| "Neno likawa Mwili" "Kal Siga hone" "Y el verbo se hizo carne" "Le Verbe s'est fait chair" "And the Word became flesh" "La Parola si fece carne" "E a palavra foi feita carne" "A slowo cialem sie stalo" "aur shabda deh bana" "mikotoba wa Hito to nata" "sheng yan jiang cheng xue rou" Jn 1,14  |
May you and your loved ones have a truly joyous and peace filled Christmas.
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HARARE Dec 20th (AP) — Zimbabwe's central bank unveiled new currency notes Thursday with denominations as high as 750,000 dollars as the government tries to ease chronic shortages of cash in a hyperinflationary economy. Official inflation is 8,000 per cent — the highest in the world — although independent estimates put it substantially higher. The International Monetary Fund forecast inflation would reach 100,000 per cent by the end of the year. The government is withdrawing all 200,000-dollar notes, currently the largest currency note, and will question those attempting to exchange them to root out “cash barons” who hoarded them for illegal deals, Gideon Gono, governor of the Reserve Bank, told the state broadcaster.The 200,000-dollar note is expected to be phased out by Jan. 1. People exchanging large sums of 200,000 dollar notes will be asked to explain how they were acquired or face forfeiture and criminal charges. Lines that have formed daily this month outside banks and automated teller machines grew even longer Thursday after Mr. Gono said the central bank was pumping new 250,000, 500,000 and 750,000 Zimbabwe dollar bills into the economy ahead of the holidays. Lines have begun forming as early as 4 a.m. and banks are limiting withdrawals to 5-million Zimbabwe dollars per customer, about enough to buy a take out hamburger. There are acute shortages of food, gasoline and basic goods in Zimbabwe, now embroiled in its worst economic crisis since independence from Britain in 1980. Unemployment is around 80 per cent and political unrest is growing. Foreign investment, loans and development aid have dried up.
President Robert Mugabe, 83, who has ruled Zimbabwe for 27 years, blames the crisis on Western sanctions and rejects criticism that mismanagement caused the meltdown.
by ANGUS SHAW
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London Dec. 18th. (ICN) - Christian Aid has welcomed the last minute agreement at the Bali climate change conference that will enable negotiations to start on a new climate change agreement on a second phase of the Kyoto Protocol, which needs to be in place by 2012. But the agency said it is dismayed that crucial target figures for cutting carbon emissions in rich countries were removed from the final agreement. A reference to 25-40% cuts for industrialised countries by 2020 over 1990 levels was included in a draft agreement produced a week ago.
London, Jesuit Communications Dec. 20th. - A unique recording of a traditional Shona lament and a Western Christmas carol is on the way to becoming year's Christmas Number One. The single - Makandifira/Silent Night - features a 30-strong Zimbabwean children's choir, all of them residents of Makumbi Children's Home and either orphaned by AIDS or HIV positive, singing with the London Oratory School Schola (choir). It is intended to raise both funds and public awareness of the plight of African children facing the devastating effects of that continent's HIV/AIDS crisis.
NEW YORK - 20 Dec. (ICN News) - A moratorium on the death penalty was adopted yesterday by the United Nations General Assembly. The General Assembly said it considered the use of the death penalty "undermines human dignity" and said the moratorium "contributed to the enhancement and progressive development of human rights" adding that "that there is no conclusive evidence of the death penalty's deterrent value and that any miscarriage or failure of justice in the death penalty's implementation is irreversible and irreparable." It welcomed the increasing number of states around the world who are abolishing capital punishment and expressed deep concern for those who still carry out executions. It called for a progressive restriction of the use of the death penalty and and a reduction the number of offences for which it may be imposed. Appealing for more countries to abandon capital punishment, it requests the Secretary-General to report to the General Assembly at its sixty-third session on the implementation of the resolution;
Diplomats from several Western countries have also questioned why Monuc has not acted more forcefully to prevent civilians from having to flee in the first place, an issue that is likely to come up as diplomats gather here this weekend to discuss regional security. The force’s mandate is up for renewal in the Security Council this month. United Nations officials say that their role is to help Congo’s government, not take its place, and that protecting civilians is mainly the government’s responsibility. The United Nations has provided transportation for troop movements and some helicopter air support to the government’s unsuccessful efforts to remove General Nkunda. Congolese frustration with the United Nations force is more than matched by anger at its own military, which retreated in the face of rebel attacks last week. Brig. Gen. Indrajeet Narayan, the commander of the 4,500 peacekeeping troops deployed in North Kivu, said the force was not authorized to go any further unless it was under attack. “There is a lot of expectation” from civilians, General Narayan said. “They see our troops, they see our weaponry, so they expect this should be used. However the mandate clearly states that we have to protect the civilian population, that is foremost.”
