YAOUNDE, CAMEROON — In Gabon, Christians joined Muslims this week to pray for peace as the country holds a month-long “national dialogue” intended to pave the way for military leaders to transfer power to a civilian government.

Clerics say that among the approximately 700 civilians who attended this year’s Eid al-Fitr prayers Wednesday at the Central Mosque in Gabon’s capital, Libreville, were scores of Christians. The Eid al-Fitr prayers marked the end of the holy month of Ramadan. 

Tidjani Babagana, grand imam of Muslims in Gabon, told Gabon’s state TV that during prayers he launched an appeal for reconciliation, peace, temperance and internal harmony among citizens who are looking forward to changes at the helm of the government. He also reminded civilians who are waiting for the government to improve their living conditions that it is a prescription in the Holy Quran to respect state authority. 

Babagana said both Muslims and Christians should celebrate Eid al-Fitr as a sign of fraternity, interreligious tolerance and living together in peace, despite the challenges Gabon is facing. 

The faithful who gathered for prayers say the country has suffered a crime wave — including theft, assault and highway robbery — since transitional president General Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema ordered the release of over 500 prisoners in late March.  

The general seized power from President Ali Bongo in a bloodless coup last August. Nguema said he took control to improve living conditions in the oil-producing nation because its citizens remained poor during the 56 years of leadership by Ali Bongo and his father, Omar Bongo. 

Gabon’s Civil Society Group says the central African state now faces the challenges of a transition to civilian rule. A transitional charter introduced by the general last November bars all members of the current government from becoming candidates in presidential elections, with the exception of Nguema. 

This month, Nguema launched what is billed as an Inclusive National Dialogue, which he said will prepare an economic blueprint and a calendar to organize elections that will hand power to civilians. 

Bruno Nguema Ela, the president of Gabon’s citizens in the diaspora, took part in Eid al-Fitr prayers. He said opposition and civil society want Nguema to reassure civilians that he will not hang on to power. 

Ela said Gabon’s diaspora is happy with efforts by Nguema to stop the Bongo dynasty from maintaining its grip on power, and added that the transitional government should make sure it hands power to civilians so Gabon does not sink into social unrest and political crisis. 

Firman Maurice Nguema, one of the spokespersons with the commission that will lead discussions in Gabon’s national dialogue, said General Nguema is committed to providing Gabon with functioning state institutions before handing power to constitutional order. He said Nguema wants Gabon to be a peaceful country where democratic choices and rights and liberties of civilians are respected. 

The transitional government says Christians joined Muslims in feasts across the central African state this week. Muslim clerics say that nationwide, prayers were for peace and a return to constitutional order without chaos. 
…

London — Environmental and human rights activists are calling on the Nigerian government to withhold approval of plans by the London-based oil giant Shell to sell off its operations in the Niger Delta, unless the oil giant does more to tackle pollution in the region caused by the industry.

For decades, foreign energy firms have extracted hydrocarbons from the Niger Delta, and Shell is by far the biggest investor. It has earned the companies — and the Nigerian government — billions of dollars. Locals, however, have long complained of massive environmental damage.

“You can’t grow crops. You can’t drink the water. You can’t fish because the fish are dying or they’re dead,” said Florence Kayemba, Nigeria director at the civil society group Stakeholder Democracy Network, based in Port Harcourt in the Niger Delta.

Shell Oil announced in January it is pulling out of its onshore and shallow water operations the region. It intends to sell its Nigerian subsidiary, the Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited (SPDC), to Renaissance, a consortium of five mainly local firms. The sale would include existing mining licenses and infrastructure. Shell says it is part of a plan to transition away from fossil fuels.

Civil society groups say Shell must do more to clean up the environment before it leaves. A recent report by a Dutch organization, the Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations, or SOMO, warned the divestment plan is a “ticking time bomb.”

“Communities fear that, once Shell exits, they will never see their environment restored or receive compensation for lost livelihoods,” the SOMO report said. “Most people in the Delta depend on farming and fishing, occupations that are impossible when the soil and waterways are deeply contaminated.”

Florence Kayemba of the Stakeholder Democracy Network, which contributed to the SOMO report, told VOA that the Nigerian government must scrutinize the sale more closely.

“We are very concerned about the legacy of pollution being left behind by Shell — not only Shell but also other oil companies that have divested their assets from the Niger Delta,” she said.

“We believe that it’s very important for the federal government to look into these issues, because the oil is not going to flow forever,” Kayemba added. “You will have a post-oil Nigeria. You will have a post-oil Niger Delta. And we need to have an environment that is functional.”

Oil companies like Shell have often blamed theft and sabotage for oil spills, a claim contested by environmental groups. Locals also seek to make money from unlicensed small-scale production known as “artisanal refining,” according to Kayemba.

“What you have is a situation where artisanal oil refining is just reinforcing what has been happening,” she said. “And yet that pollution had already existed. So, by the time you get to disentangle this, it becomes really difficult. Who is to blame who?”

A report commissioned in May 2023 by Bayelsa State, one of the major oil producing regions in the Niger Delta, estimated that it would cost some $12 billion to clean up decades-old oil spills in the state over a 12-year period. It blamed Shell and the Italian oil firm ENI for most of the damage.

Both Shell and ENI dispute the findings.

The SOMO report claims Shell is now selling its operations to domestic companies that may not have the capability to deal with the aging infrastructure and legacy of oil exploration.

“Shell is selling its oil blocks and infrastructure as going concerns to companies that appear, in several cases, to lack the finances and willingness both to deal with the old and damaged infrastructure and to undertake responsible closure and decommissioning when this becomes necessary,” the report said.

“Shell’s exit exposes the communities of the Niger Delta to major ongoing risks to their environment, health, and human rights, long after the oil industry ceases and likely for generations to come,” it added.

In a statement to VOA, Shell said that “Onshore divestments by international energy companies are part of a wider reconfiguration of the Nigerian oil and gas sector in which, after decades of capability building, domestic companies are playing an increasingly important role in helping the country to deliver its aspirations for the sector.”

“As divestments occur, mandatory submissions to the Federal Government allow the regulators to apply scrutiny across a wide range of issues and recommend approval of these divestments, provided they meet all requirements,” the statement said.

Shell added that it will continue to deploy its “technical expertise” under the terms of the sale to the new buyers.

The Nigerian government has indicated it intends to approve Shell’s divestment plans. Heineken Lokpobiri, Nigeria’s petroleum minister, told the World Economic Forum in Davos that the government is committed to “fostering a business-friendly environment” in the sector.

