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HORN OF AFRICA
IRIN-HOA Weekly Round-Up 291
20 - 26 August 2005


CONTENTS:

ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: UN envoy urges resolution of border dispute
ERITREA: USAID asked to cease operations, says US envoy
ERITREA: Blocked food aid to be distributed
ETHIOPIA: EU observers criticise elections
ETHIOPIA: Floods displace thousands in the south
SOMALIA: Religious leaders urge interim gov't to end divisions
SOMALIA: Extreme violence part of daily life - MSF
SUDAN: Southern VP appointment to boost reconciliation talks - analyst
SUDAN: UNHCR chief to highlight security problems in Darfur


ALSO SEE:

SOMALIA: Interview with Amb Francois Lounseny Fall, SRSG for Somalia at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48753


ERITREA: USAID asked to cease operations, says US envoy

The Eritrean government has asked the US Agency for International
Development (USAID) to cease its operations in the Horn of Africa
country, the US Ambassador said on Thursday in the capital, Asmara.

"I'm not going to go into great details about this publicly because we
are still talking with [the] government about these issues," Scott
DeLisi said. "They have asked us to cease operations."

Noting that he respected Eritrea's right as a sovereign state to make
such decisions, the Ambassador added: "I cannot answer for you the
question as to why [they made the decision]. The government has told us
that they are uncomfortable with the activities of USAID; that is all I
know."

Relations between the aid community and the Eritrean government have
become strained in recent months, following the impounding of more than
100 project vehicles and the announcement of a new proclamation
requiring aid agencies to pay taxes.

The new regulations also require international NGOs to register on an
annual basis, to have at least US $2 million at their disposal in the
country and to pay taxes on the import of relief aid items, including
food.

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48773]


ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: UN envoy urges resolution of border dispute

Eritrea and Ethiopia must resolve the dispute over their common border
because it continues to overshadow humanitarian activities and
negatively impact development, a UN envoy said on Wednesday. "I cannot
help recognising the fact that the border issue has not been solved.
[It] has influenced not only on the humanitarian side [but also on] the
use of resources by the government," said Martti Ahtisaari, the Special
Envoy of the UN Secretary-General for the Humanitarian Crisis in the
Horn of Africa.

"If I would hope for one thing to be solved, I would definitely say it
is the border issue, because it overshadows everything that we do," he
added at the end of a two-day visit to Eritrea. Attempts to resolve the
border dispute between the two countries since the end of a bloody
two-year war in 2000 are in stalemate.

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48754]


ERITREA: Blocked food aid to be distributed

Some 1,500 tonnes of food aid held up at Eritrea's Massawa Port until
last week was due to be distributed to vulnerable people in Zoba Anseba
administrative zone, the Red Cross Society of Eritrea said on Monday.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP) recently reported that food donations
for various NGOs had been blocked at Massawa since early July. WFP said
the delays were caused by differences over an 11 May government
proclamation on NGO activities in Eritrea requiring them to have at
least US $2 million at their disposal and to pay tax on aid imports.

However, Eritrea's Minister of Labour and Human Welfare, Askalu
Menkerios, said last week that such differences were not the reason for
the delays. She said her ministry had paid roughly $60,000 in costs for
the Red Cross shipment, which included 1,320 tonnes of wheat flour, 110
tonnes of lentils, and 91,740 litres of vegetable oil, allowing it to be
cleared through customs.

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48736]


ETHIOPIA: EU observers criticise elections

Ethiopia's national elections failed to meet international standards for
democracy in key areas, the European Union's (EU) chief observer said on
Thursday. Ana Gomes said post-polling day irregularities, delays and
questionable vote counting, as well as flawed handling of complaints and
re-runs of elections in some constituencies had undermined the electoral
process.

The ruling party in turn accused Gomes and the EU observer mission of
bias. "The report is basically biased and clearly indicates the partisan
position she and her mission have taken," said Bereket Simon, Ethiopia's
information minister, who regained his seat in a re-run of the election
after being narrowly defeated. "She has betrayed bias despite the facts
on the ground," he added.

