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

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email: irin@ocha.unon.org


Central and Eastern Africa
IRIN-CEA Weekly Round-up 25
17 - 23 June 2000



ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Peace deal signed
ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: New hope for refugees and the displaced
SOMALIA: Puntland rejects Djibouti peace process
DRC: Uganda reports troop withdrawal from Congo
DRC: UN, OAU voice concern over closure of Masire's office
DRC: Displaced still leaving "tense but quiet" Kisangani
RWANDA: Kagame reappoints senior officials
RWANDA: Ugandan prisoners of war paraded
BURUNDI: Army says Hutu, not rebel, integration agreed
BURUNDI: Mandela puts political prisoners on the agenda
GREAT LAKES: ICRC repatriates 177 prisoners of war
EAST AFRICA: 16 million people facing "critical" food shortage
TANZANIA: Government asked to assist refugee self-reliance
KENYA: 15 schools closed as food shortages bite
UGANDA: Rebels still hampering aid work


ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: Peace deal signed

Ethiopia and Eritrea on Sunday (18 June) signed a peace agreement, raising
hopes that the two year-old border dispute may be at an end. The 15-point
plan, brokered by the OAU in Algiers, provides for an immediate cessation
of hostilities, the deployment of a UN peacekeeping force in a buffer zone
extending 26 km into Eritrea, and the withdrawal of Ethiopian troops from
areas occupied inside Eritrea since 6 February 1999. Demarcation of the
border will follow later. Eritrean Foreign Minister Haile Woldetensae said
the agreement was the "first step, but not the end of the process",
Eritrean radio reported. He said the road to sustainable peace would be
full of obstacles and complications, but stressed his government's
commitment. The Ethiopian Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin, quoted by Tigray
radio in Mekele, said the agreement had created a "conducive environment
for the next round of talks", and described it as a "political victory"
for Ethiopia. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the signing now paved
the way for a "speedy implementation of the Framework Agreement and
Modalities". Speaking in Egypt, he hoped UN peacekeepers would be quickly
deployed to the buffer zone to consolidate the agreement. 

ETHIOPIA-ERITREA: New hope for refugees and the displaced

UNHCR officials in the Eritrean capital Asmara and the Sudanese capital
Khartoum expressed the hope that the peace agreement would enable refugees
and displaced people to regain their homes. "From the humanitarian point
of view, it is now essential that the agreement is honoured on the
ground,"  UNHCR official in Asmara Tahir Ali was quoted as saying. A UNHCR
report recalled that the latest bout of fighting last month had caused
large-scale displacement within Eritrea, and had driven some 85,000 people
into neighbouring Sudan. Plans to repatriate an existing 150,000 Eritrean
refugees from Sudan had also been put on hold. A senior UN official on
Friday appealed for increased aid for displaced Eritreans. Carolyn
McAskie, the acting emergency relief coordinator, described the situation
in Eritrea as "dire", noting that the latest fighting had taken place in
the country's "bread basket" region. UNHCR on Sunday began the latest in a
series of airlifts into Asmara, bringing in blankets and other supplies. 

SOMALIA: Puntland rejects Djibouti peace process

The Puntland authorities have officially rejected the Somali peace talks
currently underway in Djibouti, according to the Somali newspaper
'Ayaamaha'. In a letter to the Djibouti president, the UN
Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the regional IGAD grouping, the OAU and
other involved parties, the president of the Puntland regional government
Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmad said his administration "will never participate in
the ongoing Somali conference and will not recognise its outcome". It
pointed out that any attempt by the Djibouti government to appoint
Puntland representatives would be considered as a "hostile provocation"
and claimed the aim of the Djibouti conference was to make "short-term
political and economic gains". UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan meanwhile
urged all Somalis to take part in the Djibouti process. His spokesman
quoted Annan as saying he hoped the peace conference would lead to
agreement on a transitional arrangement "that would safeguard Somalia's
sovereignty and prepare the ground for a lasting settlement". [for IRIN
separate on progress at the Djibouti peace conference, see: 

