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.orgCentral and Eastern Africa IRIN-CEA Weekly Round-up 20 13-19 May 2000
CONTENTS: ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Fighting intensifies ERITREA: Hundreds of thousands flee fighting ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Security Council imposes arms embargo ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Major stockpiling undermines effect of embargo ETHIOPIA: Election results due on 7 June HORN OF AFRICA: New appeal for continuing drought crisis SOMALIA: Floods in limited but "fragile" areas GREAT LAKES: Two leaders vow to reduce tensions DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: "Unequivocal commitment" needed DRC: Details of Kisangani demilitarisation plan emerge DRC: Contact established with Rwanda DRC: East "ravaged" by abuses - Human Rights Watch DRC: Talks' facilitator plans for 3 July start BURUNDI: Peace implementation committee meets BURUNDI: Army reports 20 rebels killed outside capital UGANDA: Army claims 15 rebels killed in Semliki UGANDA: Cholera outbreak in Bundibugyo RWANDA: Former 'hate journalist' pleads for forgiveness RWANDA: French judge interviews genocide suspects CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC: Donors pledge $33 million ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Fighting intensifies Ethiopian troops on Thursday pushed deep into Eritrean territory on the western front and took Barentu, the strategic regional town and supply route. Journalists taken to the frontline reported that, despite calls to halt the war, Ethiopia was continuing the offensive, insisting it had the right to "defend" its sovereignty. Using helicopter gunships, fighter bombers and heavy artillery, Ethiopia now controlled "much of the skies of the Western Mereb front without Eritrean response", a BBC journalist reported from the territory. ERITREA: Hundreds of thousands flee fighting The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has been asked by the Eritrean authorities to provide emergency assistance for some 200,000 newly displaced persons near the front lines, UN spokesman Fred Eckhard said in New York on Thursday. Food items such as ready-to-eat meals and high-protein biscuits as well as medicine, water and shelter materials have been requested. The UN has set up an emergency response unit on the ground comprising UN humanitarian agencies, NGOs and representatives from the Eritrean government, Eckhard said. The government claims 550,000 people from villages and settlement camps, mainly from the Gash Barka region, were moving towards the towns of Haikoita and Agordat, approximately 50-100 km from Barantu. Thousands of Eritrean refugees from the fighting around the Eritrean town of Barentu have been crossing the border into Sudan's Kassala state. The UNHCR put the figure of new arrivals at between 6,000 and 20,000, but said there were reports of up to 80,000 more waiting to cross the border. UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond said the agency was well placed to deal with the emergency as it already had camps along the border housing some 160,000 Eritrean refugees, some of whom had been there for the past 25 years. ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Security Council imposes arms embargo In a resolution adopted on Wednesday, the UN Security Council imposed an arms embargo on Ethiopia and Eritrea and demanded that both parties withdraw forces from military engagement, and "take no action that would aggravate tensions". It also demanded that peace talks under the OAU should be reconvened "without preconditions" as soon as possible. The arms embargo calls on all States to prevent the selling or supplying to the two countries "by their nationals or from their territories, or using their flag vessels or aircraft, of arms and related materiel of all types, including weapons and ammunition, military vehicles and equipment, paramilitary equipment and spare parts". ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Major stockpiling undermines effect of embargo Announcement of the arms embargo provoked criticism by some observers who felt the Security Council had waited too long to take action against a war that is considered the largest in Africa, in terms of troop numbers and sophisticated weaponry. A regional analyst told IRIN that the arms embargo would make little difference to the two countries, which had spent the last two years buying sophisticated ground and air weaponry. ETHIOPIA: Election results due on 7 June Voters turned out on Sunday to choose Ethiopia's nine regional assemblies, its 548-seat national parliament and two city councils (Addis Ababa and Dire Dawa). The opposition did not run candidates for every seat, complaining of harassment and manipulation in some areas, although opposition parties had for the first time use of television and radio for campaign purposes. Residents in the Ogaden area did not vote because of the hunger crisis caused by three years of drought - now followed by heavy rains. The official count is likely to be announced June 7. An official at the National Election Board said the conflict had not affected the election process, state radio reported. HORN OF AFRICA: New appeal for continuing drought crisis A revised appeal based on rapid needs assessments in countries affected by drought in the Horn of Africa will be