Rwanda recruiting refugees to oust Burundi president – UN

Rwanda recruited and trained refugees from Burundi, among them children, whose ultimate goal was to remove President Pierre Nkurunziza from power, UN experts told the Security Council.

The panel said in a confidential report obtained by AFP on Thursday that they had spoken to 18 Burundian refugees who provided details of their military training last summer in a Rwandan forest camp.

“They reported that their ultimate goal was to remove Burundian President Nkurunziza from power,” said the report by the panel of experts for the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Burundi has repeatedly accused Rwanda of backing rebels intent on overthrowing the government in Bujumbura, allegations Rwanda denies.

The refugees, who had crossed into the DR Congo, told the experts that they had been recruited in the Mahama refugee camp in eastern Rwanda in May and June 2015.

The group was given two months of military training in Rwanda by instructors, some of whom were Rwandan military personnel, the report said.

“Their training included military tactics and the maintenance and use of assault rifles and machine guns, as well as ideological and morale-building sessions,” it added.

Some were also trained in the use of grenades, anti-personnel and anti-tank mines, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades.

Six of the 18 trained combatants were minors.

 

FAKE IDs

 

The refugees told the experts that at least four companies of 100 recruits were being trained at the camp and that they were transported around Rwanda in military trucks, often with Rwandan military escorts.

The Burundian combatants showed the experts fake identification cards from the DR Congo that were produced in Rwanda.

The US-based advocacy group Refugees International said last month that Burundian men and boys were being recruited from Mahama camp and facing threats if they refused.

“I haven’t even seen the tiniest evidence of that so it becomes a lot of politicking,” Rwandan President Paul Kagame said in December, calling the accusations “childish.”

UN experts also interviewed six Rwandan and Congolese nationals arrested on suspicion of arms smuggling at the Congolese-Rwandan border in October and November last year.

Some of the suspected arms smugglers told the UN experts that the “weapons were to be used in support of an armed group in Burundi,” said the report.

Burundi has been in turmoil since Nkurunziza announced plans in April to run for a third term, which he went on to win.

More than 400 people have died since then and at least 230,000 have fled the country.

During a visit to Burundi last month, UN Security Council ambassadors met Nkurunziza, who again accused Rwanda of backing rebels.

The African Union has proposed sending military observers on the Rwanda-Burundi border.

Inside Aleppo’s fight for water and electricity

One local government in rebel-held Aleppo is trying – and struggling – to provide its people with basic services.

Russia has intensified its air strikes in an attempt to back up the Syrian government’s offensive in Syria’s Aleppo, killing scores of people, Al Jazeera has learnt.

The reports of deaths come amid another breakdown of peace talks in Geneva and a donor conference in London where world leaders have pledged $10bn to help Syrians.

At least 37 people have been killed, including three children, in suspected Russian air strikes on several neighbourhoods in Aleppo city, a local activist speaking on condition of anonymity told Al Jazeera on Thursday.

“Syrian and Russian air strikes have targeted al-Bab, Hmeimeh, Soran and several other neighbourhoods in Aleppo province. We can confirm that 37 people have been killed but we are expecting the death toll to rise,” he said.

READ MORE: Medicine in Aleppo, the world’s ‘most dangerous city’

he UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights put the death toll at 21.

Russia launched its military operation in Syria in September 2015, and it says the campaign is against armed groups like the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which has seized territory in Iraq and Syria, and al-Nusra Front.

Against this backdrop of escalating political tensions, Saudi Arabia said on Thursday it was ready to participate in any ground operations in Syria if the US-led coalition decided to start such operations.

“The kingdom of Saudi Arabia announces its readiness to participate with ground troops within the US-led coalition against ISIL,” Brigadier-General Ahmed Asseri, who is also the spokesman for the Arab coalition in Yemen, told Al Jazeera.

The Syrian government launched a major offensive from the north of Aleppo and captured several strategically important towns on Monday.

Syrian forces and their allies broke a three-year rebel siege of the two Shia towns of Nubul and Zahraa in Aleppo province, Syria’s official news agency SANA reported on Wednesday, cutting off a main supply route to nearby Turkey.

