Africa Today Online: 2013

Selasa, 31 Desember 2013

N Korea threatens US in nuclear warning

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North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un has vowed that the Korean peninsula would be engulfed by nuclear disaster if war breaks out there again.

Kim warned on Wednesday that the US and South Korea would not be safe in the event of a conflict, as he said the countries' joint military training exercises could escalate to a full-scale war.

"If the war breaks out again in this land, it will bring about a massive nuclear disaster and the US will never be safe," Kim said in his New Year message, broadcast on state TV.

"We are faced with a dangerous situation in which a small, accidental military clash can lead to an all-out war."

Kim said he would not beg for peace and vowed to protect the impoverished but nuclear-armed North with strong self defence measures against enemies.

'Scum'

He also hailed the recent execution of his powerful uncle as a resolute action, as he labelled Jang Song-Thaek "scum."

"Our party's timely, accurate decision to purge the anti-party, anti-revolutionary elements helped greatly cement solidarity within our party," Kim said in his New Year message broadcast on state TV, as he accused Jang of trying to build his own powerbase within the ruling party.

It was the first time Kim has publicly criticised his disgraced uncle, who was executed on December 12 on charges including treason and corruption.

Jang, 67, played a key role in cementing the leadership of the inexperienced Kim Jong-Un, who took power after the death of his father and longtime ruler, Kim Jong-Il, in December 2011.

But Jang's growing political power and influence drew resentment from his nephew barely half of his age, analysts said.

Kim also said the regime would focus on agriculture and develop natural sources of energy, such as wind and solar power.

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S Sudan rebels take most of strategic city of Bor

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Anti-government rebels in South Sudan took control of nearly all of a strategic city on Tuesday, even as officials announced that representatives from the government and the rebels agreed to hold talks for the first time.

The announcement that talks would soon take place in neighboring Ethiopia was the first political breakthrough since ethnically-based violence began coursing through South Sudan late on Dec. 15. The violence has killed more than 1,000 people — a number that is believed to be a low estimate — and has seen the country's two most powerful ethnic groups fight each other.

The U.S. envoy to the region, Donald Booth, met with President Salva Kiir on Tuesday — their fourth meeting in eight days — and spoke on the phone with the former vice president, Riek Machar, who is accused by the government of having tried to carry out a coup, a charge he denies.

Booth told reporters in Juba that the commitment to meet by the two sides was a "first step but very important step" toward achieving a cessation of hostilities and substantive talks to resolve the underlying political issues that could bring a halt to the violence.

Earlier in the day, heavy fighting erupted in Bor, the contested provincial capital of Jonglei state, which is a short drive from the capital, Juba. Government troops battled renegade forces loyal to Machar including the Nuer tribal militia known as the "White Army," said military spokesman Col. Philip Aguer.

South Sudan's government had been warning of a looming battle for Bor, at one point saying 25,000 armed youths were moving toward the city. That number was later lowered but enough forces converged Tuesday to take control of most or all of the city, said a senior U.S. official who insisted on anonymity.

Bor is the town where gunfire hit three U.S. military aircraft trying to evacuate American citizens on Dec. 21, wounding four U.S. service members. A pro-Machar commander who defected from South Sudan's military, Peter Gadet, mobilized "elements of the White Army" in a bid to retake the town, according to Aguer. The White Army is so named because of the ash fighters put on their body to protect themselves from insects.

The recapturing of Bor, which is only about 120 kilometers (75 miles) from South Sudan's capital, Juba, could give Machar an upper hand at the negotiating table. But international officials urged Machar not to move his troops past Bor toward the capital, Juba, said an international official who insisted on anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to the press.

On Monday Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni warned Machar to report to the negotiating table, or "we shall have to go for him, all of us." Ugandan troops and several of their attack helicopters are already in South Sudan assisting the military, and international officials do not want to see more countries become involved in the warfare. Because of its long years fighting in Somalia, Uganda has perhaps the most seasoned military in East Africa.

Machar appears to be sending representatives to the negotiating table even though one of his earlier demands — that about a dozen high-level political prisoners being held by the government be released — has not yet been met. Machar has not repeated his demand in recent days that Kiir step down as president, the senior U.S. official said.

White House spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden welcomed the agreement between the South Sudan government and rebels to hold talks for the first time and urged both sides to take immediate steps to end the current conflict. But she said the White House remains "deeply concerned" about the fragile security situation there.

Hayden said the U.S. will deny support to any elements that use force to seize power and will work to ensure accountability for those perpetrating atrocities and war crimes. She said the U.S. is concerned about reports of human rights abuses allegedly carried out by both the government and rebel forces.

