD 10 monthly allowance to the country's "chronically poor." Any Ugandan who was born, raised or has lived in poverty all their life will be eligible, officials said. An additional USD 6 a month will be given to families who care for needy orphans and children with disabilities. The government has already received USD 4 million from international aid agencies including Help The Aged to fund the scheme, minister Sulaiman Madada said. (BBC)
2007/08/02
| "It is practical. It's taken into consideration most of our concerns -- we are comfortable with the resolution." -- Sudan's Foreign Minister Lam Akol in an interview with Reuters, after his country promised on Aug. 1 to cooperate with deployment of up to 26,000 UN and African Union troops and police to quell violence in Darfur after the UN Security Council authorized the force. "Now that we have been part of the discussion we will definitely cooperate with it," he said, adding that the government had no problem with deploying the entire force, which is expected to take up to a year. The hybrid mission will be able to use force to protect civilians and the world's biggest aid operation, but the resolution was watered down and no longer allows troops to seize illegal arms. There was also no threat of sanctions if Sudan fails to comply. Sally Chin, Sudan analyst from the International Crisis Group think tank, said the unanimous vote -- including Sudan's ally China -- sent a strong signal. "Just because the 'sticks' of sanctions was removed from the text...does not mean they don't still exist as a tool, as the UK and the US made very clear," she said. The mission, authorized on July 31, will absorb an African Union force that has failed to end violence in Sudan's remote west, where international experts say about 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million driven from their homes since 2003. |
African governments, especially those rich in natural resources, should do more to battle corruption and strengthen financial governance, the IMF said July 30. In an interview with Reuters in Maputo, Abdoulaye Bio-Tchane, Director of the IMF's African department said that the world's poorest continent needed to continue the progress it had made to make its governments more transparent and less prone to graft. Bio-Tchane said that growth for Africa as a whole would be 7 percent in 2007. The forecast for sub-Saharan Africa is still below the threshold needed to attain the UN Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving extreme poverty by 2015, according to the IMF's estimates.
Angola
The Angolan government in Luanda last week reiterated that it is accelerating the implementation of a strategy of diversifying its economy by developing non-oil sectors in GDP. Assistant Minister of Angolan Prime Minister Aguinaldo Jaime said the government has been rehabilitating basic infrastructures for the sustainable growth and development of the economy. (Xinhua)
Burundi
Burundi risks losing USD 40 million in World Bank funds because its divided parliament has failed to ratify the grant, the country's vice-presidency has warned. The World Bank allocated USD 40 million to Burundi to tackle poverty in the 116 communes, but opposition lawmakers have so far refused to ratify the convention, spokesman Steve De Cliff told reporters Sunday. The World Bank will accept an extension until August 21 but after that the aid will be cancelled, he said. (AFP)
Congo (DRC)
The world's longest power cables in the Cong (DRC) are to be repaired after decades of disrepair. A USD 178 million World Bank loan will help national electricity company Snel to increase power for the mining sector. Meanwhile, UN monitors have evacuated a south-eastern town in the DRC after two of their civilian staff were injured in rioting. People took to the streets of Moba in Katanga province, angered by rumors that ethnic Tutsis who fled during the long war may be returning to the area. (BBC)
Ethiopia
The UN Security Council agreed July 30 to extend the mandate by six months of the United Nations peacekeeping mission monitoring the ceasefire that ended the border war between Ethiopia and Eritrea in 2000, voicing concern about the ongoing tensions between the two African neighbors. In a unanimous resolution, Council members said repeated violations by both sides of the Temporary Security Zone (TSZ) along the border, and continued delays in the demarcation of that border, were creating a "potentially unstable security situation." (UN News)
Mauritania
The World Bank has approved a new Country Assistance Strategy for Mauritania to run between 2008 and 2011, putting more emphasis on private-sector development. The new strategy focuses on increasing non-oil investment in the economy, improving the soundness and efficiency of the Mauritanian financial system and providing support to prepare public private partnerships in the energy sector. (Global Insight Daily Analysis, UK)
Niger
As Niger enters the "lean season," when food from the last harvest runs out, too many children are still at risk of malnutrition despite much progress made over the past two years, UNICEF has warned. Although a lot has been done to improve the situation, "we must be ready and must scale up the response to save thousands child lives at risk during the lean season," UNICEF country representative Akhil Iyer said. The latest national nutrition survey reveals that the proportion of children suffering from acute malnutrition is contained at 11.2 percent at the national level, down from 15.3 percent in October 2005. More importantly, as compared to October 2005, the severe form of acute malnutrition has been cut in half. (UN News)
Somalia
The UN and its international partners in the search for peace in Somalia plan to step up their contacts with the country's National Reconciliation Congress in an effort to bring stability to a faction-riven land that has had no functioning central government for 16 years. The UN led a delegation of the International Advisory Group to Mogadishu over the weekend to attend and receive an update on Congress's ongoing work. "The delegation expressed its intention for members of the international community to have henceforth a frequent presence at the Congress," UN spokesperson Marie Okabe told a news briefing in New York July 31. (UN News)
South Africa
South Africa will soon carry out a nationwide survey among businesses, whose results will be used to help combat corruption in business. Public Service and Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi said on Monday that the survey is expected to assist policy makers to assess and monitor corruption in private sector businesses countrywide. (Xinhua)
Tonga
Tonga became the 151st member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) last week. As part of its entry package, Tonga agreed to make several commitments to liberalize its trade regime, including lowering all import tariff lines to 15 or 20 percent within one year. The country also was required to eliminate all industrial subsidy schemes prohibited by the WTO by the final date of its accession. (AP)
Zimbabwe
The WFP appealed Aug.1 for USD 118 million to assist over three million Zimbabweans facing severe food shortages caused by a poor harvest and worsening economic turmoil in the southern African nation. "Hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans are already starting to run out of food and several million more will be reliant on humanitarian assistance" by year's end, stated WFP's Regional Director for Southern Africa, Amir Abdulla. Meanwhile, President Robert Mugabe has promised to print more money to fund municipal projects, a government newspaper reported July 28. The pledge came despite hyperinflation that has created severe shortages of cornmeal, meat, milk and other staples. (UN News, AP)
2007/07/26
Angola
The Angolan government in Luanda last week reiterated that it is accelerating the implementation of a strategy of diversifying its economy by developing non-oil sectors in GDP. Assistant Minister of Angolan Prime Minister Aguinaldo Jaime said the government has been rehabilitating basic infrastructures for the sustainable growth and development of the economy. (Xinhua)
Burundi
Burundi risks losing USD 40 million in World Bank funds because its divided parliament has failed to ratify the grant, the country's vice-presidency has warned. The World Bank allocated USD 40 million to Burundi to tackle poverty in the 116 communes, but opposition lawmakers have so far refused to ratify the convention, spokesman Steve De Cliff told reporters Sunday. The World Bank will accept an extension until August 21 but after that the aid will be cancelled, he said. (AFP)
Congo (DRC)
The world's longest power cables in the Cong (DRC) are to be repaired after decades of disrepair. A USD 178 million World Bank loan will help national electricity company Snel to increase power for the mining sector. Meanwhile, UN monitors have evacuated a south-eastern town in the DRC after two of their civilian staff were injured in rioting. People took to the streets of Moba in Katanga province, angered by rumors that ethnic Tutsis who fled during the long war may be returning to the area. (BBC)
Ethiopia
The UN Security Council agreed July 30 to extend the mandate by six months of the United Nations peacekeeping mission monitoring the ceasefire that ended the border war between Ethiopia and Eritrea in 2000, voicing concern about the ongoing tensions between the two African neighbors. In a unanimous resolution, Council members said repeated violations by both sides of the Temporary Security Zone (TSZ) along the border, and continued delays in the demarcation of that border, were creating a "potentially unstable security situation." (UN News)
Mauritania
The World Bank has approved a new Country Assistance Strategy for Mauritania to run between 2008 and 2011, putting more emphasis on private-sector development. The new strategy focuses on increasing non-oil investment in the economy, improving the soundness and efficiency of the Mauritanian financial system and providing support to prepare public private partnerships in the energy sector. (Global Insight Daily Analysis, UK)
Niger
As Niger enters the "lean season," when food from the last harvest runs out, too many children are still at risk of malnutrition despite much progress made over the past two years, UNICEF has warned. Although a lot has been done to improve the situation, "we must be ready and must scale up the response to save thousands child lives at risk during the lean season," UNICEF country representative Akhil Iyer said. The latest national nutrition survey reveals that the proportion of children suffering from acute malnutrition is contained at 11.2 percent at the national level, down from 15.3 percent in October 2005. More importantly, as compared to October 2005, the severe form of acute malnutrition has been cut in half. (UN News)
Somalia
The UN and its international partners in the search for peace in Somalia plan to step up their contacts with the country's National Reconciliation Congress in an effort to bring stability to a faction-riven land that has had no functioning central government for 16 years. The UN led a delegation of the International Advisory Group to Mogadishu over the weekend to attend and receive an update on Congress's ongoing work. "The delegation expressed its intention for members of the international community to have henceforth a frequent presence at the Congress," UN spokesperson Marie Okabe told a news briefing in New York July 31. (UN News)
South Africa
South Africa will soon carry out a nationwide survey among businesses, whose results will be used to help combat corruption in business. Public Service and Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi said on Monday that the survey is expected to assist policy makers to assess and monitor corruption in private sector businesses countrywide. (Xinhua)
Tonga
Tonga became the 151st member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) last week. As part of its entry package, Tonga agreed to make several commitments to liberalize its trade regime, including lowering all import tariff lines to 15 or 20 percent within one year. The country also was required to eliminate all industrial subsidy schemes prohibited by the WTO by the final date of its accession. (AP)
Zimbabwe
The WFP appealed Aug.1 for USD 118 million to assist over three million Zimbabweans facing severe food shortages caused by a poor harvest and worsening economic turmoil in the southern African nation. "Hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans are already starting to run out of food and several million more will be reliant on humanitarian assistance" by year's end, stated WFP's Regional Director for Southern Africa, Amir Abdulla. Meanwhile, President Robert Mugabe has promised to print more money to fund municipal projects, a government newspaper reported July 28. The pledge came despite hyperinflation that has created severe shortages of cornmeal, meat, milk and other staples. (UN News, AP)
2007/07/26
Chad
The European Union took the first step towards sending forces to Chad and the Central African Republican to help the United Nations protect refugees trapped in the violent region bordering Darfur. EU foreign ministers meeting in Brussels asked the bloc's military staff to start detailed planning for a possible operation to help a U.N. police mission restore security. "We now have a European initiative," French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, who had pressed the 27-nation bloc to act, told reporters. Military staff will start working on a possible year-long deployment of a 1,500 to 3,000-strong force to be sent at the earliest at the end of October, diplomats said. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
The United Nations Mission in Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) will reinforce its presence in the north-east of the central African country to ensure Ugandan rebels do not cross over, a spokesman said. About 80 Moroccan blue helmets will be deployed in Ngundu near both the Sudanese and Ugandan borders to double MONUC's forces in the remote town, said Lieutenant Colonel Gabriel de Brosses, the mission's military spokesman. "The situation of armed groups in the DRC needs to end," de Brosses said. Up to 1,000 members of Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) have entered DRC from southern Sudan, where they were meant to gather in two bases under a 2006 cessation of hostilities agreement signed with Uganda. (DPA)
Ethiopia
The Red Cross has been given seven days to leave the Ogaden region bordering Somalia by the Ethiopian government. The ICRC has been carrying out water and sanitation projects there. An army crackdown in the area after a series of rebel attacks has restricted the movement of essential goods. The rebel group, the Ogaden National Liberation Movement, accuses the government of blockading the region, and producing a "man-made famine." (BBC)
Ivory Coast
The United Nations is investigating allegations of widespread sexual abuse and exploitation by peacekeepers serving in Ivory Coast. The U.N. said a unit of its contingent in Bouake, a northern rebel stronghold, had been confined to base. It would not give the nationalities of those troops under investigation. Claims of sexual abuse have been made against U.N. troops on various missions, prompting ex-U.N. chief Kofi Annan to declare a "zero tolerance" policy. (BBC)
Niger
Niger's prime minister and military chiefs met neighboring Algeria's President Abdelaziz Bouteflika on July 22 to discuss cross-border cooperation against Tuareg-led rebels in Niger's desert north, officials said. The rebel Niger Movement for Justice has killed at least 36 soldiers and taken dozens hostage since launching an insurgency in February to demand greater autonomy for the vast region around the ancient Saharan caravan town of Agadez. The government refuses to negotiate with the group, saying they are drug traffickers and common bandits, but has called on its neighbours to try to stop the flow of weapons, fuel and food thought to be reaching them from other Saharan armed groups. Some officials and civil society organisations in Niger have accused Libya of supporting the insurgents, who have also targeted mining interests in a region which contains some of the world's largest uranium deposits as well as reserves of oil. (Reuters)
Sudan
The United Nations human rights chief called on Sudan to protect a village of 4,500 people in West Darfur where armed men in military uniform have carried out abductions and sexual violence. Louise Arbour, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, urged the Khartoum government to fulfill its pledge to set up a permanent police presence in the village of Bir Dagig, 30 kms north of el-Geneina, and also investigate the abuses. "A number of human rights abuses are said to have been committed in the village of Bir Dagig, mostly by armed men in military uniform since the first of July," said U.N. human rights spokesman Jose-Luis Diaz. (Reuters)
2007/07/19
The European Union took the first step towards sending forces to Chad and the Central African Republican to help the United Nations protect refugees trapped in the violent region bordering Darfur. EU foreign ministers meeting in Brussels asked the bloc's military staff to start detailed planning for a possible operation to help a U.N. police mission restore security. "We now have a European initiative," French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, who had pressed the 27-nation bloc to act, told reporters. Military staff will start working on a possible year-long deployment of a 1,500 to 3,000-strong force to be sent at the earliest at the end of October, diplomats said. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
The United Nations Mission in Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) will reinforce its presence in the north-east of the central African country to ensure Ugandan rebels do not cross over, a spokesman said. About 80 Moroccan blue helmets will be deployed in Ngundu near both the Sudanese and Ugandan borders to double MONUC's forces in the remote town, said Lieutenant Colonel Gabriel de Brosses, the mission's military spokesman. "The situation of armed groups in the DRC needs to end," de Brosses said. Up to 1,000 members of Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) have entered DRC from southern Sudan, where they were meant to gather in two bases under a 2006 cessation of hostilities agreement signed with Uganda. (DPA)
Ethiopia
The Red Cross has been given seven days to leave the Ogaden region bordering Somalia by the Ethiopian government. The ICRC has been carrying out water and sanitation projects there. An army crackdown in the area after a series of rebel attacks has restricted the movement of essential goods. The rebel group, the Ogaden National Liberation Movement, accuses the government of blockading the region, and producing a "man-made famine." (BBC)
Ivory Coast
The United Nations is investigating allegations of widespread sexual abuse and exploitation by peacekeepers serving in Ivory Coast. The U.N. said a unit of its contingent in Bouake, a northern rebel stronghold, had been confined to base. It would not give the nationalities of those troops under investigation. Claims of sexual abuse have been made against U.N. troops on various missions, prompting ex-U.N. chief Kofi Annan to declare a "zero tolerance" policy. (BBC)
Niger
Niger's prime minister and military chiefs met neighboring Algeria's President Abdelaziz Bouteflika on July 22 to discuss cross-border cooperation against Tuareg-led rebels in Niger's desert north, officials said. The rebel Niger Movement for Justice has killed at least 36 soldiers and taken dozens hostage since launching an insurgency in February to demand greater autonomy for the vast region around the ancient Saharan caravan town of Agadez. The government refuses to negotiate with the group, saying they are drug traffickers and common bandits, but has called on its neighbours to try to stop the flow of weapons, fuel and food thought to be reaching them from other Saharan armed groups. Some officials and civil society organisations in Niger have accused Libya of supporting the insurgents, who have also targeted mining interests in a region which contains some of the world's largest uranium deposits as well as reserves of oil. (Reuters)
Sudan
The United Nations human rights chief called on Sudan to protect a village of 4,500 people in West Darfur where armed men in military uniform have carried out abductions and sexual violence. Louise Arbour, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, urged the Khartoum government to fulfill its pledge to set up a permanent police presence in the village of Bir Dagig, 30 kms north of el-Geneina, and also investigate the abuses. "A number of human rights abuses are said to have been committed in the village of Bir Dagig, mostly by armed men in military uniform since the first of July," said U.N. human rights spokesman Jose-Luis Diaz. (Reuters)
2007/07/19
| "There is an enormous misconception that all of Africa is strife-torn and impossible - in reality it is 56 individual countries, and many of them are ranked by the World Bank as having better business environments than Greece or India." -- Brian Myerson, the U.K.-based South African activist investor, before listing a fund on the London Aim exchange to raise USD 180 million for investing in roads, telecommunications and other infrastructure projects in Africa, as cited by The Financial Times. "I am a pioneer corporate-governance activist in the U.K. and I am very keen to reform the image that Africa has," he said. With leverage, Myerson sees the fund as having up to USD 700 million to invest. He expects the managers to invest that within 18 months, primarily in projects that have contracts or concessions with creditworthy clients, including governments. Richard Bouma, a British citizen with more than 25 years of experience in Africa, most recently in corporate finance for HSBC's sub-Saharan African operations, will choose investments for the fund, PME African Infrastructure Opportunities. |
The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) July 17 pledged to increase agricultural productivity of the continent's small farmers and lift tens of millions of people out of extreme poverty in the near future. Addressing a press conference in Nairobi, AGRA chairman and former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said the organization has invested USD 150 million to support the development of new seed systems better equipped to cope with the harsh African climate. "Africa is the only region where overall food security and livelihoods are deteriorating. We will reverse this trend by working to create an environmentally sustainable, uniquely African Green Revolution. When our poorest farmers finally prosper, all of Africa will benefit," Annan told journalists in Nairobi.
The World Bank approved a USD 93 million credit for the construction of a power link between Malawi and Mozambique, giving the southern African neighbors access to reliable and affordable energy. Mozambique's share of the credit will be USD 45 million and involve the installation of a 135-km (84 miles), 220 kilovolt power line from the Matambo substation to Phombeya in Malawi. On the Malawi side, about 75 km (47 miles) of 220 kilovolt transmission line will be built and a new 220 kilovolt substation installed at Phombeya. Like elsewhere in Africa, both countries have been plagued by chronic electricity shortages and the project is another step in the development of a southern African power grid.
Congo (DRC)
The Swiss Confederation president said July 17 that Switzerland is prepared to restore to the DRC the fortune held in Swiss accounts by the late DRC dictator Mobutu Sese Seko.
Mobutu's holdings which have been blocked in Switzerland amount to about USD 6.5 million, the Swiss leader Micheline Calmy-Rey told reporters in Kinshasa after meeting DRC President Joseph Kabila. Calmy-Rey said that he asked Kabila to designate a representative in Switzerland so that a solution can quickly be found for returning the money. (AP)
Ivory Coast
Ivory Coast faces a crucial few weeks as it seeks to reestablish its position in the world's financial system after years of civil war and conflict. The World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the African Development Bank are all expected to decide whether to begin the process of rehabilitating the country, which has an estimated USD 16 billion of debts, about one quarter of which are in arrears. (Dow Jones)
Liberia
Liberian authorities have arrested a former armed forces chief and another retired officer for questioning over "subversive activities against the state," which could include a coup plot, officials said July 18. They said General Charles Julu, who had led a 1994 coup attempt and was a former presidential guard commander under slain Liberian President Samuel Doe, was detained along with Andrew Dorbor, a former colonel, earlier in the week. (Reuters)
Madagascar
An outbreak of syphilis has prompted the government in Madagascar to declare a state of emergency in the southern town of Fort Dauphin. Ongoing tests suggest that about 17,000 people, or 30 percent of the region's sexually active population, may have the sexually transmitted disease. An economic boom linked to local mining projects has attracted prostitutes and international mine workers. There are fears the condition could provide an entry route for HIV/AIDS. (BBC)
Rwanda
Rwanda called on the UN July 18 to take action against peacekeepers in Congo accused of trading food and intelligence with Rwandan Hutu rebels for gold. The world body, whose biggest peacekeeping mission is deployed in the Congo (DRC), is investigating allegations made against Indian troops in eastern Congo's troubled North Kivu province. Rwandan President Paul Kagame said his government had received intelligence reports implicating UN peacekeepers in the alleged smuggling before reports about it appeared in the press last week. (Reuters)
Senegal
An IMF team began a mission to Senegal last week to press for better public sector transparency, rein in growing budget deficits and agree a program to boost donor confidence and development aid. As well as traditional Western donors, the team will for the first time meet Senegal's "new" donors like Saudi Arabia, China and India, to whom it is increasingly turning for aid as it prepares to host a big Islamic summit next year. (Reuters)
Somalia
The UN World Food Program (WFP) has warned that its aid programs for hungry people in Somalia could be jeopardized without fresh contributions allowing the flow of relief to continue. WFP Country Director for Somalia Peter Goossens said the agency needs USD 19.5 million or 26,500 metric tons of food by the end of the year to feed 1 million people in Somalia. Without new contributions, WFP will be short 8,500 tons by October and the accumulated deficit will grow to 70,000 tons worth USD 53 million by next May. (UN News)
Sudan
Scientists have discovered the underground remnants of an ancient lake in Sudan's arid Darfur region, offering hope of tapping a precious resource and easing water scarcity, which experts say is the root of much of the unrest in the region. The researchers hope to drill at least 1,000 wells in the dusty territory and pump the long-hidden water to ease tensions among communities living there - and strengthen efforts to restore peace in Darfur. (AP)
Uganda
The trial of former Ugandan Health Minister Jim Muhwezi, accused of embezzling nearly USD 4.3 million, has begun in the capital, Kampala. Retired Major-General Muhwezi and four former senior government officials are also charged with abuse of office. They allegedly misused grants from the Global Alliance for Vaccinations and Immunizations (GAVI) and the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. The Global Fund halted USD 150 million of grants to Uganda over misuse of the fund. The judge announced he was adjourning their case until late October to allow a new prosecution team more time to study the evidence. (BBC)
2007/07/12The World Bank approved a USD 93 million credit for the construction of a power link between Malawi and Mozambique, giving the southern African neighbors access to reliable and affordable energy. Mozambique's share of the credit will be USD 45 million and involve the installation of a 135-km (84 miles), 220 kilovolt power line from the Matambo substation to Phombeya in Malawi. On the Malawi side, about 75 km (47 miles) of 220 kilovolt transmission line will be built and a new 220 kilovolt substation installed at Phombeya. Like elsewhere in Africa, both countries have been plagued by chronic electricity shortages and the project is another step in the development of a southern African power grid.
Congo (DRC)
The Swiss Confederation president said July 17 that Switzerland is prepared to restore to the DRC the fortune held in Swiss accounts by the late DRC dictator Mobutu Sese Seko.