The breakthrough comes after days of rapid military gains north of the major city of Aleppo, with Russian air strikes playing a key role in the advance.

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Inside Aleppo’s fight for water and electricity

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Nubul and Zahraa, with an estimated 60,000 population, are connected to the border by areas under the control of Kurdish armed groups that provided access.

The towns have been besieged by rebels since 2012, and reaching them had long been a goal of President Bashar al-Assad’s government, which has also sought to sever vital rebel supply routes into Aleppo from Turkey.

In a separate development, two women have died due to malnutrition and the cold in the besieged town of Madaya, activists say.

Syrians wait for the arrival of an aid convoy on January 11 [AFP]

Abou Ammar, an aid worker in Madaya located west of Damascus, told Al Jazeera that the situation is becoming worse as supplies have began to run out.

“A 16-year old boy died before yesterday because of malnutrition. We told the MSF [Doctors Without Borders] charity that we have at least 64 new cases of people suffering from malnutrition. What was distributed last month is expected to last 30-35 days,” Abou Ammar said.

At least 19 people have died of malnutrition since three aid convoys entered the town on January 11.

“We were told to expect further humanitarian aid this week. The previous batch of aid did not include enough medical supplies or medication for diseases such as diabetes.

“Some people are in desperate need of urgent hospitalisation.

“The temperature drops to below zero at night and people are burning anything they can find to stay warm.

“In Syria, we are either bombed or starved to death.”

Madaya, which in controlled by opposition fighters, has been under siege by government forces and Hezbollah fighters since July.

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Letter from Madaya: ‘Why doesn’t anyone care?’

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Images of malnourished Madaya residents shocked the world in early January, showing wide-eyed babies without access to milk and elderly men with cavernous rib cages.

On Jan 31, MSF said that an estimated 320 people in Madaya were suffering from malnutrition, 33 of whom were “in danger of death if they do not receive prompt and effective treatment”. 

More than half of Syria’s displaced are children, UN says [Bassam Khabieh/Reuters]

Up to two million Syrians are trapped in sieges by the government or by opposition groups, MSF said last month.

Diplomatic efforts to end the conflict suffered a setback on Wednesday when Staffan de Mistura, the UN Syria special envoy, announced a temporary suspension of talks in Geneva between the opposition and the government.

Following a meeting with the opposition’s Higher Negotiations Committee (HNC) in the Swiss city, de Mistura fixed February 25 as the date for resuming talks.

Earlier on Wednesday, quoting information from the Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR), the opposition accused the Syrian government and Russia of killing at least 300 civilians since the launch of the so-called Geneva III conference on January 29.

The Geneva negotiations are meant to develop a “road map” to end the nearly five-year conflict that has resulted in more than 250,000 Syrians being killed.

The conflict has also displaced millions more and sent hundreds of thousands fleeing as refugees to Europe.

Somali central bank chief seeks new currency to rebuild nation

Few central bank chiefs have been jailed by a dictator or hide a loaded pistol in their desk draw, should Islamist militants decide to call. Bashir Issa Ali has done all that, and now he wants to recreate Somalia’s currency from scratch.

Serving his third term in a long career interrupted by exile, disputes with the government, and the spell in prison, Ali wants Somalia to print its first banknotes since the 1980s to help rebuild an economy emerging from decades of chaos at the hands of Islamist and clan militias.

The tattered shilling notes still in circulation – worth about 4 U.S. cents – are emblematic of Somalia’s descent since 1991, when dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was toppled by warlords who carved up the country into personal fiefdoms.

“We absolutely need a new currency,” said Ali, who this time became central bank governor in 2013, adding that the existing notes “are old, they’re torn, they’re dirty and they’re fake”.

Ali needs to do more than just print new banknotes. Most urban Somalis have given up on the shilling and do their daily business using a mobile phone payment system, with transactions denominated in dollars.