South Sudan has been hit by unrest since Dec. 15, when fighting among presidential guards later spiraled into ethnically-based violence across the country. Although an uneasy calm has been restored in the capital, Juba, violence persists in other parts of the oil-producing East African country. Rebel forces still control the oil-producing center of Bentiu, said army spokesman Aguer.

Regional leaders under a bloc known as IGAD last week set Tuesday as the deadline for Kiir and Machar to start peace talks.

Although Kiir insists the latest unrest was sparked by a coup mounted by soldiers loyal to Machar on Dec. 15, this account has been disputed by some officials of the ruling party who say violence broke out when presidential guards from Kiir's majority Dinka tribe tried to disarm guards from the Nuer ethnic group of Machar.

The U.N. mission in South Sudan said in a statement Tuesday that it was "gravely concerned about mounting evidence of gross violations of international human rights law" across South Sudan since mid-December. "Extra-judicial killings of civilians and captured soldiers have occurred in various parts of the country, as evidenced by the discovery of large numbers of bodies in Juba, as well as the Upper Nile and Jonglei state capitals of Malakal and Bor, respectively," the statement said.

South Sudan has been plagued by ethnic tension and a power struggle within the ruling party that escalated after Kiir sacked Machar as his deputy earlier this year. Machar has criticized Kiir as a dictator and says he will contest the 2015 presidential election.

The United Nations, South Sudan's government and other analysts say the dispute is political at its heart, but has since taken on ethnic dimensions. The fighting has displaced up to 180,000, according to the U.N.

___

Associated Press reporters Rodney Muhumuza in Kampala, Uganda, and Elias Meseret in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, contributed to this report.

Re: South African Doctor Found Guilty Of Creating Drugs, Chemicals To Kill Africans

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A South African doctor that rose to infamy during the period of apartheid for his production of chemical weapons and drugs was found guilty this week of unprofessional conduct. Wouter Basson, who headed a controversial chemical and biological weapons program in the 1980s and 1990s, saw an end to a six-year inquiry by The Health Professions Council of South Africa after the group made their verdict.

Basson, a cardiologist by trade, was made the head of Project Coast in 1983. Under the orders of then-President PW Botha, Basson secretly created large batches of toxins and bio-toxins under the guise of research laboratories. The chemicals were made as a last resort against enemy forces, and Basson created various covert ways to administer the weapons.

Basson also created drugs such as Mandrax and cocaine, which amazingly the South African government wanted to use to quell dissent among soldiers. Weaponized tear gas was also produced and sold to Angola’s National Union for the Total Independence of Angola leader Jonas Savimbi. Basson also created drugs that made kidnappings possible and capsules of cyanide for field agents to commit suicide if captured.

Watch This Report About Wouter Basson’s Project Coast Below:

Project Coast also reportedly created a hidden contraceptive the government wanted to distribute among the Black population of the country, especially the men. The contraceptive agent would have been delivered through the country’s water lines.

Although Dr. Basson was not present at the trial, the families of some of the victims of Project Coast’s drugs and chemicals were present. Basson claimed in court documents that he was only acting as a soldier, carrying out military orders and did not know where the chemicals were heading. The HPCSA contended that Basson remained a member of the Council, which binds him to the rules of ethics and the like.

He will be sentenced in February of next year.

South Sudan capture large swath of key city

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Juba, South Sudan --

Antigovernment rebels in South Sudan took control of nearly all of a strategic city on Tuesday even as officials said representatives from the government and the rebels agreed to hold talks for the first time.

The announcement that talks would soon take place in neighboring Ethiopia was the first political breakthrough since ethnically based violence began coursing through South Sudan late on Dec. 15. The violence has killed more than 1,000 people - a number that is believed to be a low estimate - and has seen the country's two most powerful ethnic groups fight each other.

The United States envoy to the region, Donald Booth, met with President Salva Kiir on Tuesday - their fourth meeting in eight days - and spoke on the phone with the former vice president, Riek Machar, who is accused by the government of having tried to carry out a coup, a charge he denies.

The recapturing of Bor could give Machar an upper hand at the negotiating table. But international officials urged Machar not to move his troops past Bor toward the capital, said an international official who insisted on anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to the press.

On Monday, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni warned Machar to report to the negotiating table, or "we shall have to go for him, all of us."

News of the day From Across the Globe, Jan. 1

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1 Subway dig: Archaeologists say excavations for a Mexico City subway extension have turned up what appears to be an unusual Aztec offering. Excavators found a dog's skull with holes that indicate it was displayed on a ritual skull rack normally reserved for human sacrifice victims. They also found a woman's skull with similar perforations around the temple. The find dates to between 1350 and 1521, the date of the Spanish conquest. Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History says several offerings were uncovered during the construction of the subway line between 2008 and 2012, but the finds were announced Tuesday.