Mobutu's holdings which have been blocked in Switzerland amount to about USD 6.5 million, the Swiss leader Micheline Calmy-Rey told reporters in Kinshasa after meeting DRC President Joseph Kabila. Calmy-Rey said that he asked Kabila to designate a representative in Switzerland so that a solution can quickly be found for returning the money. (AP)
Ivory Coast
Ivory Coast faces a crucial few weeks as it seeks to reestablish its position in the world's financial system after years of civil war and conflict. The World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the African Development Bank are all expected to decide whether to begin the process of rehabilitating the country, which has an estimated USD 16 billion of debts, about one quarter of which are in arrears. (Dow Jones)
Liberia
Liberian authorities have arrested a former armed forces chief and another retired officer for questioning over "subversive activities against the state," which could include a coup plot, officials said July 18. They said General Charles Julu, who had led a 1994 coup attempt and was a former presidential guard commander under slain Liberian President Samuel Doe, was detained along with Andrew Dorbor, a former colonel, earlier in the week. (Reuters)
Madagascar
An outbreak of syphilis has prompted the government in Madagascar to declare a state of emergency in the southern town of Fort Dauphin. Ongoing tests suggest that about 17,000 people, or 30 percent of the region's sexually active population, may have the sexually transmitted disease. An economic boom linked to local mining projects has attracted prostitutes and international mine workers. There are fears the condition could provide an entry route for HIV/AIDS. (BBC)
Rwanda
Rwanda called on the UN July 18 to take action against peacekeepers in Congo accused of trading food and intelligence with Rwandan Hutu rebels for gold. The world body, whose biggest peacekeeping mission is deployed in the Congo (DRC), is investigating allegations made against Indian troops in eastern Congo's troubled North Kivu province. Rwandan President Paul Kagame said his government had received intelligence reports implicating UN peacekeepers in the alleged smuggling before reports about it appeared in the press last week. (Reuters)
Senegal
An IMF team began a mission to Senegal last week to press for better public sector transparency, rein in growing budget deficits and agree a program to boost donor confidence and development aid. As well as traditional Western donors, the team will for the first time meet Senegal's "new" donors like Saudi Arabia, China and India, to whom it is increasingly turning for aid as it prepares to host a big Islamic summit next year. (Reuters)
Somalia
The UN World Food Program (WFP) has warned that its aid programs for hungry people in Somalia could be jeopardized without fresh contributions allowing the flow of relief to continue. WFP Country Director for Somalia Peter Goossens said the agency needs USD 19.5 million or 26,500 metric tons of food by the end of the year to feed 1 million people in Somalia. Without new contributions, WFP will be short 8,500 tons by October and the accumulated deficit will grow to 70,000 tons worth USD 53 million by next May. (UN News)
Sudan
Scientists have discovered the underground remnants of an ancient lake in Sudan's arid Darfur region, offering hope of tapping a precious resource and easing water scarcity, which experts say is the root of much of the unrest in the region. The researchers hope to drill at least 1,000 wells in the dusty territory and pump the long-hidden water to ease tensions among communities living there - and strengthen efforts to restore peace in Darfur. (AP)
Uganda
The trial of former Ugandan Health Minister Jim Muhwezi, accused of embezzling nearly USD 4.3 million, has begun in the capital, Kampala. Retired Major-General Muhwezi and four former senior government officials are also charged with abuse of office. They allegedly misused grants from the Global Alliance for Vaccinations and Immunizations (GAVI) and the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. The Global Fund halted USD 150 million of grants to Uganda over misuse of the fund. The judge announced he was adjourning their case until late October to allow a new prosecution team more time to study the evidence. (BBC)
Angola
The Angolan authorities have sent some 25,000 people back to the Democratic Republic of Congo, according to a UN-backed radio station. A local official in south-eastern DR Congo told the AFP news agency that "thousands" of people had crossed the border in recent days. Some of those expelled say all their goods were stolen. Angola's ambassador to DR Congo said these were the latest expulsions of illegal migrants from mining areas. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
William Lacy Swing, the Senior UN envoy to the DRC, has condemned the July 9 murder of a local politician in the far east of the country, saying it seems to be part of an emerging pattern of assassinations of political and business leaders in that region of the vast nation. The body of Floribert Bwana Chuy Bin Kositi, the provincial secretary of the Congolese Rally for Democracy political party, was found in Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, bordering Uganda and Rwanda. Swing called the killing an "odious crime" that had occurred as efforts were being stepped up to bring lasting peace to the volatile North Kivu region. (UN News)
Guinea
Two months after Guinea's parliament voted for an investigation into alleged human rights abuses by government security forces, legal experts, rights advocates and union leaders are questioning why the probe has not yet gotten off the ground. There are "serious questions about whether the political will to ensure accountability for the abuses that took place exists," said Human Rights Watch (HRW) researcher Dustin Sharp. Guinea is still reeling from strike-related protests in which demonstrators calling for President Lansana Conte to step down clashed with the army and presidential guard. Some 137 people were killed by marauding soldiers and nearly 2,000 people wounded. (IRIN)
Ivory Coast
Ivory Coast has asked the UN to investigate an assassination attempt against PM Guillaume Soro, the government said July 11. Unidentified attackers fired rockets at the Fokker 100 aircraft carrying Soro moments after it landed in the northern rebel stronghold of Bouake last month. Soro, leader of the New Forces rebels, was made prime minister in April under a deal to reunite the West African country, split in two since the rebels seized its northern half during a brief 2002 to 2003 civil war. (Reuters)
Kenya
Crime and violence are at crisis levels in Kenya in the build-up to elections, as gangs terrorize the population and "trigger happy" police respond with impunity, human rights groups say. The Kenya Human Rights Network said 300 criminals, police officers, victims of land clashes and suspected members of a banned sect were killed in the last six months alone. "The security and human rights situation has reached a crisis proportion. We have reached a severe national security crisis," Network member Cyprian Nyamwamu said after the group presented a petition to the government's human rights body. (Reuters)
Lesotho
The top UN humanitarian official July 11 called for international assistance to help Lesotho which is facing its worst food crisis, with 400,000 people – or a fifth of the population – in need of emergency food aid. "The situation is critical for those already living on the edge, struggling to cope with the combined impact of successive crop failures, poverty and HIV/AIDS," said Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator John Holmes. "The international community must respond rapidly to assist the Government in averting a crisis." (UN News)
Liberia
More than 3,500 officers have now graduated from Liberia’s Police Academy as part of UN-backed efforts to improve the rule of law in the West African country and help the nation rehabilitate after more than a decade of brutal civil war. Speaking at a weekend graduation ceremony for 367 officers, the UN Deputy Special Representative and Officer-in-Charge of the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL), Jordan Ryan, urged the new officers to be "professional in service delivery and accountable to the communities" they serve. (UN News)
Nigeria
Nigeria's anti-graft agency has arrested two former governors accused of corruption and money laundering. Saminu Turaki, a sitting MP and Orji Kalu, who lost a bid for Nigeria's presidency in last April's polls were arrested in Abuja, officials say. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) had invited almost all of Nigeria's 36 former governors for questioning over graft allegations. Kalu and Turaki were the only two that refused to turn up, the EFCC says. (BBC)
Somalia
Piracy off the cost of Somalia is threatening commercial shipping and fishing while impeding the delivery of humanitarian assistance to hundreds of thousands of Somalis, the heads of the WFP and the International Maritime Organization (IMO) said July 10. Since the collapse of the last national government in 1991, delivering supplies by sea to Somalia has been a logistical and security challenge, with a rise in the frequency of pirate attacks resulting in higher shipping costs and a significant reduction in the number of cargo vessels in the water. There have been 15 attacks on supply ships, including two WFP-contracted vessels, in or near Somali waters so far this year. (UN News)
South Africa
More than a quarter of a million South African metal and engineering workers have downed tools across the country. Trade unions said workers had walked out in a protest over pay and a skills shortage in the country. The indefinite strike is expected to bring production at more than 9,000 companies to a standstill. But employers and unions hope a strike by some 260,000 South African metal and engineering workers that entered its third day July 11 may be called off after employers made a fresh wage offer. (BBC, Reuters)
Sudan
The UN and African Union are to meet key regional and international actors in Sudan's war-ravaged Darfur to seek a blueprint for peace in the region. The meeting in Libya July 15-16 comes days after the UN warned that violence in Darfur had displaced another 160,000 people since the beginning of 2007, and increased the number of people in need of aid to 4.2 million. "Security incidents involving internally displaced people have more than tripled," said OCHA in a statement. "Attacks against the relief community have increased 150 percent in the past year. In June, one out of every six convoys that left provincial capitals in Darfur was hijacked or ambushed." (IRIN)
Tanzania
Tanzania's semi-autonomous islands of Zanzibar could fail to achieve the millennium development goals because of high population increase, according to the islands' finance minister Mwinyihaji Makame Mwadini. He said the government was planning to step up its family planning campaign and impose stricter migration rules to regulate the flow of outsiders wishing to settle in the islands. Opposition politicians have expressed concern over what they claimed were large numbers of people from mainland Tanzania settling in Zanzibar and suggested the reintroduction of entry permits for mainlanders. (IRIN)
Zambia
Zambia's decision to keep borrowing could slip the country back into indebtedness even before social expenditure improves, civil society activists warn. Zambia's USD 7.2 billion external debt was slashed to about USD 500 million, as a reward for sticking with economic reforms under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative by the IMF and World Bank. This week Finance Minister Ng'andu Magande announced that the country's external debt stood at USD 643 million. "The government has, since the [HIPC] completion point in April 2005, contracted eight loans totaling USD 110.21 million," he said. (IRIN)
Zimbabwe
There has been a wave of panic buying in many shops in Zimbabwe as the government enforces radical price cutting measures to try to tackle the world's highest rate of inflation - more than 3,700 percent. One resident of Harare describes how the inflation is making life difficult for everyone, even those who are relatively well off. "A single banana costs 15 times more than I paid for my four-bedroom house seven years ago." (BBC)
The Angolan authorities have sent some 25,000 people back to the Democratic Republic of Congo, according to a UN-backed radio station. A local official in south-eastern DR Congo told the AFP news agency that "thousands" of people had crossed the border in recent days. Some of those expelled say all their goods were stolen. Angola's ambassador to DR Congo said these were the latest expulsions of illegal migrants from mining areas. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
William Lacy Swing, the Senior UN envoy to the DRC, has condemned the July 9 murder of a local politician in the far east of the country, saying it seems to be part of an emerging pattern of assassinations of political and business leaders in that region of the vast nation. The body of Floribert Bwana Chuy Bin Kositi, the provincial secretary of the Congolese Rally for Democracy political party, was found in Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, bordering Uganda and Rwanda. Swing called the killing an "odious crime" that had occurred as efforts were being stepped up to bring lasting peace to the volatile North Kivu region. (UN News)
Guinea
Two months after Guinea's parliament voted for an investigation into alleged human rights abuses by government security forces, legal experts, rights advocates and union leaders are questioning why the probe has not yet gotten off the ground. There are "serious questions about whether the political will to ensure accountability for the abuses that took place exists," said Human Rights Watch (HRW) researcher Dustin Sharp. Guinea is still reeling from strike-related protests in which demonstrators calling for President Lansana Conte to step down clashed with the army and presidential guard. Some 137 people were killed by marauding soldiers and nearly 2,000 people wounded. (IRIN)
Ivory Coast
Ivory Coast has asked the UN to investigate an assassination attempt against PM Guillaume Soro, the government said July 11. Unidentified attackers fired rockets at the Fokker 100 aircraft carrying Soro moments after it landed in the northern rebel stronghold of Bouake last month. Soro, leader of the New Forces rebels, was made prime minister in April under a deal to reunite the West African country, split in two since the rebels seized its northern half during a brief 2002 to 2003 civil war. (Reuters)
Kenya
Crime and violence are at crisis levels in Kenya in the build-up to elections, as gangs terrorize the population and "trigger happy" police respond with impunity, human rights groups say. The Kenya Human Rights Network said 300 criminals, police officers, victims of land clashes and suspected members of a banned sect were killed in the last six months alone. "The security and human rights situation has reached a crisis proportion. We have reached a severe national security crisis," Network member Cyprian Nyamwamu said after the group presented a petition to the government's human rights body. (Reuters)
Lesotho
The top UN humanitarian official July 11 called for international assistance to help Lesotho which is facing its worst food crisis, with 400,000 people – or a fifth of the population – in need of emergency food aid. "The situation is critical for those already living on the edge, struggling to cope with the combined impact of successive crop failures, poverty and HIV/AIDS," said Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator John Holmes. "The international community must respond rapidly to assist the Government in averting a crisis." (UN News)
Liberia
More than 3,500 officers have now graduated from Liberia’s Police Academy as part of UN-backed efforts to improve the rule of law in the West African country and help the nation rehabilitate after more than a decade of brutal civil war. Speaking at a weekend graduation ceremony for 367 officers, the UN Deputy Special Representative and Officer-in-Charge of the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL), Jordan Ryan, urged the new officers to be "professional in service delivery and accountable to the communities" they serve. (UN News)
Nigeria
Nigeria's anti-graft agency has arrested two former governors accused of corruption and money laundering. Saminu Turaki, a sitting MP and Orji Kalu, who lost a bid for Nigeria's presidency in last April's polls were arrested in Abuja, officials say. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) had invited almost all of Nigeria's 36 former governors for questioning over graft allegations. Kalu and Turaki were the only two that refused to turn up, the EFCC says. (BBC)
Somalia
Piracy off the cost of Somalia is threatening commercial shipping and fishing while impeding the delivery of humanitarian assistance to hundreds of thousands of Somalis, the heads of the WFP and the International Maritime Organization (IMO) said July 10. Since the collapse of the last national government in 1991, delivering supplies by sea to Somalia has been a logistical and security challenge, with a rise in the frequency of pirate attacks resulting in higher shipping costs and a significant reduction in the number of cargo vessels in the water. There have been 15 attacks on supply ships, including two WFP-contracted vessels, in or near Somali waters so far this year. (UN News)
South Africa
More than a quarter of a million South African metal and engineering workers have downed tools across the country. Trade unions said workers had walked out in a protest over pay and a skills shortage in the country. The indefinite strike is expected to bring production at more than 9,000 companies to a standstill. But employers and unions hope a strike by some 260,000 South African metal and engineering workers that entered its third day July 11 may be called off after employers made a fresh wage offer. (BBC, Reuters)
Sudan
The UN and African Union are to meet key regional and international actors in Sudan's war-ravaged Darfur to seek a blueprint for peace in the region. The meeting in Libya July 15-16 comes days after the UN warned that violence in Darfur had displaced another 160,000 people since the beginning of 2007, and increased the number of people in need of aid to 4.2 million. "Security incidents involving internally displaced people have more than tripled," said OCHA in a statement. "Attacks against the relief community have increased 150 percent in the past year. In June, one out of every six convoys that left provincial capitals in Darfur was hijacked or ambushed." (IRIN)
Tanzania
Tanzania's semi-autonomous islands of Zanzibar could fail to achieve the millennium development goals because of high population increase, according to the islands' finance minister Mwinyihaji Makame Mwadini. He said the government was planning to step up its family planning campaign and impose stricter migration rules to regulate the flow of outsiders wishing to settle in the islands. Opposition politicians have expressed concern over what they claimed were large numbers of people from mainland Tanzania settling in Zanzibar and suggested the reintroduction of entry permits for mainlanders. (IRIN)
Zambia
Zambia's decision to keep borrowing could slip the country back into indebtedness even before social expenditure improves, civil society activists warn. Zambia's USD 7.2 billion external debt was slashed to about USD 500 million, as a reward for sticking with economic reforms under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative by the IMF and World Bank. This week Finance Minister Ng'andu Magande announced that the country's external debt stood at USD 643 million. "The government has, since the [HIPC] completion point in April 2005, contracted eight loans totaling USD 110.21 million," he said. (IRIN)
Zimbabwe
There has been a wave of panic buying in many shops in Zimbabwe as the government enforces radical price cutting measures to try to tackle the world's highest rate of inflation - more than 3,700 percent. One resident of Harare describes how the inflation is making life difficult for everyone, even those who are relatively well off. "A single banana costs 15 times more than I paid for my four-bedroom house seven years ago." (BBC)
2007/06/28
Botswana
Botswana is looking to draw in investors by showcasing its vast reserves of coal in a region facing a growing energy crisis and will host a government-organized conference designed to illustrate the sector's potential. The conference, with the theme: "Botswana at the dawn of ecological coal-based industrialization," comes at a time when the country is preparing to mine the Mmamabula coal deposits projected to be the next main energy source for the entire Southern African region. Some 200 delegates from India, Australia, and the US and South Africa will meet in Gaborone on June 28-29. (AFP, Mnengi)
Central African Republic
Two months after the government of the Central African Republic (CAR) concluded a peace agreement with a rebel group in the northeast, some fighters belonging to another insurgent group in the northwest have abandoned rebellion, sources said.
The move, observers said, could boost ongoing efforts to resume humanitarian work in the volatile region where the killing of an MSF worker on June 11 prompted agencies to suspend operations. The International Medical Corps has decided to resume operations in Vakaga Province, an area beset by rebellion, rampant banditry and the spillover of conflicts in Chad and Sudan. (IRIN)
Kenya
The Kenyan government said June 26 the rate of HIV and Aids infections had dropped 5.9 percent, but the disease still posed a major challenge in the country. The state-run National Aids Control Council (NACC) said the rate fell from 6.1 percent in 2004 to the current 5.9 percent of the country's nearly 35 million people. "Of notable significance is the decline in new infections from 85, 000 in 2004 to 60,000 in 2005 as well as the drop in HIV prevalence from 6.1 percent to 5.9 percent in the same period," said NACC chairperson Miriam Were. (Independent Online)
Madagascar
The sexual exploitation of children trafficked internally from Madagascar's poverty-stricken rural areas to tourist hotspots appears to be widespread in the island country, according to new reports. A study by UNICEF in two coastal cities, Toamasina and Nosy Be, found that 30-50 percent of female commercial sex workers were minors. The UN agency also recorded anecdotal information indicating that some traffickers could be recruiting rural children for domestic work in urban areas. (IRIN)
Mozambique
U.S. first lady Laura Bush announced June 27 USD 507 million in assistance would be approved for Mozambique to build roads and boost its battle with malaria, which kills about 150 Mozambicans each day. The boards of the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), established by U.S. President George W. Bush in 2004 to reward pro-business, democratic and progressive developing nations with aid and other assistance, approved the grant. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Nigeria's main opposition party, the ANPP, has said it will join the new government of President Umaru Yar'Adua. The deal comes after days of talks called by the president, whose April election victory was judged "not credible" by international observers. Both parties have agreed to work to address issues including the electoral process and the constitution. In other news, Nigeria's total external debts reached USD 2.608 billion, including outstanding obligations by both Nigeria's central government and 36 states to multilateral institutions, including the World Bank and the African Development Bank. (BBC, Xinhua)
Rwanda
Paul Rusesabagina, the man who inspired the film Hotel Rwanda, says unless the term of the UN tribunal on the genocide is extended it will be a failure. He has written to the UN chief asking for some governing Rwandan Patriotic Front members to face justice. The RPF took control of Rwanda in July 1994, putting an end to the genocide organized by extremist Hutu leaders. The mandate of the UN-backed war crimes court which sits in Tanzania to try the genocide ringleaders ends in December. (BBC)
Somalia
Somalia's trade minister and former defense minister escaped assassination attempts, but two others were killed in the latest Iraq-style guerrilla attacks on government targets, witnesses said. A roadside bomb hit Trade Minister Abdullahi Ahmed Afrah's convoy late June 26 in a busy north Mogadishu street. A female passerby was killed and eight people including four of the minister's bodyguards were injured, locals said. (Reuters)
South Africa
Three South Africans have been sent to prison after being found guilty of the 2003 murder of a farm worker. Welile Motawane was tortured and killed after entering a "whites-only" section of a lodge, the Pretoria News reports. Sunset Lodge owner Kenneth Broodryk and two others then confronted him, stripped him, tied him up and beat him for four hours. Broodryk was sentenced to 14 years in prison, the others to 10 years. All three had pleaded not guilty. (BBC)
Sudan
A close political adviser to Sudan's president has died in a car accident. Majzoub al-Khalifa and his brother were killed in the accident in northern Sudan, and several other people were injured. Khalifa headed the government negotiating team in talks which led to last year's signing of a peace deal with rebels in the Darfur region. The agreement has failed to halt the four-year Darfur conflict which has made some 2m people homeless. (BBC)
Tanzania
Drug trafficking and abuse are increasing in Tanzania and concerted efforts must be made to check this trend, President Jakaya Kikwete has said. "Tanzania used to be a transit point for drugs, but now the number of users is escalating very fast," Kikwete said at public rally. He urged law enforcement bodies, parents and activists to step up the war against narcotics, saying trafficking and use of drugs had reached alarming levels. He said the problem was especially serious in Dar es Salaam, the semi-autonomous island of Zanzibar and in the northern towns of Arusha, Mwanza and Tanga. (IRIN)
Zimbabwe
President Robert Mugabe's government has ordered prices of basic goods and services to be slashed to protect Zimbabweans battling with the world's highest inflation rate, official media reported. Industry Minister Obert Mpofu announced price cuts of up to two-thirds on a range of basic goods and services, from commuter transportation to bread, sugar, meat, milk, corn meal and even newspapers. The measure is intended to return prices to the levels of June 18 - since when the price of many basic goods has risen by up to 300 percent. Official inflation is at 4,500 percent, but independent financial institutions calculate real inflation at closer to 9,000 percent. (Reuters, AP)
Botswana is looking to draw in investors by showcasing its vast reserves of coal in a region facing a growing energy crisis and will host a government-organized conference designed to illustrate the sector's potential. The conference, with the theme: "Botswana at the dawn of ecological coal-based industrialization," comes at a time when the country is preparing to mine the Mmamabula coal deposits projected to be the next main energy source for the entire Southern African region. Some 200 delegates from India, Australia, and the US and South Africa will meet in Gaborone on June 28-29. (AFP, Mnengi)
Central African Republic
Two months after the government of the Central African Republic (CAR) concluded a peace agreement with a rebel group in the northeast, some fighters belonging to another insurgent group in the northwest have abandoned rebellion, sources said.
The move, observers said, could boost ongoing efforts to resume humanitarian work in the volatile region where the killing of an MSF worker on June 11 prompted agencies to suspend operations. The International Medical Corps has decided to resume operations in Vakaga Province, an area beset by rebellion, rampant banditry and the spillover of conflicts in Chad and Sudan. (IRIN)
Kenya
The Kenyan government said June 26 the rate of HIV and Aids infections had dropped 5.9 percent, but the disease still posed a major challenge in the country. The state-run National Aids Control Council (NACC) said the rate fell from 6.1 percent in 2004 to the current 5.9 percent of the country's nearly 35 million people. "Of notable significance is the decline in new infections from 85, 000 in 2004 to 60,000 in 2005 as well as the drop in HIV prevalence from 6.1 percent to 5.9 percent in the same period," said NACC chairperson Miriam Were. (Independent Online)
Madagascar
The sexual exploitation of children trafficked internally from Madagascar's poverty-stricken rural areas to tourist hotspots appears to be widespread in the island country, according to new reports. A study by UNICEF in two coastal cities, Toamasina and Nosy Be, found that 30-50 percent of female commercial sex workers were minors. The UN agency also recorded anecdotal information indicating that some traffickers could be recruiting rural children for domestic work in urban areas. (IRIN)
Mozambique
U.S. first lady Laura Bush announced June 27 USD 507 million in assistance would be approved for Mozambique to build roads and boost its battle with malaria, which kills about 150 Mozambicans each day. The boards of the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), established by U.S. President George W. Bush in 2004 to reward pro-business, democratic and progressive developing nations with aid and other assistance, approved the grant. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Nigeria's main opposition party, the ANPP, has said it will join the new government of President Umaru Yar'Adua. The deal comes after days of talks called by the president, whose April election victory was judged "not credible" by international observers. Both parties have agreed to work to address issues including the electoral process and the constitution. In other news, Nigeria's total external debts reached USD 2.608 billion, including outstanding obligations by both Nigeria's central government and 36 states to multilateral institutions, including the World Bank and the African Development Bank. (BBC, Xinhua)
Rwanda
Paul Rusesabagina, the man who inspired the film Hotel Rwanda, says unless the term of the UN tribunal on the genocide is extended it will be a failure. He has written to the UN chief asking for some governing Rwandan Patriotic Front members to face justice. The RPF took control of Rwanda in July 1994, putting an end to the genocide organized by extremist Hutu leaders. The mandate of the UN-backed war crimes court which sits in Tanzania to try the genocide ringleaders ends in December. (BBC)
Somalia
Somalia's trade minister and former defense minister escaped assassination attempts, but two others were killed in the latest Iraq-style guerrilla attacks on government targets, witnesses said. A roadside bomb hit Trade Minister Abdullahi Ahmed Afrah's convoy late June 26 in a busy north Mogadishu street. A female passerby was killed and eight people including four of the minister's bodyguards were injured, locals said. (Reuters)
South Africa
Three South Africans have been sent to prison after being found guilty of the 2003 murder of a farm worker. Welile Motawane was tortured and killed after entering a "whites-only" section of a lodge, the Pretoria News reports. Sunset Lodge owner Kenneth Broodryk and two others then confronted him, stripped him, tied him up and beat him for four hours. Broodryk was sentenced to 14 years in prison, the others to 10 years. All three had pleaded not guilty. (BBC)
Sudan
A close political adviser to Sudan's president has died in a car accident. Majzoub al-Khalifa and his brother were killed in the accident in northern Sudan, and several other people were injured. Khalifa headed the government negotiating team in talks which led to last year's signing of a peace deal with rebels in the Darfur region. The agreement has failed to halt the four-year Darfur conflict which has made some 2m people homeless. (BBC)
Tanzania
Drug trafficking and abuse are increasing in Tanzania and concerted efforts must be made to check this trend, President Jakaya Kikwete has said. "Tanzania used to be a transit point for drugs, but now the number of users is escalating very fast," Kikwete said at public rally. He urged law enforcement bodies, parents and activists to step up the war against narcotics, saying trafficking and use of drugs had reached alarming levels. He said the problem was especially serious in Dar es Salaam, the semi-autonomous island of Zanzibar and in the northern towns of Arusha, Mwanza and Tanga. (IRIN)
Zimbabwe
President Robert Mugabe's government has ordered prices of basic goods and services to be slashed to protect Zimbabweans battling with the world's highest inflation rate, official media reported. Industry Minister Obert Mpofu announced price cuts of up to two-thirds on a range of basic goods and services, from commuter transportation to bread, sugar, meat, milk, corn meal and even newspapers. The measure is intended to return prices to the levels of June 18 - since when the price of many basic goods has risen by up to 300 percent. Official inflation is at 4,500 percent, but independent financial institutions calculate real inflation at closer to 9,000 percent. (Reuters, AP)
2007/06/14
"I've decided no longer to waste my time going to meetings where nothing gets done. It's very agreeable to meet among ourselves but it doesn't drive things forward."
