| UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA - AFRICAN STUDIES CENTER |
Tel: +225 21 73 54 Fax: +225 21 63 35 e-mail: irin-wa@ocha.unon.org
IRIN-WA Update 438 of events in West Africa (Thursday 8 April)
SIERRA LEONE: ECOMOG warns "warmonger presidents"
ECOMOG's new force commander in Sierra Leone, Major General Felix Mujakperuo, has issued a strong warning to the presidents of Liberia and Burkina Faso, according to a press statement IRIN received on Thursday.
In the statement, titled 'Warning to Warmonger Presidents', Mujakperuo described events leading up to an alleged delivery of arms to the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels fighting the Sierra Leonean government. He said ECOMOG "has now confirmed the activities of two countries and their leaders involved in the shipment and delivery of arms to the rebels through the government of a neighbouring country."
He warned that ECOMOG will "strike at all the channels involved in this movement of heavy arms and ammunition to the rebels by land, sea and air."
According to the statement, faxed to IRIN by ECOMOG, a Ukrainian registered cargo aircraft, Antenov 124, carrying 68 tons of arms arrived in Ouagadougou on 14 March 1999, and was parked at the presidential wing of the airport. The pilot was told to continue on to Monrovia to deliver the cargo but he refused to do this on the grounds that it was not the initial arrangement, Mujakperuo said.
On 15 March, a smaller aircraft with Ukrainian crew members landed at Robertsville International airport in Liberia, accompanied by a Liberia Special Security Services Director, the statement said. Its cargo, it added, was taken to Gbanga and then to the Sierra Leone border for delivery to the RUF and to the Guinea border for rebels in Guinea.
The statement said that this process continued with additional aircraft and added that RUF commander Sam Bockarie "has indicated receipt of the arms from Liberia in recent conversations with some of his commanders."
ECOMOG said it "will no longer watch this mischief by supposed leaders continuing side by side with the peace initiative in view of the danger it poses to us and the whole sub-region." It also called upon the international community "to prevail on Charles Taylor and his colleagues to desist from this evil action if peace is to be restored."
Both Liberia and Burkina Faso have consistently denied supporting the RUF.
Kabbah urges rebels to turn to dialogue
President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah on Wednesday appealed to the RUF rebels to join talks on ending the conflict in Sierra Leone, news reports said.
"We must let them know that it is about time they learned to wage peace," news reports quoted him as saying in Freetown at the opening of a three-day consultative peace conference staged by Sierra Leone's National Commission for Democracy and Human Rights, a civil organisation.
He told delegates they would have to consider whether "power-sharing with the RUF was in the national interest, or whether political power should be derived from the will of the majority."
Fighting continues between ECOMOG and rebels
Meanwhile there have been reports of fighting between rebels and Guinean ECOMOG troops near Kambia, some 80 km north of Freetown, news organisations reported on Thursday.
According to AFP, some 31 people were killed, including 14 civilians. It said ECOMOG killed 17 rebels after a failed attempt to ambush the Guineans, while the rebels reportedly killed 14 civilians after accusing them of giving away their position to the peacekeeping force. The BBC also reported fighting in the area and said a mosque had been destroyed.
ECOMOG spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Chris Olukulade could not confirm the fighting.He told IRIN on Thursday: "I have had no feedback from troops in that area."
BURKINA FASO: Government vs Inter-African Human Rights Union
Burkina Faso's government says it revoked a 1995 agreement granting diplomatic privileges to the Inter-African Human Rights Union (UIDH) because the UIDH's president engaged in political activities incompatible with its status, a charge he has rejected.
According to Foreign Minister Youssouf Ouedraogo, "the immunities granted to the UIDH were similar to those granted to heads of diplomatic missions", including tax and customs-duty exemptions, and protection of its personnel.
"Granting immunity ... implies the imposition of several constraints, such as refraining from participating in political activities...," the foreign minister said on Tuesday on state radio. "Unfortunately, the UIDH president did not stick to these constraints, and this is the reason for the government's decision to cancel the agreement."
The UIDH, formed in 1992, links 41 human rights organisations in 39 African nations. Its president, Halidou Ouedraogo, heads the Mouvement burkinabe des droits de l'Homme et du peuple (MBDHP), Burkina Faso's main rights watchdog..
Halidou Ouedraogo also chairs a 'collectif' (group) of lawyers, journalists, civil society organisations and opposition parties that has been pressing for the death of independent journalist Norbert Zongo to be clarified and his killers brought to justice.
Zongo had been investigating the killing of the chauffeur of President Blaise Compaore's brother, blamed on presidential guardsmen. Late last year, the journalist's charred body was found in his car along with three other corpses, news organisations reported.
Criticising the revocation of the agreement, Halidou Ouedraogo said the UIDH had denounced the genocide in Rwanda and other abuses so he did not see why it should not be involved in the Zongo issue.
The measure, he told IRIN from Ouagadougou, "will not prevent the UIDH from continuing its work. However, we realise that in Africa, how democracy and human rights function is not always understood."