2 Army leaving: Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said Tuesday that the army will leave cities in the western province of Anbar, after security forces stormed a Sunni protest camp in the provincial capital Ramadi. Al-Maliki called on "the armed forces to devote themselves to continue operations pursuing al Qaeda hideouts in the desert of Anbar." He said the military would "turn over the administration of the cities to the local and federal police," according to his office.

3 Euro addition: Latvia celebrated the new year as the 18th member of the eurozone, which for all its dents and bruises still represents stability and security to the Baltic country's leaders. The euro became Latvia's official currency after midnight Tuesday as New Year's rockets exploded in the skies over the capital, Riga. After joining NATO and the European Union in 2004, entering the eurozone was seen as a natural step for Latvia's political leadership, deepening the Western integration they have sought since Latvia and its Baltic neighbors, Estonia and Lithuania, broke away from the Soviet Union in the early 1990s.

4 Rising death toll: More than two weeks of aerial bombings by Syrian government forces in the northern city Aleppo and the surrounding area have killed more than 500 people, and the death toll for the entire conflict in the country has surpassed 130,000, a rights group that opposes President Bashar Assad said Tuesday. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, based in Britain, maintains a network of contacts in Syria that has documented atrocities by combatants from both sides. It said the Aleppo assaults included a direct missile hit on a bus in a rebel-held area of Aleppo that killed at least 10 people. It was impossible to independently corroborate its reporting.

5 Airport siege: Thousands of angry people flooded the runway of the international airport in the chaotic capital of Central African Republic, shouting slogans against the nation's Muslim president, who grabbed power in a coup nine months ago. French forces deployed at the airport were unable to stop them, and international flights appeared to have been suspended. The Central African Republic has been in a state of near-anarchy since an attack on the capital, Bangui, earlier this month by a Christian militia aiming to overthrow Michel Djotodia, the Muslim coup leader. The number of displaced people in Bangui has increased 70 percent in the past two weeks, from 214,000 to 370,000, according to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Between 70,000 and 100,000 people have sought refuge at the airport, the agency said Tuesday.

US 'Deeply Concerned' About South Sudan Violence

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The White House says it remains "deeply concerned" about the fragile security situation in South Sudan.

In a statement Tuesday, spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden urged South Sudan's leaders to take immediate steps to end the current conflict. She also welcomed an agreement between the government and rebels to hold talks for the first time.

Hayden says the U.S. will deny support to any elements that use force to seize power and will work to ensure accountability for those perpetrating atrocities and war crimes. She says the U.S. is concerned about reports of human rights abuses allegedly carried out by both the government and rebel forces.

More than 1,000 people have been killed in ethnically-based violence that began coursing through South Sudan in mid-December. Some believe that estimate is too low.

Life for South Sudanese refugees uncertain, harsh

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Egypt seizes Brotherhood, Islamist leaders' assets

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CAIRO — Egypt's interim government has ordered the assets of more than 500 Muslim Brotherhood and Islamist leaders seized - including those of the country's ousted president — as part of an ever-tightening crackdown on the group, senior judicial and security officials said Tuesday.

The escalation came as the military vowed to confront "the forces of terrorism and darkness" and protect the upcoming Jan. 14-15 vote on Egypt's draft constitution. Prime Minister Hazem el-Beblawi called on Egyptians to head to the polls as their "top national duty," saying that a "heavy turnout" is the only guarantee of a successful vote.

Abdel-Azim el-Ashri, a Justice Ministry spokesman, said that a ministerial inventory committee ordered the "movable and immovable properties" of 572 Muslim Brotherhood leaders seized. Another Justice Ministry official said leaders on the list included toppled President Mohammed Morsi and his family, as well as provincial Brotherhood leaders and members of its General Guidance Bureau, which is the group's executive body.

A security official said the list also included female Muslim Brotherhood members like Azza el-Garf and wife of leader Khairat el-Shater and his daughter. He said other Islamist leaders include Assem Abdel-Maged, the leader of Gamaa Islamiyah, which waged an anti-government insurgency in 1990s against autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

The two officials said that the list includes those indicted in cases of inciting violence and those are under investigation or those who could be investigated.

The order is part of a wider state crackdown on the Brotherhood, first banned by a court order in September and declared a "terrorist" organization by the military-backed interim government last week. The court order allowed the government to form the committee that inventoried of the group's finances and ordered its confiscation.