-- Senegal President Abdoulaye Wade, in an interview late June 12 on West African TV channel Africable as quoted by Reuters, accusing an African leadership group the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) set up six years ago to manage development of wasting hundreds of millions of dollars and achieving nothing for the world's poorest continent. Wade said NEPAD, meant to commit African leaders to promote democracy and good governance in return for increased Western investment, trade and debt relief, had proved no more than a talking shop. "Expenses adding up to hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent on trips, on hotels. But not a single classroom has been built, not a single health center completed. NEPAD has not done what it was set up for," he said.
Africa Competitiveness Report 2007
African businesses can become far more competitive, but face critical hurdles in access to finance and infrastructure across the continent, according to a report released June 12 at the start of the three-day World Economic Forum on Africa in Cape Town. Low access to financial services emerges as a major obstacle for African enterprises, but poor infrastructure, corruption and weak institutions also make African goods and services less competitive in the global marketplace, the "Africa Competitiveness Report 2007" concluded. The report, conducted by the World Economic Forum (WEF), the African Development Bank (ADB) and the World Bank, said, however, that it found a growing number of ‘success stories’ in the region that show countries can take steps to improve business conditions. "Africa has the potential to become a far more competitive player in the global economy," Obiageli Katryn Ezekwesili, Vice-President of the Africa region at the World Bank, said in a statement. The competitiveness report said it found good policies are critical for a sound business environment and more important than geography or the abundance of natural resources.
To read the report, please go to:
http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Africa%20Competitiveness%20Report/2007/index.htm
-- Senegal President Abdoulaye Wade, in an interview late June 12 on West African TV channel Africable as quoted by Reuters, accusing an African leadership group the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) set up six years ago to manage development of wasting hundreds of millions of dollars and achieving nothing for the world's poorest continent. Wade said NEPAD, meant to commit African leaders to promote democracy and good governance in return for increased Western investment, trade and debt relief, had proved no more than a talking shop. "Expenses adding up to hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent on trips, on hotels. But not a single classroom has been built, not a single health center completed. NEPAD has not done what it was set up for," he said.
Africa Competitiveness Report 2007
African businesses can become far more competitive, but face critical hurdles in access to finance and infrastructure across the continent, according to a report released June 12 at the start of the three-day World Economic Forum on Africa in Cape Town. Low access to financial services emerges as a major obstacle for African enterprises, but poor infrastructure, corruption and weak institutions also make African goods and services less competitive in the global marketplace, the "Africa Competitiveness Report 2007" concluded. The report, conducted by the World Economic Forum (WEF), the African Development Bank (ADB) and the World Bank, said, however, that it found a growing number of ‘success stories’ in the region that show countries can take steps to improve business conditions. "Africa has the potential to become a far more competitive player in the global economy," Obiageli Katryn Ezekwesili, Vice-President of the Africa region at the World Bank, said in a statement. The competitiveness report said it found good policies are critical for a sound business environment and more important than geography or the abundance of natural resources.
To read the report, please go to:
http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Africa%20Competitiveness%20Report/2007/index.htm
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2007/06/07
Congo
The leader of the Republic of Congo's rebel "Ninja" rebels is due to destroy some of his arms in a ceremony. Frederic Bitsangou, also known as Pastor Ntumi, agreed to disarm after being given a government post. The man who led a five-year insurgency in the south-eastern region until a deal in 2003 will have responsibility for peace and reconciliation efforts. About 250 rebels will be absorbed into the national army and the rest will enter a disarmament and reintegration program. (BBC)
Kenya
Police in Kenya's capital, Nairobi, have fired tear gas during protests by women opposed to their crackdown on members of the banned Mungiki sect. About 20 women demanded police leave Mathare slums after 21 people were killed in a shoot-out there June 5. Police have also recovered another beheaded body in the slum. Opposition and religious leaders are accusing the police of extrajudicial killings in retaliation for the deaths June 4 of three police officers. (BBC)
Liberia
The war crimes trial of former Liberian President Charles Taylor, accused of backing rebels in Sierra Leone who killed and maimed thousands of civilians over 11 years, has opened amid dramatic scenes in The Hague, with the accused refusing to attend. Taylor said his trial would not be fair because he only had one defense lawyer. His counsel walked out, defying the judge's order to stay seated. (BBC)
Nigeria
President Umaru Yar'Adua has told managers of Nigeria's beleaguered power sector to find a lasting solution to the country's power problems or face a state of emergency. Much of the country endures daily power cuts, despite its vast oil wealth. In his first week as president, Yar'Adua, told top electricity managers he "will no longer take excuses." Tackling power generation problems was one of his campaign promises. His predecessor, Olusegun Obasanjo, sunk over USD 10 bln into the country's electricity sector over the past seven years with very little to show for it. (BBC)
Rwanda
The World Bank will increase grants to Rwanda by 51 percent to USD 106 mln in the 2007/2008 financial year, its country representative said. "We are pleased with the levels of transparency here because all the grant money goes directly to the projects it is meant for," country representative Victoria Kwakwa told reporters. Rwanda has tried to kickstart its economy after the trauma of its 1994 genocide by identifying the energy, farming, tourism, mining, information technology, manufacturing and financial sectors as deserving of investment. (Reuters)
Somalia
Somali pirates, who have been holding a Taiwanese fishing vessel since the middle of last month, have reportedly killed one member of the crew. A maritime official from neighboring Kenya says the pirates killed the crewman because the ship's owners had failed to pay a ransom demand. The Taiwanese trawler has been held by pirates for three weeks. (BBC)
South Africa
South African police June 4 fired rubber bullets and stun grenades at striking nurses in the port city of Durban. The union activists were reportedly trying to prevent nurses from working. After the clashes, the unions boycotted scheduled talks with the government. The unions want a 12 percent pay rise - double what the government has offered. Earlier, the government warned striking nurses they would be fired unless they return to work by June 4. (BBC)
Sudan
The UN and African Union chief executives June 6 resolved a dispute over command of a proposed joint military force to help end bloodshed in Darfur, but the deal still must be approved by their organizations' security councils and Sudan's government. Whether the vague language can satisfy potential contributors to the peacekeeping force who want the UN to be in command or the desire of the AU and Sudanese government for the AU to play a major role remains to be seen. It appeared to be deliberately opaque to try to win agreement from the major players. (Washington Post)
Zimbabwe
Over 4 million people in Zimbabwe, one third of population, will need food aid by early next year due to the combined effects of drought and economic decline spurred in part by Government policies, two UN agencies said June 5. The FAO and the WFP blamed poor harvests in the southern provinces and rising poverty in both rural and urban areas, predicting that out of Zimbabwe’s total estimated population of 11.8 million, 2.1 million will face critical food shortages later this year. (UN News)
The leader of the Republic of Congo's rebel "Ninja" rebels is due to destroy some of his arms in a ceremony. Frederic Bitsangou, also known as Pastor Ntumi, agreed to disarm after being given a government post. The man who led a five-year insurgency in the south-eastern region until a deal in 2003 will have responsibility for peace and reconciliation efforts. About 250 rebels will be absorbed into the national army and the rest will enter a disarmament and reintegration program. (BBC)
Kenya
Police in Kenya's capital, Nairobi, have fired tear gas during protests by women opposed to their crackdown on members of the banned Mungiki sect. About 20 women demanded police leave Mathare slums after 21 people were killed in a shoot-out there June 5. Police have also recovered another beheaded body in the slum. Opposition and religious leaders are accusing the police of extrajudicial killings in retaliation for the deaths June 4 of three police officers. (BBC)
Liberia
The war crimes trial of former Liberian President Charles Taylor, accused of backing rebels in Sierra Leone who killed and maimed thousands of civilians over 11 years, has opened amid dramatic scenes in The Hague, with the accused refusing to attend. Taylor said his trial would not be fair because he only had one defense lawyer. His counsel walked out, defying the judge's order to stay seated. (BBC)
Nigeria
President Umaru Yar'Adua has told managers of Nigeria's beleaguered power sector to find a lasting solution to the country's power problems or face a state of emergency. Much of the country endures daily power cuts, despite its vast oil wealth. In his first week as president, Yar'Adua, told top electricity managers he "will no longer take excuses." Tackling power generation problems was one of his campaign promises. His predecessor, Olusegun Obasanjo, sunk over USD 10 bln into the country's electricity sector over the past seven years with very little to show for it. (BBC)
Rwanda
The World Bank will increase grants to Rwanda by 51 percent to USD 106 mln in the 2007/2008 financial year, its country representative said. "We are pleased with the levels of transparency here because all the grant money goes directly to the projects it is meant for," country representative Victoria Kwakwa told reporters. Rwanda has tried to kickstart its economy after the trauma of its 1994 genocide by identifying the energy, farming, tourism, mining, information technology, manufacturing and financial sectors as deserving of investment. (Reuters)
Somalia
Somali pirates, who have been holding a Taiwanese fishing vessel since the middle of last month, have reportedly killed one member of the crew. A maritime official from neighboring Kenya says the pirates killed the crewman because the ship's owners had failed to pay a ransom demand. The Taiwanese trawler has been held by pirates for three weeks. (BBC)
South Africa
South African police June 4 fired rubber bullets and stun grenades at striking nurses in the port city of Durban. The union activists were reportedly trying to prevent nurses from working. After the clashes, the unions boycotted scheduled talks with the government. The unions want a 12 percent pay rise - double what the government has offered. Earlier, the government warned striking nurses they would be fired unless they return to work by June 4. (BBC)
Sudan
The UN and African Union chief executives June 6 resolved a dispute over command of a proposed joint military force to help end bloodshed in Darfur, but the deal still must be approved by their organizations' security councils and Sudan's government. Whether the vague language can satisfy potential contributors to the peacekeeping force who want the UN to be in command or the desire of the AU and Sudanese government for the AU to play a major role remains to be seen. It appeared to be deliberately opaque to try to win agreement from the major players. (Washington Post)
Zimbabwe
Over 4 million people in Zimbabwe, one third of population, will need food aid by early next year due to the combined effects of drought and economic decline spurred in part by Government policies, two UN agencies said June 5. The FAO and the WFP blamed poor harvests in the southern provinces and rising poverty in both rural and urban areas, predicting that out of Zimbabwe’s total estimated population of 11.8 million, 2.1 million will face critical food shortages later this year. (UN News)
2007/05/17
U.N. Round-Up
A remote-controlled bomb killed four Ugandan peacekeepers and a civilian in the Somali capital Mogadishu May 16 as Islamist militants followed through on a threat to wage an Iraq-style insurgency. Five peacekeepers and two children were also wounded in the attack on the African Union convoy, which an AU security source said was the first of its kind against the 1,600-strong Ugandan contingent -- who had previously only been shot at. Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, meanwhile, said his troops would not leave the country until several thousand more AU peacekeepers arrived to avoid a security vacuum.
The African Union (AU) and donors, including the G8 countries, have agreed to set up a fund to support underfunded peacekeeping missions on the continent, IRIN reports. To be funded as part of the AU's Complementary Peace Facility, it is expected to augment the existing European Union-Africa Peace Facility (EU-APF) and increase resources available for Africa-led peace support operations. It will also cover budget lines that cannot be financed by the APF, according to Said Djinnit, the AU's commissioner for peace and security. "In the absence of adequate and predictable funding, especially for African-led peace-support operations, all efforts being exerted at the level of the continent to bring lasting peace and stability will be much more difficult to carry out successfully," Djinnit said.
More than 48 million people in West Africa will be immunized for yellow fever over the next four years under a new vaccine program announced this week by the public-private GAVI Alliance. Mass vaccination campaigns from the 1940s to the 1960s nearly wiped out yellow fever in Africa, but a drop-off in immunizations caused a resurgence in the hemorrhagic disease that health experts fear could trigger epidemics in urban areas. Yellow fever, whose symptoms can include fever, vomiting and bleeding from the mouth, nose and eyes, infects some 200,000 people a year, killing around 30,000, mostly in Africa.
IMF, World Bank & IFI Round-Up
The African Development Bank (AfDB) must undertake significant internal reforms to become more responsive to the continent's needs and more effective as a tool for development, the bank's president and governors said May 16. Reuters reports Donald Kaberuka told the opening of the bank's annual meeting that the lender was financially strong but bogged down by in-house bureaucracy. "I would be less than candid if I did not point to the enduring challenges in terms of disbursements, ... project portfolio quality and, broadly, development effectiveness," Kaberuka told delegates in Shanghai, the venue of this year's two-day meeting. Member countries were having trouble meeting conditions for loans and were encountering delayed disbursements, he said. But Kaberuka said that as the AfDB increased its presence in the field -- it is now in 22 countries, out of a goal of 25 -- and stepped up staffing, it should be able to be more "agile and responsible".
The world's biggest industrial countries are failing to keep up with financial promises they made to Africa, rocker-activist Bono of U2 fame said May 15. G8 members in contributed less than half the amount needed to make good on promises to double Africa aid to USD 50 billion by 2010, according to a report released by DATA - Debt, AIDS, Trade, Africa - an advocacy group founded by Bono, AP reports. The report shows the G8 increased aid by USD 2.3 billion but says they need to increase aid by an additional USD 3.1 billion to substantially help the people of Africa. The DATA report said aid money that does arrive has an effect. Still, Bono warns that insufficient increases in aid could reverse progress already made. DATA says the G8 must contribute USD 7.4 billion this year alone to reach its goal.
Angola
Angola has been criticized for evicting thousands of people from poor districts of the capital over the last four years and leaving them virtually destitute. Human Rights Watch (HRW) says in a report some 20,000 vulnerable people have been affected in often violent evictions. In most cases, the land is not formally expropriated or inhabitants given a chance to make claims, the group says. SOS Habitat, an Angolan NGO co-wrote the HRW report. (BBC)
Burundi
Human rights violations, including executions by armed bandits and sexual violence against women and children, have continued in Burundi despite an improvement in the political landscape, the national watchdog ITEKA has said. Since the inauguration of the government in 2005, the continuing circulation of weapons among civilians and the slow reintegration of demobilized fighters into society have led to daily reports of armed banditry in 2007, ITEKA said. (IRIN)
Ethiopia
A rebel attack on an oil facility in Ethiopia that killed nine Chinese workers and 64 locals has not dented Beijing's investment in the Horn of Africa nation Prime Minister Meles Zenawi told Reuters. "The Chinese have made it abundantly clear that they are not going to be scared away. On the contrary, they are increasing their investment in our country," he said. The pre-dawn raid in late April was one of the ONLF's highest profile operations. (Reuters)
Ghana
Ghana plans to tap the eurobond market in July, underlining global appetite for emerging market debt but fanning a controversy over whether developing countries that have won debt relief should risk piling up new borrowings. The long-awaited issue, the first by a sub-Saharan sovereign outside South Africa since the 1970s, is likely to be followed later in the year by Nigeria, according to bankers attending the annual meeting of the AfDB. (Reuters)
Guinea
Guinea's President Lansana Conte has again postponed talks with discontented soldiers in the capital, Conakry, after days of riots. He failed to show up on Saturday, further angering troops who are demanding better pay and housing. Conte He then put back Monday's scheduled talks for 24 hours to allow the new defense minister and army chief to be installed in office. (BBC)
Ivory Coast
Ivory Coast May 14 agreed with the World Bank and the IMF to adhere to a strictly managed budget in return for renewed reconstruction aid, IMF official Arend Kouwenaar said. The program foresaw employing state resources for social needs and restoring infrastructure damaged in more than four years of conflict that have divided the country. Ivory Coast could receive qualified approval by the IMF for an emergency Program of Post-Conflict Assistance to help the country's reconstruction, Kouwenaar said. (AFP)
Madagascar
The UN relief arm May 15 more than doubled the appeal it launched just two months ago to help Madagascar as the country tries to recover and rebuild its agriculture after a series of deadly recent cyclones and tropical storms since December. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is now seeking USD 19.5 million and those funds are needed urgently, OCHA spokesperson Elisabeth Byrs said. (UN News)
Niger
Niger's parliament has approved more than USD 60 million in extra budget funds to help the government confront attacks by Tuareg rebels who are threatening uranium mining and oil exploration. Minister for Institutional Relations Salifou Madou Kelzou said the government was able to count on extra funds coming from contractual obligations paid by Chinese uranium and oil companies operating in the landlocked country, the world's third-largest producer of uranium. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Unidentified gunmen May 16 blew up the country home of Nigerian vice president-elect Goodluck Jonathan and sacked a nearby police station, killing two officers. Militant attacks in Africa's top producing nation have surged in the wake of flawed elections last month, raising the tally of oil supply halted by violence to about 900,000 barrels per day (bpd), or one third of Nigeria's total capacity. (Reuters)
Sudan
Sudan's eastern rebels have submitted a list of candidates for government posts after a meeting with Khartoum officials to push forward a delayed peace deal for the region, the rebels said May 16. The failure by the Eastern Front rebels to agree a list had hampered efforts to implement the agreement, which was mediated last year by Eritrea and ended a decade of low-level conflict. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe faces shortages of bread and flour, the government has warned, which may cause even more hardship. The planting of this year's wheat crop is well behind target and the season ends in two weeks' time. Zimbabwe's agricultural sector has been in decline since the government's chaotic seizure of white-owned farms began seven years ago. The government blames shortages of fuel and fertilizer, but disturbances are still reported on commercial farms. (BBC)
A remote-controlled bomb killed four Ugandan peacekeepers and a civilian in the Somali capital Mogadishu May 16 as Islamist militants followed through on a threat to wage an Iraq-style insurgency. Five peacekeepers and two children were also wounded in the attack on the African Union convoy, which an AU security source said was the first of its kind against the 1,600-strong Ugandan contingent -- who had previously only been shot at. Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, meanwhile, said his troops would not leave the country until several thousand more AU peacekeepers arrived to avoid a security vacuum.
The African Union (AU) and donors, including the G8 countries, have agreed to set up a fund to support underfunded peacekeeping missions on the continent, IRIN reports. To be funded as part of the AU's Complementary Peace Facility, it is expected to augment the existing European Union-Africa Peace Facility (EU-APF) and increase resources available for Africa-led peace support operations. It will also cover budget lines that cannot be financed by the APF, according to Said Djinnit, the AU's commissioner for peace and security. "In the absence of adequate and predictable funding, especially for African-led peace-support operations, all efforts being exerted at the level of the continent to bring lasting peace and stability will be much more difficult to carry out successfully," Djinnit said.
More than 48 million people in West Africa will be immunized for yellow fever over the next four years under a new vaccine program announced this week by the public-private GAVI Alliance. Mass vaccination campaigns from the 1940s to the 1960s nearly wiped out yellow fever in Africa, but a drop-off in immunizations caused a resurgence in the hemorrhagic disease that health experts fear could trigger epidemics in urban areas. Yellow fever, whose symptoms can include fever, vomiting and bleeding from the mouth, nose and eyes, infects some 200,000 people a year, killing around 30,000, mostly in Africa.
IMF, World Bank & IFI Round-Up
The African Development Bank (AfDB) must undertake significant internal reforms to become more responsive to the continent's needs and more effective as a tool for development, the bank's president and governors said May 16. Reuters reports Donald Kaberuka told the opening of the bank's annual meeting that the lender was financially strong but bogged down by in-house bureaucracy. "I would be less than candid if I did not point to the enduring challenges in terms of disbursements, ... project portfolio quality and, broadly, development effectiveness," Kaberuka told delegates in Shanghai, the venue of this year's two-day meeting. Member countries were having trouble meeting conditions for loans and were encountering delayed disbursements, he said. But Kaberuka said that as the AfDB increased its presence in the field -- it is now in 22 countries, out of a goal of 25 -- and stepped up staffing, it should be able to be more "agile and responsible".
The world's biggest industrial countries are failing to keep up with financial promises they made to Africa, rocker-activist Bono of U2 fame said May 15. G8 members in contributed less than half the amount needed to make good on promises to double Africa aid to USD 50 billion by 2010, according to a report released by DATA - Debt, AIDS, Trade, Africa - an advocacy group founded by Bono, AP reports. The report shows the G8 increased aid by USD 2.3 billion but says they need to increase aid by an additional USD 3.1 billion to substantially help the people of Africa. The DATA report said aid money that does arrive has an effect. Still, Bono warns that insufficient increases in aid could reverse progress already made. DATA says the G8 must contribute USD 7.4 billion this year alone to reach its goal.
Angola
Angola has been criticized for evicting thousands of people from poor districts of the capital over the last four years and leaving them virtually destitute. Human Rights Watch (HRW) says in a report some 20,000 vulnerable people have been affected in often violent evictions. In most cases, the land is not formally expropriated or inhabitants given a chance to make claims, the group says. SOS Habitat, an Angolan NGO co-wrote the HRW report. (BBC)
Burundi
Human rights violations, including executions by armed bandits and sexual violence against women and children, have continued in Burundi despite an improvement in the political landscape, the national watchdog ITEKA has said. Since the inauguration of the government in 2005, the continuing circulation of weapons among civilians and the slow reintegration of demobilized fighters into society have led to daily reports of armed banditry in 2007, ITEKA said. (IRIN)
Ethiopia
A rebel attack on an oil facility in Ethiopia that killed nine Chinese workers and 64 locals has not dented Beijing's investment in the Horn of Africa nation Prime Minister Meles Zenawi told Reuters. "The Chinese have made it abundantly clear that they are not going to be scared away. On the contrary, they are increasing their investment in our country," he said. The pre-dawn raid in late April was one of the ONLF's highest profile operations. (Reuters)
Ghana
Ghana plans to tap the eurobond market in July, underlining global appetite for emerging market debt but fanning a controversy over whether developing countries that have won debt relief should risk piling up new borrowings. The long-awaited issue, the first by a sub-Saharan sovereign outside South Africa since the 1970s, is likely to be followed later in the year by Nigeria, according to bankers attending the annual meeting of the AfDB. (Reuters)
Guinea
Guinea's President Lansana Conte has again postponed talks with discontented soldiers in the capital, Conakry, after days of riots. He failed to show up on Saturday, further angering troops who are demanding better pay and housing. Conte He then put back Monday's scheduled talks for 24 hours to allow the new defense minister and army chief to be installed in office. (BBC)
Ivory Coast
Ivory Coast May 14 agreed with the World Bank and the IMF to adhere to a strictly managed budget in return for renewed reconstruction aid, IMF official Arend Kouwenaar said. The program foresaw employing state resources for social needs and restoring infrastructure damaged in more than four years of conflict that have divided the country. Ivory Coast could receive qualified approval by the IMF for an emergency Program of Post-Conflict Assistance to help the country's reconstruction, Kouwenaar said. (AFP)
Madagascar
The UN relief arm May 15 more than doubled the appeal it launched just two months ago to help Madagascar as the country tries to recover and rebuild its agriculture after a series of deadly recent cyclones and tropical storms since December. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is now seeking USD 19.5 million and those funds are needed urgently, OCHA spokesperson Elisabeth Byrs said. (UN News)
Niger
Niger's parliament has approved more than USD 60 million in extra budget funds to help the government confront attacks by Tuareg rebels who are threatening uranium mining and oil exploration. Minister for Institutional Relations Salifou Madou Kelzou said the government was able to count on extra funds coming from contractual obligations paid by Chinese uranium and oil companies operating in the landlocked country, the world's third-largest producer of uranium. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Unidentified gunmen May 16 blew up the country home of Nigerian vice president-elect Goodluck Jonathan and sacked a nearby police station, killing two officers. Militant attacks in Africa's top producing nation have surged in the wake of flawed elections last month, raising the tally of oil supply halted by violence to about 900,000 barrels per day (bpd), or one third of Nigeria's total capacity. (Reuters)
Sudan
Sudan's eastern rebels have submitted a list of candidates for government posts after a meeting with Khartoum officials to push forward a delayed peace deal for the region, the rebels said May 16. The failure by the Eastern Front rebels to agree a list had hampered efforts to implement the agreement, which was mediated last year by Eritrea and ended a decade of low-level conflict. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe faces shortages of bread and flour, the government has warned, which may cause even more hardship. The planting of this year's wheat crop is well behind target and the season ends in two weeks' time. Zimbabwe's agricultural sector has been in decline since the government's chaotic seizure of white-owned farms began seven years ago. The government blames shortages of fuel and fertilizer, but disturbances are still reported on commercial farms. (BBC)
2007/05/10
U.N. Round-Up
Congo's Foreign Minister Rodolphe Adada will head a joint UN-African Union peacekeeping mission in Sudan's devastated Darfur region, which has been resisted by the Sudanese government. The appointment of Adada, who has been Congo's foreign minister since 1997, was announced in a statement May 8 by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the AU commission chairman, Alpha Oumar Konare. The UN Security Council last year adopted a resolution to deploy a "hybrid" UN-African Union force of more than 20,000 in Darfur, western Sudan. So far Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir has agreed only to deployment of 3,000 UN police and military to aid the African Union force of 7,000 troops.
