DRULAP

Kenya Cult Death Toll Hits 201, More Than 600 Missing

The death toll linked to a doomsday cult in Kenya hit 201 Saturday after police exhumed 22 more bodies, most of them bearing signs of starvation, according to the coast regional commissioner.

The bodies are believed to be those of followers of a pastor based in coastal Kenya, Paul Mackenzie. He’s alleged to have ordered congregants to starve to death in order to meet Jesus.

More than 600 people are still missing.

Mackenzie, who was arrested last month, remains in custody. Police plan to charge him with terrorism-related offenses.

Hundreds of bodies have been dug up from dozens of mass graves spread across his 800-acre property, located in the coastal county of Kilifi.

Mackenzie insists that he closed his church in 2019 and moved to his property in a forested area to farm.

Autopsies conducted on more than 100 bodies last week showed the victims died of starvation, strangulation, suffocation and injuries sustained from blunt objects.

Local media outlets have been reporting cases of missing internal body organs, quoting investigators in the case.

Mackenzie, his wife and 16 other suspects will appear in court at the end of the month.

Coast regional commissioner Rhoda Onyancha said Saturday the total number of those arrested stood at 26, with 610 people reported as missing by their families.

It is unclear how many survivors have been rescued so far from the search and rescue operations on Mackenzie’s vast property. Some of them were too weak to walk when they were found.

Cults are common in Kenya, which has a religious society.

Police across the country have been questioning other religious leaders whose teachings are believed to be misleading and contrary to basic human rights.

President William Ruto last week formed a commission of inquiry to investigate how hundreds of people were lured to their deaths at the coast and recommend action on institutions that failed to act.

Mackenzie had in the past been charged with the deaths of children in his church in a case that is ongoing in court. Residents nearby had raised the alarm after his followers moved to the forested area.
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Sudan Talks to Resume Amid Heavy Fighting

Sudan’s warring army and Rapid Support Forces paramilitary will resume talks Sunday, a senior Saudi diplomat said, as airstrikes and heavy fighting raged overnight around Khartoum despite an agreement to protect civilians.

Saudi Arabia, which has been hosting the talks aimed at securing a cease-fire deal, has also invited army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan to Friday’s Arab League summit in Jeddah, the diplomat said.

The conflict that broke out suddenly a month ago has killed hundreds, sent more than 200,000 people into neighboring states, displaced another 700,000 inside the country and risks drawing in outside powers and destabilizing the region.

Despite Burhan’s invitation to the Jeddah summit, he is not expected to leave Sudan for security reasons, two other diplomats in the Gulf said.

Burhan was invited because he is head of Sudan’s Sovereign Council that was meant to be overseeing a planned transition to civilian rule before the conflict erupted, the Saudi diplomat said. His rival RSF chief Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, is deputy head of the council.

“We haven’t yet received the names of the delegation, but we are expecting Sudan to be represented in the summit,” the Saudi diplomat said.

The two sides agreed Thursday to a “declaration of principles” to protect civilians and allow humanitarian access, but there has been no let up in the fighting, with clashes and strikes ringing around Khartoum and neighboring areas.

In the resumed talks in Jeddah, the sides will start by discussing mechanisms to implement Thursday’s agreement including plans for aid delivery, safe corridors and the removal of forces from civilian areas.

Talks would then move onto ways to end the conflict, eventually paving the way for a civilian government. “The nature of the conflict affects the dialog. Yet I found a very good spirit from both sides,” the Saudi diplomat said.

In public neither side has shown any sign it is willing to compromise, and they battled through previous truces. Although the RSF has promised to uphold Thursday’s agreement, the army has not yet commented on it.

Neither side seems able to secure a quick victory, with the RSF dug into residential districts throughout the capital and the army able to call on air power.
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Ghana’s Cocoa Farmers Suffer Falling Incomes as Chocolate Makers Reap Profits, Says Oxfam

The world’s biggest chocolate producers are enjoying large profits while failing to pass on the benefits to cocoa farmers, many of whom are suffering falling incomes and worsening poverty, according to a report from the charity Oxfam.

The report was published ahead of World Fair Trade Day on May 13.

Falling incomes

The analysis focuses on Ghana, the world’s second-largest producer of cocoa. The charity says farmer’s incomes in the country have fallen since the start of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020.

“An Oxfam survey of more than 400 cocoa farmers supplying chocolate corporations across Ghana found that their net incomes have fallen on average by 16 percent since 2020, with women’s incomes falling by nearly 22 percent. Nine out of ten farmers said they are worse off since the pandemic,” the report says.

The authors add that up to “90 percent of Ghanaian cocoa farmers do not earn a living income, meaning they cannot afford enough food or other basics such as clothing, housing and medical care. Many of the 800,000 farmers in the country survive on just $2 a day.”

Several local and global factors have driven down farmers’ wages, said Uwe Gneiting, a co-author of the Oxfam report.

“COVID, of course, was a big disruption. But then also the war in Ukraine and the resulting economic crisis, coupled with some more longer-term challenges, like the impacts of climate change and aging farms, which is a big issue in Ghana,” Gneiting told VOA, adding that there are widespread social and environmental consequences.

“Lower incomes really have shown to facilitate the use of children on farms, so child labor, which is a big problem of course in Ghana and other cocoa producing countries. But also deforestation – that farmers are more likely to go out and cut down more trees and or to expand their farms and to make a living.”

Bumper profits

At the same time, Oxfam says profits for the world’s biggest chocolate firms have increased.