Hundreds of Brotherhood members have been arrested during protests and the Brotherhood's daily newspaper, Freedom and Justice, also was suspended after security forces confiscated Thursday's edition.

The government made the "terrorist" designation by linking the Brotherhood to a wave of recent militant attacks targeting security forces without publicly presenting any evidence backing its claim. The move signaled a new era of zero tolerance of the group and ended any reconciliation efforts.

In the latest arrest, Egypt's official news agency said former Morsi spokesman Yasser Ali was arrested in an apartment in Cairo late hours Tuesday. Its not clear what accusations Ali faces as he was not known to be involved in decision-making before he was removed from his post as a spokesman while Morsi was still in power. He was appointed as head of information center affiliated to the Cabinet.

The group denies being involved in the attacks and continues to hold near-daily protests demanding the reinstatement of Morsi, toppled in a July 3 military coup after millions rallied against him. Islamic militant groups have claimed responsibility for the bombings and shootings. During his year-long presidency, Morsi allied with hard-line Islamists and held talks with militants in the Sinai Peninsula to negotiate a truce.

The government decision comes as security authorities are on alert for possible attacks during New Year's Eve or Jan. 7, when Coptic Christians mark Christmas. They also fear the Brotherhood could disrupt the coming constitutional referendum.

In most recent attack, a military official said that unidentified militants blow up a gas pipeline in central Sinai Peninsula late Tuesday. The pipeline feeds cement factories in the region with natural gas, the official said.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to journalists.

A statement posted Tuesday on the Facebook page of military spokesman Col. Ahmed Mohammed Ali promised "the armed forces will not let the forces of darkness and terrorism terrorize the sons of the Egyptian people or obstruct the march toward" the upcoming referendum.

Life for South Sudanese refugees uncertain, harsh

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Egypt seizes Brotherhood, Islamist leaders' assets

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The two officials said that the list includes those indicted in cases of inciting violence and those are under investigation or those who could be investigated.

Hundreds of Brotherhood members have been arrested during protests and the Brotherhood's daily newspaper, Freedom and Justice, also was suspended after security forces confiscated Thursday's edition.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to journalists.

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Why Tamarod is the Most Important Story of 2013

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It began in the classic grassroots fashion of anyone lobbying for change, with volunteers young and old, Muslim and Copt, veiled and flowing-haired, pounding the pavement in Egypt’s subways, squares and street corners with a stack of petitions and a few extra pens.

By the time the June 30 protest rolled around, the Tamarod (“Rebel” in Arabic) campaign started by three activists amassed 22 million petition signatures. “We had an idea of organizing a strong, popular street action against the deteriorating political and economic conditions, to reunite the revolutionaries and all the Egyptians who are fed up with Morsi,” said Mahmood Shaheen, one of those founders. They found 60 volunteers to start circulating the petitions, then “thousands wanted to join, millions wanted to sign.”

As many as 14 million people poured into the streets in the June 30 protest, a massive groundswell of humanity downgraded to hundreds of thousands by media outlets as diverse as Fox News and Al-Jazeera. Either the number of signed petitions or the top estimate of the protesters were greater than the number who originally cast ballots for Mohammed Morsi.

“If the people of Egypt are not obeyed, another regime will fall,” Tamarod promised in a message to the world shortly before the protest. People were skeptical that they could affect change. Some Egyptians signing the petitions wished Tamarod the best of luck but had doubts they could get Morsi out. A nervous Morsi sacked officials the Muslim Brotherhood suspected of acting in concert with Tamarod. Publicly, an attorney for the Brotherhood scoffed that the movement acted like they were trying to change the management of a sports club, calling the petition signatures “as worthy as void itself.”

Tamarod kept its eye on the prize, reminding Egyptians from all walks of life that regime sold the Jan. 25, 2011, revolution to the Muslim Brotherhood and that Morsi was “no longer a president because he is a murderer.”

On July 3, as laser beams and fireworks lit up the Cairo sky, Tamarod won.

These are the moments that define history. This is the raw spirit of the Tiananmen Square protesters who inspired many of us Gen Xers to fight for human rights and democratic freedoms. It was as alive when opponents of the Muslim Brotherhood danced outside the party’s headquarters to get the Islamists’ goad as it was when smiling Coptic nuns grabbed their Egyptian flags and joined the June 30 protest.

The Muslim Brotherhood stood next to the democracy activists in 2010, gathering petitions to oust Hosni Mubarak at the beginning of 2011 so their banned ranks could gain the inside track to making this rich millennia-old civilization a state crushed under the weight of Islamic law. By 2013, Egyptians seeking real freedom were on the front lines again as theocrats turned their post-dictatorship world into another autocracy. They defied the powerful Brotherhood. They still weather attacks from Morsi supporters. Coptic Catholic Bishop Antonios Aziz Mina of Giza called weathering the Brotherhood’s attacks “the price we know we have to pay” for “Egypt to get back up on its feet again.”