“On the part of the government, once we get the necessary documents, we will not waste time to give the necessary considerations and consent,” Lokpobiri said at Davos January 18, according to Reuters.

The Nigerian Ministry for Petroleum Resources did not respond to VOA requests for comment.
…

Blantyre, Malawi   — Police in Malawi have arrested a newspaper journalist over an online story published last year exposing fraudulent activities involving a corruption suspect charged with conspiracy to defraud the Malawi government.  

The journalist, Macmillan Mhone, who works for the daily Nation Newspaper in Blantyre, was arrested Monday following the story he allegedly wrote in August of last year when he was working for the online publication Malawi24. The story exposed fraudulent activities involving corruption suspect Abdul Karim Batatawala, who was charged with conspiracy to defraud the Malawi government. 

Mhone’s lawyer, Joseph Lihoma, told VOA on Tuesday that Mhone was yet to be charged.  

Mhone’s preliminary charges include conduct likely to cause breach of peace and cause public alarm.   

The arrest comes two months after another local investigative journalist, Gregory Gondwe, went into hiding following a tip from military sources about plans to arrest him for writing a story about corruption in the military. 

Several press freedom advocates and human rights campaigners, including the Committee for Protection of Journalists and the Media Institute for Southern Africa — known as MISA-MALAWI — have condemned Mhone’s arrest.   

Golden Matonga, the chairperson for the Media Institute for Southern Africa in Malawi, called on police to release the journalist without conditions.    

“Malawi is one of [the] beacons of hope for democracy,” said Mantonga. “To see this backsliding of our democracy is saddening for us in the journalism profession and also for everyone who wished our democracy to continue to grow.” 

In a statement, MISA-Malawi also said the story in question does not cause fear or public alarm. 

Pearson Nkhoma, the director of the board of the online publication Malawi24, where the story was published, said police have arrested Mhone based on wrong information because he never wrote the story. 

“If anyone has a screenshot indicating that Macmillan has the byline, then those people are basically lying,” he said. 

Nkhoma said it is surprising that police have arrested someone who no longer works for Malawi24 on the matter concerning the publication.   

VOA did not get a comment from the police because calls to the national police spokesperson went unanswered. 
…

Nairobi, Kenya — Kenyan doctors held new demonstrations Tuesday in their push for better pay and working conditions.

The doctors are demanding a commitment from the government to fulfill collective bargaining agreements signed in 2017, but President William Ruto says the country has no money to pay the doctors and asked them to return to work.

Thousands of striking doctors and medical trainees chanted, “The doctors united, shall never be defeated,” as they protested outside the Kenyan Parliament.

Led by officials of Kenya’s main health care professionals union, the doctors want the government to honor the agreement.

“The government has not implemented critical components of this collective bargaining agreement and instead, they have begun to violate it outrightly.” said Davji Atellah, secretary-general of the Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union.

“Despite the inflation, despite the challenges [and] changes on all the other civil servants and public servants, doctors and other health workers have remained without it being considered,’ Atellah said. “Instead, we realized that the new doctor interns that are being posted, their salaries were reduced by 91%.”

President William Ruto has asked the doctors to call off the strike and go back to work, saying the government is struggling with a huge wage bill and cannot afford to review their salaries.

“I am telling our friends, the doctors, that we mind about them. We value the service they give to our nation. But we have to live within our means,” Ruto said.

Opposition lawmakers who joined the striking doctors Tuesday accuse the president of using the wage bill as an excuse to deny doctors their due pay at a time when there is exorbitant spending in government.

“The doctors must not be paid yesterday, they must not be paid tomorrow, but they must be paid today,” said Paul Ongili, also known as “Babu Owino,” an opposition member of parliament. “Ruto took loans, and Ruto is collecting taxes. And those taxes must be used to pay these doctors. Ruto is vicariously liable for all the deaths occurring in the hospitals, for all the deaths occurring in this country, because he has refused to pay the doctors.”

Another opposition member, Otiende Amollo, said there was support for the strike.

“We want to reassure you that we stand with you, and we stand with your right under the constitution to peacefully demonstrate. Nobody has the authority to outlaw a peaceful demonstration by doctors,” Amollo said.

Irene Kenyatta, a final year medical student at the University of Nairobi, was among those who joined the doctors in the demonstrations.

“I’m fighting for my future. I went to school to have a bright future. It can’t be the moment that I’m going to finish school you are telling me that I can’t have the bright future after all,” she said. “I have invested a lot. If I want a bright future, I have to get the bright future, even if it means coming to the streets to fight for my rights.”

The 2017 Kenyan doctors’ strike that lasted 100 days is the longest in the country’s history. 

Implementation of the collective bargaining agreement that ended that strike is the cause of the current strike, now in its fourth week.
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Johannesburg — Former president Jacob Zuma can contest upcoming national elections in May, a South African court ruled Tuesday.

Zuma had appealed a ban by the electoral commission, which said last month that Zuma couldn’t compete for a seat in parliament because the constitution bars people who have been convicted of a crime and sentenced to more than one year in prison from running for office. 

Zuma, 81, was forced to resign near the end of his second term in 2018 amid numerous corruption scandals. In 2021, he was sentenced to 15 months in jail for contempt of court after he refused to appear in a corruption investigation. 

Zuma’s lawyers argued in court Monday that because the former leader, who served just three months before being released on health grounds, was granted a remission, the ban did not apply. 

The court’s decision will not be welcome news to the governing African National Congress party, of which Zuma was a lifelong member before throwing his support behind a newly formed political party called uMkhonto weSizwe, or MK, late last year. 

The ANC suspended him, and Zuma — who, despite all the allegations against him, still has massive support in his home province of Kwa Zulu-Natal — has since been campaigning as the face of MK. 

National elections on May 29 are widely expected to be the most fiercely contested ever, with surveys suggesting the ANC will win less than 50 percent of the vote for the first time since the advent of democracy in 1994. 

Political analyst Sandile Swana broke down what the electoral court’s ruling means. 

“The reintroduction of Jacob Zuma into mainstream politics is already eating away at the electoral base of the African National Congress led by Cyril Ramaphosa, and they have now been fortified with this decision of the electoral court that Zuma can be the face of the party, he can campaign, he can be the number one candidate for the party,” Swana said. 

Outside the court on Monday, Zuma told supporters he’d be happy to lead the country again. 

However, Swana noted, there is still a legal question over whether Zuma could ever become president again, as he was already in his second term when he was forced out. 

Rather than directly electing a president, South Africans vote for members of parliament. Whichever party wins a majority then puts their leader forward as president. 