“The world’s four largest public chocolate corporations, Hershey, Lindt & Sprüngli, Mondelēz and Nestlé, have together made nearly $15 billion in profits from their confectionary divisions alone since the onset of the pandemic, up by an average 16 percent since 2020. They paid out on average more than their total net profits (113 percent) to shareholders between 2020 and 2022,” the report said.

Oxfam also analyzed the wealth of the two biggest private chocolate corporations, Mars and Ferrero, which has risen by $39 billion since 2020, giving them a combined net worth of around $157 billion.

Ghana and Ivory Coast – the world’s two biggest cocoa producers – signed a deal in 2021 to try to get a bigger share of the chocolate industry’s profit. The two governments set a minimum market price or living income differential for cocoa and also insist on a premium payment – an extra sum of money paid directly to farmers per ton of cocoa.

But Oxfam says the payments have failed to meaningfully increase farmers’ incomes.

Declining yields

“Oxfam analyzed the sustainability programs of ten of the top chocolate manufacturers and traders operating in Ghana… None of the programs achieved their stated goal of increasing cocoa production and, consequently, boosting farmer income. In fact, the crop yields of farmers in the corporations’ supply chains declined by 25 percent between 2020 and 2022,” the report said.

“Cocoa farmers surveyed by Oxfam said they are being paid a premium of $35 to $40 per ton of cocoa. The average cocoa farmer in Ghana produces about one ton of cocoa annually. They need to earn $2,600 more per year to get a living income,” according to the Oxfam report.

The entire supply chain is unbalanced, argues author Uwe Gneiting.

“If you as a company are profitable, at the same time as the producers of your most critical raw material are falling deeper into poverty and there’s something wrong with your business model,” he told VOA.

Response

In an email, Lindt & Sprüngli told VOA it pays Ghanaian farmers a $60 per ton premium and has invested over $20 million in cocoa sustainability programs in 2021.

“The Lindt & Sprüngli Farming Program aims to contribute to building resilient livelihoods for farmers, their families, and farming communities by taking a holistic approach to increasing farming household incomes. We are addressing this through a combination of measures,” the email said.

Hershey told VOA in an email that the company “has had a long-term commitment to supporting increased incomes for cocoa farming households. We are investing in proven approaches such as cash transfers and village savings and loan associations, implementation of sustainable and regenerative farm management practices and creating greater access to education in cocoa growing communities.”

Mondelēz and Nestlé did not respond to VOA requests for comment.
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Oxfam: Chocolate Makers Reap Profits, But Not Cocoa Farmers

The world’s biggest chocolate producers are enjoying record profits – but are failing to pass on the benefits to cocoa farmers, many of whom are suffering falling incomes and worsening poverty, according to a report from the charity Oxfam. Henry Ridgwell reports.
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Sudanese Who Fled War Return to Find Homes Occupied by Fighters

Like many other Sudanese forced to flee their homes amid raging street battles, Mohamed said that when he finally returned to his flat, he found heavily armed paramilitaries had moved in.

After cautiously approaching his Khartoum apartment block, he discovered that “the entire building had become like a military barracks filled with weapons and ammunition.”

Almost a month of heavy fighting has turned Khartoum into a war zone, with the city’s 5 million residents enduring artillery barrages, gunfights, airstrikes and anti-aircraft fire.

Many have hunkered down at home amid power outages and a lack of clean water, food and medicine — but many have also been forcibly evicted.

The northern suburb where Mohamed lived has become a major battleground in the war between army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, commander of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

After Mohamed’s family had spent terrifying days at home, waking and sleeping to deafening explosions and gunfire outside, RSF fighters came to evict them.

“They knocked on the door and asked us to leave,” said the 54-year-old, who, like others interviewed by AFP for this article, asked not to be identified by his full name, citing security fears.

Before leaving home, his family members took what they could carry and locked their doors, he added.

When he returned days later to collect some belongings, Mohamed was interrogated by the RSF paramilitaries whom he had found sitting inside his apartment.

Fighters ‘in our kitchen’

Witnesses in Khartoum say RSF fighters have often taken up positions in leafy residential streets, with soldiers hiding camouflaged trucks under trees.

Men in military fatigues patrol in pickup trucks mounted with heavy machine guns.

Another man, Babiker, 44, said he fled his home in central Khartoum amid incessant gunfire, only to return two weeks later to find it occupied by the RSF.

“I found more than 20 paramilitaries living there,” he said, adding he was interrogated for half an hour before being allowed entry.

“They were using all appliances and cooking in our kitchen,” he said. “All the bedrooms that we had locked before leaving were open.”

Sudan’s bitter fighting has so far killed at least 750 people, wounded thousands and uprooted hundreds of thousands, with many refugees fleeing the country.

The U.N.’s human rights commissioner, Volker Turk, said the RSF had allegedly taken “possession of many buildings in Khartoum to use as operational bases, evicting residents and launching attacks from densely populated urban areas.”

He also criticized Sudan’s military for launching “attacks in densely occupied civilian areas, including airstrikes” that have killed residents.

The paramilitaries have also turned many hospitals and medical facilities into “barracks” — a practice the U.N. World Health Organization has condemned as a “gross violation.”

Even diplomatic missions in Khartoum have not been spared. On May 3, Saudi Arabia said “an armed group” had stormed its cultural office and “damaged appliances, cameras, and seized some property.”

The European Union said on April 17 that its ambassador was “assaulted” in his residence, and it labeled the attack a “gross violation of the Vienna Convention.”

‘All our memories’

“Last Wednesday, the RSF took over my family house in Khartoum, where my cousins and I have our documents, valuables and all our memories,” one Sudanese woman wrote on Twitter.

“It’s confirmed by the only neighbor left in the neighborhood that it is the RSF. RSF soldiers are going out of control, out of Hemeti’s control,” she added, referring to Dagalo’s nickname.