Chad
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon May 7 welcomed the latest agreement between Chad and Sudan aimed at calming tensions in the strife-torn Sudanese region of Darfur and the eastern area of the neighboring country. "It is now crucial for the parties to honor their agreements," Ban's spokesperson, Michele Montas, said in a statement on the agreement signed on May 3 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. (UN News)
Congo (DRC)
The first group of refugees from the DRC who fled to neighbouring Zambia to escape the civil war in the 1990s arrived back home last week under a voluntary repatriation organized by the UNHCR. The 416 people travelled by boat across Lake Tanganyika, disembarking at the town of Kalemie in the southeastern province of Katanga, according to Jens Hesemann, spokesman for the UNHCR. Zambia hosts an estimated 61,000 refugees from the DRC; about 40,000 live in camps. (IRIN)
Eritrea
Eritrea May 9 defended its right to send troops into the disputed border region with arch-foe Ethiopia. The UN called for both nations the previous day to withdraw their troops from the border where it said Addis Ababa and Asmara had moved more than 5,000 soldiers in recent months. A peace agreement ended the border war that killed some 70,000 people, but the process soon ground to a halt when Ethiopia rejected a 2002 decision by an independent boundary commission. (Reuters)
Guinea
Rioting last week by soldiers in two towns and in the capital Conakry, suggests that the government's grip on the country remains fragile. "The general feeling is one of impatience; that there has been a lot of talk but no action," Elisabeth Cote, who represents the Washington-based election support NGO IFES in Guinea told IRIN. Soldiers reportedly shot into the air in their barracks May 3 and May 4. In one city they strafed a residential area with machine guns, killing at least two people. (IRIN)
Kenya
The World Bank has launched a survey to analyze investment climate and identity obstacles to the development of business activities which impacts negatively to the economic growth in Kenya. The Investment Climate Assessment (ICA) is to identify policy gaps and point out areas of focus for policy intervention. The indirect costs of doing business in Kenya from crime, corruption and disorder are stifling economic growth, the bank said. Cheap labor gives Kenya an advantage, yet worker productivity lags well behind other African countries . (Xinhua, Reuters)
Liberia
The war crimes trial of former Liberian president Charles Taylor begins June 4 with opening arguments, the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone announced May 8. "That Charles Taylor will now face justice is the very embodiment of the maxim that no one is above the law," Special Court Prosecutor Stephen Rapp said. Taylor faces 11 counts of war crimes, crimes against humanity and other serious violations of international humanitarian law, including mass murder, mutilations, rape, sexual slavery and the use of child soldiers, for his role in the decade-long civil war that engulfed Sierra Leone. (UN News)
Nigeria
Heavily armed gunmen May 9 kidnapped four US oil workers from a barge off the Nigerian coast as violence flared after disputed elections in the world's eighth largest oil exporter. It was the ninth attack on Western oil facilities in as many days in the Niger Delta, home to Africa's biggest oil industry, in the wake of April's general elections which were condemned by observers as fraudulent. Earlier this week, rebels blew up three oil pipelines in the delta (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone has said that it is pushing back the date of presidential and legislative elections by two weeks. The polls, the first since UN peacekeepers left in 2005, had been scheduled to take place July 28, but electoral officials said that the original date does not allow sufficient time from the dissolving of parliament to organise an election. The opposition criticised the president's original choice of date, saying it had been "arbitrary." (BBC)
Somalia
The UN World Food Programme (WFP) said May 8 it had carried out its first aid distributions in Mogadishu since Somalia's capital was blasted by the heaviest fighting for 16 years. Some 1,300 people died and hundreds of thousands more fled battles last month between insurgents and allied Somali-Ethiopian forces. "We started in the heaviest damaged areas in north Mogadishu, where the fighting was concentrated," WFP country director Peter Goossens said in a statement. (Reuters)
South Africa
South Africa has made great efforts to redress housing inequality but desperate living conditions persist, according to a UN human rights expert who called on the government to boost social services to settlements. "Success cannot be measured merely through the number of houses built but also needs to take into account quality of housing and access to services, especially for the poor," said the Special Rapporteur on adequate housing, Miloon Kothari, who visited the country from April 12-24. (UN News)
Sudan
A report by Amnesty International on violations of the UN arms embargo in Darfur will add to the diplomatic pressure for the ban to be applied to Sudan as a whole. The current limited UN ban meant to prevent the supply of arms to belligerent parties in Darfur applies only in the territory of Darfur itself. This technically allows countries such as Russia and China to continue supplying weapons to the government of Sudan. Amnesty says that such weapons, including attack helicopters and jet fighters, are being used in Darfur. (BBC)
Zambia
Zambia's ex-President Frederick Chiluba has been found guilty of stealing USD 46 million of public money by a UK court. The judge said that Zambians should know that when he appeared wearing his trademark designer clothes, they were paid for with stolen money. Chiluba's spokesman told a Zambian newspaper that the ex-leader did not accept the court's jurisdiction. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
The detention of two lawyers for providing legal counsel to members of Zimbabwe's MDC party is the latest attempt by the ZANU-PF government to undermine the rule of law and victimise practitioners representing the opposition, legal experts have said. Condemnation of the arrests came May 8 as the Law Society of Zimbabwe, which represents the country's legal fraternity, organized a Harare protest march but a lawyer told IRIN that heavily armed police had prevented it from taking place. (IRIN)
Congo's Foreign Minister Rodolphe Adada will head a joint UN-African Union peacekeeping mission in Sudan's devastated Darfur region, which has been resisted by the Sudanese government. The appointment of Adada, who has been Congo's foreign minister since 1997, was announced in a statement May 8 by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the AU commission chairman, Alpha Oumar Konare. The UN Security Council last year adopted a resolution to deploy a "hybrid" UN-African Union force of more than 20,000 in Darfur, western Sudan. So far Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir has agreed only to deployment of 3,000 UN police and military to aid the African Union force of 7,000 troops.
Chad
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon May 7 welcomed the latest agreement between Chad and Sudan aimed at calming tensions in the strife-torn Sudanese region of Darfur and the eastern area of the neighboring country. "It is now crucial for the parties to honor their agreements," Ban's spokesperson, Michele Montas, said in a statement on the agreement signed on May 3 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. (UN News)
Congo (DRC)
The first group of refugees from the DRC who fled to neighbouring Zambia to escape the civil war in the 1990s arrived back home last week under a voluntary repatriation organized by the UNHCR. The 416 people travelled by boat across Lake Tanganyika, disembarking at the town of Kalemie in the southeastern province of Katanga, according to Jens Hesemann, spokesman for the UNHCR. Zambia hosts an estimated 61,000 refugees from the DRC; about 40,000 live in camps. (IRIN)
Eritrea
Eritrea May 9 defended its right to send troops into the disputed border region with arch-foe Ethiopia. The UN called for both nations the previous day to withdraw their troops from the border where it said Addis Ababa and Asmara had moved more than 5,000 soldiers in recent months. A peace agreement ended the border war that killed some 70,000 people, but the process soon ground to a halt when Ethiopia rejected a 2002 decision by an independent boundary commission. (Reuters)
Guinea
Rioting last week by soldiers in two towns and in the capital Conakry, suggests that the government's grip on the country remains fragile. "The general feeling is one of impatience; that there has been a lot of talk but no action," Elisabeth Cote, who represents the Washington-based election support NGO IFES in Guinea told IRIN. Soldiers reportedly shot into the air in their barracks May 3 and May 4. In one city they strafed a residential area with machine guns, killing at least two people. (IRIN)
Kenya
The World Bank has launched a survey to analyze investment climate and identity obstacles to the development of business activities which impacts negatively to the economic growth in Kenya. The Investment Climate Assessment (ICA) is to identify policy gaps and point out areas of focus for policy intervention. The indirect costs of doing business in Kenya from crime, corruption and disorder are stifling economic growth, the bank said. Cheap labor gives Kenya an advantage, yet worker productivity lags well behind other African countries . (Xinhua, Reuters)
Liberia
The war crimes trial of former Liberian president Charles Taylor begins June 4 with opening arguments, the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone announced May 8. "That Charles Taylor will now face justice is the very embodiment of the maxim that no one is above the law," Special Court Prosecutor Stephen Rapp said. Taylor faces 11 counts of war crimes, crimes against humanity and other serious violations of international humanitarian law, including mass murder, mutilations, rape, sexual slavery and the use of child soldiers, for his role in the decade-long civil war that engulfed Sierra Leone. (UN News)
Nigeria
Heavily armed gunmen May 9 kidnapped four US oil workers from a barge off the Nigerian coast as violence flared after disputed elections in the world's eighth largest oil exporter. It was the ninth attack on Western oil facilities in as many days in the Niger Delta, home to Africa's biggest oil industry, in the wake of April's general elections which were condemned by observers as fraudulent. Earlier this week, rebels blew up three oil pipelines in the delta (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone has said that it is pushing back the date of presidential and legislative elections by two weeks. The polls, the first since UN peacekeepers left in 2005, had been scheduled to take place July 28, but electoral officials said that the original date does not allow sufficient time from the dissolving of parliament to organise an election. The opposition criticised the president's original choice of date, saying it had been "arbitrary." (BBC)
Somalia
The UN World Food Programme (WFP) said May 8 it had carried out its first aid distributions in Mogadishu since Somalia's capital was blasted by the heaviest fighting for 16 years. Some 1,300 people died and hundreds of thousands more fled battles last month between insurgents and allied Somali-Ethiopian forces. "We started in the heaviest damaged areas in north Mogadishu, where the fighting was concentrated," WFP country director Peter Goossens said in a statement. (Reuters)
South Africa
South Africa has made great efforts to redress housing inequality but desperate living conditions persist, according to a UN human rights expert who called on the government to boost social services to settlements. "Success cannot be measured merely through the number of houses built but also needs to take into account quality of housing and access to services, especially for the poor," said the Special Rapporteur on adequate housing, Miloon Kothari, who visited the country from April 12-24. (UN News)
Sudan
A report by Amnesty International on violations of the UN arms embargo in Darfur will add to the diplomatic pressure for the ban to be applied to Sudan as a whole. The current limited UN ban meant to prevent the supply of arms to belligerent parties in Darfur applies only in the territory of Darfur itself. This technically allows countries such as Russia and China to continue supplying weapons to the government of Sudan. Amnesty says that such weapons, including attack helicopters and jet fighters, are being used in Darfur. (BBC)
Zambia
Zambia's ex-President Frederick Chiluba has been found guilty of stealing USD 46 million of public money by a UK court. The judge said that Zambians should know that when he appeared wearing his trademark designer clothes, they were paid for with stolen money. Chiluba's spokesman told a Zambian newspaper that the ex-leader did not accept the court's jurisdiction. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
The detention of two lawyers for providing legal counsel to members of Zimbabwe's MDC party is the latest attempt by the ZANU-PF government to undermine the rule of law and victimise practitioners representing the opposition, legal experts have said. Condemnation of the arrests came May 8 as the Law Society of Zimbabwe, which represents the country's legal fraternity, organized a Harare protest march but a lawyer told IRIN that heavily armed police had prevented it from taking place. (IRIN)
2007/04/26
Central African Republic (CAR)
The Paris Club of creditor countries and the Central African Republic have reached agreement on restructuring USD 36.1 million in debt, the Paris Club said April 20. The group said the sum covered USD 28.4 million of arrears and late interest and would lead to the cancellation of debt totaling USD 9.9 million. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
The UN Deputy Secretary-General said April 24 in the DRC that all parties there agree on the need for dialogue and reconciliation in order to achieve lasting peace in the country, where recent clashes have forced thousands to flee in the northeast. "I carry with me a strong feeling of triumph, having seen the efforts of the National Assembly and its president in promoting reconciliation and dialogue in a bid for unity and to strengthen democracy in the DRC," said Asha Rose Migiro. (UN News)
Guinea-Bissau
The Guinea-Bissau government has moved to reduce the price of cashew nuts, the country's main cash crop which is integral to many people's livelihoods, in a bid to revitalize the sector following dismal performance linked to a previous price hike that last year sparked a food crisis in the tiny state. Guinea-Bissau is one of the world's poorest countries but also among the largest producers of cashews. (IRIN)
Kenya
The World Bank has unlocked USD 338 million withheld due to perceived laxity in the war against official corruption in Kenya, further increasing the East African nation's chance of receiving bilateral aid pledges, officials said in Nairobi April 23. Addressing a news conference in Nairobi, Finance Minister Amos Kimunya also said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has cleared Kenya to receive the second round of poverty and economic restructuring funding. (Xinhua)
Madagascar
The UN World Food Program (WFP) April 24 announced that it is flying desperately needed food aid and other supplies by helicopter for 20,000 people in north-western Madagascar who have been effectively cut off after the island nation faced one of the worst cyclone seasons in years. Air transport is necessary because villages have been isolated due to road and bridge damage caused by several cyclones. (UN News)
Malawi
US pop star singer Madonna has ended a six-day trip to Malawi, where the one-year-old boy she hopes to adopt was born. The star opened a center funded by the charity she co-founded, which aims to feed and educate 32,000 orphans. She also visited the orphanage where toddler David Banda had lived, but her spokeswoman denied reports that she planned to adopt a second local child. (BBC)
Nigeria
Nigeria's opposition parties have asked the parliament to annul last weekend's presidential poll, which ruling party candidate Umaru Yar'Adua won by a landslide in the polls, and set up an interim administration to take over government. They also called for a re-run of all recent elections described as "flawed" by local and international observers. The opposition also called on Nigerians to troop out to the streets on 1 May to reject the "sham elections" and call for their cancellation. (BBC)
Somalia
Somalia has become the most dangerous place in the world for relief workers to operate, the UN humanitarian chief has warned, with none of the sides in the deadly fighting that has raged across Mogadishu respecting the rules of war or making any allowance for aid operations. John Holmes, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, told the Security Council April 24 that the fighting in Somalia is probably the worst in 16 years, since the impoverished country stopped having a functioning national government. (UN News)
Sudan
After reaching agreement with the Sudanese Government, the UNHCR will upgrade its presence in the western part of the war-torn Darfur region where about 700,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) are living. UNHCR Antonio Guterres, while touring Darfur, said April 25 that the UN and Khartoum had reached a deal and called on local authorities to play their part by boosting security in West Darfur state for the large IDP population and for humanitarian workers. (UN News)
Zimbabwe
Officials from the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and the UN World Food Program (WFP), at the invitation of Zimbabwean government, are scheduled to arrive in the country this week to assess the food security situation. President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF government has already warned that it will not accept any food aid with "political strings attached," although a second successive year of drought and major disruptions in the farming sector in recent years have resulted in the country producing less than one-third of its annual food requirements this year. (IRIN)
The Paris Club of creditor countries and the Central African Republic have reached agreement on restructuring USD 36.1 million in debt, the Paris Club said April 20. The group said the sum covered USD 28.4 million of arrears and late interest and would lead to the cancellation of debt totaling USD 9.9 million. (Reuters)
Congo (DRC)
The UN Deputy Secretary-General said April 24 in the DRC that all parties there agree on the need for dialogue and reconciliation in order to achieve lasting peace in the country, where recent clashes have forced thousands to flee in the northeast. "I carry with me a strong feeling of triumph, having seen the efforts of the National Assembly and its president in promoting reconciliation and dialogue in a bid for unity and to strengthen democracy in the DRC," said Asha Rose Migiro. (UN News)
Guinea-Bissau
The Guinea-Bissau government has moved to reduce the price of cashew nuts, the country's main cash crop which is integral to many people's livelihoods, in a bid to revitalize the sector following dismal performance linked to a previous price hike that last year sparked a food crisis in the tiny state. Guinea-Bissau is one of the world's poorest countries but also among the largest producers of cashews. (IRIN)
Kenya
The World Bank has unlocked USD 338 million withheld due to perceived laxity in the war against official corruption in Kenya, further increasing the East African nation's chance of receiving bilateral aid pledges, officials said in Nairobi April 23. Addressing a news conference in Nairobi, Finance Minister Amos Kimunya also said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has cleared Kenya to receive the second round of poverty and economic restructuring funding. (Xinhua)
Madagascar
The UN World Food Program (WFP) April 24 announced that it is flying desperately needed food aid and other supplies by helicopter for 20,000 people in north-western Madagascar who have been effectively cut off after the island nation faced one of the worst cyclone seasons in years. Air transport is necessary because villages have been isolated due to road and bridge damage caused by several cyclones. (UN News)
Malawi
US pop star singer Madonna has ended a six-day trip to Malawi, where the one-year-old boy she hopes to adopt was born. The star opened a center funded by the charity she co-founded, which aims to feed and educate 32,000 orphans. She also visited the orphanage where toddler David Banda had lived, but her spokeswoman denied reports that she planned to adopt a second local child. (BBC)
Nigeria
Nigeria's opposition parties have asked the parliament to annul last weekend's presidential poll, which ruling party candidate Umaru Yar'Adua won by a landslide in the polls, and set up an interim administration to take over government. They also called for a re-run of all recent elections described as "flawed" by local and international observers. The opposition also called on Nigerians to troop out to the streets on 1 May to reject the "sham elections" and call for their cancellation. (BBC)
Somalia
Somalia has become the most dangerous place in the world for relief workers to operate, the UN humanitarian chief has warned, with none of the sides in the deadly fighting that has raged across Mogadishu respecting the rules of war or making any allowance for aid operations. John Holmes, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, told the Security Council April 24 that the fighting in Somalia is probably the worst in 16 years, since the impoverished country stopped having a functioning national government. (UN News)
Sudan
After reaching agreement with the Sudanese Government, the UNHCR will upgrade its presence in the western part of the war-torn Darfur region where about 700,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) are living. UNHCR Antonio Guterres, while touring Darfur, said April 25 that the UN and Khartoum had reached a deal and called on local authorities to play their part by boosting security in West Darfur state for the large IDP population and for humanitarian workers. (UN News)
Zimbabwe
Officials from the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and the UN World Food Program (WFP), at the invitation of Zimbabwean government, are scheduled to arrive in the country this week to assess the food security situation. President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF government has already warned that it will not accept any food aid with "political strings attached," although a second successive year of drought and major disruptions in the farming sector in recent years have resulted in the country producing less than one-third of its annual food requirements this year. (IRIN)
2007/04/19
U.N. Round-Up
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has described Sudan's decision to allow 3,000 UN troops into Darfur as "a very positive sign." The UN contingent will provide support for 7,000 struggling African Union troops there. Sudan's apparent change of heart comes after months of international pressure to accept UN peacekeepers. But Khartoum is yet to agree to the deployment of a much-larger AU force of 20,000 troops proposed by the UN. The four-year Darfur conflict between rebels and pro-government Arab militia has seen more than 200,000 deaths and at least 2.4 million displaced.
US President George W. Bush, meanwhile, warned Sudan's president April 18 that he has one last chance to stop violence in Darfur or else the United States will impose sanctions and consider other punitive options. Bush said he has decided to give UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon more time to pursue diplomacy with Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir but made clear in a speech at the US Holocaust Museum that his patience is limited. In his speech, he accused Bashir of routinely violating past agreements.
Burundi
The UN Peacebuilding Commission (PBC) is committed to supporting Burundi, including by helping mobilize resources to fight poverty, an official from the newly created body, which aims to prevent countries from relapsing into conflict, said April 14 in Bujumbura. Ambassador Johan Lovald told reporters after wrapping up a four-day visit to Burundi, which has been the victim of violent coups and political instability since gaining independence in 1962, stressed the importance of adhering to all peace agreements as well as promoting "inclusive political dialogue, human rights and good governance." (UN News)
Chad
British aid agency Oxfam says urgent funding is needed to address water shortages being experienced by some 140,000 Chadian internally displaced persons. "We need more funding to enable us to adequately intervene in the provision of water and sanitation facilities in the IDP camps which are inadequate. The camps are in eastern Chad where it is normally dry and there is a need to drill more boreholes to increase water supply," said Michel Anglade, campaign and policy adviser at Oxfam's West Africa regional office in Dakar. (IRIN)
Congo (DRC)
Congolese soldiers shot dead dozens of unarmed civilians, some while they prayed, in a violent repression of protests by a religious sect earlier this year, US-based Human Rights Watch said April 18. More than 100 people, mostly civilians, were killed on Jan. 31 and Feb. 1 when Bundu Dia Kongo, an opposition-allied religious group, demonstrated against alleged fraud in regional governor polls in western Bas-Congo province. (Reuters)
Ethiopia
Ethiopian and World Bank representatives are continuing their negotiation in Washington in a bid to finance four road projects under the third phase of Adaptable Program Lending package. The negotiation mainly focuses on how the World Bank releases USD 225 million for the rehabilitation of the road projects in different parts of the country. (The Reporter, Ethiopia)
Ivory Coast
Ceremonies have begun to mark the removal of a buffer zone that has divided Ivory Coast for five years. A bulldozer knocked down a UN military check-point and vehicles moved freely into the zone. President Laurent Gbagbo and former rebel leader PM Guillaume Soro jointly inspected government troops and former rebel soldiers. They will form a joint force to patrol the zone separating the rebel-run north from the loyalist-controlled south. The zone has been patrolled by 11,000 French and UN peacekeepers. (BBC)
Kenya
Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki has announced a USD 12 billion plan over 13 years to eradicate slums in the country. Speaking at the 21st Session of the Governing Council of UN-Habitat in Nairobi, he said the strategy envisages improvement of livelihoods of 5.4 million people living in informal settlements. Kibaki and his government are enjoying an all time high rating seven months ahead of the December general election, a new opinion poll shows. (BBC/AllAfrica)
Liberia
Liberia's economic growth, already motoring at nearly 8 percent thanks to reconstruction after a civil war, will surge above 11 percent on average in the coming five years, the International Monetary Fund said. In a statement released April 17, an IMF team which visited earlier this month said however the West African country could not sustain its huge foreign debt, which totals nearly USD 4 billion, and needed comprehensive debt relief. (Reuters)
Niger
More strikes among primary and secondary school teachers have been met with violent protests in Niamey by their disgruntled students, and as separate protests erupt on university campuses, some observers are warning that the whole academic year is in jeopardy. Since the start of the academic year last October, powerful unions controlling 24,000 of the 28,000 primary and secondary school teachers in the country have called almost two months of strikes at intermittent periods. (IRIN)
Nigeria
Nigeria is likely to go ahead with Saturday's (April 21) watershed presidential election, despite an opposition demand that it should be postponed because of rigged state polls, political sources said on Wednesday. The election was earlier thrown into doubt when a coalition of 18 opposition parties said a fair vote was impossible after wholesale fraud and violence in the state polls last weekend. (Reuters)
Rwanda
Rwanda has filed a case at the World Court accusing France of violating international law by seeking the prosecutions of Rwandan President Paul Kagame and associates. A French judge issued nine arrest warrants in November over the 1994 shooting down of a plane in which former Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana died. The incident led to the massacre of some 800,000 minority Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus by extremist Hutus. (Reuters)
Somalia
A member of Somalia's transitional government has accused Ethiopian troops in the capital Mogadishu of committing genocide since arriving in December. The accusations came from Hussein Aideed - a former Somali warlord who is the deputy prime minister of the transitional government. Ethiopia dismissed Aideed's comments as an absolute fabrication. Hundreds of people have been killed and thousands forced to flee since Ethiopian troops arrived in Mogadishu. (BBC)
Sudan
British aid agency Oxfam has launched an appeal for humanitarian aid for the Darfur region of Sudan and east Chad. Oxfam says it needs USD 10 million to help displaced people in the region who continue to flee from violence. Visiting US official John Negroponte has said Sudan is obstructing humanitarian aid and has warned of wider sanctions. The four-year Darfur conflict between rebels and pro-government Arab militia has seen more than 200,000 deaths and at least 2.4 million displaced. (BBC)
Uganda
Two opposition MPs have appeared in court in Uganda, charged in connection with a demonstration last Thursday in which three people died. The MPs were accused - along with 25 others - of participating in a riot. Police have fired live bullets to disperse dozens of protesters angry at their arrest in the capital, Kampala. MPs Beatrice Atim and Hussein Kyanjo were arrested for taking part in last week's protests against plans to allocate forest land to a sugar firm. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
President Robert Mugabe has blamed "unbridled greed" in the business sector and "saboteurs" for the country's economic woes during independence celebrations. Heavily criticized for his brutal crackdown of the opposition, he also defended his government's stance. "Misguided opposition elements [have tried] to create a state of anarchy through an orgy of violence," Mugabe said, speaking on Zimbabwe's Independence Day. The country's has the world's highest annual rate of inflation and 80 percent unemployment. (BBC)
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has described Sudan's decision to allow 3,000 UN troops into Darfur as "a very positive sign." The UN contingent will provide support for 7,000 struggling African Union troops there. Sudan's apparent change of heart comes after months of international pressure to accept UN peacekeepers. But Khartoum is yet to agree to the deployment of a much-larger AU force of 20,000 troops proposed by the UN. The four-year Darfur conflict between rebels and pro-government Arab militia has seen more than 200,000 deaths and at least 2.4 million displaced.
US President George W. Bush, meanwhile, warned Sudan's president April 18 that he has one last chance to stop violence in Darfur or else the United States will impose sanctions and consider other punitive options. Bush said he has decided to give UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon more time to pursue diplomacy with Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir but made clear in a speech at the US Holocaust Museum that his patience is limited. In his speech, he accused Bashir of routinely violating past agreements.
