 |
Create your own website in seconds with easy to use Visit http://geographicalmedia.org to build your own custom site! |
World News - .geographical media - RSSSyndicated content powered by .geographical mediaRSS syndication makes it easy to receive content updates in My Yahoo!, Newsgator, Bloglines, and other news readers. |
Current Feed ContentKENYA: Claims of torture by army and militia, as food shortages grip Mt Elgon Friday, May 16, 2008 The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR)
has called for an investigation into allegations of torture committed
by security forces deployed in the clash-torn Mt Elgon district in
western Kenya. "In seeking to return sanity to the area as a result of the atrocities being committed in the area, the military should stop the excesses of the security forces deployed therein," the commission said on 15 May when it launched a report, The Mountain of Terror, which highlights some of the atrocities allegedly committed by the security forces and a militia group that has been active in the area since 2006. The commission said it had written to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour, urging her to recommend to the UN Security Council the suspension of Kenya's armed forces in any ongoing or future UN peacekeeping missions "on account of the violations". However, the police denied the commission's allegations of torture by security officials. Police spokesman Eric Kiraithe said the police, instead, had evidence of acts of torture committed by Sabaot Land Defence Force (SLDF) militiamen but these would only be released once the investigations were complete. "We have details of the atrocities committed by this criminal gang but, for the security of the victims, we cannot release them to the press because the security operation is ongoing and investigations are not complete," Kiraithe said. "So far, since the military operation started in the district, there has been only one case of murder reported," Kiraithe told IRIN. "The operation will continue because we are determined to rid the district of this criminal gang." Land rights The government deployed security forces - comprising the army and police - to Mt Elgon in March to quell an insurgency by the SLDF, which claims to be defending the land rights of the dominant Sabaot community in the district. SLDF was formed to seek redress for alleged injustices during land distribution in the Chebyuk settlement scheme, with the conflict pitting two main clans of the Sabaot - Mosop (also known as Ndorobo) and Soy – against each other. "The army intervention is proving to be counterproductive since it has actually participated in gross human rights violations in the area," KNCHR said. "Sources told the commission that the military torture members of the Sabaot community to death and those who survive are taken to the police station. Those who die are taken to Kamarang hill in Mt Elgon where it is alleged that they are buried en masse." Torture The commission said the nature of the injuries inflicted on suspected militiamen included sexual violence to genitals; being forced to torture each other (pulling each others' genitals and whipping each other); forced to witness torture by the military; food and sleep deprivation; broken arms and legs; submerging in sewage; hanging upside down from a moving helicopter; forced to crawl in razor wire; deep lacerations resulting from whip lashes; bullet wounds; forced to swallow sand; and powdered pepper inserted into women’s vaginas. The commission said it was of the view that the use of force in the district had not elicited positive results and might have served to worsen the security situation. "KNCHR further proposes that the government seeks to reach out to the militia in an effort to stop further bloodshed in the area," the commission said. "However, KNCHR believes there should be no amnesty for perpetrators of gross violations of human rights." It also proposed that the government should come up with an acceptable formula of sharing out land between the Mosop (Ndorobo) and Soy, the two dominant clans of the Sabaot, "as opposed to an imposed formula that leads to fresh clashes". The SLDF was formed in 2005 in a bid to resist government efforts to evict squatters from the Chebyuk settlement scheme in the district. KNCHR said the militia had, since 2006, been accused of killing at least 600 people and terrorising the community through physical assaults, threats and atrocities such as murder, torture, rape, theft and destruction of property. An estimated 66,000 people have been displaced over an 18-month period. Food shortages Meanwhile, many residents of the district are facing food shortages because of the military operation. "Food