Another citizen, Tahany, 33, escaped her home when fighting intensified near Khartoum’s airport.

Having abandoned hope for an end to the fighting, she decided to join the tens of thousands of Sudanese making the long, arduous trip to Egypt, but she first needed to return home to get her travel documents.

“Paramilitaries at checkpoints interrogated us as we were trying to return to our neighborhood, and every time we told them we wanted to pick up some things from our home,” she said.

Eventually, Tahany and her mother were allowed entry to the home, escorted by paramilitaries.

“We found that all our home items had been used, from the kitchen to the beds,” she said. “They even mounted a weapon on the balcony on the second floor.”

Terrified, Tahany and her mother frantically searched for their travel documents and rushed out. “We are now on our way to Egypt,” she said. “We don’t know what has become of our home.”
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Common Currency on Agenda for South African BRICS Summit

The creation of a BRICS currency will be one of the main topics up for discussion when the group of five emerging nations – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — meet in Johannesburg in August, South African officials said this week.

Russia has been spearheading the push for the creation of a joint currency, and Brazil has also thrown its support behind the idea. China, too, is in favor of challenging what its ministry of foreign affairs calls U.S. “dollar hegemony.”

South Africa’s Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor has said a move away from the dollar could empower other countries, but also noted the project is challenging: “It’s a matter we must discuss and discuss properly. I don’t think we should always assume the idea will work, because economics is very difficult, and you have to have regard to all countries.”

Isaah Mhlanga, chief economist for Rand Merchant Bank, a South African investment bank, told VOA he thought the idea that a BRICS currency could upend the dollar’s dominance “any time soon” was “just not founded by any economic fundamentals that we know of.”

The U.S. dollar has been the world’s dominant currency since the end of World War II. Eighty percent of international transactions are conducted in U.S. dollars and nearly two-thirds of all currency reserves in central banks are in dollars. U.S. capital markets are also the most liquid in the world.

“South Africa really can’t play much of a role, it’s a very small open economy with very little reserves, which gets influenced by global factors. China might have a possibility but the willingness of the Chinese authorities to let the Chinese currency float freely and lose control is close to none,” he said.

Mhlanga also noted that given the different economic and political systems of the members of BRICS “it’s quite difficult to have a common currency.” He said although there has long been talk of a single currency for Africa, an actual economic framework for it is “still nowhere to be seen, it’s almost impossible.”

Most likely, he said, would be for individual member states to conduct more bilateral trade using their own currencies, as has already happened with Russia and India’s trade in oil.

South African Reserve Bank Governor Lesetja Kganyago also expressed some skepticism this week, saying that if a single form of legal tender were created by BRICS it would spur debate about the creation of a central bank and where that would be located.

“I don’t know how we would talk of a currency issued by a bloc of countries that are in different geographical locations because currencies are national in nature,” he said. “For the euro area to arrive at that, they had to establish a treaty where the other countries had to all surrender their currencies.”

A game-changer or a non-starter?

However, some economists think a new currency could be a game-changer. BRICS accounts for some 40 percent of the world’s population, and an estimated one-quarter to one-third of global GDP.

A number of other countries, including Saudi Arabia and Iran, have also expressed interest in joining BRICS.

Writing in Foreign Policy magazine recently, former White House economist Joseph W. Sullivan said that while “many practical questions remain unanswered, such a currency really could dislodge the U.S. dollar as the reserve currency of BRICS members.”

Mikatekiso Kubayi, a BRICS specialist at the Pretoria-based research organization the Institute for Global Dialogue, told VOA that easier and more equitable trade was the main reason BRICS members wanted a common currency.

“A lot of the countries that BRICS trades with… particularly in the global South, they all share one common challenge,” he said. “The expense, the cost of actually doing trade, the cost associated with fluctuating exchange rates, the dominance of some currencies over others and that sort of thing, access to cheap finance, affordable finance for their infrastructure.”

Sanctions Solution?

But Aly-Khan Satchu, a political economist based in Nairobi, said he thinks the main reason long-held ideas of a BRICS currency have gained momentum is primarily due to Western sanctions on Russia for the war in Ukraine.

“The freezing of their reserves, $300 billion, by the Americans and a similar scenario unfolding in Europe, forced the Russians to look for a different payment solution outside the U.S. system,” he said.

“I think it’s difficult to underestimate the level of shock that various countries have experienced when Russia’s reserves were frozen,” he said.

“China saw that and thought look, if they can do it to Russia they can do it to us,” he added, noting Beijing—given its current strained relations with Washington – had got on board with the idea very quickly.

The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs recently released a long policy paper entitled “U.S. Hegemony and its Perils,” which stated: “The hegemony of U.S. dollar is the main source of instability and uncertainty in the world economy.”

The paper also noted Washington’s use of sanctions, saying “America’s economic and financial hegemony has become a geopolitical weapon.”

Asked how viable a BRICS currency would be, Satchu said there were some impediments.

“The main hurdles and pitfalls are that there are plenty of interested parties. Constructing a currency is not an easy task, there’s a question of how its composition will be constructed. There’s a lot of talk about having a commodity-based currency and therefore there will be complexities around the weighting of the various commodities,” he said, referring to the proposition the currency be tied to oil or gold.

Likewise, he said, Beijing has no intention of making China’s Yuan fully convertible now because they’d lose a lot of control.

“The hard market reality is that the dollar remains supreme, 80 percent of trade is conducted in the dollar… the most liquid market in the world. This is really about chipping away at the foundations of the dollar rather than a decapitation,” he said.