Independent analyst Asanda Ngoasheng said Tuesday’s developments are concerning. 

“We now have the potential of someone who has faced or is facing multiple allegations of corruption and bankrupting the state being able to kind of keep coming back,” Ngoasheng said. “Is Jacob Zuma really turning out to be Mr. Teflon as he has been called, with nothing ever sticking to him, or will something come that will trip him up?”

Last month the ANC went to court to try to prevent Zuma’s new party from using the name uMkhonto weSizwe, which was also the name of the ANC’s disbanded armed wing.
…

GENEVA — The United Nations refugee agency says thousands of people are still fleeing Sudan every day as clashes between two warring army factions, raging for nearly a year, show no signs of abating.  

The latest UNHCR figures show that more than 8.5 million people in Sudan have been forced to flee their homes since war erupted on April 15, 2023, making this one of the largest displacement and humanitarian crises in the world.  

The number includes 1.8 million Sudanese who have fled to neighboring countries seeking refuge.  

The UNHCR says fighting between the Sudanese Armed Forces and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces has shattered peoples’ lives. It says attacks on civilians are escalating, human rights violations are widespread and rampant, conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence continues without stop, and the economy has collapsed.  

“While the war started one year ago, thousands are crossing borders daily as if the emergency had started yesterday,” UNHCR spokesperson Olga Sarrado told journalists in Geneva Tuesday.  

“Chad has experienced the largest refugee arrivals in its history. While teams from UNHCR and partners continue to work and relocate refugees to expanded and new settlements, over 150,000 remain in border areas in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions, mainly and largely due to funding shortfalls,” she said.  

The UNHCR says more than 1,800 people are arriving daily in South Sudan alone, increasing pressure on the country’s overstretched infrastructure and worsening vast humanitarian needs.  

“Some 635,000 people have arrived in South Sudan since the 15th of April last year, which represents more than 5% of the population of South Sudan,” said Marie-Helene Verney, UNHCR representative in South Sudan, speaking from the capital, Juba. 

To put that number in perspective, she said 635,000 people would be equivalent to 4.5 million people arriving in less than one year in Germany or about 17.6 million people arriving in less than one year in the United States. 

“This is the world’s poorest country, so you can imagine the pressure that is being put on this country,” she said. “There are very few roads, pretty much all humanitarian assistance has to be airlifted, at significant cost. We are approaching the rainy season again, so we are facing the risk of disease, particularly cholera. 

“Unfortunately, we all know that the risk of sexual violence is high during transit,” she said, “and we have heard of heartbreaking stories of what has happened to women who have had to flee when they were in Sudan.” 

Verney said the profile of many of the refugees presents challenge and opportunity as “many tend to be very urban.”  

She said those who arrive from Sudan mostly lived in the capital, Khartoum, and the city of Wad Madani and “are very middle class, very educated, and have professional skills, mainly in health and education.”  

The urban people are “reluctant to live in refugee camps,” she said, so UNHCR is working with South Sudan to match their skills with the gaps that exist in the country. 

The UNHCR’s Sarrado notes other countries of asylum, including the Central African Republic, Egypt and Ethiopia, also are experiencing large daily inflows of Sudanese refugees and the many logistical challenges that come with them. 

“Those crossing borders, mostly women and children, are arriving in remote areas with little to nothing and in desperate need of food, water, shelter and medical care. Many families have been separated and arrive in distress. People and children have witnessed or experienced appalling violence, making psychosocial support a priority. Many children arrive malnourished,” she said. 

As the conflict continues and the lack of assistance and opportunities deepens, Sarrado warned that “more people will be forced to flee Sudan to neighboring countries or to move further, risking their lives by embarking on long, dangerous journeys,” seeking safety in countries further afield.  

In the last year, the UNHCR reports Uganda has welcomed 30,000 Sudanese refugees, including over 14,000 since the start of the year. 

Additionally, UNHCR statistics show more Sudanese refugees are going to Europe, with 6,000 arriving in Italy from Tunisia and Libya since the beginning of 2023 — an almost six-fold increase from the previous year. 

Despite the magnitude of the crisis, Sarrado said funding remains critically low, saying that “only 7%” of the UNHCR’s $1.4 billion 2024 Regional Refugee Response Plan for Sudan has been received. 

She said UNHCR and partners are saving lives in many locations, but firm commitments from international donors to support Sudan and the countries hosting refugees “are needed to ensure those forced to flee by the war can live in dignity.” 
…

A government-run school in Cameroon’s capital is teaching students how to manufacture plant-based meat, an innovation which the school’s director hopes will contribute to the fight against climate change. Anne Nzouankeu has more from Yaoundé in this report narrated by Moki Edwin Kindzeka.
…

YAOUNDE, CAMEROON — Police in Gabon say a crime wave has hit the capital, Libreville, several days after the country’s transitional president pardoned and set free over 500 prisoners. Civil society groups on Tuesday launched a campaign asking the government to give the former prisoners more support and for freed prisoners to be law-abiding citizens. 

General Jean Germain Effayong Onong, commander in chief of Gabon’s Penitentiary Administration, told Gabon’s state TV that former prisoners caught committing crimes will either be punished or sent back to prison.

Onong said the country’s transitional government led by General Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema wants civilians to live in peace with total freedom to carry out their daily activities.

Onong spoke about a week after the government set free more than 560 of the close to 4,000 inmates at the Libreville Central Prison.

In December, President Oligui, who seized power from President Ali Ben Bongo following a disputed election last August, promised to set free over 1,000 prisoners. He said most were civilians were unjustifiably held in prison by Gabon’s former leaders. The general said a majority of prisoners were held in pretrial detention for a long time with no evidence of wrongdoing.

The presidential pardon did not extend to prisoners who had been convicted of drug-related offenses or violent crimes.

However, Gabon’s police this week reported that many people who regained freedom following the presidential clemency have been arrested for involvement in crimes such as theft, assault and highway robbery. 

Firman Ollo’o Obiang is secretary general of S.O.S Prisoners, a non-governmental organization that works for the well-being of Gabon’s inmates.

Obiang said it is very surprising that less than two weeks after regaining freedom, former prisoners whose liberation was hard earned are again arrested by the police for committing crimes. Obiang said while waiting for families and the government to socially and economically reintegrate the freed prisoners, his organization is providing moral and financial assistance to poor and unemployed civilians who were freed by Gabon’s transitional government.

Obiang did not say how much financial assistance S.O.S Prisoners provides to the freed inmates.

Rights groups and S.O.S Prisoners blame unemployment, the high cost of living and poverty for the crime wave reported by Gabon police.