launched at the end of May, which will give donors a clear picture of relief needs in the food, health, water and livestock sectors, Catherine Bertini, WFP executive director and special envoy of the UN Secretary-General on the drought in the Greater Horn of Africa, said at a New York briefing on Tuesday. She warned that food needs may go up. War between Ethiopia and Eritrea was a "huge challenge" to relief operations, Bertini said. But humanitarian programmes had to continue "no matter what governments are doing" as the region was "larger than the two countries in conflict", she said. Bertini said there had been welcome reports of rainfall in different parts of the country since the last appeal. SOMALIA: Floods in limited but "fragile" areas Southern Somalia is affected by floods in "relatively limited but very fragile areas", said UN Humanitarian and Resident Coordinator for Somalia Randolph Kent after a rapid flood assessment conducted on Tuesday by a team of UN officials. Exceptional rains during the past few weeks had caused river floods in southern Somalia, and flash floods in the north. The southern town of "Mombasa" was the only significantly affected community. Kent said there was now an "excellent opportunity" to start preventative measures, concentrating on building up embankments and dredging canals and water catchment pools. GREAT LAKES: Two leaders vow to reduce tensions Rwandan President Paul Kagame and Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni on Sunday agreed to take measures to defuse tensions between the two countries and prevent a repeat of the recent clashes between their forces in the Congolese city of Kisangani, news agencies reported. During a one-day summit in the Tanzanian town of Mwanza, the two presidents reaffirmed their commitment to the 8 May agreement on the "demilitarisation " of Kisangani. A joint statement read out by Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa, who organised the meeting, said the two presidents also reaffirmed their commitment to the implementation of the Lusaka peace agreement on the DRC. Diplomatic sources said the closed-door summit aimed to reach an agreement on dealing with specific Rwandan and Ugandan officers considered to be largely responsible for fomenting the crisis between the two countries, and the two leaders also pledged to reduce their troops deployed along their common border. Kagame and Museveni "sorted out most issues, which were blamed to a large extent on lack of communication between the two leaders," one source said. DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: "Unequivocal commitment" needed UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan had a difficult decision to make on whether or not the circumstances were right to ask the Security Council to approve phase II of the UN Observer Mission in the DRC (MONUC), a special Security Council delegation reported last Friday, after a week-long mission to the region. The Security Council mission recommended that Annan, before making his final recommendation on deployment, "should speak to each of the Lusaka parties at the highest level, seeking their unequivocal commitment to assist the proposed deployment of phase II of MONUC". DRC: Details of Kisangani demilitarisation plan emerge The details of a demilitarisation plan for Kisangani - under which the main bodies of Ugandan, Rwandan and RCD rebel troops in the town would withdraw to a distance of at least 100 km - were still being negotiated, with certain issues to be fully resolved between Rwanda, Uganda and MONUC, which is expected to ensure that the Congolese army does not seek to take advantage of the reduced military presence, military sources told IRIN on Tuesday. Under the agreement, a 'residual force' of one company each of the Uganda People's Defence Forces (UPDF) and the Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA) would remain to jointly control bridges, airports and road junctions until UN observers and peacekeepers took control of the city, which would continue to be administered by the Rwandan-backed rebel Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie (RCD), they added. DRC: Contact established with Rwanda Congolese Justice Minister Mwenze Kongolo on Saturday met Kagame in Kigali with a message from President Laurent-Desire Kabila, the Associated Press (AP) reported. It was the first high-level meeting between the two countries since Rwandan forces entered the DRC in support of anti-Kabila Congolese rebels in 1998, it said. Kabila's message expressed his desire for a quick end to the war and said he hoped to maintain direct contacts with Rwanda, AP reported Rwandan officials as saying. DRC: East "ravaged" by abuses - Human Rights Watch The New York-based NGO Human Rights Watch on Tuesday accused the Rwandan army and its RCD allies of massacring and raping civilians in eastern DRC, and said the east of the country was "ravaged" by human rights abuses. "The UN is looking for ways to prop up the 1999 Congo [Lusaka] peace accord, but one thing must be made clear: The human rights situation in eastern Congo is disastrous, and civilians are bearing the brunt of the fighting," the report said. Mayi-Mayi and Hutu [Interahamwe] armed groups were also committing atrocities against civilians, HRW reported. The organisation warned of anti-Tutsi 'hate literature' circulating in eastern Congo. DRC: Talks' facilitator plans for 3 July start The DRC government, opposition and civil society representatives will meet the facilitator of the inter-Congolese negotiations, former Botswana President Ketumile Masire, from 5-7 June to work out details for the holding of the full negotiations, now slated to start on 3 July, Masire said on Tuesday. "We will get together somewhere and decide on the venue," Masire told IRIN. He said the June meeting, to include only "a few" people, would also decide on the representation and number of participants for the negotiations. Masire said he would be travelling to Goma, Bunia and Gbadolite, starting on Wednesday, to meet the leaders of the two RCD groups and the Mouvement de liberation du Congo (MLC) as part of the "consultative process". Meanwhile, Masire said a lack of funding continued to hinder his facilitation efforts. BURUNDI: Peace implementation committee meets Burundi peace talk's committee five, which deals with the implementation modalities of any potential accord reached in the Arusha peace process, resumed on Monday, Internews agency reported on Tuesday. The week-long meeting would hear three UN experts on electoral and transition processes, and consider proposals submitted by the 19 negotiating parties. BURUNDI: Army reports 20 rebels killed outside capital More than 20 rebels in Burundi were killed by the army on Monday after a raid on a village near Kanyosha in Bujumbura Rural province, Burundi army spokesman Longin Minani said on Wednesday. "We knew about the attack and moved in. In the fight, 21 of the rebels were killed," he said. There have been no clashes between the army and the rebels; the rebels have been attacking civilians and the army is protecting them, Minani told IRIN. News organisations on Monday reported that Burundi army troops had opened fire on civilians outside Bujumbura after first clashing with rebel forces. UGANDA: Army claims 15 rebels killed in Semliki The Uganda People's Defence Forces (UPDF) has killed at least 15 ADF rebels and captured one of its commanders in recent fighting around Semliki National Park in Bundibugyo District, western Uganda, the semi-official 'Sunday Vision' reported. There were no UPDF casualty figures released by the army, which also declined to name the rebel commander it claimed to have captured, the report said. UGANDA: Cholera outbreak in Bundibugyo Five people died and 76 new cases of cholera were identified in an outbreak in displaced people's camps in Bundibugyo between 27 April 27 and 9 May, according to an OCHA mission report. This brings the total cholera cases to 303, with 22 deaths recorded, between 27 February and last week, it said. "The health situation in the district is still in dire need of more interventions" from UN agencies and NGOs, but insecurity remained a problem and was hampering humanitarian activities throughout western Uganda, the field mission reported. RWANDA: Former 'hate journalist' pleads for forgiveness A former journalist with Radio Television Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM), Georges Ruggiu - who changed his plea on Monday from not guily to guilty - has asked for forgiveness for his role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide. "I beg you to accept my regrets and my apologies for what happened," he pleaded at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). "I know that, alas, I can do nothing more than to testify and make known the truth, which is horrible. But I am ready to do it to repair the wrong that I have done you, and I ask you once again to forgive me," the independent Hirondelle news service quoted the Italian-born Belgian journalist as saying. RWANDA: French judge interviews genocide suspects A French anti-terrorist judge, Jean-Louis Brugiere, on Tuesday started closed-door interviews with seven suspects of the Rwandan genocide currently being held at the ICTR prison in Arusha, news organisations reported. Brugiere's interviews were part of his investigations into the 1994 plane crash in which former Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana and his Burundian counterpart Cyprien Ntaryamira died. He was investigating on behalf of the families of four French crew members who also perished in the crash, Hirondelle reported. The suspects include Hassan Ngeze, former editor of the extremist Hutu newspaper 'Kangura', who has claimed the crash was masterminded by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC: Donors pledge $33 million International donors meeting this week pledged over US$ 33 million to support the CAR's security and development efforts, a UN statement said. The meeting - held at UN Headquarters on Monday and Tuesday, and sponsored by the UN Department of Political Affairs, UNDP and the German government - aimed to raise funds for government programmes to restructure its defence and security forces, as well as to demobilise and reintegrate military personnel. Nairobi, 19 May 2000, 15:30 gmt [IRIN-CEA: Tel: +254 2 622147 Fax: +254 2 622129 e-mail: irin-cea@ocha.unon.org ] [This item is delivered in the English service of the UN's IRIN humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations. For further information, free subscriptions, or to change your keywords, contact e-mail: irin@ocha.unon.org or Web: http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN . 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