Congo and Rwanda Agree to Align Against Rebels

November 12, 2007
Congo and Rwanda Agree to Align Against Rebels
By REUTERS

KINSHASA, Congo, Nov. 11 (Reuters) — Congo has reached a deal with Rwanda to disarm Rwandan Hutu rebels on its soil, by force if necessary, in an effort to reduce tensions between the central African neighboring countries, a joint statement said Sunday.

The Hutu rebels, including former Rwandan soldiers and members of the militia known as the Interahamwe, are among several armed groups continuing to destabilize eastern Congo, even after the end of a broader war that ended in 2003.

Since the beginning of the year, more than 370,000 people have fled fighting between Congolese government soldiers, Tutsi-dominated Congolese insurgents and Rwandan Hutu rebels who are accused by Rwanda of involvement in the genocide against Tutsi and moderate Hutu in Rwanda in 1994.

Congo’s government “commits to launch military operations as a matter of urgency” to dismantle the Rwandan Hutu rebel forces, the countries said in a joint statement.

The agreement was announced after a meeting in Nairobi between the Congolese and Rwandan foreign ministers.

Under the terms of the deal, Congo will prepare a detailed plan by Dec. 1, with the backing of the country’s United Nations peacekeeping mission, to disarm the rebels.

Rwanda promised to share with Congo and the United Nations a list of people it accuses of orchestrating the 1994 genocide, in which an estimated 800,000 Rwandans were massacred.

The Rwandan foreign minister, Charles Murigande, also agreed to seal his country’s border with Congo and ensure that illegal armed groups, particularly a Tutsi insurgency led by Laurent Nkunda, a renegade Congolese general, did not receive cross-border support.

Mr. Nkunda is a Congolese Tutsi who has accused the Congolese Army of supporting the Hutu militias, which the army denies. Mr. Nkunda says his rebel force is simply protecting Tutsi civilians from being victimized again.

Congo’s army has been battling Mr. Nkunda’s forces in North Kivu Province since late August, when the rebel leader abandoned a January peace deal and pulled thousands of his fighters out of special mixed army brigades.

Army commanders in Congo have accused Rwanda of backing Mr. Nkunda, who led two army brigades into the bush in 2004, claiming he was doing so to protect eastern Congo’s small Tutsi minority.

The continued presence in eastern Congo of the rebels, who fled across the border after the Rwandan genocide, was used by Rwanda to justify two military interventions. The second, in 1998, helped unleash a five-year war that killed an estimated five million people, mainly through hunger and disease.

Fears that the current crisis in North Kivu could worsen into another Congo war have brought intense diplomatic pressure in recent weeks to find a peaceful solution.

The United States and United Nations have sent top level officials to the border province this month.

As part of the deal agreed upon in Nairobi, which was also signed by diplomats from the United Nations, United States and European Union, Congo said it would arrest and hand over to Rwanda anyone indicted on charges of genocide, war crimes or crimes against humanity.

Rebel fighters who choose to disarm, and who are not believed to be the subject of Rwandan indictments, will be moved away from areas along Congo’s border with Rwanda, according to the plan.

Disease Stalks Congo's Displaced

Disease Stalks Congo's Displaced
By Noel King
Kibaya, DRC
21 November 2007

King report - Download MP3 (1MB) audio clip
Listen to King report audio clip

As fighting continues between dissident general Laurent Nkunda and the Congolese army, displaced Congolese have packed into squalid camps that are plagued with growing health problems. Humanitarian workers are racing to stem the spread of diseases including cholera and malaria. Noel King has more in this report from Kibaya, DRC.

People carry their belongings down a road in Mugunga, DRC, 13 Nov. 2007
People carry their belongings down a road in Mugunga, DRC, 13 Nov. 2007
When the town of Kibaya in Congo's volatile North Kivu province was overrun with 20,000 civilians fleeing violence, the town was simply unprepared to cope with the influx of people.

The health center employed a single nurse, who could see only three patients per day.

The few medicines available had passed their expiration dates.

And in a town where cases of chronic diarrhea were spiraling, only three packets of rehydration salts were available.