They also say if prisons in Gabon were the correctional facilities they are supposed to be, freed prisoners would not be involved with crime. 

Stanislas Kouma is Gabon’s director general of penitentiary affairs. 

Kouma said Gabon’s transitional government is planning to improve living conditions of inmates while in prison and when the inmates eventually regain their freedom. He said conditions deteriorated during ousted president Ali Bongo Ondimba’s term in office. 

Kouma said Gabon’s central prison in Libreville, constructed for less than a thousand inmates, had about 4.000 detainees when General Oligui seized power in an August 30 coup.

Shortly after the coup, President Oligui freed several political prisoners who had jailed for years without trial.

Included in that release were Jean-Remy Yama, leader of the Coalition of Gabon State Workers Trade Unions, Renaud Allogho Akoue, former director general of Gabon’s National Social Insurance and Health Fund, and Léandre Nzué, former mayor of Gabon’s capital, Libreville.

Hundreds more less prominent prisoners pardoned by Oligui are scheduled to be released by the end of April.
…

STATE DEPARTMENT — The United States must refine its Africa policy with a focus on critical minerals, including boosting its diplomatic and commercial presence in African mining hubs, says a report from the Washington-based United States Institute of Peace, or USIP.

The group says the changes are needed to safeguard against export controls and market manipulation by geopolitical competitors.

The United States heavily relies on imports for many critical minerals for use in electric vehicle batteries and other applications such as cobalt, graphite and manganese.

“Especially concerning is that the United States is at or near 100% reliant on ‘foreign entities of concern’ — mainly the People’s Republic of China — for key critical minerals,” says the USIP report.

Despite the efforts of the Biden administration and Congress to support U.S. firms in African markets, progress remains measured, with no sign that China and Gulf State competitors are retreating. The USIP report recommends the U.S. government invests in “commercial diplomacy” in Africa.

For example, Washington should prioritize to fully realize the potential benefits of a memorandum of understanding signed with the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Zambia, following the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit in December 2022 to jointly develop a supply chain for electric vehicle batteries.

The DRC produces more than 70% of the world’s cobalt, while Zambia is the world’s sixth-largest copper producer and the second-largest cobalt producer in Africa.

The USIP report also recommends that the U.S. increase the physical presence of diplomatic and commercial officers in mining centers. Given the proximity of the Congolese city of Lubumbashi to critical minerals, and the high priority placed on the country’s Lobito Corridor, USIP suggests reopening a U.S. consulate in Lubumbashi, provided security levels are acceptable.

In the mid-1990s, the United States closed its consulate in Lubumbashi following the end of the Cold War and the redirection of interests and resources. Lubumbashi is the capital of the mineral-rich Katanga Province and the second-largest city in the DRC.

Gécamines, the Congolese state mining company, is headquartered in the city, as are other mining companies.

Other policy recommendations include prioritizing and leveraging existing U.S. Agency for International Development programs to assist Africans with rule-of-law and fiscal transparency efforts, expanding membership of the Minerals Security Partnership to include African partners, as well as assisting African nations in building technical capacity in the mining sector.

Launched in June 2022, the Minerals Security Partnership, or MSP, is a collaboration of 14 countries and the European Union to catalyze public and private investment in responsible critical minerals supply chains globally.

U.S. officials say MSP members represent more than 50% of global gross domestic product and currently run 23 projects that involve the extraction and processing of cobalt, copper, gallium, germanium, graphite, lithium, manganese, nickel and rare earth elements. 

“We need to scale up our critical mineral supply chains to deploy clean technologies more quickly, more effectively,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told an MSP forum in Leuven, Belgium, earlier this month. “The demand is rising. By 2040, demand for lithium is expected to grow by more than 40%. Graphite, cobalt, nickel demand is set to grow 20 to 25 times.”

 
…

Political violence in Sudan is forcing thousands of refugees, many of them children, to neighboring South Sudan for safety. There, they face a different threat — a collapsing health care system. Sheila Ponnie reports from Renk, Upper Nile State, South Sudan.
…

GOMA, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO — Mortar fire in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo has killed three Tanzanian soldiers who were part of a southern Africa force deployed to help government troops battling M23 rebels, officials said. 

The regional force sent soldiers to North Kivu province in December to help Kinshasa regain ground from the M23 militia in the lawless east. 

The force includes soldiers from regional military heavyweight South Africa, Tanzania and Malawi. 

“This unfortunate incident happened after a hostile mortar round had fallen near the camp [where] they were staying,” the 10-nation Southern African Development Community (SADC) said in a statement. 

It gave no further details. 

A source at the North Kivu governorate said the mortar attack struck last Thursday and a ceremony to honor the dead was held at SADC headquarters in the provincial capital, Goma, on Monday. 

A soldier from South Africa has also died in a hospital while being treated for health problems, the SADC statement said. 

After several years of dormancy, the mostly Tutsi M23 (March 23 Movement) group took up arms again in late 2021 and has seized swaths of North Kivu province. 

Decades of violence 

The region has been beset by violence in the decades since regional wars in the 1990s. 

The DRC, the U.N. and Western countries accuse Rwanda of supporting the rebels in a bid to control the region’s vast mineral resources, an allegation Kigali denies. 

The force suffered its first losses in mid-February when two South African soldiers were killed by mortars at Mubambiro camp, near the town of Sake, about 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Goma. 

A Congolese security source, asking not to be named, said the Tanzanian casualties happened at the same camp. 

The force was to take over from an East African peacekeeping force, whose mandate was ended by Kinshasa, which accused it of colluding with the rebels instead of fighting them. 

The U.N. mission in the DRC, MONUSCO, is also being wound down. 

The 15,000 U.N. troops deployed in the vast central African country started to leave in February at the request of the Kinshasa government, which considers them ineffective. 

The withdrawal is due to be completed by the end of the year. 

According to an internal U.N. document seen by AFP, M23 rebels have made new gains in the east after Indian U.N. troops abandoned positions near Goma. 

MONUSCO said in a note to staff that “the current security situation is becoming increasingly volatile as M23 has reached the northern outskirts of Sake.” 

The population of Goma has doubled to 2 million as refugees have fled the advance of the rebel group. 

Residents said that M23 and Congolese forces exchanged artillery fire throughout the weekend around Sake and the western outskirts of Goma. 
…

abuja, nigeria — Nigeria’s former central bank governor on Monday pleaded not guilty to fresh charges brought against him by the country’s anti-corruption body,

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, or EFCC, last week filed 26 charges accusing Godwin Emefiele of corrupt practices and misuse of authority while in office. Emefiele appeared before the Lagos State High Court on Monday with a co-defendant, Henry Omoile.