The United Nations also has serious human rights concerns in working too closely with the Congolese military, which has struggled, largely unsuccessfully, to maintain discipline and morale. The army is mostly composed of former members of the old national army and militias who fought in the civil war. They have been retrained and redeployed, but problems have continued, and the army has been accused of many human rights violations, including murder and rape. Human rights organizations and aid workers say that the army sometimes collaborates with militias, like the Mai Mai. Last week, the 14th Brigade, which the rebels chased out of Mushake, harassed civilians and looted as it left, drawing censure from the United Nations. Many Congolese are also frustrated with aid organizations, many of which began to scale back emergency programs after last year’s election to focus more on long- and medium-term development, the brick-and-mortar projects, like schools, clinics and water systems, needed to rebuild a shattered country. They are struggling to keep up with the surge in demand for basic supplies, like food and shelter for the endless river of displaced people, and work amid the violence.
Hunger and disease, not bullets and bombs, have always been the primary killers in Congo, where some researchers estimate four million have died since the war began in 1996. People on the run often crowd in with relatives in provincial towns to avoid the refugee camps. But this practice can make them more vulnerable to disease — most camps have clean water and latrines. In Rutshuru, a large regional town, a cholera epidemic brings 50 people daily to a hospital run by Doctors without Borders. Cholera is a grim byproduct of displacement. When rural people flock to cities, they take cholera with them. In crowded and unsanitary conditions, it spreads like wildfire, said Augustin Augier, the hospital’s coordinator. “The violence and disease are completely connected,” Mr. Augier said. “We have never seen a cholera epidemic in Rutshuru; it is only as a result of the crisis.” The hospital set up a cholera ward, and a workshop to build cots. Speed is essential. Caught early, cholera is treatable — no medicine is needed, just copious infusions of intravenous fluids. But left untreated, it kills half of its victims, sometimes in a day.
Getting food to the displaced has been a problem. Security concerns and rutted, mud-choked roads have made it difficult to move supplies. “The vast majority of North Kivu’s people are farmers, so when they get displaced, food becomes an issue almost immediately,” said Aya Shneerson of the World Food Program. “A lot of times they really run with nothing.” Many are displaced multiple times, running from one village to another as the fighting moves, Ms. Shneerson said. Even when populations can return, they cannot farm because of roaming armed groups. Rebels and army soldiers alike, aid and human rights workers say, rape women who leave their villages to farm. Child malnutrition is rising, and displaced people are forced to flee with no food, leaving them dependent on handouts. In Minova, a town where dozens of ragged, exhausted families arrived last week seeking refuge, Cadre, a local aid organization, opened a spare building where it usually offers sewing classes as a shelter from the driving rain. “We really don’t have anything to offer them — no food, nothing to make shelter,” said Edouard Dunia, who leads Cadre. Eugenie Hasima sat on a hill nearby, trying to calm her daughter Ajira, 2, who screeched for food. “I have nothing to give her,” she said, breaking down in sobs as Ajira cried inconsolably. “She has not eaten since yesterday, and she spent all day walking. We are all just so hungry.”
By LYDIA POLGREEN
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 Saudi women are subject to strict sex segregation laws |
London Dec. 17th. (BBC) - The "Qatif girl" case caused an international outcry with widespread criticism of the Saudi justice system. The male and female victims were in a car together when they were abducted and raped by seven attackers, who were given jail sentences up to nine years. Press reports say King Abdullah's move did not mean the sentence was wrong. Quoted by the Jazirah newspaper, Justice Minister Abdullah al-Sheikh said the king had the right to issue pardons if it served the public interest. Women in Saudi Arabia are not allowed to mix with men who are not close family members.