The Bank of America said last week in a note that reports of U.S. dollar replacement are “greatly exaggerated,” echoing Mark Twain’s famous quote “reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.”
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MSF: Nearly 50 People Sexually Assaulted Per Day in DRC’s North Kivu Province

Doctors Without Borders, also known by the French acronym MSF, is sounding the alarm this week as it treats an unusually high number of sexual assault victims in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s North Kivu province.

Jason Rizzo, the emergency coordinator for MSF in North Kivu, told VOA that clashes between the Congolese army and many armed groups, including M23, have recently led to the enormous displacement in the province of 1.2 million people.

“We have been trying to respond to the different needs that come with mass displacement, access to health care, food, water, shelter and all the epidemics that can come with that, when vaccination coverage is low with measles and cholera,” Rizzo said. “We’ve been trying to respond to all these medical humanitarian emergencies at the same time and one of the biggest problems has been the question of sexual violence.”

Rizzo said the number of victims of sexual assault has climbed to nearly 50 per day in the past two weeks.

He said a contributing factor is that people don’t have enough to eat. When the humanitarian response clearly does not provide basic services, he said, people take matters in their own hands to make ends meet.

“Perhaps one of the reasons the numbers on our end have exploded over the last couple of weeks is that we’ve started providing medical services in one of the newer camps called Rusayo,” Rizzo said. “Now this is one of the most densely populated camps, also located sort of on the periphery of the city and closer to the forest area. People will go out, they will search for firewood, food, and that’s often when the incident is occurring.”

One displaced woman living at the Rusayo camp said that shortly after arriving, her child started exhibiting signs of malnutrition. Needing to do something, she said, she went into the nearby forest to collect firewood to sell so she could buy food, and was attacked.

MSF says it treated nearly 700 victims in the last two weeks of April in camps located in Bulengo, Lushagala, Kanyaruchinya, Eloime, Munigi and Rusayo.

Asked who the perpetrators are, Rizzo said it’s difficult to respond with any degree of certainty.

“This is a very traumatic event,” he said. “We know a good percentage of the victims have told us they were being raped by armed men, but to be able to say exactly what group a particular aggressor was a part of, it’s hard for them to say, it’s hard for us to say.”

Rizzo said MSF is having open discussions with various DRC authorities to ensure that services are in place so that victims can seek medical treatment within 72 hours. Sexual violence is a medical emergency, he told VOA, not something that could be treated weeks later. The reason, he said, is there are a host of potential medical complications, including potential pregnancy and infections.

VOA asked DRC officials for comment, including Major Guillaume Djike, DRC Goma Military spokesperson. Djike said authorities were looking into it, but did not elaborate.

This week, Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi threatened to end the mandate of the East African Community Regional Force, whom he accused of working with M23 rebels, a group that claims to represent the interests of the minority Tutsis in eastern DRC. East African forces have been deployed in the eastern part of the country to help fight M23 and other armed groups there.

Last month, regional force commander Major General Jeff Nyagah lauded the ongoing stability efforts in eastern DRC, saying the cease-fires among warring parties have been holding for over one month and they’ve seen significant withdrawal of M23 from certain areas. Shortly after, Nyagah resigned abruptly.
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Somalia’s Hope for Debt Relief Under Threat, Experts Warn

A renewed political dispute between the federal government of Somalia and the Puntland federal member state, and a failure of the fragile reforms to boost revenue collection and fiscal transparency, could endanger Somalia’s hope for full debt relief from the International Monetary Fund and other multilateral lenders by the end of the year, officials and experts warn.

“Strengthening fiscal transparency is a requirement for Somalia to secure not only debt forgiveness but also more loans from the International Monetary Fund,” said Hussein Abdikarim, Somalia’s former presidential adviser.

“If Somalia fails to continue the steady progress it has made so far on its financial reforms, it could lose hope of paring its debt to around $550 million from $5.2 billion by 2023,” he added.

In February 2020, the executive boards of the IMF and the World Bank announced that Somalia was eligible for debt relief following economic and institutional reforms.

In October 2022, the IMF said its staff reached a staff-level agreement with Somalia that would allow the release of $10 million to the East African country, once reviewed and approved by the board.

Economic and financial experts are concerned about challenges that could reverse the hard-earned gains of the poor and heavily indebted tiny horn of Africa Nation.

“Lack of competitive procurement, lack of agreement(s) between the levels of government and its federal member states on fiscal federalism, and lack of transparency in several oil and gas deals are the main current challenges that could jeopardize and hinder Somalia’s progress towards winning reliable financial credibility,” Hussein Siad, an independent economic consultant and Somalia’s former vice minister of finance, told VOA in a phone interview.

“A government cannot work without the necessary mechanisms to operate, including laws, regulations, manuals and trained or skilled staff members that can implement government policies,” Siad said.

The debt owed by Somalia to external creditors is estimated to be more than $5 billion. Somalia owes the single biggest debt — $1 billion — to the United States.

Countries that become eligible for the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative of the IMF and World Bank have to commit to economic and financial reforms, as well as poverty reduction and political stability.

Corruption

In response to the concerns, Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud on Thursday signed a set of anti-corruption directives aimed at boosting the legitimacy and credibility of the country’s financial institutions, a government statement said.

In the early morning Cabinet meeting, Somalia’s Council of Ministers approved the anti-corruption directives before the president endorsed them.

Reading a statement, government spokesman Farhan Jimale said, “The key directives, eight in number, included combating corruption, fostering accountability, strengthening public financial management systems and meritocracy, as well as improving the efficiency and effectiveness of government institutions.”

The statement also said, “The announced steps seek to increase transparency and accountability through financial disclosures by public officials, enhanced enforcement capacity, and expanded merit-based recruitment.”

