U N I T E D   N A T I O N S
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Integrated Regional Information Network for Central and Eastern Africa

Tel: +254 2 622147
Fax: +254 2 622129
email: irin@ocha.unon.org


Central and Eastern Africa
IRIN-CEA Weekly Round-up 9
26 February - 3 March 2000



CONTENTS:

SUDAN: Expelled NGOs call on SRRA to negotiate
SUDAN: Crisis creates void in OLS
RWANDA: New government to be announced next week
BURUNDI: More sites to be dismantled
BURUNDI: Government urges calm after Arusha talks
DRC: Rwanda rejects JMC move
DRC: MONUC prepares for larger, more robust deployment
DRC: Reconciliation meeting gets underway
DRC: More haemorrhagic fever
KENYA: Government strengthens security
TANZANIA: Karago camp hits capacity
TANZANIA: DRC refugees flee fighting, food shortages
UGANDA: No fresh deployment in Ituri
UGANDA-SUDAN: Follow-up peace talks in Nairobi
ETHIOPIA: UNHCR to reconsider refugee status
ETHIOPIA: Raging forest fires continue
SOMALIA: Puntland authorities ban 'political meetings'
SOMALIA: Aid to Mogadishu "suspended"
HORN OF AFRICA: Below-normal rains forecast in east


SUDAN: Expelled NGOs call on SRRA to negotiate

Humanitarian agencies which pulled out of south Sudan this week have
called for talks with the rebel SPLM/A. They consider they were "forced to
leave"  over their refusal to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU)
with the South Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Association (SRRA), the
humanitarian wing of the SPLM/A. "We are talking about principles that
affect the long-term credibility and effectiveness of our programmes ...
We are dismayed that the process has not been completed," said Nick
Southern of Save the Children (UK) and focal point for the NGOs who
refused to sign. "We are determined to see negotiations restarted so that
we can return to our humanitarian work." [See also IRIN Focus on NGO
pull-out from SPLM areas: 
http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN/cea/countrystories/sudan/20000229.htm]

Crisis creates void in OLS

UNOCHA on Wednesday confirmed the evacuation of 149 NGO workers from 11 of
the 35 organisations working as part of the Operation Lifeline Sudan
consortium in SPLM-controlled areas. This represented the "temporary loss
of a significant proportion of the humanitarian resources" provided by the
OLS and "created a void" in its ability to provide adequate humanitarian
assistance to south Sudan, an OCHA press release stated. Emergency
response, health, nutrition, food security, and water and sanitation
programmes would be hardest hit - with the impact on some parts of Bahr el
Ghazal and Jonglei of particular concern, it said. The UN urged donors to
maintain their support to the OLS. 

RWANDA: New government to be announced next week

There is "technically" no government in Rwanda since the resignation of
Prime-Minister Pierre-Celestin Rwigema, a senior Rwandan official said on
Thursday. "Members of the government are working on a caretaker basis
until the new government is announced sometime next week," Patrick
Mazimhaka, minister in the President's office, told IRIN. Rwigema resigned
on Monday, saying there was "no conducive atmosphere" for him to work due
to summonses by the national assembly to explain various actions (related
to alleged mismanagement of public funds while he was education minister)
and the resulting "unpleasant words". He stressed he would not be
following the example of the former speaker of parliament, Joseph Kabuye
Sebarenzi, who was forced to resign on 6 January and subsequently fled the
country. 

BURUNDI: More sites to be dismantled

In its latest update on the humanitarian situation in Burundi, OCHA
recalled that the dismantling of the regroupment camps would be carried
out in stages, with the first phase providing for the return of 55,732
people from 11 sites in Bujumbura Rural. Three sites, Maramvya, Matara and
Kinonko, have already been closed and two more (Gitaza and Rutongo) are
expected to be closed between 1-7 March. Two more sites (Gatumba and
Muberure) were due to be shut down on Friday. The first phase could take
up to three months, OCHA said. It will be followed by a second phase in
which 13 more sites should be dismantled. 

BURUNDI: Government urges calm after Arusha talks

The Burundi government has called for a compromise peace accord acceptable
to all Burundians in order to avoid an "agreement without a future". In a
statement, received by IRIN, the government said it hoped for a peace
settlement as soon as possible but stressed that "favourable conditions" 
should be created for its implementation. There would be no imposition of
a solution, the statement said. "Some people think, wrongly, that [Nelson]
Mandela's speech [during last week's Arusha peace talks] has put an end to
the debate or negotiations," the statement said. 

The government said last weekend's demonstrations against the Arusha
negotiations in the capital Bujumbura were "insignificant". Tutsi groups
were enraged by comments by the facilitator, Nelson Mandela, that Tutsis
monopolised power in the country. News agencies say the demonstrations
were a clear sign of nervousness among middle-class Tutsis, a major
constituency of President Pierre Buyoya. Power-sharing arrangements with
the majority Hutu are under consideration at the ongoing Arusha
negotiations. 

