6,000 Palestinians Trapped at Border Crossing

A fifth person dies after 40 days in the wilderness

Jerusalem, July 20th. 2007: Imagine yourself being in a place that lacks water, food and proper living conditions. Imagine suffering health problems and staying under the hot sun and facing cold nights for more than 40 consecutive days. Imagine people around you are dying. Imagine having no hope for a resolution of this problem. Certainly, we hope you will never be in such a situation, but this is what is happening at this moment for more than 6,000 persons stuck on the Palestinian-Egyptian border.

More than 6,000 Palestinians are trapped between Egypt and the Gaza Strip awaiting a solution to get them out of this catastrophic situation. They are waiting relief or any kind of support as a quick response to their needs. They want to return back home to Gaza and they do not have any money nor visas to return back to Egypt. According to media reports today some 30,000 other Palestinians are waiting at other locations in Egypt to return to Gaza. They are less than five kilometres away from their home, but Rafah crossing remains closed and it is the only gate out and in for Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip. It has remained closed since Hamas' takeover of the Gaza Strip.

We in Caritas Jerusalem spoke to Ali who has been trapped on the border for 32 days. He said angrily: "We are only a few kilometres away from the border. Our life looks like hell here. I can't take a shower. I can't go back to Egypt. I can't enter my home [Gaza], I can't find or buy good food, I have no money A woman last week died here as well as many others. These days are the worst in my life and if my situation remains like this, I prefer to die."

During our call with Ali, he was coughing. He suffers health problems after staying all this time without shelter or warmth at night. Talking about the situation, he said, "There is little support that helps us stay alive. We need to go to our homes. We don't want to stay here." Ali was in France before coming back to Gaza. His family, work and whole life is in Gaza. He wants to return, but he cannot. He dreamt many times of having Rafah open, but he woke up to the bitter reality. During our call with Ali, the line was cut. We tried to call him again, but without success.

Many people travelled to Egypt to escape from the deteriorating situation, when they heard about some improvement, they came back expecting one or two days on the border, but the worst happened; the crossing has closed for 40 days. Many went to have medical treatment in Egypt, but they returned in coffins back to Gaza after long processes of coordination with the Israeli authorities for their entry. Last Saturday, medical sources announced the deaths of 28 Palestinians who had been trapped in Egypt due to the closure of the Rafah Crossing since the 1st of June. Of the 28 casualties, 5 had died at the crossing. The rest died in Egyptian medical facilities.

Ashraf, a Gazan from Jabaliya Refugee Camp, told Caritas Jerusalem that the contact with his brother has halted for weeks. He said, "My brother phoned three weeks ago telling us that the situation is a disaster on the Egyptian side of the border and no one is paying them any attention." The urgent humanitarian crisis on the Palestinian-Egyptian border is growing seriously. A quick response and intervention of the international community are urgently required as soon as possible before it is too late.
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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. Mozlink

Kidnapped Priest Freed

MANILA - 20 July 2007: Italian missionary Fr Giancarlo Bossi was released to police authorities late Thursday night in Lanao del Norte, local news services report.

Fr Bossi was kidnapped on 10 June. Police Regional Director Jaime Caringal said: ."He is well, but he lost a lot of weight". Fr Bossi was rushed to Camp Kawa-kawa where he was given immediate medical attention.

In Rome, Italian Premier Romano Prodi announced the release. He said: "Father Giancarlo Bossi has been freed ... Today is his mother's birthday, so it was also a very lucky coincidence". Pope Benedict, who said last week that he was praying daily for Bossi,is overjoyed at the news according to Vatican spokesman Fr Frederico Lombardi.
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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. Mozlink

Zimbabwean Refugees Suffer in Botswana & Sth. Africa

20 July 2007: Chipo Ngwira, 31, left Harare three weeks ago to look for a job in Gaborone, Botswana. She has not tasted a decent meal for 14 days as Batswanas constantly remind her that they have no jobs for foreigners, commonly known in the diamond-rich nation as 'makwerekwere'. The 100 Pula she had raised over six months in Zimbabwe's economically crippled capital, Harare, has been exhausted. The only thing now is for her to join other Zimbabwean women at Gaborone West's Mogoditshane suburb where prostitution is the order of the day. Finding a job in Gaborone's White City area, largely frequented by Zimbabweans looking for formal employment such as gardening and housekeeping is just a pipe dream.

To Chipo, the idea of leaving her two starving children with their grandmother was the most painful decision she has ever made in her life. "I just dumped them at my grandmother's place in Highfield density suburb in Harare and told the granny that I am leaving for a better life either in Botswana or South Africa," says the distraught single parent. "I shed my tears before embarking on the 760 kilometre journey to Gaborone. Right now, I don't know whether my children have had a decent meal during the past three weeks because my grandmother is poor and she receives $100,000 per month from the Department of Social Welfare. This is hardly enough to buy two loaves of bread." Chipo is not the only Zimbabwean facing such difficulties as thousands of economic refugees are flocking to Botswana and South Africa to search for basic food commodities and greener pastures as the country is facing its worst economic crisis in its history.

Independent sources estimate that between 500 and 600 refugees cross into Botswana and South Africa every day to look for jobs. Farmers close to the border between Zimbabwe and South Africa say that the figures are much higher, a fact that they say senior officials in the military and police will only privately admit to. According to the farmers' estimates, about 4,000 Zimbabweans are crossing into South Africa every night. That represents at least 100,000 people a month, far more than official estimates of 20,000 per month. Just this week the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) reported that 6,000 Zimbabwean refugees were deported every week from Musina near the Beit Bridge border post. ZimbabweJournalists.com reported that Andrew Gethi, the chief operating officer of the International Organisation for Migration, which opened an office to assist deported Zimbabwean refugees on the northern side of the border, says the organisation is handling on average 17,000 deportees every month - it estimates that more than 86,000 illegal immigrants were forcibly repatriated between January and May this year alone. (It is important to note that the figure of 17,000 per month excludes those refugees who have managed to evade the South African authorities).

