SOMALIA is one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world, says the UN. No wonder: Of its 9.5million inhabitants, a total of 1.4million are internally displaced, over 570000 are refugees dispersed in the region and nearly three million people are dependent on humanitarian aid, let alone the tens of thousands of civilians dead and injured.
This humanitarian disaster, tragically common to all war-torn countries and areas, continues to be ignored.
Apparently, the business of killing people is more interesting for politicians and more lucrative for market-based economies than saving lives. The world spends over 1trillion (R7.4trillion) a year on its war machinery.
To quote Al-Jazeera’s Andrew Wander, who reported on April 19: “Fighting, death and destruction on the streets of the Somali capital is nothing new; but now human rights groups are warning civilian suffering is being fuelled by weapons shipments from the very countries that say they want to bring peace.”
The US government shipped about 40 tons of weapons and ammunition to the transitional government last year to bolster its position in the face of increasingly powerful armed opposition groups like Al-Shabaab, according to Wander.
“The US believes the armed groups fighting to topple the government have ties to al-Qaeda and have been alarmed by their takeover of vast swathes of the country,” he said. “But government forces, and the African Union troops tasked with supporting them, have used the weapons to commit what human rights groups say are clear breaches of the laws of war.”
All this leads to questions about the value of statements by representatives of world bodies, such as the call issued by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees urging parties to the conflict to avoid targeting civilian facilities and heavily populated areas of the capital, Mogadishu, which already shelter more than 300000 internally displaced people. For instance, has the international community reacted so far to the fact that more than 100000 people have been displaced from or within Mogadishu since the beginning of this year?

On top of all this, the UN reports that part of its food aid to Somalia ends in the hands of the so-called “warlords” and local contractors who deliver their profits – or the aid itself – to armed factions.

Ongoing drought and civil unrest in central Somalia has left 70% of the population in the region in need of humanitarian assistance. Deepening drought in northern Somalia is now of particular concern, with nearly 300000 people in need of assistance. And one in six Somali children is acutely malnourished – a total of some 240000 children – the highest acute malnutrition rates anywhere in the world. But does anybody care?
Babukar Kashka writes for IDN, InDepthNews, where this article first appeared

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 11th, 2010 at 7:35 am and is filed under News in English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

The Somali President, Sharif Sheikh Ahmed calls on the members of the Council of Ministers and the Parliament to put their differences aside and focus on the important security and governance tasks that the Somali people expect.

President Sharif has held a closed-door session with the TFG Council of Ministers. This followed similar meetings that the President had in the last four days with the Members of Parliament and other leading figures of the Transitional Federal Institutions namely the Speaker of the Parliament and the Prime Minster.

Today’s meeting was part of extensive consultations that the President had had with the members of the Transitional Institutions in order to defuse the ongoing political wrangling within the TFIs and at the same time refocus the combined energies of the government and parliament to the tasks that they swore to uphold – namely serving the people and putting the national interest ahead of personal and partisan gains.

The President underscored to the members of the Council of Ministers and MPs that both the Somali people and international community expect the TFIs to set their priories right in the face of the daunting security and humanitarian challenges the nation face. “Unity, patience and selflessness should be our motto” the President informed all concerned.

Communications Directorate

Email: media@sompresidency.org

This entry was posted on Monday, April 26th, 2010 at 6:27 am and is filed under News in English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Thailand mobilised tens of thousands more security personnel Friday to restore order in Bangkok, where leaders of mass anti-government protests faced arrest for defying a state of emergency.

A Thai court approved arrest warrants for another 17 leaders of the “Red Shirt” demonstrators, who have occupied the capital’s commercial district for almost a week, paralysing traffic and causing major stores to shut.

Defying a ban on rallies, protesters travelled on motorcycles and in cars towards the headquarters of broadcaster Thaicom to try to put the Red’s television channel back on air after the government pulled the plug.

The army said it had called up 33,000 extra police and troops in and around the capital, where supporters of fugitive ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra have been staging rolling rallies for almost a month.

FRANCE 24 correspondent Nelson Rand reports from Bangkok.

“It’s crucial for the military and police to bring the situation under control,” army spokesman Sunsern Kaewkumnerd told a news conference. “Police and soldiers will decisively enforce the law.”

