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 West Africa

Tel: +225 22-40-4440
Fax: +225 22-41-9339
e-mail: irin-wa@irin.ci


WEST AFRICA
IRIN-WA Weekly Roundup 161
01 - 07 February 2003


CONTENTS:

COTE D'IVOIRE: Situation remains fluid, WFP appeals for funds
LIBERIA: Fighting erupts again, 5,000 displaced 
LIBERIA-GUINEA: Humanitarian envoy continues tour 
CAMEROON-NIGERIA: Sharing of disputed resources discussed
NIGERIA: Ethnic clashes erupt in southern oil town
NIGERIA: Explosion kills at least 40 in Lagos
WEST AFRICA: Gas pipeline project treaty signed
GHANA: Trafficked child labourers registered
GUINEA: Yellow fever kills 24
MALI: Rights groups want lives of pregnant women protected

 

COTE D'IVOIRE: Situation remains fluid

The situation in Cote d'Ivoire remained fluid this week. Demonstrations
against the Marcoussis Accord, a peace agreement signed on 24 January in
France, continued and embassies, international organisations and foreign
businesses relocated non-essential employees and dependents to other
countries.

On Tuesday the UN Security Council expressed support for the Marcoussis
Accord, which was also endorsed by the African Union and other
institutions, and urged the government to implement it.
 
However, demonstrations against the accord continued. Women's groups
protested on Monday, the handicapped on Tuesday, while on Wednesday it was
the turn of public and private sector workers.
 
This week's protests were preceded on Saturday by a demonstration
involving hundreds of thousands of people from a multiplicity of
organisations, and described as the largest since the start of the crisis.

While these demonstrations were aimed at expressing popular opposition to
the Marcoussis Accord, a protest on Sunday was of a totally different
nature. It followed the discovery in Abidjan's Adjame suburb of the
bullet-ridden body of a member of the politiburo of the opposition
Rassemblement des Republicains (RDR), Camara va Karamogo, who had been
taken from his home on Saturday night by armed men in uniform. Va Karamogo
worked in the office of Adjame's mayor, also an opposition member. News of
his murder led to riots in Adjame and another low-income suburb, Abobo.
Two buses were burned by demonstrators, who denounced the government.

The Marcoussis Accord provides for the establishment of a government of
national reconciliation to include the ruling party, opposition parties,
the rebel Mouvement patriotique de Cote d'Ivoire (MPCI) which controls the
mainly Muslim north and part of the centre, and the two smaller rebel
groups, the Mouvement pour la Justice et la Paix (MJP) and the Mouvement
patriotique ivoirien du Grand Ouest (MPIGO) which control part of the
west, along the border with Liberia. The Ivorian army described the accord
as "humiliating to the military and the nation".

Meanwhile, the World Food Programme (WFP) warned that lack of funds
threatened its efforts to provide urgent food aid to victims of the
conflict. WFP said it had appealed for $6.6 million for an initial five
months to respond to the basic needs of 170,000 affected people, but had
received only 30 percent of the requested resources from Germany, Italy,
Switzerland and Luxembourg.
 
The Ivorian conflict began on 19 September as an uprising by members of
the military, before developing into a full-fledged rebellion. In October,
West African mediators negotiated a ceasefire between loyalist forces and
the MPCI. However little progress was made in subsequent negotiations
between the two sides. Last week West African heads of state travelled to
Abidjan to meet Gbagbo, but details of their meeting were not revealed.

As the conflict drags on, both loyalists and rebels have been accused of
committing human rights abuses.

A mission led by the Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights said in a
report submitted to the Security Council on 24 January that: "Many murders
of politicians, businessmen and others have taken place in the economic
capital, Abidjan." The report said "these murders are organised by death
squads and private militias" and that information was available "to the
effect that the death squads are made up of elements close to the
government, the presidential guard, and a tribal militia of the
president's ethnic group".

