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HORN OF AFRICA
IRIN-HOA Weekly Round-up 93
08 - 14 June 2002


CONTENTS:

ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: Ethiopia accepts Eritrea's mine information
ETHIOPIA: UN says making poor farmers repay loans "immoral"
ETHIOPIA: Use of "lethal force" criticised
ETHIOPIA: "Voluntary resettlement" in Badme
ETHIOPIA: Addis denies airport checks violate accord with UN
SOMALIA: RRA cracks down on charcoal traders
SOMALIA: North Gedo Region in food security crisis
SOMALIA: Somaliland sultans in reconciliation meetings
SOMALIA: RRA leader off to Ethiopia
DJIBOUTI: Dubai port authority to run airport
ERITREA: Vulnerable children and women at risk
ERITREA: WFP warns of food shortages
SUDAN: Khartoum condemns hostility at US Congress hearing



ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: Ethiopia accepts Eritrea's mine information

Ethiopia has accepted minefield records from Eritrea, after previously
rejecting them as "fake", the United Nations said on Monday.They were
handed over to the Ethiopian authorities by Phil Lewis, programme manager
for the UN Mine Action Coordination Centre (MACC), part of the UN
peacekeeping mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE).The records mark the
final exchange between the two countries over where exactly they planted
thousands of mines during their two-year border war.  [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28251]

ETHIOPIA: UN says making poor farmers repay loans "immoral"

The United Nations said on Thursday that forcing farmers facing serious
food shortages to pay back money borrowed to improve their land was
"immoral". The UN's Emergency Unit For Ethiopia (EUE) said the government
should ease the credit burden on already overstretched farmers facing
severe food shortages. It said many farmers in Sidama Zone in southern
Ethiopia were already relying heavily on humanitarian help from charities
and could not repay their loans.

In some parts of the country, farmers who have been unable to meet the
repayments on money borrowed for improved seeds and fertilisers have been
jailed. Interest on loans taken out by farmers can be as high as 12.5
percent - higher than bank rates - for "agricultural extension packages"
of improved seeds and fertiliser. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28298]


ETHIOPIA: Use of "lethal force" criticised

An international human rights organisation has criticised Ethiopia's use
of "lethal force" against civilians. In a statement issued on Tuesday,
Human Rights Watch (HRW) said the Ethiopian security forces last month
killed "at least 15 and perhaps as many as 38 farmers" demonstrating
against a change in the administrative status of Awasa, the capital of the
Southern Nations, Nationalities and People's Regional State. "The
Ethiopian government must urgently establish clear restraints on the use
of lethal force against civilians," HRW said. It noted that the Ethiopian
Human Rights Council (EHRC) said police had fired indiscriminately at the
protestors.[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28248]

ETHIOPIA: "Voluntary resettlement" in Badme

Ethiopia has begun "voluntarily resettling" drought-affected families in
the northern Tigray region to the disputed border area near Badme, local
sources told IRIN on Tuesday. They said some 210 people were moved from
central Tigray in May under a pilot project to the Badme sub-region, as
part of the government's new drive to tackle food insecurity in Ethiopia.
The two-year border war between Ethiopia and Eritrea broke out in Badme in
May 1998 and both countries claim they were awarded the village after a
crucial border ruling in The Hague on 13 April. Badme - which is currently
administered by Ethiopia - saw some of the heaviest fighting of the war.
[Full story at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28253]

ETHIOPIA: Addis denies airport checks violate accord with UN

Ethiopia has rejected accusations by UN peacekeepers that certain
restrictions applied by Addis Ababa violate an agreement signed by both
sides. Staff of the UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) now have to
undergo normal immigration procedures by showing their passports at Addis
Ababa airport and they can be subject to searches. UNMEE says that under a
Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), Ethiopia agreed that the peacekeepers
should have unhindered freedom of movement to carry out their mission.
Ethiopia's State Minister for Information Netsannet Asfaw told IRIN on
Monday that the restrictions were put in place "until the UN can restore
confidence". Ethiopia was furious when UNMEE recently took a group of
journalists to the disputed town of Badme via the Eritrean capital Asmara.
The bitter border war with Eritrea flared up in the small town of Badme in
May 1998. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28233]


SOMALIA: RRA cracks down on charcoal traders

The authorities of the self-declared autonomous region of South West State
of Somalia, have over the past two weeks apprehended over a dozen trucks
transporting charcoal, a senior police officer in the regional capital,
Baidoa, told IRIN on Thursday. "In the past two weeks we arrested 14
trucks loaded with charcoal, and their crews." The arrests were made after
the traders had "ignored repeated warnings to stop their activities". The
authorities were not banning all charcoal trade, but "only the charcoal
meant for export", a business source in Baidoa, 240 km northwest of
Mogadishu, told IRIN. "The problem is how you differentiate charcoal meant
for local consumption and that meant for export," the source said.  [Full
story at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28303]

