A truck emerged from the tracks in bushes and then dropped about 30 passengers at Kambi Garba near Isiolo town. Immediately after they disembarked, two taxis pulled up and immediately some of the passengers entered before the cars zoomed towards Isiolo Town.
The taxis later returned to pick the rest of the passengers. They took them to a lodging in town. At the lodging they met members of a cartel promising to arrange their travel to South Africa.
On the same day, more than 60 people were dropped by a truck and two new Land cruisers at Archers Post, Samburu East District.
Lucrative trade
Unfortunately, 14 of them were arrested while the rest managed to travel to Isiolo.
This is part of a lucrative human trafficking and smuggling business that has taken root along the Kenya-Ethiopia border. It involves desperate Ethiopians out to join their relatives who are refugees in Western Europe and North America or those looking for greener pastures in South Africa and Namibia.
In the first case, the truck driver, who managed to pass through more than 10 police barriers in Moyale, Marsabit and Samburu drops his human cargo at Kambi Garba, about 5km from the Isiolo town centre, to avoid the police barrier that is less than 3km ahead.
They avoid the police in Isiolo mainly for three reasons; because there is a feeling police here are more vigilant, their bribery charges are higher or the fear that the illegal activity has been leaked to the authorities.
In the second incident, the truck driver who brought his passengers from various illegal entries along the border avoids the Isiolo-Moyale highway at Turbi in North Horr and instead use cattle tracks to Merti in Isiolo District.
Many of those trafficked are women and children, who believe the cartel means well for them.
But things do not often work out.
The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) says many find themselves as slaves when they reach their destinations.
Kenya has been identified as a source, destination and a transit point for trafficked persons, a new form of modern slavery.
While admitting the existence of the trafficking cartels, Eastern Provincial Police Officer Marcus Ochola told CCI that they are so sophisticated that they use routes that are only known to locals.
Little attention
“The cartels use their knowledge of local language and terrain to bring in the Ethiopians. Every day they use a new route. We are shocked that the Ethiopians are now using Merti road to avoid the police barriers along the Isiolo-Moyale highway,’’ noted Ochola.
The police chief noted that while the Government was focusing on the Somalia-Kenya border, that of Kenya-Ethiopia had been given little attention thereby increasing the number of aliens getting into Kenya through the unmanned porous border.
Ochola said the police and immigration officers were on high alert, but admitted that they lack enough personnel and resources like vehicles to properly cover the vast, porous and remote borderline.
He said the cartel had outsmarted his officers due to their knowledge of local terrain and language adding that the brokers use different routes that are not designated as
roads.
“They (cartel) are now using the Merti road taking advantage of the unusual heavy traffic resulting from the oil exploration in the division. We are now looking at all the possible routes,’’ said the PPO.
CCI learnt that the vehicles ferrying the immigrants use the Merti-Lososia-Archers Post route and drop the Ethiopians at night at the junction of the Isiolo-Moyale highway and Archers Post-Merti road. Taxi drivers later pick them in groups and take them to hotels in Isiolo town.
They use illegal entries in Moyale, Wajir, North Horr and Turkana to enter Kenya before travelling to Nairobi and thereafter to their preferred destinations abroad.
On the Kenyan side, a trafficking cartel operates from Moyale but has branches in Marsabit and Isiolo to assist the Ethiopians to get to their destinations through Kenya.
Our month-long investigation revealed that an average of 100 Ethiopians get to Isiolo daily. An average of 30 of them are arrested by police and charged with being in Kenya illegally while the rest find their way to Nairobi.
Our findings, also confirmed by both the police and the Immigration Department in Moyale, show that most of the aliens enter through illegal border entries in Moyale’s Central and Sololo divisions, Forolle in North Horr and at entries bordering Moyale and Wajir districts through the assistance of the cartels.
The Ethiopians also use illegal entry points at the Kenya-Ethiopia and Kenya-Sudan-Ethiopia border at Lokichoggio (Turkana) and Illeret (North Horr).
>From Lokichoggio, they board matatus to Nairobi while from Illeret, they use the Loyangalani-Baragoi-Maralal-Nyahururu route to get to Nairobi.
Sources said agents in Ethiopia connect those who can afford the trip with their counterparts in Kenya.
Those involved in the illegal trade speak Borana, Amharic and other Oromo languages while most of the victims hail from centres in southern Ethiopia.
To win their trust, the cartels assure the strangers of safely reaching Nairobi.
A source intimated that each person pays the agents an average of Sh50,000 for the journey between Moyale and Isiolo.
According to a member of the cartel operating in Isiolo who has since fallen out with his colleagues, Sh25,000 is meant for transport, Sh10,000 for the agents and Sh15,000 is to be used to bribe the police and the provincial administration officers along the route.
The trip is in two phases. The first phase is between Moyale and Isiolo and it is considered the most dangerous due to the high possibility of arrest by immigration
officials and police. The other phase is between Isiolo and Nairobi and is less risky.
After paying the required amount, the cartels load the Ethiopians on trucks bound for Nairobi.
But due to difficulties experienced at police barriers, the smugglers have come up with special vehicles to ferry the aliens up to Isiolo or Archers Post in Samburu East District.
Moyale border point deputy immigration officer Guyo Duba confirmed the work of the human traffickers saying they use illegal entries along the porous border to bring in the Ethiopians.
Duba said Ethiopians, mostly traders with valid travel documents, pass through the legal border point in Moyale town while the aliens with no papers seek the help of smugglers.
No resources
“Moyale border point was among the best manned last year. Only Ethiopians with valid passport pass through here but out there, we have problem with cartels aiding aliens to use illegal entries to get into Kenya,’’ said the officer.
Many victims of human trafficking believe those transporting them mean well for them. ‘I wanted to travel to Nairobi and thereafter see the possibility of travelling to America to join my big brother. I was connected to the Kenyan traffickers in Moyale by a friend in Ethiopia,’’ said a convicted Ethiopian alien who only gave his name as Haile. He said he hails from Dirre in southern Ethiopia.
He is now serving a three-month sentence at Isiolo GK Prison and faces repatriation afterwards.
Other victims interviewed said they had given all their money to the brokers. They lamented the agents had failed to protect them from the police adding that they were asked to bribe the police if they wanted to proceed with their journey.
“I gave out Sh50,000 to the agent in Moyale. I was told part of the money was to be given to the police but on arrival here (Isiolo) I was arrested along with my brothers. My agents were nowhere to protect us,’’ lamented Haile speaking in Amharic.
Duba lamented that his department lacks resources like vehicles to monitor the border. He said they often rely on police who sometimes work with the cartels to frustrate their efforts.
He, however, noted that most of the arrests are done on the strength of information forwarded to the police by immigration officers. He said they are working with the police to end the illegal trade.
Kenya Navy and Police Arrest 11 Suspected Somali Pirates
Monday, March 22, 2010 4:02
% of readers think this story is Fact. Add your two cents.
SOMALIA – (ecop-marine) Eleven armed Somalis were nabbed by Kenyan security forces after they had allegedly taken by force fuel from a Kenyan fishing vessel on Sunday near Kiunga north of Lamu, just south of the Somali-Kenyan border.
What they didn’t realize was that one of the Kenyans sent an SMS message to the naval post at Kiunga, which triggered an alarm response.
Kenyan security forces then arrested the alleged Somali pirates reportedly in Kenyan waters, though the marine boundary between Kenya and Somalia is disputed. No exact positon was provided.
“Yes, police have arrested the 11 suspects, believed to be pirates in Kiunga area. They are in custody,” Provincial Criminal Investigation Officer (PCIO) Nyagah Reche told Reuters, whose report added: Police sources said the suspects ran out of fuel at sea, hijacked a fishing boat and ordered the crew to sail to Somalia. But one of the crew made a telephone call which led to the intervention of Kenyan security forces based in Lamu. One source of Reuters said the suspects ditched their weapons and skiffs when they realised the police were nearby, while local sources said that the incident was actually a dispute between Somali and Kenyan fishermen, which usually co-operate across the border.
So far, all the over 135 Somalis in Kenyan detention and accused of piracy have all been captured by foreign navies patrolling the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden and pressure has been mounting on the Kenyans to show results for the massive financial and institutional support, which includes equipment and vessels, they received from abroad for counterpiracy measures.
Several times Kenyan security forces have been accused of shielding or letting terror suspects escape, which usually then triggers atrocities against minor offenders or innocents in show-actions by the security apparatus.
The eleven arrested are at present in custody at a naval post on Sheila, an island near Lamu, and “Transport arrangements are being made to bring them to Mombasa from Lamu, so that they answer to several charges which are being prepared as investigations continue,” said Reche.
LATEST NEWS:
MV LEILA: INHUMAN DEADLOCK IN SOMALILAND by Venatrix Fulmen (ECOP-marine)
Five crew still held like hostages in north-western Somalia, while
A FALSE MEDIA REPORT says Lankan Captain and two others released: FM
We don’t care about mercy, we just want the money:
Exclusive interview with yacht couple’s pirate captors by and
Rachel Chandler and her husband are as far from salvation as ever
The text said British hostage Rachel Chandler had been shot. But here, in a chilling interview, her pirate captors reveal she and her husband are still alive… but as far from salvation as ever.
Rachel Chandler shot. Please call urgently … That was the dramatic and brutally short text-message sent to us by our Somali contact last weekend.
And like every such missive about the British couple held by pirates in the Horn of Africa, it demanded to be checked.
The Daily Mail has the mobile-phone number for the gang’s spokesman, a lugubrious sounding character who calls himself Ali Gedow, and we immediately tried to call it.
But separating fact from fiction in this intractable saga is never easy. For one thing, ‘Ali’ rarely deigns to answer unsolicited calls, and when he does his heavily accented English is rendered incomprehensible by whisky and khat, the pirates’ drug of choice.
For another, one never knows whether to believe his rambling pronouncements, for the pirates have become as adept as Alastair Campbell at manipulating the media, to increase the pressure on those negotiating to free their hapless captives.
And so it was now. After reportedly confirming to a Somali radio station that 56-year-old Mrs Chandler had indeed received gunshot wounds in some unspecified incident, by the time we got through to him last Monday, pirate Ali had changed his story.
‘No, it is a mistake - another girl was shot, not Rachel Chandler,’ he told the Mail during our longest and most lucid interview since the Kent economist and her husband, Paul, were kidnapped while yachting in the Indian Ocean.
‘Two of our pirates had an argument, and one fired his gun, hitting a Somali girl who was with Rachel in the leg. Rachel was close by at the time but she was not injured. She is quite OK.’
In a bizarre aside, he added that the pirates have given Mrs Chandler a gun with which to ‘protect herself’ from renegade guards.
Why would they risk this when she could use the weapon to shoot her way to freedom? ‘She will never do this,’ he replied with a hollow laugh. ‘There are 100 of us and she is alone in the desert. She knows she would be killed.’
For good measure, Ali added that Mrs Chandler - who has appeared dangerously thin and close to breaking point on video appeals sanctioned by the pirates - is now much improved in health and spirits.
Her 60-year-old husband, who seems to be bearing up better than his wife, was also faring well, he claimed.
‘We have given them books and a radio. They stay in a comfortable tent and they eat pirate food with us; sometimes we even drive them around to show them the scenery,’ he said, making it sound as though they were on an extended holiday.
‘If they get sick we give them herbal medicines made from leaves. They are not together any longer. We’re keeping them a few miles apart. But they are relaxing with our people.’
Quite what we should make of all this - given that the pirates have previously admitted to beating the couple, and Mrs Chandler has told how one guard came close to sexually assaulting her - is anyone’s guess.
However, tomorrow will mark the 150th day since these middle-class adventurers from Tunbridge Wells were taken hostage during what should have been an idyllic cruise.
And despite the rash assertion of a senior Somali politician earlier this month that the Chandlers would be released within ten days (a deadline which passed a week ago) the Mail has learned that, in reality, efforts to free them are hopelessly deadlocked.
Indeed, according to well-placed sources, little progress has been made since October 23, when, after sending out a last anguished message apparently meant for Mr Chandler’s sister - ‘PLEASE RING SARAH!’ - they were abducted at gunpoint.
Their white 38ft yacht, Lynn Rival, which they bought in the mid-Nineties and sailed in exotic locations for six months of the year, recording their progress on a widely read blog, has long since been returned to Britain.
Stripped and trashed by the pirates, it was recovered by the Royal Fleet Auxiliary vessel Wave Knight, whose commander has been criticised for failing to act as the pirates sailed off with their quarry.
It is being preserved as a ‘crime scene’ for use in a future trial, if ever the kidnap gang, who could be prosecuted in a British court, is brought to justice.
But how to repatriate the yacht’s owners is an all together thornier issue.
If the Chandlers had been crewing for some big shipping company, they would almost certainly have been released months ago.
For so many tankers, cargo ships and trawlers are being hijacked - 47 were taken last year alone - that the negotiations follow a well-rehearsed formula.
Since losses accrued through acts of piracy are invariably covered by insurance, and can amount to £50,000 for every day a vessel is impounded, it makes business sense to pay the ransom as soon as possible.
Unpalatable and morally questionable as this may sound, it remains the reality, even though average demands have escalated alarmingly in recent months.
In January, the owners of one Greek-flagged oil-tanker reportedly paid a record £4.6million to release the ship, laden with two million barrels of oil, plus 28 crew members.
As usual, the cash was simply withdrawn from a bank, secured in a waterproof container and dropped by parachute on to the deck of the pirates’ ship at a pre-arranged time. Once counted, the tanker was permitted to sail on its way.
On average, it takes 70 days for this process to be completed, according to one London-based maritime lawyer who acts in these matters; less than half as long as the Chandlers have been held.
But their plight is very different. An ordinary, semi-retired couple, they and their relatives are by no means wealthy, and have no way of paying the exorbitant sum demanded.
During the five months they have been held, this has varied seemingly at whim.
This week, spokesman Ali was talking in terms of £1.3 million to £2.6 million, although he added that the Chandlers could also be freed in exchange for the release of seven ‘ brother’ pirates awaiting trial in Kenya.
Arrested by an EU naval patrol boat as they attacked a French trawler some 50 miles from the Lynn Rival on the day the Chandlers were captured, these seven pirates may have been part of the same gang, although there is no confirmed link.
At all events, with more than 100 pirates languishing in their jails, there is no chance of the Kenyan authorities complying with this demand. Nor will the British government negotiate with the pirates, as they have repeatedly made plain.
Therefore, the unenviable task of trying to make the pirates see reason has fallen to Mrs Chandler’s brother, Stephen Collett, a retired farmer from East Anglia.
Understandably, he declines to utter a word about this parlous task.
However, according to a source close to the family, the pirates phone him frequently and at all hours. So he is constantly on red alert for the latest call from Somalia, and under enormous stress.
‘It seems we have reached an impasse,’ says the source. ‘The pirates don’t seem to understand that the Chandlers are not from a rich family. Even if they can raise some modest amount of money there’s still a huge gap in the middle.
‘The family are very frightened, naturally. Their only consolation is that, so far, the pirates have never harmed one of their hostages. Sadly, though, it seems Paul and Rachel might be in for a very long stay.’
Listening to Ali this week, his grim prognosis seemed well justified, for the pirates’ spokesman seemed lost in the realms of fantasy.
When the Mail explained the Chandlers’ financial position and ventured that his gang - who regard themselves as a latter-day version of Robin Hood and his merry men - might enhance their image by releasing the couple as an act of mercy, he laughed incredulously.
‘We don’t need a good name,’ he said. ‘Money is better than a good name. We don’t care if Paul and Rachel are nice people. This is just about money.
‘We don’t believe they [presumably he meant the Chandlers' relatives] can’t find the money. They are from Britain. Everyone there has £2million or £3million.
‘We need that much just to cover our expenses. We have to keep 150 men and we have to buy weapons, boats, engines. We have to buy big houses and 4x4s.’
He laughed again and added: ‘And each one of us has to keep four wives.’
The notion that the pirates need a seven-figure sum to recoup their outlay is preposterous. Nor is the ransom shared out among the gang and impoverished Somali villagers, as the pirates would like us to believe.
In truth, as we have discovered during a lengthy investigation into the burgeoning piracy industry, most of the estimated £80 million so far paid in ransom money has been stashed away by a few hugely wealthy pirate barons.
Meanwhile, their henchmen, who sail up to 1,500 miles from the Somali coast in tiny skiffs to seek out vessels sailing outside EU patrolled shipping lanes, are paid a few hundred dollars.
For this pittance, they are forced to remain at sea for up to a month at a time and risk being shot, drowned, arrested, or starving to death when their fuel and food supplies run out miles from shore.
Yet they dare not return without capturing a ship, for their ruthless bosses do not take kindly to seeing their resources wasted on a fruitless mission.
It is a measure of the pirates’ increasing desperation that, in a farcical episode three days ago, one raiding party even attempted to storm a Dutch warship in the EU’s anti-piracy fleet.
Realising their mistake too late, the ten pirates were caught as they tried to flee.
Yet incredibly, the EU patrol ship let them go, even though two empty AK-47 shell- casings were found in their skiff and a rocketpropelled grenade-launcher, which had clearly been thrown overboard, was floating behind them.
It was decided that this would be insufficient evidence to bring a successful prosecution - a view which illustrates why it is proving so difficult to scupper the pirates once and for all.
It will doubtless be just as tricky to convict the ‘brother’ pirates whose release is being demanded by Ali, and who may have been running with the gang who kidnapped the Chandlers last October.
Now languishing in Mombasa’s forbidding Shimo la Tewa maximum-security prison, and facing 20 years in prison - if ever the wheels of Kenyan justice begin to turn - they are a ragged bunch, all young and poor, and unable to speak anything but Somali.
Interviewed by the Mail this week, their lawyer, Dickson Oruku Nyawinda, betrayed the ambiguity of their position.
In one breath, he insisted they had been fishing when they were caught (despite the fact they were miles out at sea and the prosecution claim they had no nets). In the next, he trotted out the pirates’ well-rehearsed line in self-justification.
This is broadly that, for years, ‘their’ coastal waters have been plundered by foreign fishing vessels and used as a dumping ground for industrial waste - and it’s payback time.
Exactly how this entitles them and their brethren to maraud in an area of ocean bigger than continental Europe, and frogmarch a pair of middle-aged pleasure-cruisers away to months of terror, the lawyer did not explain.
Yet when he portrayed his clients as mere ‘foot soldiers’ alongside the ‘real pirates’ who recline beyond reach in their luxurious guarded compounds, there was no denying he had a point.
In the pirates’ stronghold, Harardheere, once an impoverished farming village, the air is that of a gold-rush town.
The potholed streets are jammed with huge, chromed four-wheel-drives, the shops are filled with imported luxury goods, and prostitutes from all parts of East Africa hustle for trade in the thronging bars.
A few months ago, the pirates even set up their own stock exchange there.
Anyone can buy shares in one of the 72 ‘maritime companies’ that profit from piracy - either by paying cash or donating useful equipment, such as weaponry or a rope-ladder. In return for their investment, they are paid a cut of the ransom money.
Meanwhile, in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi, middlemen launder the pirate barons’ ill-gotten fortunes by snapping up desirable mansions and investing in legitimate businesses, such as textiles.
One shady broker calling himself ‘Willy’, who was accompanied by an armed bodyguard when he met us this week, said he had arranged so many property deals for the pirates that they had sparked a boom in the market.
Then there is the little-mentioned link between the pirates and al-Shabab, the fanatical Islamic militia who control much of southern Somalia and are fighting to take over the entire country.
Glancing around furtively as he spoke to us in the back of a parked car in Nairobi, a smartly dressed pirate named Mohamed admitted belonging to the hard-line group, which styles itself on the Taliban and has enforced Sharia law in swathes of Somalia.
The spoils of piracy were a vital source of al-Shabab’s funding, he said, describing how he had taken part in five or six lucrative ship hijackings that helped to buy weapons for the bloody insurgency that is tearing Somalia apart.
This, then, is the tortuous and unfathomable netherworld into which the Chandlers drifted 150 days ago on the yacht that had brought them so much joy.
In the coming days and weeks, we can be sure there will be more melodramatic newsflashes from the pirates’ spokesman, Ali.
But whatever the truth behind the Somali spin-doctor’s cynical pronouncements, one thing is certain: it will take every ounce of Stephen Collett’s persuasive skills to bring his loved ones home.
N.B.: PROBLEM WITH ALL THESE ARTICLES, which immediately are taken for granted and reproduced by others, is only that the media talk to a phony “spokesperson”, who himself has been already discredited by those who actually are holding the Chandlers – a problem which is not new and the days should be remembered when outspoken and clever “Sugule Ali”, gave interviews concerning seized weapons transporter MV FAINA to the world media, while none of them knew or wanted to know that the first “Sugule Ali” was just a shopkeeper in Galkayo. Later “Sugule Ali” found even 3 other copycats of himself pulling similar stunts using that name. That confusing demands and news are thereby spread hasn’t improved the situation of the hostages in a single case, even if certain media now pay for “interviews”, though it does help to make the Chandlers not being forgotten – like still missing Murray Watson, also a Brit, who was ambushed in April 2008 in Southern Somalia together with his Kenyan counterpart and is off the media radar. Only he himself could say if that is good or not, but any contact seems to have been lost.
Pirate on Chandlers: ‘No freedom, but we’ve given her a gun’ (SailWorld)
In new interview with the Somali pirate gang who are holding kidnapped cruising sailors Paul and Rachel Chandler for ransom, their spokesman Ali Gedow has told Britain’s Daily Mail ‘We don’t care about mercy, we just want the money.’ This came after hopes had been raised that the Chandlers would be freed ‘within a fortnight’.
After unsubstantiated rumours circulated that Rachel Chandler had been shot, Gedow also confirmed that it was not Mrs Chandler but a Somali girl standing next to her who had been shot by a stray bullet when two pirates had a gunfight.
According to Ali Gedow’s latest story the Chandlers are in quite good health, that Mrs Chandler had been given a gun to protect herself against renegade guards. Weren’t they worried about her escaping with the help of a gun? No, the pirate told the Daily Mail. ‘There are 100 of us and she is alone in the desert. She knows she would be killed.’
The couple, who were kidnapped 150 days ago while they tried to sail from the Seychelles to Tanzania, are still being kept apart to guard against any rescue attempt.
However, he insisted they were living comfortably. ‘We have given them books and a radio. They stay in a comfortable tent and they eat pirate food with us; sometimes we even drive them around to show them the scenery,’ he told the Daily Mail.’If they get sick we give them herbal medicines made from leaves. They are not together any longer. We’re keeping them a few miles apart. But they are relaxing with our people.’
In the meantime their yacht, the Lynn Rival, which was transported back to Britain by the British ship the Wave Knight, who watched the couple’s kidnap helplessly, is being kept as evidence for any future trial that may take place.
In the latest interview Ali Gedow also talked about a reduced ransom – £1.3 million to £2.6 million – but mentioned that the Chandlers could be freed in exchange for the release of seven ‘ brother’ pirates awaiting trial in Kenya. However there is no chance of the Kenyan authorities complying with this demand. Nor will the British government negotiate with the pirates, as they have repeatedly made plain.
When reminded that the Chandlers were poor and their relatives could not raise anything like the requested ransom, Gedow replied,’We don’t believe they can’t find the money. They are from Britain. Everyone there has £2million or £3million.’
—- news from sea-jackings, abductions, newly attacked ships as well as seafarers and vessels in distress —-
FREED NORTH-KOREAN VESSEL ARRIVES IN MOMBASA (sap/ecoterra)
Singaporean-operated chemical tanker MT THERESA VIII arrived in Mombasa / Kenya at around 09h00 on Saturday and is now anchored at “O” anchorage, the East African Seafarers Programme confirmed.
Security officials are expected to visit the crew members in the next 24h for a debriefing and further investigations.
The 22,294 dwt tanker has a crew of now only 28 North Koreans, since the captain of the tanker was reported died from gunshot wounds sustained during the hijack.
The remains of the deceased master of the vessel is expected to be flown to North Korea as soon as the vessel docks at berth number 9 or number 10 to discharge its palm oil cargo.
The chemical tanker was hijacked on Nov 16th 2009 in the southern Somali Basin , north-west of the Seychelles while under way to Mombasa.
The vessel was then commandeered first to Garacad but thereafter returned to Harardheere, both at the Indian Ocean coast of central Somalia.
SAUDI TANKER NEGOTIATIONS IN BRITISH SLOW MOTION
The 13 Sri Lankan crew members on-board the seized Saudi Arabian vessel, ‘MV Al Nisr Al Saudi’ have still not been released, according to reports. The Foreign Minister at a media briefing said that the Sri Lankan Consulate in Jeddah was also informed that the shipping company had established contacts with the pirates through satellite communication and the pirates have assured the shipping company that they would not harm the Sri Lankan crew members. In addition, the Captain of the vessel had also spoken with the Company officials and had informed that all the crew members were on board the vessel. Reportedly, they had all the required facilities and were in good health.
At present, the company is awaiting the arrival of a professional negotiating team from UK to start negotiations with the Somali pirates over the demanded ransom of 20 Million US dollars, the Sri Lankan newspaper The Daily Mirror reports.
~ * ~
With the latest captures and releases now still at least 11 seized foreign vessels (13 sea-related hostage cases since yacht SY LYNN RIVAL was abandoned and taken by the British Navy) with a total of not less than 136 crew members (incl. the British sailing couple) plus at least 9 crew of the lorries held for an exchange with imprisoned pirates, are accounted for. The cases are monitored on our actual case-list, while several other cases of ships, which were observed off the coast of Somalia and have been reported or had reportedly disappeared without trace or information, are still being followed too. Over 134 incidences (including attempted attacks, averted attacks and successful sea-jackings) had been recorded for 2008 with 49 fully documented, factual sea-jacking cases for Somalia and the mistaken sinking of one sea-jacked fishing vessel and killing of her crew by the Indian naval force. For 2009 the account closed with 228 incidences (incl. averted or abandoned attacks) with 68 vessels seized for different reasons on the Somali/Yemeni captor side as well as at least TWELVE wrongful attacks (incl. one friendly fire incident) on the side of the naval forces.