Burundi
The UN Peacebuilding Commission (PBC) is committed to supporting Burundi, including by helping mobilize resources to fight poverty, an official from the newly created body, which aims to prevent countries from relapsing into conflict, said April 14 in Bujumbura. Ambassador Johan Lovald told reporters after wrapping up a four-day visit to Burundi, which has been the victim of violent coups and political instability since gaining independence in 1962, stressed the importance of adhering to all peace agreements as well as promoting "inclusive political dialogue, human rights and good governance." (UN News)
Chad
British aid agency Oxfam says urgent funding is needed to address water shortages being experienced by some 140,000 Chadian internally displaced persons. "We need more funding to enable us to adequately intervene in the provision of water and sanitation facilities in the IDP camps which are inadequate. The camps are in eastern Chad where it is normally dry and there is a need to drill more boreholes to increase water supply," said Michel Anglade, campaign and policy adviser at Oxfam's West Africa regional office in Dakar. (IRIN)
Congo (DRC)
Congolese soldiers shot dead dozens of unarmed civilians, some while they prayed, in a violent repression of protests by a religious sect earlier this year, US-based Human Rights Watch said April 18. More than 100 people, mostly civilians, were killed on Jan. 31 and Feb. 1 when Bundu Dia Kongo, an opposition-allied religious group, demonstrated against alleged fraud in regional governor polls in western Bas-Congo province. (Reuters)
Ethiopia
Ethiopian and World Bank representatives are continuing their negotiation in Washington in a bid to finance four road projects under the third phase of Adaptable Program Lending package. The negotiation mainly focuses on how the World Bank releases USD 225 million for the rehabilitation of the road projects in different parts of the country. (The Reporter, Ethiopia)
Ivory Coast
Ceremonies have begun to mark the removal of a buffer zone that has divided Ivory Coast for five years. A bulldozer knocked down a UN military check-point and vehicles moved freely into the zone. President Laurent Gbagbo and former rebel leader PM Guillaume Soro jointly inspected government troops and former rebel soldiers. They will form a joint force to patrol the zone separating the rebel-run north from the loyalist-controlled south. The zone has been patrolled by 11,000 French and UN peacekeepers. (BBC)
Kenya
Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki has announced a USD 12 billion plan over 13 years to eradicate slums in the country. Speaking at the 21st Session of the Governing Council of UN-Habitat in Nairobi, he said the strategy envisages improvement of livelihoods of 5.4 million people living in informal settlements. Kibaki and his government are enjoying an all time high rating seven months ahead of the December general election, a new opinion poll shows. (BBC/AllAfrica)
Liberia
Liberia's economic growth, already motoring at nearly 8 percent thanks to reconstruction after a civil war, will surge above 11 percent on average in the coming five years, the International Monetary Fund said. In a statement released April 17, an IMF team which visited earlier this month said however the West African country could not sustain its huge foreign debt, which totals nearly USD 4 billion, and needed comprehensive debt relief. (Reuters)
Niger
More strikes among primary and secondary school teachers have been met with violent protests in Niamey by their disgruntled students, and as separate protests erupt on university campuses, some observers are warning that the whole academic year is in jeopardy. Since the start of the academic year last October, powerful unions controlling 24,000 of the 28,000 primary and secondary school teachers in the country have called almost two months of strikes at intermittent periods. (IRIN)
Nigeria
Nigeria is likely to go ahead with Saturday's (April 21) watershed presidential election, despite an opposition demand that it should be postponed because of rigged state polls, political sources said on Wednesday. The election was earlier thrown into doubt when a coalition of 18 opposition parties said a fair vote was impossible after wholesale fraud and violence in the state polls last weekend. (Reuters)
Rwanda
Rwanda has filed a case at the World Court accusing France of violating international law by seeking the prosecutions of Rwandan President Paul Kagame and associates. A French judge issued nine arrest warrants in November over the 1994 shooting down of a plane in which former Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana died. The incident led to the massacre of some 800,000 minority Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus by extremist Hutus. (Reuters)
Somalia
A member of Somalia's transitional government has accused Ethiopian troops in the capital Mogadishu of committing genocide since arriving in December. The accusations came from Hussein Aideed - a former Somali warlord who is the deputy prime minister of the transitional government. Ethiopia dismissed Aideed's comments as an absolute fabrication. Hundreds of people have been killed and thousands forced to flee since Ethiopian troops arrived in Mogadishu. (BBC)
Sudan
British aid agency Oxfam has launched an appeal for humanitarian aid for the Darfur region of Sudan and east Chad. Oxfam says it needs USD 10 million to help displaced people in the region who continue to flee from violence. Visiting US official John Negroponte has said Sudan is obstructing humanitarian aid and has warned of wider sanctions. The four-year Darfur conflict between rebels and pro-government Arab militia has seen more than 200,000 deaths and at least 2.4 million displaced. (BBC)
Uganda
Two opposition MPs have appeared in court in Uganda, charged in connection with a demonstration last Thursday in which three people died. The MPs were accused - along with 25 others - of participating in a riot. Police have fired live bullets to disperse dozens of protesters angry at their arrest in the capital, Kampala. MPs Beatrice Atim and Hussein Kyanjo were arrested for taking part in last week's protests against plans to allocate forest land to a sugar firm. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
President Robert Mugabe has blamed "unbridled greed" in the business sector and "saboteurs" for the country's economic woes during independence celebrations. Heavily criticized for his brutal crackdown of the opposition, he also defended his government's stance. "Misguided opposition elements [have tried] to create a state of anarchy through an orgy of violence," Mugabe said, speaking on Zimbabwe's Independence Day. The country's has the world's highest annual rate of inflation and 80 percent unemployment. (BBC)
2007/04/12
U.N. Round-Up
The UN and the Government of Rwanda have officially announced that the central African country will participate in the "One UN" pilot program which seeks to better coordinate development activities nationally. The scheme will test how the greater UN family can ensure efficient and more effective development operations, while aiming to speed up activities to help achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), eight targets for tackling poverty, hunger and other social ills by 2015. The reform projects --also set to be carried out in Albania, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Pakistan, Tanzania, Uruguay and Viet Nam -- will consolidate the UN's presence by replacing current structures with one leader, one program and one budget, thus allowing various UN agencies to play to their strengths while also building on the strengths of different members of the UN family
Chad
Following last month's brutal attacks in south-eastern Chad, the UN refugee agency UNHCR said April 10 that the humanitarian situation is far worse than it had initially estimated, with between 200 and 400 killed and thousands displaced during the offensive possibly carried out by Janjaweed militias from Sudan’s neighboring Darfur region. (UN News)
Congo (DRC)
International logging firms working in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are causing social chaos and wreaking environmental havoc, a Greenpeace report claimed April 11. It said that efforts by the World Bank to control the logging industry were failing because parts of the rainforest were being sold off under the "illusion'' that logging alleviated poverty. (PA newswires)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia's government has admitted that it detained 41 "terror suspects" who were captured in neighboring Somalia. The ministry of foreign affairs said the detainees were from 17 countries including America, Canada and Sweden. It is the first time the government has admitted that it is holding the foreigners, defending the action as part of the "global war on terror." (BBC)
Guinea-Bissau
The president of Guinea-Bissau, Joao Bernardo "Nino" Vieira, has named a new prime minister after three weeks of political uncertainty stemming from the national assembly's passage of a no-confidence motion against the former premier, a long-time ally of Vieira. The president named Martinho N'Dafa Cabi, a vice president of the former ruling African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde. He replaces Aristides Gomes. "Our society is completely divided and fragile," N'Dafa Cabi told reporters April 11. "For this reason our mission will also be national reconciliation." (IRIN)
Madagascar
The UN humanitarian arm has dispatched a five-member disaster assessment and coordination team to Madagascar, where relief operations are under way after the sixth cyclone of the season struck the island nation. The team from OCHA will support the UN country team already in Madagascar and the African country's authorities as they determine what emergency supplies and facilities are needed to avert further deaths and diseases. Madagascar has been battered by six cyclone or tropical storms since December, with tropical storm Jaya striking in early April. (UN News)
Niger
With malnutrition responsible for more than half of all deaths of children under five in Niger – a country where 20 percent never reach their 5th birthday –UNICEF is warning that recent gains in lowering mortality rates could be lost without consistent funding for aid efforts. A new survey shows that malnutrition rates among children in Niger have improved significantly over the last year, the agency said, while cautioning that without consistent support for the strategy of managing and preventing malnutrition the situation could deteriorate again. (UN News)
Nigeria
The head of Nigeria's anti-graft agency has been given a renewed four-year mandate with a high-profile promotion. The president has promoted Nuhu Ribadu from police commissioner to the rank of assistant inspector general of police. Critics, who see Ribadu as an ally of the president, say his tenure renewal is a "reward for successfully silencing the opposition." But President Olusegun Obasanjo's supporters say the move will secure the regime's four-year-old anti-graft war. (BBC)
Rwanda
Thirteen years after some 800,000 Rwandans were murdered by their compatriots in an orchestrated criminal campaign, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called for "a global partnership against genocide" and pledged to strengthen UN mechanisms to ensure that such an event never happens again. The post of UN Special Adviser for the Prevention of Genocide -- currently held by Juan E. Mendez of Argentina -- will be upgraded to a full-time position, Ban said in a message marking the anniversary of the start of the genocide. (UN News)
Somalia
Calling on authorities to take action to curb piracy in Somali waters, the WFP hailed the release of a hijacked ship used for carrying food aid which had been hijacked in February off the coast of the semi-autonomous region of Puntland in the northeast of the African country. The MV Rozen and its 12-member crew, comprising six Kenyans and six Sri Lankans, had completed its contract with WFP on Feb. 22 when it dropped off 1,800 metric tons of food from Mombasa in Kenya to Bossaso in Somalia when it was hijacked on Feb. 25. (UN News)
Sudan
The US has delayed for several weeks imposing new sanctions against Sudan over its handling of Darfur to give the UN more time to negotiate with Khartoum, the US special envoy to Sudan, Andrew Natsios, told lawmakers. He said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon had asked the US at the end of last month to wait for two to four weeks to enable him to negotiate a UN-African Union peacekeeping force for Darfur, which Sudan has so far refused. African Union officials plan to come to the UN on Monday to complete planning for the AU-UN hybrid force. (Reuters)
Uganda
The African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF) has given Uganda a grant of USD 4.5 million to help institutions in the country develop skills for planning, budgeting and proper use of resources. The ACBF, based in Harare, Zimbabwe, is an independent, capacity-building institution established in 1991 by the African Development Bank, the World Bank, and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and other donors. (Xinhua)
Zimbabwe
The Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) in Zimbabwe has warned journalists of an increasingly hostile working environment after the abduction and subsequent murder of a freelance reporter, and the arrest and torture of two other foreign correspondents. "The unlawful arrest and subsequent severe assault of photojournalist Tsvangirai Mukwazhi while in police custody on 11 March 2007, and that of Gift Phiri on 1 April 2007, behooves Zimbabwean journalists to be on high alert as they conduct their lawful and professional duties," MISA said in a statement. (IRIN)
The UN and the Government of Rwanda have officially announced that the central African country will participate in the "One UN" pilot program which seeks to better coordinate development activities nationally. The scheme will test how the greater UN family can ensure efficient and more effective development operations, while aiming to speed up activities to help achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), eight targets for tackling poverty, hunger and other social ills by 2015. The reform projects --also set to be carried out in Albania, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Pakistan, Tanzania, Uruguay and Viet Nam -- will consolidate the UN's presence by replacing current structures with one leader, one program and one budget, thus allowing various UN agencies to play to their strengths while also building on the strengths of different members of the UN family
Chad
Following last month's brutal attacks in south-eastern Chad, the UN refugee agency UNHCR said April 10 that the humanitarian situation is far worse than it had initially estimated, with between 200 and 400 killed and thousands displaced during the offensive possibly carried out by Janjaweed militias from Sudan’s neighboring Darfur region. (UN News)
Congo (DRC)
International logging firms working in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are causing social chaos and wreaking environmental havoc, a Greenpeace report claimed April 11. It said that efforts by the World Bank to control the logging industry were failing because parts of the rainforest were being sold off under the "illusion'' that logging alleviated poverty. (PA newswires)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia's government has admitted that it detained 41 "terror suspects" who were captured in neighboring Somalia. The ministry of foreign affairs said the detainees were from 17 countries including America, Canada and Sweden. It is the first time the government has admitted that it is holding the foreigners, defending the action as part of the "global war on terror." (BBC)
Guinea-Bissau
The president of Guinea-Bissau, Joao Bernardo "Nino" Vieira, has named a new prime minister after three weeks of political uncertainty stemming from the national assembly's passage of a no-confidence motion against the former premier, a long-time ally of Vieira. The president named Martinho N'Dafa Cabi, a vice president of the former ruling African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde. He replaces Aristides Gomes. "Our society is completely divided and fragile," N'Dafa Cabi told reporters April 11. "For this reason our mission will also be national reconciliation." (IRIN)
Madagascar
The UN humanitarian arm has dispatched a five-member disaster assessment and coordination team to Madagascar, where relief operations are under way after the sixth cyclone of the season struck the island nation. The team from OCHA will support the UN country team already in Madagascar and the African country's authorities as they determine what emergency supplies and facilities are needed to avert further deaths and diseases. Madagascar has been battered by six cyclone or tropical storms since December, with tropical storm Jaya striking in early April. (UN News)
Niger
With malnutrition responsible for more than half of all deaths of children under five in Niger – a country where 20 percent never reach their 5th birthday –UNICEF is warning that recent gains in lowering mortality rates could be lost without consistent funding for aid efforts. A new survey shows that malnutrition rates among children in Niger have improved significantly over the last year, the agency said, while cautioning that without consistent support for the strategy of managing and preventing malnutrition the situation could deteriorate again. (UN News)
Nigeria
The head of Nigeria's anti-graft agency has been given a renewed four-year mandate with a high-profile promotion. The president has promoted Nuhu Ribadu from police commissioner to the rank of assistant inspector general of police. Critics, who see Ribadu as an ally of the president, say his tenure renewal is a "reward for successfully silencing the opposition." But President Olusegun Obasanjo's supporters say the move will secure the regime's four-year-old anti-graft war. (BBC)
Rwanda
Thirteen years after some 800,000 Rwandans were murdered by their compatriots in an orchestrated criminal campaign, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called for "a global partnership against genocide" and pledged to strengthen UN mechanisms to ensure that such an event never happens again. The post of UN Special Adviser for the Prevention of Genocide -- currently held by Juan E. Mendez of Argentina -- will be upgraded to a full-time position, Ban said in a message marking the anniversary of the start of the genocide. (UN News)
Somalia
Calling on authorities to take action to curb piracy in Somali waters, the WFP hailed the release of a hijacked ship used for carrying food aid which had been hijacked in February off the coast of the semi-autonomous region of Puntland in the northeast of the African country. The MV Rozen and its 12-member crew, comprising six Kenyans and six Sri Lankans, had completed its contract with WFP on Feb. 22 when it dropped off 1,800 metric tons of food from Mombasa in Kenya to Bossaso in Somalia when it was hijacked on Feb. 25. (UN News)
Sudan
The US has delayed for several weeks imposing new sanctions against Sudan over its handling of Darfur to give the UN more time to negotiate with Khartoum, the US special envoy to Sudan, Andrew Natsios, told lawmakers. He said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon had asked the US at the end of last month to wait for two to four weeks to enable him to negotiate a UN-African Union peacekeeping force for Darfur, which Sudan has so far refused. African Union officials plan to come to the UN on Monday to complete planning for the AU-UN hybrid force. (Reuters)
Uganda
The African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF) has given Uganda a grant of USD 4.5 million to help institutions in the country develop skills for planning, budgeting and proper use of resources. The ACBF, based in Harare, Zimbabwe, is an independent, capacity-building institution established in 1991 by the African Development Bank, the World Bank, and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and other donors. (Xinhua)
Zimbabwe
The Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) in Zimbabwe has warned journalists of an increasingly hostile working environment after the abduction and subsequent murder of a freelance reporter, and the arrest and torture of two other foreign correspondents. "The unlawful arrest and subsequent severe assault of photojournalist Tsvangirai Mukwazhi while in police custody on 11 March 2007, and that of Gift Phiri on 1 April 2007, behooves Zimbabwean journalists to be on high alert as they conduct their lawful and professional duties," MISA said in a statement. (IRIN)
2007/04/05
Accelerating Africa's Development - UNECA
African economic growth will accelerate in 2007, though reforms are needed to underpin "very fragile foundations," according to a report by the UN Economic Commission for Africa. It says the continent's economies will grow by 5.8% on average in 2007, up from 5.7% a year earlier. Better management and demand for commodities will boost expansion. However, to keep growing, Africa needs to diversify its economic output and spend on infrastructure, the UN warned. A number of factors pose risks to growth in Africa, including the spread of HIV/AIDS that threatens to incapacitate a large chunk of the workforce, the UN said in its report, called Accelerating Africa's Development through Diversification.
To learn more, please go to http://www.uneca.org/
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has said that he wants more time to convince Sudan to accept a large "hybrid" peacekeeping force in Darfur before Britain and the US push for Security Council sanctions. "Before we talk about the sanctions, let me have some more political space to deal with this dialogue with them," Ban told reporters after returning from an 11-day Middle East trip. The US is working closely with Britain, which takes over the presidency of the Security Council for April, and is planning a new resolution on Darfur that could include sanctions. Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir has hesitated on allowing UN peacekeepers into Darfur, where experts say at least 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million displaced since 2003, when rebel groups took up arms against Khartoum.
African Union forces can no longer cope with the dangers in Darfur and need the help of UN troops to prevent further "slaughter," a top AU official in Sudan said April 3. Sam Ibok, head of the AU team charged with implementing a peace agreement in western Sudan, expressed his concerns after gunmen killed five AU troops in the deadliest single attack against the African force since it deployed in 2004. The five Senegalese soldiers were guarding a water point near the Sudanese border with Chad when they came under fire on Sunday. "The African Union force cannot cope with the circumstances that it finds itself in, and we have to be honest about it," Ibok told Reuters Television in an interview. "Anybody who wants us to succeed would need to work to give us the ability to be more effective and that can only be done ... between the United Nations and the African Union."
Burundi
Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza has said his government would not meet new demands from the country's last rebel group, accusing them of failing to keep a ceasefire deal. The Hutu Forces for National Liberation (FNL) signed a peace agreement with the government in September after a South African-led mediation. But the FNL last week stopped participating in a ceasefire monitoring team, arguing that government forces had not been withdrawn from areas under their control. (Reuters)
Central African Republic (CAR)
The CAR plans to issue a bond on a new regional bourse later this year to help raise funds to boost its ailing economy and curb insecurity, Prime Minister Elie Dote said in an interview. Current information suggests the Central African state needs around USD 1 billion to ensure security and peace and drive its economic development, he said. (Reuters)
Chad
UNHCR and its partners are dealing with a new wave of displacement in south-eastern Chad following a deadly attack at the weekend against the villages of Tiero and Marena. Preliminary reports by UNHCR and other humanitarian agencies indicate that since Saturday's attack between 2,000 and 3,000 people have arrived at the Goz Amir refugee camp near the town of Koukou, which is located about 45 km east of the two villages. The camp is home to more than 19,000 Sudanese refugees from the neighboring Darfur region. (UN News)
Guinea
Guinea's president has named a new government, a month after appointing a consensus prime minister to end a series of crippling strikes. Lansana Conte's decree was announced in a television broadcast to the West African nation, following consultations with Prime Minister Lansana Kouyate. More 100 people were killed during a seven-week period of unrest earlier this year in the country. Most were shot by Guinea's security forces. (BBC)
Ethiopia
Ethiopian soldiers have killed 23 Eritrean-backed rebels, captured 18, and received the surrender of 112 more, the state news agency ENA said April 3. "The 23 rebels engaged in proxy war coordinated by the Eritrean government were killed in gunfire with the army in Armacheo district of the northern Gondar region," ENA said, quoting a regional official. Ethiopia, the major military power in the Horn of Africa, has frequently accused Eritrea of backing, arming and harboring a variety of insurgents. (Reuters)
Kenya
The lives of many Kenyans are being transformed by an innovative mobile phone money transfer service. The free account - M-Pesa - is offered by Safaricom Kenya, a leading mobile phone service operator and is a technological breakthrough say the operators. It enables subscribers to send large volumes of money in an instant transaction. Statistics show USD 93 billion in remittances is sent by migrants overseas to Africa each year and M-Pesa hopes to tap into this transfer of funds. (BBC)
Madagascar
As the sixth mayor cyclone to hit Madagascar this season tears across the northeast of the impoverished Indian ocean island, a relentless succession of natural disasters has left nearly half a million people in desperate need of humanitarian assistance. Tropical cyclone Jaya made landfall on Madagascar's northeastern coast today on a projected trajectory that will see it rage through areas already devastated by cyclone Indlala just over two weeks ago. (IRIN)
Nigeria
Nigeria's electoral body has been told to allow Vice-President Atiku Abubakar to run for president in April's poll. Abubakar was indicted for graft by a government ministerial panel which investigated corruption in an oil fund. But the Federal High Court in Abuja ruled the electoral body lacked the power to exclude Abubakar from the election, in contradiction to a ruling made hours earlier by a superior court which said the electoral body could disqualify candidates. (BBC)
Rwanda
European countries should put on trial 37 suspects of the 1994 Rwandan genocide who are living in Europe, human rights groups said April 3. They accused France and Belgium, among others, of giving the suspects safe haven. Speaking ahead of the 13th anniversary of the genocide, when 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus were butchered in 100 days of state-sponsored killings, rights group REDRESS and the International Federation for Human Rights said delays in putting suspects on trial were inexcusable. (Reuters)
Somalia
Mogadishu residents buried their dead and ventured onto streets for the first time in five days April 2 during a lull in battles pitting Ethiopian and Somali troops against Islamist insurgents and clan militia. But even as elders from the dominant Hawiye clan insisted a truce was in place, hundreds of Ethiopian reinforcements drove into Mogadishu from other parts of Somalia, witnesses said. The UN said 47,000 Somalis have fled Mogadishu in the last 10 days, making a total of 96,000 since February. (Reuters)
Sudan
Unidentified gunmen killed five African Union peacekeepers in the Darfur region of western Sudan, the deadliest single attack against the force since late 2004, the AU said April 2. The five were guarding a water point near the border with Chad when they came under fire on Sunday. Three gunmen were also killed, he said. AU Commission chairman Alpha Oumar Konare warned that continued violence raised the possibility "for a catastrophic and tragic breakdown of the security and humanitarian situation in Darfur." (Reuters)
Uganda
Sixty-six children were killed in eastern Uganda during an army operation against suspected cattle rustlers, UK charity Save the Children says. They were shot by soldiers, run over by armored vehicles or crushed by stampeding animals last month. The aid group said it had not found physical evidence of the alleged deaths in Karamoja, but had consistent reports after interviewing some 200 people. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has called on South Africa's leader to act quickly and decisively to halt political violence in his country. President Thabo Mbeki was appointed to mediate between Zimbabwe's government and the opposition party of Tsvangirai, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Tsvangirai said he felt threatened by President Robert Mugabe. (BBC)
African economic growth will accelerate in 2007, though reforms are needed to underpin "very fragile foundations," according to a report by the UN Economic Commission for Africa. It says the continent's economies will grow by 5.8% on average in 2007, up from 5.7% a year earlier. Better management and demand for commodities will boost expansion. However, to keep growing, Africa needs to diversify its economic output and spend on infrastructure, the UN warned. A number of factors pose risks to growth in Africa, including the spread of HIV/AIDS that threatens to incapacitate a large chunk of the workforce, the UN said in its report, called Accelerating Africa's Development through Diversification.
To learn more, please go to http://www.uneca.org/
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has said that he wants more time to convince Sudan to accept a large "hybrid" peacekeeping force in Darfur before Britain and the US push for Security Council sanctions. "Before we talk about the sanctions, let me have some more political space to deal with this dialogue with them," Ban told reporters after returning from an 11-day Middle East trip. The US is working closely with Britain, which takes over the presidency of the Security Council for April, and is planning a new resolution on Darfur that could include sanctions. Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir has hesitated on allowing UN peacekeepers into Darfur, where experts say at least 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million displaced since 2003, when rebel groups took up arms against Khartoum.
African Union forces can no longer cope with the dangers in Darfur and need the help of UN troops to prevent further "slaughter," a top AU official in Sudan said April 3. Sam Ibok, head of the AU team charged with implementing a peace agreement in western Sudan, expressed his concerns after gunmen killed five AU troops in the deadliest single attack against the African force since it deployed in 2004. The five Senegalese soldiers were guarding a water point near the Sudanese border with Chad when they came under fire on Sunday. "The African Union force cannot cope with the circumstances that it finds itself in, and we have to be honest about it," Ibok told Reuters Television in an interview. "Anybody who wants us to succeed would need to work to give us the ability to be more effective and that can only be done ... between the United Nations and the African Union."