SOMALIA: North Gedo Region in food security crisis

Insecurity, due to fighting, and lack of trading activities have all
contributed to an acute food security crisis in Gedo Region, particularly
the north. Food intake for a large number of people is well below any
acceptable minimum, a food analysis report said. This is despite the fact
that productive animals have retuned from Middle Juba, Lower Juba and
Bakol regions, and from Ethiopia (where they had been taken in search of
pasture), the EU-funded and FAO-implemented Food Security Analysis Unit
(FSAU) said in its June food security report. According to the report, the
animals "are providing no direct benefits" to the population, due to the
recent fighting in northern Gedo, and are still being kept in southern
Gedo. [Full story at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28274]

SOMALIA: Somaliland sultans in reconciliation meetings

Sultans - senior and traditional elders - of the self-declared republic of
Somaliland, northwestern Somalia, are holding meetings to reconcile
differences between pro-administration elders and their opposition
counterparts, a local source in the Somaliland capital, Hargeysa, told
IRIN on Tuesday. The dialogue between the two groups of elders was
reportedly initiated by the new Somaliland president, Dahir Riyale Kahin,
earlier this month. He began the process by first meeting opposition
elders, who were said to have been impressed by the new president's
sincerity. "They were very surprised by his forthright approach," said a
local source, who had spoken with the elders after their meeting with
Dahir. Dahir then arranged a meeting between the opposition sultans and
those from the Gurti, or members of the House of Elders. "By all accounts,
the meetings are going very well, but so far no statement has come out of
it," the source said. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28275]

SOMALIA: RRA leader off to Ethiopia

The president of the self-declared South West State of Somalia, Col Hasan
Muhammad Nur Shatigadud - who is also the chairman of the Rahanweyn
Resistance Army (RRA)- has left for Ethiopia at the head of a large
delegation, an RRA official confirmed to IRIN on Monday. Shatigadud's
deputies visited Ethiopia a few weeks ago, and returned with an invitation
for him from the Ethiopian authorities. He was reportedly reluctant to
make the trip for fear that he might be replaced during his absence.
However sources in Baidoa, the capital of the newly-declared state, told
IRIN he left on Saturday "with a 40-member delegation". [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28222]

DJIBOUTI: Dubai port authority to run airport

The government of Djibouti has signed a "management contract" with the
Dubai Ports International Authority (DPIA) to run Djibouti's international
airport. A senior official in the Djibouti transport ministry told IRIN
the agreement comes within the framework of the government's policy of
privatising public institutions. The DPIA is expected to improve the
airport's services and infrastructure, and help in the airport's financial
recovery through a "normalisation of its fees", he said.  The agreement
comes at a time when the airport is experiencing some difficulties, caused
largely by a lack of business following the withdrawal or reduction of
flights by big airline companies. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28231]


ERITREA: Vulnerable children and women at risk

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in Eritrea has warned that it
is facing a serious shortfall in funding for this year, putting vital work
with vulnerable women and children at risk. According to a recent donor
update, the agency has received less than one quarter of the funding it
requested in its annual appeal last November. Christian Balslev-olesen,
UNICEF's representative in Asmara, said the situation was very worrying.
He noted that the funding shortfall had come as the agency's programme was
reaching a crucial stage. "People are trying to re-establish their lives
after the war," he told IRIN. "Refugees returning from the Sudan,
expellees from Ethiopia, as well as internally displaced people urgently
need basic facilities, such as water, sanitation, education and health."
[Full story at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28249]

ERITREA: WFP warns of food shortages

The UN's World Food Programme (WFP) in Eritrea has warned that it only has
enough food aid stocks to last until the end of September. Only those
considered most vulnerable due to the recent war and drought will receive
food aid over the next four months. Supplementary feeding programmes
across the country are to be stopped due to the food shortage. The
shortage has been created by a poor response to the UN's 2002 Consolidated
Inter-Agency Appeal (CAP) for Eritrea, a WFP spokesman said. Seven months
after the appeal was launched, only 2.71 percent of WFP's food aid
requirements have been met. He described the situation as "extremely
serious". [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28224]

SUDAN: Khartoum condemns hostility at US Congress hearing

The Sudanese presidential peace adviser, Ghazi Salah al-Din al-Atabani,
has criticised certain US groups' enmity towards the government of Sudan
in the wake of a US Congressional hearing on the country on 5 June. Salah
al-Din said that certain groups hostile to the Sudanese government wanted
to confuse American policy towards the country, and these would weaken any
progress achieved by the US peace envoy, John Danforth.

USAID assistant administrator Roger Winter testified at the hearing that
Khartoum was engaged in a strategy of erecting bureaucratic and
operational barriers to the delivery of humanitarian assistance, that the
frequency of its attacks on civilians was increasing, and that USAID hoped
to make use of Washington's political leverage to support the UN in its
efforts "to negotiate cross-line access and eliminate government of Sudan
access denials". [http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28235]

Meanhwile, the World Food Programme has also expressed concern over the
continued humanitarian access denial to the oil-rich region of western
Upper Nile in southern Sudan, where fighting has caused the displacement
of tens of thousands of civilians. WFP spokeswoman Laura Melo told IRIN on
Wednesday that the decision by the Sudanese government to deny relief
agencies access to western Upper Nile (also known as Unity/Wahdah State)
in the past three months was increasing the vulnerability of civilians,
whose food supply from harvests garnered earlier in the year was already
thinning out. [http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=28281]


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