Perhaps there was no story that more clearly highlighted the shame of American foreign policy. Egyptian protesters were not shy about expressing their feelings of betrayal, hoisting banners that accused President Obama of supporting terrorism in backing the Morsi government and blew up photos of Ambassador Anne Patterson smiling and laughing at a meeting with Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Badie. “We know what you did last summer,” read one banner, while another said, “Anne Patterson, leave Egypt now and go to hell!!!” In a post-revolution slap to Egyptians, Patterson was removed as ambassador but promoted to assistant secretary of State overseeing Middle Eastern affairs.

“Wake up America, Obama backs up a fascist regime in Egypt,” said one banner, while another placed an international “no” symbol over Obama’s face and read, “Obama, you can’t fool your people and the world any more. You finance & back terrorism.”

It wasn’t just difficult to find U.S. news coverage of the protests until they celebrated the July 3 removal of Morsi, but there were crickets from the White House as the administration seemed irritated by the distraction from Obama’s Africa trip. When Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi mobilized the military as the protector of the Egyptian people, he gave Morsi a deadline to step down before removing him — an ouster that left both overt and less-vocal Morsi supporters crowing “coup.” As the interim government has forged a new, more inclusive constitution, the Obama administration leaned on al-Sisi to include the Muslim Brotherhood. As the Egyptians branded the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist group, the White House kept pressing its demands for inclusiveness. Luckily, as Washington suspended large-arms and cash deliveries to Egypt, Cairo has gotten high-dollar support from Gulf nations that know from experience that keeping the terrorists out reaps the benefits of drawing business investment and tourists.

Tamarod may have caused the ouster in Egypt, but across the world the movement’s actions made masks clatter to the ground as leaders’ true intentions and loyalties were no longer cloaked behind democracy-friendly rhetoric.

In 2014, the spirit of Tamarod still has more to do. It’s alive in Tunisia, where the Islamist government is under pressure from the movement, and in Libya, where it’s demanding not a new government but a stronger one more able to govern — and the expulsion of armed Islamist militias that wield considerable power in the post-Gaddhafi country. Tamarod has made Hamas nervous in the Gaza Strip, where anyone uttering the name of the rebellion movement faces threats or arrest.

Until now we’d thought of Turkey as the last great bastion of secularism in the Muslim world, a republic that had held faithful to the vision of founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk over the decades. But it’s been a tough year for westernized Turks who have no desire to live under religious law, with Islamist Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan showing more of his colors, arresting demonstrators and cracking down on basic freedoms.

And that brings us from the story of the year to the image of the year.

Uncivil war

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Three days after violence erupted in the South Sudanese capital of Juba, a group of church leaders in the East African nation entreated warring factions and ordinary citizens: Don’t let political strife turn into ethnic war.

It was a desperate plea in a devolving conflict between Sudanese soldiers loyal to South Sudan President Salva Kiir—a member of the Dinka ethnic group—and those loyal to former Vice President Riek Machar—a member of the Nuer tribe.

Even as the South Sudan Council of Churches issued its statement calling for peace on Dec. 18, church leaders acknowledged the chaos unfolding in the capital. “Soldiers are asking civilians to identify themselves by tribes,” church leaders wrote. “And we cannot accept to be identified by our tribes, as we are all South Sudanese.”

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For hundreds of soldiers and civilians—including at least one pastor—the plea fell short. On Dec. 19, the international advocacy group Human Rights Watch reported South Sudanese soldiers had “fired indiscriminately in highly populated areas and targeted people for their ethnicity during recent fighting in Juba.”

In the capital city, most reports concerned attacks on ethnic Nuer tribal members. In the nearby city of Bor, reports emerged of attacks against the Dinka. A Sudanese radio station reported that two truckloads of bodies left a military hospital in Juba after family members didn’t come to identify the dead. One Juba resident told the station she saw nine Nuer corpses dumped near a Catholic seminary.

In the Human Rights Watch report, witnesses described soldiers conducting house-to-house searches in Juba and killing Nuer civilians, including women and children. Three independent sources told the organization that soldiers forcibly removed Simon Nyang Lam, a Nuer minister, from his house. “He thought he would be OK because he was a pastor,” a relative told Human Rights Watch. Instead, sources say the soldiers killed him.

By Tuesday, UN officials reported at least 1,000 dead in the conflict that has spread to at least six of the country’s 10 states. Many experts say the death toll is likely much higher.