In its suit filed April 3, the EFCC said Emefiele violated Nigeria’s corrupt practices act by receiving bribes and gifts and acquiring property through fraud.

The EFCC also accused Emefiele of arbitrarily allocating $2 billion dollars in foreign exchange without bids or due process and conferring undue advantage to his associates.

Emefiele and Omoile both pleaded not guilty to the charges. But the court remanded Emefiele into custody until Thursday, when a verdict on his bail application is expected.

Emefiele’s legal counsel was not immediately available to comment on the new charges.

But public affairs analyst Chris Kwaja said, “On the strength of the allegations, if he’s found wanting them, he’ll face justice as required by the laws of the land. For every individual that has been given the mandate to occupy public office, that mandate is a product of trust. This case represents that. The only thing for me is that in pursuit of accountability, the Nigerian state must be conscious of the right of every individual.”

Former President Goodluck Jonathan appointed Emefiele as CBN governor in 2014, and he served until last year. He was arrested in June, days after President Bola Tinubu took office.

Last year, the former Central Bank governor faced charges in another court in  Abuja, for illegally awarding contracts and violating Nigeria’s procurement laws — charges that he denied.

Eze Onyekpere, founder of the Center for Social Justice, wondered whether the government was looking for a scapegoat.

“I’m getting a bit worried, because we’ve seen this happen before in previous administrations,” Onyekpere said. “Let it not appear to be looking for a fall guy,  somebody that could easily be shaken off … and trying to provide excuses for their inability to manage the economy very well. It’s beginning to look a little bit not based on empirical legal evidence.”

Emefiele withdrew from a possible presidential bid in 2022.

Last July, Tinubu hired a special investigator to scrutinize the operations of the Central Bank under Emefiele. On Friday, the investigator said his work was complete, but his report has not been released.
…

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Lusaka, Zambia — Two senior U.N. officials are wrapping up their visit to Zambia to assess the country’s worst drought in 20 years, which affected some 8 million people and left at least 6 million at risk of food insecurity. The officials say communities affected by the drought need immediate humanitarian aid and food assistance.

Reena Ghelani, the U.N. assistant secretary-general, and climate crisis coordinator for the El Niño and La Niña response, and Eva Kadilli, UNICEF regional director for eastern and southern Africa, called for international solidarity to support the humanitarian response during their visit to Zambia.

Speaking in Lusaka Sunday, Ghelani said the country received less than normal rainfall, leaving hundreds of thousands of hectares of maize destroyed. This accounted for more than half of the country’s cultivation of maize, which is a staple food in Zambia.

“That means there’s not going to be food on the table for many families, and they are not going to be able to purchase,” she said. “So we need to respond swiftly with assistance today. This might become the new normal so we need to prepare, as the president has said, for the future.”

The U.N. representatives met with government and local partners involved in ongoing efforts to address both the drought and a historic cholera outbreak that claimed more than 700 lives.

The U.N. officials also heard from communities and NGOs working on the frontlines of the humanitarian crisis.

Eva Kadilli, UNICEF regional director for eastern and southern Africa, told VOA that about 3 million of the people in need are children. She said those most vulnerable to the impact of a climate crisis are children, specifically those under 5. They were also impacted by COVID and cholera, she said.

“Now to drought … this has a huge toll on children, on communities and families but also mothers, pregnant women lactating women as well, young adolescent girls,” she said.

Felesia Manico, a small-scale farmer in Chongwe near the capital Lusaka, told VOA that the drought has been a nightmare as she lost hundreds of hectares of crops such as maize and various vegetables.

“Our fields dried up one month in we couldn’t get anything from all the inputs that we put in,” she said. “We invested quite a bit in seed and labor and also fertilizer and all the other requirements that come with farming.”

Another small-scale farmer, Sam Tembo, said he has lost all 40 hectares of maize field to the drought. He borrowed $5,000 from the bank.

“All my crops are gone and now I cannot afford any meals,” he said. “Already I have lost money investing in the crops … but nothing came out. I don’t know how I am going to feed the children as it is.”

Worsened by climate change and the El Niño weather pattern, the crisis threatens national food security as well as water and energy supply, Zambia’s President Hakainde Hichilema said recently.

Zambia is highly dependent on hydroelectric power as experts warn that the drought consequences could last until early 2025.

The U.N. mission follows a recent declaration by Hichilema of a state of emergency and national disaster, as 84 of the country’s 116 districts are affected by the prolonged drought.

The crisis could have regional implications as Zambia is a major maize exporter in the region.
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Thirty years after the Rwandan genocide, survivors continue to grapple with fear and trauma. Their plight, they say, is exacerbated by ongoing battles against misinformation and genocide denial, prompting calls for increased education and awareness to foster a genocide-free world. Senanu Tord reports from Kigali, Rwanda. Moki Edwin Kindzeka contributed to this report.
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On his farm near Burkina Faso’s capital, Ouagadougou, Clark Lungren studies and breeds wild animals, some of them endangered species. The Canadian, who has been living in the country for several decades, is also giving tourists an opportunity to see his animals up close. But fighting and unrest in the country has put the farm at risk. VOA’s Gildas Da has more in this report narrated by Jackson Mvunganyi. (Solomane Nikiema contributed to this report)
…

Bunia, DRC — The death toll from an attack in a village in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo’s Ituri province rose to 25 on Sunday, a local chief and civil society leader said, after a government spokesperson and a U.N. document confirmed the attack Saturday.

The Cooperative for the Development of the Congo (CODECO) group, one of many militias operating in the conflict-ridden east, carried out the killings in the village of Galayi, 70 km (45 miles) northwest of the city of Bunia, they said.

Fifteen bodies were discovered Sunday, in addition to the 10 bodies recovered Saturday, Banzala Danny, a local chief, and Vital Tungulo, a civil society leader, told Reuters.

An internal U.N. document seen by Reuters, and Jules Ngongo, spokesperson for the governor of Ituri province, both confirmed the attack and the initial death toll of 10 civilians.

“We assure that all the killers will be punished by justice,” Ngongo said.

The human rights situation in Ituri has deteriorated since the beginning of the year as CODECO carries out more attacks, the United Nations Joint Human Rights Office (UNJHRO) said in a report published in March.

CODECO and the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), another militia group, are responsible for most civilian killings in eastern DRC, according to a report by the U.N. peacekeeping mission released in March.
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Red Sea State, Sudan — Sudanese paramilitary forces have killed at least 28 people in an attack on a village south of the capital Khartoum, a local doctors’ committee said Sunday.