For 2010 the recorded account stands at 29 attacks resulting in 9 sea-jackings.
The naval alliances had since August 2008 and until January 2010 apprehended 666 suspected pirates, detained and kept or transferred for prosecution 367, killed 47 and wounded 22 Somalis. (New independent update see: http://bruxelles2.over-blog.com/pages/_Bilan_antipiraterie_Atalanta_CTF_Otan_Russie_Exclusif-1169128.html).
Not fully documented cases of absconded vessels are not listed in the sea-jack count until clarification. Several other vessels with unclear fate (although not in the actual count), who were reported missing over the last ten years in this area, are still kept on our watch-list, though in some cases it is presumed that they sunk due to bad weather or being unfit to sail – like the S/Y Serenity, MV Indian Ocean Explorer.Present multi-factorial risk assessment code: GoA: ORANGE / IO: RED (Red = Very much likely, high season; Orange = Reduced risk, but very likely, Yellow = significantly reduced risk, but still likely, Blue = possible, Green = unlikely). Piracy incidents usually degrade during the monsoon season and rise gradually by the end of the monsoon. Starting from mid February until early April every year an increase in piracy cases can be expected.
If you have any additional information concerning the cases, please send to office[at]ecoterra-international.org – if required we guarantee 100% confidentiality.
For further details and regional information see the Somali Marine and Coastal Monitor at www.australia.to and the map of the PIRACY COASTS OF SOMALIA.
—————- directly piracy, abduction, mariner or naval upsurge related reports ——————–
Somali piracy – A grave concern for all nations (EconomicTimes/IndiaTimes)
The resurgence of piracy on the high seas, which was once a historic occurrence, has now become a routine feature, off the coast of East Africa, with hijackings being reported almost daily.
Statistics reveal that the attacks in 2009 increased by an astounding 96% (over 2008). They constitute more than half (53%) of global incidents; in tune with this, the value of ransoms paid have gone up.
For many Somalis, piracy has become ‘a line of business’ to earn big money. That is the reason why piracy has taken such a hold in the country : It’s the only multimillion-dollar industry there, and the one that actually works and pays for itself. The increased hijacking of vessels, off the Horn of Africa, reflects the world’s neglect of Somalia’s internal conflicts.
Today, Somalia is on the front pages of the International media for all the wrong reasons. This world attention comes after a long period of neglect – of persistent internecine warfare – a humanitarian crisis, that the world had largely ignored, as it didn’t affect anybody else till now.
The involvement of Somalis in piracy is rooted in the circumstances of an internal conflict since the early 1990’s. There has been, for years, no authority to enforce and regulate Somalia’s fishing area along its coast – itself one of the most extensive, in the whole of Africa. The result has been, that local Somali fishing fleets had no protection or ‘rights’ over their country’s coastline and ‘international’ fleets have been able to misuse their waters and use up the country’s fishing-stock. The grievances over this issue led local Somalis to seek to extract ‘license-fees’ from the foreign fishermen.
The situation has now worsened, with large ransoms from these captures financing the increasingly lethal and sophisticated weapons, that have come into the hands of the pirates, with the result that they are now operating from large ‘mother-ships’, capable of striking out much further from the coast than before.
Somalia’s strategic position, at the Horn of Africa, means that pirates are able to assert their presence in a major way, brazenly conducting their hijacking operations in the shipping channels, in the process cutting into one of the important life-lines of world trade.
An estimated 20,000 cargo ships transit the Gulf of Aden every year, crossing the straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, the Red Sea and onwards to the Suez Canal – the shortest sea-link between Asia and Europe.
Because of the increased risks, insurance premiums are sky-rocketing. This cost will only multiply, if shipping companies have to re-route their vessels around the Cape of Good Hope, which prolongs the journey by twelve to fifteen days. As freight rates in the maritime transport business are already hitting the rock-bottom and profit margins are down, it is only a matter of time, before such sharp increases in transportation costs will send commodity prices across the world shooting-up, further increasing inflation.
The current global economic situation makes the political and economic concerns in the world understandable. Already, several warships in the Gulf of Aden are committed to defend their own cargo vessels / trying to foil pirate attacks.
The Indian Navy has followed-up and has been doing a commendable job. These naval ships are, however, hardly sufficient to conduct effective security operations, in an area that is even larger than the Mediterranean Sea.
At present, the attacks are being confronted with armed guards on board vessels. Such action, however, will, at best, manage to a limited extent – rather than solve the problem of piracy and its consequences for world trade. The root causes of the problem lie in Somalia itself.
In that country, 2.5 million people (a third of the population) are now on the verge of starvation and appro 1 million are internally displaced. A new policy towards Somalia’s crisis is needed. One of the requirements is developing an open mind to bring moderate factions into some sort of power-sharing arrangement in the government.
If the root of crisis are to be addressed, international community must find ways to play an active and constructive role in the situation, so as to bring lasting peace within. Somalia Piracy: The Worst Form of Introduction by M. J. Farah (*)
On Friday, October 23, 2009, President Obama and the governor of Massachusetts Deval Patrick appeared jointly at an event in Boston, MA. The event was meant to raise funds for Governor Patrick’s reelection bid in 2010. I was excited to attend. During lunch, I sat with some high-profile attorneys and other important people. As people were socializing and exchanging business cards, they could not get beyond my national identity as Somali. Of course, everyone seemed to have many questions about piracy activities in Somalia. Piracy activities are the worst public relations for Somalis who are living abroad.
While others were proudly boosting their accomplishments and describing their achievements to each other, I was busy explaining piracy to them. As my turn to introduce myself to the group approached, I had very little time showcasing my credentials, and more time discussing issues related to piracy.
A conversation began in the following manner, “Hello, how are you? My name is Cathy and you?” I said, “It is a pleasure to meet you, Cathy. My name is Mohamed” Cathy asked “Where are you from?” I answered “I am originally from Somalia, in east Africa. But, I have lived here most of my life.” Cathy said, “I have never understood the piracy issue; could you explain it to me?” Whereas others’ conversations went, “Hello, my name is Diane and you?” Another person replied, “Hello, good to meet you, Diane. My name is David” Diane asked “What do you do, David?” David answered “I recently graduated from Suffolk Law and I now work for Senator Kerry.”
Many important people were there to see the President as well as to network with one another. Likewise, I was not only there to see President Obama, but also to network with people. As people quizzed me on piracy issues, my initial plan to establish professional contacts went out of the window. It bothered me a bit, but I had to explain what I understood about the civil unrest in Somalia and its newly added piracy activities.
Upon reflection on this experience, I went back and tried to understand piracy issue in Somalia. Piracy is Somalia’s new addition to the list of nightmares resulting from the civil unrest of the last 20 years.
Imagine you are 19 years old, a male, born and reared in the coastal city of Eyl, Somalia. You only know violence as a means to accomplish something or to settle disputes. There are no police, no schools, and no visible authority all. Yet, you are in the process of discovering your own purpose in this life. Perhaps you want to establish a family of your own, and your family’s survival depends upon fishing from the coastline city of Eyl, northern Somalia. The coastline is threatened by foreign ships and you, along with other people in the town, are frustrated.
Many of the elders, in the ancient town of Eyl, are talking about how the illegal fishing in the coastline is hurting your families’ survival. There are shortages of fishery combined with various reports that European and Asian companies are dumping toxic waste, including nuclear waste, in the Somalia coastline. This is your reality.
In fact, a resident, who chose to remain anonymous, from Eyl told me that the ocean resembles another city at night because of the lights glowing from the numerous ships illegally fishing there.
Eyl locals showed signs of frustration over the illegal foreign companies depleting their marine resources. As a result, young Somalis started to entertain the idea of organizing themselves and found a meaningful purpose of serving their people by defending their coastal waters against illegal fishers. With the elders’ blessing, Somali piracy as we know it was born. It started with a decent purpose but not an organized one. Now, it has metastasized into public nightmares for Somalis as well as for the international community.
It is now out of control, as piracy activities have attracted international criminals and is largely driven by monetary interests. At this point, it can only be contained by an effective Somali government, which is not yet there.
I constantly have to explain piracy to people so much, that it even became part of opening remarks for a mini speech I made at a Suffolk University class run by Oiste called Initiative for Diversity in Civic Leadership. I told the audience that I am from Somalia, known as the land of piracy. Of course, this remark woke up the crowd with loud laughter. Since I am unable to quell or change the trajectory of the piracy activities in Somali, then I chose to have some fun with it. My experience at the Obama/Patrick event demonstrated that for Somali expatriates, piracy has been the worse way to introduce ourselves to the world. Despite this, I am optimistic that this piracy nightmare and the civil unrest in Somalia will soon be things of the past.
(*) M. J. Farah is an independent analyst, lecturer, writer, aspiring entrepreneur, and he currently resides in the Unites States.
CHINESE NAVY CLAPS FOR OWN BLUE WATER ADVENTURE
Hijackings of ships to increase by Xin Dingding (China Daily)
Chinese transport officials warn vessel crews to prepare for more pirate attacks
More pirate attacks in the Gulf of Aden and waters off Somalia is a possibility in the coming months, China’s water transport authority warned on Friday.
Liu Gongchen, safety supervisor of the Ministry of Transport, urged shipping companies to equip ocean-bound merchant vessels with self-defense devices to fend off possible piracy attacks.
He warned that piracy attacks are likely to rise in the Gulf of Aden and waters off Somalia from now to May.
Liu said with the summer monsoon approaching the Somali waters, conditions will be favorable for pirates from mid-March to May, adding that October to December is another period that witnesses active piracy for similar reasons.
According to statistics, Somali pirates hijacked 43 ships during the two periods last year, accounting for 74 percent of the total attacks.
As a great majority of China’s imported crude oil, iron ore and steel are shipped through the pirate-haunted Strait of Malacca and the waters off Somalia, the country is attaching greater attention to the anti-pirate mission.
Earlier this month, Chinese navy sent its fifth flotilla on escort duties in the Gulf of Aden and waters off Somalia.
Now the ministry, responsible for anti-pirate liaison, command and coordination, is making the anti-pirate mission its main priority, Liu said.
“We will issue warnings, train sailors, give shipping companies anti-pirate guidance and promote self-defense equipment on ships,” he said.
“But the kind of self-defense devices that can be carried by merchant ships and ways to manage them are still under study,” he said.
Cao Desheng, deputy director of the ministry’s water transport bureau, said the defense devices under discussion will not be lethal, as no firearms are allowed on board.
“Carriage of arms on merchant ships may encourage attackers to carry more dangerous weapons, thereby escalating the current situation,” he said.
“But the defense devices should be powerful enough to stop pirates from boarding the ship and as a better result, reach a stalemate for half an hour.”
Zhuo Li, deputy director of the general operation office of China Maritime Search and Rescue Center, said generally, the attacked ship that can reach an impasse with pirates for at least 20 minutes will have a better chance to be rescued by helicopters or warships patrolling the waters.
“Devices that produce strong sound waves or smoke could be a good way to achieve the purpose,” he said.
Currently, all merchant ships have emergency plans to handle pirate attacks. When a ship enters a hazardous area, sailors usually prepare water torches on the deck and observe the conditions of the waters round the clock, he said.
The bureau now requires shipping companies to strengthen anti-pirate drills, with at least one every three months, Cao said.
Xing Yucang, a director in charge of anti-pirate matters with the China Ocean Shipping Companies Group, told China Daily that they have come up with innovative ideas, such as pouring gasoline into empty beer bottles to make a “fire bomb” in case of an attack.
These devices require the use of existing materials on ships, and have proven effective during drills, he said.
According to the International Maritime Bureau, 1,782 piracy attacks were recorded worldwide from 2003 to 2008, 71 percent of which occurred in Africa and Southeast Asia.
The number increased by nearly 40 percent in 2009, with Somali pirates accounting for more than half of the 406 reported incidents.
Pirates have hijacked at least five ships from China, including two from Hong Kong and two from Taiwan in the past year. In addition, pirates attacked more than 10 other Chinese ships.
China’s fourth naval escort mission leaves Gulf of Aden (Xinhua)
China’s fourth Gulf of Aden mission left the Somali waters on Saturday local time after having successfully escorted more than 6,00 domestic and foreign vessels since the flotilla arrived in the region in November last year.
The fourth mission served as part of a multinational coalition of warships patrolling the pirate-infested waters.
China’s fifth Gulf of Aden mission took over the escort of merchant vessels through the troubled waters in a handover ceremony from the fourth mission on Wednesday.
The first Chinese fleet arrived in the Gulf of Aden in early 2009.
The Gulf of Aden, off the northern coast of Somalia, has the highest risk of piracy in the world. An estimated 25,000 ships annually cruise the channel south of Yemen, between the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea.
China warns of more pirate attacks in Gulf of Aden by K J M Verma (PTI)
China has warned of more pirate attacks in the Gulf of Aden and waters off Somalia in the coming months and asked the shipping companies to equip ocean-bound merchant vessels with self-defence devices to fend off possible piracy assaults.
Piracy attacks are likely to rise in the region from mid-March to May with the summer monsoon favourable for the pirates. October to December is another period where pirates are active for similar reasons, Safety supervisor of the Ministry of Transport Liu Gongchen said.
According to statistics, Somali pirates hijacked 43 ships during the two periods last year, accounting for 74 percent of the total attacks. Several Indian sailors operating on various international merchant vessels got caught in these attacks.
Canadian frigate like a floating city, but sailors miss comforts of home by Allison Cross (CanwestNewsService)
In the afternoons, the flight deck on the back of HMCS Fredericton transforms into a makeshift running track and rooftop patio.
In the afternoons, the flight deck on the back of HMCS Fredericton transforms into a makeshift running track and rooftop patio.
Some sailors run laps around the deck in the hot sun while others smoke cigarettes and watch the wake created by the Canadian warship.
There isn’t much to look at, other than clear skies, the odd tanker ship and an ocean that seems to have no end.
If seasickness is what ails a sailor, the flight deck is the place to go to get some relief.
The Halifax-based frigate has been away from Canada for five months on a counter-piracy and counter-terrorism mission in the waters surrounding Yemen and Somalia.
Built to house hundreds of sailors at sea, the Fredericton is like a self-contained, floating city, with exercise equipment, a pay office, first-aid supplies and a small canteen that sells chips and candy.
A handful of barbers are on hand to give male and, if they are so inclined, female sailors a closely cropped buzz cut.
There are also books, movie nights, music and video games to keep sailors entertained.
But despite all that, the experience of being away from home and the endless routine of a navy ship can start to wear on sailors’ morale.
Most are fixated with May 4 — the day they are set to arrive home in Halifax.
Petty Officer First Class Jerry Parsons, chief cook for the Fredericton, says he already knows what he wants to do first when he gets home.
“I miss my car,” he said. “I’m going to get in my car and drive to Tim Hortons.”
After that, Parsons, in the navy for 26 years, plans to visit his brother.
“It will be nice to get home. When you go away, it’s hard. When you get back you start all over again,” he said. “You can never go back to the things you left.”
Even after four deployments, Parsons said if he had to choose between being at sea or on land, he’d choose the big blue ocean.
“I just love to sail. I love the ocean,” he said. “I’ve got to see a lot of the world. I’ve never regretted a day yet. I love it.”
Master Cpl. Chris Denman looks forward to monthly video conferences with his wife and two children back in Halifax.
“It’s only five minutes, but it helps,” Denman said.
Parsons and Denman said they can remember when the only communication between those on ship and those on land was mail and a phone call from each port visit.
Sailors on the Fredericton can check their e-mail every day, unless the satellite connection isn’t working properly. They also receive about half an hour on the phone each week.
Weekends, as such, don’t exist while on ship, and the food being served at mealtimes is often the only way the sailors can determine the day of the week.
And, unless they work on the bridge or the flight deck, some sailors will go days without seeing the sun.
Below decks, the air gets stale and the fluorescent lighting starts to feel harsh.
Most sailors have developed their own routine, separate from their work, to keep themselves busy, and sane.
Immediately after dinner each night, a group of four officers plays a card game that never seems to end.
Some sailors huddle in their beds, watching movies on their laptops.
Able Seaman Allyson Boutin, who has a four-year-old son in Nova Scotia, takes time at night to exercise as much as she can.
At night, under the glow of the ship’s red lights, it’s not uncommon to find a sailor peddling furiously on a stationary bike, or running on a treadmill.
“I call home once a week and talk to him, and he sends me pictures and colours for me,” Boutin said. “It’s hard. But it makes all the time we spend together better.”
Able Seaman Mitch Stokes is counting down the days until the Fredericton stops in St. John’s, N.L., because that’s where his parents and his four-year-old daughter will be waiting to greet him.
Keeping busy is what keeps sailors from dwelling too much on what’s going on at home.
The Fredericton has a chaplain on board, who helps counsel sailors and gives them spiritual, and non-spiritual, advice.
Lt. (Navy) Jennifer Gosse also runs a weekly church service.
“I’ve had people come to me because they’re having inter-personal problems with people in their (bunks) or that they’re working with and they just want to vent to somebody,” she said. “I’m a safe place for that because chaplains are outside the chain of command.”
Ukraine: Pro-Western Navy Commander Dismissed
Ukraine president dismisses Navy commander (Itar-Tass)
Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich signed a decree dismissing Admiral Igor Tenyukh from the post of Navy commander, the presidential press service reported on Thursday.
The admiral has filed resignation recently explaining his decision by “moral and ethical reasons.” Tenyukh supported the policy of former president Viktor Yushchenko. Vice-Admiral Viktor Maksimov, who is currently the first deputy commander of the Ukrainian Navy, is considered as the main candidate for the vacant post.
President Viktor Yanukovich is currently on a visit in the Crimea, where he will probably announce about the appointment of a new Navy commander.
[N.B.: Meanwhile the recently announced assistance in cyber-warfare provided by NATO to the Ukraine has caused also the collopse of the website and e-mail of the Human Rights Ombudsman of the Ukrainian parliament - Human Rights Commissioner Nina Karpatchova is off the internet and http://ombudsman.kiev.ua/ is down and out like also several UN-related addresses hosted by that kiev server. ]
Russia Needs At Least 50 Nuclear Subs To Counter NATO States
Russia needs minimum 50 nuclear subs for fleet – Navy Vice Admiral (Russian Information Agency Novosti)
Moscow: The Russian Navy ideally needs to have at least 50 nuclear-powered submarines, a high-ranking Navy officer said during a live interview with Ekho Moskvy radio station on Saturday.
The Russian Navy has some 60 strategic, multi-functional and diesel-powered submarines in its fleet that are combat ready.
“The number of nuclear submarines in Russia’s Navy should be no less than 40-50,” First Deputy of the Naval General Staff Vice Admiral Oleg Burtsev said.
He said that France, Britain and the United States have at least nine combat ready nuclear subs at sea at all times.
“In order to counterbalance them, we need to have two or three nuclear-powered submarines. They need to know that we are prepared to respond to any strike,” Burtsev said.
In answering a call-in question of whether Russia is behind in developing its fleet in comparison with China, which builds two or three submarines a year, Burtsev said that Russia was not behind in development.
“Trial runs are taking place with the Yasen class subs, and this year the final trial stages of the Lada class submarine will be held.”
Indian Ocean Race
Seychelles ocean yacht regatta on for May b
The Seychelles Tourist Board has confirmed to this correspondent that their planned ocean yacht regatta will go ahead between May 22-30, 2010 and that several top-rated skippers will participate in this annual event. The regatta course will be mapped out within the inner islands and can be watched by spectators using either vantage points like beaches or some of the mountains on the various islands, chartering their own boats, or using one of the helicopter services available from Mahe.
Meanwhile, the ongoing, and often biased and wrong reporting about pirate activities in the Indian Ocean, does not seem to have deterred the Seychelles from going out and promoting cruise tourism. A small, albeit powerful, delegation will attend the Seatrade Cruiseship Convention in Miami between March 16-18, which is taking place in the wake of ITB where the Seychelles Tourist Board and the destination management companies, aka tour operators, will undoubtedly already have prepared the way when talking to the cruise lines also present in Berlin. The partly-negative publicity over piracy has impacted undoubtedly on cruise tourism in the Indian Ocean region, and Mombasa for instance, has seen its share from cruise tourism arrivals halved over the past one-and-a-half years, as has Dar es Salaam and Zanzibar.
However, the Seychelles are not giving up on this lucrative market just yet, and with ever-increasing naval patrols along the major shipping lines and an apparently shifting mood towards a more robust forward engagement of the pirates when leaving Somali waters, there is hope that the whole of the region can benefit once more from increased port calls by ocean liners presently deployed elsewhere over such fears.
The Seychelles delegation will be joined by their colleagues from La Reunion, with whom they maintain close contacts and share common objectives in regard of cruise tourism and twin-center holidays. This move was inspired by the CEO of the Seychelles Port Authority who prevailed upon his colleagues of the Association of Indian Ocean Ports, some of whom had already signaled they would not go to Miami, only – like La Reunion – to change their minds when told that this attendance was needed to show the flag and tell the world that not all routes in the Indian Ocean are unsafe as portrayed in some of the global media.
Seychelles ocean yacht regatta on for May b
The Seychelles Tourist Board has confirmed to this correspondent that their planned ocean yacht regatta will go ahead between May 22-30, 2010 and that several top-rated skippers will participate in this annual event. The regatta course will be mapped out within the inner islands and can be watched by spectators using either vantage points like beaches or some of the mountains on the various islands, chartering their own boats, or using one of the helicopter services available from Mahe.
Meanwhile, the ongoing, and often biased and wrong reporting about pirate activities in the Indian Ocean, does not seem to have deterred the Seychelles from going out and promoting cruise tourism. A small, albeit powerful, delegation will attend the Seatrade Cruiseship Convention in Miami between March 16-18, which is taking place in the wake of ITB where the Seychelles Tourist Board and the destination management companies, aka tour operators, will undoubtedly already have prepared the way when talking to the cruise lines also present in Berlin. The partly-negative publicity over piracy has impacted undoubtedly on cruise tourism in the Indian Ocean region, and Mombasa for instance, has seen its share from cruise tourism arrivals halved over the past one-and-a-half years, as has Dar es Salaam and Zanzibar.
However, the Seychelles are not giving up on this lucrative market just yet, and with ever-increasing naval patrols along the major shipping lines and an apparently shifting mood towards a more robust forward engagement of the pirates when leaving Somali waters, there is hope that the whole of the region can benefit once more from increased port calls by ocean liners presently deployed elsewhere over such fears.
The Seychelles delegation will be joined by their colleagues from La Reunion, with whom they maintain close contacts and share common objectives in regard of cruise tourism and twin-center holidays. This move was inspired by the CEO of the Seychelles Port Authority who prevailed upon his colleagues of the Association of Indian Ocean Ports, some of whom had already signaled they would not go to Miami, only – like La Reunion – to change their minds when told that this attendance was needed to show the flag and tell the world that not all routes in the Indian Ocean are unsafe as portrayed in some of the global media.
Between the Lines
New voyage (timesargus)
Capt. Richard Phillips of Underhill, who was rescued from Somali pirates after they seized his cargo ship last spring, is again entering unfamiliar waters: this time a nationwide book tour and interviews with the likes of NBC’s “Dateline,” NPR’s “Fresh Air,” and “The Daily Show.”
His book, “A Captain’s Duty: Somali Pirates, Navy Seals, and My Dangerous Days at Sea,” is due out April 6. Published reports say he got a $500,000 advance. Columbia Pictures bought the movie rights. And according to Yankee magazine, Phillips has been meeting occasionally with a speech coach who helps him with his delivery of the tales that come naturally to him.
[N.B.: Just to remember: Phillips crew-mates painted a different picture of the events and when Phillips tried to escape from the boat he was in with the three armed Somali boys, they didn't shoot him but just dragged him out of the water. Elders were waiting to be picked up in order to achieve a deal where everybody would walk off alive, but the U.S. Navy never considered that and ordered the Navy Seals to take pot-shots killing the three teenagers at a 10 m distance after having pulled the boat on an underwater line during the night close to the warship. Let's see what naval spin the book will tell.]
Guinness World Records are truly shit these days by Rogin the Armchair Fan
World Record number of “pirates” in one place
Oh come off it. I mean apart from the fact that it will take the experts from Guinness until early next week to verify the “record” (like, what, check on facebook that 1,600 people dressed as pirates haven’t shown up somewhere before?) just how fucking pathetic is this as a “World Record”?
The Guinness Book of World Records used to be full of wonders. Fastest man, largest animal, tallest tree, most baked beans eaten in a minute. Not just “most bored mums who got their children half-heartedly dressed up as [insert something] and went to a soggy theme park in Berkshire on the same day”.
I mean if there really is a World Record for “most pirates in one place” they could at least send this “Guinness World Record Spokesperson” down to the Somali coast to check for accuracy.
——— ecology , ecosystems, marine environment, IUU fishing and dumping, UNCLOS ————
CITES AGAIN PROVES ITS USELESSNESS
Global conference rejects tuna ban by Khalif Hassan in Doha
A U.N. meeting about wildlife trade has rejected the proposal to ban the export of Atlantic bluefin tuna.
Scores of developing nations joined Japan in voting down the measure, which had been backed by the U.S. and Northern European countries, while the traditional fish exploiters Spain, France and Greece blocked a unified European vote for the ban.
At the end of what the U.S. delegation called “intensive lobbying” but what insiders know was intensive bribing especially of African delegations, the vote resulted in only 20 countries supporting Monaco’s proposal for a ban while 30 abstained and 68 countries rejected the scientifically backed moratorium – only the United States, Norway and Kenya supported Monaco’s proposal outright. Delegates even from landlocked countries, who have not anything to do with the oceans, were standing up clapping after the result was announced – most likely just for the money they realized was filling their pockets.
Atlantic and Mediterranean stocks of bluefin, a fish prized especially by Japanese sushi lovers, have been severely depleted by years of heavy and industrialized commercial fishing catching and exterminating whole shoals in one go or tracking them with satellite technology until the last one is caught.
Japan consumes about 80 percent of the world’s Atlantic bluefin tuna, and the possibility of a ban had consumers and fish wholesalers worried that prices for the pink and red meat of the fish – called “hon-maguro” there – would soar or that it might even vanish from some menus.
