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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HORN OF AFRICA
IRIN-HOA Weekly Round-Up 233
5 - 11 March 2005


CONTENTS:

ERITREA: Malaria cases drop as households increase use of bednets
ERITREA: ACT appeals for $2 m to alleviate hunger and drought
ETHIOPIA: Government rejects US criticism on human rights
ETHIOPIA: Ban on media association lifted
SOMALIA: IGAD meeting asks for more details on proposed peace mission
SOMALIA: President and prime minister return to Nairobi
SOMALIA: Tsunami-affected fishing communities to continue receiving aid
SUDAN: Billions needed for initial recovery and development
SUDAN: Awaiting peace in the southern region
SUDAN: No let up in sexual violence in Darfur - MSF
SUDAN: Funding shortfall may affect peace efforts, UN official warns


ALSO SEE:

SUDAN: Coping with disease and drought in Upper Nile at: 
[http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=45936]

SUDAN: Awaiting peace in the southern region at: 
[http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=45970]


ERITREA: Malaria cases drop as households increase use of bednets

The number of reported malaria cases in Eritrea has fallen by 85 percent 
over the past five years due to the increased use of free bednets 
provided by the government, an official told IRIN.

Tewolde Ghebremeskel, head of Eritrea's National Malaria Control 
Programme (NMCP), said on Thursday the reported cases of malaria at 
Eritrean health facilities had fallen from almost 180,000 in 1999, to 
28,000 in 2004.

"In Eritrea, there are around 2.2 million people who live in the 
malaria-prone areas," said Ghebremeskel. He added that reported 
fatalities had also fallen from 176 in 1999 to 16 in 2004. "We have 
distributed more than one million treated bednets in the last four 
years," he said.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=46057]


ERITREA: ACT appeals for $2 m to alleviate hunger and drought

Action by Churches Together (ACT) appealed on Tuesday for more than US 
$2.2 million to fund projects aimed at alleviating food and water 
shortages in Eritrea, caused by four years of drought. According to an 
ACT press release, the Lutheran World Federation, an ACT member, intends 
to undertake various projects in four regions: Maekel, Anseba, Debub and 
Gash Barka. The statement said these projects would supply inhabitants 
with food, water and shelter, and restock their livestock.

Scarce rainfall had resulted in another poor harvest, thus food reserves 
had been depleted and the coping mechanisms of the population stretched 
to the limit, it added. Livestock had migrated to find more fertile 
grazing. Another affiliated body, the Norwegian Church AID 
(NCA-Eritrea), would provide targeted communities in the Zoba Senafe and 
Zoba Debub sub-regions with much-needed drinking water, said ACT. 
NCA-Eritrea would also address the problem of HIV/AIDS in those areas, 
which are located in the temporary security zone and host many displaced 
people.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=46055]


ETHIOPIA: Government rejects US criticism on human rights

The Ethiopian government reacted strongly on Friday to criticism of its 
human-rights record by the United States. A statement released by the 
foreign affairs ministry said the US condemnation of human rights in 
Ethiopia was "baseless and frivolous". The criticism came in the US 
State Department's annual human-rights report, released on Monday, 
detailing abuses in countries throughout the world in 2004.

"Security forces committed a number of unlawful killings - including 
alleged political killings - and beat, tortured, and mistreated 
detainees," it said. It added that the government had infringed privacy 
rights, restricted the press, "tightly controlled" news broadcasts and 
imprisoned thousands without charge. The government dismissed the 
report, saying it was based on "lies". "The report cannot, in any way, 
be taken as serious," the ministry stated. "It is essentially based on 
rumours, lies and innuendoes known to be peddled by those 
foreign-financed groups in Ethiopia who have an axe to grind against the 
government."

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=45941]


ETHIOPIA: Ban on media association lifted

A 17-month ban imposed on Ethiopia's only independent journalists' 
association has been lifted by the federal high court, the president of 
the association told IRIN on Friday. "This is a new chapter for 
Ethiopian journalists, and this brings us to the forefront of the fight 
for freedom of expression in this country," Kifle Mulat, head of the 
Ethiopian Free Press Journalists Association (EFPJA), said. "This is an 
important event in the country." Set up in 1993, the EFPJA was only 
granted its government licence three years ago. It aims to defend the 
rights of the independent press in Ethiopia.

In November 2003, it was ordered by the Ministry of Justice to suspend 
activities amid allegations that it was breaching Ethiopian law. The 
decision to suspend the organisation drew widespread criticism. The 
International Federation of Journalists, with 500,000 members in more 
than 100 countries, urged the government to reassess the move and 
expressed concern that it was trying to silence the EFPJA. The 
government initially said the association was banned because it had 
failed to meet its legal obligations regarding registration with the 
ministry. It said the EFPJA had been operating illegally after failing 
to renew its annual operating licence for the last three years. [Full 
story at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=45944]


SOMALIA: IGAD meeting asks for more details on proposed peace mission

Senior defence officials from the Inter-Governmental Authority on 
Development (IGAD) meeting in the Ugandan capital, Kampala, on Tuesday 
asked the African Union (AU) for further details about the proposed 
peace mission to Somalia. "We need guidance from members of the AU 
[African Union] Commission to throw more light on what was discussed and 
agreed on in Abuja as far as the peace mission for Somalia is 
concerned," Aronda Nyakairima, Uganda's army commander, said at the 
official opening of the conference of IGAD defence experts.