There are now more than 80,000 security personnel in Bangkok — more than the number of protesters, whose number peaked at about 60,000 on Thursday night at two locations, according to police estimates.

The authorities have so far avoided using force to break up the rallies, highlighting Thailand’s deep rift pitting Bangkok’s ruling elite against the mainly poor and rural Reds.

The Reds want immediate elections, arguing the government is illegitimate because it came to power with army backing through a parliamentary vote in December 2008 after a court decision ousted Thaksin’s allies from power.

“The government is not concerned about people’s lives but worries that glass at shopping malls may be shattered. That’s why the government has not yet used force to crack down,” said one of the Reds’ leaders, Jatuporn Prompan, who himself has immunity from arrest because he is a member of parliament.

The government announced emergency rule Wednesday after protesters briefly forced their way into the parliament compound. Lawmakers fled and several senior government figures were evacuated by military helicopter to safety.

On Thursday a Thai court issued arrest warrants for seven Red Shirts involved in the incident.

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva was due attend a Southeast Asian summit in Vietnam this week but cancelled the visit because of the mass rallies and remains holed up at an army barracks.

“Once leaders who prefer violence are arrested, we believe we can persuade other protesters to leave the protest site,” said Abhisit, under increasing pressure to end the protests.

It is the fourth time since 2008 that emergency law has been declared in the capital because of political turmoil.

Abhisit’s government has banned public gatherings of more than five people and given broad powers to police and military under emergency rule in the capital and surrounding areas.

But it is anxious to avoid a repeat of last April’s clashes that left two people dead.

The army said the number of demonstrators had dwindled after the TV channel was pulled.

But many Reds returned Thursday evening, with police estimating the number peaked at 50,000 in the commercial hub, along with 11,000 in another location.

Supporters of Thaksin, who was ousted in a 2006 military coup, hail his policies for the masses such as cheap healthcare, but Bangkok’s powerful elite sees him as corrupt, authoritarian and a threat to the revered monarchy.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 9th, 2010 at 10:37 am and is filed under News in English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Hailed as the first democratic elections in Sudan for 24 years, the polls unfolding between April 11 and 13 are also the first of two key electoral steps under a comprehensive peace deal signed in January 2005 between Khartoum and the former southern rebels of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA).

The multi-party presidential, legislative and governor polls will be followed by a referendum to be held next year, when the mostly Christian and animist South is expected to hold a referendum on whether to secede from the Muslim-majority North. A former British colony, Sudan is Africa’s biggest country and is also the sub-Saharan region’s third-largest oil producer.

The 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement, signed in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi under Kenyan auspices, ended 21 years of a fratricidal civil war between the North and the South, which resulted in approximately two million deaths and over 4.6 million displaced people.

It also led to the establishment of a unity government of the ruling northern National Congress Party (NCP) and the former rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), which was founded on the ashes of the SPLA. The deal is aimed at developing the different regions of the country through an equitable sharing of power and resources.

Oil between borders and at the heart of the problem

But the coalition has been shaky at best, marked by frequent disputes and mutual distrust.

Over the past five years the alliance between Sudanese President Hassan Omar al-Bashir from the North, and Vice-President Salva Kiir Mayardit, the SPLM leader, has been fraught. At the heart of friction lies the distribution of oil revenues and particularly the rich deposits situated along the border between the North and South – including the oil-rich Abeyi region, which is considered a historical bridge between northern and southern Sudan.

During a visit to Paris in November, Mayardit accused his former opponent of not respecting the terms of the peace agreement. The North, he said, did not give the South all the oil royalties provided by the peace deal.

The 2005 commitment by the two parties to hold a referendum on self-determination in southern Sudan in January 2011 has not helped either. The South is widely expected to opt for secession, a troubling prospect for the North.

For Khartoum, which must also deal with the identity politics in the troubled western Darfur region, southern Sudan’s accession to independence is considered a prelude to the break-up of the country.

According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), oil accounts for 95 percent of Sudan’s export income and 60 percent of the central government revenues. Most of the country’s oil reserves – estimated at six billion barrels – are located in the South. By all accounts, the authorities in Khartoum do not want to watch this liquid gold slip through their fingers.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 9th, 2010 at 10:34 am and is filed under News in English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

A French soldier was killed Thursday in clashes between insurgents and Afghan troops backed by French forces, the French presidency has announced.