Stocks of the fish have fallen by 60 percent from 1997 to 2007, and environmentalists argue that a trading ban imposed by the 175-nation Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, or CITES, would protect the fish.
Surely enough the representative of the Japanese Government, Masanori Miyahara, chief counselor of Japan’s Fisheries Agency, emphasized that they would work with ICCAT – the toothless and corrupted commission, which has failed since years to stop the decline of bluefin tuna populations in the Atlantic.
This decision shows one time more that the Convention on International Trade in Endang ered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) is actually the best watchdog for the unscrupulous traders and ensures that they can continue their exploitative business – depleting the living world.
A U.N. meeting about wildlife trade has rejected the proposal to ban the export of Atlantic bluefin tuna.
Scores of developing nations joined Japan in voting down the measure, which had been backed by the U.S. and Northern European countries, while the traditional fish exploiters Spain, France and Greece blocked a unified European vote for the ban.
At the end of what the U.S. delegation called “intensive lobbying” but what insiders know was intensive bribing especially of African delegations, the vote resulted in only 20 countries supporting Monaco’s proposal for a ban while 30 abstained and 68 countries rejected the scientifically backed moratorium – only the United States, Norway and Kenya supported Monaco’s proposal outright. Delegates even from landlocked countries, who have not anything to do with the oceans, were standing up clapping after the result was announced – most likely just for the money they realized was filling their pockets.
Atlantic and Mediterranean stocks of bluefin, a fish prized especially by Japanese sushi lovers, have been severely depleted by years of heavy and industrialized commercial fishing catching and exterminating whole shoals in one go or tracking them with satellite technology until the last one is caught.
Japan consumes about 80 percent of the world’s Atlantic bluefin tuna, and the possibility of a ban had consumers and fish wholesalers worried that prices for the pink and red meat of the fish – called “hon-maguro” there – would soar or that it might even vanish from some menus.
Stocks of the fish have fallen by 60 percent from 1997 to 2007, and environmentalists argue that a trading ban imposed by the 175-nation Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, or CITES, would protect the fish.
Surely enough the representative of the Japanese Government, Masanori Miyahara, chief counselor of Japan’s Fisheries Agency, emphasized that they would work with ICCAT – the toothless and corrupted commission, which has failed since years to stop the decline of bluefin tuna populations in the Atlantic.
This decision shows one time more that the Convention on International Trade in Endang ered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) is actually the best watchdog for the unscrupulous traders and ensures that they can continue their exploitative business – depleting the living world.
The marine defenders of Somalia – often called pirates – might be the only onces achieving true conservation and nature protection in their waters these days.
Blue Water Navy & Agent Orange (RainbowWarrior)
Every day, thousands of veterans who served on land and in the waters in Korea, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, and CONUS are denied benefits they are entitled to for exposure to dioxin from Agent Orange and other defoliants.
Learn more, visit:
BlueWaterNavy.org
In both S.E. Asia and CONUS Agent Orange was used at least from 1963 through 1975 although there have been reports of use and disposal activities as late as 1978 in Korea as a defoliant. In S.E. Asia, the chemicals were used to protect our troops and prevent the enemy from hiding in the foliage to kill many more of our fighting men and women.
In the CONUS, they were used to keep surroundings of various military buildings free from unwanted vegetation growth and keep it clean and neat looking.
Veterans who served not just in Korea since 1962 but also on the DMZ are denied benefits due to erroneous reports about where these chemicals were deployed and that there is a “residual life” of Agent Orange Dioxin which if this was true, then why are we in Vietnam helping the Vietnamese government to clean up the land that was contaminated some 40 years ago.
According to the reliable website, publichealth.va.gov/exposures/agentorange/, “October 13, 2009 Secretary Shinseki decided to establish service-connection for Vietnam Veterans with B cell leukemia, such as hairy cell leukemia; Parkinson’s disease; and ischemic heart disease. This is based on an independent study by the Institute of Medicine showing an association with exposure to Agent Orange. Vietnam veterans with these diseases may be eligible for disability compensation and health care benefits”, however, Secretary Shinseki failed to acknowledge the recommendation for presumption of exposure for the Blue Water Navy.
Veterans-For-Change believes exposure to Agent Orange is truly exposure to a deadly chemical, regardless of the location where it was deployed. One of the chemicals in the Agent Orange herbicide combination contained contaminating traces of TCDD (dioxin). Dioxin has been shown to cause a variety of illnesses in laboratory animals. Studies also suggest that the chemical may be related to a number of cancers and other health effects in humans: publichealth.va.gov/exposures/agentorange/health_effects.asp
The research data speaks for itself – Agent Orange was and is a deadly, toxic chemical, destroying the health and lives of many Veterans, including those who served in Korea and on the DMZ.
Many of these Veterans are continuously denied as the missions they served on were, and still to this day remain, classified by the DoD even though former President Bush signed executive order 13292 on March 28, 2003 directing classified missions beyond 25 years be declassified.
Now President Obama has signed Executive Order 13526 to declassify mission orders based on the 25 year rule.
Veterans-For-Change, as an advocacy group, has as its mission to broadcast and inform all veterans about their rights concerning Agent Orange, regardless of when and where the military veteran was exposed. You, the legislators of our proud and courageous country owe a debt of not just gratitude, but benefits and care to our veterans. Please take a stand and help us to provide the best care for our veterans. Take action today
TCE/PCE Contamination, Illnesses CONUS:
Learn more by visiting:
Salem-News.com El Toro articles
For over a year now there have been media outlets such as CNN, Salem News, Veterans Today and countless local newspapers in each region of our nation telling stories of active duty military, veterans and their families all being diagnosed with many unexplained illnesses.
Studies have shown, and evidence presented by several sources showing TCE (chemical degreaser) and PCE (chemical dry cleaning solution) have been used on most, if not all military bases throughout the Continental United States dating back to the mid 1950’s and disposed of by simply dumping waste into the ground. Both chemicals are known carcinogens.
Most recently TCE has been heavily addressed surrounding the Marine Corps Base Camp LeJeune, North Carolina where there was a Male Breast Cancer Cluster. According to a recent report, Camp LeJeune is where at least 40 men reported a cancer cluster in this location, all related to exposure at Camp LeJeune, according to the St. Petersburg Times. According to the report published, “A Marine Corps spokesman declined to comment on the cancer cluster, saying epidemiologists were better qualified, but the spokesman noted the Marine Corps had spent approximately 14.5 million on research initiatives regarding health issues…” Perhaps it would be of interest to you to get to the bottom of this so our military will be better protected, able to fight wars, and our Veterans will live a healthier life, proud of their military service and the actions they took to preserve and protect the freedom of American citizens, such as yourself.
Tests have proven the drinking water not only on this base, but other bases as well were contaminated, thus contaminating military personnel and their families as well as civilian personnel who worked on the bases. And let us not forget that TCE/PCE was used on board all ships as well and that cleaning clothing, showering washing hands all put this chemical into their water purification system, also contaminating all those who work and lived on board our ships!
Clear Cell Carcinoma, liver & kidney cancer, esophageal cancer, breast cancer in men and women, children with Leukemia and Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma are just some of the illnesses veterans and their families suffer from exposure to these contaminants. Many of these cancers, such as esophageal cancer are terminal, with only a 5% survival rate!
Veterans-For-Change has drafted a bill and we are actively gathering petition signatures to get any member of Congress to sign and present to the floor for a vote and passage to give the benefits to these families who are so desperately in need of medical treatment, healthcare and funding!
Veterans-For-Change would like to know, will you be the one who steps up to the plate and will sign and present this bill?
Contracted Medical Care:
When VA Medical Centers are not readily available, or aren’t able to provide services and care needed in that region, private facilities are contracted.
Less veterans are properly and adequately served and the costs to the taxpayer is several times higher than if the VA would simply add on to a facility to meet the need and/or build a VA Medical Center where needed most to meet the veteran community needs.
Most contracted facilities aren’t even up to par with the standard of health care, charge more and offer less and there are no controls nor is there any over-sight.
A shining example of need are the 100,000 veterans of the Rio Grande Valley who are expected to drive 250 miles each way to the nearest VA Medical Center, and are only provided a very small contracted clinic which is nothing more than an industrial injury clinic, nowhere near able to handle and or understand veterans who suffer illnesses caused by Dioxins, TCE, PCE, Burn Pit fumes, PTSD, etc.
Veterans-For-Change expects members of Congress to uphold the promises of decades to care for those who fought to defend our Country, and to practice what was established by the Continental Congress in 1776 — “the United States has the most comprehensive system of assistance for veterans for any nation in the world.” Now, in the Twenty First Century, it is time to draft, sign, and present legislation to correct wrongs from centuries ago. It is time to practice what was created and promised to motivate, service and care for our veterans – ‘nothing less than a 21st-century VA.’
President Obama has said: “We have a sacred trust with those who wear the uniform of the United States of America, a commitment that begins with enlistment and must never end.”
If our nation rescinds its promises and ignores its obligation to those who have fought to preserve freedom throughout the world, we compromise the right to ask our men and women to serve and defend our national principals. The choice is yours. With the election of 2010 in mind, please take action to defend and service our country and our proud and deserving veterans today!
Veterans-For-Change has been crying out to all 535 members of Congress going on four years this April 2010, as President Wilson said, a leader’s ears must ring with the voices of the people! Veteran’s voices will be ringing in the polling places come November! Do you hear us?
Source
Related
Breast Cancer in Iraq leads to Gulf War Veteran News Alert and Rep Boswell Legislation
March 18, 2010 : Gulf War Veterans need to be made aware of the following articles. Alert for all female veterans you know the drill! Self Breast Checks often and Mammograms. VA does provide this, so make use of that service!
Male Veterans yes you too can get breast cancer. Again our females will have to teach you the principles of breast self exams. Basically you work in a clockwise pattern and outward and inner in direction from the clock face. If you palpate any lumps or bumps under the skin GET IN TO A DOCTOR for further Assessment!
Bad Water More Deadly Than War by Thalif Deen (IPS)
Bad water kills more people than wars or earthquakes, declares Anders Berntell, executive director of the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI).
The devastating earthquake in Haiti last January claimed the lives of more than 200,000 people, making it one of the biggest single natural disasters this year.
But in contrast, some 3.6 million people – including 1.5 million children – are estimated to die each year from water-related diseases, including diarrhoea, typhoid, cholera and dysentery.
As the United Nations commemorates World Water Day next week, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says clean water has become scarce and will become even scarcer with the onset of climate change.
“More people die from unsafe water than all forms of violence, including war,” he said in a statement released Thursday.
The theme of this year’s World Water Day on Mar. 22 – “clean water for a healthy world” – stresses that both the quality and the quantity of water resources are at grave risk.
A study released Monday by the Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) of the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the U.N. children’s agency UNICEF provided current trends on water and sanitation in 209 countries and territories worldwide.
With 87 percent of the world’s population – about 5.9 billion people – using safe drinking-water sources, the world is on track to meet or even exceed the drinking-water target of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
But the bad news, according to the report, titled “Progress on Sanitation and Drinking-Water 2010 Update Report,” is that the U.N.’s sanitation targets are still lagging far behind.
With almost 39 percent of the world’s population (over 2.5 billion people) living without improved sanitation facilities, the report said that much more needs to be done to reach or come close to the sanitation MDG target.
“If the current trend continues unchanged, the international community will miss the 2015 sanitation MDG by almost one billion people,” it warned.
Serena O’Sullivan of the London-based End Water Poverty, however, is sceptical.
“The JMP suggests we’re on track to meet or even exceed the MDG for drinking water, but the situation is simply much more complicated, and we are not afforded the luxury of congratulating ourselves,” she told IPS.
Firstly, much of this progress is due to rapid improvements in East Asia, particularly China, “without which we would still be off-track”.
Secondly, she said, the overall figures mask huge disparities within countries and between them.
And thirdly, “even though we are on-track globally, nearly 900 million people are still without access to safe drinking water.”
Berntell of SIWI told IPS the joint work of WHO and UNICEF to continue monitoring the coverage of water supply and sanitation is extremely important.
“The results so far, however, are not as encouraging (because) even though progress is made, the rate is by far too slow,” he added.
As far as sanitation is concerned, Berntell said, “It is a global scandal that we see a total increase in the numbers of persons without improved sanitation.”
“This year, when we focus on the challenges of water quality in many of our discussions, the obvious links between the lack of proper sanitation facilities, and the resulting practice of open defecation, leading to deteriorating water quality, needs to be highlighted even more,” he added.
He appealed to leaders in society, from the local village to the international level, to resume their responsibility, and lead the way towards more investments and changed behaviour.
Dr. Maria Neira, WHO’s director of the Department of Public Health and Environment, said: “We all recognise the vital importance of water and sanitation to human health and well-being and their role as an engine of development.”
The question now lies in how to accelerate progress towards achieving the MDG targets and most importantly how to leap a step further to ultimately achieve the vision of universal access, she noted.
O’Sullivan said the sanitation and water crisis undermines progress made in other development areas because it affects some 2.5 billion people, and it is killing more children than malaria, HIV/AIDS and TB combined.
These two basic human rights – access to water and sanitation – are being refused to people across the world, leading to horrific consequences.
Currently, about 4,000 children under the age of five are dying every day from preventable water related illnesses such as diarrhoea, typhoid, cholera and dysentery.
Over half of hospital beds in developing countries are taken by those suffering with diarrhoeal illnesses, overburdening fragile health systems, she added.
The U.N. estimates that half of girls who stop attending primary school in Africa do so because of the lack of safe and private toilets.
“This water and sanitation crisis is holding back improvements across all other MDGs, including education and maternal and child health, and affecting not only human development but also, crucially, economic growth,” O’Sullivan said.
To prevent other development efforts from being undermined, “We need world leaders to take firm action to reverse the global water and sanitation crisis before it’s too late”.
On Apr. 23, she said, government ministers will have the chance to do just that as the first-ever high level meeting on water and sanitation takes place in Washington.
“They simply must commit to delivering real progress towards achieving sanitation and water for all,” she said.
BBC High Court Defence against Trafigura libel suit (WikiLeaks)
This document was submitted to the UK’s High Court by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) in September 2009, as a Defence against a libel claim brought against them by the oil company Trafigura. A May 2009 BBC Newsnight feature suggested that 16 deaths and many other injuries were caused by the dumping in the Ivory Coast of a large quantity of toxic waste originating with Trafigura. A September 2009 UN report into the matter stated that 108,000 people were driven to seek medical attention. This Defence, which has never been previously published online, outlines in detail the evidence which the BBC believed justified its coverage. In December 2009 the BBC settled out of court amid reports that fighting the case could have cost as much as 3 million pounds. The BBC removed its original Newsnight footage and associated articles from its on-line archives. The detailed claims contained in this document were never aired publicly, and never had a chance to be tested in court. Commenting on the BBC’s climbdown, John Kampfner, CEO of Index on Censorship said: “Sadly, the BBC has once again buckled in the face of authority or wealthy corporate interests. It has cut a secret deal. This is a black day for British journalism and once more strengthens our resolve to reform our unjust libel laws.” Jonathan Heawood, Director of English PEN, said: “Forced to choose between a responsible broadcaster and an oil company which shipped hundreds of tons of toxic waste to a developing country, English libel law has once again allowed the wrong side to claim victory. The law is an ass and needs urgent reform.” Now that this document is in the public domain, the global public will be able to make their own judgement about the strength of the BBC’s case.
FULL TEXT: http://file.wikileaks.org/file/bbc-trafigura.pdf
U.S. Intelligence planned to destroy WikiLeaks (WikiLeaks)
This document, dated 18 Mar 2008, is a classifed (SECRET/NOFORN) 32 page U.S. counterintelligence investigation into WikiLeaks. “The possibility that current employees or moles within DoD or elsewhere in the U.S. government are providing sensitive or classified information to Wikileaks.org cannot be ruled out”. It concocts a plan to fatally marginalize the organization. Since WikiLeaks uses “trust as a center of gravity by protecting the anonymity and identity of the insiders, leakers or whisteblowers”, the report recommends “The identification, exposure, termination of employment, criminal prosecution, legal action against current or former insiders, leakers, or whistlblowers could potentially damage or destroy this center of gravity and deter others considering similar actions from using the Wikileaks.org Web site”. [As two years have passed since the date of the report, with no WikiLeaks' source exposed, it appears that this plan was ineffective]. As an odd justificaton for the plan, the report claims that “Several foreign countries including China, Israel, North Korea, Russia, Vietnam, and Zimbabwe have denounced or blocked access to the Wikileaks.org website”. The report provides further justification by enumerating embarrassing stories broken by WikiLeaks—U.S. equipment expenditure in Iraq, probable U.S. violations of the Chemical Warfare Convention Treaty in Iraq, the battle over the Iraqi town of Fallujah and human rights violations at Guantanamo Bay.
FULL TEXT: http://file.wikileaks.org/file/us-intel-wikileaks.pdf
A regional take on food security (IRIN)
A study commissioned by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) has been taking stock of food security initiatives in Eastern Africa, and the authors urge those involved in such efforts to “think regionally”.
Organizations should identify food and nutrition interventions that had worked in the region and scale them up. They should promote regional trade and cooperation to boost food production and flow across borders, and develop risk management interventions to help countries cope with climate change. The study includes a review of food security initiatives in the region.
The UN study noted that 20 million people are in need of food aid in East Africa and identified “inadequate food exchange or trade between places of abundant harvests on one hand, and those with deficit harvests on the other hand”, as one of the key reasons for food insecurity.
The authors also listed frequent droughts and floods brought on by the unfolding impact of climate change, as well as poverty, poor economic performance, land availability and access, among the other main reasons for food insecurity.
The stock take was carried out by various regional governmental organizations such as Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR), the Eastern African Community (EAC), the Economic Community of Great Lakes Region (CEPGL), and six countries – Uganda, Rwanda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The region covered by IGAD comprises Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan, Uganda and Eritrea, and is “still perhaps the most food insecure part of the world, with over 70 million people facing chronic hunger and poverty,” the paper noted.
Read the report: http://uneca.org/eca_programmes/srdc/ea/meetings/srcm2010/Food%20Security%20OVERVIEW.pdf
————————— anti-piracy measures ——————————–
NOW BORED NAVAL “HEROES” BECOME EVEN CYNICAL ABOUT THEIR IGNOBLE DEEDS
EU NAVFOR Press Release: Pirates go for a swim – EU NAVFOR Pirate Disruption Continues
While EU NAVFOR Warship FGS EMDEN was proceeding to the last known position of a pirate attack reported by the Spanish fishing vessel ALBATUN 2, on the 18th of March, her helicopter found one whaler and two attack skiffs with twelve persons onboard.
When the suspected pirates noticed the presence of the helicopter, they tried to escape, and it took warning shots to stop them fleeing. They then jumped overboard and swam to their mother ship. More warning shots were required to stop the whaler that tried to escape as well. As a result of this action, two attack skiffs were destroyed and grappling hooks were seized.
Two days later the EMDEN’s helicopter discovered a new PAG, consisting of one mother ship (whaler) and two skiffs in tow about 250 nautical miles from Somali coast. Initially, the mother ship refused to stop and to follow the instructions given by the helicopter. Warning shots were necessary to stop them and finally a boarding team was sent onboard the PAG. The boarding team destroyed several weapons, grappling hooks and ladders and afterwards the two skiffs were destroyed as well.
This operation is a part of a coordinated operation planned and directed by EU NAVFOR staff embarked in EU NAVFOR Flagship ITS ETNA, to disrupt pirate activity.
[N.B.: What the naval snobs nowadays call falsely a "whaler" is always an open, slow, typical Somali fishing boat with inboard motor and what they call "grappling hooks" are nothing else than the usual, simple anchors produced locally and used along the whole East-African coast. Though unproven by any facts, it might have potentially been a piracy party what was found here, but it also could have been just a legitimate fuel transport. Why the otherwise so "precisely trained" naval forces always avoid to provide exact GPS data and thereby the real positions of the incident locations is obvious - one wants to avoid legal complications if it would have to be admitted that the incident took place inside the 350nm continental shelf zone or the 200nm territorial waters, which also is the 200nm Exclusive Economic Zone of Somalia - all areas where it is more than doubtful if the foreign naval forces have any right to give any "instructions" or to engage militarily if such are not followed, because it has never been proven that the UN Security Council Resolutions, which are solely based on a letter of a former so-called president - a fictive letter which can not be produced by the UN -, or the personal agreements between a French Ambassadress sitting in for the EU and a sole Somali politician without the backing of his parliament have any legal standing with respect to the violation of the sovereignty of a nation.
To not be misunderstood: The real work to make piracy, armed robbery at sea and hostage taking crimes of the past has to continue with all might and intellect and anybody who takes another human being as hostage must face the full force of a hopefully soon coordinated international law, but to just engage in legally and morally very questionable actions against skinny Somalis in their little skiffs and within what they know is their rightful territory is appalling, especially because these warships do absolutely nothing against the rampant illegal fishing by foreign vessels.
That real pirates can be forced to give up peacefully was shown several times before and recently by a NATO vessel, which by persistently staying on them and by thereby making the potential pirates to realize that the naval force would stay on them in their sea-jacked or co-operating Iranian dhow day and night and that they therefore would have no chance to use it to capture any other vessel, which could bring them any ransom. In this case the Somalis very quickly sent that dhow away. But the wrong way in trying to condition Somalis is to engage them in these actions the European Forces are doing right now by taking any Somali off their waters or by even going on land and destroying beached fishing boats. Such, if it continues, will soon backfire - like it was with "Black Hawk Down". Is it that what is wanted - to find a reason for a real invasion or want the militarists then to be whistled back again by politicians, who only wake up when then there is a big boom?
While many millions are spent every day to keep the naval circus touring not a single dollar is spent to help the decent coastal communities in Somalia to survive and develop, which also would set free the still existing self-healing powers - but this obviously is beyond the will or the intellectual capacity of politicians in Brussels or elsewhere and surely against the interests of military-industrial complex. When will the people who have to pay for all that naval nonsense finally wake up?]
Puntland jails 22 pirates (AFP)
A court in Bosaso in northern Somalia’s breakaway Puntland region on Saturday sentenced 22 pirates to six years in jail, an official said.
The majority of the men denied the charges of piracy and kidnapping off Somalia.
“After hearing the charges and evidence brought against the 22 suspected pirates, the court found them guilty of being pirates and sentenced them to six years in jail each,” judge Sheik Abdirasak Haji Adan said, according to a security officer at the court.
“Most of them denied the charges and argued they were just ordinary fishermen, but their claims were null and void,” the security officer, Abdi Mohamed Jama, told AFP by phone.French anti-piracy forces operating off Somalia last week handed 24 suspected pirates to the Puntland authorities. Two were later released after being found not guilty.
Meanwhile Puntland deputy police chief Mohamed Said Jaqanaf said a further six suspected pirates were handed over to the authorities of the breakaway region on Saturday.
22 Pirates Jailed for Six Years in Puntland, Somalia by Shafi’i Mohyaddin Abokar (NewsBlaze)
A high Court in Bosasso, the commercial capital of the Somali semiautonomous regional state of Puntland on Saturday sentenced 22 pirates for six years of imprisonment each, the regional court judge announced.
The buccaneers were captured by the French navy a week ago while they were sailing the high seas in the Indian Ocean and were jailed for six years each according the Sheik Abdirizak Hajji Aden, the judge of Puntland’s high court in Bosasso.
“We have investigated their case and the court found them guilty of being pirates so they have been sentenced for six years of imprisonment” the judge told reporters after jailing the buccaneers Saturday.
But the suspected pirates denied the accusation and allegedly said that they were Somali fishermen who were illegally arrested by the French navy off the coast of Somalia.
The French navy last week handed 24 men to Puntland authorities, but two of them were later released after they were declared innocent, according to the judge.
Meanwhile, on Saturday the French navy handed 6 other Somali pirates to the Puntland authorities, according to the internal security minister General Yusuf Ahmed Kheir.
The minister said that Puntland is not capable of detaining hundreds of pirates who are arrested by the foreign navies off the coast of Somalia and he requested the foreign navies not to send the captured buccaneers to the Puntland region.
“Now we have 246 pirates in our prisons and we can not afford to have more than that number so we are asking France and other foreign nations whose navies are operating along the Somali coast not to hand the captured buccaneers to us” the minister said.
The Puntland region is somewhat peaceful in comparison to the troubled south-central Somali regions, but the region is a hot bed of notorious buccaneers, drug dealers and human traffickers.
French navy hands over six suspected pirates to Somali authorities (Saba)
The French navy fleet patrolling the pirate-infested Somali coast on Saturday handed over suspected six pirates to the local authorities in the semi- autonomous region of Puntland, regional officials said, according to Xinhua.
The French navy handed over the six men to local anti-piracy units off the northeastern port city of Bossaso, the commercial capital of the self-government state, Yusuf Ahmed Khayr, regional security minister told reporters.
The regional official said that the men and their equipment were handed over to local anti-piracy task force and would be tried in local courts.
Authorities in Puntland and the French navy had an agreement regarding the transfer of captured pirates to local security forces for trail in accordance with local laws.
The French navy and a number of other navy forces from other countries have previously handed over dozens of suspected pirates to local authorities in Puntland, hotbed of piracy in the horn of Africa country of Somalia.
Meanwhile local court in the region have given nearly 20 suspected pirates prison terms of 6 years each after they were convicted of piracy activities in the Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Aden, a region known for being rife with pirates.
Local courts have previously given varies prison sentences to captured suspected pirates.
Nearly 20 years of anarchy in Somalia led to the spread of the menace of buccaneering in the waters off Somalia and the Gulf of Aden, an importunate international waterway.
US praises Russia’s counter-piracy role (VoiceOfRussia)
The United States has praised the role of Russia in battling the Somali-based pirates. Speaking in Washington Friday, the senior State Department official Thomas Countryman mentioned this country’s participation in the international contact group against piracy and also its successful naval missions to crush pirates. He looked forward to great results from growing international cooperation against piracy. Since October 2008, Russian warships have been escorting international cargo vessels through pirate-infested waters off the Horn of Africa. Its current patrol ship there is the frigate Neustrashimy.