availability, for many residents, is a problem given the ongoing military operation, which has an impact on the flow of food in markets as well as access to markets by both the locals and the traders," Anthony Mwangi, the public relations manager of the Kenya Red Cross Society (KRCS), told IRIN. However, Mwangi said food distribution by KRCS was ongoing, targeting thousands of people. The society was distributing maize, beans, cooking oil and soap, he said. "Both the displaced and those still in their homes are facing food shortages; but we are trying our best to intervene by distributing food, especially to the vulnerable," Col Yulu, the regional disaster preparedness and response officer for the KRCS, said. js/am/mw IRIN NEWS http://irinnews.org NIGERIA: Emergency rice import cancelled Friday, May 16, 2008 A
decision by the Nigerian government to reverse an earlier decision to
import 50,000 metric tonnes of rice from Thailand to ease supply
pressures on rice in Africa’s most populous country was met with mixed
reactions. Yau Aladuwa, a 60-year old peasant in the farming village of Buntusu in northern Jigawa state, told IRIN: “This decision not to import the rice has thrown us into despair because we thought the [rice] import would ease the food shortage we are experiencing”. Harvests from last season were poor and higher food prices this year have forced many into begging and menial jobs, Aladuwa said. However Ahmed Rabiu, vice president of Kano Chamber of Commerce, told IRIN the massive order never made sense. “It would have taken a minimum of three months to import and distribute the rice to the people that needed it and by then many farmers will have started harvesting their crops which will make the import worthless,” he explained. The Nigerian government had on 1 May announced it would import 50,000 metric tonnes of rice worth US$600 million as an interim measure “to cushion the impact of global food crisis on vulnerable Nigerians”. One week later, on 7 May, agriculture minister Abba Sayyadi Ruma rescinded the import decision and instead approved the investment of US$85 million in a credit scheme meant to support local rice processing as part of measures to attain food sufficiency. The government also suspended duties on rice imports for six months and ordered the release of 11,000 metric tonnes of grains from its strategic food reserves for sale at one-sixth its market value. Sabo Nanono, head of Kano chapter of Nigeria’s commercial farmers union said the decision to invest in the domestic agriculture sector was the right one, even though it will not achieve as much populist enthusiasm as the rice imports. He estimated that Nigeria has conditions favourable enough to become a net exporter of rice, given the right tools, seeds and irrigation. “It is a wise decision that the government reversed the idea of importing the rice,” Nanono said. Poor harvests in some parts of Nigeria in 2007 were due to shorter than necessary rainfall and a locust invasion. In some cities in northern Nigeria, streets are now swarming with child beggars, sent out to earn by impoverished families struggling to afford enough to eat as they wait for the rainy season to start. According to the agriculture ministry, 91 million Nigerians representing 65 percent of the country’s population are food insecure. IRIN NEWS http://irinnews.org SUDAN: Abyei town deserted following fresh clashes Friday, May 16, 2008 Thousands
of people have fled Abyei town after two days of clashes between
Sudanese government troops and the southern Sudan People’s Liberation
Movement/Army (SPLM/A). "There was fighting in the evening yesterday," SPLA spokesman Maj Gen Peter Parnyang told IRIN on 15 May. "Fighting is still continuing up to today." A meeting between leaders of the mainly Arab Misseriya and largely African Dinka communities – the main residents of the disputed oil-rich region – would resolve the crisis, Parnyang said. Other sources said a ceasefire had been agreed, but sporadic shooting continued. Abyei remained tense as a result. Aid workers in Juba, the capital of Southern Sudan, said Abyei town was largely deserted after an estimated 25,000 people fled. More people were leaving. The clashes started on 14 May, according to Edward Lino, the SPLM-appointed governor of the region that lies between North and South Sudan. Three people, he told the UN Radio Miraya, were killed. UN spokeswoman Michele Montas told reporters in New York that the UN Mission in Sudan had decided to pull out most of its civilian international and national staff because of the safety and security conditions in Abyei town. The mission was established to help implement the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that