DRC: Rwanda rejects JMC move

Rwanda has rejected a proposal to move the base of the Joint Military
Commission (JMC) to Kinshasa, a Rwandan government official said on
Thursday. "A proposal to that effect was presented to us but we rejected
it....We cannot send our people to Kinshasa for security reasons," 
Theogene Rudasingwa, advisor to Rwandan Vice-President Paul Kagame, told
IRIN on Thursday. Sources close to a regional heads of summit held last
month in Lusaka told IRIN the secretariat of the JMC, which is responsible
for overseeing implementation of the Lusaka ceasefire agreement until the
deployment of a peacekeeping force, had proposed shifting the body's
headquarters from Lusaka to Kinshasa to strengthen cooperation with the UN
Observer Mission in the DRC (MONUC). 

DRC: MONUC prepares for larger, more robust deployment

The UN Observer Mission in the DRC (MONUC) was currently preparing to
receive the "initial enablers" - logisticians and communications staff,
along with their security cover - for the Phase II deployment of UN
personnel approved by the Security Council last week to support the Lusaka
peace deal, a MONUC official told IRIN. Several hundred more UN personnel
are expected to deploy in four main bases - Mbandaka, Kisangani, Kindu and
Mbuji-Mayi - in the next 40 to 60 days. That deployment would see a whole
new profile for MONUC, with UN Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping
Operations Bernard Miyet - expected in the DRC in the next week or so -
likely to adopt a more robust attitude and lay down stricter ground rules
on freedom of movement and security clearances, a UN official said. 

DRC: Reconciliation meeting gets underway

President Laurent-Desire Kabila on Tuesday attended the opening ceremony
of national reconciliation talks organised by Congolese religious groups
in Kinshasa, but he made no speech, news agencies reported. Organisers
said delegates would begin meeting in small working groups on Wednesday to
pave the way for the implementation of the Lusaka peace agreement, but
"above all" to prepare for the inter-Congolese dialogue envisaged in it.
Some 1,200 people were invited to the talks, which aimed to pave the way
for inter-Congolese negotiations called for in the Lusaka ceasefire
agreement. Both the country's main opposition politicians and rebel
leaders declined to attend. "My movement is not going to identify with any
inter-Congolese talks outside Lusaka [peace accord]," Jean-Pierre Bemba of
the Mouvement de liberation du Congo (MLC) told IRIN on Tuesday. Moise
Nyarugabo, vice-president of RCD-Goma, told the Rwanda News Agency that
the Kinshasa talks were an attempt by Kabila to undermine the Lusaka peace
agreement, and his group was not attending either. 

DRC: More haemorrhagic fever

Six more cases of Marburg haemorrhagic fever have been confirmed from the
Watsa area of Province Orientale, WHO said on Thursday, citing the results
of tests conducted by the National Institute for Virology in South Africa.
In a statement, WHO said all six new cases had occurred in adult men, of
whom three had died. It was not yet known whether the new cases were gold
miners working in nearby Durba, the statement said. Marburg infections in
miners in Durba were first diagnosed in April 1999, but were believed to
have begun as early as November 1998, it added.

KENYA: Government strengthens security

The Kenyan government has sent out extra security personnel to maintain
security along the country's borders with its neighbours, as well as
between the warring Pokot and Marakwet tribes in northwest Kenya. "We have
reinforced our presence in these areas and are improving on our
intelligence information flow," Minister of State in the Office of the
President, Marsden Madoka told IRIN. On 20 February, a group of raiders
believed to be from west Pokot attacked a Turkana homestead killing 40
people.  Last Wednesday, some 80 people were killed after heavily-armed
raiders from the Merrile community in Ethiopia struck Turkana homesteads
in Kokuro area near the Kenya-Ethiopia border. 

TANZANIA: Karago camp hits capacity

UNHCR has been transferring all new arrivals from Burundi to Karago
refugee camp established in December but, with 40,660 residents as of
Monday, Karago "has reached its maximum holding capacity", UNHCR
information officer Vincent Parker told IRIN on Monday. The agency was
exploring ways to expand Karago, but if the camp could not cope refugees
would be transferred to Ngara district in Kagera Region, where there was
still some capacity, Parker said. Two hundred to 300 refugees were
currently arriving each day and some 11,000 had arrived in February,
compared to a total of 24,000 arrivals in January, he said. Recent
arrivals had reported continued fighting between government troops and
rebels, particularly in the Gitega and Ruyigi provinces, and a resurgence
of fighting closer to the Tanzanian border.