The scale of the problem is likely to worsen as the Zimbabwean economy deteriorates further and as Zanu PF policies become increasingly repressive and brutal. For most refugees, the dangerous crossing into neighbouring countries and the uncertain future they face there presents them with far better options of survival than staying at home. Zimbabwe's economy is deteriorating at an alarming rate. South Africa's Econometrix Ecobulletin of 10 July reported that in June, Zimbabwe's inflation was around 3,700% and the preceding month around 2,200%. At the time of publishing, the bulletin said the official rate had reached over 4,500%. This clearly indicated that the country had reached the realms of hyperinflation as a 4 500% inflation rate entailed roughly a doubling of prices every month or an escalation of 2.33% per day. Furthermore, if daily prices accelerated to 2.8% per day, on an annualised basis this would be equivalent to 20,000% inflation.

Among the refugees fleeing Zimbabwe, those who have already sought political asylum in Botswana during the past six months are awaiting the processing of their application papers at Dukwe Camp, a security-tight compound once occupied by Zimbabweans fleeing atrocities perpetrated by former Rhodesian leader Ian Smith's repressive regime and the Mugabe government's Gukurahundi - involving mass civilian murders - in the 1980s. It is estimated that more than 20,000 people died during the Gukurahundi massacres. Although the Zimbabwean government is tight-lipped over refugees fleeing the country into neighbouring countries, the situation appears to be worse in Johannesburg, one of Africa's largest cities.

This has forced Bishop Paul Verryn's Central Methodist Church to take care of 900 stranded refugees, some of them with little children, who crossed the borders illegally to look for a better living. "Conditions for refugees in a church building not meant for housing are a nightmare, but it's far sight better than living rough on the inner-city streets where life is very tough and the refugees are regularly harassed," said the Bishop. He continued: "The presence of Zimbabweans in this country presents us with a choice about our view of humanity. Firstly, refugees are by no means a nuisance or a curse in a country. They are a glorious opportunity for us to show our true humanity. Secondly, Zimbabweans come with gifts. Our wisdom is to expose and celebrate their presence among us."

An estimated three million Zimbabweans, mostly illegal immigrants, live in South Africa. The majority end up living in crime-infested areas such as Hillbrow, Berea and some parts of Johannesburg's South-Western Townships (Soweto), leading to the troubling perception among some South Africans that Zimbabweans are deeply involved in crime - a perception that many commentators see as a worrying increase in xenophobia.

The Zimbabwean refugees in South Africa and Botswana believe that there is only one answer to their suffering - the demise of Zanu PF and Robert Mugabe's rule, a dictatorial evil leader who has been at the helm of the country for all of the 27 years since independence from British rule.

"Our lives are resting on one selfish man named Robert Gabriel Mugabe. I don't see the reason why over 12 million people can be terrorised by one man without fighting back. This is the time for us to retaliate against this monster. Enough is enough!" says Phathisani Mkandla, an economic refugee roaming the streets of Johannesburg during the past two weeks looking for formal employment.

"If all people agree to stage a strike against Mugabe, we will push him out of power within hours and our country may pull out of this mess," says Mkandla's friend Power Nketha with razor sharp cheekbones, a sign of extreme hunger.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 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

World Struggling to Treat HIV-AIDS - Report

SYDNEY, July 18 (Reuters) - Global AIDS treatment will fall far short of a universal target to have five million people being treated by 2010, due to a continued lack of access to drugs by many of the world's impoverished people, said a new report. The report analysing AIDS treatment in 17 countries and titled "Missing the Target" said free HIV treatment was actually not free in many poor countries. "Free treatment is not truly free in most countries surveyed," said Gregg Gonsalves from the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition, which released the report on Wednesday. "Charges for diagnostic tests, medical care and other services are putting lifesaving care out of the reach of many thousands of people," Gregg said in a statement.

Although 700,000 more people with HIV received treatment in 2007, the pace needed to accelerate, said the coalition, which represents activists in more than 125 countries. "Tripling the annual growth rate of treatment access from today's 700,000 to 2 million new people on treatment each year is both possible and necessary to meet the G8 commitment of coming close to universal access by 2010," said the coalition's report. The United Nations says close to 40 million people are infected with the AIDS virus and that treatment had dramatically expanded from 240,000 people in 2001 to 1.3 million by 2005. In June, world powers at the Group of Eight (G8) summit in Germany set a target of providing AIDS drugs over the next few years to approximately 5 million people.

STIGMA, MARGINALISED
While increasing numbers of people were being treated for HIV, the latest report said there remained serious challenges with marginalised people, inequitable access to care for rural populations and children, a lack of transportation, the stigma of being diagnosed and the high cost of drugs. Cambodia, which has some 134,000 people with HIV, was a "success story" in increasing treatment, it said. AIDS drugs only became available in Cambodia in 2004 and there were now 40 centres treating some 21,900 people. But the report said there was still a "large but silent minority" of marginalised people, such as sex workers, Vietnamese citizens living in Cambodia and people in remote areas and slums, who still did not receive treatment. "Many of these individuals...are reluctant to seek out health services in general because of fear of stigma and discrimination, if not harassment," it said.

China's free treatment programme, started four years ago, had expanded rapidly from August 2006 when 26,000 people were treated to 30,000 by June 2007, said the report. But this was a small percent of the official 650,000 people with HIV in China. Major obstacles in China to treatment were stigma and a "prohibitively expensive" test to confirm diagnosis, along with a lack of drugs and trained medical staff, it said.

India has one of the world's largest populations living with HIV-AIDS, about 2.5 million people, but as of 2007 only 70,780 people were being treated through 107 centres, said the report. "Clearly, therefore, only a fraction of those needing treatment are receiving it now or can hope to receive it in the next half a decade," said the report.