Burundi
Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza has said his government would not meet new demands from the country's last rebel group, accusing them of failing to keep a ceasefire deal. The Hutu Forces for National Liberation (FNL) signed a peace agreement with the government in September after a South African-led mediation. But the FNL last week stopped participating in a ceasefire monitoring team, arguing that government forces had not been withdrawn from areas under their control. (Reuters)
Central African Republic (CAR)
The CAR plans to issue a bond on a new regional bourse later this year to help raise funds to boost its ailing economy and curb insecurity, Prime Minister Elie Dote said in an interview. Current information suggests the Central African state needs around USD 1 billion to ensure security and peace and drive its economic development, he said. (Reuters)
Chad
UNHCR and its partners are dealing with a new wave of displacement in south-eastern Chad following a deadly attack at the weekend against the villages of Tiero and Marena. Preliminary reports by UNHCR and other humanitarian agencies indicate that since Saturday's attack between 2,000 and 3,000 people have arrived at the Goz Amir refugee camp near the town of Koukou, which is located about 45 km east of the two villages. The camp is home to more than 19,000 Sudanese refugees from the neighboring Darfur region. (UN News)
Guinea
Guinea's president has named a new government, a month after appointing a consensus prime minister to end a series of crippling strikes. Lansana Conte's decree was announced in a television broadcast to the West African nation, following consultations with Prime Minister Lansana Kouyate. More 100 people were killed during a seven-week period of unrest earlier this year in the country. Most were shot by Guinea's security forces. (BBC)
Ethiopia
Ethiopian soldiers have killed 23 Eritrean-backed rebels, captured 18, and received the surrender of 112 more, the state news agency ENA said April 3. "The 23 rebels engaged in proxy war coordinated by the Eritrean government were killed in gunfire with the army in Armacheo district of the northern Gondar region," ENA said, quoting a regional official. Ethiopia, the major military power in the Horn of Africa, has frequently accused Eritrea of backing, arming and harboring a variety of insurgents. (Reuters)
Kenya
The lives of many Kenyans are being transformed by an innovative mobile phone money transfer service. The free account - M-Pesa - is offered by Safaricom Kenya, a leading mobile phone service operator and is a technological breakthrough say the operators. It enables subscribers to send large volumes of money in an instant transaction. Statistics show USD 93 billion in remittances is sent by migrants overseas to Africa each year and M-Pesa hopes to tap into this transfer of funds. (BBC)
Madagascar
As the sixth mayor cyclone to hit Madagascar this season tears across the northeast of the impoverished Indian ocean island, a relentless succession of natural disasters has left nearly half a million people in desperate need of humanitarian assistance. Tropical cyclone Jaya made landfall on Madagascar's northeastern coast today on a projected trajectory that will see it rage through areas already devastated by cyclone Indlala just over two weeks ago. (IRIN)
Nigeria
Nigeria's electoral body has been told to allow Vice-President Atiku Abubakar to run for president in April's poll. Abubakar was indicted for graft by a government ministerial panel which investigated corruption in an oil fund. But the Federal High Court in Abuja ruled the electoral body lacked the power to exclude Abubakar from the election, in contradiction to a ruling made hours earlier by a superior court which said the electoral body could disqualify candidates. (BBC)
Rwanda
European countries should put on trial 37 suspects of the 1994 Rwandan genocide who are living in Europe, human rights groups said April 3. They accused France and Belgium, among others, of giving the suspects safe haven. Speaking ahead of the 13th anniversary of the genocide, when 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus were butchered in 100 days of state-sponsored killings, rights group REDRESS and the International Federation for Human Rights said delays in putting suspects on trial were inexcusable. (Reuters)
Somalia
Mogadishu residents buried their dead and ventured onto streets for the first time in five days April 2 during a lull in battles pitting Ethiopian and Somali troops against Islamist insurgents and clan militia. But even as elders from the dominant Hawiye clan insisted a truce was in place, hundreds of Ethiopian reinforcements drove into Mogadishu from other parts of Somalia, witnesses said. The UN said 47,000 Somalis have fled Mogadishu in the last 10 days, making a total of 96,000 since February. (Reuters)
Sudan
Unidentified gunmen killed five African Union peacekeepers in the Darfur region of western Sudan, the deadliest single attack against the force since late 2004, the AU said April 2. The five were guarding a water point near the border with Chad when they came under fire on Sunday. Three gunmen were also killed, he said. AU Commission chairman Alpha Oumar Konare warned that continued violence raised the possibility "for a catastrophic and tragic breakdown of the security and humanitarian situation in Darfur." (Reuters)
Uganda
Sixty-six children were killed in eastern Uganda during an army operation against suspected cattle rustlers, UK charity Save the Children says. They were shot by soldiers, run over by armored vehicles or crushed by stampeding animals last month. The aid group said it had not found physical evidence of the alleged deaths in Karamoja, but had consistent reports after interviewing some 200 people. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has called on South Africa's leader to act quickly and decisively to halt political violence in his country. President Thabo Mbeki was appointed to mediate between Zimbabwe's government and the opposition party of Tsvangirai, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Tsvangirai said he felt threatened by President Robert Mugabe. (BBC)
2007/03/29
Asian Investment in Africa - UNCTAD report
Chinese and Indian companies are turning into a promising source of direct investment in Africa, adding to an Asian investment surge in Africa over the past 15 years, the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) said in a report this week. Nonetheless, investment outflows to African nations are still just a small fraction of the global total of investment by Asian companies abroad, which has also surged since the mid-1990s, UNCTAD said. Asian investments are also sharply focused on energy and mining, it added, calling for a diversification of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in other sectors of African business and the economy. An average of USD 1.2 billion a year of the USD 46 billion in Asian FDI in 2002 to 2004 went to Africa, according to the UNCTAD report entitled "Asian Investment in Africa: a new era of cooperation." Direct investments in Africa by Asian economies, such as China, India, Vietnam, Singapore and Malaysia focus on the energy sector, in particular oil development, according to UNCTAD.
To learn more, please go to
http://www.unctad.org/Templates/Page.asp?intItemID=4179〈=1
The new UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Jon Holmes warned Sunday that humanitarian efforts in Darfur could collapse if the situation deteriorates. AP reported the warning came on a day of unusually heavy condemnation of the violence in Darfur, with UK Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain proposing a no-fly zone over the region and German Chancellor Angela Merkel saying the suffering of the Sudanese people had become unbearable.
The world could be free of the guinea worm within two years, the World Health Organization (WHO) said March 27. While some 3 million people suffered from the blight in the early 1980s, the WHO said it now affects about 25,000 people in nine African countries, with most prevalence in Sudan and Ghana.
World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz has announced the appointment of Obiageli ‘Oby’ Ezekwesili, formerly Education Minister in Nigeria, as Vice President of the Bank for the Africa region. "Oby's life is a testament to her dedication to Africa as is the high degree of respect in which she is held by the international community," Wolfowitz said in a statement. "Her passion for and commitment to Africa, high degree of integrity and optimism will bring invaluable strengths to our organization." A graduate of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, Ezekwesili will oversee the Bank's lending to the region, which is around USD 4.7 billion a year.
Angola
A French prosecutor said March 28 that 42 people, including the son of former president Francois Mitterrand, should stand trial in a USD 790 million scandal over arms sales to Angola in the 1990s. Concluding a seven-year inquiry, prosecutor Jean-Claude Marin said arms traders Pierre Falcone and Arcady Gaydamak had bought their way into setting up a network of political contacts to favor their activities in Angola. Falcone is accused of selling Russian arms to the war-torn country in 1993 and 1994. (Reuters)
Congo
Britain has donated USD 98 million to protect the fragile ecosystem of the Congo Basin, the world's second largest rainforest, which spans 10 countries at the heart of Africa and loses 3.7 million acres a year to agriculture, logging, road development, oil exploitation and mining. The British aid was intended to protect the fragile region. The money will be deposited in the African Development Bank, which will start an African environment fund as ordered by an African Union summit in January. (Reuters)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia could reach the Millennium Development Goals in the primary education sector, according to a study, conducted by the non-governmental Young Lives Ethiopia which said Ethiopia has shown a dramatic increase in primary education coverage over the past few years, from 51 percent in 1999 to 77.7 percent in 2004/05. (Xinhua)
Ivory Coast
A group of 34 Ivorian children who dreamed of playing soccer for Europe's top clubs were reunited with their families March 27 after being duped by people traffickers who held them in neighboring Mali. Malian authorities discovered the boys three weeks ago in a villa in the southeastern town of Sikasso, where they had spent more than two months waiting for papers from traffickers who charged them or their families up to USD 600 each to get to Europe. (Reuters)
Kenya
The World Bank March 27 endorsed a revised lending program for Kenya that deepens government efforts to root out corruption and promises to unleash loans to sectors where the most progress is made. The World Bank also approved USD 154.5 million in new loans for two projects in western Kenya, including financing for micro projects in 600 communities and funding to reduce flooding and droughts by improving management of water and forest resources. (Reuters)
Liberia
The Liberian government and the international community have been called upon to give more support to the private sector of the nation as one sure way of creating jobs and boosting development in the country. A meeting held under the theme, "Role of the Private Sector in Rebuilding Liberia," was organized by the investment Climate Team for Africa of the World Bank Group in consultation with the Ministry of Commerce. (The Inquirer, Liberia)
Mozambique
Mozambique needs USD 24 million to improve weapons storage after a recent explosion at a military armory killed 101 people and wounded hundreds, Defense Minister Tobias Dai told Reuters. "(The money) is necessary for the building of silos in different sites across the country and the government is currently working to raise funds," he said. Victims have reacted with outrage to a series of blasts last week that sent rockets and artillery shells into residential sections of the city still scarred by a bloody 16-year war that ended in 1992. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Global investors are eager to invest in Africa and have pledged USD 800 million to a new plan to boost the continent, Nigeria's Central Bank Governor Chukwuma Soludo said March 27. Soludo was speaking after a presentation in Johannesburg on the Africa Finance Corporation, a financing institution piloted by the Central Bank of Nigeria and modeled on the International Finance Corporation. (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
The first-ever field mission from the new UN Peacebuilding Commission, set up to prevent countries emerging from civil war and other conflicts from slipping back into bloodshed, has returned from Sierra Leone. Amb. Frank Majoor, Permanent Representative of the Netherlands to the UN told a news conference at UN Headquarters in New York that justice and security reform are among the key priorities, adding, "The country needs capacity building in almost every area." (UN News)
Somalia
The UN and Sudan signed a joint communique March 28 in which the Government pledged to support, protect and facilitate all humanitarian operations in the strife-torn Darfur region, where an estimated 4 million people now depend on outside aid. The communique, signed in Khartoum, commits the Government to rapid and full implementation of all measures relating to humanitarian access contained in a July 2004 communique that followed a visit to Darfur by the then UN Secretary-General. (UN News)
Sudan
The Sudanese government has pledged to ease restrictions on aid workers in its western war-torn region of Darfur. In an agreement signed with the UN, Khartoum promised to accelerate the issuing of visas and travel permits. Some 13,000 aid workers based in Darfur are feeding more than 2m people in camps, in what is the world's largest aid operation. Donors have complained that red tape was paralyzing the aid effort. (BBC)
Uganda
Uganda is set for its self- appraisal next month in preparation of the African Peer Review Mechanism, the government has announced. A total of 26 African countries are part of the peer review program, a mechanism which assess social development, political, economic and corporate governance. In other news, the National Association of Professional Environmentalists was written a letter to the World Bank asking it to re-inspect the Uganda's Bujagali hydropower plant project claiming that the project violates the Bank's operational and procedural policies. (Xinhua)
Zimbabwe
Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the Zimbabwean opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), and several other members of his party were detained in a police raid in the capital, Harare, on Wednesday, said party officials and lawyers. Police denied picking up Tsvangirai but confirmed a crackdown on "perpetrators of violence." Their detention came as President Robert Mugabe was set to attend a South African Development Community (SADC) meeting in Tanzania March 29-30, called to discuss Zimbabwe (IRIN)
Chinese and Indian companies are turning into a promising source of direct investment in Africa, adding to an Asian investment surge in Africa over the past 15 years, the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) said in a report this week. Nonetheless, investment outflows to African nations are still just a small fraction of the global total of investment by Asian companies abroad, which has also surged since the mid-1990s, UNCTAD said. Asian investments are also sharply focused on energy and mining, it added, calling for a diversification of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in other sectors of African business and the economy. An average of USD 1.2 billion a year of the USD 46 billion in Asian FDI in 2002 to 2004 went to Africa, according to the UNCTAD report entitled "Asian Investment in Africa: a new era of cooperation." Direct investments in Africa by Asian economies, such as China, India, Vietnam, Singapore and Malaysia focus on the energy sector, in particular oil development, according to UNCTAD.
To learn more, please go to
http://www.unctad.org/Templates/Page.asp?intItemID=4179〈=1
The new UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Jon Holmes warned Sunday that humanitarian efforts in Darfur could collapse if the situation deteriorates. AP reported the warning came on a day of unusually heavy condemnation of the violence in Darfur, with UK Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain proposing a no-fly zone over the region and German Chancellor Angela Merkel saying the suffering of the Sudanese people had become unbearable.
The world could be free of the guinea worm within two years, the World Health Organization (WHO) said March 27. While some 3 million people suffered from the blight in the early 1980s, the WHO said it now affects about 25,000 people in nine African countries, with most prevalence in Sudan and Ghana.
World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz has announced the appointment of Obiageli ‘Oby’ Ezekwesili, formerly Education Minister in Nigeria, as Vice President of the Bank for the Africa region. "Oby's life is a testament to her dedication to Africa as is the high degree of respect in which she is held by the international community," Wolfowitz said in a statement. "Her passion for and commitment to Africa, high degree of integrity and optimism will bring invaluable strengths to our organization." A graduate of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, Ezekwesili will oversee the Bank's lending to the region, which is around USD 4.7 billion a year.
Angola
A French prosecutor said March 28 that 42 people, including the son of former president Francois Mitterrand, should stand trial in a USD 790 million scandal over arms sales to Angola in the 1990s. Concluding a seven-year inquiry, prosecutor Jean-Claude Marin said arms traders Pierre Falcone and Arcady Gaydamak had bought their way into setting up a network of political contacts to favor their activities in Angola. Falcone is accused of selling Russian arms to the war-torn country in 1993 and 1994. (Reuters)
Congo
Britain has donated USD 98 million to protect the fragile ecosystem of the Congo Basin, the world's second largest rainforest, which spans 10 countries at the heart of Africa and loses 3.7 million acres a year to agriculture, logging, road development, oil exploitation and mining. The British aid was intended to protect the fragile region. The money will be deposited in the African Development Bank, which will start an African environment fund as ordered by an African Union summit in January. (Reuters)
Ethiopia
Ethiopia could reach the Millennium Development Goals in the primary education sector, according to a study, conducted by the non-governmental Young Lives Ethiopia which said Ethiopia has shown a dramatic increase in primary education coverage over the past few years, from 51 percent in 1999 to 77.7 percent in 2004/05. (Xinhua)
Ivory Coast
A group of 34 Ivorian children who dreamed of playing soccer for Europe's top clubs were reunited with their families March 27 after being duped by people traffickers who held them in neighboring Mali. Malian authorities discovered the boys three weeks ago in a villa in the southeastern town of Sikasso, where they had spent more than two months waiting for papers from traffickers who charged them or their families up to USD 600 each to get to Europe. (Reuters)
Kenya
The World Bank March 27 endorsed a revised lending program for Kenya that deepens government efforts to root out corruption and promises to unleash loans to sectors where the most progress is made. The World Bank also approved USD 154.5 million in new loans for two projects in western Kenya, including financing for micro projects in 600 communities and funding to reduce flooding and droughts by improving management of water and forest resources. (Reuters)
Liberia
The Liberian government and the international community have been called upon to give more support to the private sector of the nation as one sure way of creating jobs and boosting development in the country. A meeting held under the theme, "Role of the Private Sector in Rebuilding Liberia," was organized by the investment Climate Team for Africa of the World Bank Group in consultation with the Ministry of Commerce. (The Inquirer, Liberia)
Mozambique
Mozambique needs USD 24 million to improve weapons storage after a recent explosion at a military armory killed 101 people and wounded hundreds, Defense Minister Tobias Dai told Reuters. "(The money) is necessary for the building of silos in different sites across the country and the government is currently working to raise funds," he said. Victims have reacted with outrage to a series of blasts last week that sent rockets and artillery shells into residential sections of the city still scarred by a bloody 16-year war that ended in 1992. (Reuters)
Nigeria
Global investors are eager to invest in Africa and have pledged USD 800 million to a new plan to boost the continent, Nigeria's Central Bank Governor Chukwuma Soludo said March 27. Soludo was speaking after a presentation in Johannesburg on the Africa Finance Corporation, a financing institution piloted by the Central Bank of Nigeria and modeled on the International Finance Corporation. (Reuters)
Sierra Leone
The first-ever field mission from the new UN Peacebuilding Commission, set up to prevent countries emerging from civil war and other conflicts from slipping back into bloodshed, has returned from Sierra Leone. Amb. Frank Majoor, Permanent Representative of the Netherlands to the UN told a news conference at UN Headquarters in New York that justice and security reform are among the key priorities, adding, "The country needs capacity building in almost every area." (UN News)
Somalia
The UN and Sudan signed a joint communique March 28 in which the Government pledged to support, protect and facilitate all humanitarian operations in the strife-torn Darfur region, where an estimated 4 million people now depend on outside aid. The communique, signed in Khartoum, commits the Government to rapid and full implementation of all measures relating to humanitarian access contained in a July 2004 communique that followed a visit to Darfur by the then UN Secretary-General. (UN News)
Sudan
The Sudanese government has pledged to ease restrictions on aid workers in its western war-torn region of Darfur. In an agreement signed with the UN, Khartoum promised to accelerate the issuing of visas and travel permits. Some 13,000 aid workers based in Darfur are feeding more than 2m people in camps, in what is the world's largest aid operation. Donors have complained that red tape was paralyzing the aid effort. (BBC)
Uganda
Uganda is set for its self- appraisal next month in preparation of the African Peer Review Mechanism, the government has announced. A total of 26 African countries are part of the peer review program, a mechanism which assess social development, political, economic and corporate governance. In other news, the National Association of Professional Environmentalists was written a letter to the World Bank asking it to re-inspect the Uganda's Bujagali hydropower plant project claiming that the project violates the Bank's operational and procedural policies. (Xinhua)
Zimbabwe
Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the Zimbabwean opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), and several other members of his party were detained in a police raid in the capital, Harare, on Wednesday, said party officials and lawyers. Police denied picking up Tsvangirai but confirmed a crackdown on "perpetrators of violence." Their detention came as President Robert Mugabe was set to attend a South African Development Community (SADC) meeting in Tanzania March 29-30, called to discuss Zimbabwe (IRIN)
2007/03/22
Central African Republic (CAR)
Nearly 14,000 inhabitants have fled the burned-out wreck of the main town in north-eastern CAR since this month's resumption of fighting between Government and rebel forces, UN officials reported March 21. "Never before has the UN seen a town in CAR where 70 percent of houses have been torched," UN country humanitarian coordinator Toby Lanzer said after leading the first mission to Birao following the fighting which resumed on March 3. (UN News)
Congo (DRC)
UN peacekeepers in Kinshasa have deployed around the residence of defeated presidential contender Jean-Pierre Bemba to defuse a confrontation over the disarmament of his personal guard. UN armored vehicles were posted at key intersections in the plush, residential Gombe neighborhood, where hundreds of government soldiers surrounded former rebel fighters guarding Bemba's compound. The troops pointed machine guns and grenade launchers at Bemba's men, who were dug in behind sandbags. Several shots were fired. (Reuters)
Eritrea
Eritrea has expelled the head of a UN demining unit in the latest sign of deteriorating relations between the world body and the Horn of Africa state, the UN said March 21. David Bax, the South African head of the mine unit for a peacekeeping mission on the Eritrea-Ethiopia border, was ordered out on accusations of "repeated violations" of local laws, UNMEE said. (Reuters)
Mozambique
Fifteen years after the end of Mozambique's devastating civil war, efforts to clear the country of deadly landmines are entering the final phase. The largest humanitarian group involved in demining, HALO Trust, a UK-based NGO that specializes in removing the debris of war, said their work was nearly done. HALO will end its demining operations in June after working in Mozambique's four northern provinces for 13 years. In 2006, the NGO accounted for more than 98 percent of all mines cleared in the country. (IRIN)
Nigeria
Senate committee members probing graft allegations against the president and his deputy have resigned, saying Senate leaders were interfering with their investigations. They also say there had been pressure on them to "water down" their report which alleges money belonging to a government agency was misappropriated. Vice-President Atiku Abubakar is barred from running in next month's presidential poll and is challenging an indictment in court. (BBC)
Somalia
Acute watery diarrhea in Somalia has killed hundreds of people this year, the Minister of Health said March 20 as aid agencies warned the nation was in the midst of a cholera outbreak. "The death toll is in the hundreds (but) we don't believe there is cholera in the country," Health Minister Qamar Adan Ali said in a telephone interview. The WHO said in a report this week acute watery diarrhea has killed 251 people and had infected 5,602 since January. (Reuters)
Sudan
Two Sudanese women have been sentenced to death by stoning for adultery after a trial in which they had no lawyer and which used Arabic, not their first language, the rights group Amnesty International said. Their sentences could be carried out at any time, the London-based group said in a statement released March 19. North Sudan implements Islamic sharia law. (Reuters)
Tanzania
Tanzania has called up student nurses and redeployed others to battle an outbreak of deadly Rift Valley Fever. Sixteen people have died since the start of Tanzania's first outbreak in nearly a decade. Health Minister David Mwakyusa said 79 others are infected across the country following the spread of the disease from Kenya, where 139 people have died. Northern frontier districts are most affected by the fever, which causes severe hemorrhaging in victims. (BBC)
Uganda
Uganda PM Apolo Nsibambi has reportedly approved a plan for thousands of hectares of a rainforest nature reserve to be replaced by a sugarcane plantation. He decision affects part of Mabira Forest, one of the east African country's last remaining patches of natural forest. The government's own paper cited a letter from Nsibambi to Environment Minister Maria Mutagamba: "I direct you to bring a Cabinet paper seeking permission to degazette part of Mabira for sugarcane growing." (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
The Zimbabwean government has officially declared 2007 a drought year, but insisted it would not ask for food assistance because it has the capacity to feed its own people. Agricultural minister Rugare Gumbo told IRIN the government had issued the declaration after a countrywide food assessment revealed that most provinces had been severely affected by a ravaging dry spell that had wilted crops, especially maize, Zimbabwe's staple food. (IRIN)
Nearly 14,000 inhabitants have fled the burned-out wreck of the main town in north-eastern CAR since this month's resumption of fighting between Government and rebel forces, UN officials reported March 21. "Never before has the UN seen a town in CAR where 70 percent of houses have been torched," UN country humanitarian coordinator Toby Lanzer said after leading the first mission to Birao following the fighting which resumed on March 3. (UN News)
Congo (DRC)
UN peacekeepers in Kinshasa have deployed around the residence of defeated presidential contender Jean-Pierre Bemba to defuse a confrontation over the disarmament of his personal guard. UN armored vehicles were posted at key intersections in the plush, residential Gombe neighborhood, where hundreds of government soldiers surrounded former rebel fighters guarding Bemba's compound. The troops pointed machine guns and grenade launchers at Bemba's men, who were dug in behind sandbags. Several shots were fired. (Reuters)
Eritrea
Eritrea has expelled the head of a UN demining unit in the latest sign of deteriorating relations between the world body and the Horn of Africa state, the UN said March 21. David Bax, the South African head of the mine unit for a peacekeeping mission on the Eritrea-Ethiopia border, was ordered out on accusations of "repeated violations" of local laws, UNMEE said. (Reuters)
Mozambique
Fifteen years after the end of Mozambique's devastating civil war, efforts to clear the country of deadly landmines are entering the final phase. The largest humanitarian group involved in demining, HALO Trust, a UK-based NGO that specializes in removing the debris of war, said their work was nearly done. HALO will end its demining operations in June after working in Mozambique's four northern provinces for 13 years. In 2006, the NGO accounted for more than 98 percent of all mines cleared in the country. (IRIN)
Nigeria
Senate committee members probing graft allegations against the president and his deputy have resigned, saying Senate leaders were interfering with their investigations. They also say there had been pressure on them to "water down" their report which alleges money belonging to a government agency was misappropriated. Vice-President Atiku Abubakar is barred from running in next month's presidential poll and is challenging an indictment in court. (BBC)
Somalia
Acute watery diarrhea in Somalia has killed hundreds of people this year, the Minister of Health said March 20 as aid agencies warned the nation was in the midst of a cholera outbreak. "The death toll is in the hundreds (but) we don't believe there is cholera in the country," Health Minister Qamar Adan Ali said in a telephone interview. The WHO said in a report this week acute watery diarrhea has killed 251 people and had infected 5,602 since January. (Reuters)
Sudan
Two Sudanese women have been sentenced to death by stoning for adultery after a trial in which they had no lawyer and which used Arabic, not their first language, the rights group Amnesty International said. Their sentences could be carried out at any time, the London-based group said in a statement released March 19. North Sudan implements Islamic sharia law. (Reuters)
Tanzania
Tanzania has called up student nurses and redeployed others to battle an outbreak of deadly Rift Valley Fever. Sixteen people have died since the start of Tanzania's first outbreak in nearly a decade. Health Minister David Mwakyusa said 79 others are infected across the country following the spread of the disease from Kenya, where 139 people have died. Northern frontier districts are most affected by the fever, which causes severe hemorrhaging in victims. (BBC)
Uganda
Uganda PM Apolo Nsibambi has reportedly approved a plan for thousands of hectares of a rainforest nature reserve to be replaced by a sugarcane plantation. He decision affects part of Mabira Forest, one of the east African country's last remaining patches of natural forest. The government's own paper cited a letter from Nsibambi to Environment Minister Maria Mutagamba: "I direct you to bring a Cabinet paper seeking permission to degazette part of Mabira for sugarcane growing." (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
The Zimbabwean government has officially declared 2007 a drought year, but insisted it would not ask for food assistance because it has the capacity to feed its own people. Agricultural minister Rugare Gumbo told IRIN the government had issued the declaration after a countrywide food assessment revealed that most provinces had been severely affected by a ravaging dry spell that had wilted crops, especially maize, Zimbabwe's staple food. (IRIN)
2007/03/15
-- World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz, defending his anti-corruption drive, which prompted him to suspend aid to countries such as Chad. Critics have said the push threatens to reduce aid to the needy. Wolfowitz's comments came at the end of a weeklong trip through Africa, during which he urged developed nations to increase aid or risk the continent turning into a 'breeding ground for terrorists." Wolfowitz's third trip to Sub-Saharan Africa since he took over as president of the lender in June 2005 was also a prelude to a yearlong campaign to raise at least USD 18 billion from rich countries that the World Bank will then use to build schools, roads and clinics in poor nations
IMF, World Bank & IFI Round-Up
During a small press briefing March 12 with French daily La Tribune, World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz explained that some mining contracts signed in the Democratic Republic of Congo will have to be revisited. "Rich countries should assume responsibility by preventing companies from taking advantage of the situation in the poorest countries. After a week-long tour in Africa (with visits to Ghana, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo), Wolfowitz stopped briefly in Paris to speak with some members of the press. "Good governance is the basis of all," said Wolfowitz who actively supports the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative and has made corruption one of the priorities of his mandate.