ended more than two decades of war between Southern and Northern Sudan. Despite the agreement, however, mutual suspicion has remained between the two entities. Stumbling block The oil-rich Abyei region has emerged as one of the stumbling blocks to the implementation of the CPA, according to analysts. Despite both sides signing the Abyei protocol, disagreements over its status have left the region with an administrative and political vacuum. SPLM leaders claim the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) has ignored its proposals over Abyei because of oil revenues - estimated at US$529 million in 2007. The government in Khartoum denies the claims. The Northern government has taken issue with the appointment of an administration for the disputed region by the SPLM, arguing that under the provisions of the CPA, it should have first approved the appointment. The SPLM, however, says it acted to ensure locals in the region received humanitarian assistance. Governor Lino’s job, it says, is to organise the people of Abyei politically and socially, coordinate the humanitarian work of the UN and NGOs and prepare the ground for full implementation of the Abyei protocol. On 15 May, Southern Sudanese President Salva Kiir Mayardit, speaking at the opening of the second national SPLM convention in Juba, said his government was working to resolve the Abyei questions. "The Abyei protocol is the only protocol of the CPA that is not implemented, in spite of the fact that it is one of the clearest components of the CPA and lack of its implementation will question the genuineness of ... our partner to put this problem behind us," he told more than 2,000 SPLM delegates. "The report of Abyei Boundaries Commission is not only final and binding but all independent legal opinions confirmed this simple and straightforward fact," he added. "Although we are still engaged with the National Congress Party to find amicable means of implementing the Abyei Protocol, we should not deprive the people of Abyei from enjoying the fruits of peace and that is why I appointed Comrade Edward Lino." Later that month, 70 people were killed in Al-Mayram township, following which the two sides traded accusations. Another 75 people were killed in violent skirmishes in December 2007 and January 2008. In March, clashes between the SPLA and Misseriya fighters again displaced hundreds of civilians from their homes and raised tension across Abyei. “This latest development in Abyei, whose complex problems represent one of the most difficult challenges facing the successful implementation of the [CPA] in Sudan, underscores the importance of fully implementing the Abyei protocol,” Ashraf Jehangir Qazi, special representative of the UN Secretary-General for Sudan, warned in a statement on 16 May. IRIN NEWS http://irinnews.org Dialogue With People's Tour Introspective/Did the President Got It Wrong ?Part Two Friday, May 16, 2008 This is part two of the introspective of the president’s dialogue with the people. This is looking at the president’s personal interventions rather than government interventions in addressing matters in governance. It reads: What I found difficult to understand is the issues of your personal intervention regarding prices of basic commodities (RICE) and your gifts that amounts to 100th of thousands of dalais. Rice which is the basic food commodity the price of which rocketed from D150 in 1994 to D800 this year and the failure of your government to address it is a course for concern. Your government seems to run out of solutions to the skyrocketing prices of Rice, all you have as a solution is asking people to go back to the land. Yes a clarion call but it take more to get people back to the land d, than a mere call. One has to make agriculture attractive. Farmers should have guaranteed that their products will be marketed and not to be given promise notes in place of payments. If your government takes good stocks, you will realized that our farmers are really frustrated by the lack of market for their farms produce for many years now–cash crops has to go hand in hand with subsistence crops. When you cross from Barra May 5th 2008, you were confronted by the women farmers who told you that they did answer your call to go back to the land but could have a market for their crops/ produce. Your response was that you personally will buy all their produce that is good but how sustainable is that? You are an individual; will you guarantee that you will keep on buying such produce? Once done for a particular group others will follow. Because you are the president of all. One would have thought your government would have put in place a sound government policy to address such a problem rather than