South Africa, the epicentre of the AIDS epidemic with 5.5 million people with HIV, was also struggling to treat people. As of 2007 some 257,100 patients were receiving drugs at specialist centres, with 30,000 on waiting lists, and up to 110,000 people being treated privately, said the report. The report said South Africa had a long way to go meet its goal of treating 80 percent of new AIDS cases by 2011. "Treatment delivery is working and there can be no more excuses for losing this momentum or letting millions die of AIDS," said Zackie Achmat of South Africa's Treatment Action Campaign.
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Zimbabwe's Top Cleric Responds to Sex Romp Row

Pretoria News (SA), 18 July: Zimbabwe's state-controlled media have had a field day in publishing lurid, grainy photographs of a man they claim is Catholic Archbishop Pius Ncube, allegedly taken inside his bedroom with a naked woman. Archbishop Ncube, an outspoken critic of President Robert Mugabe, has been sued by a lowly-paid public servant who said the cleric has destroyed his marriage. When shown the photographs, the woman admitted to having had a sexual relationship with Ncube. Ncube sounded weary on the telephone from his home in Bulawayo on Tuesday. He said the pictures claimed to be of him naked, were part of "a long-term strategy". The pictures, taken by a secret camera, show a naked man, which the state Press says is Pius Ncube, and a woman in a bed in the same room. A summons was served on the archbishop at St Mary's Cathedral on Monday and about a dozen journalists from state media were on hand when the sheriff of Bulawayo delivered the papers to him.

A colleague of the archbishop, who asked not to be named, said on Tuesday the cleric had agreed to have an interview with the SABC's Supa Mandanwanzira, who also freelances for the state-controlled Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation. Ncube agreed to the interview to talk about the effects of the price cuts imposed by the government which have led to widespread shortages of essential foods. The summons was served on behalf of Onesimus Sibanda, a technician at the bankrupt National Railways of Zimbabwe, who claimed his wife Rosemary, who worked in the Catholic Church in Bulawayo, was having a two-year long affair with the archbishop. Sibanda has demanded about R700 000 in damages from the Archbishop. Ncube said he was "very stressed" but many people had shown him support and he was "praying a great deal" during this time.

David Coltart, founding legal secretary for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, and a long standing human rights lawyer, said the revelations in the media and the summons appeared to be what he described as "a well co-ordinated campaign". Coltart said he did not believe a state-employed railway technician could have afforded a sophisticated operation like the one which produced the explicit pictures taken with a concealed camera and were published in the state Press and on television. He said Ncube was President Mugabe's most consistent critic, and the state had felt restrained from "arresting, torturing or killing him, as happened to many others" who opposed the present government. "President Mugabe had obviously known in advance about this, as he referred to priests on July 7, saying 'some of them have sworn to celibacy but they sleep around'. It was hypocritical of the present regime, which was involved in genocide, to focus on this issue in the way it has. Archbishop Ncube tries to feed hungry people while the present government tries to starve them."

Coltart also said Mugabe had children with a married woman while his first wife, Sally, was dying. Mugabe went on to marry his present wife Grace after Sally died. Coltart said he and many of his colleagues and friends would support Ncube, "regardless of whether the allegations proved to be true or not". Rosemary Sibanda, the woman with whom the archbishop is alleged to have had an affair, told the Zimbabwe state media she was separated from her husband at the time she began a sexual relationship with the archbishop. Nicholas Mathonsi, a lawyer for Ncube, said he was still discussing the matter with his client and would make a statement later. He said in his years as a lawyer in Bulawayo he had never seen a summons delivered with a crowd of state journalists in attendance.
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Mugabe's Price Cuts bring Cheap TVs Today, New Crisis Tomorrow

Harare July 18th: Police and Zanu PF officials lead the bargain hunt, after officials order shops to act. Zimbabweans are shopping like there's no tomorrow. With police patrolling the aisles of Harare's electrical shops to enforce massive government-ordered price cuts, the widescreen TVs were the first things to go, for as little as £20. Across the country, shoes, clothes, toiletries and different kinds of food were all swept from the shelves as a nation with the world's fastest shrinking economy gorged itself on one last spending spree. Car dealers said officials were trying to force them to sell vehicles at the official exchange rate, effectively meaning that a car costing £15,000 could be had for £30 by changing money on the blackmarket. The owners of several dealerships have been arrested. President Robert Mugabe's order that all shop prices be cut by at least half, and sometimes several times more, has forced stores to open to hordes of customers waving thick blocks of near worthless money given new value by the price cuts. The police and groups of ruling party supporters could be seen leading the charge for a bargain.

Mr Mugabe has accused business interests of fuelling inflation, running at about 20,000%, to bring down his government. A hotline is in place to report "overcharging", and retailers who flinch at slashing prices are being dragged before the courts. Several thousand have been arrested for "profiteering" over the past week, including the chief executives of the biggest retailers in the country, some of them foreign-owned. Economists say the price cuts will only deepen the national crisis, leaving many shops bare because they will not be able to afford to restock while official retail prices remain lower than the cost of buying wholesale or importing. Mr Mugabe has dismissed such warnings as "bookish economics". Some businesses fear that Operation Reduce Prices is intended to pin the blame on the private sector for Zimbabwe's economic problems as a step towards seizing control of many companies in the way that white-owned farms were expropriated at the beginning of the decade, sparking the crisis. Parliament is expected to pass legislation in the coming weeks that will effectively give a controlling stake in all publicly traded companies to ruling party loyalists and others chosen by the government.

The impact of the price cuts was felt almost immediately as fuel virtually disappeared from sale after garages were forced to sell petrol for 23p a litre, less than they paid the state-owned supplier. The police and army broke the locks on petrol pumps at some garages and tanks ran dry amid panic buying. Now petrol is available only on the blackmarket, at more than seven times the official price and three times what garages had been charging. By Saturday, most minibus taxis had gone from the roads because drivers could not find petrol. Crowds of workers were left on kerbs for hours trying to get to or from their jobs. The riot police had to be called out to the South African-owned Makro super store in Harare after thousands of people stormed the shop after it was forced to slash prices. The scenes were replicated in stores throughout Harare. The Bata shoe chain's shops were stripped bare in two days by people snapping up pairs for as little as 20p. Food is still available, although bread, sugar, cornmeal and other staples are hard to find, and meat has all but disappeared because livestock owners say it is now uneconomic to slaughter their animals. Much of the meat that is available is goat slaughtered in backyards and sold in informal markets.