The custodial sentence plus 200 lashes was imposed after the woman, who has not been named, appealed against an earlier sentence of 90 lashes. The Saudi king frequently pardons criminals at the Eid al-Adha festival which takes place this week, but correspondents say that is usually announced by the official press agency. The BBC's Heba Saleh says the king's decision to pardon the woman victim is already arousing controversy with some contributors to conservative websites, who say he has breached the rules of religion in order to appease critics in the West. The US had called the punishment "astonishing", although it refused to condemn the Saudi justice system. Human rights groups had been calling on King Abdullah, who has a reputation as a pro-Western reformer, to change it.
The justice ministry recently rejected what it saw as "foreign interference" in the case and insisted the ruling was legal and that the woman had confessed to having an affair with her fellow rape victim. Earlier, the woman - who is a Shia Muslim from the Qatif area - had reportedly said she met the man in order to retrieve a photograph of them together, having herself recently got married. She says two other men then entered the car and took them to a secluded area where others were waiting, and both she and her male companion were raped. The woman's companion was sentenced to 90 lashes. It is not known if his sentence was also lifted.
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BRASÍLIA, NY Times Dec. 12th. — The police jail at Abaetetuba could not be torn down soon enough for Márcia Soares, a lawyer and federal human rights official here. To her, the jail has come to symbolize everything that is wrong with Brazil’s efforts to safeguard women and children from violence. It was at Abaetetuba, in the NE state of Para on the fringes of the Amazon, that a 15-year-old girl arrested on suspicion of petty theft was illegally placed among 34 male inmates in late October. For 26 days they treated her as their plaything, raping and torturing her repeatedly. Sometimes she traded sex for food; other times, she was simply raped, federal investigators here said. The police in the jail did more than turn their backs on the violence. They shaved her head with a knife to make her look more like a boy, investigators said, and now are blaming her for lying about her age. The case is causing soul-searching here in Brazil’s capital, where federal officials have become increasingly concerned about the treatment of women and minors in the nation’s crowded prison system and the failure of judges throughout the country to prosecute cases of torture. Women make up only 5 percent of Brazil’s prison population, but the number is growing. States have not built enough jails and prisons with separate facilities for women, even though federal law requires such separation. A recent study commissioned by the government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva showed that female prisoners were being illegally placed with men or transvestites in five Brazilian states and being subjected to torture and sexual abuse. Even as Brazil was raised in November to the United Nations highest human development category, its spotty human rights history and mixed record of punishing those guilty of abuses have been an Achilles’ heel internationally. A SWAT team operates in Rio de Janeiro to root out and kill drug traffickers with impunity. The police are rarely convicted under a 1997 law against torture, because of an “institutionalizing of torture” under Brazil’s military dictatorship and more than 300 years of slavery, said Paulo Vanucchi, Brazil’s human rights minister.
The case of the 15-year-old will be another test of justice in the largely lawless Amazon region. Two years ago, a Brazilian rancher ordered the killing of Dorothy Mae Stang, 73, an American-born nun and rain forest advocate. She was shot to death on a jungle road. The rancher, Vitalmiro Bastos de Moura, was sentenced to 30 years in prison. What has been particularly disheartening to federal human rights officials in the case of the 15-year-old girl is how many people had the chance to protect her. Ms. Soares, the lawyer, said the police, the judge and a public defender who had visited the jail all knew the teenager was in an all-male setting. “Several officials were aware of what was happening, and at worst they were complicit in it,” Ms. Soares said. “It’s a very serious situation.” Ana Júlia Carepa, the governor of Para, has been scrambling to clean up the mess since the situation became public late last month. Ms. Carepa pressed Raimundo Benassuly, the state police chief, to resign the day after he said publicly that the girl had lied about her age because she had a “mental deficiency.” The police have said that the girl had claimed she was 19, not 15, during several run-ins with the law. Ms. Soares said that officials, including the judge in the case, a woman, did not press the girl for documentation proving she was an adult, even though she is under five feet tall and weighs about 80 pounds. “When I first saw her I thought she was 12, not 15,” Ms. Soares said. For Ms. Carepa, the girl’s age is beside the point. “If she is 15, 20, 50, 80 years old or almost 100, it doesn’t matter,” she told journalists in Rio last month. “A woman cannot be in a cell with men.” Ms. Carepa said that the jail would be torn down and replaced with something that has facilities for women.