Therefore he must create a new currency that can be used by Somalis who have no mobile phone, while winning back those who no longer use shillings by choice. The currency will also need a new system to fix its foreign exchange rate if it is to become credible.

Somalia’s capital of Mogadishu is changing fast. Hotels and restaurants have sprouted from the rubble since African Union troops wrested control of the city from al Shabaab Islamist militants in 2011. The government, however, has struggled to build a financial system and pull the country’s 12 million people out of poverty.

Shoring up the economy is vital to securing the military gains and stopping Somalia being a haven for the likes of al Qaeda, which is aligned to al Shabaab. Both groups have staged bomb attacks in the region and threatened Western targets at home and abroad.

Ali, 73, has led efforts to rebuild the financial sector over the past decade. In 2005, he returned to East Africa from exile in Sweden to re-establish the central bank, whose headquarters lay in the bombed out ruins of Mogadishu. In the early months, he paid the first few employees out of his own pocket.

PRESSURE TO PRINT

Ali said some Western diplomats, whose nations help pay salaries of soldiers and civil servants, fear the government may push the central bank to print money to plug budget deficits.

“But that’s not the case. We will never give them a penny,” said Ali, whose predecessor at the bank quit after seven weeks at the job citing corruption at the heart of government.

A Western diplomat said Ali – at a stage in his career when he need no longer worry about political patronage – had resisted government pressure in the past, which was a good sign. “He doesn’t have much to lose. He can say ‘no’ to people who ask for money,” said the diplomat.

The spruced up headquarters for the bank’s 110 employees points to progress made over the past decade but the pace of change has been frustratingly slow, with funding shortages and dearth of qualified financial experts hurting Somalia.

The same problems dog Ali in his efforts to print the new currency. “We don’t have the financing,” he told Reuters on a visit to the Kenyan capital of Nairobi.

The 1,000 shilling banknote is the only Somali bill in use, and so small is its value that money changers in the Mogadishu bazaar need wheelbarrows to move about any meaningful amounts.

The Central Bank of Somalia estimates about 1.3 trillion shillings ($56 million) are in circulation, but this includes counterfeit currency printed by warlords who used the fake notes to prop up their militias.

Ali said Somalis accept the forged notes due to chronic shortages of the authentic pre-war currency. “People use it even though they know it’s fake,” he said.

Since the central bank last printed notes, the economy has become virtually dollarised. In bustling bazaars and restaurants most Somalis use the electronic mobile phone payment system, known as EVC. Dollar bills also circulate, with shillings used only as small change.

Yet Ali said the poor, elderly and those who do not own phones need a new currency that is credible and practical. He estimates printing costs at $20-$22 million for banknotes of 1,000, 2,000, 5,000, 10,000 and 20,000 shillings.

Seeking help from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Ali has proposed Somalia adopts a “currency board” to peg the shilling to the dollar, a system used by Hong Kong since 1983.

LOADED PISTOL

Ali left the central bank for the first time in 1982 when he fell out with the then finance minister, who was Barre’s brother. In 1988, the dictator imprisoned Ali for six months along with dozens of intellectuals and businessmen.

His second stint ended in 2010, when he resisted a government plan for Sudan to print a new Somali currency. Boxes of those banknotes remain stacked in a warehouse in Khartoum, he said.

Since 2013, Ali has tried to build a financial system, inviting foreign banks to open offices in Mogadishu, joining remittance companies who form the cornerstone of Somalia’s banking system and act as a lifeline for millions.

None has taken up the offer. “They are highly interested but there is always the concern of security,” Ali said.

Ali has himself been threatened, and two of his employees have been killed in al Shabaab attacks in Mogadishu. That’s why Ali keeps the pistol in his desk, with a bullet loaded in the chamber.

Kenya seizes UN trucks for allegedly ferrying food to Al-Shabaab

Kenyan authorities are holding three UN World Food Programmed (WFP) trucks in Mandera County near the Somali border for allegedly ferrying food supplies to Islamist militants Al-Shabaab in the Horn of Africa nation.