Bob Kitchen is an emergency response team coordinator with the International Rescue Committee.

"There's one water spring that serves the indigenous population of 20,000 plus the additional IDP population," he said. "Basically, it's a large puddle with thousands of people walking into the water to get water out. Every single site within there that we tested the water, it was heavily contaminated with fecal matter. So it's bad, bad, bad."

Water contamination is rampant because only five percent of Kibaya's 40,000 residents have access to latrines.

As a result, chronic diarrhea and suspected cholera cases are on the rise.

Congo's camps for the displaced are just as bad. Aid agencies have provided chlorination points and large containers full of fresh water.

But in the overcrowded camps, many people say they do not have access.

Bosco Machumpenze is an elected leader at Mugugna Two camp, which hosts some 15,000 displaced people outside the North Kivu capital, Goma.

He says the children are sick and they have diarrhea. The women have no water to cook with. The only thing to do is go down to Lake Kivu to get water.

Humanitarian workers say the collection of water from dirty sources, including Lake Kivu, and the character of the soil in Goma, have compounded the problem of cholera.

Louis Vigneault is a spokesman for the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Goma.

"Especially in this region there's been a history of cholera being a major problem," he explained. "Because the soil is basically only lava, it's not porous so all bacteria or disease will stay on surface and propagate, especially with people going to the lake to get water."

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees says cholera broke out in North Kivu's IDP camps in early October.

More than 400 cases were identified in October, but because the testing process is long and expensive, many more cases may have gone undiagnosed.

Woman and children are particularly susceptible to illness.

Nuraka Jeduka is the mother of two-day old twins. Her babies were born two months prematurely, and she is worried about their health.

She says she fled her home to come to Kibaya when she was pregnant; and her stomach hurt all of the time. She says she is having trouble sleeping now and she is worried about how her babies will survive.

To combat the spread of disease, some aid agencies are undertaking creative measures.

Jasons Snuggs, an emergency response co-coordinator for environmental health with the International Rescue Committee, spoke to VOA in Kibaya during one of Congo's frequent heavy downpours, about a technique called rain guttering.

"Quite simply, on a traditional roof, which is made out of corrugated sheeting, we install a piece of bamboo which is split in half, and when it rains it fills up with water," he said. "We direct it into a container that people have."

Using rain gutters, Snuggs said each roof can drain off as many as 50 liters of relatively fresh water per day.

The challenges of working during Congo's rainy season are immense.

The IRC evacuated new mother Nuraka Jeduka and her infant twins to a larger hospital that same day.

But a downpour turned roads into muddy rivers and the family's car slowed to a crawl: clear evidence that rain is both a blessing and a curse in eastern Congo.

Congo Bound

In a few short days I will be leaving for my first trip to the North Kivu region of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
I am excited and humbled by this opportunity to go and see first hand the work that God is doing in that region. For the first time, the people in that area have hope.
I will be flying into Entebbe , Uganda and be staying with an Ugandan for one night. My friend stayed at my house years ago when he was visiting the states. It will be good to see him again. Then I will fly via a small plane into DRC.
Arriving on a unpaved airstrip in Beni, DRC, I will begin my nine day visit.
Many of you might have heard of the fighting that is still going on in the North Kivu region of the DRC. While I'll be close to this, I will still be far enough away because of the infrastructure of the country. I've been told that this country, while it is the size of the US east of the Mississippi, has only 50 miles of paved road in the whole country. But the fighting has increase lately, and I would appreciate your thoughts and prayers as I travel.
The work in the Congo has really began.
From a vision three to four years ago, now is a reality. Here's an excerpt from the co-founder of the Congo Initiative.
The past few weeks we have spent in Congo have been an experience of Nehemiah as people from all walks of life joined in work so that the building would be ready, at least in part, to hold the consultation and start the academic year. We had a successful consultation, attended by over 120 people, leaders in churches, business, politics and community. We have opened the doors of the Christian Bilingual University of Congo. We had hoped to have 30 students; today we have 80, which by itself is another challenge, e.g., being ready with chairs, rooms, etc.