Ships take new plan against pirates (BurlingtonCountyTimes)
An international fleet of warships is attacking and destroying Somali pirate vessels closer to the shores of East Africa and the new strategy, combined with more aggressive confrontations further out to sea, has dealt the brigands a setback, officials and experts said Thursday.
The new tactics by the European Union naval force comes after Spain – which currently holds the EU’s rotating presidency, and whose fishing vessels are frequent pirate targets – encouraged more aggressive pursuit of pirates and the coalition obtained more aircraft and other military assets, said Rear Adm. Peter Hudson, the force commander.
The EU Naval Force attacked 12 groups of pirate vessels, which normally includes several skiffs and a mother vessel, this month, more than last year.
Half of those attacks were on the high seas and half close to shore, reflecting the new strategy to intercept pirates before they reach deep water and international shipping lanes.
Fighting Piracy by Rebecca Kearley (CMI)
A collaborative communication tool that allows international military vessels, including ships from the EU and NATO, to exchange vital information securely, in real-time and without political agreements, has been short-listed for a national award
Operation Atalanta is being used to enable the military vessels to respond rapidly to acts of piracy off the coast of Somalia.
Polymorph, the company that developed it, and the Royal Navy-led EU NAVFOR are finalists in the Excellence in Shared Services category of the e-Government National Awards.
Polymorph’s MD Stephen Harris says: “Operation Atalanta has some two dozen ships from EU nations including Britain, France, Germany and Italy patrolling an area of about two million square miles off the Horn of Africa. The requirement from EU NAVFOR was for a system to be developed in just three weeks that would enable military vessels from all nations involved in counter piracy to communicate more securely in international waters and coordinate rapid reactions to acts of piracy.
“The success of the system has led to it now being used by over 40 nations and military authorities, ranging from the EU, US and NATO to China, India, Russia, South Korea and Malaysia. Although the collaborative solution was primarily designed to assist the EU NAVFOR to combat piracy threats, it has also enabled increased food aid to be delivered safely to Somalia, as well as safeguard activity of vessels operating and transporting goods in international waters.”
————– no real peace in sight yet ————–
Somalia president rejects direct American military intervention (garoweonline)
Somalia’s interim president Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed says he does not welcome direct military intervention from the US to support his fragile government in overcoming the powerful insurgents.
“We are requesting the US not engage in direct military in Somalia but provide us with support in rebuilding the forces and weapons,” said Sheikh Sharif who added that he would not allow foreign country to directly intervene in his country.
“Our forces have prepared well and can do the job of flushing terrorist out the country and that is why we are requesting non military interference,” President Ahmed said.
He said the African Union troops are in the country as part of peace efforts which his government welcomes.
Ahmed’s comments come after senior US security officials announced that Washington is ready to provide air support in the war against the powerful insurgents in the restive capital Mogadishu.
Senior U.S. military commander in the region, William Ward told a Senate hearing on Somalia that the war against the insurgents is “something that we would look to do in support.”
Somali government warns of major offensive by Abdulkadir Khaalif (NATION)
Sheikh Abdulkadir Ali Omar, the Somali Minister for Interior Affairs, today said that his government is determined to take over the parts of Mogadishu controlled by rebel groups.
He made the statement after his ministry and the Transitional Federal Government’s local authority in Mogadishu held a meeting.
Minister Omar underlined that plans to secure Mogadishu have already been fixed and that implementation will be done quickly. “The public suffering is going to end soon,” said the interior minister.
The minister blamed the Islamist groups, namely Al-Shabaab and Hizbu Islam, of orchestrating the suffering of the people by inciting insecurity.
“The TFG’s plan is to alleviate the public from the awful situation,” said Minister Omar.
Sheikh Omar urged the public to offer the government their utmost support in its drive to capture all the 16 districts of Mogadishu. The TFG currently controls seven districts of the Somali capital.
Al-Shabaab and Hizbu Islam have powers on the rest of the city.
On Saturday, Engineer Abdirizak Mohamed Nur alias Nunne, the Mayor of Mogadishu, once again urged the people inhabiting in rebel controlled areas of Mogadishu to leave. “We are warning fellow citizens in order to avoid dangers,” said Engineer Nunne.
However, it is not the first time the government or the rebels have sworn to take over Mogadishu.
Statement of Concern regarding an upsurge in fighting in Somalia (NGO Cons.)
As humanitarian agencies working in Somalia for many years, we are deeply concerned about a renewed intensification of the conflict and military action in South/Central Somalia.
We are deeply concerned that key stakeholders seem to have given up on working towards a peaceful diplomatic solution. Based upon our experience of supporting people affected by the conflict, we wish to underline the devastating effects that a significant surge in fighting has on the civilian population.
We call upon all parties to the conflict to:
Comply with their obligations under International Humanitarian Law with respect to the conduct of military operations, and the safeguarding of the lives and dignity of the civilian population. Particular attention must be paid to the principles of Proportionality and Distinction.
Permit unimpeded access of humanitarian aid to the civilian populations in need and to ensure that all humanitarian workers, medical staff and hospitals are protected.
Allow civilians who choose to flee from conflict areas to do so in safety.
We furthermore urge the international community to:
Strengthen all efforts to find a peaceful solution to the conflict.
Underline to all parties to the conflict that they have duties under International Humanitarian Law and monitor the progress of fighting to ensure that these obligations are being upheld.
Ensure that the protection of civilians is prioritised in the planning and implementation of any military action, that civilian casualties are minimised and that any humanitarian consequences are addressed appropriately and sufficiently.
Respect for the life and dignity of all persons who are not taking a direct part in hostilities is of paramount importance. Civilians must on no occasion be directly targeted by parties to the conflict and furthermore must be protected from the indirect impact of fighting.
Even without an upsurge in conflict, the humanitarian situation in Somalia is acute. Nearly half the Somali population, 3.2 million people, are in need of life-saving assistance. Millions of vulnerable people are living in deplorable conditions, lacking even the most basic items needed for daily survival. Further intensification of the conflict will lead to additional deterioration of the humanitarian situation and will force more Somalis to flee their homes. Initial reports suggest that more than 8,000 people have already been displaced since the start of February.
In spite of extremely difficult and hazardous operating conditions, humanitarian agencies are striving to provide aid to the civilian population of Somalia, according to the humanitarian principles of humanity, impartiality, neutrality and independence. We attempt to prevent and alleviate human suffering and work on the basis of need and without distinction according to nationality, race, religion, social position, political conviction, or other affiliation.
(*) Statement by 25 humanitarian organizations
Doubts grow on Somali offensive’s chances at peace by Jason Strziuso, Katharine Hourheld and Mohamed Olad Hassan (AP)
Problems including corrupt officials and a lack of supplies have delayed Somalia’s military offensive against Islamic insurgents, but even before the first shot has been fired new warnings have emerged that blood may be spilled for little or no gain.
In signs the offensive is approaching, close to 1,000 additional troops arrived from Uganda last week to support the African Union’s forces in Mogadishu, and the Islamists have been digging trenches across the capital’s streets to impede AU armored cars. The AU backs the beleaguered Somali government and has more than 5,000 troops stationed in the country.
But Somalia’s government, whose forces are weak and poorly trained and equipped, has not described how it would consolidate any gains made in the offensive or win the support of the people, who are splintered into hundreds of clans.
Experts say the government does not appear to have a political plan ready to deploy after the end of the fighting, which is likely to kill scores of civilians.
Foreshadowing a struggle just to take ground from al-Shabab, an Islamic militia loosely linked with al-Qaida, a U.N. report this month said Somalia’s security forces lack resources, organization and a functional chain of command, and blamed the problems on a lack of commitment by the country’s leaders.
The Somali government, for its part, says it is committed but needs more international support, even though more than $180 million has been poured into the country by the U.S. alone in the last three years.
As the commander in chief, President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed would order the start of the offensive. Ahmed told The Associated Press that efforts are under way to professionalize and better equip the security forces, but the government lacks money to pay the soldiers, many of whom have been trained in neighboring Djibouti by the African Union.
U.S. officials in Washington say they have given money to help pay for Somalia’s soldiers, but declined to discuss how the money was delivered, to whom, or how they could be sure it reached the fighters. A U.N. report said the government’s ability to pay soldiers is hindered by deep corruption.
The U.N. Monitoring Group of Somalia found that the Somali military is dominated by a command structure based on clan loyalties and noted that corruption has deprived soldiers of pay and meals and is so bad that Somali commanders and troops often sell their arms and ammunition to militants.
“The consequences of these deficiencies include an inability of the security forces of the Transitional Federal Government to take and hold ground,” the U.N. monitoring group said in its scathing analysis. “As a result, they have made few durable military gains during the course of the mandate, and the front line has remained, in at least one location, only 500 meters (yards) from the presidency.”
The offensive, which has been repeatedly delayed over the past few months, is meant to push back insurgents who operate within just a few blocks of the presidential palace and widen the government’s small slice of Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu.
U.S. officials say the United States is not planning the offensive and won’t be coordinating or directing it. Johnnie Carson, America’s assistant secretary of state for Africa, said last week that the U.S. has only “provided limited military support” to Somali government.
The U.S. recognizes the Somali government’s need to defend itself from al-Shabab. However, the U.S. is encouraging the Somali government to think about what it will do after the battles are over, said a State Department official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of departmental policy.
Col. Aden Ibrahim Kalmoy, Somalia’s military spokesman, insisted that the government does have a post-offensive security plan but would not reveal any details. He said Somali government forces are “committed to an inevitable war until they eradicate the terrorists from all Somali territory.”
Nairobi-based analyst E.J. Hogendoorn of the International Crisis Group said the long-term success of the offensive requires a political strategy and that a military solution cannot be imposed on Somalia.
“We’re not aware of any plan that would suggest the government has any strategy into which this offensive fits,” he said.
Al-Shabab insurgents may melt away before superior firepower and if Ahmed reaches out to different powerbrokers and cut deals, the offensive may do some good. But Roland Marchal, a Somalia expert at the Center for International Studies and Research in Paris, said militants can wait for government troops to either start selling their ammunition or simply defect because they’re not being paid or given food.
Former U.S. Deputy National Security Adviser Juan Zarate said that unless the government can regain momentum and strengthen its bargaining position, al-Shabab and other Islamist groups will continue to control large swaths of Somalia.
But Somalia’s government, whose forces are weak and poorly trained and equipped, has not described how it would consolidate any gains made in the offensive or win the support of the people, who are splintered into hundreds of clans.
Experts say the government does not appear to have a political plan ready to deploy after the end of the fighting, which is likely to kill scores of civilians.
Foreshadowing a struggle just to take ground from al-Shabab, an Islamic militia loosely linked with al-Qaida, a U.N. report this month said Somalia’s security forces lack resources, organization and a functional chain of command, and blamed the problems on a lack of commitment by the country’s leaders.
The Somali government, for its part, says it is committed but needs more international support, even though more than $180 million has been poured into the country by the U.S. alone in the last three years.
As the commander in chief, President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed would order the start of the offensive. Ahmed told The Associated Press that efforts are under way to professionalize and better equip the security forces, but the government lacks money to pay the soldiers, many of whom have been trained in neighboring Djibouti by the African Union.
U.S. officials in Washington say they have given money to help pay for Somalia’s soldiers, but declined to discuss how the money was delivered, to whom, or how they could be sure it reached the fighters. A U.N. report said the government’s ability to pay soldiers is hindered by deep corruption.
The U.N. Monitoring Group of Somalia found that the Somali military is dominated by a command structure based on clan loyalties and noted that corruption has deprived soldiers of pay and meals and is so bad that Somali commanders and troops often sell their arms and ammunition to militants.
“The consequences of these deficiencies include an inability of the security forces of the Transitional Federal Government to take and hold ground,” the U.N. monitoring group said in its scathing analysis. “As a result, they have made few durable military gains during the course of the mandate, and the front line has remained, in at least one location, only 500 meters (yards) from the presidency.”
The offensive, which has been repeatedly delayed over the past few months, is meant to push back insurgents who operate within just a few blocks of the presidential palace and widen the government’s small slice of Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu.
U.S. officials say the United States is not planning the offensive and won’t be coordinating or directing it. Johnnie Carson, America’s assistant secretary of state for Africa, said last week that the U.S. has only “provided limited military support” to Somali government.
The U.S. recognizes the Somali government’s need to defend itself from al-Shabab. However, the U.S. is encouraging the Somali government to think about what it will do after the battles are over, said a State Department official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of departmental policy.
Col. Aden Ibrahim Kalmoy, Somalia’s military spokesman, insisted that the government does have a post-offensive security plan but would not reveal any details. He said Somali government forces are “committed to an inevitable war until they eradicate the terrorists from all Somali territory.”
Nairobi-based analyst E.J. Hogendoorn of the International Crisis Group said the long-term success of the offensive requires a political strategy and that a military solution cannot be imposed on Somalia.
“We’re not aware of any plan that would suggest the government has any strategy into which this offensive fits,” he said.
Al-Shabab insurgents may melt away before superior firepower and if Ahmed reaches out to different powerbrokers and cut deals, the offensive may do some good. But Roland Marchal, a Somalia expert at the Center for International Studies and Research in Paris, said militants can wait for government troops to either start selling their ammunition or simply defect because they’re not being paid or given food.
Former U.S. Deputy National Security Adviser Juan Zarate said that unless the government can regain momentum and strengthen its bargaining position, al-Shabab and other Islamist groups will continue to control large swaths of Somalia.
Nearly 40 Hospitalized, as Watery-Diarrhea Outbreaks in Somali Capital by Shafi’i Mohyaddin Abokar (NewsBlaze)
At least 37 Somali children under the age of five have been admitted to the Banadir hospital in Mogadishu for the past 24 hours, because of acute watery-diarrhea outbreak, doctors revealed here on Sunday.
Doctor Mohamed Isse Abdi of the Mother and infant care Banadir hospital told reporters in Mogadishu Sunday that children continue to be brought to the hospital which received 37 children infected with watery-diarrhea since early Saturday.
He said that because of the very hot atmosphere and children drinking much unclean water, the disease is overwhelming, spreading in more areas, particularly in the outskirts of the capital Mogadishu, where more than 1.5 million displaced people live.
“No organization assists the hospital which is now running out of medicine, so we are calling on International health agencies like WHO, MSF or Somali business communities to help the hospital” Doctor Mohamed Isse Abdi stated during his Sunday’s press conference.
“The hospital is holding more than its capacity and ailing children are being brought here minute by minute and without emergency medical assistance I am afraid that more deaths will occur in less than 12 hours from now” the Doctor warned.
Most of the international aid agencies which were very active in Somalia have been banned from operating in the country by Al shabab militants who accuse the agencies of being involved in intelligence, spreading Christianity or crippling the country’s economy.
The banned aid organizations include: The United Nations development program, the United Nations world food agency, the United Nations safety and security department, the UN mine action, the United Nations political office for Somalia, International medical Corps, the Care International and many others.
With Islamists banning the international aid organizations from operating in Somalia, the UN says more than 3.5 million people, nearly half of the country’s total inhabitants are in need of emergency life-saving food assistance. Those include about 1.5 million people who fled from their homes in the restive capital alone.
Somali Ministers Attack High Court’ Chairman (shabelle)
Mohamed Omar Farah better known as “Indabur”, the chairmen of the high court of the transitional government of Somalia said Friday that some ministers of the TFG had attacked the work of the high court..
Mr. Indabur said in an interview with Shabelle radio that he will defend the court against some of the transitional government ministers who had intervened in the affairs of the high court, which he pointed out was unlawful.
“It is illegal to interfere with the own rules of the high court. We will not accept that. The ministers who attacked the court are ministers like the Fisheries and Marine Resources Minister, the Justice Minister and others. But we shall defeat them by using the law of the TFG and the one of the court,” said Mohamed Indabur.
The chairman said that his statement was not to highlight that there was conflict between the transitional government of Somalia adding that there was a disagreement between the justice committee and the ministry of justice.
The statement came as two ministers of the TFG accused the high court during a function opening legal centers in Mogadishu, whereby they proclaimed that the the justice committee and the high court must work together.
Somali government signs trade relation with India and China by Mohammed Omar Hussein (Somaliweyn)
The Somali Ministry of trade has officially said that it has signed trade deal with less amount of taxation with two Asian countries that is India and China.
“I have just recently returned from tour of duty to some countries in Asia that is India and China, and in my tour I meet with the Ministers for trade in these two countries and we have agreed upon that there will be less taxation on the goods which Somalia exports to these two countries like wise there will be less taxation on the goods which these two countries import to Somalia” said Abdirashid Mohammed Abdi Iro the Somali Minister fire Commerce.
Somalia imports different kinds of items from these countries such as Engines, cars and many other things.
The Minister has added that this will be a great opportunity for not only the Somali government but the entire of the Somali people including the Somali traders, but has deplored the current situation which the country is in.
“If country achieves reliable peace and tranquility I am sure the Somali people are very strong and striving people and can work hard, and they can open their own enterprises in the country” added Minister Iro.
Ultimately the Minister has said that his Ministry will support all the Somali traders who are willing and intending to develop their trade. The Minister is among the active Somali government Minister who are creating excellent relationships with Somalia and the rest of the world.
Russian delegation arrives in Somaliland (Somalilandpress)
Somaliland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday welcomed a high-powered Russian business delegation that is in Somaliland to explore investment opportunities and strengthen relations.
The delegation which consists of investors and journalists is in the country for a four-day visit and are expected to meet with different Somaliland ministers and the president.
The delegation will travel to number of locations where they will examine investment-related opportunities in a bid to strengthen bilateral economic and commercial relations in the region.
According to sources the Russians want to renew their relations with the nations of the Horn of Africa under new foreign policy dubbed ‘Horn of Africa initiative’, similar to that one of the days of the Soviet Union. They added that Somaliland was the first of number of countries the Russians want to develop ties with in the region.
They will visit port of Berbera, where they will meet President Dahir Rayale. Berbera’s 12-metre deep-water facility was constructed in 1964 by Russian engineers at a cost of $5.6 million. They have also constructed the longest run way in the region in the 70s.
The reports added that the Russians want to invest in oil exploration and other infrastructures.
In the final-leg of their visit, the Russian delegation have been invited for a dinner at Mansor Hotel where they will meet with former Somali students who studied in the Soviet Union.
Last week, the Russian navy operating the coast of Somalia, turned over seven suspected pirates to Somaliland authorities in the Sanaag region.
Enterprising ‘Somalilander’ dreams of returning home by Joe Avancena (SaudiGazette)
Mohamed T. Gino has been residing and working in the Kingdom for the past 24 years. He calls himself a Somalilander and dreams of returning to Somaliland, the country of his birth, someday.
“It is a personal struggle to be away from home, but I am happy and thankful to this country, Saudi Arabia, and its leaders for extending the benevolent arms to us Somalilanders to stay and work in this place we now call our home,” Gino said.
Gino is one of the approximately 3,000 Somalilanders residing in the Eastern Province. The Somalilanders in the Kingdom work in government agencies and private business sectors. Gino works independently as a businessman and business development officer.
For over two decades, Gino has built strong ties with business communities in Saudi Arabia, leading him to a number of successes. “I plan to return home someday; I am saving enough money to start a fishing business because my country is endowed with rich fishing resources,” he said.
Gino, like his compatriots, is waiting for international recognition of Somaliland and the establishment of a strong and transparent government. “When all these issues are settled, then it will be time for me and my family to return home,” he said.
Somaliland was the first of the five Somali territories to achieve independence from the British Empire on June 26, 1960 based on its existing borders and, before the merger with Somalia on July 1, 1960, the first Somali country to be recognized by the United Nations and 35 member nations immediately after independence like the rest of the African States.
Independent Somaliland tried to strengthen its unification with Somalia in its quest for Greater Somalia in the Horn of Africa, but Somalia hijacked the governments of the union for the thirty years of its existence, from1960 to1990, and treated Somaliland as one of its own provinces. The Somalilanders rebelled against the injustices perpetrated by Somalia in the twenty years between 1960-1980. In those 20 years, Somaliland had three consecutive elected presidents and two parliaments in addition to a municipal council.
Somalilanders held a national congress on May 18, 1991 and unanimously proclaimed the withdrawal of Somaliland from the union with Somalia and reclaimed the country’s independence on June 26, 1960 renaming it the Somaliland Republic.
Somaliland Republic’s fledgling democracy, however, encountered many serious obstacles since the first municipal elections that were held in 2002, resulting in the delay of the presidential election.
According to Gino, many of his compatriots who arrived and settled in Saudi Arabia in the early 1960s have become Saudi citizens. Like many Saudis, they continue to support Somaliland by investing and doing business in there. “We Somalilanders have strong links and ties of friendship with Saudi Arabia,” he added.
“Our country is rich in natural and mineral resources, and I plan, with the cooperation of my fellow expatriate Somalilanders, to harness this wealth for the benefit of our people,” Gino said. – SG
“It is a personal struggle to be away from home, but I am happy and thankful to this country, Saudi Arabia, and its leaders for extending the benevolent arms to us Somalilanders to stay and work in this place we now call our home,” Gino said.
Gino is one of the approximately 3,000 Somalilanders residing in the Eastern Province. The Somalilanders in the Kingdom work in government agencies and private business sectors. Gino works independently as a businessman and business development officer.
For over two decades, Gino has built strong ties with business communities in Saudi Arabia, leading him to a number of successes. “I plan to return home someday; I am saving enough money to start a fishing business because my country is endowed with rich fishing resources,” he said.
Gino, like his compatriots, is waiting for international recognition of Somaliland and the establishment of a strong and transparent government. “When all these issues are settled, then it will be time for me and my family to return home,” he said.
Somaliland was the first of the five Somali territories to achieve independence from the British Empire on June 26, 1960 based on its existing borders and, before the merger with Somalia on July 1, 1960, the first Somali country to be recognized by the United Nations and 35 member nations immediately after independence like the rest of the African States.
Independent Somaliland tried to strengthen its unification with Somalia in its quest for Greater Somalia in the Horn of Africa, but Somalia hijacked the governments of the union for the thirty years of its existence, from1960 to1990, and treated Somaliland as one of its own provinces. The Somalilanders rebelled against the injustices perpetrated by Somalia in the twenty years between 1960-1980. In those 20 years, Somaliland had three consecutive elected presidents and two parliaments in addition to a municipal council.
Somalilanders held a national congress on May 18, 1991 and unanimously proclaimed the withdrawal of Somaliland from the union with Somalia and reclaimed the country’s independence on June 26, 1960 renaming it the Somaliland Republic.
Somaliland Republic’s fledgling democracy, however, encountered many serious obstacles since the first municipal elections that were held in 2002, resulting in the delay of the presidential election.
According to Gino, many of his compatriots who arrived and settled in Saudi Arabia in the early 1960s have become Saudi citizens. Like many Saudis, they continue to support Somaliland by investing and doing business in there. “We Somalilanders have strong links and ties of friendship with Saudi Arabia,” he added.
“Our country is rich in natural and mineral resources, and I plan, with the cooperation of my fellow expatriate Somalilanders, to harness this wealth for the benefit of our people,” Gino said. – SG
Islamist officer says there is money embezzlement within the faction by Mohammed Omar Hussein (Somaliweyn)
An officer in Hizbul-Islam, a rival Islamist faction which is vivid in Somalia, has condemned his own faction of money misuse within the faction which was allocated for road renovation.
“There is improper use of money which was allocated for the repairing of the road between Mogadishu and Afgoye district, a panel of the faction which was assigned for the duty and I as the chairman of this panel have seen that things are not moving in the most accurate way, and in this matter I am determined to resign from the post to which I was appointed as the chairman because I am not willing to defame my status” said Sheikh Salman Mohammed Osman the chairman of the faction.
The Chairman of the road repairing panel Sheikh Salman added that there was a huge amount of money which was collected, but it was later used in extravagant ways by some top officials who are strong members and pillars of the faction.
Eventually Sheikh Salman has said that he will think twice of being a member in Hizbul-Islam.
Nevertheless it is not yet clear where this condemnation will lead to.
Pamphlets threatening security group found in Puntland region by Mohammed Omar Hussein (Somaliweyn)
Threatening leaflets were found to have been scattered overnight in almost all the sections of the commercial seaport of Bosaso in the semi-autonomous state of Puntland in north-eastern Somalia.
The writings on the leaflets were threats towards the employees of Puntland Intelligence Service. These pamphlets have not only scared away the staff of the PIS, but also the ordinary citizens in the region.
The contents of the letter said that the Puntland Intelligence Service works for the interest of America and Ethiopia, and very often oppresses and threatens the religious figures in the region.
So far no group has come forward to claim the responsibility for distributing these pamphlets and the authority of Puntland has not given out comments about these threatening leaflets.
At present there is a stand-off between the former PIS commander, who refused to be relieved by Puntland president Farole and be replaced with the newly appointed head of the now renamed Puntland Intelligence Agency (PIA).
Puntland regional state is the hub for the largest number of Somali sea pirates, and the security of the region is not good - proven by the killing of top Puntland state officials including cabinet Ministers – though being one of the regions in Somalia where many people from the war-ravaged southern regions in their search for a peaceful life have migrated to.
Al Shabaab condemns Dubai meeting (Mareeg)
Al Shabaab militant group has strongly condemned Friday the meeting about Somalia which was held in Dubai last week.
Sheikh Mukhtar Abu Mansoor, the former spokesman and the deputy leader of al Shabaab condemned the meeting which influential Muslim clerics and Somali president attended in Dubai last week.
The Muslim clerics who attended the meeting “Bringing peace to Somalia” described the fighting against the Somalia government as Un-Islamic and called on the Somali people to reject the actions by the Somali militant groups.
Addressing hundreds of people in Nasruddin Mosque after Friday’s prayer, Abu Mansoor called on the Somali people to take part their fighting against the Somali government and the African Union troops in the country.
He said some of the Muslim clerics who attended the meeting had declared the “Jihad” in Somalia before and described as unfortunate to reject now.
The clerics said in the end of the meeting which was organized by the Global Centre of Renewal and Guidance (GCRG) led by the renowned Mauritanian Islamic scholar Sheikh Abdalla Bin Bayah it was a religious obligation to recognize the legitimate authority of the Somali government led by president Sharif Sheikh Ahmed.