The rest of the food supply - already severely undermined by drought and lack of production on land seized from white farmers - is also under threat after Mr Mugabe threatened to take over manufacturers if they shut down their plants on the grounds that they were uneconomic. "Factories must produce. If they don't, we will take you over ... We will seize the factories," he said. Last week, the government said it was reviving the State Trading Corporation, shut down two decades ago because of mismanagement, to take over businesses that collapse or are seized. But many factories are unable to produce goods because electricity and water are unavailable for much of the day. The price cuts were ordered by the joint operation command, a committee of army, intelligence and police officers closely tied to the ruling Zanu PF and chaired by Mr Mugabe. The government despatched security personnel and party cadres, including its notorious "green bomber" thugs, to enforce the price cuts, in some cases by beating up shop managers who did not implement them quickly enough.

"Zanu PF is at heart a military organisation and that's exactly how it's gone about this, as a military operation," said David Coltart, an opposition MP. "The benefits will only last a few weeks at most and then we're going to have to live with the consequences. They believe they can dictate price cuts and print money with gay abandon but ultimately it will rebound. Not ultimately, very soon." Business leaders say one reason for the price cuts is to quell unrest in the security forces, which saw a dramatic increase in inflation last month wipe out a 600% pay rise in May. They also fear the campaign is a step towards doing to private companies what was done to white farmers. Mr Mugabe is pressing a law through parliament in the coming weeks that will require all businesses to be at least 51% Zimbabwean owned and managed. Zanu PF has dressed up the move as an affirmative action measure to help previously disadvantaged black people. But firms will not be able to choose their new partners. They will be selected by the government. The measure will be paid for by taxing the same businesses forced to hand over control.

Mr Coltart said the move was essentially a means for the ruling party and military to take over the economy. "We can't expect a rational policy to emerge. You will see the military in charge of manufacturing. We've already got the military in charge of railways and grain marketing and the electoral process. There are military men now involved in all sorts of other businesses. The militarisation of the state will continue," he said. In a letter to the cabinet the governor of Zimbabwe's central bank, Gideon Gono - until recently considered one of Mr Mugabe's closest allies - said that price controls must be scrapped and foreign investments and property rights protected to put the country on the path to economic recovery. He also said that the seizure of white-owned farms had been counterproductive because it cost Zimbabwe foreign currency earnings by losing tobacco exports and scaring off investors. Many of Mr Mugabe's opponents agree with Mr Gono but they are quietly heartened by the latest upheaval. They are fond of quoting the US ambassador to Harare, Christopher Dell, who recently said that Zanu PF was committing regime change on itself with its disastrous economic policies and that Mr Mugabe would be gone by the end of the year.
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Sharks Face Increased Threat Due to Fin Soup

BEIJING, July 18 (Reuters) - Sharks could face extinction within a generation from overfishing for their fins, a conservation group said on Wednesday, calling on the Chinese government to lead the way in their protection. More than 90 percent of shark fin is consumed in China and demand is growing rapidly as the economy develops leading to more sharks being caught, many illegally in areas that are supposed to be protected, according to the group WildAid. Shark fin, once offered as a gift to emperors, is traditionally served in soup at Chinese wedding banquets and occasions when the host wants to impress guests with expensive dishes. Some also believe it is good for the health. "These animals have been here for 400 million years and they may disappear in one generation, not to provide people with basic food, but for a solely luxury item," executive director Peter Knights told a news conference to launch a new report. Hammerhead, Great White and Basking sharks were some of the species at risk, WildAid said in the report. The group said shark fin is becoming cheaper and eaten by a growing number of people in China -- perhaps by around 100 million people a year. "Precisely the role China plays is one of unsustainable demand. The demand for shark fin soup as it now stands, and as it's set to increase, cannot be sustained by wild shark populations," said Steve Trent, WildAid president. "This is a role where the Chinese government can show genuine global leadership and can help many other countries around the world that are extremely poor and less well resourced, to protect their shark populations."

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Zimbabwe's Desperate People Flee South to Escape Mugabe

18 July 2007: "At the rate which they are flocking in, I think there will soon be very few people left in Zimbabwe," says Peter Thompson, a South African farmer. His verdict is typical of the landowners and businessmen the length of the border with Zimbabwe who say they are witnessing a dramatic upsurge in illegal immigration as their northern neighbour's economic collapse has accelerated in recent weeks.

In public, South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki, who has been criticised for his "softly softly" approach to Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe, is refusing to acknowledge any surge. But the irate farmers say senior officials in the military and police admit privately to the scale of the problem. According to their estimates, 4,000 are crossing into South Africa every night. That represents at least 100,000 people a month, far more than official estimates of 20,000. At the last census, prior to the 2000 elections, Zimbabwe's population was estimated at 11 million. With life expectancy plummeting and migration surging, some sources claim that figure may now be lower than seven million.

Maggie Sotyu, an African National Congress MP who led an investigation into the influx, described the situation as "unbelievable". She said she had been told by border patrol staff that at least 5,000 illegal Zimbabwean immigrants had been arrested in the past two weeks alone. And these are "only the people we manage to catch". Andrew Gethi, chief operating officer of the International Organisation for Migration, which opened an office to assist deported Zimbabwean refugees on the northern side of the border, says the organisation is handling on average 17,000 deportees every month. But that is only those caught and deported by the South African authorities.