personal intervention, like the one you offer. Does it mean that your government has run sort of solutions? No it is a good news that you are now in charge of Agriculture and that you vow not to give it to anyone again as all the previous agriculture minister have failed to deliver………. If department of state for education cannot address the issues of transportation for students one has to ask what went wrong. If Department of state for Agriculture cannot bring any solution to food production or the marketing of farmers produce then there is a problem. In the recent days we have seen you personally donates buses to schools not one, two, or three but to more. We have seen you offer bags of rice, cash, Hajj tickets –the question is where are all these monies coming from? The people need explanation since you hold a public office. You have little privacy –Mr. President you owe Gambian an explanation. With such it gives you more credit now and after. I would suggest that a think Tank be in place immediately you finish the tour to find solutions to the numerous concerns raised by the people during your tour. This TT could also be charge with provision of policies to address identified problems. Web master none The Gambia UPDATE: Book on Deyda Hydara launched in Gambia Friday, May 16, 2008 The struggle which culminated in the murder of Deyda Hydara, an ardent critic of the regime of President Yahya Jammeh, three years ago, has been given meaning with the launch of his biography in The Gambia. The book which was launched on May 3, 2008, World Press Freedom Day, was according to the authors to keep the values of Hydara alive. Hydara was murdered in December, 2004 by unknown assailants, and the government has still failed to investigate his death. Sierra Leone ALERT: Newspaper risks legal action for defaming President Friday, May 16, 2008 The Press Secretary to State House, Sheka Tarawally, on May 6, 2008, threatened New Vision, an independent Freetown-based newspaper, with legal action if the paper failed to retract three articles it published accusing President Ernest Bai Koroma of being wasteful. Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA)'s correspondent reported that Tarawally lodged a formal complaint to the Independent Media Commission (IMC), Sierra Leone's media regulatory body, calling on it to urge New Vision to retract the articles within three days or face legal action. The first article, published on May 2 accused President Koroma of spending US$102m on unnecessary travelling. On May 5 and 6 the newspaper again published articles repeating the allegations and stating that New Vision stood by the reports. In the complaint, the Press Secretary claimed that there had been no attempts by New Vision to cross check the information, and the story should therefore be regarded as "malicious and calculated to damage the image of the President". Tarawally also stated that "all the insinuations in the offending articles are false" and concluded that New Vision had violated sections of the 1965 Public Order Act. The IMC is a media regulatory body, which has no judicial powers, but provides a platform for negotiations between aggrieved persons and media houses to reduce using law courts to settle media related cases. MFWA regrets that such threats come at a time when the new government of Sierra Leone has expressed its intention to repeal sections of the obnoxious and archaic Public Order Act, which authorise jail terms of up to seven years for those who criticise government officials. Aid agencies in Chad condemn the killing of Pascal Marlinge, Save the Children UK Country Director Friday, May 16, 2008 ACTED, Air Serv, Care International, Catholic Relief Services, COOPI, Concern Worldwide, Christian Outreach Relief and Development, International Medical Corps, International Rescue Committee, Intersos, Jesuit Refugee Service, Oxfam International, Prodabo, Secadev, Solidarites, in Chad mourn the loss of Pascal Marlinge, the Country Director of Save the Children UK, who was killed on Thursday (May 1st) by bandits. Pascal was a leader in the humanitarian community in Chad; his tenacity, energy and dedication to the refugee and IDP populations in Chad was inspiring. His death is a tragedy. We send our heartfelt condolences to Pascal’s family and to Save the Children UK. As a result of the dramatic downturn in security, we were forced to suspend all of our non-lifesaving activities throughout eastern Chad for 48 hours. Citation for Alhaji Ebou Joof the 2008 GNOC Awardee in the Hall of FameFriday, May 16, 2008 Born in Bakau Sanchaba this awardee attended a) The Sports Leadership Course conducted by Olympic Solidarity itinerant administration school in 1989. b) The Olympic