The soldier, a member of the second airborne regiment of the French Foreign Legion, was hit in Tagab valley, north-east of Kabul, where most of France’s 3,500-strong contingent is deployed.

His death brings to 41 the number of French soldiers killed in the country since 2001.

A statement issued by the French presidency expressed condolences, but reiterated France’s commitment to NATO-led operations in Afghanistan: “The president reaffirms his support of the Afghan people and the Afghan authorities. He forcefully condemns this blind violence and expresses France’s determination to continue working with the International Security Assistance Force”.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 9th, 2010 at 10:33 am and is filed under News in English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

The Afghan Taliban issued a video on Wednesday of an American soldier captured last summer that showed him him saying “please bring me home.”

The video of Idaho National Guard Private Bowe Bergdahl was posted and described by SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors websites used by extremist groups.

The Afghan Taliban had previously issued a video of Bergdahl on Christmas Day.

“I’m a prisoner. I want to go home. You know, the Afghanistan men who are in our prisons want to go home too. Let me go. Get me to come home. Release me,” Bergdahl says, according to SITE.

The video ends with Afghan Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid saying his group demands the release of a limited number of prisoners in exchange for Bergdahl’s release, SITE said.

A Pentagon spokeswoman said: “We have seen reports of the video but we have not seen the video.”

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 8th, 2010 at 11:05 am and is filed under News in English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

US President Barack Obama arrived in Prague on Thursday to sign a landmark nuclear disarmament treaty with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev that slashes their two nations’ atomic arsenals.

The two heads of state will sign a successor to the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which expired last December, in the city where Obama called for a nuclear-free world in a keynote speech a year ago.

The treaty, which must be ratified by the US Senate and Russia’s parliament to take effect, also imposes limits on the intercontinental ballistic missiles needed to deliver the warheads.

Prague airport spokeswoman Michaela Lagronova told AFP that Obama arrived at 0915 (0715 GMT). Medvedev arrived in Prague on Wednesday evening.

Obama will meet Medvedev at the Prague Castle — the seat of the Czech president — for a one-on-one before the signature scheduled to take place in the castle’s richly adorned Spanish Hall around noon local time (1000 GMT).

Thousands of police have been deployed to provide security in Prague during the US-Russian summit.

The agenda for the talks includes hot-button international issues such as Iran’s nuclear programme.

The Obama administration has been seeking Russian support at the UN Security Council for tougher sanctions against Iran.

They are also likely to discuss US missile defence — a point of conflict between the two superpowers ever since the George W. Bush administration introduced a plan to deploy a missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic.

Last September, the United States scrapped that version of the initiative, which had been a major source of tension between Washington and Moscow.

But Russia has warned that it may pull out of the new treaty if it feels threatened by the new US plan, under which Poland may still host an anti-missile system.

Following the signing, Obama and Medvedev are scheduled to give a joint press conference.

Obama had pushed hard for the new treaty in a bid to improve strained ties with Moscow and set an example for the rest of the world as he seeks to strengthen global non-proliferation efforts.

The initiative helped him earn the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009.

In the justification of its decision to pick Obama, the Nobel committee said it had “attached special importance to Obama’s vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons.”

The US president, whose country is set to host a key nuclear security summit on April 12-13, took another major step on Tuesday when he unveiled a new nuclear policy reducing the role of atomic weapons in the US national security strategy.

Later on Thursday, Obama will meet 11 leaders from eastern and central Europe, whose countries have fretted about eroding support from Washington as the Obama administration pursues closer ties with Russia.

The US president will spend the night in Prague and leave around noon (1000 GMT) on Friday after bilateral talks with Czech leaders.

Medvedev will leave Prague around 1500 (1300 GMT) on Thursday after a joint ceremonial lunch with Obama and Czech President Vaclav Klaus.

Thousands of police have been deployed to provide security in Prague during the US-Russian summit.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 8th, 2010 at 11:01 am and is filed under News in English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Key Sudanese presidential hopeful Yassir Arman has pulled out of April’s vote, leaving the way clear for a first-round win by President Omar al-Beshir unless the opposition finds a single candidate.