The 83-year-old Mr Mugabe, who has been in power since independence from Britain in 1980, has announced that he will stand for another five-year term next year. But with hyper-inflation estimated at more than 10,000 per cent, the prominent Zimbabwean academic and long-time Mugabe supporter Ibbo Mandaza says that for the good of the country, Mr Mugabe must now go. "We cannot even begin thinking of resolving the economic crisis here as long as he remains in power. He must quit for his own good and that of the country," says Mr Mandaza.

The Zimbabwean dollar has become so worthless that nobody will use it. Landlords such as Norah Mutasa now ask their tenants to pay rentals in kind. "Instead of giving me cash, which loses value while I hold it, I have asked tenants to give me sugar, oil, flour and salt," said Ms Mutasa. Instead of issuing quotations valid for 14 days, many traders now issue quotes valid for a few hours. Alfred Moyo, a bank worker, has not forgotten the day when he stood in a queue for bread and the price went up twice before he reached the teller. Mr Mugabe says that high prices are caused by businesses working with Britain, and are intended to sabotage his government. To punish the businesses, on 25 June he ordered that the cost of all goods and services in Zimbabwe be cut by half. More than 2,000 businessmen defying the order had by yesterday been jailed and fined. The result has been serious shortages of almost all basic commodities in the shops as manufacturers have stopped production. Mr Mugabe has threatened to nationalise all the companies closing down, but he does not have the capacity to run them. All this, coupled with increasing political violence ahead of next year's elections, means many Zimbabweans, who no longer see any hope in their country, are crossing the border.

One border official called the situation a "human tsunami". The reality of the influx hits home on the drive along the 200-mile perimeter fence along the border. While the three parallel lines of fencing are relatively intact close to the official border crossing, a few miles further on they have been shredded. The night crossings are staged by trafficking gangs known as "Magumaguma", or scavengers. It has become a violent trade, with clashes between police and traffickers becoming more common. Zimbabwean army deserters have swelled the ranks of the Magumaguma, who have also been linked with organised criminal networks on the South African side of the border.

On numerous occasions the Magumaguma turn on the illegals they are supposed to be helping across the border, raping women, robbing them and sometimes killing them. One farmer said a border "jumper'' on his farm had been hit so hard on the head that he could see his brains through the fractured skull. "These Magumaguma operate with such impunity that some people are suggesting that police officials are in with these gangs," said another farmer, Stewart Pienaar. Some game farms and lodges have been attacked and robbed of guns, pumps, cables, motors, solar panels, ball valves, computers, vehicles, clothes, among many other goods. The farmers said game tourists travelling to watch or hunt animals, instead saw illegal immigrants on their farms. They said their animals had also become "skittish" from their interactions with the large groups of humans crossing the farms. Business at game lodges had consequently suffered. The farmers are joining the chorus of voices calling on Mr Mbeki to use whatever leverage he has to rein in Mr Mugabe. "They [politicians] say they can't erect a Great Wall of China nor switch on the electric fence. We have been abandoned to our own devices," said one of the farmers.
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Madiba Urges Fellow Elders to Inspire Hope

Johannesburg, South Africa 18 July 2007: Nelson Mandela, the icon of South Africa's struggle against apartheid, marked his 89th birthday on Wednesday by launching his fellow elder statesmen on a new venture to reduce conflict and despair. The former South African president was the host and star turn at a ceremony in Johannesburg to announce the formation of a brains trust of world leaders, bringing together the likes of former United States president Jimmy Carter and former United Nations chief Kofi Annan, on a mission to tackle some of the world's most pressing problems.

Supported by a walking stick and his wife Graça Machel on their ninth wedding anniversary, Mandela told his guests they could offer both wisdom and independence of thought after a lifetime of public service. "Together we will work to support courage where there is fear, foster agreement where there is conflict and inspire hope where there is despair," said Mandela as he unveiled the launch of the Elders. "They don't have careers to build, elections to win and constituencies to please," he said. "I am confident that the Elders can become a real role model. I wish them well and hope that they succeed in bringing light to some of the darkness that affects our world."

While his opening address was followed by short speeches from fellow luminaries such as Carter and British tycoon Richard Branson, it was the beaming face of Mandela in one of his trademark shirts that stole the show. His successor as president and leader of the governing African National Congress (ANC), Thabo Mbeki, has long struggled to emerge from the shadow of Mandela, but he was among those who paid tribute to the man who is more widely known in South Africa by his clan name Madiba. "Former president Mandela inspires South Africa, the continent and the rest of humanity through his life, his leadership and his resolute and deep-seated commitment to the struggle against apartheid and for a just and democratic society," Mbeki said. "The country and the world are privileged to celebrate the life of such an outstanding leader of our people. I am a son of Mandela."

After what is becoming an increasingly rare public appearance, Mandela was to spend his evening watching a football match in his honour in Cape Town from the comfort of his living room in Johannesburg. The celebrations come as a new survey showed the anti-apartheid icon, who spent 27 years behind bars for his role in the fight against the white-only apartheid regime, was more popular than ever -- especially among white people. Mandela has limited his political activities since announcing his retirement from public life in 2004, although he still releases occasional video messages and holds private audiences with visiting statesmen.

As Mandela was hosting the launch in Johannesburg, a galaxy of stars from the football world, such as Liberian legend George Weah and Cameroon ace Samuel Eto'o, visited the former prison colony on Robben Island where Mandela spent 18 of his 27 years in captivity. They will later line up at Cape Town's Newlands Stadium for a special "90 Minutes for Mandela" match designed to raise money for his foundation. Fifa president Sepp Blatter said the match was an opportunity "to honour an extraordinary man who dedicated his lifetime to the promotion of human rights and democracy". "I am a son of Mandela. He has inspired me. He fought for our continent. He inspired millions over the world," former AC Milan star Weah said. Pele, who presented Mandela with a commemorative match shirt in Johannesburg on Tuesday, did not make the trip as he suffers from sea sickness.