Meanwhile, as many as 180,000 South Sudanese civilians have fled their homes, fearing for their safety. At least 75,000 of those civilians are seeking refuge at UN compounds ill equipped to care for masses of displaced citizens. UN officials warned of the danger of disease spreading in camps without enough sanitation and clean water.

It’s a tragic turn for a 2-year-old nation that endured decades of brutal civil war before declaring its independence from Northern Sudan in 2011. The Islamic government in the North tried to force Islamic law on the predominantly Christian and animist South for nearly 25 years. Still, Sudan’s Christian population grew dramatically, from about 1.6 million in 1980 to more than 11 million in 2010. Millions of Southerners escaped violent attacks by fleeing to neighboring countries. Some spent decades in refugee camps.

A Comprehensive Peace Agreement brought a ceasefire between the North and South in 2005, and Southerners began returning to a region resembling a wilderness after years of war and abandonment. In 2011, Southerners voted to declare their independence from Sudan and celebrated jubilantly as they became South Sudan—the world’s newest nation.

But the celebration was short-lived. Despite billions of dollars of international aid—including $300 million a year from the United States—the fledgling country stagnated. When I visited in 2012, the city of Juba was more advanced than it was during my 2008 visit, but the capital still had a Wild West feel: limited electricity, slums abounding, and an overcrowded, one-story hospital where some of the seriously ill patients camped outside and cooked their own food while waiting for treatment.

For an impoverished region with a complicated and traumatic history, becoming a well-established nation wouldn’t happen quickly. But the country also suffered from corruption in some of its government ranks, and the nation ran out of cash as officials mismanaged resources.

Many civilians blamed President Kiir for the mismanagement, and Vice President Machar became one of Kiir’s fiercest critics. The conflict wasn’t a surprise: The two men had nursed tension for years, and Machar had led an infamous massacre of Dinka civilians in 1991 during the country’s civil war. (Machar led a breakaway faction that vied for power in the South.)

By July 2013, Machar’s criticism of Kiir intensified, and he announced his intentions to run for the presidency in 2015. Kiir’s response: He fired the vice president.

Tension continued to build over the summer and fall, until fighting broke out between soldiers loyal to both men in December. The president charged Machar with attempting a coup d’état. Machar denied the charges but called for the president to step down in the days after the violence began. The conflict quickly spread to other states, as it took on ethnic dimensions that threaten to unravel the hard-fought peace.

U.S. special envoy Donald Booth

Associated Press/Photo by Ali Ngethi

U.S. special envoy Donald BoothBy New Year’s Eve, both men had agreed to send delegations to hold peace talks in Ethiopia, but Machar hadn’t called for militias to stop advancing on Dinka strongholds.

Meanwhile, the United States sent special envoy Donald Booth to Juba to hold talks with Kiir and other Sudanese officials. Booth also spoke with Machar by phone. U.S. officials joined diplomats, aid groups, church leaders, and human rights advocates worldwide pleading with the warring factions to avoid plunging the country into a civil war that threatened millions of vulnerable citizens.

If South Sudan does avoid civil war, the country still faces an urgent question: How does it move forward? That’s also an urgent question for the United States and other countries trying to help the South Sudan move past crisis and toward development.

Jok Madut Jok—a former South Sudanese official who now works for the Sudd Institute in Juba—told The Wall Street Journal that economic help alone won’t solve the nation’s problems.

Jok argued that outside countries had focused on helping South Sudan build infrastructure, but had failed to help longtime factions learn how to govern together. International backers fattened Juba’s bank account, but Jok said, “What they missed is that people’s souls have to be fat in the same way.”

Delegations will be sent to try ending South Sudan crisis

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Struggles increased in South Sudan today as peacekeeping forces move forward in an effort to cease hostilities between President Salva Kiir and supporters of former Vice President Riek Machar.

According to CNN, the two sides have agreed to nominate delegations to be sent to Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa, home of the African Union, for the talks that are likely to begin Thursday.

U.S. Envoy Donald Booth met with the current president of South Sudan, Salva Kiir to move the negotiations forward. Booth also spoke with Riek Machar, the leader of rebel forces and former vice president who is denying that he attempted to carry out a government coup. Regional leaders set deadlines for Kiir and Machar to start peace talks.

Fighting persists in Bor, which is only a short drive from Juba, the sountry's capital. Renegade forces loyal to Machar clashed with government troops on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press. South Sudan has been in a state of unrest since mid-December.

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

South Sudan: Ceasefire Agreed to in South Sudan

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Rebels and government forces in South Sudan have agreed to lay down arms following weeks of bloody conflict. A deadline of Tuesday had been set for the warring factions to agree to peace talks.