Top Al Shabab commander assassinated in southern Somali town (APA)
Suspected Hezbal Islam gunmen have shot and killed a high-ranking Al Shabab commander Sheikh Daood Ali Hassan in the key port town of Kismayo, about 500 kilometres south of the Somali capital Mogadishu, officials confirm here Saturday.
“The slain man, who was the group’s commander in the city of Dhobley near the borer with Kenya, has been in Kismayo for the past several days and was due to return to Dhobley early on Saturday but was killed last night,” Sheikh Abokar Ali Aden, Al -Shaba’s governor of southern Juba regions told reporters Saturday.
“What I can confirm is that our brother Sheikh Daood has been killed by notorious assailants and investigations are under way to find out who was exactly behind his killing,” the governor said, adding that some suspects have been arrested a little while after the killing.
No group has yet claimed responsibility for the assassination, but speculations say that another Islamist group, Hezbal Islam, is suspected to have carried out the killing in retaliation for the assassination of Sheikh Barre Ali Barre, the second in command of the group who was killed in Mogadishu’s Bakara Market earlier this month.
Both Islamist insurgent groups were allied in fighting against the Somali government but later fell apart and started fighting for the control of the key port town of Kismayo in October last year, as the city later fell into the hands of Shabab militants after a long combat in October last year.
In May 2009, both Islamist opposition groups launched a big offensive against the Somali government in a bid to topple it, but African Union peacekeepers in Mogadishu have been protecting the government since then.
Al Shabaab official killed in Kismayo (Mareeg)
A commander from al Shabaab Insurgents has been shot dead in Kismayo, 500 kilometers south of the Somali capital Mogadishu, witnesses and officials said on Saturday.
A commander from al Shabaab Insurgents has been shot dead in Kismayo, 500 kilometers south of the Somali capital Mogadishu, witnesses and officials said on Saturday.
Sheikh Daud Ali Hassan, who was the commander of Dhobley police station, was killed in Kismayo overnight by gunmen.
Sheikh Abukar Ali Adan the governor of Juba regions in southern Somalia under the control of al Shabaab said they were investigating the killing and added that they have arrested some suspected people on the spot.
The gunmen escaped from the scene after the killing of the commander.
No group has claimed the killing of the commander and it is the first time that al Shabaab official was killed in Kismayo.
Somali Islamist al-Shabab commander assassinated (BBC)
A senior commander of the Somali Islamist group, al-Shabab, has been shot dead at close range as he left a mosque in the city of Kismayo.
Unidentified gunmen shot Sheikh Daud Ali Hasan several times, inside an area of Somalia held by his own forces.
Sheikh Hasan was in charge of front line operations in the town of Dhobley, near the Kenyan border.
Al-Shabab said it arrested several people and would bring them before a court, but did not identify them.
Rival Islamist groups in the vicinity, including Hizbul-Islam, have not said whether they were behind the killing.
A witness, Ahmed Daud, said: “At least three masked men armed with pistols shot Sheikh Daud Ali Hasan several times in the head and the chest as he was coming out of a mosque in Kismayo.”
Hours after the assassination, Hizbul-Islam fighters launched an attack in Dhobly and claimed they had killed number of al-Shabab militants during the attack.
Al-Shabab and Hizbul-Islam are the only two insurgent groups fighting against the UN-backed, weak Somali government and the African Union soldiers.
They have fought together in the capital against government forces and the AU peacekeepers, but in the southern Jubba regions the groups continue to fight each other.
The dispute began last year when al-Shabab forcibly took control of Kismayo from Hizbul-Islam.
Islamist guns down a civilian in southern town (Mareeg)
An Islamist militia from Hizbul Islam group has shot dead a civilian woman in Afgoye town, 30 km south of Mogadishu, witnesses said on Saturday.
Residents say the soldier opened gun fire to passenger bus taking passengers from a bus station in the town and a woman was severely injured who later died in a hospital in the town.
It is not known why the soldier has opened the fire to the bus but reports say the driver ran over a checkpoint in the area manned by Hizbul Islam rebel group.
A soldier from Hizbul Islam killed a doctor in Afgoye last year and the soldier was later executed by his group.
Officials from the group say they captured the soldier who killed the woman and will bring him before justice.
Somali militants excavate grave of a revered Sunni Muslim cleric (APA)
Militants belonging to the Al Qaeda-inspired Al Shabab movement in Somalia have excavated and destroyed the grave of a revered Sunni Muslim cleric Sheikh Hassan Moalim in Basra Village in the Middle Shabelle region, residents confirm here Saturday.
Some residents in the village who were reached for comment by APA said that Al Shabab militants had destroyed the grave of Sheikh Hassan Moalim and those of dozens of other Sunni followers since early Friday.
“They have destroyed the grave of our beloved Sheikh and took his decayed bones with them. The Sheikh was buried there some two hundred years ago and he was well known for spreading the message of the Islamic religion,” Hajji Dahir Ahmed, a resident in the village told APA by telephone on Saturday.
“I am sorry for what has happened, since my childhood, thousands of well wishers were arriving here in Basra to pay homage to his grave,” said Hajji Dahir, who is over 80 years old.
For the past three years, Al Shabab militants have been destroying the graves of the revered Suffiyah clerics of the Sunni Muslim sect and that led to the Suffiyah Muslims taking up arms to fight against Al Shabab militants with ties to Al Qaeda.
Late in 2008, the two groups fought in central Somali regions where the Suffiyah Muslims are now controlling after defeating the Al Shabab militants in different combat zones.
The Suffiyah are now controlling more towns and cities including the city of Dhusamareeb, which was once a base for the former Al Qaeda chief in Somalia Sheikh Aden Hashi Airow who was killed by a US air strike in May 2008.
The Suffiyah group, Ahlu Sunna Waljamaa has not yet commented on the latest incident of excavating the revered cleric’s grave which is seen by many as a big sin against Islam.
Al Shabaab excavates famous Sheikh from grave (Mareeg)
Al Shabaab militants who are fighting against the Somali government have excavated the body of famous Sheikh from his grave in Basra town in middle Shabelle region in southern Somalia, witnesses said on Saturday.
Residents said the grave of Sheikh Hassan Moallin has been excavated from Basra where thousands of people used to pay homage every year.
Al Shabaab has been destroying graves in towns in southern Somalia under their control since 2008.
Sufi adherents pay homage to graves where respected clerics are buried. There is no word from the Sufi sect.
Ahlu Sunna Waljama’a fighters took up arms against Shabaab in 2009 to protect them against destroying the graves of their respected clerics.
UN Food Aid Used To Nourish War In Somalia by Babukar Kashka (IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis)
The news is scaring: part of UN food aid to war-torn Somalia ends in the hands of ‘war-lords’ and local contractors who deliver their profits – or the aid itself – to armed factions, thus fueling the armed conflict.
“A handful of Somali contractors for aid agencies have formed a cartel and become important power-brokers, some of whom channel their profits, or the aid itself, directly to armed opposition groups,” Security Council’s Monitoring Group on Somalia reported.
In its report, released on March 17, 2010, the UN group of experts points out the Adaani family, one of the three largest contractors for the World Food Programme (WFP) in Somalia, which has “long been a financier of armed groups,” and which has ties with Hassan Dahir Aweys, the leader of the militia coalition Hizbul Islam.
CORRUPTION
For its part, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported on March 12 that insurgents disrupted food aid deliveries bound for five sites in Mogadishu as part of a WFP feeding scheme.
“Two trucks were seized on March 6, but were released the next day, thanks to the intervention of elders. Three out of the five sites received their rations, and once the security situation improves, it is hoped that the remaining two sites – feeding 10,000 people – will be able to carry out their work,” OCHA reported.
The Monitoring Group criticised “the war economy for corrupting and enfeebling state institutions under the leadership of the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) and President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed.”
Apparently, “corruption has spread to the Somali security services which sell their military supplies in open markets,” says the Group in its report.
“The limited ability of the transitional government to pay its officials and security forces is handicapped by entrenched corruption at all levels: commanders and troops alike sell their arms and ammunition, sometimes even to their enemies.”
The report also cautioned against the increasing involvement of Somalia’s immediate neighbours, Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya, which “are militarily involved in the conflict or plan to become involved in the coming months.”
“Somalia is one of the most dangerous places in the world for humanitarian workers, and an environment within which WFP has to constantly adjust and revise its operations,” according to the UN.
In early 2010, WFP was forced to suspend the delivery of food assistance in southern Somalia due to growing insecurity and threats and unacceptable demands from armed groups in the region.
DESPERATION
Meanwhile, there is growing anxiety in Nairobi about the mounting waves of refugees from Somalia. In fact, Kenya has witnessed an influx of these refugees, with 10,000 new Somali refugees having been registered in the first nine weeks of 2010 alone.
In this regard, UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) fears that the Dabaab refugee complex in northern Kenya, already home to 270,000 refugees, could see a spike in arrivals, according to its spokesperson Andrej Mahecic.
In a previous report, the UN refugee agency reported that Somalia continues to be among the countries generating the highest number of internally displaced people (IDPs) with over 1.4 million, in addition to more than 560,000 refugees.
Although food and livestock production in the southern part of Somalia have improved leading to a reduction in the number of people in need of food assistance, WFP is “extremely concerned for the welfare of people in this region we know to be in need of assistance.”
Ongoing drought and civil unrest in central Somalia has left 70 percent of the population in the region in need of humanitarian assistance.
Six consecutive seasons of below-average rainfall have decimated livestock herds and forced many pastoralists to gather in towns and villages in search of assistance.
Deepening drought in northern Somalia is also now of particular concern, with nearly 300,000 people in need of assistance.
And one in six Somali children is acutely malnourished – a total of some 240,000 children – the highest acute malnutrition rates anywhere in the world.
WFP is currently targeting some 2.5 million people for food assistance across Somalia, although 625,000 of those are in areas where operations are currently suspended. In 2009, WFP reached 3.3 million people in Somalia with food supplies.
Last year, WFP doubled its capacity to reach moderately malnourished children and women with nearly 150,000 treated in WFP-supported supplementary feeding programmes. It is piloting the use of specialised ready-to-use supplementary food.
In the capital, WFP continues to provide 80,000 hot meals each day to mainly women and children through local and international partners.
Naval escorts continue to be necessary for ships carrying WFP food into Somalia, in order to protect against the threat of piracy.
In January, the agency had to suspend operations across southern Somalia in response to intimidation of its staff and the imposition of a number of unreasonable demands by armed groups that contravened WFP’s rules and regulations for delivering food for the hungry.
SOMALIA, WHAT SOMALIA?
Situated in the so-called Horn of Africa, and bordering with Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya and the Indian Ocean, Somalia covers over 637,000 kilometers, hosting some 10 million inhabitants who speak Somali, Arabic, Italian and English, and are mostly Muslim Sunnis.
Somalia’s main ethnic groups are Somali (some 85%), Bantu and other non-Somali (15%) including slightly over 300,000 Arabs. Nevertheless, Somalia is a member of the League of Arab States.
It is not a poor country buy extremely impoverished. In fact, Somalia has uranium and quasi unexploited reserves of iron ore, bauxite, copper, tin, salt, natural gas and non-quantified oil reserves. Foreign fishing floats largely benefit from its fish-rich waters and contiguous international waters.
Nevertheless, its income per capita is around 600 US dollars.
Another fact is that Somalia was historically made of different tribes living in different areas that used to include large areas, which now remain outside the country.
EUROPEAN COLONISATION
The big European colonial powers took bits and pieces of it, splitting it arbitrarily in five different Somalia.
One is the so-called British Somalia. There, in 1839, the British Empire established a military protectorate in the North West region, cutting it up from Somalia. It remained under British occupation until independence in 1960.
The second one is the so-called French Somalia – in 1860, the French Empire decided to take one part of Somalia, which became independent in 1997, and now known as Djibouti.
The third is the so-called Italian Somalia. There, in 1889, Italy opted for not lagging behind other European powers and therefore occupied another part of Somalia. This part is the largest area, positioned in the South and East of the country, hosting over 2.5 million people. In 1938, Italy decided to enlarge its occupation, invading other parts of Somalia and occupying Ogaden, which was under British rule.
The fourth one is the ‘Kenyan’ Somalia. Another region, situated in the South West of Somalia, was annexed to the British-ruled Kenya in 1963. Before Kenya’s independence from Britain, this region decided its integration to Somalia, through a referendum. This result, however, was declared null. It remained in Kenya.
The fifth Somalia is the ‘Ethiopian’ Somalia or the Ogaden region, which was formerly occupied by Britain, later on by Italy, and finally it was annexed by Ethiopia.
After the II Big War, Britain annexed the French and Italian areas, naming them Somalia, which was declared independent in 1960.
A formally independent Somalia, but left without some of its – one part was annexed to Ethiopia, a second part was annexed to Kenya, and a third one became Djibouti. All this would lead to several wars.
The dramatic fact is that none of its former colonisers managed to act to halt the continuing bloodshed in this country which has known no peace, no development and no human care – not to speak of a stable government over the last about a quarter century.
Dahabshiil opens Islamic Bank in Djibouti by Mohammed Omar Hussein (Somaliweyn)
Dahabshiil which is one of the leading remittance companies in Somalia has on Saturday opened a new Islamic bank in the Djiboutian capital Djibouti.
In the opening of the ceremony top figures in the government of Djibouti have attended including the President of Djbouti his Excellency Ishmael Omar Gelle, the first lady Khadra Mohamoud Hayd, the Prime Minister of Djibouti Dileita Mohammed Dileita, the speaker of the Djbouti national assembly Idiris A. Ali and the chairman of Djibouti central bank Jamac Mohamoud Heyd and some other dignitaries.
“Our bank is an international bank and we shall be dealing with our clients in an Islamic way I mean there will be no usuries in our bank, and I hope this will be a good example of depositing and withdrawal of money from the bank, we have currently employed highly skilled and talented Djiboutian citizens, and in the near future we are planning to open similar Islamic banks across Africa” said Mr. Abdirashid Mohammed Saaid the overall chairman of Dahabshiil.
“Dahabshiil bank is for the entire Somalis people wherever they are in the world and I am sure that they will have smooth access with it and no difficulties at all whatsoever” added Abdirashid.
Dahabshiil has been operating for over 40 years both locally and internationally, but in the capacity of money transferring company.
———— reports, news and views from the global village with an impact on Somalia ——————-
Seriously ill Somali woman and her son deported from Norway (SomalilandPress)
Fathiya Ahmed Omar and her six year old son, Munir, were forcefully deported from Bergen, Norway, and sent back to the city of Genoa in Italy where she was found to have been a fingered-printed and was processed as an asylum seeker before entering Norway.
Ms. Omar left Mogadishu, Somalia, carrying her son Munir and walking all the way to Kenya. From Kenya she went to Sudan, and eventually ended up in Libya. On her way to Libya she was held captive by Libyan human traffickers who raped her for twenty days.
After this tribulation, Fathiya and her child arrived in Italy where she was processed in the city of Genoa as an asylum seeker. Fathiya decided to head to Norway where she had some family members and she went to the city of Bergen.
Last week Immigration officers came to Fathiya’s apartment and she was given one hour to gather all her belongings and was told that she will be deported to Italy because of the Dublin Cooperation regulation (343/2003/EC).
This agreement established a series of criteria in which any member state that permits an applicant to enter or to reside in the territories of the member states of the European Union is obligated to take back its applicants who are irregularly found in another Member State.
At the time of her deportation Fathiya Omar was undergoing intensive medical surgery at the Bergen hospital for the rape that she sustained from the Libyan human traffickers. Doctor Ulf Horlyk who was treating Fathiya before her deportation confirmed that Fathiya not only needed the physical surgery but also that she needs physiological treatment for the torment that she went through. Fathiya and her son Munir are now in the city of Genoa, Italy, where they are homeless and without the medical treatment that Fathiya requires. She may not make it without assistance from international rights groups and medical teams.
On 18 February 2003, the EU Council of Ministers adopted a regulation (343/2003/EC) establishing a series of criteria which, in general, allocate responsibility for examining an asylum application to the Member State that permitted the applicant to enter or to reside in the territories of the Member States of the European Union. That Member State is responsible for examining the application according to its national law and is obliged to take back its applicants who are irregularly in another Member State.
Security Council Extends Mandate of Group Monitoring Weapons Bans in Somalia (ReliefWeb)
Condemning the continued flow of weapons that it said violated its arms embargoes on Somalia and Eritrea, the Security Council this afternoon extended for 12 months the mandate of the group monitoring those measures, expanding its mandate and giving it three additional experts.
Unanimously adopting resolution 1916 (2010) under the Charter’s Chapter VII, the Council also condemned the misappropriation and politicization of humanitarian assistance by armed groups in Somalia and called upon all Member States and United Nations units to take all feasible steps to mitigate such practices.
Through the resolution, in addition, the Council decided to ease some restrictions and obligations under the sanctions regime to enable the delivery of supplies and technical assistance by international, regional and subregional organizations and to ensure the timely delivery of urgently needed humanitarian assistance by the United Nations.
The expanded mandate of the Monitoring Group includes oversight of the arms embargo on Eritrea and the designation of individuals subjected to a travel ban and asset freeze for violations, as set out in December 2009 by resolution 1907, which demanded that Eritrea cease its support for destabilizing elements in the region.
The Council, by today’s action, reiterated its intention to consider further specific action to improve the implementation of the arms embargo, which was first imposed by resolution 733 in 1992 on arms destined for Somalia. The country has been without a functioning Government and beset by factional fighting since 1991.
Kenyan Nation Stuck With Somali ‘Mercenaries’ by Abdilatif Maalim
An estimated 2,500 Somali youths trained by Kenya to fight in Somalia are stranded at Archer’s Post in Isiolo, The Star has established.
A report by the UN Monitoring Group on Somalia which was presented to the UN Security Council indicates the youths, majority of them from the Ogaden clan, started receiving training early last year at the request of President Sheikh Shariff under the auspices of his then Minister of Defence Mohamed Abdi Mohammed “Gandhi”.
“Kenya hosted the programme and Ethiopia has been closely involved.
Approximately 2,500 youths were recruited by clan elders and commissioned agents both from within Somalia (exclusively the Juba Valley) and Northeastern Kenya, including the Daadab refugee camp,” states the UN report.
The Star established that the youths cannot be deployed to Somalia as there was a stalemate between Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia about where they would be most useful.
While the Kenyan security forces want to have the youths deployed in the southern Somali regions of Juba and Gedo to create a buffer zone with the militant Al Shabaab, Ethiopia and the Somalia transitional government want them sent to Mogadishu to help repulse the Al Shabaab who have taken control of large parts of the capital.
Somalia President Sheikh Shariff later fell out with his Defence minister Mohamed Ghandi, an Ogadeni, whom he suspected of pushing for the deployment of the youths in Juba and Gedo to not only fight the Al Shabaab but also lay the foundation for the establishment of an Ogaden autonomous region.
Ethiopia’s fears the deployment of the contingent in Ogaden might bolster and give the Ogaden National Liberation Front a launching pad for its attacks against Ethiopia.
The Ogaden clan live in the central Ogaden plateau of Ethiopia, the North Eastern Province of Kenya, and the Jubaland region of Southern Somalia. In Kenya, the Ogadeni have served the government in key positions since independence.
Yesterday Somalia Ambassador to Kenya, Mohamed Ali Nur, confirmed there was a stalemate in the deployment process. He could not comment further “because the issue is sensitive.” “The government of Somalia will very soon address that. I am not an authority on this matter. I can’t talk about it, but I have heard the reports of the former Somali Defence minister meeting with Somali elders in Nairobi on the deployment issue,” said Ali Nur.
The Ministry of Foreign Affair spokesman Egara Kabaji denied the UN report that Kenya was training the youths to support Somalia transitional government. He denied the existence of the such a contingent anywhere in the country, Kabaji said the only training that the government was involved in was in accordance with an agreement between the EU and Kenya in which Kenya offered to train policemen for the Somalia government.
“The last time we trained Somali police officers was in 2006, when we trained 200 VIP protection police officers. But even as we speak there is a plan between Kenya and the EU to train Somali policemen,” said Kabaji.
However, according to the UN report: “In December 2009, the Kenyan Minister for security, George Saitoti, reportedly confirmed to foreign diplomats the existence of Jubaland policy which is intended to establish a ‘buffer zone’ bordering Kenya in the Juba Valley.” Yesterday Parliament’s departmental committee of Foreign Affairs said they will in the next 10 days table a report on the recruitment in the House. Committee chairman Aden Keynan said the matter had serious consequences for security in the region.
“The issue we have been dealing with is about recruitment of the youth which the committee has concluded its investgigations,” said Keynan.
According to the UN report, two training centres were established at the Kenya Wildlife Service training camp at Manyani, and near Archer’s Post in Isiolo.
“A total of 36 Somali officers were recruited to assist in the training under the command of a General Abdi Mahdi and Abdullahi Sheikh Ismail ‘Fartaag’. The officers completed one-month training in September 2009″.
The youths under the command of General Mahdi, a former Somali warlord, were supposed to be deployed on February 16, 2010 immediately after they completed their training.
They have been at the training camps since then waiting for their deployment.
Yesterday security analysts were fearful that if the squad is allowed back into the communities it would pose a grave security risk. A few of the trainees escaped from the camp when they received reports they might be deployed to Mogadishu to fight the Al-Shabaab militants.
One of the Kenyan Somali trainers who sought anonymity told the Star that he and other trainers have not been paid since the programme started last September.
The youths who were each promised a salary of $150 (Sh11,400) a month after recruitment had also not been paid.
Last Tuesday the former Somalia Defence minister Mohamed Ghandi hosted elders from the Marehan and Ogaden clans to brief them on the training and deployment plans. The meeting, held at Chester House, Nairobi, also discussed the possibility of the two clans withdrawing their support to the Somali government.
Sources at the meeting said Ghandi assured the elders that the youths will be deployed in the Gedo and Juba region as he had initially planned when he was still Minister.
[N.B.: In two similarly ill-advised ventures the US and European Armed Forces are training Somali mercenaries in Djibouti and Uganda. Why the European and North-American taxpayers and people with brains do not stop such craziness can no longer be understood except under the pretext that the financing peoples are totally ignorant and/or their military adventure machines have gone completely out of control.]
Sh27bn Kenya arms purchase queried by Dominic Wabala (DailyNation)
UN last week said Kenya had spent Sh27 billion on combat aircraft, helicopters and grenade launchers. Although Kenya is not at war, militants in Somalia have threatened to attack the country. Kenya neighbours Ethiopia, which is fighting two wars.
The government was on Sunday on the spot over its massive expenditure on military hardware. A whopping Sh27 billion ($348 million) was used to buy combat aircraft, helicopters, grenade launchers and other light arms in a single year, according to a report by a peace studies institute.
In the report released last week, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, says Kenya came fourth behind South Africa, Angola and Sudan in a group of 23 east and southern African countries in the 2008 weapons purchases.
Transparency International has termed Kenya’s expenditure as “gross miscarriage of justice for a country that is not at war”. “Kenya is not at war with any country, yet our military expenditure compares with Ethiopia, which has a larger army and is at war with two countries,” Mr Job Ogonda, the executive director of TI Kenya chapter, said.
The money, he added, should instead have been used on urgent needs like free primary education, buying farmers’ maize or milk that is going to waste. “Why do we need all that military hardware, yet we don’t have money for the referendum or for the interim electoral commission to begin voter registration?”
The TI boss said the weapons may be used against Kenyans in case of political violence similar to the one that followed the disputed presidential poll in 2007.
Large sums of money
Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Security, Fred Kapondi, said it was unjustifiable to spend such large sums of money on weapons. But the Mt Elgon MP also raised the possibility that most of the money alleged to have been spent on weapons may have been stolen by officials.
“There is no correlation between what the government says we have spent and the equipment we have. A lot of this money goes into individuals’ pockets,” Mr Kapondi said. Among the hardware Kenya is said to have bought were 15 combat aircraft from Jordan and four helicopters from China.
South Africa, which is modernising its military, spent Sh285.7 billion while Angola used Sh184.2 billion. Department of Defence spokesman Bogita Ongeri, disputed the figure saying although the military is modernising, it did not spend that kind of money on hardware purchases.
“The amount being mentioned could be the total allocation to the department, which includes what is used to pay emoluments and other expenses to staff,” Mr Ongeri said. The report titled, “Trends in International Arms Transfers, 2009”, reveals that Kenya received 40,000 rifles and 405 grenade launchers from Ukraine in 2007.
It notes that in several cases, small volumes of arms supplies to sub-Saharan African countries have had “a major impact on regional conflict dynamics.” According to the report, Kenya’s expenditure on weapons has been rising steadily over the years from Sh16.7 billion in 1999 to Sh27 billion in 2008.
Trafficking of desperate Ethiopians a lucrative trade in Kenya by Ali Abdi (TheStandard)
One Response at Ethiopian Review to “Trafficking of desperate Ethiopians a lucrative trade in Kenya”
The Godless are acting Satanic… says:
Ghana was the reason to the flourishing of black slave trade by western Europeans for 300 years and colonization. Ghana allowed herself to become the centre of slave trade (the first international trade in any form in human history) and the west European slave traders were allowed to settle there to conduct this horrible and inhuman cruel acts against the Africans. Ghana also participated with this criminal act including hunting the slaves deep in the continent and bringing them to the west Europeans.
History is repeating itself again in Africa. This time in East Africa. Kenya is playing the same dirty job as Ghana did back then. Kenya is becoming the nobody’s land zone (a country nobody cares about her but corruption, selfishness and being owned by foreigners for few cash in return) to mainly western Europeans such as to so called business people, Journalists, Organizations and the likes.
The tourism industry, Animal(safari) parks, huge fertile lands and so on in Kenya are still owned by the colonizers. Anything bad against Africa will come only through this corrupt place. The land of Kenyatta became looking like this. It is shame.
So, don’t think the human traffickers are Kenyans or/and Ethiopians. These stupids are serving the well organized international traffickers settled in Kenya as the slave traders were settled in Ghana.
