Ainashe.net

PRESS RELEASE 0020/2008

Nairobi, 13 August 2008 – The United Nations Special Representative for Somalia, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, said he was very pleased that the two main Committees in the Djibouti Agreement are being convened this weekend. After consultations with the Transitional Federal Government and the Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia, it was agreed that the Joint Security Committee (Article 8.) and the High Level Committee (Article 9) will meet in Djibouti from 16 – 18 August.

The two sides will have delegations attending each meeting. The Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein as well as the leaders of the ARS, Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed and Sharif Hassan Sheikh Adan plan to attend.

The international community, including diplomats from several countries and regional organizations including France (Chair of the European Union), the US, UK, the African Union, the League of Arab States, European Union, European Commission, Organization of Islamic Conference, IGAD and UNDP will be present. Representatives from civil society have also been invited.

In this context, the Special Representative calls on the Somali Parliament to suspend its work on certain political issues from 15 – 20 August to facilitate the participation of its members in the meetings of the two committees.

“I would like the Parliamentarians to show their full support for the peace process and for the plight of the Somali population,” said Mr Ould-Abdallah.

Source: UN Political Office for Somalia.

USAID/OFDA Assistance to Somalia - $47,077,637
USAID/FFP(2) Assistance to Somalia - $197,415,500
State/PRM(3) Assistance to Somalia - $20,100,000
Total USAID & State Humanitarian Assistance to Somalia:
$264,593,137

Click here to retreive the full report by the USAID, et, alt.

Source: RW

The Oxford Analytica released following report on “The effect of a growing food emergency on security in the Horn of Africa”.

SIGNIFICANCE: Poverty, drought and food insecurity are well known in the Horn of Africa. This latest emergency occurs at a time of global increases in the price of food and fuel and when regional conflicts threaten to destabilise the region.

ANALYSIS: The sharp increase in food and energy prices globally has hurt the poorest and most food insecure regions of the world particularly hard. According to the US Agency for International Development’s latest estimates, as many as 16.3 million people in the Horn of Africa (Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia and Djibouti) are in need of emergency assistance or face food insecurity. Hunger and security. This latest food security crisis arises in a context of increasing tensions within and between the states of the region:

1. Somalia. In Somalia, this is the third year that the rains have failed. The incredible scale of the food security crisis is overshadowed by the humanitarian emergency caused by the brutal insurgency and counter-insurgency which have persisted since early 2007. In June, the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) and the opposition Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS) signed a UN-brokered peace agreement in Djibouti. Under the Agreement, the TFG and ARS agreed to end their conflict and called on the UN to deploy an international stabilisation force. However, prospects for such a force are remote, violence continues, and a faction of the ARS based in Asmara has condemned the accord.

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Following is the latest news dispatch from the Somali besieged capital:

A former Somali commander and five other ministers, who had resigned after criticizing President Yusuf’s policies, have been killed. Colonel Ibrahim Hassan Isse, the ex-commander of Bali-Doogle Air Base and five other members of the cabinet who resigned four days ago, have been killed by masked gunmen in Afgoye town on Friday, Press TV Correspondent reported. Hassan Isse refused to work with the government on the grounds that the President was a puppet of the Ethiopians.

Source: Press TV

The London based Iranian Press TV reports:

Four Ethiopian soldiers were killed in heavy clashes with the Union of Islamic Court (UIC) fighters north of the Somali capital Mogadishu. A Press TV correspondent, reporting from Mogadishu, says the fighting between the Ethiopian troops and the UIC fighters is ongoing in the Industrial Street. According to an eye-witness at least six mortars landed in the Pasta Base in north Mogadishu killing 4 Ethiopian soldiers and injuring several others. In a telephone interview with Press TV the UIC spokesman, Abdirahim Isse Addow, confirmed that the UIC has launched two strong attacks on Somali government troops backed by Ethiopian soldiers. Somalia has been without an effective central government since President Siad Barre was overthrown in 1991. In 2006, US-backed Ethiopian troops invaded the country in an attempt to back Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government (TFG). Thousands of civilians have been killed and displaced as a result of the continuous violence in the war-torn country.

Click here for more Somalia News compiled by the Press TV.