Mandera County Commissioner Fredrick Shisia said Tuesday the security agents seized the trucks stashed with food items destined for Dolo in the Horn of Africa nation.

Shisia said WFP workers have started supplying food rations to the Al-Shabaab militants following a meeting at Bulla Hawa by Somali authorities.

“Following a meeting between Somalia National Army, Transitional Federal government officials and the Bulla Hawa community they agreed the Al-Shabaab also be given food rations from WFP, the government cannot allow this to happen as criminals who continue killing our people cannot be fed,” said Shisia.

He said the government which has been fighting the insurgents in southern Somalia will not allow food to be supplied to the same militants whom its troops have been fighting.

Shisia said the lorries which were held on Sunday will continue being under police custody until WFP clarifies its position.

The government administrator said the government is yet to receive WFP position on the issue and that the trucks will continue being detained.

“We will need to get an explanation from the WFP as to who are to who sole beneficiary of the food programme before we allow it to get into Somalia,” Shisia said.

The county boss disclosed that a truck that was in the same convoy and carrying a land cruiser was allowed to proceed to Dolo.

“We allowed the truck to proceed as this was not food, what we are doing is to deny our enemy benefit from the humanitarian assistance,” Shisia said.

There was no comment from the UN WFP officials in Nairobi.

Kenya’s security forces have intensified patrols along its porous border with Somalia after the Somali militants attacked its base in Gedo region, killing several soldiers.

The Kenyan military has confirmed the deaths, but did not give the number of those killed in the Jan. 15 attack, saying efforts to “consolidate” returns from the battlefield were still ongoing.

However, Al-Shabaab forces said that more than 100 Kenyan soldiers were killed and several others injured a statement that has been disputed by AMISOM.

campaigns takes aim at inequality in Somalia

In Somalia, political marginalization and failure to achieve a greater level of equality has been a major problem for decades, a conundrum that analysts say despite sharing the same culture and one religion makes many to question the existence a common Somali identity.

Rights groups have earlier suggested that unraveling the challenge would require a legislative or administrative reform to repeal ‘discriminatory’ provisions to end ‘entrenched’ discrimination.

However, a new US-based campaign group tries to challenge the status quo to combat political and social inequality in Somalia to achieve an ambitious goal: Equal Somalia (Soomaali Siman).

At an event organized by the campaign group, Soomaali Siman (equal Somalia) in Columbus Monday, the founders say they aim to mobilize Somali societies across the world to counter the ‘outrageous’
inequality setting which they said threatens the identity of the country and its people.

“Instead of honoring those who didn’t participate the civil war in Somalia, they were instead marginalized politically as minorities.” said professor Abdi Kusow of the campaign’s founders as well as the co-author of a research about the inequality and discrimination faced by Somali minority groups in Somalia last year.

“Its a sad tale that we have to work out towards its elimination.”

The group also highlighted an economic marginalization and political exclusion against minority clans, something they said the campaign takes aim to bring to an end.

“The inequality problem is something created by foreign actors that we have assumed as fitting.” Said Dr. Rashid Farah, one of the scholars who attended the event.

“Its a factor that further polarized our people.” he said.

In many African states including Somalia, ethnicity has been considered as a major obstacle to modem state-building causing political instability and violent conflict.

Scholars also argued that ethnicity, so commonly invoked as an explanation of conflict in contemporary African states, seemed less relevant  and led to social consequences of political and economic exclusion that followed the state collapse.

 

Cameroon: Christians and Muslims unite against Boko Haram

Following a spate of suicide bomb attacks on mosques and churches, Christians in Cameroon have resorted to guarding mosques during prayer sessions and Muslims have also started guarding churches.

Recently, at a mosque on Cameroon’s northern border with Nigeria, two female suicide bombers detonated explosives, killing at least 10 people.

There have been a spate of attacks on mosques by suspected Boko Haram fighters and Christians and Muslims have decided to join hands to fight what they call a common enemy, reports suggest.

Boko Haram has previously targeted Christians in its jihad campaign.

Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau (centre)

According to VOA, at a recent morning prayer call in the central mosque at Mozogo, on the border with Nigeria, “the faithful assembled while members of the local vigilante committee kept guard to ensure no stranger is given access”.

The Governor Midjiyawa Bakari reportedly congratulated Christians and Muslims for working together to protect the country from the terrorist group and urged others in the country to follow the example.

There have been various cases of Christians and Muslims working together despite their religious differences.

Recently, in a development which was hailed as a gesture fostering stronger interfaith relations, about 100 Ugandan Christians living in the U.S. raised about shillings 12.6 million ($3,600) to help renovate a crumbling Namayiba mosque, in Uganda.

A bus in Kenya was attacked by al-Shabaab militants. The militants were targeting Christian passengers but the Kenyan Muslims managed to shield the Christian passengers, reportedly telling the attackers they were prepared to die together, in a show of bravery and religious solidarity.

mpeketoni-terror-suspects-to-stand-trial again

A Mombasa court will proceed with a case in which two men are charged with mass murders in Mpeketoni, Lamu.

The High Court put the duo on their defence in connection with the June 15, 2014 slaughter of 60 men and a woman in carnage claimed by Al Shabaab. High Court Judge Martin Muya yesterday said Mahadi Swaleh Mahadi alias Jesus and Diana Salim Suleiman have a case to answer. State witnesses told the court Mr Suleiman hired the vehicles that ferried the attackers. They also claimed he participated in the murders and was in contact with the militants before and after the killings. The witnesses accused him of misleading investigators that he left his cellphone in Malindi as a ruse to mask his movements. A survivor of the slaughter said Suleiman was among the killers. Justice Muya said: “I have perused the evidence adduced in the court during the trial and found that the prosecution has established a prima facie against the accused.” Their lawyers, immediately announced that they would call witnesses to demolish the State’s case arguing Mr Mahadi and Suleiman had no connection to the violence and were not at the scene on day of the

killings.

mpeketoni suspects Diana Suleiman (left) and Mahadi swaleh Mahadi at High court in Mombasa

Taib Ali Taib, Mahadi’s lawyer, said his client would call 10 witnesses to prove that he was not among the militants while Suleiman’s lawyer, A B Olaba, told the court that his client would call three witnesses. During the trial, a single witness who testified under protection and cannot be named due to a court sanctioned gag order, said he saw Suleiman among the attackers. Early yesterday the witness said men in jungle uniform stormed his house. “Before I could start the journey to the village elder, they tied my hands with a rope and started hurling all sorts of insults at me as we walked to the place they were headed to,” said the witness. The witness recalled that on their way one of the attackers suggested they visit a woman who sold alcohol in the area and confusion ensued. The witness escaped. Suleiman has told the court that he was hijacked in his vehicle in Witu and injured by the attackers who forced him to ferry them to Mpeketoni. He said he was arrested after seeking treatment at a Lamu hospital. Mahad said he was in Malindi on the said day, although his cellphone records brought to court by the State indicated he was in Mpeketoni on the dreadful night

Ban-ki-moon praises Somalia election plan

 UN Secretary-General Ban- Ki-moon has praised Somalia’s government for agreeing Thursday to hold elections this year to a new two-chamber parliament in which women will hold nearly a third of seats.

The new federal parliament will hold elections “based on inclusivity and representation,” Ban said in a statement welcoming the decision.

The UN chief “particularly applauds the commitment to representation of women and minority groups, including that women will comprise 30 percent of the next parliament,” the statement said.

The members of the new parliament will not be chosen by direct vote, and Ban called for a “roadmap towards universal suffrage in Somalia by 2020” as part of Somalia’s transition to democracy.

UN special envoy Michael Keating said Thursday’s decision by the Somali cabinet, which capped nearly six months of intense negotiations, “may be a watershed moment.”

The move marks “the growing political maturity of a federal Somalia,” Keating told the UN Security Council, adding that the new electoral model was devised by Somalis and would be led by them.

The new parliament will consist of a 275-seat lower house and an upper chamber of 54 members.

The lower house will be elected based on a power-sharing formula between clans, said Keating.