TANZANIA: DRC refugees flee fighting, food shortages

UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond said new refugee arrivals from the DRC had
also slowed.  "So far, some 600 new arrivals were recorded in February,
compared to 1,300 in January," Redmond said. The Congolese refugees, who
reportedly fled from Baraka, claim they were forced to leave due to acute
food shortages during the past few months, he stated. Others who arrived
form Uvira and Fizi in South Kivu claimed that heavy fighting was still
raging and rebel forces continued to loot villages,

UGANDA: No fresh deployment in Ituri

Meanwhile, the Ugandan army says there has been no fresh deployment of
troops to the Ituri region in northeast DRC which has suffered a wave of
ethnic clashes between the Lendu and Hema communities.  "We have scaled
down the deployment of troops to Ituri because the situation has calmed
down as a result of dialogue between the Lendu and Hema," Bantariza told
IRIN. "Also the heavy deployment of troops is a deterrent to whoever wants
to pick up a machete and kill another." However, he warned that "if the
need arises", the army was in a position to deploy more troops. 

UGANDA-SUDAN: Follow-up peace talks in Nairobi

Ugandan and Sudan officials are in Nairobi for follow-up talks on the
implementation of the agreement signed between the two governments in
December last year. An official from the facilitation team, the Carter
Centre, told IRIN they would be reviewing the implementation of the
Nairobi agreement of December last, when Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni
and his Sudanese counterpart Omar al-Bashir agreed not to harbour, sponsor
or give military or logistical support to rebel groups on each other's
territories.  Museveni has since complained repeatedly about the slow pace
of Sudan's implementation of the agreement. 

ETHIOPIA: UNHCR to reconsider refugee status

UNHCR will no longer confer automatic refugee status on Ethiopians who
fled their country before 1991 under the regime of Mengistu Haile Mariam,
the agency said in a statement on Tuesday. Ethiopians in all countries of
asylum will be affected, but "UNHCR will assist them if they choose to be
repatriated", UNHCR spokesman in Geneva Ron Redmond said. Those who do
not, will be screened and continue to be protected under the refugee law
only if they can still claim a valid fear of persecution in Ethiopia.
Since the country's democratic elections in 1995, the government has
declared its willingness to welcome home all refugees who fled under the
Mengistu regime, and has committed itself to assisting them reintegrate,
Redmond said. 

ETHIOPIA: Raging forest fires continue

More than 30,000 hectares of land has been destroyed by raging fires which
broke out in Shakiso district, in Borena zone of Oromiya State, southeast
Ethiopia over three weeks ago. "The fire is still out of control," 
counsellor at the Ethiopian embassy in Nairobi, Mengistu Ayalew, said on
Friday. "Help from the international community is yet to come." The fire
has caused the deaths of hundreds of animals at the National Park in the
Bale Mountains, destroyed forests, electricity poles, residential houses
and bee hives. "It is a catastrophe," he told IRIN. 

SOMALIA: Puntland authorities ban 'political meetings'

The Puntland regional government recently banned political meetings until
June 2001, the region's local newspaper 'Kaaha Bari' said. In a circular
dated 17 February, the director-general for international relations Ahmad
M.  Egal said that "political activities had been banned until June 2001,
when the two-year transition period ends". The circular said the move was
taken to avert civil war, social unrest and to "ensure that law and order
is maintained in Puntland". It warned that workshops and seminars meant to
discuss social development should not be turned into political forums.
Organisers of workshops and seminars were further required to submit to
the relevant authorities a list of items they wished to discuss 15 days in
advance. 

SOMALIA: Aid to Mogadishu "suspended" 

Italian special envoy to Somalia, Francesco Sciortino, announced on
Thursday that international aid to Mogadishu will be withheld "until
security conditions in the Somali capital improve". "Armed confrontations
between clans, kidnappings, destruction and sacking of property are
preventing law enforcers from helping the population of Mogadishu," the
Italian news agency ANSA quoted Sciortino as telling journalists in
Mogadishu. The envoy was in the town with the European Commission's
Somalia counsellor, Joao Duarte de Carvalho, to foster talks and establish
peace. They held talks with various politicians, members of civil society
and public organisations to discuss the "role of the public in the
Djibouti peace conference".  Faction leader Hussein Aideed refused to meet
the two because "they represent ideas which would not be acceptable to our
backers", the Somali 'Qaran' newspaper said. 

HORN OF AFRICA: Below-normal rains forecast in east

"Far below normal" rainfall is forecast for the March-May season in
eastern parts of the Horn of Africa, according to the Nairobi-based
Drought Monitoring Centre. A statement on the findings of a forum held in
Tanzania from 9-11 February said there were "enhanced probabilities" for
near-normal rainfall conditions over much of the "greater" Horn of Africa.
But in most of Somalia, eastern Kenya and southeastern Ethiopia,
below-normal rainfall associated largely with 'La Nina' weather phenomenon
was anticipated over the next three months, while normal to below-normal
rainfall was most likely for northern Ethiopia, Eritrea and Djibouti. 

Nairobi, 3 March 2000, 14:30 gmt


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