According to a Press Pelease by the European Commision:

The European Commission has allocated a further €21 million in humanitarian aid for the Horn of Africa: Assistance is being provided to vulnerable populations in Somalia (€13m), Eritrea (€4m) and Ethiopia (€4m). So far in 2008, the Commission has provided nearly €120 million in humanitarian aid, including food aid, to needy people in the Horn of Africa (Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and Uganda). The funds are channelled through the Humanitarian Aid department (ECHO), under the responsibility of Commissioner Louis Michel.

The Press Release went on by saying:

The Commission’s assistance will focus on rural populations and internally displaced people (IDPs). It addresses core humanitarian needs, with emergency relief assistance for IDPs, host communities, the most marginalised groups and the chronically vulnerable, focusing on central and southern Somalia. The main needs identified are shelter and non-food relief items, health and nutrition, emergency food assistance, water and sanitation, as well as co-ordination of relief efforts. The Commission has also provided food aid worth €14 million so far this year. Humanitarian aid worth more than €56 million has been provided for Somaliasince 2006.

Click here to view the full Press Release by the European Commission.

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Agency (FAO):

The general food security situation in Somali Region has deteriorated over the last two months due to cumulative effects of three failed consecutive rainy seasons, poor terms of trade coupled with the progressing dry “hagga” season. Humanitarian partners and elders are comparing the current drought situation to that of 1999/2000. The recently completed DPPA led multi-agency pastoral assessment team reported critical food security problems with records of massive livestock and human migration, reduced livestock births and production as well as increased prices of food.

Click here to view the full report by FAO. You may also like to click here more FAO reports on Somalia.

IRIN News reports:

Much of Somalia’s displaced population has scattered across rural villages, which are hard to reach because of rampant insecurity and limited resources, an international agency said, impeding aid delivery. CARE International, which distributed some 900MT of food to 12,000 IDPs in the southern town of Beletweyne two weeks ago, said its staff had failed to access rural areas. Instead, they relied on local partner agencies to do assessments. “The IDP population is mixed, with some households previously displaced from Mogadishu [the capital], and then there are [those] recently displaced out of Beletweyne town by fighting,” CARE said. Some of them were reportedly returning but others were moving farther away, as far as Tayeeglow district in Bakool region. Their situation was dire, according to local sources.

Click here to view the full dispatch on IRIN NEWS.

Here click here to view full index of today’s Somalia news from Yahoo News Service.

The Relief Web released following short statistical report on northern regions of the Somali Republic.

Investments by returning refugees and remittances from those still abroad provide a lifeline to millions in the breakaway Somaliland Republic.

Here are some details about Somaliland:
GEOGRAPHY: Somaliland is about the size of England and Wales with an area of 137,600 sq km (68,000 sq. miles). It shares borders with Republic of Djibouti to the west, Ethiopia to the south and Somalia to the east.

POPULATION: The population of Somaliland is estimated at around 4.0 million.
CAPITAL: Hargeisa is the capital of Somaliland with an estimated population of 0.45 million. The other main towns are Burao, Borama, Berbera, Erigabo and Las Anod.
LANGUAGE: Somali is the official language. Arabic and English are the other official languages.
RELIGION: Islam (Sunni).
GOVERNMENT: Somaliland’s system of government consists of a house of representatives elected directly by the people and an upper chamber, or Guurti, consisting of traditional elders representing the different clans and sub-clans.
ECONOMY: The economy is mostly powered by $450 million a year in remittances from diaspora. The government’s annual budget is around $40 million — an amount the U.S. government spends every six minutes.

– According to a European Union study, the region has substantial untapped resources of oil, coal and metals such as gold, platinum, copper, nickel and zinc.

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According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs:

Acute malnutrition is a chronic emergency all over the country. Families who have been displaced for years due to the political conflict require urgent assistance. Pastoralists in some areas have lost half of their herds. In southern Somalia, historically the country’s breadbasket, production of staple foods (such as sorghum and maize) has fallen by up to 50 percent because of the protracted drought.