Halidou Ouedraogo said the government had given the UIDH 60 days to appeal against the measure, which it intended to do. He added that, if the government stuck to its decision, the Union would appeal to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU)'s court of arbitration.
NIGERIA: Shi'ite Moslems protest detentions
More than 1,000 Shi'ite Moslems, led by the preacher Ibrahim Zak-Zaky, marched through the northern Nigerian city of Kaduna on Wednesday to demand the release of dozens of detained Islamic activists, news organisations reported.
"No fewer than 40 Islamic activists remain unjustifiably in various prisons across the country and the government is pretending that all is well," Shi'ite spokesman Abdulkareem Ahmed was quoted by news agencies as saying.
The protestors carried black and red flags and chanted Islamic songs as they marched peacefully through Kaduna. Security forces made no attempt to stop the march, news reports said.
Zak-Zaky was freed last December after spending more than two years in prison on charges of sedition. General Abdulsalami Abubukar, Nigeria's head of state, denies that any political prisoners remain in detention, Reuters reported.
Bodies trapped in boat
The confirmed death toll from a boat disaster last week has risen above 100 following the discovery of more than 50 corpses in the sunken hull, according to news reports.
Divers told journalists that they found 50 to 60 corpses trapped in the wreck. Another 60 bodies have been found floating in a river about 60 km from Port Harcourt, Reuters said. Most of the dead were women and children, it added.
The boat sank last Thursday on its way from Port Harcourt
to Nembe in south-eastern Nigeria. Built for 170 persons,
it was believed to have been carrying up to 300, news
reports said.
Oil protestors claim to hold flow stations
Activists are reported to have taken over several oil installations in Niger Delta area, demanding compensation from the US company Mobil for pollution caused by an oil spill there last year, news organisations reported on Wednesday.
The activists claimed they had occupied 13 flow stations operated by other multinationals, Reuters reported, adding that it was unable to confirm the claim. Two multinationals, Royal Dutch/Shell and Agip, both of which operate in the area, said they were not aware that any of their installations had been occupied by protestors, Reuters said.
Mobil has already paid out millions of dollars in compensation for the offshore spill in January 1998. It said any claims will have to be properly verified before compensation can be agreed, Reuters reported.
Reuters added that the Association of Mobil Spill Affected Communities (AMSAC) which claims to represent 61 communities, threatened to take action against other companies last weekend if Mobil did not pay up.
Meanwhile a senior government official said on the BBC that Nigeria's Provisional Ruling Council is considering setting up new local administrations with the aim of easing tension in troubled regions such as the Niger Delta.
CAMEROON: President Biya visits volcano
President Paul Biya of Cameroon on Thursday visited a volcano that threatens villages and agriculture in the southwest of his country, the BBC reported.
He flew to the region by helicopter and reached within a few kilometres of the molten lava that has been moving down the slopes of Mount Cameroon at 10 to 25 metres per hour, the BBC said.
Lava from the volcano, which first erupted on 21 March, threatens a major palm oil plantation, villages and the main road leading to neighbouring Nigeria. Tremors that accompanied and followed the eruption have already destroyed homes.
NIGER: Partial result of local elections announced
Niger's presidential bloc is trailing a coalition of 11 opposition parties by 128 seats, according to results for just over half the 2,052 municipal, departmental and regional seats contested in February's local elections, AFP reported on Tuesday.
However, the Supreme Court, which released the results, ordered a rerun of the elections in 17 of the country's 72 municipalities, 21 of its 26 departments and five of its seven regions, where the voting - on 7 February - was marred by vandalism, arson and the theft of voting material, AFP reported.
No date was set for the new elections, according to the BBC.
All told, the opposition obtained 596 seats against 468 for supporters of President Ibrahim Bare Mainassara, according to AFP. However, the presidential bloc won 34 seats in regional assemblies as against 33 for the opposition, which led by 164 seats to 126 in the departmental assemblies.
Councillors are elected for four years.
LIBERIA: Over one million received food aid in 1998, NGOs say
International non-governmental organizations in Liberia said on Wednesday that they distributed 34,725 mt of food to 1.5 million people in the country during 1998, PANA reported.
The donations were mainly corn/soya blend, wheat, vegetable oil and beans, they said in a statement released in Monrovia. They also said they gave seed rice and cuttings to over 110,000 farmers.
The NGOs include the Adventist Development and Relief Agency, Catholic Relief Services, Concern Worldwide, International Foundation for Education and Self-Help, International Rescue Committee, Lutheran World Federation, Medecins Sans Frontiers, Merlin, Oxfam, Save the Children, Tearfund, World Vision and Movimiento por la Paz, PANA reported.
Abidjan, 8 April 1999, 19:32 GMT
Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1999 19:28:10 +0000 (GMT) From: UN IRIN - West Africa <irin-wa@wa.ocha.unon.org> Subject: WEST AFRICA: IRIN Update 438 for 4/8/99
Editor: Ali B. Ali-Dinar
| Previous Menu | Home Page | What's New | Search | Country Specific |