DRC: Uganda reports troop withdrawal from Congo

Uganda has withdrawn five battalions of its troops from the DRC, according
to a statement issued by the President's office on Thursday. "The
President's office would like to inform Ugandans and the rest of the world
that, following the pullout of the Uganda People's Defence Force (UPDF)
units from Kisangani and the areas around the city as part of the UN
supervised demobilisation exercise,... Uganda has decided to withdraw some
units from the DRC," the statement said. "These include the 5, 3, 9, 67
and 75 battalions," it added. Ugandan army spokesman Major Phineas
Katirima told IRIN that Uganda had decided to unilaterally withdraw from
the DRC as a gesture of goodwill. "This shows that we have no intention of
staying in Congo permanently, the rest of the troops will be withdrawn in
accordance with the Lusaka agreement," he said.  Humanitarian sources told
IRIN that tension persists in Kisangani, with the rival Congolese rebel
groups, the Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie (RCD) and Mouvement
de liberation du congo (MLC) amassing troops to fight for control of the
city following the departure of their Rwandan and Ugandan allies. The bulk
of UPDF and Rwandan forces appeared to have left the city but the UN
Observer Mission in the DRC (MONUC) was continuing to monitor the
situation, it said. 

The UN Security Council had, on Friday 16 June, demanded that Uganda and
Rwanda, which had violated the sovereignty and territorial integrity of
the DRC, "withdraw all their troops from the country's territory without
further delay." In a unanimously-adopted resolution, the Council also said
Rwanda and Uganda "should make reparations for the loss of life and the
property damage inflicted on Kisangani's civilian population." In
addition, it called on all the Congolese parties to engage fully in the
inter-Congolese dialogue, as provided for in the Lusaka peace agreement.
In particular, it called on the DRC "to honour its obligations in that
regard and cooperate with the facilitator appointed by the OAU [Ketumile
Masire], and to allow the full participation of political parties and
civil society groups." [Full resolution at: 

DRC: UN, OAU voice concern over closure of Masire's office

The UN on Wednesday voiced concern over the closure by the DRC government
on Tuesday of the Kinshasa office of the inter-Congolese dialogue
facilitator, Ketumile Masire. UN spokesman Manuel de Almeida e Silva said
MONUC was "concerned" about the closure and was urgently seeking further
information.  OAU Press and Information Officer Desmond Orjiako told IRIN
on Thursday that the organisation had made an appeal to the DRC government
to "reconsider its decision". Humanitarian sources in Kinshasa told IRIN
that on Tuesday morning, a group of about 30 members of the Police
d'Intervention Rapide (PIR) entered Masire's Kinshasa office and ordered
the occupants "to get out, for they had received instruction to seal this
office". Masire said on Monday, in a report posted on the Botswana
government's website, that his facilitation initiative was at "a momentary
dead-end" because the DRC President, Laurent-Desire Kabila, had failed to
send representatives to preparatory talks in Benin from 5 to 7 June, but
that another meeting had been set for 3 July and he hoped all those
invited would send delegates. 

DRC: Displaced still leaving "tense but quiet" Kisangani

The number of internally-displaced people leaving IDP sites and either
returning to their houses (many destroyed in the fighting) or seeking
refuge outside the "tense but quiet" city of Kisangani increased early
this week.  The number of IDPs in known sites had declined from around
12,500 to approximately 5,000 as of Friday 16 June, according to the
humanitarian information available. Though relatively decent water was
still running in the city, unconfirmed cholera cases have been reported
and the need for chlorination, cholera prevention and cholera testing
stocks was keen, aid officials indicated. The WFP has delivered some 17 mt
of food to the city, while CARITAS, MSF-Holland and the ICRC also
envisaged bringing in some 60 mt more, the ICRC targeting hospitals and
war-wounded in particular. The estimate of human casualties as a result of
the most recent fighting between Uganda and Rwanda now stood at over 600
dead and some 1,200 to 1,500 injured, humanitarian sources added. A
serious concern was the safe disposal of military ordnance, especially
around the Tshopo area; 5,000 to 6,000 shells are estimated to have fallen
on Kisangani, without strategic reason, and the danger of unexploded
munitions all over the city was tragically illustrated when three children
were recently killed after picking up a grenade, humanitarian sources told
IRIN. 