Both the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), a group of east African nations, and the United States special envoy to South Sudan reported that the country’s government and rebels loyal to Riek Machar, the sacked vice president, had agreed to lay down their weapons. Both groups agreed to send representatives to peace talks, to be held in Ethiopia.

On Tuesday, US envoy Donald Booth told the Associated Press that the commitment of both sides was “a first but very important step to achieving a cessation of hostilities” and the beginning of negotiations to resolve the crisis.

“The talks will focus on a monitored ceasefire followed by further dialogue aimed at solving the underlying political problems that led to the emergence of the present confrontation,” a statement released by the Kenyan government, quoting an IGAD envoy, added.

IGAD member country Uganda had previously threatened to send troops to defeat Manchar’s forces if the Tuesday ceasefire deadline was not met.

Violence has spread through the oil-producing country since December 15, when South Sudan President Salva Kiir accused Machar of trying to overthrow him in a coup. The political battle evolved along ethnic lines with tensions raised between Kiir’s Dinka and Machar’s Nuer clan.

At least 1,000 people have been killed and more than 180,000 displaced as a result of the fighting in the world’s newest nation. South Sudan gained independence in 2011 following a civil war which killed more than two million people over 22 years.

(AP, dpa, Reuters)

Life for South Sudanese refugees uncertain, harsh

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JUBA, SOUTH SUDAN - Emmanuel Taban has been a refugee before.

When he was only five years old, Taban and his mother fled South Sudan to avoid their fledgling nation's war of independence against their more powerful neighbor, Sudan.

For 15 years, and most of his childhood, they stayed in a refugee camp in Uganda, returning only after they believed it was safe, after South Sudan became the world's newest country in 2011.

Today, as civil war tears South Sudan apart, Taban's wife and children have returned to their former adopted country to avoid the fighting. He's ready to follow.

"I have already sent my family to Arua, Uganda â?? they're going to the camps again," said Taban. "If the situation gets worse, I will join them and continue with life in Uganda."

Around 1,000 people have died so far in hostilities that erupted on Dec. 15 between the government of South Sudanese President Salva Kiir and rebel forces led by the country's former vice president, Riek Machar.

Taban's loved ones are among the 100,000 South Sudanese refugees who have crossed the border to Uganda and Kenya to escape the hostilities, according to the United Nations. Another 80,000 are displaced inside South Sudan, including in UN bases. Most are women and children, UN officials said.

The UN has warned of a major humanitarian crisis in East Africa unless the international community provides at least $166 million in aid for the refugees.

"I have seen just how badly the communities caught in violence need our help," said Toby Lanzer, the UN's humanitarian coordinator for South Sudan. "This is an extremely difficult time. It is crucial that aid agencies have the resources they need to save lives in the coming months."

The head of MÃ©decins San Frontiers in South Sudan, David Nash, said conditions in the refugee camps in the region were deteriorating.

"There is an urgent need for clean water, latrines and waste management," he said. "The potential for disease is enormous."

The situation in the Juba is becoming especially desperate as the 20,000-strong "White Army" loyal to Machar approaches the city.

The White Army's members are mostly youths from the Machar's ethnic Neur community.

President Kiir belongs to the ethnic Dinka group. He dismissed Machar this summer after accusing the then-vice president of planning a coup.

A resident of Juba's Munuki district, Viola Keji, hunkered down in her house for three days as the fighting between Kiir and Machar's forces raged around her. The violence has since spread elsewhere but reports by human rights groups of mass graves in the countryside have heightened the sense of urgency for Keji and her neighbors.

"I feel like going out, but how and where will I go?" she asked. "I have never been anywhere apart from Juba."

She couldn't endure another day in a war zone, however, she said. "I don't want to hear any sound like a gunshot," said Keji. "It breaks my heart."

Still, hope could be on the horizon.

Kiir and Machar announced a cease fire on Tuesday, according to reports. The two sides are now expected to sit down in Ethiopia for talks brokered by the African Union and other international organizations.

But, despite the tentative peace, reports also said fighting continued in Bor, a strategically important city around 120 miles north of Juba that's the capital of Jonglei, a province bordering Ethiopia.

Rebels claim they have captured Bor, but it's not clear if they can hold it. In late December they seized the city only to lose it again to government forces a few days later on Christmas Eve.

The ongoing violence has triggered a new exodus of civilians out of the city that threatens to worsen the refugee crisis. Already, 70,000 people have fled Bor.

"Thousands have sought shelter at the UN mission's compound on the southeastern outskirts of the city," said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon's special representative for South Sudan, Hilde Johnson.