"There are some issues which are not very clear to us and they include 
the following: troops contributing countries, mandate of the mission, 
size of the mission [and] its funding and logistics," he added. In 
February, the AU authorized IGAD - which comprises Djibouti, Eritrea, 
Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda - to prepare to send a peace 
mission to Somalia. Its purpose would be to help the country's 
transitional federal government (TFG) get a foothold there when it 
relocates from Nairobi, Kenya.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=46016]


SOMALIA: President and prime minister return to Nairobi

Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed and Prime Minister Ali Muhammad 
Gedi returned to Nairobi on Friday, after a nine-day tour of various 
regions of Somalia, a senior official in Gedi's office told IRIN. The 
visit was part of the new government's relocation process. Yusuf and 
Gedi began their "meet-the-people tour" on 24 February and visited the 
towns of Jowhar, Beletweyn, Garowe, Bosasso, Galkayo and Baidao. The 
delegation, however, did not visit the capital, Mogadishu.

"The trip was very successful and the delegation was warmly welcomed by 
enthusiastic crowds wherever they went," Abdurrahman Ali "Malaysia", the 
special adviser to Gedi, told IRIN. It underscored the need for the 
government to relocate to Somalia "and the government intends to do that 
soon," Ali said. He also said no final decision had been made on where 
the government would be based, but added that "Mogadishu remains the 
capital of Somalia". However, if security in Mogadishu remained 
problematic, "there may be a need for an alterative temporary seat of 
government".

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=45948]


SOMALIA: Tsunami-affected fishing communities to continue receiving aid

Somali coastal communities that lost their livelihoods in December's 
tsunami will continue to receive aid from the World Food Programme (WFP) 
until the next fishing season starts in October, the WFP country 
director, Robert Hauser, has said. "The assistance that we have provided 
so far is purely survival assistance for the population because they 
have lost their livelihoods, their means of income and they have lost 
their fishing gear," Hauser told IRIN in an interview on 3 March. He 
expressed hope that other agencies, donors and the international 
community in general would rebuild infrastructure and help those 
affected by the tsunami to acquire new fishing gear so that they could 
become self-reliant again.

WFP, he added, had enough funds to sustain the tsunami relief effort, 
and donors were continuing to respond to the appeal for money to run 
other longer-term operations throughout the rest of Somalia. "The good 
thing for Somalia is also that despite the tsunami, the funding for the 
normal programme has also not suffered," said Hauser.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=46011]


SUDAN: Billions needed for initial recovery and development

Some US $7.8 billion is required to fund an initial post-war recovery 
and development plan for Sudan, an assessment report prepared by the 
government, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A), the 
World Bank and the UN said. The emergency reconstruction report, 
entitled: "Framework for Sustained Peace, Development and Poverty 
Eradication in Sudan", was officially launched at a news conference in 
the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, on Wednesday. A statement released ahead of 
the launch said Sudanese government and SPLM/A teams had reached a 
consensus on major development challenges facing their country following 
21 years of civil war in the south.

The war, which pitted the government against the SPLM/A, officially 
ended with the signing of a peace agreement between the two sides in 
Nairobi on 9 January. "The process started a year ago when the peace was 
not yet signed, but today the report has been endorsed and we are 
working as a team," Yahia Hossein Babiker, the chairman of the Joint 
Assessment Mission (JAM), whose membership includes the government, UN 
agencies, the SPLM/A and the World Bank, told reporters during the 
launch of the report.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=46038]


SUDAN: No let up in sexual violence in Darfur - MSF

The incidence of rape and sexual violence against women and girls, often 
perpetrated by armed men, continues to be high in the war-torn western 
Sudanese region of Darfur, according to the medical charity, Medecins 
Sans Frontiers (MSF). In a report released on Monday, the eve of 
International Women's Day, MSF reported that between October 2004 and 
mid-February 2005, doctors in several locations in North and South 
Darfur had treated almost 500 women and girls who had been raped.

"These women come to us for treatment of sexually-transmitted diseases, 
physical injuries and psychological trauma," Paul Foreman, MSF's head of 
mission in Khartoum, told IRIN on Tuesday. "The problem is massive." The 
report, entitled "The Crushing Burden of Rape: Sexual Violence in 
Darfur", said "MSF believes that these numbers reflect only a fraction 
of the total number of victims because many women are reluctant to 
report the crime or seek treatment." It called on local government and 
other health-care providers in Darfur to ensure full and appropriate 
treatment for victims of sexual violence.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=45968]


SUDAN: Funding shortfall may affect peace efforts in the south, UN 
official warns

Inadequate funding could undermine efforts to consolidate peace in 
southern Sudan following the signing in January of an accord that ended 
more than two decades of civil war there, a top UN official warned on 
Friday. "I was shocked to find that the south has only received 5 
percent of what it needs to implement the [2005] Work Plan for Sudan," 
Jan Egeland, UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and 
Emergency Relief Coordinator, told staff of UN agencies and NGOs in the 
southern town of Rumbek.

"There is a disturbing discrepancy between what the world promised it 
would do once a peace agreement was signed, and what it has delivered," 
Egeland, who was on a three-day visit to Sudan, added. "Of the [US] $500 
million that has been requested for recovery and development assistance 
in the south in 2005, only $25 million has been received and a further 
$25 million has been promised," Dawn Elizabeth Blalock, spokesperson for 
the UN humanitarian coordinator in Sudan, told IRIN on Monday.

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=45965]


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Copyright (c) UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 
2005


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