The judge who placed the girl in the all-male jail, Clarice Maria Andrade, is being investigated and could lose her job. Two others in her office are accused of altering a document to make it seem as if the judge had approved a transfer from the jail shortly after the police made the request, not 12 days later. Local officials were already familiar with the girl before she was arrested and placed in the Abaetetuba jail on Oct. 21. Growing up in a broken home, she had left school before and frequented an area known for child prostitution, Ms. Soares said. At the time of her arrest, she was shuttling among her parents’ homes and an uncle’s house, and no one seemed to keep careful tabs on her. During the 26 days, no relative came to the jail looking for her. Within her first two days in jail, a man raped her in the bathroom, the girl told investigators. Inmates rely on visiting relatives to bring food. With no such visits, extreme hunger soon overtook the girl and she began trading sex for food, investigators said. Other men, however, simply raped her when they wanted to, and tortured her for amusement, investigators said. Some placed crumpled papers between her toes as she slept and lighted them, Ms. Soares said, adding that the girl still had burn marks on her feet.
Residents heard the girl’s screams from the road, which is near the jail windows. Yet for weeks no one came to her rescue. It was only after an anonymous note reached the local child protection services agency that she was removed from the jail. In recent days, she and her family have been relocated under a federal witness protection program. The girl’s father complained of death threats from the police. He said they had tried to press him to say that the girl was 19 or 20. “It’s now up to us to protect her and help her to start a new life,” Ms. Soares said. “And we need to keep up the political pressure, so that justice has a chance.”
by Alexei Barrionuevo
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These developments have created a number of important challenges for the international community. The first arises from the increasingly complex nature of human mobility. The majority of people on the move are migrants who leave their own country because they are unable to maintain their livelihoods at home and because their labour is needed elsewhere. Others are forced to abandon their homes as a result of persecution and armed conflict. Under international law, these people are considered as refugees. They have been granted specific rights, including protection from being forced to return to their own country. The responsibility of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the UN's refugee agency, is to uphold the rights of this latter group. In many parts of the world, however, refugees and migrants are to be found travelling alongside each other, heading in the same direction, using the same forms of transport and lacking the passports and visas that states require them to carry. Such "irregular" movements have prompted many states to erect new barriers to the admission of foreign nationals. Regrettably, these measures have had the effect of preventing refugees from seeking the safety they need. We must therefore ensure that border controls enable people to exercise their right to seek and enjoy asylum in other states.
A second challenge is to provide more opportunities for people to move in a safe and legal manner. Most states have now recognised the need for goods, services, capital and information to flow freely across national borders. But governments are apprehensive about applying the same principal to the movement of people. The result has been a massive growth in the expansion of an industry whose purpose and profit lies in smuggling and trafficking people across international frontiers. As well as cracking down on such activities, states should consider opening new channels and expanding existing programs of legal migration. The forces that are prompting many people to migrate are deeply entrenched within the international economy. It is an illusion to think that their numbers can be brought down in the present and dynamic phase of globalisation. Greater efforts are therefore needed to prevent the emergence of situations in which people are forced to leave their homes as a result of human rights abuses, armed conflict or other calamities that disrupt their lives and livelihoods.
If this third challenge is to be tackled in an effective manner, serious efforts must be made to promote environmentally sensitive forms of development in countries where the struggle for survival threatens to lead to violence. Above all, governments in every part of the world must be encouraged and supported to protect the lives and wellbeing of their citizens, thereby enabling them to live a peaceful and prosperous life in their own country. When people move from one country to another, they should do so out of choice and not because it is the only way they can survive.
By Antonio Guterres who is the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
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LISBON, Dec. 8 — A summit meeting of leaders from Europe and Africa on Saturday was dominated by divisions between the two continents over trade and criticism from European leaders of human rights abuses in Zimbabwe. Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya was among the leaders of 80 European and African countries meeting in Lisbon Saturday. The first such European Union-African meeting in seven years began amid growing concern in Europe that its economic and political influence in Africa was being eclipsed by China’s growing economic influence there.