The IMF’s board is expected to review the staff-level agreement reached with Somalia in early December.

Mohamud has urged an immediate implementation of the directives.

In 2019, his predecessor, Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed, signed the country’s anti-corruption bill into law, but critics say the implementation of the law has been a challenge.

The nonprofit Transparency International ranks Somalia as one of the most corrupt countries in the world.

In its 2022 Corruptions Perceptions Index, Transparency International put Somalia at the bottom, saying, “Along with constant violence, Somalia’s President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud dissolved two very important anti-corruption bodies with a ‘wave of the hand’ decree.”

According to Somalia’s Criminal Code, active and passive bribery, attempted corruption, extortion, bribing a foreign official and money laundering are crimes.

“The debt relief is a big hope for Somalia to reclaim its financial position within the international community and allows our country to rejoin global economy after a 30-year exile,” a senior government economist told VOA on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak.

The official said if corruption and unnecessary political disputes remain, Somalia will miss a golden opportunity to clear its debts.

Somalia’s outlook remained clouded, with GDP growth for 2022 projected at 1.9%, down from 2.9% in 2021, and inflation projected to reach 9% from 4.6% in 2021, the IMF said.

Political dispute

The concerns grew following tension over a long-simmering dispute between the leaders of the federal government of Somalia and the northeastern semi-autonomous region of Puntland.

For months, Puntland has been reluctant to collaborate with the federal government on national issues, including debt relief programs, accusing Mogadishu of refusing to share power and foreign aid with the regions in line with the country’s federal system.

The political dispute took a turn for the worse this week when the leaders exchanged strong verbal accusations.

Puntland President Said Abdullahi Deni on Tuesday accused Mohamud and Somali Prime Minister Hamza Abdi Barre of “attempting to destabilize the relatively stable region.”

“The president and his prime minister have agreed to refuse the Puntland democracy and its willingness to hold one man, one vote elections,” Deni told his supporters.

Deni’s accusations came a day after Barre accused Puntland of jeopardizing the country’s debt relief efforts.

“Somalia’s debt relief program is in danger because Puntland has been refusing to participate in national meetings on the issue,” Barre warned. “If this fails because of Puntland, it will be a black scar on Puntland’s history, and its leaders will be responsible.”
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Sudan’s Warring Sides Sign Commitment to Secure Humanitarian Aid

Sudan’s warring parties signed a commitment late Thursday on guidelines for allowing humanitarian assistance, U.S. officials said.

Representatives of the army and paramilitary forces, who have been fighting for nearly a month, signed the agreement in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on a “declaration of commitment to protect the civilians of Sudan,” a U.S. official involved in the talks said.

The commitment is not a cease-fire but rather aims to help secure humanitarian aid.

The agreement requires both sides to permit humanitarian assistance, to allow the restoration of electricity, water and other basic services, to withdraw security forces from hospitals and to arrange for “respectful burial” of the dead.

“We are hopeful, cautiously, that their willingness to sign this document will create some momentum that will force them to create the space” to bring in relief supplies, the U.S. official said. Still, the two sides remain “quite far apart,” the official added.

Earlier on Thursday, the U.N. Human Rights Council barely managed to pass a motion to increase monitoring of human rights abuses in Sudan, where hundreds of civilians have been killed since a conflict began last month.

Backed by the United Kingdom and the United States, the motion passed 18-15.

The initiative grants the U.N.’s Sudan expert more powers to monitor abuses, among other measures. It was watered down several times in recent days in order to gain approval.

“I think it’s really important that the people of Sudan know that we here in the Human Rights Council in Geneva are watching what is happening, that we are appalled by what we see,” British Ambassador Simon Manley told Reuters after the vote.

No African country voted in favor of the initiative. Sudanese Ambassador Hassan Hamid Hassan said the conflict was internal and reiterated the refrain of “African solutions for African problems.”

Earlier Thursday, U.N. human rights chief Volker Turk urged countries with influence in Africa to encourage Sudan’s warring sides to end the fighting.

Addressing an emergency session of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva, Turk said the conflict has pushed “this much-suffering country into catastrophe.”

“I condemn the use of violence by individuals who have no regard for the lives and fundamental rights of millions of their own compatriots,” he said.

Fighting in Sudan’s capital worsened Wednesday, with witnesses reporting airstrikes, rocket-propelled grenades and gunfire in several neighborhoods.

The Sudanese army, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, struck targets in Khartoum and its two sister cities, Omdurman and Bahri. The army is trying to dislodge the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, led by General Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, which have dug into the residential areas they have held since fighting began in mid-April. 

In recent weeks, there have been concerns — including from U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken — that Russia’s Wagner mercenary group was involved in the conflict.

Wagner’s head, Yevgeny Prigozhin, said Thursday that the paramilitary group was not operating in Sudan and had not been involved in politics there since army officers deposed Omar al-Bashir in 2019, according to Reuters.

“Wagner is not in Sudan,” Prigozhin said in an audio clip posted on Telegram. “Wagner never got involved in the domestic political affairs in Sudan after the departure of Omar al-Bashir.”

Regardless of whether Wagner is involved, the conflict is only getting worse.

According to the World Health Organization, the fighting has left more than 600 people dead and more than 5,000 others injured.

Delegations from the army and the RSF have been meeting in Saudi Arabia for almost a week. The opposing generals are former allies who together orchestrated the October 2021 military coup that derailed a transition to civilian rule following the 2019 ouster of Bashir. 

Tensions between the generals have been growing over disagreements about how the RSF should be integrated in the army and who should oversee that process. The restructuring of the military was part of an effort to restore the country to civilian rule and end the political crisis sparked by the 2021 military coup. 