The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) carried out a “massacre” in “the village of Um Adam” 150 kilometers (93 miles) south of the city Saturday, the Sudan Doctors Committee said in a statement.

Sudan’s war between the military, under army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the RSF, commanded by his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, began last April 15.

Many thousands of people have been killed, including up to 15,000 in a single town in the war-ravaged Darfur region, according to United Nations experts.

The war has also displaced more than 8.5 million people, practically destroyed Sudan’s already fragile infrastructure and pushed the country to the brink of famine.

Saturday’s attack “resulted in the killing (of) at least 28 innocent villagers and more than 240 people wounded,” the committee said.

It added that “there are a number of dead and wounded in the village that we were not able to count” due to the fighting and difficulty in reaching health facilities.

A local activists’ committee had given a toll of 25 earlier in the day.

A medical source at the Manaqil hospital, 80 kilometers (about 50 miles) away, confirmed to AFP that they had “received 200 wounded, some of whom arrived too late.”

“We’re facing a shortage of blood, and we don’t have enough medical personnel,” he added.

More than 70 percent of Sudan’s health facilities are out of service, according to the U.N., while those remaining receive many times their capacity and have meager resources.

Both sides in the conflict have been accused of war crimes, including targeting civilians, indiscriminate shelling of residential areas and looting and obstructing aid.

Since taking over Al-Jazira state just south of Khartoum in December, the RSF has laid siege to and attacked entire villages such as Um Adam.

By March, at least 108 villages and settlements across the country had been set on fire and “partially or completely destroyed,” the U.K.-based Center for Information Resilience has found.
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KIGALI, Rwanda — Rwandans are commemorating 30 years since the genocide in which an estimated 800,000 people were killed by government-backed extremists, shattering the small East African country that continues to grapple with the horrific legacy of the massacres.

Rwanda has shown strong economic growth in the years since, but scars remain and there are questions about whether genuine reconciliation has been achieved under the long rule of President Paul Kagame, whose rebel movement stopped the genocide and seized power.

Kagame, who is praised by many for bringing relative stability but vilified by others for his intolerance of dissent, will lead somber commemoration events Sunday in the capital, Kigali. Foreign visitors include a delegation led by Bill Clinton, the U.S. president during the genocide, and Israeli President Isaac Herzog.

Kagame lit a flame of remembrance and laid a wreath at a memorial site holding the remains of 250,000 genocide victims in Kigali.

The killings were ignited when a plane carrying then-President Juvénal Habyarimana, a Hutu, was shot down over Kigali. The Tutsis were blamed for downing the plane and killing the president. and became targets in massacres led by Hutu extremists that lasted over 100 days in 1994. Some moderate Hutus who tried to protect members of the Tutsi minority were also killed.

Rwandan authorities have long blamed the international community for ignoring warnings about the killings, and some Western leaders have expressed regret.

Clinton, after leaving office, cited the Rwandan genocide as a failure of his administration.

French President Emmanuel Macron, in a prerecorded video ahead of the Sunday’s ceremonies, said on Thursday that France and its allies could have stopped the genocide but lacked the will to do so.

Macron’s declaration came three years after he acknowledged the “overwhelming responsibility” of France — Rwanda’s closest European ally in 1994 — for failing to stop Rwanda’s slide into the slaughter.

Rwanda’s ethnic composition remains largely unchanged since 1994, with a Hutu majority. The Tutsis account for 14% and the Twa just 1% of Rwanda’s 14 million people. Kagame’s Tutsi-dominated government has outlawed any form of organization along ethnic lines, as part of efforts to build a uniform Rwandan identity.

National ID cards no longer identify citizens by ethnic group, and authorities imposed a tough penal code to prosecute those suspected of denying the genocide or the “ideology” behind it. Some observers say the law has been used to silence critics who question the government’s policies.

Rights groups have accused Kagame’s soldiers of carrying out some killings during and after the genocide in apparent revenge, but Rwandan authorities see the allegations as an attempt to rewrite history. Kagame has previously said that his forces showed restraint in the face of genocide.

Kagame is expected to give a speech and a night vigil will be held later on Sunday as part of a week of remembrance activities.

Naphtal Ahishakiye, the head of Ibuka, a prominent group of survivors, told The Associated Press that keeping the memory of the genocide alive helps fight the mentality that allowed neighbors to turn on each other, killing even children. Mass graves are still being discovered across Rwanda 30 years later, a reminder of the scale of the killings .

“It’s a time to learn what happened, why it happened, what are the consequences of genocide to us as genocide survivors, to our country, and to the international community,” said Ahishakiye.

He said his country has come a long way since the 1990s, when only survivors and government officials participated in commemoration events. “But today even those who are family members of perpetrators come to participate.”

Kagame, who grew up a refugee in neighboring Uganda, has been Rwanda’s de facto ruler, first as vice president from 1994 to 2000, then as acting president. He was voted into office in 2003 and has since been reelected multiple times. A candidate for elections set for July, he won the last election with nearly 99% of the vote.

Rights activists and others say the authoritarian Kagame has created a climate of fear that discourages open and free discussion of national issues. Critics have accused the government of forcing opponents to flee, jailing or making them disappear while some are killed under mysterious circumstances. Kagame’s most serious political rivals are his Tutsi ex-comrades now living in exile.

Though mostly peaceful, Rwanda also has had troubled relations with its neighbors.

Recently, tensions have flared with Congo, with the two countries’ leaders accusing one another of supporting armed groups. Relations have been tense with Burundi as well over allegations that Kigali is backing a rebel group attacking Burundi. And relations with Uganda are yet to fully normalize after a period of tensions stemming from Rwandan allegations that Uganda was backing rebels opposed to Kagame.
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ACCRA, Ghana — When Efua, a 25-year-old fashion designer and single mother in Ghana, became pregnant last year, she sought an abortion at a health clinic but worried the procedure might be illegal. Health workers assured her abortions were lawful under certain conditions in the West African country, but Efua said she was still nervous.

“I had lots of questions, just to be sure I would be safe,” Efua told The Associated Press, on condition that only her middle name be used, for fear of reprisals from the growing anti-abortion movement in her country.

Finding reliable information was difficult, she said, and she didn’t tell her family about her procedure. “It comes with too many judgments,” she decided.