Top terror suspect vanishes from Kenyan police station by NATION Team
A high-level terror suspect arrested by police in Kenya has mysteriously disappeared from custody at a border police station.
Kenyan anti-terror detectives identified the man who disappeared from police custody as an operative of the al-Shabaab which has links to the al-Qaeda terror network.
The man, who was arrested on March 13, was reported missing at 9 pm on Tuesday last week from Busia police station where he was awaiting further profiling by Anti-Terrorism Police Unit officers from Nairobi.
Three police officers, a sergeant and two constables, have been arrested in connection with the suspect’s disappearance. They are suspected to have accepted cash from the suspect to release him.
Anti-terror detectives identified the man as an operative of the Somalia-based al-Shabaab which has links to the al-Qaeda terror network and had been placed on an international watch list.
The suspect had an Australian passport identifying him as Farah Hussein, but Immigration officers arrested him after suspecting that the document was forged.
Two Busia businessmen were also arrested and charged in court for “aiding a prisoner to escape” as they had visited the man at the station.
The man had $3,400 (Sh258,400) on him when he was arrested just after crossing the Uganda border.
Senior officers dispatched from the Western provincial headquarters to investigate the escape found that the suspect was given “special treatment” while in custody.
NEXT WAR IN THE MAKING
Canadian Company to Explore Oil in Ogaden, Ethiopia (EZEGA)
African Oil, a Canadian company, plans to explore oil and gas resources in the Ogaden basin in the southeastern part of Ethiopia, reports Ethiopian Reporter.
Based in Vancouver, the company has acquired two exploration blocks in the Ogaden basin, previously under Lundin, a Swedish oil and gas company. Lundin has conducted different geological surveys including aeromag survey in the blocks covering an area of over 25000 sq.m of land. African oil has also bought exploration blocks in Keya and Puntland. These blocks were also owned by Lundin. Last year Lundin announced that it was to farm out all its concession in East Africa, namely in Ethiopia, Kenya and Puntland.
Industry analysts believe that East Africa is the next hot zone for oil discovery. The recent discovery of oil in the Albert basin of Uganda by Tullow Oil has boosted hopes for more discoveries in the East Africa rift system, according to the report.
The Ogaden basin is a vast arid land in the remote eastern part of Ethiopia. The sedimentary basin has a total area of 350,000 sq.m. As the basin has an equivalent age and similar geological formation to oil productive basins in the Middle East, it has been considered as the most promising area for oil reserve discovery.
Dozens of foreign oil companies at different times have engaged in oil exploration activities since the 1950s in the Ogaden basin, found in the Somali Regional State.
Is ‘AINSWORTHLESS’ actually planning to parachute himself into Somalia?
‘GIVE TROOPS A HALO FOR PROTECTION’ by Marco Giannangeli (Express)
Col Stuart Tootal, a former officer, said troops were not equipped with the right parachutes
CRACK troops are wasting their skills because they are not equipped with the right kind of parachutes, according to a former officer.
Col Stuart Tootal said last night that HALO – High Altitude Low Opening – and HAHO – High Altitude High Opening – parachutes, which are linked to GPS navigation systems and used by the SAS, could be used to greater effect by a more conventional force.
“It’s a great source of frustration that, unlike the Americans, Paras are not being allowed to use their special skills in war zones,” he said.
“For the price of a Typhoon jet we could equip all paratroopers with GPS-guided high altitude parachutes which could drop them silently behind an enemy. This would give them a unique ability and would be especially effective in Afghanistan and Somalia.”
Col Tootal, who commanded 3rd Battalion The Parachute Regiment in Afghanistan, quit the Army in 2008 over concerns about equipment. In his book Danger Close he tells how Prince Charles took his concerns over helicopter shortages straight to former Defence Secretary John Reid.
* Djibouti president hopes for third mandate starting 2011
* Sees Somalia situation improving
* Expects up to 6 pct GDP growth in 2010
* Chinese to transform port into region’s shipping hub
Djibouti, a former French colony which separates Eritrea from Somalia, hosts France’s largest military base in Africa and a major U.S. base. Its port is used by foreign navies patrolling busy shipping lanes off the coast of Somalia to fight piracy.
The president of Djibouti Ismail Omar Guelleh signalled in an interview that he was prepared to run for a third six-year term if lawmakers amend the constitution in the small Horn of Africa nation. Asked if he would accept the parliament’s decision to approve a third term, he said: “If it’s God’s will.”
The national assembly is expected to decide next week on an extension of presidential terms in office and speculation has surrounded his plans to run for a third mandate. “This is a demand from our population and this will be next year. Let us wait for the outcome of the national commission that is working on the subject,” Guelleh said in an interview on Saturday at the 19th century French colonial presidential palace on the shores of the Indian Ocean.
Guelleh took office in 1999 and his second mandate expires in April 2011. Guelleh said he believed the situation in Somalia was improving. “I think the situation is better than before. There is some sort of fed-up (mood) among the Somali people especially of Mogadishu’s citizens which suffer from this opposition. I think that (President) Sheikh Sharif (Ahmed) will prevail,” he said.
Since 2007, fighting between pro-government militia and the Islamist al Shabaab group — which Washington sees as al Qaeda’s proxy in the region — has killed more than 21,000 Somalis and driven 1.5 million from their homes.
Ahmed joined a Western-backed peace process and was voted president of Somalia in January 2009 in an election which took place in Djibouti. Guelleh said he was not planning to send more troops to Somalia on top of the 450 Djibouti has pledged to boost a 5,000 strong African Union force there.
The U.N. Security Council imposed sanctions on Eritrea in December, accusing it of destabilising the region by providing funds and arms to Islamist insurgents in Somalia. Eritrea has denied the allegations.
Relations between Djibouti and neighbouring Eritrea under President Isaias Afwerki remain hostile.
“We are now in the process of implementation of the resolution which we hope will make this guy more flexible to the international community,” Guelleh said, referring to Isaias. “He must abide by international law.” Guelleh said he expected Djibouti’s 2010 gross domestic product (GDP) to come in above a 5.4 percent estimate by the International Monetary Fund.
“We have not so much been affected by the financial crisis. We hope that there will be an influx of foreign direct investment which will boost our economy. We hope that we will achieve 5.7 or even 6 percent,” he said.
Chinese will be Djibouti’s biggest investors next year and in 2012, Guelleh said. “The Chinese will help make the port of Djibouti the biggest hub in this region. That will cost nearly half a billion U.S. dollars,” he said. “We’ll have an electrified railway from Djibouti to Addis Ababa — also by the Chinese. And we’ll have geothermal energy. And we are in discussions with French investors (about) wind farms.”
Spanish EU Presidency wants to meet IGAD by Jackson Maina
After the European Council meeting of Thursday 25 and Friday 26 March the EU and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), which brings together the six countries in the Horn of Africa – Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda – will discuss the conflicts in Somalia and Sudan and the role of the EU in both countries, at a ministerial meeting held as part of the political talks held by the parties every year.
The meeting, being held at the request of Catherine Ashton, will be chaired by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Ángel Lossada.
But the African Nations in the Horn of Africa are getting tired with the rotation of the EU presidency andd with meeting every six month new and inexperienced teams from Europe, while nothing which was discussed under the previous EU presidencies has been implemented or improved.
Like the naval officers need a situation as provided for them now around the Horn of Africa to get their first patches, ribbons and medals pinned to their overly proud breasts, the African talk excercises of the EU seem to be a cadre school opportunity for the offspings of Europe’s bold and not so beautiful to earn their first pair of spoores.
Real African leaders would put an end to such.
Don’t break away from Sudan, West tells South by Michael Wakabi (EastAfrican)
Donor circles want Southern Sudan to drop its bid for independence in the referendum next January, as concerns grow that a rushed secession could trigger turmoil and instability beyond Sudanese borders.
In 2005, President Omar al-Bashir’s National Congress Party and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, led by the late Dr John Garang signed a Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that ended 22 years of war between the North and South.
That CPA left the door open for the South to break away from the union if 60 per cent of voters decide so in the 2011 plebiscite.
Although the United States, which is considered to have a vested interest in the outcome of Sudan’s peace process says it “takes no position on what the outcome of that referendum should be,”
The EastAfrican has separately learned that key Western democracies and institutions, fearing that independence for the South in its present state could see the area slide into anarchy, have quietly urged President Salva Kiir’s government to go slow on secession.
“Independence for the South should be put off for a few more years primarily because of lack of capacity in the South to run a stable and secure state,” said a source privy to Western analysis of the evolving situation in Sudan.
He added: “There is no institutional infrastructure to support a state, so there is a high chance that the country will degenerate into a Somalia-like situation. This would open a ‘corridor of terror’ across the region that could be infiltrated by Al Qaeda and its associates to create instability that would run counter to Western interests.”
The West is spooked by the prospect of sudden independence for a fragile state — with a corrupt and fractious national leadership, a nearly non-existent civil service, a poorly established local police and professional military — immediately disintegrating into a civil war.
This could draw the international community into a costly intervention to rebuild a state that few countries want to underwrite in the current economic climate.
With new discoveries of oil in both Uganda and Sudan and the likelihood of further discoveries in the northeast of the Democratic Republic of Congo, peace in the region is essential to the exploitation of these resources.
Western strategists believe that even under the best of circumstances, the absence of institutional infrastructure in the South and independent communication links to the outside world mean Juba would remain hostage to Khartoum, making it difficult to get energy and other exports to outside markets.
Such a scenario would deny the infant state the resources to deliver to the population the promised benefits of independence, leading to high levels of discontent that could result in a breakdown of law and order, said one analyst.
Other fears revolve around the fact that the South is far from homogenous and united, with a real risk that it could spiral into uncontrolled violence as the different regions jostle over resources.
Apparently, the West would like to see some slack factored into the timeline for Juba’s independence ambitions, while the shaky alliance between the SPLM and al-Bashir — who has largely been “contained” by the ICC warrants against him — is propped up until such a time that institutional capacity and critical infrastructure have been developed in the South.
Apparently, Kenya and Uganda, which have separately announced plans to build key road and railway links to Juba, are partly implementing this strategy.
While it denies any direct interest in the outcome of the referendum, the United States says it is concerned about peace and stability in Southern Sudan and is working with both the SPLM and the NCP to “prepare for the 2011 referendum, and working with the parties to ensure that the process is fair and credible and that the will of the people, as expressed through the referendum, is respected peacefully.”
Lagging behind
Responding to enquiries by this newspaper, Joann M Lockard, public affairs officer at the US embassy in Kampala, said, “The United States is concerned about peace and stability in South Sudan. The parties in Sudan are behind in the implementation of the most contentious provisions of the CPA, which is why we have worked so hard in 2009 and will double our efforts in 2010 to implement the agreement before it expires in 2011.”
For their part, while officially professing the position of the Intergovernmental Authority on Drought and Development (Igad), which is to encourage the parties in Sudan to make unity as attractive as possible, Kenya and Uganda are pursuing a two-track strategy.
On one track, fearing to set a precedent that could lead to a ripple effect with sections of their own populations agitating for secession, Uganda and Kenya are not officially breaking ranks with proponents of a unified Sudan.
Uganda is still wary of what a split of Sudan would mean for its restive north, while Kenya has for years kept a wary eye on its northeastern regions bordering Somalia.
“In international law, it is very rare to find a country openly calling for the partition of another country because it sets a precedent that could come back to haunt them; in the case of Uganda, you must have heard Norbert Mao (chairman of Gulu District Local Council in northern Uganda) suggest that the north should break away from Uganda,” said Uganda’s Junior Minister for Foreign Affairs, Henry Okello Oryem.
According to independent sources however, Uganda and its EAC partners believe that despite the challenges the South faces, Juba is better off breaking away from its unproductive marriage with Khartoum.
IT’s RAPE AGAIN
NATO: AFRICOM’s Partner In Military Penetration Of Africa
NATO: AFRICOM’s Partner In Military Penetration Of Africa by Rick Rozoff (StopNATO)
The world’s oldest extant military bloc (formed 61 years ago) and the largest in history (twenty eight full members and as many partners on five continents), the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, counts among its major member states all of Africa’s former colonial powers: Britain, France, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Germany and Belgium.
After World War II and the groundswell of anti-colonial sentiment throughout Africa and Asia, the European powers were forced to withdraw from most of the African continent, though Portugal retained its possessions until the 1970s.
Most every new African nation adopted some model of socialist-oriented economic and political development and the continent as a whole more closely aligned itself with the Soviet Union, which moreover had for decades supported the anti-colonial struggles in Africa, than with the West, both Western Europe and the United States.
With the end of the Cold War and the breakup of the Soviet Union nearly twenty years ago, the major Western powers on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, united under the aegis of NATO, saw that as with the Balkans and the former republics of the Soviet Union itself, Africa was now wide open for penetration and domination.
NATO’s largest, most powerful and dominant member is of course the United States. On October 1, 2007 the Pentagon established United States Africa Command (AFRICOM) under the temporary wing of United States European Command, which at the time included in its area of responsibility all of Africa except for four island nations in the Indian Ocean and the Horn of Africa states and Egypt. (The first were in Pacific Command and the others in Central Command where Egypt, alone among Africa’s 53 nations, remains.)
A year to the day later AFRICOM was launched as the first new U.S. regional military command outside North America since Central Command was activated 25 years earlier in 1983. It takes in far more nations – 52 – than any other military command in history.
AFRICOM was conceived, carried, nurtured and delivered by the Pentagon’s European Command (EUCOM), based in Stuttgart, Germany where AFRICOM headquarters are also based as no nation in Africa has yet volunteered to be the host.
The top commander of EUCOM is “dual-hatted” as NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) and has been from General Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1951 to Admiral James Stavridis today.
The three top EUCOM/NATO military commanders most instrumental in the creation of AFRICOM were General Joseph Ralston (2000-2003), General James Jones (2003-2006) and General Bantz John Craddock (2006-2009). Arguably Jones, former Marine Corps four-star general and current U.S. National Security Adviser, was the real father of Africa Command. [1]
The distinction between the Pentagon and NATO in relation to Europe and Africa – and increasingly the Caucasus, the Caspian Sea Basin, Central Asia, South Asia and the Indian Ocean – is blurred and more and more of a strictly formal nature.
NATO has now joined AFRICOM’s first war, in Somalia.
The bloc’s Allied Command Operations website announced on March 18 that from March 5-16 the North Atlantic military alliance had airlifted 1,700 Ugandan troops from their homeland to the Somali capital of Mogadishu for the intensified fighting that began there earlier this month.
The Pentagon supplied the transport planes “under the NATO banner” and the operation was “undertaken by USA contracted DynCorp International. ” [2]
The commander of AFRICOM, General William Ward, recently informed the Senate Armed Services Committee of plans to focus the military command’s attention on East Africa and indicated plans to assist the formal government of Somalia to reclaim the country’s capital.
In May the European Union is to began training 2,000 Ugandan troops for deployment to war-wracked Somalia to assist the regime being propped up by the West.
NATO recently confirmed that it has prolonged an agreement to provide strategic sealift and airlift support for African (Ugandan, Rwandan and Burundian) troops to assist Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government in the nation’s civil war.
The bloc’s European command, Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE), “delegated the authority to Joint Command Lisbon to have the operational lead for NATO engagements with the African Union and they provide the majority of the personnel to support the mission.” [3]
As with the government of Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan, the Western-backed Transitional Federal Government doesn’t even control its own capital. Since last week fighting there has led to hundreds of people being killed and wounded and thousands displaced.
Six days earlier NATO effected a changing of the guard “in the Gulf of Aden and Somali Basin” [4] as part of its Operation Ocean Shield, and five warships of the Standing NATO Maritime Group 2 joined four from the Standing NATO Maritime Group 1 in Djibouti, where there are some 2,000 U.S. troops and where AFRICOM bases its Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa. Djibouti also hosts over 1,000 French soldiers and France’s second largest military base abroad.
On March 10 NATO extended its deployment of warships in the Gulf of Aden and the Horn of Africa until the end of 2012 in what originally was portrayed as an ad hoc, short-term deployment when Operation Ocean Shield was initiated last August following Operation Allied Protector in March. Instead, NATO has effectively expanded its over eight-year-old naval operation in the Mediterranean Sea, Operation Active Endeavor, through the Red Sea and into the Arabian Sea and is now involved in the Horn of Africa both on land and at sea.
The Standing NATO Maritime Groups consist of warships from member states assigned for the occasion – the latest deployment in the Gulf of Aden includes a U.S. ship – and is under the command of Allied Component Command Maritime Naples, one of the two Component Commands of Allied Joint Force Command Naples.
Allied Joint Force Command Naples (JFC Naples) was inaugurated six years ago as part of NATO strategy to deploy further south and east, succeeding Allied Forces Southern Europe (AFSOUTH). The reorganization was a component of Alliance transformation policy growing out of the 2002 NATO summit in Prague. JFC Naples takes in the entire NATO Area of Responsibility (AOR) which, as will be seen, includes the Balkans, Africa, the Mediterranean Sea region and Iraq.
Its commander is the U.S.’s Admiral Mark Fitzgerald, who is also the top commander of U.S. Naval Forces Europe and U.S. Naval Forces Africa. Earlier this year Fitzgerald was in Kosovo threatening Serbian authorities in the north, branding them “a threat to Kosovo stability.” [5]
NATO’s Naples Command has offices and is involved in operations throughout the Balkans: In Albania, Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia and Serbia.
The NATO Training Mission – Iraq is also conducted under JFC Naples’s supervision. (Its first commander was General David Petraeus, now in charge of United States Central Command.)
In his dual capacity as head of U.S. naval forces in Europe and Africa, Fitzgerald is also in charge of the Pentagon’s Africa Partnership Station (APS), created in 2006 and now part of AFRICOM.
Its first deployment was to West Africa, including the Gulf of Guinea, in 2007 and 2008 when the USS Fort McHenry and HSV (High Speed Vessel) Swift visited Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Ghana, Senegal, Sao Tome and Principe, and Togo. Former NATO Supreme Allied Commander, current U.S. National Security Adviser, James Jones years ago marked off that expanse of Africa along its Atlantic Coast as a vital theater in the battle for world oil resources. [6]
On March 13 the U.S. began military exercises in Ghana which will last to the end of the month.
“The three-week exercise, with about 120 Ghana Armed Forces personnel and about 95 US Marines, forms part of the Africa Partnership Station (APS) 2010 project.” [7]
The operation is the first of three U.S. Marines will conduct in Africa this year.
The day before the Ghanaian maneuvers began, AFRICOM completed the Africa Partnership Station East operation at the other end of the continent.
On its final day a review was held in Mombasa, Kenya with leaders from Kenya, Namibia, Tanzania and the U.S., which was hosted by Admiral Mark Fitzgerald of U.S. Naval Forces Europe-Africa (and NATO’s Allied Joint Force Command Naples).
Two American warships were deployed for the occasion, the frigate USS Nicholas and HSV Swift.
A Kenyan naval officer described what preceded the exercises in East Africa: “From Naples, the ships steamed to Souda Bay, Greece, and then through the Suez Canal to our first Africa Partnership Station engagement in Djibouti.
“During this deployment, Swift and Nicholas covered a total of 12,500 nautical miles and conducted 11 ports of calls; namely, Mombasa, Kenya; Dar es salaam, Tanzania; Durban and Cape Town, South Africa; Maputo, Mozambique; Port East, Reunion; Port Louis, Mauritius; and Port Victoria, Seychelles.” [8]
The commander of Africa Partnership Station East, Captain James Tranoris, described its significance: “While APS has been active in East Africa for a few years, this year marks the inaugural deployment of an international staff to execute the mission.”
AFRICOM’s APS has established itself in both the Gulf of Guinea and the western shores of the Indian Ocean.
At the north end of the continent, Admiral Giampaolo Di Paola, chairman of the NATO Military Committee, was in Algeria to promote both the Mediterranean Dialogue partnership and the Alliance’s new Strategic Concept.
The first is a NATO program that includes Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia, expanding the bloc’s influence – and presence – from both banks of the Jordan River to well down Africa’s western coast.
The second is the formalization of NATO’s 21st century military strategy to further the global, expeditionary character of the military bloc.
“During his address the Chairman underlined the cooperation between NATO and Algeria in the framework of the Mediterranean Dialogue and praised Algeria’s great contribution to the formation of its Officers in the NATO Regional Cooperation Course (NRCC) at the NATO Defense College (NDC).
“Admiral Di Paola also stressed the need to bring forward Mediterranean Dialogue views into the New NATO Strategic Concept.” [9]
Di Paola also visited Morocco and delivered a speech on “the new NATO Strategic Concept to officers of the Royal Moroccan Army General Staff.
“He praised the cooperation between NATO and Morocco in the framework of the Mediterranean Dialogue and the contribution of the Royal Moroccan Armed Forces to NATO operations,” and urged the “ongoing development of the new Strategic Concept to strengthen the ties between NATO and its Mediterranean partners.” [10]
In 1884 the major European powers gathered at the Berlin Conference to divide up those parts of Africa that had escaped colonization and to create a consortium to dominate and exploit an entire continent and its peoples.
The anti-colonial struggles after the Second World War put an end to that enforced order, but 126 years later there are ominous indications that the former colonial masters are nostalgic for their past power.
Notes
1) Global Energy War: Washington’s New Kissinger’s African Plans – Stop NATO, January 22, 2009
http://rickrozoff. wordpress. com/2009/ 08/26/global- energy-war- washingtons- new-kissingers- african-plans
2) North Atlantic Treaty Organization – Allied Command Operations – March 18, 2010
3) Ibid
4) North Atlantic Treaty Organization, March 12, 2010
5) 11 Years Later: NATO Powers Prepare Final Solution In Kosovo – Stop NATO, March 18, 2010
http://rickrozoff. wordpress. com/2010/ 03/19/11- years-later- nato-powers- prepare-final- solution- in-kosovo
6) Global Energy War: Washington’s New Kissinger’s African Plans
7) Ghana Government, March 18, 2010
8) United States Africa Command – Africa Partnership Station – March 17, 2010
9) North Atlantic Treaty Organization – International Military Staff – March 15, 2010
10) North Atlantic Treaty Organization – International Military Staff – March 18, 2010
[N.B.: Unfortunately there is no more argument available to say to the affected African countries, their peoples and people that it would actually not be the ordinary people of the so called United States of America, the supremacist North-Americans, and those from other NATO countries, who are at the core of this aggressive neo-colonial move, because they are - as long as the taxpayers of the backing countries do not stand up and withdraw their money from the budgets of military mad-dogs and nobbling naval nobs serving the interests of military-industrial nabobs, the people of Africa have to see clearly who still are their true enemies, though they are often misguided by paid stooges and coerced assassins in their own ranks and file.]
Oil, minerals and the militarisation of globalisation by Julius Barigaba (EastAfrican)
A new study has linked conflicts in Africa with the continent’s oil and mineral resources that Western powers are fighting to control through the militarised foreign policy of the United States in Africa, and geopolitical wars.
The study, Globalisation in Africa: Commercial Wars and State Failure in Uganda is a University of Malaya PhD thesis by Ugandan scholar Yunus Lubega Butanaziba.
Released in October 2009, it says the West’s “imperial” interest in Africa’s wealth first led to conquest and more recently the creation of a centralised military force, the US African Command (Africom) to police these resources, including Uganda’s oil.
This interest has shaped global geopolitics from pre-World War II through the Cold War to the present in Congo, Darfur, Somalia, Sudan, Angola, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Uganda.
No wonder these countries are among the world’s conflict flashpoints of the post-Cold War era.
The study also postulates that commercial and resource wars are a US agenda with its allied Western powers — all members of the Bretton Woods institutions since 1944 that seeks to weaken internal political systems and take control of resources.
This casts a very grim picture on the fortunes of Uganda that struck oil only a few years ago but has since been on the brink of slipping back into conflict.
When Uganda discovered oil in 2006, the two-decade long war in the north was on the ebb, but since then, there have been flashes of violence — last year’s Banyoro-Bakiga tribal clashes and the clash between Congo and Uganda armies — which could point to eruption of conflict, this time in the oil fields of western Uganda.
However, it is the creation of the Djibouti-based Africom, based on theories of American political scientist Samuel Huntington that explain why more resource wars are set to unfold in oil and mineral rich countries.
Huntington had taken the global strategy theory to another level in his “Next pattern of conflict” essay that Butanaziba says guided Washington’s model of globalised security, which others have called the militarisation of globalisation.
This model saw the creation of four strategic military commands to keep close watch on resources.
Other commands are Eucom (Europe), Centcom (Africa/Asia), Pacom (Pacific) and Southcom (South America).
This stage had been arrived at following years of implementing the global strategy to control world resources that the US political strategists Halford Mackinder and Nicholas Spykman had laid ground for earlier.
It would guide imperial interests in Africa through the colonial, Cold War and post-Cold War periods.
Mackinder argued that whoever rules East Europe commands the Heartland, and eventually, the world and its resources.
Spykman took the argument to taking control of the World Island (Africa and Eurasia) by seizing Eurasia’s coastal lands, also known as the Rimland, while in the post-Cold War era, Huntington saw the use of the military to control continents as the perfect way to control global resources.
Batanaziba says events that have unfolded since the creation of Africom confirm that in creating this force, Washington was clearly executing Huntington’s post-Cold War theory.
“In the thinking of Pentagon and White House officials, the world today is too dangerous a place not to be policed by Washington. The establishment of Africom… is being driven by two main strategic concerns: First, the growing demand for African oil and gas…”
Africom has the force of law to intervene in African security because African states have agreed to it.
American geopolitics analyst William Engdahl wrote in November 2008 that the birth of Africom had more to do with a fight for resources than mere security concerns.
Indeed, in a matter of weeks after President George W. Bush assented to the creation of Africom, a new wave of conflict erupted in mineral-rich eastern Congo to pre-empt the major agenda of the incoming Barack Obama presidency.
To focus the US’s military and other resources on dealing with the Congo, the oil rich Gulf of Guinea and oil rich Darfur, as well as the increasing Somali pirate threat in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean waters.
“The legitimate question is whether it is mere coincidence that Africa appears to just at this time become a new geopolitical ‘hotspot’ or whether it has a direct link to the formal creation of Africom,” wrote Mr Engdahl.