Reuters reports that Wolfowitz further said March 13 that a London court decision to force Zambia to repay some of its debt to an investment fund at a much higher price than it was purchased for is "appalling." He said the international community must come up with a solution to such cases where so-called vulture funds buy up discounted debt, often of developing countries, and then sue the government for a higher payment. The international community should "come up with some effective legal remedies that protect countries like Zambia from that kind of unfair dealing and in time sustain an effective credit system for poor countries," he said.
The IMF should clarify its role in poor African countries and better communicate its practices on aid and poverty to the outside, according to a report published March 12 by the Independent Evaluation Office. It comes at a time that the IMF is already studying how it can improve its operations and effectiveness as guardian of the world's financial system, notes Retuers. The IEO also urged a better working relationship between the IMF and the World Bank, which is consistent with a February 28 report commissioned by the sister institutions and which looked at Fund-Bank cooperation.
Angola
World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz said March 13 that a British human rights worker accused of espionage in Angola should be allowed to work freely as an anti-corruption campaigner. Global Witness campaigner Sarah Wykes went to Angola to investigate transparency in its oil sector. She was arrested last month and then released but ordered not to leave the country. "We think it's very important for purposes of transparency that people like Sarah be allowed to report freely," Wolfowitz told reporters. (Reuters)
Burkina Faso
Burkina Faso is set to receive 3.3 million vaccines against bacterial meningitis to help stem an epidemic currently sweeping the country. The International Coordination Group on Vaccine Provision for Epidemic Meningitis Control (ICG) approved Burkina Faso's request for the vaccines on Tuesday, William Perea, the head of the World Health Organization's (WHO) meningitis program, told IRIN March 14. He said the vaccines would arrive in the country in the coming week. (IRIN)
Burundi
Burundi has made progress in protecting children from the ravages of armed conflict, but more still needs to be done, especially to improve detention facilities for minors charged with belonging to armed groups, the top UN envoy on children and armed conflict said March 13. Radhika Coomaraswamy, the Secretary-General's Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict, made her remarks during a press conference in Bujumbura, at the end of her visit to the impoverished and strife-torn country. (UN News)
Congo (DRC)
An estimated 10,000 civilians have fled the village of Burumba in North Kivu province in eastern DRC after violence erupted between the national army and a Rwandan Hutu rebel group, officials said March 13. The displaced people had sought refuge in the neighboring village of Nyamilima after the clashes, which erupted on Saturday between DRC government forces and rebels of FDLR, some of whose members have been in eastern Congo since 1994 and stand accused of masterminding the genocide in their country. (IRIN)
Mozambique
The UN and its humanitarian partners have launched a flash appeal for USD 17.7 million to support the Mozambican Government’s relief efforts following severe flooding and Cyclone Favio, which together affected hundreds of thousands of people when they struck last month. The funds raised will be used to provide relief and recovery assistance for 435,000 Mozambicans for a period of up to six months, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in a news release. (UN News)
Niger
Classes were cancelled all across Niger March 14 and health centers were functioning at a minimum after unions called for workers to go on strike for 72 hours to demand higher salaries. "Living conditions must improve now," said Chamsou Issaka, a spokesman for one of the teachers' unions, which are seeking to improve salaries and benefits for 24,000 teachers who work on contracts rather than as permanent civil servants as do 4,000 others. Contract teachers, students and health workers frequently go on strike in Niger, a vast, arid country with few resources. (IRIN)
Nigeria
Nigeria's VP cannot run in April's polls, says The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). INEC said candidates indicted for graft, including Atiku Abubakar, are not on the official list of candidates to be published March 15. Abubakar, standing as an opposition presidential candidate after falling out with the president, told the BBC he will challenge the decision in court. Last week, an Abuja court ruled INEC has no power to disqualify candidates. (BBC)
Rwanda
Rwanda plans to withdraw its troops from the African Union mission in Sudan's Darfur region unless they get more logistical support. Foreign Minister Charles Murigande said the troops are too poorly equipped to protect lives in the volatile region. Some 150 Rwandan soldiers are part of the AU mission whose mandate comes to an end in June 2007. Sudan is resisting plans to allow a beefed-up joint AU-UN force of 20,000 troops to be deployed to Darfur. (BBC)
Somalia
The African Union is disturbed by attacks on its peacekeepers in Somalia and member states are consulting about the situation, AU Chairman John Kufuor said March 13. "It's unfortunate that the first batch of troops to have gone there has been met with shooting," Kufuor told a news conference in London. "It is discouraging and the African Union is rather disturbed," said Kufuor, who is also president of Ghana. (Reuters)
South Africa
Thousands of South Africans have marched in some of the country's main cities in protest at the high levels of violent crime. Politicians, religious leaders and schoolchildren were on the streets of Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town. Every day, more than 300 murders and violent attacks take place in South Africa, making it one of the three most dangerous countries on earth. An estimated 200,000 people have signed a petition urging government action. (BBC)
Sudan
After a planned visit to Darfur fell through because of visa problems, the UN Human Rights Council's fact-finding mission on the situation inside the strife-torn region of Sudan has traveled to neighboring Chad to interview refugees who have fled the war-torn region. The high-level team did not travel to Sudan as planned when the government denied them visas. The mission, headed by Nobel Peace Prize winner Jody Williams, is expected to present its report on the trip by the end of the week. (UN radio)
Uganda
Uganda's government says the northern rebels have agreed to resume stalled peace talks because a number of African countries will join the mediation team. The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) had accused the south Sudan negotiators of bias in favor of the Ugandan government. The rebels say they will go back to the table to end their 20-year war if this and certain other conditions are met. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai says the beating he received at the hands of police should be an "inspiration" for the struggle. He was speaking from hospital as he received blood transfusions for internal bleeding and treatment for a fractured skull. Tsvangirai and 49 opposition activists were arrested at a rally on Sunday, which the government said breached a ban on political gatherings imposed after violence at a February demonstration. (BBC)
2007/03/08
African banks have shown remarkable growth over the past decade mainly due to a raft of reforms introduced in the financial sector, the World Bank said in a new study launched in Nairobi March 6. The Bretton Wood institution, however, decried the low access to banking services for the majority of the people on the continent. "Africa has been perpetually identified with conflict and instability and the idea of a stable growing financial sector is often dismissed without a second thought," said Patrick Honohan, the principal author of the study, Making Finance Work for Africa. "Now, as more African countries are on a path of sustained economic growth, it is time to make sure that the financial institutions are able to play their role," said Honohan, World Bank senior financial policy advisor.
Cameroon
Villagers in northwestern Cameroon have burned down some 300 homes and forced thousands of people to flee a rival settlement in a dispute over farming land, a senior local official said March 7. The villages of Bawock and Bali Nyongha in the have been locked in a leadership struggle and battle over land rights for decades. The latest attack came on the eve of the region's new planting season, when tensions over land rights are particularly acute. (Reuters)
Chad
Chad will not allow the UN to send an advance mission to the country to prepare for deployment of peacekeepers. Some 70 military liaison officers and police were due later this month. The UN has approved funding for an 11,000-strong force, although Chad's government has said it now only wants a police operation, not a military one. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
Summary executions, enforced disappearances, mass arbitrary arrests, ill-treatment and torture of civilians for their political affiliations as well as rape continued at an alarming rate in the DRC in a climate of total impunity in the second half of 2006, says the latest UN report on the issue. All sides, from the armed forces and police to the protection division of defeated presidential candidate Jean-Pierre Bemba and Rwandan Hutus, came in for censure. (UN News)
Ghana
On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Ghana's independence, World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz said that the bank is looking forward to seeing Ghana reach the level of one of the best performing economies in the world. He stressed that Ghana’s economy in the last 10 years had become one of the strongest performing African economies and that had come about through human capital development with emphasis on sound economic policy. (JoyOnline, Ghana)
Mauritania
Up to 68,000 young children in Mauritania, already threatened by malnutrition, will have their rations reduced or cut completely at the most critical time of the year unless substantial new contributions are forthcoming, the WFP warned March 6. Country Director Gian Carlo Cirri said the agency requires a further USD 14.4 million for its Mauritania operation this year amid concerns that funding has largely dried up in recent months. (UN News)
Nigeria
Nigeria has agreed a deal for US investment bank Merrill Lynch to take on most of its USD 500 million debt. The money is owed to the London Club, a group of creditor nations. Nigeria's Finance Minister, Nenadi Usman, said it allowed a "clean start" and would prevent Nigeria from indiscriminate borrowing in future. The government hopes the deal will make Nigeria more attractive for foreign investors and clear debt before it leaves office in May. (BBC)
Somalia
Gunmen fired rockets near Mogadishu's airport March 7, apparently heeding an Islamist call to fight African Union peacekeepers arriving to help the interim government restore order. Rival Islamist leaders, defeated in a brief offensive by government troops and their Ethiopian allies late last year, have vowed to wage guerrilla war against any foreign forces. Hospital sources said one civilian was killed and at least four others wounded. (Reuters)
Sudan
Sudan's government is paralyzing the humanitarian operation in Darfur with a complex web of bureaucratic obstructions which could cause massive loss of life, US envoy Andrew Natsios said March 7. After meeting with President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, he said there was still no agreement on allowing non-African peacekeeping troops to assist a cash-strapped and inexperienced African Union mission in Darfur. (Reuters)
Uganda
Ugandan lawyers will strike next week in support of judges who stopped work over the seizure of six opposition supporters from the High Court by security forces, later charged with plotting rebellion alongside chief opposition leader Kizza Besigye. Uganda's judges began a week-long strike March 5 to protest against what they called an unlawful invasion of court premises last Thursday by gun-toting military police. (Reuters)
Cameroon
Villagers in northwestern Cameroon have burned down some 300 homes and forced thousands of people to flee a rival settlement in a dispute over farming land, a senior local official said March 7. The villages of Bawock and Bali Nyongha in the have been locked in a leadership struggle and battle over land rights for decades. The latest attack came on the eve of the region's new planting season, when tensions over land rights are particularly acute. (Reuters)
Chad
Chad will not allow the UN to send an advance mission to the country to prepare for deployment of peacekeepers. Some 70 military liaison officers and police were due later this month. The UN has approved funding for an 11,000-strong force, although Chad's government has said it now only wants a police operation, not a military one. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
Summary executions, enforced disappearances, mass arbitrary arrests, ill-treatment and torture of civilians for their political affiliations as well as rape continued at an alarming rate in the DRC in a climate of total impunity in the second half of 2006, says the latest UN report on the issue. All sides, from the armed forces and police to the protection division of defeated presidential candidate Jean-Pierre Bemba and Rwandan Hutus, came in for censure. (UN News)
Ghana
On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Ghana's independence, World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz said that the bank is looking forward to seeing Ghana reach the level of one of the best performing economies in the world. He stressed that Ghana’s economy in the last 10 years had become one of the strongest performing African economies and that had come about through human capital development with emphasis on sound economic policy. (JoyOnline, Ghana)
Mauritania
Up to 68,000 young children in Mauritania, already threatened by malnutrition, will have their rations reduced or cut completely at the most critical time of the year unless substantial new contributions are forthcoming, the WFP warned March 6. Country Director Gian Carlo Cirri said the agency requires a further USD 14.4 million for its Mauritania operation this year amid concerns that funding has largely dried up in recent months. (UN News)
Nigeria
Nigeria has agreed a deal for US investment bank Merrill Lynch to take on most of its USD 500 million debt. The money is owed to the London Club, a group of creditor nations. Nigeria's Finance Minister, Nenadi Usman, said it allowed a "clean start" and would prevent Nigeria from indiscriminate borrowing in future. The government hopes the deal will make Nigeria more attractive for foreign investors and clear debt before it leaves office in May. (BBC)
Somalia
Gunmen fired rockets near Mogadishu's airport March 7, apparently heeding an Islamist call to fight African Union peacekeepers arriving to help the interim government restore order. Rival Islamist leaders, defeated in a brief offensive by government troops and their Ethiopian allies late last year, have vowed to wage guerrilla war against any foreign forces. Hospital sources said one civilian was killed and at least four others wounded. (Reuters)
Sudan
Sudan's government is paralyzing the humanitarian operation in Darfur with a complex web of bureaucratic obstructions which could cause massive loss of life, US envoy Andrew Natsios said March 7. After meeting with President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, he said there was still no agreement on allowing non-African peacekeeping troops to assist a cash-strapped and inexperienced African Union mission in Darfur. (Reuters)
Uganda
Ugandan lawyers will strike next week in support of judges who stopped work over the seizure of six opposition supporters from the High Court by security forces, later charged with plotting rebellion alongside chief opposition leader Kizza Besigye. Uganda's judges began a week-long strike March 5 to protest against what they called an unlawful invasion of court premises last Thursday by gun-toting military police. (Reuters)
2007/03/01
Amid increasing insecurity and violence in eastern Chad, partly driven by killings in the neighboring Sudanese region of Darfur, the UN refugee agency Feb. 27 launched a USD 6.2 million supplementary appeal to cope with up to 150,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) expected to be made homeless this year. This latest appeal by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) comes in addition to $69.3 million already budgeted this year for some 220,000 refugees from Darfur in 12 camps in eastern Chad, and another 46,000 from the Central African Republic (CAR) in the south of the country.
The United Nations called on the IMF, the World Bank and the African Development Bank to cancel about USD 1.5 billion of debt owed by Liberia, saying repayment would hold up efforts to consolidate democracy and promote development. "Now is the time for multilateral institutions to step up to the plate and commit to assisting one of the world's poorest countries rid itself of the stranglehold of poverty," Anwarul Chowdury, a top UN representative, said in a statement published late Friday. "Undoubtedly, Liberia deserves special consideration given her recent tumultuous history and current post-conflict reconstruction efforts," Chowdury said.
Chad
Chad says it will not accept UN military peacekeepers on its eastern border with Sudan's Darfur region. The deputy foreign minister said there had never been any question of Chad receiving a military force, but only of one made up of police officers. Earlier, the UN Security Council said it supported a call for 11,000 troops to be backed up by helicopter gunships, meant to protect refugees in Chad and the Central African Republic displaced by the conflict in Darfur. (BBC)
Ethiopia
Under-five mortality rates in Ethiopia have steadily declined to 123 out of every 1,000 live births, down from peak levels in 1990 when 204 out of every 1,000 children died before the age of five, according to UNICEF. However, with close to 400,000 children under five still dying from preventable causes each year, Ethiopia continues to have one of the highest child mortality rates in the world. (UN News)
Kenya
Crime is hampering the growth of east Africa's largest economy by forcing businesses to spend heavily on private security services in the absence of effective policing, the UNDP said in a new report. Poverty has also increased slightly in four of Kenya's eight provinces, it said. Nairobi has seen at least 50 murders in the last three months including the wife of a US embassy employee and a top Kenyan AIDS researcher. (Reuters)
Liberia
Liberia's ex-President Gyude Bryant has been charged with embezzling more than USD 1 million while in office. He headed the country during a transitional phase after the end of the 14-year civil war in 2003. Bryant's government is accused by regional body the Economic Community Of West African States, which oversaw the peace process, of stealing state funds. President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf came to power just over a year ago promising to crack down on corruption. (BBC)
Mozambique
Around 80,000 children in the southern African country of Mozambique have now been displaced by flooding after Friday’s cyclone added to the misery of almost a month of floods that destroyed the homes of at least 160,000 people, UNICEF said Feb. 27, adding that the next week will be critical in avoiding outbreaks of disease. (UN News)
Nigeria
Nigeria is planning to launch a fund with an initial capital of USD 1 billion to help homegrown companies invest. The central bank has launched a private placement to raise funds for the proposed African Finance Corporation (AFC) and Nigerian banks had already committed USD 700 million. The AFC aims to be a commercially-driven PPP aimed at reducing poverty by providing credit for companies to invest in infrastructure and development projects. (Reuters)
Senegal
Two leading presidential candidates in Senegal say they do not accept unofficial results that show incumbent Abdoulaye Wade has won Sunday's polls. Partial results indicate that Wade, 81, has more than 55 percent of the vote making a run-off unnecessary, Senegal's official news agency reports. But Ousmane Tanor Dieng and Abdoulaye Bathily say there were irregularities. (BBC)
Somalia
Five people have been killed in several attacks in Somalia's capital, including a relative of the prime minister. An in-law of Ali Mohamed Ghedi was waylaid by armed gunmen near a main market in Mogadishu though it is unclear if this was a political attack. African Union representatives are in Mogadishu to lay the groundwork for its planned deployment of peacekeepers. (BBC)
Uganda
Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels say they will not renew a ceasefire due to expire at midnight unless President Yoweri Museveni agrees to resume talks. A fragile truce has been in place for six months but talks were halted when the rebels walked out in December. The LRA accuses the government of violating the ceasefire and says it will pick up its guns if Mr Museveni refuses to talk. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
The IMF Feb. 23 maintained its suspension of financial and technical assistance to Zimbabwe, saying the government had failed to clear its arrears and address a worsening economic and social crisis. Zimbabwe again averted expulsion from the IMF by making small payments toward clearing its arrears, which currently amount to USD 129 million. But the IMF extended its suspension of Zimbabwe's voting rights. (Reuters)
The United Nations called on the IMF, the World Bank and the African Development Bank to cancel about USD 1.5 billion of debt owed by Liberia, saying repayment would hold up efforts to consolidate democracy and promote development. "Now is the time for multilateral institutions to step up to the plate and commit to assisting one of the world's poorest countries rid itself of the stranglehold of poverty," Anwarul Chowdury, a top UN representative, said in a statement published late Friday. "Undoubtedly, Liberia deserves special consideration given her recent tumultuous history and current post-conflict reconstruction efforts," Chowdury said.
Chad
Chad says it will not accept UN military peacekeepers on its eastern border with Sudan's Darfur region. The deputy foreign minister said there had never been any question of Chad receiving a military force, but only of one made up of police officers. Earlier, the UN Security Council said it supported a call for 11,000 troops to be backed up by helicopter gunships, meant to protect refugees in Chad and the Central African Republic displaced by the conflict in Darfur. (BBC)
Ethiopia
Under-five mortality rates in Ethiopia have steadily declined to 123 out of every 1,000 live births, down from peak levels in 1990 when 204 out of every 1,000 children died before the age of five, according to UNICEF. However, with close to 400,000 children under five still dying from preventable causes each year, Ethiopia continues to have one of the highest child mortality rates in the world. (UN News)
Kenya
Crime is hampering the growth of east Africa's largest economy by forcing businesses to spend heavily on private security services in the absence of effective policing, the UNDP said in a new report. Poverty has also increased slightly in four of Kenya's eight provinces, it said. Nairobi has seen at least 50 murders in the last three months including the wife of a US embassy employee and a top Kenyan AIDS researcher. (Reuters)
Liberia
Liberia's ex-President Gyude Bryant has been charged with embezzling more than USD 1 million while in office. He headed the country during a transitional phase after the end of the 14-year civil war in 2003. Bryant's government is accused by regional body the Economic Community Of West African States, which oversaw the peace process, of stealing state funds. President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf came to power just over a year ago promising to crack down on corruption. (BBC)
Mozambique
Around 80,000 children in the southern African country of Mozambique have now been displaced by flooding after Friday’s cyclone added to the misery of almost a month of floods that destroyed the homes of at least 160,000 people, UNICEF said Feb. 27, adding that the next week will be critical in avoiding outbreaks of disease. (UN News)
Nigeria
Nigeria is planning to launch a fund with an initial capital of USD 1 billion to help homegrown companies invest. The central bank has launched a private placement to raise funds for the proposed African Finance Corporation (AFC) and Nigerian banks had already committed USD 700 million. The AFC aims to be a commercially-driven PPP aimed at reducing poverty by providing credit for companies to invest in infrastructure and development projects. (Reuters)
Senegal
Two leading presidential candidates in Senegal say they do not accept unofficial results that show incumbent Abdoulaye Wade has won Sunday's polls. Partial results indicate that Wade, 81, has more than 55 percent of the vote making a run-off unnecessary, Senegal's official news agency reports. But Ousmane Tanor Dieng and Abdoulaye Bathily say there were irregularities. (BBC)
Somalia
Five people have been killed in several attacks in Somalia's capital, including a relative of the prime minister. An in-law of Ali Mohamed Ghedi was waylaid by armed gunmen near a main market in Mogadishu though it is unclear if this was a political attack. African Union representatives are in Mogadishu to lay the groundwork for its planned deployment of peacekeepers. (BBC)
Uganda
Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels say they will not renew a ceasefire due to expire at midnight unless President Yoweri Museveni agrees to resume talks. A fragile truce has been in place for six months but talks were halted when the rebels walked out in December. The LRA accuses the government of violating the ceasefire and says it will pick up its guns if Mr Museveni refuses to talk. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
The IMF Feb. 23 maintained its suspension of financial and technical assistance to Zimbabwe, saying the government had failed to clear its arrears and address a worsening economic and social crisis. Zimbabwe again averted expulsion from the IMF by making small payments toward clearing its arrears, which currently amount to USD 129 million. But the IMF extended its suspension of Zimbabwe's voting rights. (Reuters)
2007/02/22
Mali, Africa's third biggest gold producer, on Monday formally joined a World Bank-backed initiative that seeks to improve transparency in the management of mining contracts and other natural resource industries. Mines, Energy and Water Minister Hamed Diane Semega announced the West African state's adhesion to the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) in the presence of representatives of the World Bank and other international organizations. The EITI was launched by British Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2002. It sets out guidelines for developing countries to improve the handling of income from their oil, gas and mineral reserves, to ensure these are properly used to foster economic growth and reduce poverty.