Young men and woman, the future of the DRC, have begun the journey to bring hope to a land that desperately needs it after years and years of oppression.
I hope to blog on my trip, when electricity and access allows it.
So check back often from 11-26 to 12-8 for updates :)

Congo Bound!

Democratic Republic of the Congo: Helping the Displaced

This area will be about 100 miles or so away from where I will be. I will be traveling to Beni, near the Ugandan border.

Food Crisis

Thanks to Rick r for passing this info on to me....



from a person that is on the ground in Senegal-
... on Friday we heard that millet (their staple
food) has gone from a normal price of 40 to 50 CFA/kilo to 175. So
their staple food is now about four times the price it normally is.
Rich people are stockpiling food now.



Senegal's Wade cuts govt pay as food prices rise Sat 3 Nov 2007, 13:17 GMT

By Diadie Ba

DAKAR, Nov 3 (Reuters) - Senegal's president has pledged to cut the number of ministers in his cabinet and reduce government salaries, including his own, in a show of solidarity for citizens struggling with high energy and food prices.

In an address broadcast on state television late on Friday, Abdoulaye Wade said his government would put an emergency bill before parliament authorising the temporary pay reduction in a bid to "lessen the suffering" of the country's poor.

"At a time when important fringes of our population are suffering in their daily life from the negative effects of the rise in world oil prices on their household, I have decided as president to set an example," the octogenarian leader said.

Prime Minister Cheikh Hadjibou Soumare said Wade had asked him to come up with proposals to reduce the number of ministers in the cabinet from a current 38 as part of the measures.

Surging food prices, with grains and other crops at record highs, are making life difficult for many families in Senegal and across Africa, leaving them struggling to afford the staples such as rice that make up the national diet.

Record oil prices have increased food transport costs, while the explosion of biofuels production from food crops, subsidised by some Western countries as less environmentally damaging than fossil fuels, has also contributed to the rise.

Senegal's state electricity firm Senelec, hit by a cash crunch caused by high global fuel prices and by rising consumption, has struggled to maintain supplies to the former French colony, an economic hub in the region.

Power shortages across the Sahelian nation of 11 million people have steadily increased in recent years, tarnishing its image as one of West Africa's most developed states and disrupting businesses unable to afford their own generators.

Wade urged the population to try to conserve energy in an effort to stave off a worsening in the power crisis.

"I call on the solidarity of all Senegalese, to the business community, the formal and informal sectors, to religious leaders, to take part in this national effort," he said.

SENEGAL: Smooth transition for Taxi Sisters

AKAR, 2 November 2007 (IRIN) - “It’s not heavy,” Sanou Top insists, as she takes a suitcase out of her client’s hands and hoists it into the trunk of her cab.

“I hope you drive like a man,” the customer says. The small-framed, head-scarfed 25-year-old laughs.

Top is one of 10 women chosen for a pilot project by the Senegalese government to get female taxi drivers on the road.

And after more than a month behind the wheel in one of the world’s most chaotic capitals for driving, Top says it’s been a smooth ride.

“At first, it was difficult,” Top says. But now? “Complete satisfaction.”

Her cell phone rings. She tucks it under her head scarf and begins a conversation, all while shifting gears and keeping an eye out for customers. It’s a system she seems to have mastered.

Money and autonomy

Under the ‘Taxi Sister’ project, 10 women have been given brand-new cars, which they will gradually pay for and eventually own.

The project is touted as a way to pull women out of poverty and introduce them to new occupations in Senegalese society. Within two years, the government hopes to have 50 female taxi drivers on its streets, and hopes to expand the project beyond the capital, Dakar.

According to the UN 2006 Human Development Index, Senegalese women lag behind men in development indicators. Less than 30 percent of adult women are literate, compared to 50 percent of men; and on average, women earn just over half the income men do.

Still, the new initiative is “not a purely financial activity,” explained Awa Paye Gueye, administrator of the national fund for the promotion of female entrepreneurship at the Ministry of Family and Female Entrepreneurship. “It’s a female leadership project as well.

“Where some say, ‘It won’t work because it’s women’, [this project] allows certain barriers to be broken,” Gueye said.

It seems to be working.