This position had been stated by Washington adviser Dr Peter Pham in unequivocal terms in 2007, while justifying Africom’s creation before Congress, saying its purpose was to protect “access to hydrocarbons and other strategic resources which Africa has in abundance… a task which includes ensuring against the vulnerability of those natural riches and ensuring that no other interested third parties, such as India, China, Japan or Russia obtain monopolies or preferential treatment.”
The irony of it is that these countries have enormous resources but they are also saddled with raging poverty hence the dreaded resource curse.
In the thesis, Mr Butanaziba clearly alludes to this failure stated in Uganda’s Oil and Gas Policy 2008.
“The reports of the National Oil and Gas Policy of Uganda indicated that oil and gas are non-renewable extractive resources which in addition to having potentially immense benefits to the country, also pose the challenge of insecurity to the country.”
Clearly, the military option that the west preaches is no panacea for Africa: it has bred havoc in Sudan, left Somalia split along clan lines and reduced Liberia to shambles.
It has not tamed several midlevel powers like France, Libya and Israel that enjoy impunity in their swash buckling exploits in Africa.
Madagascar: Ending the Crisis (CisisGroup)
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Madagascar has been in crisis since the bloody upheavals in early 2009. Several rounds of mediation under the auspices of the African Union (AU) and others have not unlocked the stalemate. Despite the signing of several documents, and the AU’s announcement of individual sanctions against members of the regime on 17 March, negotiations have stalled, mainly due to the refusal of the Rajoelina government to implement the power sharing agreed in Maputo in August. While violence has been kept at bay since the Rajoelina regime took power in March 2009, its legitimacy is questioned both internally and externally, and a dire economic environment weighs heavily on an already impoverished population. To avoid further escalation, the mediation should cease trying to implement a transitional power-sharing deal but instead aim for agreement on the consensual writing of a constitution and the organisation of early elections under international supervision.
>From January to March 2009, Andry Rajoelina, the then mayor of the capital, Antananarivo, assembled several tens of thousands in the streets demanding the resignation of Marc Ravalomanana’s government. He forged an alliance of convenience with the political opposition and parts of civil society, leading to mass rallies which degenerated into violent riots in which at least 70 people died. Rajoelina organised a parallel government – the “High Authority of the Transition” (HAT) –and asked his supporters to take the presidential palace on 7 February. Thirty people died as the security forces opened fire on the crowd.
Mediation attempts by the churches and the UN failed because both protagonists played a game of political brinkmanship. Demonstrations continued, coupled with targeted arrests and repression by the security forces, until a military camp mutinied and allied itself with Rajoelina. As the tide turned, Ravalomanana yielded power on 17 March 2009 to a military directorate of three senior generals, who immediately transferred their authority to Rajoelina. The AU and others condemned this unconstitutional takeover of the government.
Power-sharing agreements signed in Maputo in August and Addis Ababa in November offered opportunities to promote a consensual transition by uniting in one government the four political movements represented by Rajoelina, Ravalomanana and two former presidents, Didier Ratsiraka and Albert Zafy. But even though he signed, Rajoelina and his entourage have blocked implementation of the accords, reserved all senior positions in the transitional authority for themselves and threatened to organise elections unilaterally.
Similarly, the lack of political will to compromise of the other protagonists, who are more concerned about securing the spoils of power than finding a solution in the national interest, has made genuine power sharing virtually impossible. This attitude of the political elite has been at the root of the other political crises (1972, 1991 and 2002) that have shaken Madagascar since independence. Its members have each time maintained their power networks, making eventual recurrence inevitable.
To break this cycle and to end the crisis, a new constitution and new elections are the only realistic option. Madagascar needs to restore legitimate institutions and then launch administrative reforms. The mediation team’s priority, therefore, should be the negotiation of an agreement between the four political movements that allows rapid drafting of a new constitution, a referendum on that document, free and fair elections and clarification of the terms of amnesty agreed in Maputo.
The organisation of elections cannot be turned over solely to the HAT. The four movements should agree that the constitutional referendum and the elections will be organised and supervised by a joint AU/UN mission. During the transition period, the activities of the HAT should be reduced to that of a caretaker government. Any member of the HAT who wishes to stand in the elections should first resign, as was agreed in Maputo. Andry Rajoelina would be entitled to stay in office and, as negotiated in Maputo, would be able to contest the elections. This would meet the wishes of both the HAT, which insists on rapid organisation of elections, and of the other three movements, which want impartial control of the electoral process. It would also make bickering over ministerial posts redundant and avoid an over-long transition.
For this solution to work, the AU and UN should appoint a joint envoy mandated to supervise the drafting of a new constitution and the organisation of a constitutional referendum and general elections. An AU/UN police mission should be formed and put under the envoy’s responsibility, charged to work closely with the Malagasy security forces to secure the electoral process. The international community, already represented in a contact group, needs to remain engaged, and its guarantor role should be enshrined in the political accord.
RECOMMENDATIONS
To the Malagasy political movements:
1. Sign a political agreement that authorises the AU and UN jointly to:
a) supervise the drafting of a new constitution through a consensual process involving Malagasy parties and civil society;
b) organise and administer a referendum on that constitution and the holding of elections; and
c) deploy a police mission to work in collaboration with the national police to secure the elections.
2. Accept the nomination of a single special envoy, mandated jointly by AU and the UN Security Council to exercise responsibility for the above tasks.
To the High Authority of the Transition (HAT):
3. Avoid any potential conflict of interest by requiring members who want to stand in the elections to resign first from their posts.
4. Cease any legislative activities and exercise the role of a caretaker government only.
To the chief of the joint mediation team, Joaquim Chissano:
5. Collaborate closely with the special AU/UN envoy and intervene as a moral authority in case the process reaches an impasse.
To the AU Peace and Security Council and the UN Security Council:
6. Appoint a senior African as special joint envoy to exercise responsibility for the tasks enumerated in recommendation 1 above.
7. Secure the electoral process in close collaboration with the national police by authorising the deployment of a joint AU/UN police mission composed of small operational units integrated into the Malagasy police forces and led by an AU/UN police commissioner reporting directly to the special envoy.
8. Convey to all parties that the obstruction of the process would lead to targeted sanctions (such as asset freezes and visa bans) for themselves and their families.
To France, the U.S., the European Union and South Africa:
9. Support diplomatically and financially this peace process (constitution drafting and organisation of elections in particular), but withhold any other financial support until after the satisfactory completion of the electoral process.
10. Promote an armed forces reform program, focusing in particular on the integration into civilian life of those who choose to leave the army and on a program that allows high-ranking officers to retire in dignity.
(*) CrisisGroup’s Africa Report N°156 – 18 March 2010 – To read the full report in French, please click here.
[N.B.: And we might add an advice to the naval players in the Indian Ocean: STOP trying to entangle Madagascar into your piracy games!]
INTERVIEW: Terror risk still high, EU anti-terrorism chief warns by Marion Trimborn and Ben Nimmo (dpa)
European Union citizens should not assume that the terrorist threat to Europe has receded just because there have been no major attacks in recent years, EU anti-terrorism coordinator Gilles De Kerchove warned Sunday.
De Kerchove’s job is to oversee and boost cooperation between member states and the EU’s central organs on terrorism issues.
“If Europe has not been the target of an attack, it does not mean that there is no threat. This impression does not reflect the reality,” De Kerchove told the German Press Agency dpa.
“There are still reasons for being concerned,” including the activity of terrorist recruiters in Europe and the growth of radicalization in areas as diverse as North Africa, Afghanistan, Yemen and Bangladesh, De Kerchove said.
The position of EU anti-terrorism coordinator was created in 2004, shortly after Islamist terrorists killed 191 people in a bomb attack on the Madrid underground. De Kerchove took over the role in 2007.
And though there has not been a major attack on the European mainland since then, he warned that there is no room for complacency, with terrorist recruiters playing a more and more active role in Europe, and especially Germany.”
The number of people leaving Germany to go to a training camp is not insignificant. You have a growing number of (Muslim) converts getting to a high level of jihadism and radicalization. This in itself requires that we have to work on it,” De Kerchove said.
At the same time, terrorists are becoming more organized and aggressive in many parts of the world, such as Afghanistan, the Sahel, Pakistan and Somalia, he said.
And the EU should pay special attention to developments in Yemen and Bangladesh, where local conditions are proving fertile ground for terrorist recruiters, he said.
Yemen shot up the international agenda at Christmas after it emerged that a would-be bomber on a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit had been trained as a terrorist in the country.”
We should Yemen keep high on the agenda of the international community because you have a booming demography, you will soon have a water shortage, there is a rebellion in the north, secession in the south, and the oil production is declining.”
Meanwhile, some young people in religious schools in Bangladesh “are only learning the Koran in Arabic: that does not give you any job afterwards. We should help Bangladesh more, we should help in Afghanistan,” De Kerchove said.
But the only way for the EU to respond to those threats will be to help the countries themselves offer their citizens a better way of life, so that they do not turn to radical terrorism instead.
“We have to help them to address the problem. That means developing policy in terms of prevention of radicalization and programmes of de-radicalization. We have to develop the countries where there is radicalization,” De Kerchove said.
UN Security Council Holds Small Arms Flow to Central Africa by Ma Ting (Xinhua)
As the most profitable market for arms smugglers, it comes as no surprise that Africa suffers the largest number of causalities from conflict, the United Nations chief of drugs and crime told the Security Council on Friday.
Director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime Antonio Maria Costa told the 15-nation Council that most weapons are shipped through commercial channels from Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union to Africa, fueling almost every conflict on the continent.
During an open-door session of the Security Council, members debated illicit trade in arms in Central Africa, one of the regions hardest hit by the phenomenon of small arms and light weapons.
Costa singled out Ukraine as being a “major” arms supplier for Africa. “There are 54 firearms for every Ukrainian soldier … and a surplus of large planes,” said Costa. “Add low regulation and high economic insecurity, and you get an environment where merchants of death can make millions.”
A Ukrainian ship, for example, hijacked by Somali pirates in Sept. 2008 ironically uncovered an illegal shipment of ammunition that was intended for South Sudan, not Kenya, as the export certificate said. Once a shipment of weapons or ammunition makes it to its final destination, it is often battered for drugs or natural resources, said Costa.
“Arms trafficking and organized crime fuels conflicts and vice- versa,” he said.
Speaking on behalf of UN Secretary-general Ban Ki-moon, who was in Moscow, Russia this week for the Quartet meeting, UN Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro welcomed the recent steps taken by Central African countries towards a subregional system to monitor small arms.
The move is the first step towards drafting the sub-region’s first legally binding instrument on the control of small arms and light weapons, ammunition and explosives, she said. On April 26-30, negotiators will work on the instrument’s first draft at the 13th ministerial meeting of the UN Standing Advisory Committee on Security Questions in Central Africa in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo.
“The decisions and actions by the Standing Advisory Committee are of great significance in tackling the tools of violence, designing ways to improve sub-regional security, and creating the necessary conditions for sustainable development,” said Migiro.
The Doomsday Weapon by Uri Avnery
IT IS already a commonplace to say that people who don’t learn from history are condemned to repeat their mistakes.
Some 1942 years ago, the Jews in the province called Palaestina launched a revolt against the Roman Empire. In retrospect, this looks like an act of madness. Palestine was a small and insignificant part of the world-wide empire which had just won a crushing victory against the rival power – the Parthian Empire (Persia) – and put down a major rebellion in Britain. What chances could the Jewish revolt have?
God knows what was going on in the mind of the “Zealots”. They eliminated the moderate leaders, who warned against provoking the empire, and gained sway over the Jewish population of the country. They relied on God. Perhaps they also relied on the Jews in Rome and believed that their influence over the Senate would restrain the Emperor, Nero. Perhaps they had heard that Nero was weak and about to fall.
We know how it ended: after three years, the rebels were crushed, Jerusalem fell and the temple was burned down. The last of the Zealots committed suicide in Masada.
The Zionists did indeed try to learn from history. They acted in a rational way, did not provoke the great powers, endeavored in every situation to attain what was possible. They accepted compromises, and every compromise served them as a basis for the next surge forward. They cleverly utilized the radical stance of their adversaries and gained the sympathy of the whole world.
But since the beginning of the occupation, their mind has become clouded. The cult of Masada has become dominant. Divine promises once again start to play a role in public discourse. Large parts of the public are following the new zealots.
The next phase is also repeating itself: the leaders of Israel are starting a rebellion against the new Rome.
WHAT BEGAN as an insult to the Vice President of the United States is developing into something far bigger. The mouse has given birth to an elephant.
Lately, the ultra-right government in Jerusalem has started to treat President Barack Obama with thinly veiled contempt. The fears that arose in Jerusalem at the beginning of his term have dissipated. Obama looks to them like a paper black panther. He gave up his demand for a real settlement freeze. Every time he was spat on, he remarked that it was raining.
Yet now, ostensibly quite suddenly, the measure is full. Obama, his Vice President and his senior assistants condemn the Netanyahu government with growing severity. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has submitted an ultimatum: Netanyahu must stop all settlement activity, East Jerusalem included; he must agree to negotiate about all core problems of the conflict, including East Jerusalem, and more.
The surprise was complete. Obama, it seems, has crossed the Rubicon, much as the Egyptian army had crossed the Suez Canal in 1973. Netanyahu gave the order to mobilize all the reserves in America and to move forward all the diplomatic tanks. All Jewish organizations in the US were commanded to join the campaign. AIPAC blew the shofar and ordered its soldiers, the Senators and Congressmen, to storm the White House.
It seems that the decisive battle has been joined. The Israeli leaders were certain that Obama would be defeated.
And then an unusual noise was heard: the sound of the doomsday weapon.
THE MAN who decided to activate it was a foe of a new kind.
David Petraeus is the most popular officer of the United States army. The four-star general, son of a Dutch sea captain who went to America when his country was overrun by the Nazis, stood out from early childhood. In West Point he was a “distinguished cadet”, in Army Command and General Staff College he was No. 1. As a combat commander, he reaped plaudits. He wrote his doctoral thesis (on the lessons of Vietnam) at Princeton and served as an assistant professor for international relations in the US Military Academy.
He made his mark in Iraq, when he commanded the forces in Mosul, the most problematical city in the country. He concluded that in order to vanquish the enemies of the US he must win over the hearts of the civilian population, acquire local allies and spend more money than ammunition. The locals called him King David. His success was considered so outstanding that his methods were adopted as the official doctrine of the American army.
His star rose rapidly. He was appointed commander of the coalition forces in Iraq and soon became the chief of the Central Command of the US army, which covers the whole Middle East , except Israel and Palestine (which “belong” to the American command in Europe).
When such a person raises his voice, the American people listen. As a respected military thinker, he has no rivals.
THIS WEEK, Petraeus conveyed an unequivocal message: after reviewing the problems in his AOR (Area Of Responsibility) – which includes, among others, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Iraq and Yemen – he turned to what he called the “root causes of instability” in the region. The list was topped by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
In his report to the Armed Services Committee he stated: “The enduring hostilities between Israel and some of its neighbors present distinct challenges to our ability to advance our interests in the AOR…The conflict foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of U.S. favoritism for Israel. Arab anger over the Palestinian question limits the strength and depth of U.S. partnerships with governments and peoples in the AOR and weakens the legitimacy of moderate regimes in the Arab world. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda and other militant groups exploit that anger to mobilize support. The conflict also gives Iran influence in the Arab world through its clients, Lebanese Hizballah and Hamas.”
Not content with that, Petraeus sent his officers to present his conclusions to the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
In other words: Israeli-Palestinian peace is not a private matter between the two parties, but a supreme national interest of the USA. That means that the US must give up its one-sided support for the Israeli government and impose the two-state solution.
The argument as such is not new. Several experts have said more or less the same in the past. (Immediately after the 9/11 attacks, I wrote in a similar vein and prophesied that the US would change its policy. It did not happen then.) But now this is being stated in an official document written by the responsible American commander.
The Netanyahu government immediately went into damage-limitation mode. Its spokespersons declared that Petraeus represents a narrow military approach, that he doesn’t understand political matters, that his reasoning is faulty. But it is not this that made people in Jerusalem break out into cold sweat.
AS IS well known, the pro-Israel lobby dominates the American political system without limits – almost. Every American politician and senior official is mortally afraid of it. The slightest deviation from the strict AIPAC line is tantamount to political suicide.
But in the armor of this political Goliath there is a chink. Like Achilles’ heel, the immense might of the pro-Israel lobby has a vulnerable point that, when touched, can neutralize its power.
It was illustrated by the Jonathan Pollard affair. This American-Jewish employee of a sensitive intelligence agency spied for Israel. Israelis consider him a national hero, a Jew who did his duty to his people. But for the US intelligence community, he is a traitor who endangered the lives of many American agents. Not satisfied with a routine penalty, it induced the court to impose a life sentence. Since then, all American presidents have refused the requests of successive Israeli governments to commute the sentence. No president dared to confront his intelligence chiefs in this matter.
But the most significant side of this affair is reminiscent of the famous words of Sherlock Holmes about the dogs that did not bark. AIPAC did not bark. The entire American Jewish community fell silent. Almost nobody raised their voice for poor Pollard.
Why? Because most American Jews are ready to do anything – just anything – for the government of Israel. With one exception: they will not do anything that appears to hurt the security of the United States. When the flag of security is hoisted, the Jews, like all Americans, snap to attention and salute. The Damocles sword of suspicion of disloyalty hangs above their heads. For them, this is the ultimate nightmare: to be accused of putting the security of Israel ahead of the security of the US. Therefore it is important for them to repeat endlessly the mantra that the interests of Israel and the US are identical.
And now comes the most important general of the US Army and says that this is not so. The policy of the present Israeli government is endangering the lives of American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan.
FOR NOW, this is being said only as a side remark, in a military document that has not been widely aired. But the sword has been drawn from its scabbard – and American Jews have started to tremble at the distant rumble of an approaching earthquake.
This week, Netanyahu’s brother-in-law has used our own doomsday weapon. He declared that Obama is an “anti-Semite”. The official newspaper of the Shas party has asserted that Obama is really a Muslim. They represent the radical right and its allies, who argue in speech and in writing that “Hussein” Obama is a Jew-hating black who must be beaten in the coming congressional elections and in the next presidential ones.
(Yet an important poll in Israel published yesterday shows that the Israeli public is far from convinced by these insinuations: the vast majority believes that Obama’s treatment of Israel is fair. Indeed, Obama got higher marks than Netanyahu.)
If Obama decides to fight back and activate his doomsday weapon – the accusation that Israel puts the lives of American servicemen at risk – this would have catastrophic consequences for Israel.
For the time being, this is only a shot across the bow – a warning shot fired by a warship in order to induce another vessel to follow its instructions. The warning is clear. Even if the present crisis is somehow damped down, it will inevitably flare up again and again as long as the present coalition in Israel stays in power.
When the movie “Hurt Locker” won its awards, the entire American public was united in its concern about the lives of its soldiers in the Middle East. If this public becomes convinced that Israel is sticking a knife in their back, it will be a disaster for Netanyahu. And not just for him.
WINDOW-DRESSING OR REAL CHANGE AND SILVER LINING ON THE HORIZON?
Obama blocks delivery of bunker-busters to Israel (RainbowWarrior)
The United States has diverted a shipment of bunker-busters designated for Israel
Officials said the U.S. military was ordered to divert a shipment of smart bunker-buster bombs from Israel to a military base in Diego Garcia. They said the shipment of 387 smart munitions had been slated to join pre-positioned U.S. military equipment in Israel Air Force bases.
“This was a political decision,” an official said.
In 2008, the United States approved an Israeli request for bunker-busters capable of destroying underground facilities, including Iranian nuclear weapons sites. Officials said delivery of the weapons was held up by the administration of President Barack Obama.
Since taking office, Obama has refused to approve any major Israeli requests for U.S. weapons platforms or advanced systems. Officials said this included proposed Israeli procurement of AH-64D Apache attack helicopters, refueling systems, advanced munitions and data on a stealth variant of the F-15E.
“All signs indicate that this will continue in 2010,” a congressional source familiar with the Israeli military requests said. “This is really an embargo, but nobody talks about it publicly.”
Under the plan, the U.S. military was to have stored 195 BLU-110 and 192 BLU-117 munitions in unspecified air force bases in Israel. The U.S. military uses four Israeli bases for the storage of about $400 million worth of pre-positioned equipment meant for use by either Washington or Jerusalem in any regional war.
In January 2010, the administration agreed to an Israeli request to double the amount of U.S. military stockpiles to $800 million. Officials said the bunker-busters as well as Patriot missile interceptors were included in the agreement.
The decision to divert the BLU munitions was taken amid the crisis between Israel and the United States over planned construction of Jewish homes in Jerusalem. The administration, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, has warned that Washington could reduce military aid to Israel because of its construction policy.
In 2007, after its war in Lebanon, Israel requested 2,000 BLU-109 live bombs from the United States. The 2,000-pound bomb, produced by Boeing and coupled with a laser guidance kit, was designed to penetrate concrete bunkers and other underground hardened sites.
Israeli ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, was quoted as saying that his country faced its biggest crisis with the United States since 1975. A pro-Israel lobbyist said Oren was referring to the current U.S. embargo, which echoed a decision taken 35 years ago by then-President Gerald Ford after Israel’s refusal to withdraw from Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. Oren has since denied the remark.
Source:
Somehow I can’t see this lasting for very long, since the US has a history of supporting Israel no matter what type of atrocities they commit.
Bunker Busters are radioactive and should never be used by anyone.
They can also cause earthquakes.
This type of thing should have been done along time ago not just by the US but by all countries who supply arms to Israel.
Foreign Arms Supplies To Israel/Gaza:
They use the weapons to destroy the lives of defenseless Palestinians. They have no bombs, planes, tanks etc. They are defenseless.
Anyone who supplies weapons to Israel need to re-examine their position.
Israel spends billions a year on weapons:
Meanwhile Palestinians don’t have enough food, medical supplies or materials to rebuild. They live in a prison. Even those in the West Bank are treated horridly. Daily bad things happen to them. Arrests, land theft, destroyed homes, etc.
Israel is the master of fabricating lies to justify their actions. Of course they use the same old sorry lies over and over however. They demonize anyone who speaks out against their actions. Israeli leaders and Lobby groups perpetrate more hate towards others then any group I am aware of. They even demonize Jews. They perpetrate more ant Antisemitism then anyone. Sad but true.
Bagram prison in Afghanistan may become the new Guantánamo by Michael Evans (TIMESonline)
The Most Barbaric Wars in Human History: The Political Relevance of Mahatma Gandhi by Niloufer Bhagwat (Global Research)
The world over these are apocalyptic times. We are witnessing the financial and economic collapse of regions which historically owed the most to capitalist development and simultaneously the most barbaric wars in human history, to re-colonize and to destroy independent nation states in all continents, to seize every nation’s budget and the entire economic space and markets of countries, directly targeting for elimination or mass displacement the civilian population considered rivals for the consumption and use of resources.
Despite several countries militarily invaded or occupied, including Palestine, the Congo, former Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Yemen, Haiti, among others and despite Iran, Russia and China, either immediately threatened or targeted for future action ; there is to-day no serious attempt to promote a political understanding of Imperialism and fascism, extensions of capitalism, despite the overwhelming courage and success of resistance forces in on the ground combat and the political movements now gaining momentum .Consequently one country after another is destroyed by military onslaught or is succumbing to internal fascist takeover. This ideological failure to politically educate citizens, is fatal to long term political independence of citizens and societies and has seriously weakened the capacity of even those governments established after historic revolutions,to mount a determined national and international opposition to defeat the propaganda offensive accompanying military aggression, which is now global.
Along with other societies, India and its people are once again an economic and financial prize for global and Indian Multinational companies, even as three committees of the government of India report that more than one third of the people of India live in the poverty zone and workers constituting approximately 700 million of the unorganized working class sector, subsist on less than a dollar day and many on approximately twenty rupees, that is less than half a dollar .Compounding this situation, a fourth Committee on Agrarian Reforms and the Unfinished Task of Land Reforms’ is critical of the recent land acquisition policies of the State to benefit foreign and Indian Multinational Corporations, holding that the cycle of growing lawlessness, poverty and violence is the natural outcome of the State’s neo-liberal economic agenda and amendments altering legislation, which hitherto protected land lived in from time immemorial and cultivated by Indigenous tribal people and the peasantry from being arbitrarily seized. Speculative forward trading in commodities prohibited for decades after Indian Independence is now permitted by successive governments of ostensibly different political complexions, all committed to the ‘ Free Market’, financialization and indiscriminate foreign investment, even as food prices have risen astronomically, with agribusiness companies poised to devour India, known for thousands of years as a region of traditional agricultural surplus and biodiversity . With this backdrop, orchestrating of alleged ‘ Islamist Terror’ along other governments to which it is closely allied, is alternative diversionary policy, with police officials and defense lawyers exposing fabricated terror plots victims of assassination, along with those falsely framed or set up .
As we search for strategies to these brutal onslaughts on humanity, which affect most societies, it is time to recall among other movements of relevance in the 20th Century, the political struggle led by Mahatma Gandhi, his determined opposition to the domination of Indian economic space by foreign companies, his concerns for the world evidenced by his opposition to the colonization of Palestine beginning with the Balfour Declaration of the British government in collaboration with European Zionism, his critique of the human ravages of colonialism and capitalism as economic systems and his political strategy of political education, mass struggles, civil disobedience and non-co-operation, to overturn unjust political systems, still of relevance for those searching for a just reconstruct of human society for the 21st Century ..
Following the defeat of the ‘Great War of Indian Independence of I857’, with 10 million Indians slaughtered by the army of the East India Company,even as the anti-colonial movements were in disarray, Mahatma Gandhi emerged as the leader of the dominant stream of the Indian Freedom Movement, stressing that isolated acts of terrorism would not defeat British colonial rule; that consistent and continuous political education, with mass struggles and protests on vital issues and withdrawal of all co-operation in all sectors of the administration, to make unjust governance impossible, would be the strategy .This political program of sustained and steady action, along with the diverse tactics adopted by other streams of the anti-colonial struggle in India, to complement this movement, resulted in the collapse of the entire edifice of foreign political and economic control, culminating in the historic ‘Quit India’ movement .