More than 20 countries across Africa have loosened restrictions on abortion in recent years, but experts say that like Efua, many women probably don’t realize they are entitled to a legal abortion. And despite the expanded legality of the procedure in places like Ghana, Congo, Ethiopia and Mozambique, some doctors and nurses say they’ve become increasingly wary of openly providing abortions. They’re fearful of triggering the ire of opposition groups that have become emboldened since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision overturning the nationwide right to abortion.

“We are providing a legal service for women who want an abortion, but we do not advertise it openly,” said Esi Asare Prah, who works at the clinic where Efua had the procedure — legal under Ghana’s law, passed in 1985. “We’ve found that people are OK with our clinic providing abortions, as long as we don’t make it too obvious what we are doing.”

The Maputo Protocol, a human rights treaty in effect since 2005 for all 55 countries of the African Union, says every nation on the continent should grant women the right to a medical abortion in cases of rape, sexual assault, incest, and endangerment for the mental or physical health of the mother or fetus.

Africa is alone globally in having such a treaty, but more than a dozen of its countries have yet to pass laws granting women access to abortions. Even in those that have legalized the procedure, obstacles to access remain. And misinformation is rampant in many countries, with a recent study faulting practices by Google and Meta.

“The right to abortion exists in law, but in practice, the reality may be a little different,” said Evelyne Opondo, of the International Center for Research on Women. She noted that poorer countries in particular, such as Benin and Ethiopia, may permit abortions in some instances but struggle with a lack of resources to make them available to all women. Many women learn of their options only through word of mouth.

Across Africa, MSI Reproductive Choices — which provides contraception and abortion in 37 countries worldwide — reports that staff have been repeatedly targeted by anti-abortion groups. The group cites harassment and intimidation of staff in Ethiopia. And in Nigeria, MSI’s clinic was raided and temporarily closed after false allegations that staffers had illegally accessed confidential documents.

“The opposition to abortion in Africa has always existed, but now they are better organized,” said Mallah Tabot, of the International Planned Parenthood Federation in Kenya. She noted that a significant amount of money backing anti-abortion efforts appears to have come from conservative American groups — and several reports have found millions in such funding from conservative Christian organizations.

The spike from opposition groups is alarming, said Angela Akol, of the reproductive rights advocacy group Ipas.

“We’ve seen them in Kenya and Uganda advocating at the highest levels of government for reductions to abortion access,” she said. “There are patriarchal and almost misogynistic norms across much of Africa. … The West is tapping into that momentum after the Roe v. Wade reversal to challenge abortion rights here.”

Congo, one of the world’s poorest countries, introduced a law in 2018 permitting abortions in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy in cases of rape, incest, and physical or mental health risks to the woman.

Even so, pamphlets aimed at women who might want an abortion use coded language, said Patrick Djemo, of MSI in Congo.

“We talk about the management of unwanted pregnancies,” he said, noting that they don’t use the word abortion. “It could cause a backlash.”

Accurate language and information can be hard to find online, too. Last week, a study from MSI and the Center for Countering Digital Hate found that Google and Meta — which operates Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp — restricted access to accurate information about abortion in countries including Ghana, Nigeria and Kenya.

The study said the tech giants banned local abortion providers from advertising services while approving paid ads from anti-abortion groups pushing false claims about decriminalization efforts as part of a global conspiracy to “eliminate” local populations.

Google didn’t respond to a request for comment on the study. Meta said via email that its platforms “prohibit ads that mislead people about services a business provides” and that it would review the report.

Opondo, of the international women’s center, said she’s deeply concerned about the future of abortion-rights movements in Africa, with opponents using the same tactics that helped overturn Roe vs. Wade in the U.S.

Yet, she said, for now it’s “still probably easier for a woman in Benin to get an abortion than in Texas.”

For Efua, information and cost were obstacles. She cobbled together the necessary 1,000 Ghana cedis ($77) for her abortion after asking a friend to help.

She said she wishes women could easily get reliable information, especially given the physical and mental stress she experienced. She said she wouldn’t have been able to handle another baby on her own and believes many other women face similar dilemmas.

“If you’re pregnant and not ready,” she said, “it could really affect you mentally and for the rest of your life.”
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UNITED NATIONS — The United States and its Western allies are feuding with Russia over its diamond production, but they joined forces Wednesday to keep supporting the Kimberley Process, which aims to eliminate the trade in “blood diamonds” that helped fuel devastating conflicts in Africa.

At a U.N. General Assembly meeting, its 193 member nations adopted a resolution by consensus recognizing that the Kimberley Process, which certifies rough diamond exports, “contributes to the prevention of conflicts fueled by diamonds” and helps the Security Council implement sanctions on the trade in conflict diamonds.

The Kimberley Process went into effect in 2003 in the aftermath of bloody civil wars in Angola, Sierra Leone and Liberia where diamonds were used by armed groups to fund the conflicts.

Zimbabwe’s U.N. Ambassador Albert Chimbindi, whose country chaired the Kimberley Process in 2023, said in introducing the resolution that it would renew the General Assembly’s “commitment to ensuring that diamonds remain a force for inclusive sustainable development instead of a driver of armed conflict.”

It was true in 2003 and “remains true now,” he said, that profits from the diamond trade can fuel conflicts, finance rebel movements aimed at undermining or overthrowing governments, and lead to the proliferation of illegal weapons.

The European Union’s Clayton Curran told the assembly after the vote that the Kimberley Process “is facing unprecedented challenges” and condemned “the aggression of one Kimberley Process participant against another” — Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. 

For the first time in its history, last November’s plenary meeting of Kimberley Process participants failed to produce a consensus communique because of serious differences between Russia and the West.

The key reason was a Ukrainian request, supported by the United States, Britain and others, to examine whether Russia’s diamond production is funding its war against Kyiv and the implications for the Kimberley Process which Russia and several allies strongly opposed.

Russia refused to support a communique that acknowledged Ukraine’s request. And before Wednesday’s vote, the deputy director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s economic department, Alexander Repkin, accused Western countries of sabotaging international cooperation on diamonds for “their own geopolitical interests.”

Alluding to sanctions on Russian diamonds by the European Union, Repkin accused the West and its companies of trying to gain a hold over the global production and processing of diamonds.

He said “the further functioning of the Kimberley Process is at stake,” but Russia will do everything it can to support its work.

He noted that the plenary communique has served as the foundation for the General Assembly resolution on the role of conflict diamonds in fueling conflict but without one the resolution approved Wednesday “is largely technical in nature.”

The EU’s Curran urged reform of the process “to broaden the definition of `conflict diamonds’ to capture the evolving nature of conflicts and the realities on the ground.” He said the EU will also try again this year to discuss the issue of the negative impact of the illegal trade in diamonds on the environment.