Solidarity FIFA Football Coaching Course in 1990. c) Commonwealth Youth Programme at the d) National Course Director’s Course in 1996 and was awarded a certificate of competence to conduct Olympic Solidarity Sports Administration Courses. e) Regional Administration high level Diploma course for “Instructors in As a Sportsman he played for his school team and was captain of the Bakau Zonal team at the age of 17 a position he held for 8 years for the Bakau Zonal team as a result he was nicknamed “Capi”. He joined Real de Banjul F.C. in 1968 one year after it was founded and won several accolades with them including the famous FA cup final in 1969 when Real beat White Phantoms by 2 goals to 1. This we the first match to be broadcast live on Radio He joined the Department of Youth and Sports in September 1984 as Assistant Sports Officer and rose through the ranks to become the Director of Youth and Sports in 2000. In 2006 he was appointed Deputy Permanent Secretary and acting Permanent Secretary in 2007. He retired from active service in 2008. This awardee is a real sportsman and administrator having been involved one way or the other in all aspects of Physical Education and Sports in this country. His vast experience in Sports coupled with the numerous Seminars, Conferences and Workshops he attended internationally and nationally made him a valuable asset to most institutions and anyone interested in Gambia Sports in general. He has a reputation for fair play hence his other nickname the “Gentleman of the field” Those who played with him will confirm that he was a true Sportsman. Ladies and Gentlemen this Gentleman of the field is no one other than Alhaji Ebou Joof who has been inducted in the Sports Hall of Fame. By Lamin Darboe Ken Jammeh; Let’s Leave Referees Alone Friday, May 16, 2008 Following his suspension from the first division league of the Gambia Football Association GFA, the former U20 team captain and Hawks player Ken Malamin Jammeh is back on the field of play. He has urged all players to leave referees alone. Ken made these remarks with the Pointsports in an interview, after he was given a presidential pardon by the Gambia Football Association after a long spell of suspension. The suspension followed his violent and excessively brutal attack on the central referee Mawdo Jallow during their game with Armed Forces FC played at the Sere Kunda East Mini Stadium. The press release from the GFA states, “following a presidential directive, I am to inform you of the nullification of the indefinite suspension of Mr. Ken Malamin Jammeh of your club for his violent and excessive brutal attack on the central referee Mawdo Jallow during your first round league match against Armed Forces played at the Sere kunda East Mini Community field. Mr. Ken Malamin Jammeh is now free to take part in all the future matches of your club”. “You are forewarned to be in your best behavior at all times and to refrain from such a violent and an unsporting behavior,” the press release concluded. Speaking to Pointsports the Head Coach of Hawks FC Sang Dong said, I am very pleased and satisfied with the decision and it is a good lesson for each and every player to learn from. The whole team welcome him back, he is always in training even when he was suspended he always came for training,” he stated. In his reaction Ken Jammeh said that he is very happy that he was forgiven to come back to play and is “ assuring all Gambians that what happened will not happen again. I am appealing to every player to leave the referees alone’. He then thanked all those who were behind him during this sad memory and promised them that this will not happen again that he has learned a big lesson from this. Ken also sent a special thanks to his fans and the coaches after the comments they made to see him back onto the field of play. Meanwhile in another development 5 Gambians are suspended for the next two games due to their scuffle with the Algerian players during the CAF qualifiers for the CAN 2008. The players are Ousman Jallow, Lamin Conateh, Abdoulie Corr Assan Jatta and Habib Kunta who is suspended for slapping an opponent during the Gambia/ Mauritania match played in Nouakchott. The players will miss The Gambia’s games against Liberia and Senegal on June 1st and June 6th 2008. By Ebou Manneh Picture: Ken Jammeh GFA First Division League Week 14 FixturesFriday, May 16, 2008 Fri 16/05/08 Gamtel Vs A/Forces 4;30pm Sk/ East Fri 16/05/08 Hawks Vs B/ United 4;30pm Sk/ West Sat 17/05/08 GPA Vs Interior 4;30pm Sk/ East Sat 17/05/08 Sea View Vs Wallidan 4;30pm Sk/ West Sun 18/05/08 Real Vs S/Biko 4;30pm Sk/ West Sun 18/05/08 Samger Vs Africell Saitmatty 4;30pm Sk/ East |
| Site created with .geographical media. |  |