The move, announced by Arman’s ex-rebel group, came Wednesday after Beshir ruled out deferring the first multi-party polls in 24 years.

“I took the decision to withdraw for two reasons. Firstly, after having campaigned in Darfur, I realised that it was impossible to hold elections there due to the current state of emergency,” Arman told AFP early Thursday.

“Secondly, there are irregularities in the electoral process which is rigged.”

Stressing that his fight would continue despite his pullout from the race, Arman declared: “President Beshir is a burden for Sudan and for his own party. He’s been leading Sudan for over 20 years. That’s enough.”

Beshir had told a political rally in Damazin, the capital of the Blue Nile state: “The elections will not be postponed or cancelled. They will take place on time.”

“Our partner (in the government), the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, agrees with us,” that the presidential, legislative and municipal elections should be held as planned on April 11-13, Beshir added.

But a few hours later an SPLM party official dropped the bombshell and announced that Arman was quitting the race.

He said however that the SPLM will present candidates to regional and legislative elections “across Sudan, except for Darfur”.

Arman, 49, a secular Muslim from North Sudan, was selected in January by his ex-rebel group to challenge Beshir in April’s presidential election and was regarded as a leading candidate.

His withdrawal means Beshir is assured of re-election in the first round of voting, unless the opposition parties, which meet on Thursday to decide whether to boycott the election, can come up with a single candidate.

On Monday Arman accused Beshir of trying to tamper with the polls, after a contract to print ballots went to a state-owned press.

“The National Congress Party has done all in its capacity to falsify the presidential election,” Arman told reporters.

Earlier Wednesday a coalition of opposition groups warned that going ahead with the polls as scheduled would be, according to their spokesman Faruq Abu Issa, a “disaster”.

Opposition groups say the conditions for a free and fair election are not in place and that insecurity in war-torn Darfur, in western Sudan, will also prevent participation of voters there.

“We stress the importance of postponing the elections until November in order to hold free and fair elections,” said Mariam al-Mahdi from the opposition Umma party.

Human Rights Watch has said Sudanese government repression of its opponents and the media was threatening the chances of the elections being “free, fair, and credible”.

An opposition boycott would secure the re-election of Beshir, who rose to power in an 1989 military coup backed by Islamists and who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes in Darfur.

Britain — Sudan’s former colonial power — and Norway, a main provider of aid, joined the United States in expressing concern on Wednesday over the polls.

“We urge all parties in Sudan to work urgently to ensure that elections can proceed peacefully and credibly in April,” US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband and Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Store said.

“We are deeply concerned by reports of continued administrative and logistical challenges, as well as restrictions on political freedoms,” they said.

The US, British and Norwegian foreign ministers also said the election should prove a “major milestone” in the 2005 agreement that ended a 22-year north-south civil war.

Under the peace deal, mostly Christian and animist southern Sudan obtained the right to hold a referendum in January 2011 on whether to break away from the Muslim-majority north.

On Monday, Beshir warned that an elections boycott by the SPLM former rebels would result in the north rejecting the south holding the referendum.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 1st, 2010 at 10:04 am and is filed under News in English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Chechen rebel leader Doku Umarov claimed responsibility for suicide bombings in the Moscow metro that killed at least 39 people, according to a video posted on the unofficial Islamist rebel website on Wednesday.

Umarov, who styles himself as the “Emir of the Caucasus Emirate”, said in the video that he had personally ordered the attacks. He said attacks on Russia would continue.

31/03/2010 – “Russia’s most wanted”
Andrew Osborn, from Moscow

“As you all know on March 29 in Moscow, two special operations were carried out to destroy the infidels and to sent a greeting to the FSB,” Umarov was shown saying in the four-and-a-half minute long video on www.kavkazcenter.com.

One of the metro stations bombed was just metres (yards) away from the headquarters of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), the country’s main domestic security service.

“Both of these operations were carried out on my command and will not be the last,” Umarov was shown saying against the background of what looked like a wood.

He spoke heavily accented Russian and said that he was speaking on March 29.

“They will not be the last”

Chechen rebel leader Doku Umarov

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 1st, 2010 at 10:02 am and is filed under News in English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.