But the start of the two-day meeting was overshadowed by the presence of Robert G. Mugabe, Zimbabwe’s president, who remains a liberation hero in some African countries. His appearance, however, led Gordon Brown, Britain’s prime minister, to decline to attend. In her speech, Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, criticized Mr. Mugabe, who is accused of human rights abuses, vote rigging and substantially worsening the level of poverty in his country. “The whole European Union has the same view of what is happening there,” Mrs. Merkel said, according to a copy of her speech distributed at the meeting. “Zimbabwe concerns all of us, in Europe and in Africa.” After criticism of Zimbabwe from other European leaders, African countries appeared to close ranks around Mr. Mugabe. Senegal’s president, Abdoulaye Wade, said that the comments about Mr. Mugabe were “not true,” and that Mrs. Merkel was misinformed. “Zimbabwe is making progress toward democracy and should be helped, not sanctioned,” he said. President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, also speaking about human rights, avoided criticizing Mr. Mugabe, according to Baroness Amos, a former deputy foreign minister representing Britain here in Mr. Brown’s place. In a briefing with reporters, Lady Amos cited Mr. Mbeki’s role as a negotiator between Mr. Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party and the opposition as a legitimate explanation for his reluctance to confront his fellow leader.
Sudan’s president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, whose government is accused by many countries and aid groups of causing the humanitarian crisis in Darfur, was also at the meeting, as was Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, Libya’s president. In all, 80 European and African governments were represented. A meeting between Mr. Bashir and senior European officials yielded no breakthrough over plans to send non-African peacekeepers to Darfur. Access to Mr. Mugabe was closely controlled. As he left his five-star hotel in Cascais, on the coast near Lisbon, on Saturday morning, he refused to answer questions from reporters as his security team jostled a camera crew from the BBC. In order for Mr. Mugabe to attend the meeting, his Portuguese hosts had to waive a European Union visa ban that normally prevents him and 130 other Zimbabwean officials from traveling to Europe. Mr. Mugabe was invited when southern African nations made it clear that they would not attend the meeting were he excluded. In 2003, a similar standoff prevented a summit meeting from taking place, but such is the concern over China’s growing economic influence in Africa that all but a handful of European leaders agreed to override their objections and sit down with Zimbabwe’s president.
Ireland’s prime minister, Bertie Ahern, said that he would have preferred Mr. Mugabe had stayed away and said human rights needed to be addressed at the meeting. “Any country that halves the life expectancy of its population speaks for itself,” Mr. Ahern told reporters. Though Europe remains Africa’s biggest trading partner, China’s investment ambitions were underlined recently when a Chinese bank bought 20 percent of Standard Bank, Africa’s largest lender, for $5.4 billion. According to the European Commission, 800 Chinese companies have invested $1 billion in Africa through 2006, the latest year for which figures are available. The country imports 32 percent of its oil from Africa, and oil-related investment in recent years amounts to $16 billion, the commission said.
Despite their historical ties to Africa, Europeans have found it difficult to compete with China, which finances giant infrastructure projects and offers investment without conditions related to human rights or government transparency. European leaders have called for a new partnership between the continents based on common interests, from trade to climate change, instead of the traditional relationship between donors and aid recipients. But the legacy of Europe’s colonial past is a source of continuing controversy. “Africa doesn’t want charity or paternalism,” said Alpha Oumar Konaré, the chairman of the African Union, at the opening session on Saturday. “We don’t want anyone doing things for us. We want to play in the global economy but with new rules.” Mr. Konaré also criticized the European Union’s strategy of pressing individual African regions and states to sign new trade deals, called economic partnership agreements. He said the practice was divisive and would hurt the continent’s industries and rural poor. Mr. Wade, of Senegal, accused Europe of trying to impose on Africa a “straitjacket that does not work.”
by Michel Euler/Associated Press
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BALI, Indonesia, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) -- The atmosphere inside and outside the Bali International Convention Center is different as the ongoing conference is bringing together thousands of representative from over 180 countries, as well as observers from intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations, who are intensively discussing and negotiating on ways and measures that should be adopted to combat climate change. Worldwide efforts on tackling the worsening global warming is gaining steam and momentum at the conference, which is tasked withdrawing up a "roadmap" for negotiations on a new deal before the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol expires by 2012. As numerous discussions, meetings and press conferences were going on inside the closed doors at the center, dozens of side events were being held by nongovernmental organizations, academics, the private sector and others. All were trying to sell their idea on how to save the planet. Some organizations were sounding alarming bells about the climate change in their press releases and publications, and called for immediate actions in tackling the challenge of climate change. Others were trying to offer solutions to the problem. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Executive Secretary Yve de Boer said that the climate change being felt around the world has created a public awareness about the issue of global warming. This year's scientific report from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has made clear beyond doubt that climate change is a reality and can seriously harm the future development of the world's economies, societies and eco-systems. Human activities are blamed for the accelerating global warming.