The UN report is available at
http://www.reliefweb.int/library/documents/2003/unsc-cot-24jan.pdf]

For full IRIN coverage of the Cote d'Ivoire crisis go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=32116&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=COTE_D_IVOIRE


LIBERIA: Fighting erupts again, 5,000 displaced

Fighting erupted last weekend in Liberia after a months-long lull in the
conflict between the government of President Charles Taylor and rebels of
the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD). By
Wednesday, at least 5,000 people had fled the fighting and sought refuge
in camps for the displaced in Montserrado County, which includes the
capital, Monrovia. Most came from around the towns of Kley and Tubmanburg,
northwest of Monrovia.

The fighting continued throughout the week with the government massing
heavily armed troops near Tubmanburg, 60 km west of the capital, and
Bopolu, some 100 km northwest of Monrovia. Monrovia remained calm but with
more roadblocks. Taylor, who returned this week from an African Union
Summit in Ethiopia, promised to flush out the rebels.
 
The National Human Rights Center, whose membership includes nine local
human rights organizations, said in a statement on Monday that the
humanitarian situation resulting from the renewed fighting was
"disturbing". It called on the LURD to cease hostilities, saying that
fighting did not augur well for democracy in Liberia. The rebels have been
fighting since 1999 to overthrow Taylor.
 
For this week's IRIN stories on Liberia go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=LIBERIA

LIBERIA-GUINEA: Humanitarian envoy continues tour
 
The UN Humanitarian Envoy for the Cote d'Ivoire Crisis, Carolyn McAskie,
travelled to Liberia and Guinea where she visited new transit centres for
thousands of people who fled fighting in Cote d'Ivoire.

McAskie arrived in Liberia on Saturday, after a one-day visit to Burkina
Faso, and visited Saclepea transit centre, which is to be transformed into
a refugee camp. She told the refugees that she had gone to hear their
stories so that she could "bring their suffering to the eyes of the
world". She pledged to lobby the UN and others on behalf of Ivorian
refugees, Liberians returnees and third-country nationals affected by the
crisis.

On Monday McAskie proceeded to Guinea where she visited people displaced
from Cote d'Ivoire in Nzerekore, near the Ivorian border. She returned to
Abidjan on Wednesday and on Thursday signed an agreement with the Canadian
government to support a humanitarian data management system.

For IRIN coverage of McAskie's mission to West Africa go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/ADVsearch.asp?SelectCountry=&SelectRegion=West_Africa

CAMEROON-NIGERIA: Sharing of disputed resources discussed

Following a UN-brokered agreement between Cameroon and Nigeria to set up a
committee to review their dispute over the Bakassi peninsula, talks to end
the border conflict opened in the Nigerian capital, Abuja on Tuesday.
Nigeria's Vice President Atiku Abubakar, opened the meeting of the
Nigeria/Cameroon Mixed Commission. "I look forward to the joint
development and utilisation of resources in the area, particularly in case
of hydrocarbon findings," Atiku said. "I expect the joint commission to
work out the modalities."

The International Court of Justice had ruled in October that the oil-rich
Bakassi peninsula, which extends into the Gulf of Guinea between both
countries, belonged to Cameroon. But the ruling - meant to end an
eight-year legal battle between the two countries - was rejected by
Nigeria, which said the interests of its citizens who had lived in the
peninsula for centuries were not considered. UN Secretary-General Kofi
Annan invited presidents Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria and Paul Biya of
Cameroon to a meeting in Geneva in November, where they agreed to seek a
peaceful resolution of the dispute.

For the full story go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=32137&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=NIGERIA

NIGERIA: Ethnic clashes erupt in southern oil town

Violence erupted in Nigeria's southern oil region with ethnic clashes
claiming the lives of 20 people in the town of Warri. The trouble started
when a dispute broke out between factions of the ruling People's
Democratic Party, which held primaries to select candidates for the state
legislative elections due in April-May 2003. The violence degenerated into
fighting between the Urhobo and Itshekiri ethnic groups. Army and police
personnel were deployed but bands of youths engaged them in gunfights.