With a $3 million CERF allocation, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) is treating acute malnutrition in displaced children under five and vulnerable host Populations by handing out Plumpy’doz (a compound of vegetable fat, peanut paste, sugar, skimmed milk powder, malto-dextrine, and complex vitamins and minerals) every two months at distribution sites. It is also providing emergency nutrition supplementary food and technical support to 122,000 children in the Shabelle and Bossaso IDP camps.

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TFG troops supporting the continuation of the Ethiopian occupation of Somalia “came under heavy fire in north Mogadishu as the country is thrown more into anarchy at the cost of more civilian lives”.

Click here to view the full dispatch by the Press TV.

Click here for further news dispatches from Somalia.

According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs’ “Situation Reports” (No. 30, 01 Aug 2008):

More than 150 children have been killed or injured through indiscriminate shelling, bombings and crossfire in the past year. In a press statement issued on 31 July, Christian Balslev-Olesen, UNICEF Representative to Somalia, said, ‘the current environment of conflict, displacement and insecurity in Southern and Central Somalia has a serious negative impact on children’s and young people’s long-term psychosocial welfare and health development.’ During the reporting week alone, seven children died in the ongoing battles in Mogadishu - five as they were fleeing from school and two while they were playing football on a public pitch. UNICEF called on the parties involved in the conflict to respect International Humanitarian Law, safeguard the rights of children, prioritise their welfare and safety, and seek solutions to increase humanitarian access.

Here click here to view full index of today’s Somalia news from Yahoo News Service.

You may also like to click here to check New York Times’ Somalia news index. This is kind of old!

A briefing from the World Bank’s Agricultural and Rural Development Department predicts the following:

High food prices are expected to stay high (fall 2007 levels) for one to two years (and stay above 2004 levels in real terms until at least 2015)
Increased food price volatility expected to continue for the presumable future
Increased input prices linked to oil a major concern, likely to discourage smallholders who supply most of the food in developing countries
Countries are in the process of reverting to the food policies of the 1970s (food self-sufficiency at any cost, costly strategic grain reserves, reversal of diversification policies, etc) which would eventually be harmful to both poverty alleviation and food security.

Click here to view the full briefing from the World Bank.

The Missionary International Service News Agency reports:

At least 10 civilians, including a woman and a child, were killed after an Ethiopian attack in a northeastern quarter of Mogadishu. Witnesses said that 12 other people were wounded after a mortar shell exploded near a group of 40 civilians that were looking for refuge behind the home. Last night the nearby military base in Hurwa quarter was attacked. Today’s victims add to the nine from night in Mogadishu as fighting continued between armed militias and Ethiopian troops, backing the Somali transition government, which has been often denounced by human rights groups and by Somalis themselves of carrying out veritable reprisals against the population.

I think it is time to file war crimes case at the International Criminal Court against Melez and his henchmen in Somalia including the TFG members linked to the crimes committed against the somali people.

The Associated Press reports:

Mortar shells slammed into a residential area in Somalia’s capital, killing at least 10 people — including a mother and her child, witnesses and a hospital official said Tuesday.
The bloodshed Monday came as Ethiopian troops backing Somalia’s shaky government battled Islamic insurgents who have been fighting an Iraq-style guerrilla war for more than a year. Thousands of civilians have been killed.

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Click here to view a transcript from a meeting held on 19 June 2008 at Chatham House, London, UK.

According to the U.S. State Deaprtment:

The Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement in the U. S. Department of State’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs has launched a $1.4 million conventional weapons destruction program, which will also include the clearance of landmines and explosive remnants of war throughout heavily affected areas of northern Somalia.
This initiative is being carried out through grants to MAG America and The HALO Trust.

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Dominic Pkalya of the University for Peace writes:

When the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) was driven out of Mogadishu in December 2006 by a combination of Ethiopian and the Transitional Federal Government forces, many pundits were quick to note that Somalia has once again squandered another chance of pacification and statehood.

This was based on the understanding that for the six-month period starting in June and ending in December 2006 in which the ICU was in control of Mogadishu and much of central and southern Somalia, a hitherto unprecedented period of peace, order and security was realized. In other words, the security situation was getting much better in this swathe of land that had only known and lived with over 15 years of statelessness, insecurity, clan feuds, thriving warlordism and lawlessness.

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