On the conference's progress so far, Yve de Boer said that the meetings were "going well." He termed the fact that many countries have come prepared with their own proposals on how the process should move forward as "encouraging." The climate change is such a "big and complicated" issue. The problem can only be solved by working together, he said, adding that however, the Bali conference would not finalize a post-2012 climate deal, but could "put in place a two-year process to work towards such a deal." He also said that "I think it's clear to everyone that industrialized countries must continue to take the lead (in reducing emissions of greenhouse gases) and must reduce their emissions by 25 to 40 percent by 2020." The challenge for most of the developing countries in the world in tackling the climate change is how to achieve a balance in growing economy, while reducing the emission of greenhouse gases, he said. He hoped that modern clean technology can help developing countries grow economy in a clean way so as to reduce air pollution which leads to high public health costs and help them avoid making the same mistakes that were made in the West.
The main goal of the Bali Conference is to launch negotiations on a climate change deal for the post-2012 period, to set the agenda for these negotiations and to reach agreement on when these negotiations will have to be concluded, according to the UNFCCC. The U.N. climate change conference, which kicked off on Dec. 3 and will end on Dec. 14. At the end of the conference, a decision is expected to launch a new process to shape a deal on a post-2012 climate change regime, said the UNFCCC.
By Gao Li, Ren Haijun
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Spiegel On-Line Dec. 7th. - This weekend's EU-Africa summit is supposed to be about tackling issues such as trade, immigration and climate change. But the ongoing conflict in Darfur and the presence of Zimbabwe's President Mugabe have led to calls for human rights to take center stage. European Union and African leaders are gathering in Lisbon Friday for their first summit in seven years to discuss a range of issues, including trade, climate change and immigration. But there has been criticism from a number of quarters that the issues of human rights and the continuing conflict in Darfur are not being given enough prominence at the event. In the run-up to the summit, activists, writers and politicians have slammed the organizers for not placing the Darfur conflict at the top of the agenda. There has also been criticism of the decision to invite Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe, who has been accused of corruption, economic mismanagement and human rights abuses. On Friday, a group of 90 European and African parliamentarians and human rights activists appealed to their leaders to tackle the crisis in Darfur, the region of Sudan where more than 200,000 people have been killed and millions displaced. The United Nations approved a UN-African Union peacekeeping mission in July but there have been doubts cast about the mission's viability due to restrictions imposed by Sudan. Earlier in the week, leading writers from the two continents, including Vaclav Havel, Günter Grass, Ben Okri and J. M. Coetzee, accused the EU and African leaders of "political cowardice" for failing to put "two of the world's worst humanitarian crises" -- Zimbabwe and Darfur -- at the top of the summit's agenda. "We expect our leaders to lead, and lead with moral courage," the 14 authors said in an open letter published on Tuesday. "When they fail to do so, they leave all of us morally impoverished."
One leader, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, did make a stand on the issue of Zimbabwe, deciding to boycott the weekend meeting because Mugabe was attending. The Zimbabwean president is normally banned from Europe for allegedly rigging his re-election in 2002. While still revered by many Africans as a liberation leader, his regime has become increasingly autocratic and unemployment and inflation are now rampant in the country. On Thursday, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said that he didn't want the summit to be "taken hostage" by the Mugabe issue. He said he respected Brown's decision, but added: "Life has taught me that if you are in international politics sometimes you have to meet people your mother would not like to see you with." He also pointed out that the summit's first session will be on the issue of human rights. The EU president said the summit should be a "new departure" in relations between the continents, based on equal partnership and "moving away from the mere donor-beneficiary relationship to launch a true partnership between Africa and Europe, based on common interests and tackling other global challenges." The 48 leaders from Africa and 26 from Europe will be addressing the issues of immigration and climate change, as well as energy, trade and development, during the summit on Saturday and Sunday. Immigration is one of the most important issues affecting relations between the two continents. Every year hundreds of thousands of Africans embark on perilous journeys to try to reach the shores of Europe; thousands never make it. The EU has recently touted the idea of a "blue card" scheme to encourage the immigration of skilled migrants, but that may not do much to resolve the problem of the thousands of illegal migrants, many from Africa, living in poverty in Europe.