A survey, meanwhile, published by the researchers Markinor gave Mandela a 92% approval rating among South Africans, including 78% from the white population. That compares with a rating of 32% in 1992, two years after his release from prison.
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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

UN Calls for Aid to Help the Gaza Strip

Jerusalem, 16 July 2007: - The UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees, UNRWA, has issued an urgent call for US$30 million in aid for Gaza, as the borders remain shut for all but humanitarian aid and food supplies. About half of the requested aid is planned for direct-hire job-creation programmes for thousands of workers and the rest for cash assistance to help the neediest families buy food and other basic commodities, and shelter and housing repair projects.

UNRWA's Commissioner General, Karen AbuZayd, blamed the violence in Gaza, as well as the "tight closures imposed by Israel", for the "deteriorating humanitarian situation. The economic deterioration manifests itself among the population in Gaza in the form of unemployment, which is running at around 36 percent, and poverty, which is nearly 90 percent – to give just two examples," AbuZayd said in a statement. Some observers say unofficial unemployment runs much higher. The recent violence in Gaza destroyed thousands of buildings and "people are living in dire conditions", AbuZayd said. However, with the borders closed, even if the money is raised, the problem remains how to get the building supplies into the area.

UNRWA, which looks after more than 800,000 people out of the 1.5 million in Gaza, has been forced to lay off refugee labourers as cement and other materials needed for ongoing projects have not been allowed in through Gaza's tight border crossings. "We have to believe the borders will open," Irishman John Ging, UNRWA's Gaza director, told IRIN, adding that the alternative was "too bleak to contemplate". He said if industries in Gaza continue to fold, leading to economic collapse, a "doomsday scenario" might unfold in the Gaza Strip.

"We are sounding the alarm bells, as the decisions made now have long-term repercussions. We must put lives above political interests," said Ging, who added that the dividends of economic development in the longer term would be peace and stability. The call for aid was issued on 15 July in Cairo in a meeting between AbuZayd and Amr Musa, the secretary-general of the Arab League, and is directed at the Arab world.

UN officials noted that the United States, European Union and other western countries were the largest donors to UNRWA, while many Arab states gave little aid to the agency, even though indirect aid was substantial. Syria, Lebanon and Jordan, as well as the Palestinian Authority, host about three million refugees and set aside land for displaced people’s camps.
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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

UN Official says Iraqi Children Worse Off

Geneva, July 17, 2007 -- The situation for Iraqi children is getting worse and, in some respects, was better before the war began, a senior UN official said yesterday. "Children today are much worse off than they were a year ago, and they certainly are worse off than they were three years ago," said Dan Toole, director of emergency programs for the United Nations Children's Fund. He said Iraqis no longer have safe access to a government-funded food basket, established under Saddam Hussein to deal with international sanctions.

Toole said conditions for women and children in Iraq had worsened significantly since the February 2006 bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad, which triggered a wave of sectarian violence and displacement that continues today. He added that gains made shortly after the United States toppled Hussein's government in 2003, when people were able to move around the country freely and had access to food markets and health centers, had been lost. "Nutritional indicators, health access indicators are all changing for the worse," Toole said. He said recently published data showing improvement refer to the situation a couple of years ago and are outdated.

The system of government-sponsored handouts -- set up by Hussein's government to meet the basic needs of Iraqi citizens from 1991 to 2003, when the country was under UN sanctions -- started to fall apart last year, Toole said. Apart from shortages of items such as milk and baby milk formula, "the basic Iraqi food basket was fairly secure under the regime because there was food coming in and the government provided the food basket to its citizens," he said. Toole could not say whether malnutrition has worsened significantly, but he said UNICEF was concerned by reports it has received from refugees fleeing the country.

Toole said that because of the violence, mothers were too afraid to send their children to school or take them to health centers to get checkups and nutritional supplements.
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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

Africa Says World Must Fight Human Trafficking

Luanda, Angola July 15, 2007: Africa cannot stamp out the multi-billion dollar human trafficking trade alone and a global effort is needed, top legal experts from the world's poorest continent said late on Saturday. Other countries needed to work with Africa, which was the most heavily affected by the illegal sale of people — mainly women and children — they said at a meeting of African prosecutors in the Angolan capital. Many are sold into prostitution or enslaved, while children risked illegal adoption. Some trafficking victims, including youngsters, have been forced to fight in rebel armies active in some African nations. “Human trafficking isn't a domestic problem, a regional or a continental problem any more. It is a worldwide, an international problem,” Keriako Tobiko, Kenya's director of public prosecutions told Reuters. “Africa is a source or a transit point but destinations are mostly outside Africa. The only way to effectively combat this is with international collaboration on surveillance, sharing information and intelligence, mutual legal assistance and extradition. It's a problem that cannot be solved by one country alone,” he added.

United Nations experts at the third annual conference of the African Prosecutors Association (APA) said criminals raked in between $7- to 10-billion (U.S.) annually from the sale of human beings worldwide. They said more than 60 per cent of the business was made in Africa, mostly south of the Sahara. “One country can't handle it without participation of others — Europe should also get more involved,” said Richard Buteera, director of public prosecutions in Uganda. “If we are the source of human traffic, the destination should work with us to contain the problem. I think we can work together. The objectives are the same, we just need to work on the mechanisms,” he added.

Poverty and conflict, both of which are rife on the continent, were often at the root of the trade in people who sometimes passed through other African countries before reaching their final destinations. Delegates said organized criminal syndicates — often using false identification documents and taking advantage of porous borders in Africa — were behind much of the activity. “Those who are doing it, do it to enrich themselves. But for the victim it's usually a question of poverty and unemployment in their own countries,” said Mokotedi Mpshe, South Africa's deputy national director of public prosecutors and president of the APA.

“They offer them jobs but when they arrive they are often put into prostitution,” he added.
Mozlink writes: See earlier post below on "Human Trafficking"
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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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Female Genital Mutilation

'My mother held me down'
London July 12th. 2007: Police in the UK are offering a reward for information leading to the prosecution of anyone involved in the practice of female genital mutilation. Here the Somali-born model Waris Dirie describes her experience.