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48757]


ETHIOPIA: Floods displace thousands in the south

Floods left one man dead and several thousand people homeless after
heavy rains caused rivers to burst their banks in southern Ethiopia, an
official said on Wednesday. The Awash River - the longest in the country
at 1,200 km - burst its banks, flooding farmland and homes in the
country's largest region, Oromiya. "The Awash and Meki rivers have
overflowed and engulfed the surrounding farmland," Chala Horodow, the
head of emergencies in the region, said. "We have helped transport
people from the area that was flooded. One man was washed away in the
floods."

He said more than 3,000 people had fled their homes to escape the
flooding, which took place in the Gara Leman area, some 225 km south of
the capital, Addis Ababa. "The water is subsiding now," he said, adding
that the situation was being brought under control.

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48727]


SOMALIA: Religious leaders urge interim gov't to end divisions

Senior religious leaders in Somalia have called on the country's interim
government to either end the divisions that have paralysed the
administration or resign, a spokesman said on Wednesday. "It is almost a
year since they [were] elected and up to now they have not accomplished
one thing," Shaykh Nur Barud, deputy chairman and spokesman of the Ulama
Council of Somalia, told IRIN. "They are all busy attacking each other
over the media."

Barud said the country needed leadership to "pull it out of the mess" it
was in. The Transitional Federal Institutions have been divided over the
location of the government within Somalia following its recent
relocation from Nairobi, Kenya.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48741]


SOMALIA: Extreme violence part of daily life - MSF

Violence against civilians continues to be a major problem in the
strife-torn Horn of Africa nation of Somalia, the international
humanitarian aid organisation, Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF), said on
Monday. MSF said in a statement that this year alone, it had treated
more than 500 cases of violent trauma injuries in its two hospitals in
the town of Galkaayo, the regional capital of central Somalia's Mudug
region.

Galkaayo is divided into two halves, north and south, which fall in the
separate regions of Puntland and Mudug respectively. MSF said it had
been forced to operate separate hospitals in north and south Galkaayo
because patients could not cross the frontline that splits it in two.

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48685]


SUDAN: Southern VP appointment to boost reconciliation talks - analyst

The appointment of Riek Machar as vice president of the southern Sudan
government will boost hopes for a successful conclusion of
reconciliation talks between armed groups in the region, an analyst
said. Machar, who led a decade-long breakaway movement among his Nuer
people before rejoining the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army
(SPLM/A) in 2002, was on Friday appointed by Sudan's First Vice
President and President of the government of southern Sudan, Salva Kiir
Mayardit.

Kiir, the new chairman of the SPLM/A, was himself sworn into office on
11 August, replacing John Garang who died in a helicopter crash on 30
July near the Uganda-Sudan border. "The accession of two leaders who
have a better - or at least less antagonistic - rapport with the SSDF
[the government-aligned South Sudan Defense Force] leadership, presents
an opportunity to solve the outstanding issue of how to deal with other
armed groups in southern Sudan," David Mozersky of the International
Crisis Group, told IRIN on Monday.

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48700]


SUDAN: UNHCR chief to highlight security problems in Darfur

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, arrived in
Sudan's capital, Khartoum, on Monday to urge the government there to
ensure security for displaced people living in the strife-torn western
Sudanese region of Darfur.

Guterres wwas on a 10-day visit to Sudan, Chad and Kenya, a spokesperson
said. Following meetings with Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir and
other government officials, Guterres visited Darfur, where fighting has
displaced 1.9 million civilians.

"In Darfur, he will be underlining the need for the government of Sudan
to provide additional security to its own citizens," Kitty McKinsey,
regional spokesperson for UNHCR, told IRIN on Monday. "Security needs to
be provided for the displaced people in the camps as well as in the
villages where they would like to return to," she added.

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48683]


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


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