The authorities of Delta State imposed a dusk-to-dawn curfew on Monday in
Warri to curb the ethnic clashes. Residents said heavily armed soldiers
and police patrolled the streets of the worst hit section of the town,
where more than 50 houses were razed by rival gangs. Lt Col Gar Dogo,
commander of the army battalion based in Warri, told reporters that the
belligerents were armed with sophisticated weapons.

For IRIN coverage of the clashes go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=32076&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=NIGERIA

NIGERIA: Explosion kills at least 40 in Lagos

About 40 Nigerians died in explosions on Sunday in the economic capital,
Lagos. More than 100 were injured, rescue workers said. The huge explosion
leveled a three-storey building occupied by a bank and residential
apartments near the city's central business district. The blasts ripped
through three nearby buildings. On Wednesday, the police said the
explosions were caused by explosives. Investigations continued.

For the full story go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=32073&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=NIGERIA
 
WEST AFRICA: Gas pipeline project treaty signed
 
The presidents of Benin, Ghana, Nigeria and Togo have signed an agreement
that provides a legal and fiscal framework for a US $500-million
gas-pipeline project linking their four countries, Chevron Nigeria Limited
reported on Monday in Lagos, Nigeria. The proposed pipeline would
transport natural gas from Nigeria to five cities in Ghana, Togo and
Benin. It is promoted by Chevron Nigeria Limited, the Nigerian National
Petroleum Corporation, Shell, the Societe Beninoise de Gaz (Benin),
Societe Togolese de Gaz (Togo), and the Volta River Authority of Ghana.
Gas delivery from the 620-km pipeline is expected to start in June 2005.

For the full story go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=32075&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=WEST_AFRICA

GHANA: Trafficked child labourers registered

At least 571 child labourers in fishing communities in Volta and Central
regions were been registered for eventual reunification with their
families by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), IOM
reported. The US-funded programme, which is jointly implemented by the
Ghanaian authorities, the International Labour Organisation (ILO),
Catholic Relief Services and Apple, a local NGO, aims to return and
reintegrate over 1,200 children.

The Ghana initiative complements other regional efforts including the
'Combating Trafficking in Children for Labour Exploitation in West and
Central Africa' programme, a three-year initiative launched in 2000 by the
ILO. The programme covers Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cote d'Ivoire,
Gabon, Ghana, Mali, Nigeria and Togo. A West and Central African
Convention against Child Trafficking is due to be ratified in 2004.

For the full story go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=32094&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=GHANA

See also related IRIN coverage at
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=31656">GHANA: Fishermen back
fight against child labour
   
GUINEA: Yellow fever kills 24
 
The World Health Organisation reported an outbreak of yellow fever in
Guinea on Monday. It said that by 23 January, the Guinean health ministry
had reported 43 cases, 24 of them fatal, in the southern Macenta and
Kerouane prefectures. Macenta is near the Liberian border, while Kerouane
is nearer to the border with Cote d'Ivoire. A mass vaccination campaign
had begun, WHO said.

For the full story go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=32095&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=GUINEA

MALI: Rights groups want lives of pregnant women protected
 
A study released on Wednesday by the New York-based Centre for
Reproductive Rights shows that about one in 19 women in Mali die from
pregnancy-related causes. A third of deaths among women aged 15-49 were
due to complications resulting from pregnancy and childbirth, said the
report, titled "Claiming Our Rights: Surviving Pregnancy and Childbirth in
Mali".

In the report, the centre, together with the Association des Juristes
Maliennes (Association of Malian Jurists), urged the Malian government to
protect the lives of pregnant women. It said "the most visible cause of
maternal mortality in Mali is the poor state of the health-care
infrastructure, which leaves adequate obstetric care out of reach for many
women, particularly those in rural areas".

Only one in four births is assisted by a skilled attendant, it said,
adding that "Mali's high maternal mortality ratio, estimated at 630 deaths
per 100,000 live births, is a reflection of broader societal
discrimination."

The study report is available at:
http://www.reproductiverights.org/pr_03_0204mali.html. The full IRIN story
is available at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=32153&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=MALI


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