When Waris was five, her mother held her down on a rock while another woman cut off parts of her genitals with a razor blade. What remained was sewn up with a coarse thread, with a tiny hole left through which to urinate. No anaesthetic was used, and Waris' wound subsequently became infected. The agony she suffered was in part what spurred her to leave the Somali desert community she had grown up in, and escape to London.

But despite an affluent life as a supermodel who travelled the world and the best surgery money can buy to undo the mutilation, Waris says what she went through will never leave her. "Every day I still struggle to understand why this has happened to me - this cruel and terrible thing for which there is no reason or explanation - whatever they tell you about religion or purity. I can't tell you how angry I feel, how furious it makes me." Physically, Waris says she is fine - although she will never be able to experience any sexual pleasure there. "But emotionally, spiritually, there is no escaping from what happened to me."

Waris says she does not blame her mother, whom she is convinced was trying to do the right thing by her daughter in a society which demands girls are still "pure" when they are married off. I'm sure my mother thought she was doing me a favour - and in any case, I don't believe she had much choice. It was a society where what the man says goes - my mother was simply obeying. It was the norm there." It was when Waris was travelling the world as a model that it became clear that there was so little awareness of that norm. "No-one had a clue, the world had no idea," she says. "And that was the point where I had to do something, when I threw myself into it."

The woman who went from desert near the Ethiopian border to the catwalks of Milan, London and Paris, has spent the last 11 years trying to spread the word about a practice which is still carried out on an estimated three million girls every year." You deal with what you've been through and make the best of it, and for me, the campaign is the best I can do."

Waris says there have been positive developments in the decade she has been active. Several countries have banned the practice. In recent weeks Egypt has announced measures to fully criminalise the procedure, after a 12-year-old girl died. "There are laws, but people also need to be punished - that still doesn't happen often enough. Schoolgirls need to be checked after the holidays. Everyone needs to be involved."

"But most of all this is something men and women have to work together to stop. The men need to know about it, the consequences of it. They need to talk to their mothers, sisters, daughters. "But it's not something one person can do something about alone. People ask me: 'How's your work going?' or 'Good Luck with your work!' - and I think, it isn't just my work, this should be everybody's work."
Mozlink writes: Waris Dirie's story in the book "Desert Flower" excellent.
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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

The Millennium Goals Challenge for the USA

The president's foreign-aid innovation needs time and money before it can be judged.
Monday, July 16, 2007: When President Bush announced the Millennium Challenge initiative in 2002, it sounded like a promising new approach to foreign aid. The idea was to supply U.S. taxpayer dollars only to governments that could meet strict standards of efficiency and accountability. The proposal would do so based on the countries' own expressed needs, not development fads or political fealty to the United States. Money would be provided in substantial amounts, over substantial periods, so as to make a genuine impact on poverty. And the whole project would be administered outside the traditional aid bureaucracy, by a congressionally established Millennium Challenge Corp. (MCC). Typical of the Millennium Challenge approach is the five-year compact signed Friday with Mozambique. It will supply $507 million to help one of Africa's poorest countries build much-needed roads and improve access to safe drinking water.

It's still a sound concept. But the Millennium Challenge may be approaching an institutional crossroads. Mr. Bush originally said that he hoped to be sending $5 billion a year to poor countries by 2006, a pledge that never came close to being realized. Congress took two years to pass legislation setting up the program. Since then, the administration's annual budget requests have never reached $5 billion, and Congress has consistently shaved them even further. Most of the roughly $6 billion that has been appropriated so far has been committed to specific countries. But budget-cutters on Capitol Hill note that only about $71 million has actually been spent. The slow rate is an unfortunate consequence of the MCC's sensible policies: It won't write a check until recipients can document their capacity to use it appropriately, and for many poor countries making reforms and dealing with the MCC's paperwork take time -- a lot of time. Meanwhile, urgent and expensive new U.S. overseas priorities -- from securing U.S. embassies to fighting HIV-AIDS -- keep coming up.

The administration asked for $3 billion for the MCC in its fiscal 2008 budget. House appropriators have cut that to $1.8 billion, about what the MCC got last year, while Senate appropriators have gone even lower, to $1.2 billion, a figure that the MCC says will cripple its ability to make new agreements with countries that have recently qualified for its programs. One benefit of the Millennium Challenge is that it creates an incentive for poor countries to improve their practices and procedures, but that could be lost if the impression spreads that the United States is pulling the plug.

Given the intense competition for foreign-aid resources, impatience with the Millennium Challenge is understandable and even helpful, if it forces the MCC to fix its sometimes burdensome procedures. But it is too early to start slashing a program that has been in business for only three years and still deserves a chance to show what it can do.
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India Tries to Stop Sex-Selective Abortions

NEW DELHI, July 14 (AP) — Indian women would be required to register their pregnancies and seek government permission for abortions under a proposal intended to curb abortions of female fetuses in the country, where boys are traditionally preferred. “This will help to check both feticide and infant mortality,” said Renuka Chowdhury, minister for women and child development. “With this, mysterious abortions will become difficult.”

An editorial in The Times of India on Saturday derided the proposal as “ridiculous,” saying that fetal gender screening is already a criminal offense that is not strictly enforced. Boys are preferred because they do not require the enormous dowry payments that bankrupt many poor families when their daughters marry. “In the name of protecting the girl child, the state must not fall into the trap of disempowering women,” the editorial said. Abortions have been legal in India since 1971 and are viewed as a way to curb runaway population growth, but facilities to perform them are limited, and rural women often resort to unsafe abortions.

Gender-based abortions have been illegal since 1994. Ms. Chowdhury told The Hindustan Times that women would only be allowed to have an abortion when there is a “valid and acceptable reason,” but she did not elaborate. Last year, a study by The Lancet, the British medical journal, reported that up to 500,000 female fetuses are aborted each year in India, leading to the birth of nearly 10 million fewer girls over the past two decades. Experts say that sex-selective abortions in India reduced the number of girls per 1,000 boys from 945 in 1991 to 927 in 2001.
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Malawi Urges National Aids Test

Malawi's government is calling on all sexually active people in the country to take an Aids test, saying this would help it combat the pandemic.