Repeated cease-fire agreements have failed to end the conflict or even do much to reduce the violence.

The U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday that more than 700,000 Sudanese have fled their homes since the violence broke out last month — a figure that is more than double the 334,000 the agency reported to be internally displaced last week.

The International Organization for Migration said an additional 100,000 Sudanese have fled the country.

Most aid operations have been suspended or severely scaled back because of the lack of security. Several aid workers have been killed in the fighting. 

Looting also has hampered aid operations. The World Food Program said nearly 17,000 tons of food worth between $13 million and $14 million have been stolen from its warehouses across Sudan. 

The WFP said Wednesday that up to 2.5 million additional people in Sudan are “expected to slip into hunger” in the near future because of the violence. The U.N. agency said this would take acute food insecurity in Sudan to record levels.

More than 19 million people, or two-fifths of Sudan’s population, are currently affected, according to the WFP. 

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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UN Experts Urge Accountability for Atrocities Against Sudanese

United Nations experts who attended an emergency session on Sudan at the U.N. Human Rights Council Thursday were thwarted in their appeal for independent investigations into atrocities allegedly committed against Sudanese civilians by two rival armed forces.

By a vote of 18 in favor, 14 against, and 15 abstentions, the 47-member Council adopted a resolution that condemns the human rights violations committed after the October 25, 2021, military coup in Sudan and the conflict that erupted this year on April 15.

The resolution says these actions have “led to the death of hundreds of civilians, thousands injured, increased levels of sexual and gender-based violence, mass internal and external displacement, and destruction of property.”

The resolution calls for the U.N. designated expert on human rights in Sudan to monitor and document all allegations of human rights and abuses since the 2021 military takeover.

However, Hassan Shire, executive director of the rights organization DefendDefenders said the resolution “remains below what is objectively needed, namely an investigative mechanism that exposes and holds accountable those responsible for inflicting this misery on the Sudanese people.”

Hope for democracy crushed

In his opening speech to the Council, Volker Türk, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, condemned the 2021 military coup, which was carried out by the commander of Sudan’s army, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces leader, General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.

Türk said the recent fighting, which was triggered by animosity between the two men, has plunged the country into catastrophe and once again has crushed the hoped-for transition to full civilian rule and democracy.

“I strongly condemn this wanton violence, in which both sides have trampled international humanitarian law, notably the principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution,” Türk said.

He noted the clashes between the two rival forces and armed attacks, including shelling and airstrikes in densely populated residential areas in the capital Khartoum, have put millions of civilians at acute risk and have prevented them from accessing critical supplies and assistance.

“Today, immense damage has been done, destroying the hopes and rights of millions of people,” he said. “It is essential that both parties urgently commit to an inclusive political process and to a negotiated peace.”

Türk called on Sudan’s rival commanders to establish a humanitarian truce “to enable lifesaving deliveries of aid; to allow for safe passage for civilians from areas of hostilities; and to protect humanitarian supplies from looting.”

He enjoined them to respect international humanitarian law, to protect civilians, and bring an end to human rights violations.

‘An internal affair’

Several humanitarian cease-fires declared since the start of fighting last month have failed to stop the violence.

The chair of the Coordination Committee of Special Procedures, Tlaleng Mofokeng, echoed the High Commissioner’s plea for the warring parties to immediately end the fighting and to stop targeting the civilian population and infrastructure.

She called for immediate, independent and impartial investigations into the loss of civilian lives and “gross human rights violations inflicted upon humanitarians, human rights defenders and other civic activists.”

“Establishing robust investigative and accountability mechanisms is of utmost importance, as they are instrumental in effectively monitoring, documenting, investigating, and prosecuting violations,” she said.

In a testy interchange with council members, Hassan Hamid Hassan, Sudan’s ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, said what is happening in his country is “an internal affair” and what the Sudanese Armed Forces are doing is “a constitutional duty for all armies of the world.”

He questioned why the council was rushing to hold this ad hoc session now, “especially without the support of any African or Arab countries.”

Hassan said that the protection and promotion of human rights has always been and always will remain a priority for his government.
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Aid Groups: Rations Will Run Out as Sudanese Refugees Pour Into Chad

The U.N. is preparing for more than 860,000 people to flee the fighting in Sudan, and neighbor Chad has already received more than 30,000 refugees. Aid groups struggling to cope with the sudden influx say they will have to stop aid in Chad altogether this month if they do not receive more funding, as Henry Wilkins reports from Koufroune, Chad.
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UN Calls for Effort to Push Sudan’s Warring Sides Toward Resolution

United Nations human rights chief Volker Turk urged countries with influence in Africa to encourage Sudan’s warring sides to end the fighting that began last month.

Addressing an emergency session of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva, Turk said the conflict has pushed “this much-suffering country into catastrophe.”

“I condemn the use of violence by individuals who have no regard for the lives and fundamental rights of millions of their own compatriots,” Turk said.

Fighting in Sudan’s capital worsened Wednesday, with witnesses reporting airstrikes, rocket-propelled grenades and gunfire in several neighborhoods.  

According to the World Health Organization, the conflict has left more than 600 people dead and more than 5,000 others injured.  

Delegations from the army and the RSF have been meeting in Saudi Arabia for almost a week. A Western diplomat familiar with the talks told Reuters that mediators were focusing on an agreement on a cease-fire and humanitarian access.   

U.S. Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland has said U.S. negotiators were “cautiously optimistic” on both points.   

The two generals are former allies who together orchestrated an October 2021 military coup that derailed a transition to civilian rule following the 2019 ouster of longtime leader Omar al-Bashir.     