The upper chamber provides for “equal representation of the existing, emerging and prospective federal member states and the allocation of additional seats” for breakaway Puntland and Somaliland, he said.

Somalia is struggling to return to representative rule after beating back Shebab Islamists from Mogadishu in mid-2011.

The Shebab, which is fighting to overthrow the internationally backed government in Mogadishu, carries out regular attacks in the capital, as well as against African Union troops in the countryside.

 

Hassan sheikh meets kenya’s parliamentary committee

The President of Somali  Hassan Sheikh Mohamud on Wednesday held a three-hour, closed door meeting with Kenya’s Parliamentary Committee on Defence and Foreign Relations in Eldoret.

Sources privy to the meeting told the Nation the meeting discussed the progress so far made in improving security in Somalia since the attack on the Kenyan troops in El-Adde on January 15.

The Parliamentary team was headed by its chairman, Tetu MP James Gethenji.

The meeting at Boma Inn Hotel was also attended by Somali Ambassador to Kenya Jamal Mohamed Hassan.

 

ROLE IN AMISOM

 

Mr Gethenji has said his team will launch investigations into the assault and interrogate Kenya’s role in the African Union Mission in Somalia (Amisom).

 

“We want to see debate brought to the floor of Parliament where we will discuss Kenya’s lead role in liberating Somalia,” said the MP.

Mr Gethenji is on record saying the operation has achieved significant gains, but time has come to “rethink and re look at the challenges.”

He added that they will run a parallel inquiry to the one being conducted by the Kenya Defence Forces.

Mr Mohamud arrived at 11:30am, escorted by Deputy President William Ruto and other leaders including Uasin Gishu governor Jackson Mandago.

Mr Ruto later left the hotel for Eldoret International Airport to receive President Uhuru Kenyatta and Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari.

Security around the hotel was beefed up, with uniformed and plain clothes officers stationed inside and outside, to boost security teams accompanying the Somali head of State

 

President Kenyatta says kenya to Remain in Somalia peace

President Uhuru Kenyatta said on Wednesday Kenya was committed to remaining part of an African Union-led peacekeeping force in Somalia, after al Shabaab militants said they killed more than 100 soldiers in an attack on an army base.

The Islamist militants attacked the remote base close to the border with Kenya on Jan. 15, killing soldiers and seizing military equipment. Kenya has declined to say how many died.

“This is not the time to waiver or to listen to the voices of defeat and despair,” Kenyatta told a televised memorial service for the dead soldiers, attended by Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamoud and Nigeria’s Muhammadu Buhari.

We fight because our cause is just, because we want to restore a productive peace in Somalia and we also wish to protect ourselves from an enemy that would seek to destroy us.”

The main opposition party in Kenya has called for the withdrawal of troops from Somalia but Kenyatta said Kenya was committed to bringing stability to the neighbouring country.

African Union troops, now numbering about 22,000 from several African nations, have spent nearly a decade battling al Shabaab in Somalia, a country mired in conflict since civil war broke out in 1991.

Al Shabaab, which seeks to overthrow the Western-backed government in Mogadishu, often says its attacks against Kenyan targets are retaliation for its participation in the force, known as AMISOM, which also includes Uganda and Burundi.

The al Qaeda-aligned militants have been driven out of major strongholds in Somalia by AMISOM and Somali army offensives, but the group still controls some rural areas and often launches guerrilla-style assaults and bomb attacks.

Mohamoud repeatedly thanked the Kenyan people for their assistance in his government’s fight against al Shabaab, which he called “barbaric devils.”

“I want to assure you, we will defeat them,” he said.

Buhari, whose country also faces an Islamist insurgency from the group Boko Haram, expressed solidarity with Kenya, saying Nigerians “share your pain and grief.”

Newspaper pictures of coffins draped with Kenyan flags bringing back dead soldiers from the attack have increased pressure on Kenyatta and his military chiefs.

Al Shabaab has published photos which purport to show the bodies of dozens of Kenyan soldiers. Most appear to have been shot in the head.