Congo (DRC)
Thirteen soldiers have been jailed for life after the discovery of mass graves in the DRC's Ituri region. A military court found them guilty of killing about 30 civilians found buried in the graves in November. This is one of the few times armed men have been punished for atrocities since the DRC conflict began in 1997. Renewed fighting between government and rebels in the northeast has reportedly left more than 20 people dead. (BBC)
Central African Republic (CAR)
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, has called for up to 11,000 peacekeepers to be sent to Chad and the CAR to protect people affected by the Darfur conflict in neighboring Sudan. In a report to the UN Security Council, Ban proposed two options. The first option calls for 6,000 troops to be backed by helicopters; the second envisages a more ground-based mission with 10,900 troops. (BBC)
Ethiopia
Ethiopian asylum-seekers, who have been camped near the Kenyan border town of Moyale, have urged the government to rescind an order forcing them to return to Ethiopia, saying they feared for their safety. At least 1,000 people fled their homes along the Kenya-Ethiopia border and headed towards Moyale after a wave of violent conflict that left at least 11 people dead and scores injured on Feb. 9. (IRIN)
Guinea
Union leaders in Guinea insisted Feb. 22 that President Lansana Conte must name a new, neutral prime minister before they would lift a general strike which has led the government to impose martial law. They relaunched their nationwide stoppage after Conte chose a close ally, Eugene Camara, as prime minister despite having agreed to name a consensus figure. (Reuters)
Liberia
President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said Feb. 16 she was "heartened" by the outcome of an international conference on her impoverished homeland this week and noted that donor countries contributed about USD 700 million in debt relief. Sirleaf said an investment in Liberia by a foreign steel company could spark interest in the country by other transnational corporations. (AP)
Madagascar
Madagascar needs more than USD 242 million to recover from cyclone damage so far this season, Foreign Minister General Marcel Ranjeva said. The November-March cyclone season has affected about 25,000 people this year, and left more than 7,000 homeless. Rising flood waters have covered houses, cut off main roads, and destroyed an estimated 200,000 tonnes of rice. (Reuters)
Nigeria
An appeals court has ruled Nigerian leader Olusegun Obasanjo did not have the power to sack his vice-president for joining an opposition party. The court in the capital, Abuja, ruled Atiku Abubakar should remain in his post despite his defection to the Action Congress for presidential polls. In December, President Obasanjo's spokesman announced Abubakar had "technically resigned" as a result. (BBC)
Rwanda
Rwanda is releasing more than 9,000 prisoners, most of whom are in jail over the 1994 genocide which left about 800,000 people - mostly Tutsis - dead. This is the latest wave of releases under a 2003 presidential decree. About 60,000 inmates have been freed since. The government has said the releases are to ease overcrowding and foster reconciliation. (Reuters).
Senegal
A leading challenger to President Abdoulaye Wade in Senegal's elections this weekend said Feb. 21 he wanted to change accords with Spain that allow illegal Senegalese migrants to be repatriated. Voters will cast their ballots on Sunday in a presidential contest that has been dominated by debate over thousands of desperate young Senegalese risking their lives to try to reach Europe in flimsy fishing boats. (Reuters)
Somalia
Somali government forces and Ethiopian troops have shelled areas of Somalia's capital Mogadishu after their positions came under fire from insurgents. At least 12 people, mostly civilians, were killed in the exchanges - the heaviest since the government took Mogadishu from Islamists last year. Unknown gunmen launch almost daily attacks in the city. (BBC)
Sudan
Several thousand Sudanese forced to flee their villages after fighting broke out between the Targem and Reziegat Maharia communities in South Darfur have moved to Kass town, where humanitarian agencies have started assisting them. Unconfirmed reports suggested that up to 100 tribesmen were killed and 14 injured in the clashes, which were triggered by a dispute over pasture. By Feb. 20, about 3,352 people had been registered for assistance. (IRIN)
Uganda
Ugandan children who got good marks in primary school last year are the first pupils to benefit from free education at many secondary schools. Fewer than half Uganda's children go to secondary school, but about 100,000 children are expected to take part in the new scheme which started Feb. 19. Donors have backed the move, which applies to some 1,000 schools. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
Police in parts of Harare have imposed a three-month ban on political rallies and protests to try to calm tensions, after recent clashes. The police said there was "pandemonium and looting" on Sunday when they halted an opposition rally. The opposition have likened the move to "a state of emergency" and said the government was panicking. President Robert Mugabe retains an iron grip after nearly 27 years in power. (BBC)
Congo (DRC)
Thirteen soldiers have been jailed for life after the discovery of mass graves in the DRC's Ituri region. A military court found them guilty of killing about 30 civilians found buried in the graves in November. This is one of the few times armed men have been punished for atrocities since the DRC conflict began in 1997. Renewed fighting between government and rebels in the northeast has reportedly left more than 20 people dead. (BBC)
Central African Republic (CAR)
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, has called for up to 11,000 peacekeepers to be sent to Chad and the CAR to protect people affected by the Darfur conflict in neighboring Sudan. In a report to the UN Security Council, Ban proposed two options. The first option calls for 6,000 troops to be backed by helicopters; the second envisages a more ground-based mission with 10,900 troops. (BBC)
Ethiopia
Ethiopian asylum-seekers, who have been camped near the Kenyan border town of Moyale, have urged the government to rescind an order forcing them to return to Ethiopia, saying they feared for their safety. At least 1,000 people fled their homes along the Kenya-Ethiopia border and headed towards Moyale after a wave of violent conflict that left at least 11 people dead and scores injured on Feb. 9. (IRIN)
Guinea
Union leaders in Guinea insisted Feb. 22 that President Lansana Conte must name a new, neutral prime minister before they would lift a general strike which has led the government to impose martial law. They relaunched their nationwide stoppage after Conte chose a close ally, Eugene Camara, as prime minister despite having agreed to name a consensus figure. (Reuters)
Liberia
President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said Feb. 16 she was "heartened" by the outcome of an international conference on her impoverished homeland this week and noted that donor countries contributed about USD 700 million in debt relief. Sirleaf said an investment in Liberia by a foreign steel company could spark interest in the country by other transnational corporations. (AP)
Madagascar
Madagascar needs more than USD 242 million to recover from cyclone damage so far this season, Foreign Minister General Marcel Ranjeva said. The November-March cyclone season has affected about 25,000 people this year, and left more than 7,000 homeless. Rising flood waters have covered houses, cut off main roads, and destroyed an estimated 200,000 tonnes of rice. (Reuters)
Nigeria
An appeals court has ruled Nigerian leader Olusegun Obasanjo did not have the power to sack his vice-president for joining an opposition party. The court in the capital, Abuja, ruled Atiku Abubakar should remain in his post despite his defection to the Action Congress for presidential polls. In December, President Obasanjo's spokesman announced Abubakar had "technically resigned" as a result. (BBC)
Rwanda
Rwanda is releasing more than 9,000 prisoners, most of whom are in jail over the 1994 genocide which left about 800,000 people - mostly Tutsis - dead. This is the latest wave of releases under a 2003 presidential decree. About 60,000 inmates have been freed since. The government has said the releases are to ease overcrowding and foster reconciliation. (Reuters).
Senegal
A leading challenger to President Abdoulaye Wade in Senegal's elections this weekend said Feb. 21 he wanted to change accords with Spain that allow illegal Senegalese migrants to be repatriated. Voters will cast their ballots on Sunday in a presidential contest that has been dominated by debate over thousands of desperate young Senegalese risking their lives to try to reach Europe in flimsy fishing boats. (Reuters)
Somalia
Somali government forces and Ethiopian troops have shelled areas of Somalia's capital Mogadishu after their positions came under fire from insurgents. At least 12 people, mostly civilians, were killed in the exchanges - the heaviest since the government took Mogadishu from Islamists last year. Unknown gunmen launch almost daily attacks in the city. (BBC)
Sudan
Several thousand Sudanese forced to flee their villages after fighting broke out between the Targem and Reziegat Maharia communities in South Darfur have moved to Kass town, where humanitarian agencies have started assisting them. Unconfirmed reports suggested that up to 100 tribesmen were killed and 14 injured in the clashes, which were triggered by a dispute over pasture. By Feb. 20, about 3,352 people had been registered for assistance. (IRIN)
Uganda
Ugandan children who got good marks in primary school last year are the first pupils to benefit from free education at many secondary schools. Fewer than half Uganda's children go to secondary school, but about 100,000 children are expected to take part in the new scheme which started Feb. 19. Donors have backed the move, which applies to some 1,000 schools. (BBC)
Zimbabwe
Police in parts of Harare have imposed a three-month ban on political rallies and protests to try to calm tensions, after recent clashes. The police said there was "pandemonium and looting" on Sunday when they halted an opposition rally. The opposition have likened the move to "a state of emergency" and said the government was panicking. President Robert Mugabe retains an iron grip after nearly 27 years in power. (BBC)
2007/02/15
UN human rights investigators have called off a visit to Darfur after Sudanese officials demanded the removal of the UN's former top rights official from the group. The six-member team, set up last December by the UN Human Rights Council after fierce debate between countries defending Khartoum and others accusing Sudan of war crimes in Darfur, said it would pursue its work without entering the country, Reuters reported. The group had been due to arrive in Sudan Feb. 13 on the second stage of a two-month mission to look into alleged abuses against civilians in the vast, arid region where experts estimate that 200,000 have been killed and 2.5 million driven from their homes in some four years of conflict.
International rules on disposal of toxic ship waste need to be tightened after the deaths of at least 10 people in a pollution incident in Ivory Coast, the UNEP said Feb. 14. Dutch-based oil trading firm Trafigura, which has said it will pay a USD 198 million settlement to Ivory Coast after the August incident, also said it backed a tightening of regulations, Reuters reported. The money will be used largely to reimburse costs the state incurred in removing the waste and treating those affected after black sludge was dumped in open-air sites around the Ivorian economic capital Abidjan last August. Trafigura says the waste unloaded from a tanker it had chartered was routine oil slops legally handed over for disposal to a state-registered Ivorian firm. Thousands of people fell ill shortly afterwards and at least 10 died.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told an international conference on Liberia Feb. 13 that the US plans to forgive the country's USD 391 million debt to the US. "We will cancel that debt, all of it," Rice told a World Bank gathering of international development experts and delegates from at least 20 countries. With Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf seated nearby, Rice said the reduced debt burden should enable Liberia to devote more resources to reconstruction and development. The country's USD 3.7 billion overall debt is something that "today's leadership and today's people of Liberia do not deserve," Rice said, an allusion to authoritarian rulers of the past quarter century who were responsible for the debt. The heads of the World Bank and IMF said they would bring forward plans to address Liberia's billions in multilateral debt.
Burkina Faso
Some 1,300 people have been infected with meningitis in Burkina Faso so far this year and 142 of them have died, according to the Ministry of Health, which said Feb.13 it has already launched a mass vaccination campaign in the eastern district of Ouargaye, which has an outbreak above the epidemic threshold of 10 cases per 100,000 inhabitants. Authorities are also planning a vaccination campaign in Banfora district where meningitis is also at epidemic levels. (IRIN)
Central African Republic (CAR)
Thousands of immigrants from Chad marched through Bangui Feb. 14 bearing the bodies of two countrymen gunned down by police in the latest outbreak of ethnic tension in the capital of Central African Republic. They left the corpses at the Chadian embassy as a protest against N'Djamena's lack of diplomatic action, after carrying them from the suburb where they were killed to city center. (Reuters)
Guinea
Soldiers with orders to shoot rioters and looters were in control of Guinea's towns Feb. 14, as authorities tried to revive negotiations to end an anti-government strike that has led to martial law. Guinea has been under military authority since President Lansana Conte declared martial law nationwide Feb. 12 after unions mounted the second general strike this year and at least nine people were killed that day in clashes with security forces. (Reuters)
Kenya
Police sent to protect residents in the troubled Mount Elgon region of western Kenya are burning homes and beating people, said Maina Kiai, chairman of the government's National Commission on Human Rights. Some 60 people have been killed since December in violent clashes for possession of fertile land in the area near the Ugandan border, and tens of thousands have been forced out of their homes. Police blamed the violence on criminal gangs. (Reuters)
Mozambique
Mozambique may need emergency help to airlift food and other supplies to thousands of flood refugees stranded in evacuation centers that are fast running out of supplies. Mozambique's National Institute for Disaster Management (INGC) says the country faces a fresh humanitarian disaster as some 45,000 people crammed into temporary camps run short of food, fuel and basic shelter. (Reuters)
Rwanda
Rwandan journalist Jean-Bosco Gasasira, managing editor of the independent fortnightly Umuvugizi, was beaten unconscious and left in a coma for hours by unknown attackers, media rights group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said Feb. 14. Rwanda's government has long been criticized for keeping a tight grip on the media. Kigali is accused of arresting and harassing journalists who write critical articles about the government. (Reuters)
Somalia
The 1,500 Ugandan peacekeepers pledged to the African Union force for Somalia will be deployed solely in the country's lawless capital Mogadishu. The Ugandan force could go in as early as this weekend, and would secure Mogadishu while the AU awaits troops from other countries to arrive in other Somali cities, Paddy Ankunda, spokesman for the AU mission, said. Some 8,000 troops are expected in total. (Reuters)
International rules on disposal of toxic ship waste need to be tightened after the deaths of at least 10 people in a pollution incident in Ivory Coast, the UNEP said Feb. 14. Dutch-based oil trading firm Trafigura, which has said it will pay a USD 198 million settlement to Ivory Coast after the August incident, also said it backed a tightening of regulations, Reuters reported. The money will be used largely to reimburse costs the state incurred in removing the waste and treating those affected after black sludge was dumped in open-air sites around the Ivorian economic capital Abidjan last August. Trafigura says the waste unloaded from a tanker it had chartered was routine oil slops legally handed over for disposal to a state-registered Ivorian firm. Thousands of people fell ill shortly afterwards and at least 10 died.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told an international conference on Liberia Feb. 13 that the US plans to forgive the country's USD 391 million debt to the US. "We will cancel that debt, all of it," Rice told a World Bank gathering of international development experts and delegates from at least 20 countries. With Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf seated nearby, Rice said the reduced debt burden should enable Liberia to devote more resources to reconstruction and development. The country's USD 3.7 billion overall debt is something that "today's leadership and today's people of Liberia do not deserve," Rice said, an allusion to authoritarian rulers of the past quarter century who were responsible for the debt. The heads of the World Bank and IMF said they would bring forward plans to address Liberia's billions in multilateral debt.
Burkina Faso
Some 1,300 people have been infected with meningitis in Burkina Faso so far this year and 142 of them have died, according to the Ministry of Health, which said Feb.13 it has already launched a mass vaccination campaign in the eastern district of Ouargaye, which has an outbreak above the epidemic threshold of 10 cases per 100,000 inhabitants. Authorities are also planning a vaccination campaign in Banfora district where meningitis is also at epidemic levels. (IRIN)
Central African Republic (CAR)
Thousands of immigrants from Chad marched through Bangui Feb. 14 bearing the bodies of two countrymen gunned down by police in the latest outbreak of ethnic tension in the capital of Central African Republic. They left the corpses at the Chadian embassy as a protest against N'Djamena's lack of diplomatic action, after carrying them from the suburb where they were killed to city center. (Reuters)
Guinea
Soldiers with orders to shoot rioters and looters were in control of Guinea's towns Feb. 14, as authorities tried to revive negotiations to end an anti-government strike that has led to martial law. Guinea has been under military authority since President Lansana Conte declared martial law nationwide Feb. 12 after unions mounted the second general strike this year and at least nine people were killed that day in clashes with security forces. (Reuters)
Kenya
Police sent to protect residents in the troubled Mount Elgon region of western Kenya are burning homes and beating people, said Maina Kiai, chairman of the government's National Commission on Human Rights. Some 60 people have been killed since December in violent clashes for possession of fertile land in the area near the Ugandan border, and tens of thousands have been forced out of their homes. Police blamed the violence on criminal gangs. (Reuters)
Mozambique
Mozambique may need emergency help to airlift food and other supplies to thousands of flood refugees stranded in evacuation centers that are fast running out of supplies. Mozambique's National Institute for Disaster Management (INGC) says the country faces a fresh humanitarian disaster as some 45,000 people crammed into temporary camps run short of food, fuel and basic shelter. (Reuters)
Rwanda
Rwandan journalist Jean-Bosco Gasasira, managing editor of the independent fortnightly Umuvugizi, was beaten unconscious and left in a coma for hours by unknown attackers, media rights group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said Feb. 14. Rwanda's government has long been criticized for keeping a tight grip on the media. Kigali is accused of arresting and harassing journalists who write critical articles about the government. (Reuters)
Somalia
The 1,500 Ugandan peacekeepers pledged to the African Union force for Somalia will be deployed solely in the country's lawless capital Mogadishu. The Ugandan force could go in as early as this weekend, and would secure Mogadishu while the AU awaits troops from other countries to arrive in other Somali cities, Paddy Ankunda, spokesman for the AU mission, said. Some 8,000 troops are expected in total. (Reuters)
2007/01/18
IMF, World Bank & IFI Round-Up
US bank Citigroup has teamed up with private equity group CDC to invest at least USD 200 million in Africa. Citigroup will invest USD 100 million in its first African private equity fund. The UK government-owned CDC group, formally called the Commonwealth Development Corporation, will match this amount. The fund will provide opportunities for Africa's infrastructure, telecoms, manufacturing and energy industries, the CDC said. "We believe that profitable investments in such areas are fundamental to creating wealth and alleviating poverty in growing economies," said CDC chief executive Richard Laing. The investment brings CDC's total funds dedicated to Africa to more than USD 830 million.
Three African first ladies, Azeb Mesfin of Ethiopia, Jeanette Kagame of Rwanda, and Maureen Mwanawasa of Zambia, have called for new and further-reaching approaches to combating HIV/AIDS on the continent. Their message, delivered at a panel discussion on Tuesday at the World Bank headquarters in Washington, DC, was presented on behalf of the Organization of African First Ladies Against HIV/AIDS, formed in 2002.
African Union ministers adopted a united front for global trade talks at a summit this week, calling on Western countries to scrap agricultural subsidies to allow African imports to compete. In a declaration that was unanimously adopted at a summit in Addis Ababa, the ministers called for "the rapid elimination" of all forms of export subsidies. "We urge the main commercial partners to demonstrate flexibility and to show the necessary political will to facilitate the full resumption of talks and to bring them out of the impasse," the declaration said. The ministers had chosen a message of "firmness and unity," an AU Commission official told AFP.
Angola
Angola's government has been criticized for forcibly evicting thousands of people from their homes to free land for new housing projects in Luanda. A report by Amnesty International (AI) also says the Catholic Church has been involved in evictions in the capital. According to AI, homes have been demolished repeatedly in one district since September 2004 to make room for new public and private housing and none of the affected residents has received compensation. (BBC)
Central African Republic (CAR)
A UN assessment mission will head to the Central African Republic (CAR) within the next fortnight to consider whether blue helmets should be sent to stabilize the troubled country and its neighbor Chad in the wake of recent clashes between rebels and Government forces in both countries. The mission team is now determining its terms of reference. (UN News)
Chad
Rebels opposing the government in Chad say they have captured a town in the north-east of the country, inflicting heavy casualties on government forces. The Union of Forces for Democracy and Development (UFDD) said its forces attacked the town of Ounianga Kebir at dawn on Saturday. Chad's government disputed the rebel statement, playing down the clashes. (BBC)
Nigeria
The Nigerian government has raised the minimum capital base for airlines by up to 25 times and said carriers had to meet the requirement by April or lose the right to fly. Minister of State for Aviation Femi Fani-Kayode said the government adopted the measure because Nigerian airlines were insufficiently funded and were operating old, dangerous planes. (Reuters)
Rwanda
The UN war crimes tribunal for Rwanda today confirmed the sentence of life imprisonment given to a former government finance minister for his role in the genocide that engulfed the country in 1994. The appeals chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), sitting in Arusha, Tanzania, upheld the trial chamber’s convictions against Emmanuel Ndindabahizi for both genocide and extermination as a crime against humanity. (UN News)
Sierra Leone
The top loyalist and rebel defendants being tried for war crimes in Sierra Leone were both flown abroad for medical treatment Jan. 17 just weeks before the verdicts are due. Stephen Rapp, who took over on Jan. 1 as chief prosecutor for the UN-backed tribunal trying the men, told reporters that former Defense Minister Sam Hinga Norman and ex-rebel commander Issa Sesay had been flown to Dakar, Senegal. (Reuters).
Somalia
The international aid community must immediately avail itself of the window of opportunity that now exists in Somalia after the Ethiopian-backed Transitional Federal Government (TFG) drove Islamist groups out of Mogadishu, the capital, by setting up substantial operations in the city, Eric Laroche, a senior UN relief official, has warned. “If we don’t act quickly, though, this opportunity may pass,” he said. (UN News)
Sudan
UN agencies issued an unprecedented joint appeal Jan. 17 calling for an end to the violence in Darfur, where widespread attacks and insecurity threaten to collapse the world's largest aid operation. The statement said in the past six months, some 250,000 people had been forced to flee violence, many for the second or third time, and a dozen aid workers were killed, more than at any other time during the four-year-old conflict. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
A partnership between Zimbabwe's second city, Bulawayo, and the International Organization for Migration (IOM), will bring about the construction of much-needed housing to replace homes demolished nearly two years ago during Operation Murambatsvina (or Operation Restore Order). Murambatsvina was touted as an urban "clean-up campaign" by the Mugabe government but condemned by the UN for and left over 700,000 people homeless. (IRIN)
US bank Citigroup has teamed up with private equity group CDC to invest at least USD 200 million in Africa. Citigroup will invest USD 100 million in its first African private equity fund. The UK government-owned CDC group, formally called the Commonwealth Development Corporation, will match this amount. The fund will provide opportunities for Africa's infrastructure, telecoms, manufacturing and energy industries, the CDC said. "We believe that profitable investments in such areas are fundamental to creating wealth and alleviating poverty in growing economies," said CDC chief executive Richard Laing. The investment brings CDC's total funds dedicated to Africa to more than USD 830 million.
Three African first ladies, Azeb Mesfin of Ethiopia, Jeanette Kagame of Rwanda, and Maureen Mwanawasa of Zambia, have called for new and further-reaching approaches to combating HIV/AIDS on the continent. Their message, delivered at a panel discussion on Tuesday at the World Bank headquarters in Washington, DC, was presented on behalf of the Organization of African First Ladies Against HIV/AIDS, formed in 2002.
African Union ministers adopted a united front for global trade talks at a summit this week, calling on Western countries to scrap agricultural subsidies to allow African imports to compete. In a declaration that was unanimously adopted at a summit in Addis Ababa, the ministers called for "the rapid elimination" of all forms of export subsidies. "We urge the main commercial partners to demonstrate flexibility and to show the necessary political will to facilitate the full resumption of talks and to bring them out of the impasse," the declaration said. The ministers had chosen a message of "firmness and unity," an AU Commission official told AFP.
Angola
Angola's government has been criticized for forcibly evicting thousands of people from their homes to free land for new housing projects in Luanda. A report by Amnesty International (AI) also says the Catholic Church has been involved in evictions in the capital. According to AI, homes have been demolished repeatedly in one district since September 2004 to make room for new public and private housing and none of the affected residents has received compensation. (BBC)
Central African Republic (CAR)
A UN assessment mission will head to the Central African Republic (CAR) within the next fortnight to consider whether blue helmets should be sent to stabilize the troubled country and its neighbor Chad in the wake of recent clashes between rebels and Government forces in both countries. The mission team is now determining its terms of reference. (UN News)
Chad
Rebels opposing the government in Chad say they have captured a town in the north-east of the country, inflicting heavy casualties on government forces. The Union of Forces for Democracy and Development (UFDD) said its forces attacked the town of Ounianga Kebir at dawn on Saturday. Chad's government disputed the rebel statement, playing down the clashes. (BBC)
Nigeria
The Nigerian government has raised the minimum capital base for airlines by up to 25 times and said carriers had to meet the requirement by April or lose the right to fly. Minister of State for Aviation Femi Fani-Kayode said the government adopted the measure because Nigerian airlines were insufficiently funded and were operating old, dangerous planes. (Reuters)
Rwanda
The UN war crimes tribunal for Rwanda today confirmed the sentence of life imprisonment given to a former government finance minister for his role in the genocide that engulfed the country in 1994. The appeals chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), sitting in Arusha, Tanzania, upheld the trial chamber’s convictions against Emmanuel Ndindabahizi for both genocide and extermination as a crime against humanity. (UN News)
Sierra Leone
The top loyalist and rebel defendants being tried for war crimes in Sierra Leone were both flown abroad for medical treatment Jan. 17 just weeks before the verdicts are due. Stephen Rapp, who took over on Jan. 1 as chief prosecutor for the UN-backed tribunal trying the men, told reporters that former Defense Minister Sam Hinga Norman and ex-rebel commander Issa Sesay had been flown to Dakar, Senegal. (Reuters).
Somalia
The international aid community must immediately avail itself of the window of opportunity that now exists in Somalia after the Ethiopian-backed Transitional Federal Government (TFG) drove Islamist groups out of Mogadishu, the capital, by setting up substantial operations in the city, Eric Laroche, a senior UN relief official, has warned. “If we don’t act quickly, though, this opportunity may pass,” he said. (UN News)
Sudan
UN agencies issued an unprecedented joint appeal Jan. 17 calling for an end to the violence in Darfur, where widespread attacks and insecurity threaten to collapse the world's largest aid operation. The statement said in the past six months, some 250,000 people had been forced to flee violence, many for the second or third time, and a dozen aid workers were killed, more than at any other time during the four-year-old conflict. (Reuters)
Zimbabwe
A partnership between Zimbabwe's second city, Bulawayo, and the International Organization for Migration (IOM), will bring about the construction of much-needed housing to replace homes demolished nearly two years ago during Operation Murambatsvina (or Operation Restore Order). Murambatsvina was touted as an urban "clean-up campaign" by the Mugabe government but condemned by the UN for and left over 700,000 people homeless. (IRIN)
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