“I’m autonomous. I’m free. I’m my own boss,” said Top, a former accountant and secretary, who quit because she felt she was being exploited by her boss.

Other than their bright yellow and red uniforms and the Taxi Sister signs on the roofs of their cars, these women fit right in. They may be slightly less aggressive on the road, but they honk and argue just the same.

“Who do you think you are?” Maj Samb screams, her head out the window, to a male driver after their cars nearly collide in traffic.


Male resistance

For the most part, foreigners and Senegalese alike have been supportive of the project, a partnership between the government and the private car dealer Espace Auto. As the women drive by, people wave, little girls smile and young men call out “Taxi Sister!”

Top says the clean, well-kept cars – a far cry from the often dilapidated vehicles driven by their male counterparts – are good for Senegal, since “a cab is the first image of a country [to a foreigner]”.

Still, some men are having a hard time accepting the idea. The female taxi drivers complain of men who cut them off on the road and speak out against them on the radio.

Just outside the driveway to the Novotel, one of two hotels in town where the Taxi Sisters are stationed, a group of male taxi drivers sit around on shoddy wooden benches, protesting the extra support given to their female colleagues.

The women are allowed to park right outside the hotel doors, while the men must remain in the traditional taxi area, outside the hotel grounds.

''...Taxi driving isn't for women. It's hard work...''
“They get all the [customers], and we stay here with nothing to do but sleep,” said Alioune Ndiaye, 60, who has been driving a cab in Dakar for 35 years. “Before, there weren’t any problems. But now, the sisters have ruined everything.”

The state’s claims to alleviate poverty and raise the status of women in Senegalese society are noble, Talla Ndiaye, another cab driver, told IRIN.

“The state talks about equality. Yes, sure. But this isn’t equality.”

Besides, he said, “taxi driving isn’t for women. It’s hard work.”

Determination

The attitude that women should not be driving taxis is not uncommon, but it does not faze the women.

“There are some people who don’t want us to succeed,” said Assaïtou Goumdiam, 32. “It’s very normal…I don’t pay any attention to them.

“It’s those who say no [to the idea] who give you the courage and the strength to work,” she said. After two years of unemployment, Goumdiam will not be held back by a few skeptical comments.

That is not to say there are no challenges. The diesel is expensive and traffic is difficult to bear. Security has not been a problem thus far – the women were given self-defense courses and have internal communication systems in their cars – but Top says a customer once came on to her.

Still, they believe they will serve as examples to other women in Senegal and neighbouring countries.

“Many people thought it would never actually happen,” Top says. “This will really give [other women] courage.”

The Ministry of Family and Female Entrepreneurship has financed more than 700 projects for women since 2005 and says it will continue funding projects that encourage women to enter new occupations. The ministry has already received a funding request from female mechanics.

“Women must contribute to the creation of jobs in Senegal. They can contribute,” the ministry’s Gueye said.

As for Top, who hopes to own her own taxi business in the future, she says she is proud of herself for taking part in this initiative.

“For a long time, there were many occupations that were reserved for men. Now, people are realising that women have the ability too.”


http://www.irnnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=75137

Copyright © IRIN 2007
The material contained on www.IRINnews.org comes to you via IRIN, a UN humanitarian news and information service, but may not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations or its agencies.
All IRIN material may be reposted or reprinted free-of-charge; refer to the IRIN copyright page for conditions of use. IRIN is a project of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Global Water Initiative

DAKAR, 25 October 2007 (IRIN) - A donation of US$150 million to a 10-year water project in Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, Senegal and nine other countries in Africa and Central America by the Howard G. Buffett Foundation could be the start of a much needed injection of donor innovation into the relief sector, non-governmental organisations involved in the project say.

The foundation’s money will be used to start the Global Water Initiative (GWI), a partnership of seven charities and relief organisations which will be given US$15 million a year for 10 years.

In the whole West Africa region in 2006, traditional donor spending on water and sanitation was US$130,000 – just 11 percent of the US$1,165 million aid agencies had asked for – according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

“We have found a shift in the whole donor funding scene towards large amounts of money being given to direct budgetary support which is good for governments but has sapped energy and resources from locally defined and implemented activities,” said Camilla Toulmin, Director of the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) in London.

