President Bush has approved plans to create a Pentagon command for Africa, a move that reflects increasing US strategic interests in the continent. Bush said in a Feb. 13 statement that he had asked Defense Secretary Robert Gates to get… Read moreAfrica Command: “Follow the oil”
Do we laugh or do we cry? From Inter-Press Service, Jan. 29: Resolving the conflicts in Somalia and Darfur will extend well beyond the two-day African Union (AU) summit, according to academics and civil society activists. But, they say, the… Read moreArchitect of Darfur genocide wants to lead African Union
Ethiopian occupation troops in Somalia are reportedly hunting down Ethiopian Oromo refugees living in the country. Allied Somali militias are also said to be abducting Oromos and handing them over to Ethiopian troops for reward money. Ethiopian forces in Somalia… Read moreEthiopian troops hunt down Oromo refugees in Somalia
Last week’s US air raids in the Lower Juba region of southern Somalia near the Kenyan border, caused heavy civilian casualties, according to local reports. Some of the attacks apparently hit groups of nomadic herdsmen on their way to watering… Read moreSomalia: US raids wiped out nomads; Kenya next domino?
Ethiopian and US forces are still in pursuit of three supposed al-Qaida militants originally said to have been killed in the US airstrike of Jan. 8, with an anonymous “senior US official” in Kenya telling AP that they all survived… Read moreSomalia: facts of US air-strike disputed; exiles deported for opposing intervention
Unknown Somali fighters opened fire with automatic weapons and launched rockets at Ethiopian and allied Somalian troops in Mogadishu Jan. 9. The attack came as the troops had established themselves in a building formerly used by the police force. No… Read moreSomalia: US airstrikes, anti-Ethiopia resistance
Another sign of Nigeria’s social breakdown—and similar tensions are reported from Ghana. From Xinhua, Jan. 9: Six persons were killed at the weekend in a bloody clash between herdsmen and farmers in Korenganuwa village in Nigeria’s northwestern state of Zamfara,… Read moreNigeria: Fulani herders in bloody clash with farmers
A pretty astounding figure. But as we noted the last time it happened, in May: when resource hyper-exploitation co-exists with dire poverty, such incidents are absolutely inevitable. From IRIN, Dec. 28: LAGOS – The Nigerian Red Cross has taken the… Read moreNigeria: 2,000 dead in ten years of pipeline blasts
Fighting exploded between Islamic Courts Union (ICU) forces and the “official” Transitional Federal Government (TFG) of Somalia Dec. 20, just as the ICU’s deadline for Ethiopian troops to quit the country or face a declaration of “jihad” expired. Rocket, mortar… Read moreSomalia: “jihad” against Ethiopian forces opens
From The Independent, Dec. 15: France yesterday defended recent fighter jet raids on towns bordering Sudan’s Darfur region by claiming the aggressive action was aimed at preventing regional chaos. In the past two weeks, with minimal publicity, Mirage F1 jets… Read moreFrench air-strikes in Central African Republic; Darfur crisis spreads
A press release from the International Human Rights Clinic (IHRC) at Harvard, Dec. 13: Retaliatory Attacks Also Kill Highlanders in Gambella Region Cambridge, MA – Soldiers in the Ethiopian military have killed, raped, and otherwise abused hundreds of Anuak civilians… Read moreEthiopia: military atrocities against Anuak civilians
The US and Ethiopia appear to be grooming the northern autonomous regions of Somalia—Puntland and Somaliland—as proxies to fight the Islamic Courts Union that controls the traditional capital, Mogadishu. So: should we be supporting this as a defense of freedom… Read moreSomalia: Ethiopia grooming Puntland to fight Islamists?