RWANDA: Kagame reappoints senior officials

Rwandan President Paul Kagame on Wednesday reappointed former senior
government officials as foreign and domestic policy observers. "The
appointments are designed to strengthen the president's capacity to deal
with both domestic and foreign policy issues, and the appointed people
have the experience to work with the president," government spokesman
Joseph Bideri told IRIN on Thursday. Former minister of state in the
president's office Patrick Mazimhaka, who was named special presidential
envoy, told IRIN he would deal mainly with issues relating to Congo and
Burundi. Former foreign minister Amri Sued was appointed foreign policy
adviser, and former interior minister Abdul Karim Halelimana domestic
policy adviser. Former prime minister Pierre-Celestin Rwigema, who
resigned in February after being cited by parliament on corruption
charges, was named chairman of the board of directors Rwandatel, the state
telecommunications company. Dr Army spokesman Emmanuel Ndahiro was named
presidential private secretary on security matters, and Theogene
Rudasingwa, former political adviser in the vice-president's office, was
named principal private secretary to Kagame. 

RWANDA: Ugandan prisoners of war paraded

Rwanda on Wednesday paraded 28 Ugandans and five Congolese prisoners
captured in the Kisangani fighting from 5-11 June, to journalists gathered
at Mbaare military camp in Gitarama prefecture, central Rwanda. "Ugandan
authorities should stop their posturing in denying that we have their
prisoners. It is normal to take prisoners in any war," Rwandan government
spokesman Joseph Bideri said. "As a matter of fact, the army leadership in
Uganda is negotiating their release with the military authorities here,"
he added. Uganda on Friday criticised Rwanda for parading the POWs. "It is
unfortunate for the Rwandan authorities to publicly humiliate our soldiers
... we had agreed that the accounting of UPDF soldiers should be done
behind the scenes through MONUC," said James Wapakhabulo, Ugandan national
coordinator on matters in the Great Lakes region. 

BURUNDI: Army says Hutu, not rebel, integration agreed

Defence Minister Colonel Cyrille Ndayirukiye said on Friday (16 June) that
the proposal by Burundi peace facilitator Nelson Mandela that ethnic Hutus
and Tutsis should be integrated into the national army on a 50-50 basis
had been accepted by the government. However, the 50 percent Hutu
representation did not imply a 50 percent rebel integration in the army,
the Burundi news agency ABP quoted Ndayirukiye as saying on national
radio. "The mediator told us it would be an integration of Hutus and
Tutsis, and not a mixture of 50 percent rebels and 50 percent of the
army," he said. The manner of achieving Mandela's 50-50 Hutu-Tutsi
proposal was still to be worked out, and if a 50 percent rebel
representation were the facilitator's vision of things, then "that should
be negotiated, just like the implementation modalities," Ndayirikuye
added. Meanwhile, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata - who
marked Africa Refugee Day on Tuesday in Uganda - held discussions with
President Pierre Buyoya in Bujumbura on Monday on the prospects for the
return of some 350,000 refugees from Tanzania, as the prospects of a peace
deal at the Arusha peace talks improved. Ogata told Buyoya "there would
have to be tangible improvements in the security situation before UNHCR
could promote repatriation to Burundi," UNHCR spokesman Kris Janowski said
in Geneva. Ogata then marked Africa Refugee Day on Tuesday in a settlement
for Sudanese refugees in Mungula, near Adjumani, in northern Uganda. 

BURUNDI: Mandela puts political prisoners on the agenda

The Burundi human rights league ITEKA has broadly welcomed the new focus
on political prisoners in Burundi since Arusha peace facilitator Nelson
Mandela called for their release. However, it expressed concern that his
words could be misinterpreted and contribute to the culture of impunity
which, it says, has been at the heart of Burundi's crisis since 1993.
ITEKA leader Louis-Marie Nindorera said Mandela's speech could give the
impression that some prisoners who were guilty of terrible crimes had only
"to get their crimes recognised as part of a political or ideological
campaign" to justify their release, the independent Hirondelle news agency
reported on Wednesday.  Mandela had failed to distinguish between giving
hope to the innocent and cautioning the guilty against the use of
violence, and the facilitator should "clarify his position on this",
Nindorera added.  The Association Burundaise pour la Défense des Droits
des Prisonniers (ABDDP), for its part, suggested the setting up of a
commission to establish criteria for different prisoners and study the
circumstances in which individuals were detained, Hirondelle reported.
With the international community and civil society exerting pressure on
the issue of political prisoners, and State Prosecutor Gerard Ngendabanka
having proposed a national debate on the issue, the ball was now in the
government's court, the agency stated. 