“We’re trying to get more energy and resources back into the local-based agenda, which I hope this initiative can do.”

The Buffett Foundation-funded NGOs are to study how to provide communities with long-term access to clean water and sanitation, access to water for rural production, and protection and sustainable management of ecosystem services.

“Projects will deliver water and sanitation in rural communities,” the GWI said in a statement on 25 October.

“In addition, investments will be made to strengthen institutions, build capacity to enable organizations to initiate and sustain long term projects, increase community participation, improve local governance, facilitate inter-governmental coordination and cooperation, raise awareness, emphasize innovation and support the development of responsible water policies.”

“The GWI was designed to integrate all aspects of sound water resource management, from emergency relief and community needs to development and sustainable resource management,” said Youcef Hammache, project officer at Action Against Hunger (AAH) in Paris.

“The needs in the Sahel are varied and the GWI’s programs will attempt to tackle the full spectrum of needs in both the short- and longer-term - not just in the Sahel, but in all 13 countries covered by the GWI coalition.”

Traditional European donors and USAID came in for heavy criticism in a scathing report released in July 2007, co-authored by 10 NGOs including most of those involved in the GWI. The NGOs accused the donors of funding projects only for one to two years and for demanding results rather than letting NGOs experiment to find the best solutions.

“The Buffett Foundation is funding things that don’t necessarily produce rapid and immediate results and is prepared to find that some things we do don’t always produce the expected results,” said IIED’s Toulmin. “There’s extraordinary interest in seeing things over the long term and there aren’t many donors who are as open-minded and willing as that.”

Howard Buffett, the President of the Foundation said in a statement: “It is our objective to utilise and leverage the experience of our partners to create a flexible and spontaneous approach to providing poor communities access to safe drinking water. By building new constituencies, creating stronger alliances and engaging all stakeholders, it is our hope to create a new vision and an effective platform for change.”

Improving water in the Sahel region of West Africa is central to improving health and nutrition and to providing the predominantly rural communities with the ability to provide for themselves year round, not just during the annual July-October rainy season, experts say.

Worldwide, more than one billion people are estimated to lack access to clean water and 2.6 billion people lack sanitation. Countries in West Africa’s Sahel consistently feature at the bottom of human development indexes for the particularly high level of poverty found there and the poor access to water.

The NGOs involved in the GWI are Catholic Relief Services, CARE, IIED, IUCN, SOS Sahel, AAH and Oxfam. In addition to the Sahel, the project will cover El Salvador, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guatemala, Honduras, Kenya, Nicaragua, Tanzania and Uganda.

The Howard G. Buffett Foundation is multi-million dollar private foundation controlled by the eldest son of the billionaire American investor Warren Buffett.

Birds Eye View

This is a photo from Google Earth of the village my family has a relationship with. I will not give the name of the village for obvious reasons.
This village is small with an approximately 250 people.
In this village you will find kind , gentle people who have been oppressed by the social system they live in.
In this village you will find some of my closest friends on earth...

ps...the pin that's on map...that's the compound I have spent many nights in...

As Fuel Prices Soar, Oil Lamps Becoming a Luxury Product

UN Integrated Regional Information Networks

NEWS
23 October 2007
Posted to the web 23 October 2007
Ourossogui

Surging petrol prices in Africa usually weigh most heavily on the emerging urban middle class, making it a struggle to put fuel in cars or motorbikes every day and to pay home electricity bills.

In Senegal, the energy shock is starting to filter down to the most isolated rural areas, where, far from electricity grids and roads, illiterate parents hoping their children will have a better life through education are worrying about how to put fuel in oil lamps so their children can do their homework.

"It is very difficult, because at night, we need to make light but there has not been any petrol in the area since last year," said Abba Diallo, president of the Parent-Teacher Association in Thiancone Boguel, a town in northeastern Senegal, some 690km from the capital, Dakar, in the Matam region.

Senegal has been confronted with serious energy supply difficulties for the last three years. Several times, the 12 million-strong West African country, one of the region's most stable economies, has simply run out of gas, petrol and electricity.