Repeated cease-fire agreements have failed to end the conflict or even do much to reduce the violence.   

The U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday more than 700,000 Sudanese have fled their homes since the violence broke out last month — a figure that is more than double the 334,000 the agency reported to be internally displaced last week.    

The International Organization for Migration said an additional 100,000 Sudanese have fled the country.   

Most aid operations have been suspended or severely scaled back due to the lack of security. Several aid workers have been killed in the fighting.          

Looting also has hampered aid operations. The World Food Program said nearly 17,000 tons of food worth between $13 million and $14 million have been stolen from its warehouses across Sudan.    

The WFP said Wednesday that up to 2.5 million additional people in Sudan are “expected to slip into hunger” in the near future due to the violence. The U.N. agency said this would take acute food insecurity in Sudan to record levels.   

More than 19 million people, or two-fifths of Sudan’s population, are currently affected, according to the WFP.     

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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Rights Groups Criticize Nigeria’s Bid to Relocate Conflict Impacted

Rights groups are urging Nigerian authorities to suspend the resettlement of people who fled Islamic militants in the country’s northeast. Borno state authorities have relocated most camps for displaced people, but critics say security and basic needs are not being met. Timothy Obiezu reports from Maiduguri, Nigeria.
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US ‘Cautiously Optimistic’ About Sudan Cease-Fire

U.S. diplomats told lawmakers on Wednesday they are cautiously optimistic that Sudan’s warring factions will agree to a temporary humanitarian cease-fire during peace talks in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Since fighting started in April, hundreds of people have been killed and hundreds of thousands have been displaced. VOA’s Katherine Gypson reports.
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In Sudan’s Khartoum, Civilians Face Desperate Struggle to Survive

Since fighting broke out in Sudan on April 15, Khartoum resident Omar says he and his father have not left their home and believe they are the only civilians left in the neighborhood.

They have limited themselves to one meal a day, hoping their dwindling food supplies will last a month longer.

“After that, we don’t know what we’ll do except survive off water and dates,” he said by phone from Sudan’s embattled capital.

While others have fled, they have stayed in Khartoum in an area near the airport where there has been intense fighting, because they did not want to abandon their home, said Omar, who declined to give his full name out of fear for their safety.

His account captures the desperate situation facing the millions of people still believed to be in Khartoum more than three weeks since the eruption of deadly fighting between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

While tens of thousands of people have fled the capital — which had a pre-war population of some 10 million — most have stayed put, some because it was too dangerous or expensive to leave, others to hold onto their homes.

They face dwindling food supplies, power cuts, water shortages and patchy telecoms. The United Nations, which has warned of a major humanitarian catastrophe, has said it is working to negotiate safe aid access to Khartoum.

The World Food Program said that as many as 2.5 million people in Sudan are expected to slip into hunger. Even before the violence began, millions of people in Sudan and neighboring countries were dependent on aid due to poverty and conflict.

Talks underway in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, aim to secure a lasting cease-fire and humanitarian access.

But the fighting has continued in Khartoum, where long queues can be seen at the limited number of bakeries that are still functioning.

“There’s always a shortage of something,” said business owner Hashim, 35, who hasn’t been able to find rice or pasta for a week. He would have left Sudan but couldn’t because he lost his passport before the fighting began.

“There are those without money who have resorted to going into their neighbors’ abandoned homes and they take whatever food they can find,” he said. “I’ve been surviving off my own savings … but eventually that will run out.”

Those with money have struggled to spend it as cash has dried up and the banking apps upon which many Sudanese depend have mostly stopped functioning.

With most hospitals shut, volunteer medics have fanned out into Khartoum’s neighborhoods to help those in need of medical attention, while locals have taken to the streets to keep watch in an effort to prevent looting.

Airstrikes, artillery, and gunfire can be heard far from the front lines, inflicting a mental toll.

Life had come to a complete standstill, said Ahmed Khalid, 22, a college student still in Khartoum. “We cannot even feel the days as they pass by.”

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DRC President Accuses East African Forces of ‘Co-Habitiating’ With M23 Rebels

The president of the Democratic Republic of Congo has accused East African forces deployed to fight rebels in his country of working with the enemy. Felix Tshisekedi made the remarks Tuesday during a visit to Botswana, where he welcomed the planned deployment of Southern African forces as a replacement.

Addressing journalists in Gaborone, Tshisekedi, who spoke through an interpreter, said there are issues within the East African Community regional force deployed to fight the M23 rebels in the east of DRC.

“We are going to evaluate the situation because there are problems with the regional force. The first reason that pushes us to ask questions is the role that was assigned to this regional force, which is not fulfilled,” he said. “Today, in certain regions, there is a co-habitation that we have noticed between the contingents of the regional force of Eastern Africa and the terrorists of M23, which was not the plan.”

The DRC president did not specify how the East African forces are working with the rebels, but said his government has had to reevaluate its operations in the east.

“We had to stop. Working together with the forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo so that we get peace, it means a cease-fire and a retreat,” Tshisekedi said. “But unfortunately today, we have noticed that there are forces that are tolerating that and we also have some officers, either from the countries of these contingencies, where the military officers of those countries, when they get to DRC, they clearly say they are not coming to fight the M23, which was not part of the plan.”

The DRC president said he is also concerned over Kenya’s decision to appoint a replacement commander for the regional forces, without consulting authorities in Kinshasa.

This came after the commander of the East African forces, Kenyan General Jeff Nyagah, abruptly quit the DRC mission at the end of April.

“He is talking about threats but he has never told us about those threats,” Tshisekedi said. “Why didn’t he tell us about the threats? He alone knows. And when he decides to leave the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya directly sends another commander of the force without consultations, as if that force only belongs to Kenya. There must be a problem and we need to talk about it.”