Trade will also be a key issue at the summit. With Europe dependent on Russia for a quarter of its energy supplies, many countries are looking for other more reliable sources -- and Africa is rich in natural resources. The EU is mindful that it may have missed the boat in availing itself of these resources, given that energy-hungry China has been dramatically increasing its investment in Africa since the 1990s. However, human rights may still end up dominating the conference. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is to give a keynote speech in Lisbon and Berlin has made it known that she will address the issue of human rights. Merkel has not shied away from tackling the issue in the past, for example during her visit to China this year. And as G-8 leader at the Heiligendamm summit in June of this year, Merkel chose to make Africa a central issue.
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Spiegel Online, Dec. 5th. - The war in Sudan's Darfur region has spread to epidemic proportions and is now plunging the neighboring Central African Republic into chaos. This is just adding one more problem to a country that has been torn apart by its own internal divisions for decades.
UGANDA: Ebola kills two doctors as death toll rises to 21 KAMPALA, 5 December 2007 (IRIN) - Two Ugandan doctors who had been helping in the fight against an outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus have died, bringing the death toll to 21, officials said on 5 December."The sad news today is that our doctor who was admitted to Mulago Hospital [in the capital, Kampala] died last night and a senior clinical officer who had been in a critical condition also died this morning," said Samuel Kazinga, resident district commissioner for Bundibugyo, the epicentre of the outbreak. The doctor who died at Mulago had come from Bundibugyo to the city to collect one of his children, only to fall sick, and had been put in an isolation ward at the hospital, the largest in the country. Some health officials have said a lack of appropriate equipment in Mulago and other hospitals allowed the virus to spread, but the government announced on 4 December that it had sent 400 packages of protective gear to the affected region to help ensure medical workers were adequately protected.
LONDON (Reuters) Dec. 5th. - As many as 150 million people in the world's big coastal cities are likely to be at risk from flooding by the 2070s, more than three times as many as now, according to a report released on Tuesday. Climate change, population growth and urban development will mean the number at risk will rise from the current 40 million while total property and infrastructure exposure is forecast to rise to $35 trillion -- 9 percent of projected global GDP. The report from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, put together by disaster modeling firm Risk Management Solutions and leading scientists, is the first part of the largest ever study on urban coastal flood exposure.The report analyzed the vulnerability now and in the future of 130 port cities to a major flood, on a scale likely to occur once in 100 years. Miami in Florida will remain the city with the highest value of property and infrastructure assets exposed to coastal flooding caused by storm surge and damage from high winds, the report said. The city has exposed assets of $400 billion today. Those are projected to rise in value to over $3.5 trillion by 2070. But with rapid economic development in Asia, Guangzhou in China will be the second most exposed city in terms of assets in 2070, followed by New York, Kolkata, Shanghai, Mumbai, Tianjin, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Bangkok, the report said.
Population growth and urban development in coastal cities will increase the exposure, exacerbated by the effects of climate change and subsidence, the report said. Scientists believe global warming will cause sea levels to rise and bring more frequent and severe storms and other natural disasters. "This report raises crucial policy considerations, and highlights the urgency for climate change mitigation and risk-informed adaptation strategies at a city level," said Jan Corfee-Morlot, the OECD's senior policy advisor on climate change. Policies to mitigate climate change will bring "precious time" for exposed cities to implement strategies to adapt to and protect themselves from the higher risk of flooding, said Corfee-Morlot. Projects to protect cities from flooding, such as the Thames Barrier built to protect central London from a major flood, typically take up to 30 years, said the report.
Policymakers from around the world are meeting this week in Bali to try to hammer out a successor agreement to the Kyoto Protocol to cut man-made emissions of carbon dioxide that are believed to lead to global warming. Insurers, who end up paying a large part of the bill from any damage caused by climate change, should encourage policyholders to adopt methods to adapt to effects of global warming, the report said.