A revolutionary is known by his outstanding disciples .In the United States of America, Reverend Martin Luther King emerged to follow Mahatma Gandhi, to lead one of the largest mass movements in American history to begin emancipation of the African American people, consistently opposing US militarism, which he held was a continuation and extension of the anti –human policies of economic exploitation and racism within the United States and against the interest of the working people of the United States . Whereas Mahatma Gandhi believed that in a country where millions were hungry,food was the ‘ divinity’ required to be installed in every home and that religious philosophy in fact mandated respect for all of humanity, cutting across cultures; Martin Luther King stressed that : “ Any religion that professes to be concerned with the souls of men and is not concerned with slums that damn them, the economic conditions which cripple them, is a spiritually moribund religion in need of new blood.”
In view of his political apprenticeship in
In India on the other hand, mainstream political parties did not oppose “Operation Green Hunt”,a large scale Para military operation recently launched against the Indigenous tribal and peasant populations of Central and Eastern India, even as the Supreme Court directed the winding up of the ‘Salwa Judum’, the privately armed militias financed by Indian and foreign Multinational corporate mining and other interests in Central and Eastern India, to clear thousands of acres of mineral rich land of the tribal people and peasantry, cultivated by them from time immemorial,in excess of all rational requirements for mining and industrialization, in a massive land seizure, destructive of the habitat of these regions, referred to by some as ‘ internal colonization’ in a region of one of the lowest human development indexes in India .There is no doubt whose side Mahatma Gandhi would have chosen in this region, even while attempting to strike a just balance between agriculture and industrialization . Presently even Gandhians working among tribal people and peasantry have been targeted and imprisoned.
Mahatma Gandhi did not oppose industrialization and economic development as is sometimes wrongly projected. His view was that heavy industry should be regulated and under social control, with workers participation in management in all sectors, even as a massive effort should be launched for improved agricultural techniques and employment in cottage and small industry to abolish mass unemployment in rural and urban India, stressing the importance of rural infrastructure for clean water, sanitation, health, literacy, education and basic shelter, as immediate priorities .There are many similarities in the program of Mahatma Gandhi and of Mao Tse Tung for rural uplift as a prelude to the take off of economies, in countries of agrarian distress, historically ravaged by colonization, however their methods differed . Mao Tse Tung was a nationalist concerned primarily with the people of
“A non –violent system of government is clearly impossibility so long as the wide gulf between the rich and the hungry millions persists. The contrast between the palaces of New Delhi and the miserable hovels of the poor labouring classes …………a violent and bloody revolution is a certainty one day unless there is a voluntary abdication of riches and the power that riches give and sharing them for the common good .”
Gandhi laid great stress on personal example by individuals and movements, transforming simple living into an elegant culture, emphasizing that excessive consumption was vulgar and indecent, always at the cost of societal resources and morally repugnant. This is in absolute contrast to the present day political classes in India and elsewhere, condoning corporate salaries and bail outs of banks in millions and trillions, far in excess of the requirement even of the needs of one lifetime of comfortable existence, only to serve obscene and indecent living standards, with millions consequently stacked away in paper securities or such other inanimate objects, producing nothing but frequent asset bubbles and speculation, even as many governments now confront inevitable sovereign debt default, with worldwide impact on all societies.
There was a moral angle to the political struggle of Mahatma Gandhi which was irresistible, making it difficult to defeat. Gandhi kept the attention focused on the injustices of society and the political system enslaving humanity, rather than on individuals, de-personalizing issues and was a political people’s ‘General’ par excellence, with strategic and intuitive political understanding, based on extensive experience of political advance and retreat. His movement overshadowed in sheer scale of support and diverse composition any other anti-colonial movement.
It is not widely known that Gandhi sympathized with the objectives of the first Socialist Revolution of 1917 which extended support to all National Liberation Movements, as Gandhi’s paramount concern was not only freedom from colonial rule, for him that was only the first step in the objective to abolish hunger, unemployment and large scale penury and for overall welfare and social reform of Indian society decaying with feudalism, the caste system and religious taboos, with ritual overriding religious philosophies. Gandhi having been exposed in
Dr M. S.Swaminathan, the agricultural scientist identified with India ‘s green revolution ( controversial in those circles supporting organic farming free from chemical fertilizers and pesticides which they believe have been off loaded on to farmers in large quantities increasing their debt and polluting land and water resources ) in a television interview on Bloomberg UTV relayed on 20th January 2010, recalling the political priorities of Mahatma Gandhi, regretted that India had not fulfilled even half of the United Nations goal in respect of availability of food and nutrition in the past decade, whereas China and Vietnam had fulfilled their programme, warning that the spiraling of food prices and absence of food security would inevitably lead to mass unrest .
The Mahatma was targeted and assassinated by the fascist right wing, not any other leader of alternative political persuasion, at an advanced age, when most political personalities lose their relevance, as his continuing political programme and activity were perceived as the most serious threat to the divisive Imperial future agenda for the Indian Subcontinent, whatever explanation the assassins and their ideological kinsmen may now give, though Partition, which was the restructuring of the Indian subcontinent had already been imposed as the last Imperial act through political forces of both religious groups, financed and cultivated by the colonial ruler, trained for sectarian religious killings,on the pattern of what is now happening in the occupied countries or in those societies targeted for control.
On Gandhi’s assassination, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, who studied at Columbia University in the United States, at the height of the ‘Great Depression’, one of the foremost architects of the Constitution of India, representing in the Constituent Assembly with Gandhi ‘s overwhelming political support, the most downtrodden of India ‘s urban and rural working classes, now referred to as Dalits, with unsuppressed emotion said -“ Mahatma Gandhi was the closest to us”. This tribute sums up the life of India ‘s gentle yet uncompromising revolutionary, who politically inspired the people of India and movements in many parts of the world along with other outstanding leaders of the 20th Century, to resist Imperialism and political systems structured to deny working people economic, social and political justice .
Is al-Qaida planning energy war? (UPI)
Yemen’s Interior Ministry says it has strengthened security at the country’s main oil installations and tanker terminals amid warnings of al-Qaida attacks against energy industry targets.
The announcement Wednesday was the latest in a series of alerts about terrorist threats against the global energy industry in the Middle East and Far East over the last few weeks. It is not clear whether these are linked or are part of a new strategy by al-Qaida to attack energy targets but they fit in with renewed calls by al-Qaida Central, the leadership cadre holed up in Pakistan, for an economic jihad against the West.
In a March 7 videotape issued by al-Qaida’s media arm, as-Sahab, Adam Gadahn, the movement’s U.S.-born spokesman, called on jihadists to “further undermine the West’s already struggling economies.”
This echoes calls by Osama bin Laden, who long advocated attacks on the energy industry.
The alert in Yemen follows a March 8 warning by Singapore’s navy that militants planned to attack tankers in the choke point Strait of Malacca, between Malaysia and the Indonesian island of Sumatra. The 600-mile waterway, the shortest route between the oil-rich Gulf and Pacific, is a vital energy artery to Asia.
A month earlier, Said al-Shihri, deputy leader of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, the jihadist group based in Yemen, called on jihadists in Somalia, across the Gulf of Aden, to join his fighters and take control of the Bab al-Mandeb Strait. That waterway, north of the pirate-infested Gulf of Aden, links the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean.
Yemeni Foreign Minister Abu Bakr al-Kurbi says it is unlikely the jihadists could totally control the strait but acknowledged that they could “threaten ships by attacking them with missiles or capturing them in international waters like the pirates of Somalia.”
They could also use seaborne suicide bombers, as they did in attacking the American destroyer USS Cole in Aden harbor in southern Yemen Oct. 12, 2000, or the Asia-bound French supertanker Limburg in the Gulf of Aden Oct. 6, 2002.
AQAP, formed by the 2009 merger of Yemeni and Saudi jihadists, has become a potent force in recent months and clearly has the organizational capabilities to engage in maritime attacks.
However, the jihadists in Yemen have not shown any inclination to do so since the November 2002 capture in the United Arab Emirates of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, a Saudi of Yemeni descent who allegedly masterminded the Cole and Limburg attacks.
The U.S. global security consultancy Stratfor, noted that while the plan outlined by al-Shihri is “not a very plausible strategy, the statement does reflect an al-Qaida interest in targeting strategic waterways.”
The al-Shabeb jihadists fighting in Somalia haven’t engaged in maritime operations, although they may have links with pirates plaguing the Gulf of Aden.
The reported arrival of a seasoned al-Qaida operative, Fazul Andullah Mohammed, alleged mastermind of the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in East Africa, to head al-Shabeb could indicate that major operations are being planned.
The Strait of Malacca is of immense strategic importance to global energy supply and its vulnerability is a major concern of regional governments.
The heavily congested waterway is heavily patrolled by the navies of Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore to guard against pirates who infest the waters. Terrorists haven’t struck there but concerns about security were heightened this month when Indonesian authorities disclosed the existence of a militant Islamist group in Aceh, the northernmost province of Sumatra that overlooks the strait.
This group, calling itself al-Qaida in Aceh, is believed to be linked to the Indonesian Jemaah Islamiya, the main jihadist group in Southeast Asia. It also has links with Abu Sayyaf, an Islamist outfit in the Philippines tied to al-Qaida.
JI has suffered setbacks in recent months after Indonesia’s crack counter-terrorism force, the U.S.-trained Detachment 88, killed several of its leaders.
But the appearance of jihadists in Aceh, a bastion of conservative Islam in the world’s most populous Muslim nation, so soon after Singapore’s warning has raised the possibility that Indonesian militants are using the region to train for maritime operations.
Abu Sayyaf has also become more active in recent months. It has bombed several inter-island ferries over the years and has periodically threatened to attack larger vessels.
Net produces new generation of human rights activists in China by Anita Chang (AP)
Lin Xiuying believes her daughter bled to death after being gang-raped two years ago by a group of thugs that had ties to the police in their southern Chinese town.
For more than a year, the illiterate mother appealed to various government departments in Fujian province’s Mingqin county, pleading for someone to take a closer look at the death of 25-year-old Yan Xiaoling that police blamed on an ectopic pregnancy.
Lin, 50, was sobbing outside a government office last summer when she met self-taught legal expert Fan Yanqiong. Fan took down the details of the case from Lin and then posted them online. Two others, You Jingyou and Wu Huaying, spoke to the mother and posted their video interview online.
On Friday, the three were in court awaiting a verdict on charges of making false accusations, which carries a sentence of up to three years in jail.
It is the latest example of Chinese Internet users being targeted for their budding grass-roots activism — ordinary people spreading the word about grievances from every corner of the country with postings on Twitter, microblogs and other websites.
“Netizens are using the Internet to talk about injustice,” said Liu Xiaoyuan, You’s lawyer. “But local officials just use their public
power to suppress them.”
Dozens of bloggers showed up outside Mawei Distrist People’s Court on Friday in Fuzhou city where the verdict was to be announced, tweeting constantly and posting photos from the scene online. They reportedly were met by more than 100 uniformed and plainclothes police. The case was indefinitely postponed.
China blocks online materials it deems to be harmful or pornographic, which frequently includes information that contradicts the views of the ruling Communist Party. Such restrictions prompted Internet giant Google to announce in January that it may close China-based Google.cn because it no longer wanted to co-operate with Beijing’s Internet censorship.
But there is a vibrant community of tech-savvy users who can easily hop over the “Great Firewall” that blocks access to sites like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. They are a minority of the 384 million people online in China but among the most vocal: young, educated, liberal-minded and unafraid of questioning the Communist government.
Twitter in particular has been harnessed by Chinese users who revel in having a forum where they can speak freely about politically sensitive matters — in 140 characters or less, of course.
“With the help of new technology, it’s become quite common and convenient for citizens to exercise their right of supervising the
government. It’s always hard to publish articles in traditional media and it’s much easier to do so on the Internet,” said Zhou Ze, a law professor at China Youth University for Political Science who has spoken out about detentions related to online comments.
Those arrested or detained for trying to help Lin are just the latest to be punished for their activism.
Wang Shuai was detained in Shanghai after speaking out online about land confiscation in his hometown in central China’s Henan province. Wu Baoquan was sentenced to 1-1/2 years in jail for criticizing — also online — a land compensation plan in his Inner Mongolian village.
But there have been a few victories, too.
Authorities dropped charges against a man in the eastern province of Shandong who was detained after accusing his local Communist Party secretary of corruption. An unpopular garbage incinerator project in the southern city of Guangzhou has been put on hold. A karaoke bar waitress went unpunished after fatally stabbing a drunk government official who cornered her and demanded sex. Each case got strong attention from Chinese citizens online as details spread through blogs and forums.
Guo Baofeng, who works as a translator in the southern city of Xiamen, was among those taken away by police after posting a video interview of Lin on an overseas website. He became famous among Chinese netizens for sending Twitter updates while in police custody.
“Pls help me, I grasp the phone during police sleep,” and “i have been arrested by Mawei police, SOS,” he tweeted in English from his cellphone, avoiding Chinese characters that take longer to input. Guo was released from detention after about three weeks, though he is still under police monitoring.
Lin, the mother, does not have a deep understanding of the Internet or its workings, but knows that it is helping to keep her daughter’s case in the public eye. Poor and uneducated, she can do little other than try to support those who helped spread the word of her plight by attending their court hearings.
“The authorities take advantage of us because I’m illiterate and have no money or family connections,” she said. “Thankfully there are reporters and citizens helping me. They’ve helped so much and I hope they can keep helping us.”
————————
We do not send pictures with these reports, because of the volume, but picture this emetic scene with your inner eye:
A dying Somali child in the macerated arms of her mother besides their bombed shelter with Islamic graffiti looks at a fat trader, who discusses with a local militia chief and a UN representative at a harbour while USAID provided GM food from subsidised production is off-loaded by WFP into the hands of local “distributors” and dealers – and in the background a western warship and a foreign fishing trawler ply the waters of a once sovereign, prosper and proud nation, which was a role model for honesty and development in the Horn of Africa. (If you feel that this is overdrawn – talk to people who lived in Somalia in the 70s and 80s and come with us into Somalia and see the even more cruel reality today for yourself!)
- and if you need lively stills or video material on Somalia, please do contact us.
———–
There is no limit to what a person can do or how far one can go to help
- if one doesn’t mind who gets the credit !
- if one doesn’t mind who gets the credit !
————-
ECOTERRA Intl. maintains a register for persons missing or abducted in the Somali seas (Foreign seafarers as well as Somalis). Inquiries by family member can be sent by e-mail to office[at]ecoterra-international.org
For families of presently captive seafarers – in order to advise and console their worries – ECOTERRA Intl. can establish contacts with professional seafarers, who had been abducted in Somalia, and their wives as well as of a Captain of a sea-jacked and released ship, who agreed to be addressed ”with questions, and we will answer truthfully”.
———–
ECOTERRA – ALERTS and persistent issues:
PIRATE ATTACK GULF OF ADEN: Advice on Who to Contact and What to Do www.noonsite.com/Members/sue/R2008-09-08-2
In an effort to counter Piracy in the Gulf of Aden and off the east coast of Somalia industry bodies including the International Maritime Bureau have published the Best Managment Practice (BMP) guidelines. Please click here to download a copy of the BMP as pdf.
Especially YACHT-sailors should download, read and implement the ISAF Guidelines
Merchant vessels are requested to report any suspicious activity to UKMTO Dubai (+97 1505523215 - [email protected]). NATURAL RESOURCES & ARMED FISH POACHERS: Foreign navies entering the 200nm EEZ of Somalia and foreign helicopters and troops must respect the fact that especially all wildlife is protected by Somali national as well as by international laws and that the protection of the marine resources of Somalia from illegally fishing foreign vessels should be an integral part of the anti-piracy operations. Likewise the navies must adhere to international standards and not pollute the coastal waters with oil, ballast water or waste from their own ships but help Somalia to fight against any dumping of any waste (incl. diluted, toxic or nuclear waste). So far and though the AU as well as the UN has called since long on other nations to respect the 200 nm EEZ, only now the two countries (Spain and France) to which the most notorious vessels and fleets are linked have come up with a declaration that they will respect the 200 nm EEZ of Somalia but so far not any of the navies operating in the area pledged to stand against illegal fishing. On a worldwide scale, illegal fishing robs some 10 billion Euros every year mainly from poor countries, according to the European Commission. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) estimates that 18 percent of Indian Ocean catches are caught illegally, while ECOTERRA’s estimates speak of at least 30-40 %. While the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) has no means whatsoever to control the fish looting, even the new EU regulations do not prevent the two most obvious circumventions: Fish from a registered and licensed vessel is transhipped on the high seas to an illegal vessel – often already a mother-ship with an industrial processing plant – in exchange for good payment and thereby exceeding the quota of the registered vessel several times before the “legal” vessel sails back into port with its own storage full. In the inverse of this criminal technique, called “fish laundering”, an illegal vessel – often even using banned fishing methods or ripping its catch from poorly protected fishing zones – “transships” for little money its cargo to a legal one, which, equipped with all the necessary authorisations, delivers the fish into the legal market chain – without having to spend a single dollar or minute on real fishing activities and therefore often only has cheap fun-crews, which even wouldn’t know how to catch the highly migratory tuna. Since flags under which all these vessels fly can be changed overnight and via the internet and the real beneficial ownership is hidden behind a mesh of cover-companies, the legal eagles, who try to follow up usually are blindfolded and rarely can catch up with the culprits managing these schemes. So far not a single illegal fishing vessel has been detained by the naval forces around the Horn of Africa, though they had been even informed about several actual cases, where an intervention would have been possible. Illegally operating Tuna fishing vessels (many from Taiwan and South Korea, some from Greece and China) carry now armed personnel and force their way into the Somali fishing grounds – uncontrolled or even protected by the naval forces mandated to guard the Somali waters against any criminal activity, which included arms carried by foreign fishing vessels in Somali waters.
LLWs / NLWs: According to recently leaked information the anti-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden are also used as a cover-up for the live testing of recently developed arsenals of so called non-lethal as well as sub-lethal weapons systems. (Pls request details) Neither the Navies nor the UN has come up with any code of conduct in this respect, while the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Program (JNLWP) is sponsoring several service-led acquisition programs, including the VLAD, Joint Integration Program, and Improved Flash Bang Grenade. Alredy in use in Somalia are so called Non-lethal optical distractors, which are visible laser devices that have reversible optical effects. These types of non-blinding laser devices use highly directional optical energy. Somalia is also a testing ground for the further developments of the Active Denial System (ADS) Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration (ACTD). If new developments using millimeter wave sources that will help minimize the size, weight, and system cost of an effective Active Denial System which provides “ADS-ACTD-like” repel effects, are used has not yet been revealed. Obviously not only the US is developing and using these kind of weapons as the case of MV MARATHON showed, where a Spanish naval vessel was using optical lasers – the stand-off was then broken by the killing of one of the hostage seafarers. Local observers also claim that HEMI devices, producing Human Electro-Muscular Incapacitation (HEMI) Bioeffects, have been used in the Gulf of Aden against Somalis. Exposure to HEMI devices, which can be understood as a stun-gun shot at an individual over a larger distance, causes muscle contractions that temporarily disable an individual. Research efforts are under way to develop a longer-duration of this effect than is currently available. The live tests are apparently done without that science understands yet the effects of HEMI electrical waveforms on a human body.
WARBOTS, UAVs etc.: Peter Singer says: “By cutting the already tenuous link between the public and its nation’s foreign policy, pain- free war would pervert the whole idea of the democratic process and citizenship as they relate to war. When a citizenry has no sense of sacrifice or even the prospect of sacrifice, the decision to go to war becomes just like any other policy decision, weighed by the same calculus used to determine whether to raise bridge tolls. Instead of widespread engagement and debate over the most important decision a government can make, you get popular indifference. When technology turns war into something merely to be watched, and not weighed with great seriousness, the checks and balances that undergird democracy go by the wayside. This could well mean the end of any idea of democratic peace that supposedly sets our foreign-policy decision making apart. Such wars without costs could even undermine the morality of “good” wars. When a nation decides to go to war, it is not just deciding to break stuff in some foreign land. As one philosopher put it, the very decision is “a reflection of the moral character of the community who decides.” Without public debate and support and without risking troops, the decision to go to war becomes the act of a nation that doesn’t give a damn.”
————
ECOTERRA Intl., whose work does focus on nature- and human-rights-protection and – as the last international environmental organization still working in Somalia – had alerted ship-owners since 1992, many of whom were fishing illegally in the since 1972 established 200 nm territorial waters of Somalia and today’s 200nm Exclusive Economic Zone (UNCLOS) of Somalia, to stay away from Somali waters. The non-governmental organization had requested the international community many times for help to protect the coastal waters of the war-torn state from all exploiters, but now lawlessness has seriously increased and gone out of hand – even with the navies.
ECOTERRA members with marine and maritime expertise, joined by it’s ECOP-marine group, are closely and continuously monitoring and advising on the Somali situation (for previous information concerning the topics please google keywords ECOTERRA (and) SOMALIA)
—————-
The network of
ECOTERRA Intl. and the SEAFARERS ASSISTANCE PROGRAMME helped significantly in most sea-jack cases. Basically the East African Seafarers Assistance Programme tackles all issues of seafarers welfare and ECOTERRA Intl. is working in Somalia since 1986 on human-rights and nature protection, while ECOP-marine concentrates on illegal fishing and the protection of the marine ecosystems. Your support counts too.Getting what you want is not nearly as important as giving what you have. – Tom Krause
We give all – and You? Please consider to contribute to the work of SAP, ECOP-marine and ECOTERRA Intl. Please donate to the defence fund. Contact us for details concerning project-sponsorship or donations via e-mail: ecotrust[at]ecoterra.net
Kindly note that all the information above is distributed under and is subject to a license under the Creative Commons Attribution. ECOTERRA, however, reserves the right to editorial changes. To view a copy of this licence, visit creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/uk/. The opinion of individual authors, whose writings are provided here for strictly educational and informational purposes, does not necessarily reflect the views held by ECOTERRA Intl. unless endorsed. With each issue of the SMCM ECOTERRA Intl. tries to paint a timely picture containing the actual facts and often differing opinions of people from all walks of live concerning issues, which do have an impact on the Somali people, Somalia as a nation, the region and in many cases even the world.
Send your genuine articles, networked or confidential information please to: mailhub[at]ecoterra.net (anti-spam-verifier equipped).
We welcome the submission of articles for publication through the SMCM.Pls cite ECOTERRA Intl. - www.ecoterra-international.org as source (not necessarily as author) for onward publications, where no other source is quoted.
Press Contacts:
ECOP-marine
East-Africa
+254-714-747090
marine[at]ecop.info
www.ecop.info
ECOTERRA Intl.
Nairobi Node
africanode[at]ecoterra.net
+254-733-633-733
+254-714-747-090
EA Seafarers Assistance Programme
Mshenga Mwacharo (Information Officer)
+254-721-513 418 or +254-734-010 056
sap[at]ecoterra.net
SAP / ECOTERRA Intl.
Athman Seif (Media Officer)
+254-722-613858
office[at]ecoterra-international.org
N.B.: If you are missing certain editions of our updates, this can have two reasons: Either you have not white-listed our sender address office[at}ecoterra-international.org for your inbox and your server provides for censorship (beware of aol or yahoo as mailservice and barracudacentral as filter - it shows only that you want to remain dumb folded) or you do not belong [yet] to our trusted friends and supporters, who receive all updates including those with classified content. Join the network or become a funding supporter to get them all. Look up earlier public updates on the internet – e.g. at:australia.to or go to
australia.to/2010/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=70&Itemid=142
The many thousand mails which have to go out with each update demand a structured mailing. If you require to receive the updates with the first bunch that is sent out, please request to be placed on the priority list. Note: ECOTERRA is not responsible for the spam that sometimes appears to come from our domains. This is spoofed mail, is part of a systematic, ongoing harassment targeting many independent groups and websites. 90% of spam is sent not by people but systems, which are part of a scheme to restrict the internet. For more information see this article in The Nation or this article in Wired News.
To subscribe to or unsubscribe from this listserve – just send a mail with reference SMCM and your instruction to office[at]ecoterra-international.org
One tree makes approx. 16.67 reams of copy/printing paper or 8,333.3 A4 sheets.
Kindly print this email only if strictly necessary
Before It’s News® is a community of individuals who report on what’s going on around them, from all around the world.
Anyone can join.
Anyone can contribute.
Anyone can become informed about their world.
"United We Stand" Click Here To Create Your Personal Citizen Journalist Account Today, Be Sure To Invite Your Friends.
Anyone can join.
Anyone can contribute.
Anyone can become informed about their world.
"United We Stand" Click Here To Create Your Personal Citizen Journalist Account Today, Be Sure To Invite Your Friends.
Please Help Support BeforeitsNews by trying our Natural Health Products below!
Order by Phone at 888-809-8385 or online at https://mitocopper.com M - F 9am to 5pm EST
Order by Phone at 866-388-7003 or online at https://www.herbanomic.com M - F 9am to 5pm EST
Order by Phone at 866-388-7003 or online at https://www.herbanomics.com M - F 9am to 5pm EST
Humic & Fulvic Trace Minerals Complex - Nature's most important supplement! Vivid Dreams again!
HNEX HydroNano EXtracellular Water - Improve immune system health and reduce inflammation.
Ultimate Clinical Potency Curcumin - Natural pain relief, reduce inflammation and so much more.
MitoCopper - Bioavailable Copper destroys pathogens and gives you more energy. (See Blood Video)
Oxy Powder - Natural Colon Cleanser! Cleans out toxic buildup with oxygen!
Nascent Iodine - Promotes detoxification, mental focus and thyroid health.
Smart Meter Cover - Reduces Smart Meter radiation by 96%! (See Video).
MOST RECENT
HELP KEEP NEWS FREE
DONATE
HERE
| Online: | |
| Visits: | 1,602,802,564 |
| Stories: | 8,147,974 |
Wanted: Citizen Reporters,
Whistler Blowers, Insiders
Whistler Blowers, Insiders
"Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts." Zechariah 4:6
Today's Top Stories
Featured
Top Global
Top Alternative