Weekly Round-Up - IRINWA-335: 23-Jun-06
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 Round-Up 335
17 - 23 June 2006
CONTENTS:
SIERRA LEONE: Former Liberian leader flown out of Sierra Leone; UN
welcomes transfer
GUINEA: Life returning to normal after strike ends
LIBERIA: Lifting of UN timber ban gives hope for economic revival
LIBERIA: UN refugee agency short of funds to help Liberians home
CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC-CHAD: Forgotten refugees face epidemics, food
cuts
GUINEA-BISSAU: As rains fall, cholera threat returns
GAMBIA: Justice demanded for slain journalist ahead of AU summit
SIERRA LEONE: Former Liberian leader flown out of Sierra Leone; UN
welcomes transfer
Former Liberian president Charles Taylor was flown out of Freetown on
Tuesday ahead of a trial for war crimes at The Hague for his alleged
backing of rebel fighters in Sierra Leone in exchange for diamonds.
Officials of the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone, which
indicted Taylor, did not specify where the former Liberian leader was
heading. But the Netherlands had said that it would host his trial
should another country volunteer to imprison him, if convicted. Britain
last week said it would allow Taylor to be jailed there.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan welcomed Taylor's transfer. Annan
expressed confidence that the trial would "mark a further victory in the
struggle to end impunity."
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=54058&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=SIERRA_LEONE
GUINEA: Life returning to normal after strike ends
Shops opened, public transport resumed and markets were bustling in the
Guinean capital on Monday after the government made significant
concessions to trade unions, ending a crippling nine-day strike that was
marked by violence.
The leading Confederation of Guinean Workers (CNTG) and the Union
Syndicate of Guinean Workers (USTG) called off the strike late Friday
after the government agreed to salary rises of up to 25 percent for
public sector workers, and small increases in transport and rent
allowances.
The biggest victory belonged to teachers. The government agreed to
permanently absorb some 12,000 contract instructors, who have lengthy
salary arrears, into the civil service.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=54037&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=GUINEA
LIBERIA: Lifting of UN timber ban gives hope for economic revival
The UN Security Council has lifted a ban on Liberian timber exports and
the government has promised to harness earnings from the multi-million
dollar trade for reconstruction and development of the war-wearied
country.
Liberia's logging industry, focused on the southeast and northwest
regions, has been off-limits since the UN banned its member states from
buying Liberian logs in 2003. The Security Council said the government
of former Liberian president Charles Taylor was using the US $15 million
industry to fuel war in the region.
But Liberia now has an elected peace-time government, headed by Africa's
first female President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf.
The resolution lifting the sanctions, passed unanimously on Tuesday,
said the 15-member Council recognised her new government's =93commitment
to transparent management of the country's forestry resources for the
benefit of Liberians, and its reforms in the timber sector."
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=54084&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=LIBERIA
LIBERIA: UN refugee agency short of funds to help Liberians home
Nearly three years after the guns fell silent in war-torn Liberia, over
150,000 Liberian refugees remain scattered across West Africa and the UN
refugee agency, UNHCR, is massively short of the funds needed to help
them home, officials said on Wednesday.
According to UNHCR Liberia=92s spokesperson Annette Rehrl, UNHCR has only
20 percent of the funds needed to finance a US $37 million refugee
repatriation programme.
A related programme to help resettle tens of thousands of internally
displaced Liberians is also short of cash, having received only 17
percent from donors of the US $30 million needed.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=54081&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=LIBERIA
CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC-CHAD: Forgotten refugees face epidemics, food
cuts
In the lush malarial forests of southern Chad tens of thousands of
forgotten refugees from Central African Republic squat in tattered tents
exposed to shrinking food rations and infection from diseases that could
easily be prevented with minimal investment.
Their story is relatively untold, as many of the more than 48,000
refugees who have surged north into Chad since 2003 to escape fighting
between rebels and government loyalists barely understand the chain of
events that led them to the camps.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=54115&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=CENTRAL_AFRICAN_REPUBLIC-CHAD
GUINEA-BISSAU: As rains fall, cholera threat returns
The first seasonal rains are falling in Guinea Bissau, damping the
searing midday heat but inflaming fears of another cholera outbreak in
the poorest districts of the capital, Bissau.
Among the maze of dirt pathways between houses, women and children
gather around street taps, filling up every available bucket and pot
while they can in the crowded Bissau district of Bairro Militar.
Last year, Guinea Bissau bore the brunt of a cholera epidemic that
afflicted over 42,000 across West Africa. Some 26,000 people were
stricken and more than 400 died of the water borne disease in tiny
Guinea Bissau alone. The first cases of cholera in West Africa this year
have already been confirmed in Niger and neighbouring Guinea.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=54056&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=GUINEA-BISSAU
GAMBIA: Justice demanded for slain journalist ahead of AU summit
When the African Union (AU) meets for its annual summit in the Gambian
capital Banjul next week, local journalists will not only report on
events they will also recall them.
Specifically, they want to remind summit participants of the murder of
prominent Gambian journalist Deyda Hydara 18 months ago.
The Gambia Press Union is urging the summit to press the Gambian
government to allow a private investigation from abroad into the murder.
Hydara was shot dead in his car about 15 minutes after leaving the
offices of the The Point newspaper on the evening of 16 December 2004.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=54112&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=GAMBIA
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