Tshisekedi said the planned deployment of Southern African Community Development (SADC) troops is welcome, particularly at a time when the tour of duty of some East Africa regional forces is coming to an end.

Botswana’s President Mokgweetsi Masisi, speaking Tuesday night during a state banquet organized for Tshisekedi, said there is a need to find a solution to challenges in the eastern DRC.

“Let us not make a mistake; the agents of instability are hard at work to frustrate genuine efforts aimed at finding a lasting solution to the problems of the region,” Masisi said. “Which is why Botswana and the Democratic Republic of the Congo should in the context of the regional, economic and other structures to which they both belong, redouble their efforts to finding a lasting solution to the security challenges in the Eastern DRC.”

Nairobi-based political commentator Wene Owino said Tshisekedi’s concerns over the conduct of the East African regional force are valid.

“Tshisekedi is right about forces from East Africa. The SADC forces might be seen as neutral because of the historical bad blood between some of these [regional] militaries and the DRC,” he said. “Remember, Uganda and Rwanda were involved when President [Laurent] Kabila rose to power in the 1990s. So these troops have been compromised all along. But whether the coming of SADC troops will bring lasting peace to DRC is another issue, it’s a more complex issue than just neutral troops.”

Fierce fighting has raged for years in the North Kivu province of DRC, with more than 100 armed groups battling for valuable mineral resources.

Attempts by VOA to get a comment from the East African Community forces were not successful.
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Cameroon Journalists Protest Killing of Colleague by Separatist Fighters

Scores of journalists in Cameroon’s troubled Northwest region have protested after rebels claimed responsibility for killing their colleague. A separatist spokesman acknowledged their forces shot the newspaper reporter Sunday night but said they mistook him for a military officer.

Journalists in Cameroon’s Northwest region say they staged a peaceful march on the streets of the regional capital Bamenda on Tuesday to condemn the killing of their colleague Anye Nde Nsoh.

The Cameroon Association of English-Speaking Journalists, CAMASEJ, reports that armed men opened fire on Nsoh on Sunday night as he relaxed at a bar in the Ntarikon neighborhood of Bamenda.

He was struck in the chest and died while being rushed to a hospital.

CAMASEJ says it was a targeted killing because the armed men went straight to Nsoh and shot him in front of helpless onlookers.

Jude Muma, local president of CAMASEJ, said journalists want the killers of Nsoh punished.

“Some faction in the fighting in the Northwest here has come out to take responsibility for what happened. We are saying that justice should take its course. Whoever pulled the trigger should pay for this crime. Human lives matter,” said Muma.

Muma spoke via a messaging app from Bamenda.

The protest took place after separatists claimed responsibility for Nsoh’s killing. Capo Daniel is the president of the Ambazonia People’s Rights Advocacy Group.

He said the group commands separatists fighting to carve out an independent English-speaking state called Ambazonia from French-speaking majority Cameroon.

Daniel said Nsoh was the victim of a case of mistaken identity. He spoke via a messaging app.

“A Cameroon commanding officer who visits that particular bar was the target of the operation that was carried out by Ambazonian forces. Unfortunately, Nsoh the young journalist was killed by Ambazonia forces in a case of a mistaken identity situation,” he said.

Daniel said the armed man who killed Nsoh has apologized but journalists say the killer should be found and punished.

Nsoh is not the only journalist who has died in the restive western regions.

Samuel Wazizi, who worked for Cillen Music Television, was arrested in 2019 for allegedly supporting anglophone separatists. He was not seen in public for more than a year. In 2020, the military declared that he died in government custody in August 2019.

Cameroon journalists also say that reporters Thomas Awah Junior, Tsi Conrad, Mancho Bibixy and Kingsley Njoka are being held at the Yaounde-Kondengui prison.

The reporters were accused of collaborating with western separatists, but they say they were simply doing their jobs. The government has charged them with threatening Cameroon’s national sovereignty.

Richard Nde Lajong is the publisher and editor of the Herald Tribune Newspaper. He said Cameroonian journalists in the Northwest and Southwest regions are increasingly facing oppression, threats, attacks and illegal detentions.

“No matter how objective you are in your report, you would be accused by the non-state armed groups of supporting the regular forces or the regular forces would accuse you of reporting in favor of the non-state armed groups. Government or whoever is concerned should find a solution to this problem so that journalists should do their work with ease,” he said.

Mooh Emile Simon, the Cameroon government’s highest official in Mezam municipality, where Bamenda is located, said government troops will hunt down the killers of Nsoh.

The government says media in the Northwest region will be protected and allowed free access to information but asks reporters to be cautious as any other civilian.
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Attack Near Tunisian Synagogue Kills 4

A Tunisian naval guard killed four people and injured nine others Tuesday as he tried to reach a synagogue on the island of Djerba.

The attack happened during an annual pilgrimage to the Ghriba synagogue, Africa’s oldest, which brings hundreds of people from Europe and Israel each year.

Tunisia’s interior ministry said in a statement that the assailant first shot another guard at a naval installation and took his ammunition before heading to the synagogue.

The attacker then fired at security personnel outside the synagogue, killing one officer and two visitors. Security guards then shot the attacker dead.

Tunisia’s foreign ministry identified the two visitors killed as a Tunisian and a French national.

The synagogue was the site of a 2002 truck bombing that killed 21 tourists.

“The United States deplores the attack in Tunisia coinciding with the annual Jewish pilgrimage that draws faithful to the El Ghriba Synagogue from around the world,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement. “We express condolences to the Tunisian people and commend the rapid action of Tunisian security forces.”

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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