GREAT LAKES: ICRC repatriates 177 prisoners of war

On Friday and Saturday (16 and 17 June), following agreements between the
governments of DRC, Rwanda, Zimbabwe and Namibia, the International
Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) acted as a neutral intermediary to
repatriated 177 former prisoners of war (POWs) of Rwandan, Zimbabwean and
Namibian nationality who had been detained by the various belligerents in
the DRC conflict. An ICRC aircraft brought 35 Zimbabweans and 11 Namibians
from the Rwandan capital Kigali to the DRC capital Kinshasa on Friday
afternoon, before returning to Kigali with 88 former POWs from Rwanda.
Another plane took the 35 Zimbabweans onward to Harare, and an additional
43 Rwandan Rwandans from Harare to Kigali, the ICRC stated. DRC Human
Rights Minister Leonard She Okitundu, speaking on Congolese television on
Friday, criticised Rwanda for failing to repatriate a single Congolese
prisoner, but only those of Zimbabwe and Namibia, despite Kinshasa having
repatriated tens of Rwandan POWs. 

EAST AFRICA: 16 million people facing "critical" food shortage

Nearly 16 million people are facing critical food shortages due to
drought-induced crop and livestock losses, the FAO said in its June food
outlook. Pastoralists in the sub-region are the worst-affected after a
succession of poor rains. In Kenya, nearly 2.7 million people mainly in
the pastoral north and northeast provinces are facing severe food
shortages, FAO said. In Tanzania some 800,000 people in several regions
face serious food supply difficulties due to a poor "vuli" harvest for the
third year running, while in Uganda, the food situation in the northeast
is difficult for some 215,000 people affected by drought. Another 112,000
people have been displaced by civil strife in the country's western
district of Bundibugyo, FAO added. 

[see also: IRIN interview on 23 June with Manuel Aranda Da Silva, Regional
Humanitarian Coordinator for the Drought in the Horn of Africa and
Humanitarian Coordinator in Ethiopia]

TANZANIA: Government asked to assist refugee self-reliance

UNHCR representative for Tanzania Marjon Kamara on Monday marked Africa
Refugee Day by reiterating the agency's call for the government to allow
refugees living in camps to engage in self-supporting activities. "We
appeal to the government not only to continue their open-door policy but
to allow and encourage refugees to engage in activities of self-reliance,"
Kamara said in a speech at Lukole refugee camp in Ngara District, western
Tanzania. District Commissioner Deusdedit Mtambalike promised to present
the request to higher government authorities, according to a statement
from the UNHCR office in Dar es Salaam. Kamara also called for refugees to
respect the humanitarian ground rules of host camps. "I urge you refugees
to preserve the civilian nature of the refugee camps and refrain from
activities which compromise your stay in Tanzania," she said. The refugees
in Lukole urged the parties involved in the Arusha peace talks on Burundi
to reach a power-sharing agreement and called for the facilitator, Nelson
Mandela, to visit the refugee camps in Tanzania to collect the views of
refugees on the peace process. 

KENYA: 15 schools closed as food shortages bite

Fifteen primary schools in Kenya's north-central Samburu district have
been closed due to prolonged drought and insecurity, the 'East African
Standard' quoted the District Education Officer Joseph Kikwai as saying.
He said acute shortages of food, water and the current insecurity
situation had forced the schools to close. In the Eastern Province, nearly
60,000 pupils have abandoned classes with several primary schools
threatened with closure, education officers said. Kenya has been facing
acute drought, leading to both food and water shortage in most parts of
the country. Low water in the country's main hydro-generating plant
recently led to the government, together with stakeholders in the energy
industry, announcing a power rationing programme throughout the country. 
There have also been warnings of a similar programme for water. 

UGANDA: Rebels still hampering aid work

Rebels of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) have maintained a presence in
Uganda's two northern districts of Gulu and Kitgum since the year began,
OCHA's latest humanitarian update said. "Unfortunately, there seems to
have been even more increased rebel activity in the two districts over the
last couple of months," the update pointed out. It observed that there are
frequent reports of ambushes and groups of LRA spotted in both districts. 
Anti-tank mines were discovered between Acholi-bur and Pajule by the army
"but no reports of injury", the report said. It noted that the security
situation was bad especially on roads leading northwards to Sudan and in
the south of the district. "The Gulu-Kitgum road has literally been
closed,"  the report said.  Most NGO activities have been greatly hampered
or are on hold as agencies can no longer move to the field. 


[IRIN-CEA: Tel: +254 2 622147 Fax: +254 2 622129 e-mail: irin-cea@ocha.unon.org ]


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