Alioune Badara Ndiongue, director of the village school in Thiancone Boguel, says that is hampering education.

"I was very surprised the first time I saw 20 of my students squeezed into the corner of a room in one of the very few houses in the village which is equipped with solar energy," he told IRIN.

"I'm worried about the school results, taking into account the conditions that students have to live with when they do homework."

"We cannot teach in these conditions," said Yerim Sy, a teacher at the school, who warns results are already slipping - he says because of the high cost of lamp oil.

In 2005, 100 percent of the students received a certificate for having finished elementary education and all of them went on to college, he said. "It was the only school in the department to have obtained these satisfactory results," according to Sy.

The results of 2006 show that just 60 percent got the certificate and only 20 percent of children went to college.

"Because of the fuel problem students are obliged to go and look for pieces of wood around their village to make fires to be able to see by," said one former student, comparing the task to work performed by Talibes - students at Koranic schools who are forced out on the streets to work as beggars between their religious lessons.

People are also starting to use other more dangerous products to fuel lamps in the villages. "We use diesel which creates a lot of smoke and gas which is very dangerous," said Abass Niang, a student, who has himself used these fuels to help him study.

"When we prepare our courses, we actually use torches lit with things other than petrol," confirmed Sy, the teacher.

Coumba Daff, a cleaner, was shocked to learn that she could not find lamp fuel even at a shop 10km from her village, Séno Palèl. She was obliged to go and visit her sister 30km away, where she hoped to find someone with some fuel. She said she expected to be able to buy one litre for around 2 kilograms of rice.

At Bokidiawé only one shop was selling lamp oil at a price of 400 CFA francs per litre, almost double what is costs in Dakar.

"Electrification and building up sustainable development pose a problem in this region where the most important needs are water and health," said Hamady Dieng, a local politician.

The primary source of energy in almost 50 percent of Senegalese households is wood. A quarter use charcoal, according to government data.

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations ]

Copyright © 2007 UN Integrated Regional Information Networks. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com).

Excert from President Kabila visit to oval office

RSS Feed White House News

9:51 A.M. EDT

PRESIDENT BUSH: It's my honor to welcome back to the Oval Office President Kabila. Thanks for coming, sir. The President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The last time the President was here we talked about his desire to have free and fair elections in his country. Since that time his country has had free and fair elections. And my first order of business today was to congratulate the President for garnering 58 percent of the vote.

We talked about the need to work together to help consolidate the gains. We talked about the need to -- for the United States to partner with the country to help on economic development. One of the things the President recognizes is the need for there to be investment in his country, so people can find work, and the stability that comes with economic development. And I appreciate your recognition of the opportunity to work together.

We talked about the eastern part of his country. And he shared with me his strategy to make sure that the government's reach extends throughout the entire country and that there is stability throughout the country. And I want to thank you very much for sharing your thoughts with me.

I did bring up my desire to help our friend deal with malaria. Malaria is a great concern to me and my wife and the Secretary of State. This is an issue that can be solved. We hurt when young babies are dying from a mosquito bite, knowing full well that a strategy could help save lives. So the President shares the same sense of compassion I do for people all throughout the world who are being affected by malaria.

Mr. President, you are -- you've said that you wanted there to be free and fair elections, and you delivered. And I appreciate that and congratulate you on being a man of your word. And we look forward to continuing to work with you, sir, to bring peace and stability to the neighborhood. So, welcome.

PRESIDENT KABILA: Well, Mr. President, thanks a lot. Of course, this is the second time that we meet in the Oval Office. Yes, elections were also high on the agenda in 2003. We organized those elections. And basically our priorities have now changed from elections, it's now stability, and with stability, peace and development. And I emphasized and insisted on the fact that we need continued support by the United States in order to achieve these two remaining goals, which is basic stability throughout the whole country and embark on a very, very long journey of development and really try to combat poverty, which is the biggest issue not only in the Congo, but in the region and on the African continent.

So thanks a lot for the continued support that we've always had from the United States government and the administration. And together, let's move further and further ahead.

PRESIDENT BUSH: Yes, sir. Glad you're here. Thank you.