About 14% of Malawi's 12m people are believed to be HIV-positive but more accurate figures would help planning and enable people to get treatment. The campaign is to be focused on rural areas that are usually beyond the reach of the state's health services. Malawi's government says Aids is one of its biggest challenges. President Bingu wa Mutharika has said the disease is a major threat to efforts to drag the nation out of poverty.

In May, the World Health Organization issued new guidance, saying that anyone seeking medical treatment in countries where HIV was rife should be tested, unless they "opted out". However, no test should be done against a person's wishes or without their knowledge, the guidelines stress. The WHO said that 80% of people with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa did not know they had the virus.

The BBC's Peter Greste says nobody is predicting that the entire nation will show up at the test sites in the next seven days but the health ministry has distributed about 300,000 testing kits around the country to cope with the expected demand. "We want to encourage Malawians to go for the tests. We also want to take advantage to reach them with correct information on HIV prevention, treatment, care and support," ministry of health official Mtemwa Nyangulu told the AFP news agency last week.

Until now, testing was done only if a person requested it. The authorities say only 15% of the six million sexually active Malawians have had an Aids test and know their status. On Saturday, Tanzania's President Jakaya Kikwete publicly took an Aids test at the start of a similar campaign.

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Warning - UN Cannot Afford to Feed the World

London, July 15 2007: Rising prices for food have led the United Nations programme fighting famine in Africa and other regions to warn that it can no longer afford to feed the 90m people it has helped for each of the past five years on its budget.

The World Food Programme feeds people in countries including Chad, Uganda and Ethiopia, but reaches a fraction of the 850m people it estimates suffers from hunger. It spent about $600m buying food in 2006. So far, the WFP has not cut its reach because of high commodities prices, but now says it could be forced to do so unless donor countries provide extra funds. Josette Sheeran, WFP executive director, said in an interview with the Financial Times: “In a world where our contributions are holding fairly steady, this [cost increase] means we are able to reach far less people.” She said policymakers were becoming more concerned about the impact of biofuel demand on food prices and how the world would continue to feed its expanding population.

The warning could re-ignite the debate on food versus fuel amid concerns biofuel production will sustain food inflation and hit the world’s poorest people. The WFP said its purchasing costs had risen “almost 50 per cent in the last five years”. The UN organisation said the price it pays for maize had risen up to 120 per cent in the past sixth months in some countries. Biofuel demand is soaking up grain production as is rising consumption in emerging countries for animal feed. “We face the tightest agriculture markets in decades and, in same cases, on record,” Ms Sheeran said. Global wheat stocks have fallen to the lowest level in 25 years, according to the US Department of Agriculture.

Ms Sheeran added: “We are no longer in a surplus world.”
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UN warns of Humanitarian Disaster in Eastern Congo (DRC)

GENEVA, July 13 (Reuters) - The U.N. refugee agency warned on Friday of a humanitarian disaster looming in eastern Dem. Rep. of Congo, where more than 160,000 people have fled fighting & atrocities this year.

Despite successful polls last year that chose Joseph Kabila as Congo's first democratically-elected president in more than 40 years, fears were growing of a return to war in North Kivu, which has seen a wave of kidnappings and murders in recent months. Fighting between Tutsi-dominated Congolese army brigades and predominantly Hutu Rwandan rebels has forced more than 160,000 people from their homes this year, bringing the total number of displaced in North Kivu to some 650,000, according to the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

"We urge all armed parties in North Kivu to immediately halt direct attacks on civilians and atrocities which include burning of villages, widespread pillaging and raping of women," UNHCR spokeswoman Jennifer Pagonis told journalists in Geneva. "With heightened tensions and the build-up of military forces, the situation risks turning into a humanitarian and human rights disaster," she said. "Certainly government forces along with militias and mixed brigades have been implicated in some of these human rights abuses that are going on there."

Aid workers' access to camps for people uprooted in the country -- known as "internally displaced persons" or IDPs in humanitarian circles -- has been restricted because of security concerns, Pagonis said. "We are, indeed, in touch with the U.N. peacekeeping forces and when we realise that some particular IDP sites are in danger, they deploy mobile units to them. But it is a very dangerous area for humanitarian agencies," she said.

The U.N. Security Council voted in May to prolong, at least until the end of the year, the mandate for its 17,000-strong peace force, which allows it to carry out joint military operations with the Congolese army and protect civilians. A 1998-2003 war fuelled by Congo's mineral riches caused an estimated 4 million deaths, mainly through hunger and disease.
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Eradication Of Poverty is a Moral Commitment

VATICAN CITY, JUL 14, 2007 (VIS) - Made public today was an address delivered by Archbishop Silvano Tomasi C.S., permanent observer to the Office of the United Nations and Specialized Institutions in Geneva, during the "Substantive Session" of the United Nations Economic and Social Council.

In his English-language talk, which he delivered on July 4, Archbishop Tomasi made it clear that "the continued effort to address the plight of people trapped in poverty and to search for new ways and means to free them from its destructive consequences remains essential if the international community wants to achieve truly integral human development. Poverty elimination demands an integration between the mechanisms that produce wealth and the mechanisms for the distribution of its benefits at the international, regional and national levels. The projects of multilateral institutions and developed countries aimed at reducing poverty and improving growth in poor regions, like the Millennium Development Goals, the Highly Indebted Poor Countries Initiative and the Poverty Reduction Strategy, have made some limited progress," said the permanent observer.

After highlighting the fact that "eradication of poverty is a moral engagement," Archbishop Tomasi concluded by saying that "the various religions and cultures see the achievement of this end as a most important task that frees people from much suffering and marginalization, that helps them to live peacefully together, and that provides individuals and communities the freedom to protect their dignity and actively contribute to the common good."

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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.