By Simon Challis
(Editing by Matthew Tostevin)
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No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Mozlink’ for any or all of the articles/images placed here. The placing of an article does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.
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The US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, is in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, for a series of meetings on some of Africa's worst conflicts. BBC News Dec. 5th. - Ms Rice is to discuss the situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia and Sudan with regional presidents and ministers. However, none of the three countries' leaders are going to Ethiopia. She said she was "increasingly concerned about several crisis spots in Africa" before starting the talks. She will also hold bilateral talks with Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi. They are expected to discuss renewed tensions with neighbouring Eritrea. A deadline set by an international border commission for the countries to demarcate their shared border expired on Friday without agreement.
Her first talks were on the latest fighting in DR Congo, with the presidents of Rwanda, Burundi and Uganda, as well as Congolese ministers. They agreed to strengthen the Congolese security institutions, Ms Rice said after the talks. All countries agreed not to "harbour negative forces" - a reference to Rwandan Hutu rebels, which are at the heart of fighting across the region. The Congolese army, backed up by UN peacekeepers, is also trying to disarm a dissident Tutsi general. Laurent Nkunda refuses to join the army, saying his men must keep their arms to defend themselves against the Hutus. Rwanda denies claims it is backing Gen Nkunda.As President Abdullahi Yusuf is in hospital in Kenya, Ms Rice is due to discuss the Somali crisis with his newly appointed Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein, as well as Mr Meles. The US supported Ethiopia's intervention in Somalia last year, to help the government oust Islamists from Mogadishu. However, Ethiopia's intervention is unpopular in Somalia and insurgents continue to stage attacks. The UN says that one million Somalis have been displaced by the fighting, including 60% of the capital's residents. Mr Meles says he wants to withdraw his forces but cannot until they are replaced by a promised African Union peacekeeping force.
The BBC's Elizabeth Blunt in Addis Ababa says the US is offering to help African countries who are willing to send troops to Somalia as part of a peacekeeping force. "We do believe that peacekeeping efforts need to take place in Somalia," she said. "We appreciate very much the [Ugandan] grounding forces that are there. They frankly need to be joined soon by other forces."
On Sudan, Ms Rice is due to discuss the tensions in the US-brokered 2005 peace deal between north and south. "That is really an agreement that we cannot afford to let unravel," she said. She is also expected to discuss the conflict in Darfur with African officials. However, Sudan's government has signalled that it will not meet Ms Rice, reports the AP news agency.
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Disclaimer
No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Mozlink’ for any or all of the articles/images placed here. The placing of an article does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.
Mozlink
Daily Star, Tues. Dec. 4th. - Many of today's war zones - including Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia, and Sudan - share basic problems that lie at the root of their conflicts. They are all poor, buffeted by natural disasters - especially floods, droughts, and earthquakes - and have rapidly growing populations that are pressing on the capacity of the land to feed them. And the proportion of youth is very high, with a bulging population of young men of military age (15-24 years). All of these problems can be solved only through long-term sustainable economic development. Yet the United States persists in responding to symptoms rather than to underlying conditions by trying to address every conflict by military means. It backs the Ethiopian Army in Somalia. It occupies Iraq and Afghanistan. It threatens to bomb Iran. It supports the military dictatorship in Pakistan.
BBC Dec. 3rd. - A UK teacher has been released and handed over to British officials in Sudan after being jailed for letting her class name a teddy bear Muhammad. Gillian Gibbons, 54, from Liverpool, was freed after eight days in custody. She had been given a 15-day jail term. Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir pardoned her after talks with two British Muslim peers. In a statement, Mrs Gibbons apologised for "any distress". Prime Minister Gordon Brown said he was "delighted". Mother-of-two Mrs Gibbons has been released into the care of the British embassy in Khartoum, but her exact location has not been disclosed. She was released four days after receiving a 15-day sentence for insulting religion.
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An elder Cherokee Native American was teaching his grandchildren about life. He said to them...
“A fight is going on inside me... it is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One wolf represents fear, anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority and ego.
The other stands for joy, peace, love, hope, sharing, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, friendship, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith.
This same fight is going on inside you and every other person, too.”
They thought about this for a minute, and then one child asked his grandfather... “Which wolf will win?”
The old Cherokee simply replied... “The one you feed.”