Executive Director Edmund Yakani of the Community Empowerment for Progress Organization, a South Sudan-based human rights group, said that if the situation in Bor devolves further, the international community won't be able to ignore the plight of the city.

"This risk scenario may lead to serious human rights violations that may be tantamount to genocide and war crimes," said Yakani.

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Sierra Leone: War Crimes Tribunal Closes

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Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has congratulated the staff of the United Nations-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone (SCSL), which closes today, on their important achievements over the past 11 years in ensuring accountability for crimes committed during the country’s decade-long civil war.

The SCSL, an independent tribunal set up jointly by the Government of Sierra Leone and the UN, is mandated to try those who bear the greatest responsibility for serious violations of international humanitarian law and Sierra Leonean law committed in the country since 1996.

Based in the capital city of Freetown, the Special Court carried out numerous trials since its establishment in 2002, including those of various leaders in the country as well as of former Liberian President Charles Taylor. The trials saw first-ever convictions for attacks against UN peacekeepers, forced marriage as a crime against humanity, and for the use of child soldiers.

“The United Nations is proud of its partnership with the Government of Sierra Leone in establishing the Special Court, which ensured accountability for the unspeakable crimes committed during Sierra Leone’s over a decade-long civil war, and thereby greatly contributed towards establishing peace and stability and in laying the ground for Sierra Leone’s long-term development,” said a statement issued by the spokesperson for the Secretary-General.

“Of the impressive legacy and the many lessons that the work of the Special Court leaves behind as we move forward in truly establishing an age of accountability, one lesson stands out above all: justice is an indispensable element for peace to be sustainable in post-conflict societies,” it added.

The SCSL will be succeeded on 1 January 2014 by the Residual Special Court for Sierra Leone, which will deal with matters arising from the ongoing legal obligations of the tribunal which could include the review of applications by convicts for early release or the judicial review of their convictions. Judges may also be called on to preside over any contempt of court proceedings.

At a formal ceremony held in Freetown earlier this month, Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs and UN Legal Counsel Miguel de Serpa Soares hailed the closing of the SCSL as “a landmark, not only for the Special Court, but also for international criminal justice in general.”

He said that the Special Court’s legacy would benefit both national courts in the region and around the world in dealing with vital issues, and paid tribute to the witnesses who stepped forward and allowed the Court “to inscribe their experiences in the history of this country.”

“In the most fundamental sense, this Court is their court,” he said. “Its success validates their accounting of the most horrendous crimes known to humanity. I salute their courage and their conviction in speaking out, in order that justice could be done.”

Congo-Kinshasa: 103 Died in Monday's Attacks

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Dakar — The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo says 103 people were killed Monday when its forces repelled attacks in Kinshasa and at least two other towns.

Eight soldiers were among those killed in the fighting, which appears to have been led by followers of evangelical Christian pastor Joseph Mukungubila, a self-proclaimed prophet who is an outspoken opponent to the government.

DRC government spokesman Lambert Mende said security forces had captured more than 150 attackers. He said these young people had been sent on “suicide missions” by what he referred to as a “sort of guru.” But he did not name that person.

Mende said several justifications have been put forth to explain Monday’s violence, and that they are political in nature. He said it is hard to link them with any “plan of God,” and difficult to see how one individual could have the right to wreak havoc in society because he is upset about a nomination to some post. Mende said political and judicial means exist for addressing these kinds of grievances.

On Monday, young men who briefly captured the state TV station went on the air and identified themselves as followers of Mukungubila.

The station was one of three locations that were attacked in the capital city.

A press release from “the Office of the Prophet” posted to Facebook and released by the pastor’s Twitter account said the attacks were a spontaneous uprising by his followers in several parts of the country. The statement says the uprising was a response to security forces that had stopped young followers from distributing leaflets the day before, and then attacked the pastor’s home in the southeastern town of Lubumbashi.

The web site for Mukungubila’s ministry, called the Ministry of Restoration From Black Africa http://www.ministryofrestoration.com/ , dubs him the “Prophet of the Eternal.”

A series of YouTube videos that profile Mukungubila bill him as “marrying the priesthood and politics.”

Mukungubila ran for president in 2006, but won less than one percent of the vote. He has since been a minor, if vocal, political figure, frequently and vehemently criticizing President Joseph Kabila and the neighboring country of Rwanda.

Mukungubila has confirmed to several international media outlets that his followers took part in Monday’s attacks. It remains unclear, however, if he had any role in coordinating the violence or if his followers acted on their own.

Jean Noel Ba-Mweze contributed reporting from Kinshasa.