Britain expressed regret at the failure to discuss the link between Russia’s rough diamond revenue and their invasion of Ukraine, and reiterated the need for a discussion to ensure that the Kimberley Process deals with issues related to delinking diamonds from conflict.

United Arab Emirates deputy ambassador Mohamed Abushahab said it’s more important than ever to strengthen the Kimberley Process, which his country is chairing this year.

The UAE has identified three ways: to establish a permanent secretariat which was approved at the end of March in Botswana’s capital, Gabarone, to complete a review and reform of the process by the end of the year, and to identify digital technologies that can strengthen the Kimberley Process, he said.
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BUGESERA, Rwanda — Anastasie Nyirabashyitsi and Jeanette Mukabyagaju think of each other as dear friends.

The women’s friendship was cemented one day in 2007, when Mukabyagaju, going somewhere, left a child behind for Nyirabashyitsi to look after.

This expression of trust stunned Nyirabashyitsi because Mukabyagaju, a Tutsi survivor who lost most of her family in the Rwandan genocide, was leaving a child in the hands of a Hutu woman for the first time since they had known each other.

“If she can ask me to keep her child, it’s because she trusts me,” Nyirabashyitsi said recently, describing her feelings at the time. “A woman, when it comes to her children, when someone trusts you with (her) children, it’s because she really does.”

It wasn’t always like that.

‘We had no hope of living’

Nyirabashyitsi and Mukabyagaju are both witnesses to terrible crimes. But, in the government-approved reconciliation village where they have lived for 19 years, they have reached a peaceful coexistence from opposite experiences.

Nyirabashyitsi, 54, recalled the helpless Tutsis she saw at roadblocks not far from the present reconciliation village, people she knew faced imminent death when the Hutu soldiers and militiamen started systematically killing their Tutsi neighbors on the night of April 6, 1994.

The killings were ignited when a plane carrying then-President Juvénal Habyarimana, a Hutu, was shot down over Kigali. The Tutsi were blamed for downing the plane and killing the president. An estimated 800,000 Tutsis were killed by extremist Hutus in massacres that lasted over 100 days in 1994. Some moderate Hutus who tried to protect members of the Tutsi minority were also targeted.

One victim was a woman who had been a godmother to her child, and later she saw the woman’s body dumped in a ditch, Nyirabashyitsi remembers. “It was so horrible, and it was even shameful to be able [to] see that,” she said. “For sure, we had no hope of living. We thought that we would also be killed. How could you see that and then think you will be alive at some point?”

As for Mukabyagaju, she was a 16-year-old temporarily staying in the southern province of Muhanga while her parents lived in Kigali. When she couldn’t shelter at the nearest Catholic parish, she hid in a latrine for two months, without anything to eat and drinking from trenches, until she was rescued by Tutsi rebels who stopped the genocide.

“I hated Hutu so much to the point that I could not agree to meet them,” she said, adding that it took a long time “to be able even think that I can interact with a Hutu.”

The women are neighbors in a community of genocide perpetrators and survivors 40 kilometers outside the Rwandan capital of Kigali. At least 382 people live in Mbyo Reconciliation Village, which some Rwandans cite as an example of how people can peacefully coexist 30 years after the genocide.

More than half the residents of this reconciliation village are women, and their projects — which include a basket-weaving cooperative as well as a money saving program — have united so many of them that it can seem offensive to inquire into who is Hutu and who is Tutsi.

An official with Prison Fellowship Rwanda, a Kigali-based civic group that’s in charge of the village, said the women foster a climate of tolerance because of the hands-on activities in which they engage regularly.

“There’s a model we have here which we call practical reconciliation,” said Christian Bizimana, a program coordinator with Prison Fellowship Rwanda. “Whenever they are weaving baskets, they can engage more, talk more, go into the details. We believe that by doing that … forgiveness is deepened, unity is deepened.”

‘It pleases my heart’

In Rwanda, a small East African country of 14 million people, women leaders have long been seen as a pillar of reconciliation, and Rwandans can now “see the benefits” of empowering women to fight the ideology behind genocide, said Yolande Mukagasana, a prominent writer and genocide survivor.

Two of three members of Mbyo Reconciliation Village’s dispute-resolution committee are women, and they have been helpful in resolving conflicts ranging from domestic disputes to communal disagreements, residents say.

The women’s activities set an example for children and “promote the visibility of what really this village is like in terms of practical unity and reconciliation,” said Frederick Kazigwemo, a leader in the village who was jailed nine years on charges of genocide-related crimes.

He said of the friendship between Nyirabashyitsi and Mukabyagaju: “It pleases my heart. It’s something that I could have never imagined. … It gives me hope (for) what will happen in future.”

Eighteen women are actively involved in basket weaving, meeting as a group at least once a week. Nyirabashyitsi and Mukabyagaju sat next to each other one recent morning as they made new baskets. A collection of their work was displayed on a mat nearby.

“When we came here the environment was clouded by suspicion. It wasn’t easy to trust one another,” Nyirabashyitsi said. “For example, it wasn’t easy for me to go to Jeanette’s house, because I had no idea what she was thinking about me. But after time, the more we lived together, that harmony and that closeness came.”

Nyirabashyitsi and Mukabyagaju were among the first people to arrive in the village when it was launched in 2005 as part of wider reconciliation efforts by Prison Fellowship Rwanda. The organization, which is affiliated with the Washington-based Prison Fellowship International, wanted to create opportunities for genocide survivors to heal in conditions where they can regularly talk to perpetrators. There are at least eight other reconciliation villages across Rwanda.

President Paul Kagame’s rebel group, the Tutsi-led Rwandan Patriotic Front, stopped the genocide after 100 days, seized power and has since ruled Rwanda unchallenged.

Rwandan authorities have heavily promoted national unity among the majority Hutu and the minority Tutsi and Twa, with a separate government ministry dedicated to reconciliation efforts. The government has imposed a tough penal code to prosecute those it suspects of denying the genocide or promoting the “genocide ideology.” Some observers say the law has been used to silence critics who question the government.

Rwandan ID cards no longer identify a person by ethnicity. Lessons about the genocide are part of the curriculum in schools.
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Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso — In the suburbs of Burkina Faso’s capital Ouagadougou, lucrative strawberry farming is supplanting traditional crops like cabbage and lettuce and has become a top export to neighboring countries.

Prized as “red gold” in the Sahel, strawberry crops brought in some $3.3 million from 2019 to 2020, according to agricultural support program PAPEA.

In their January to April season, strawberries “take the place of other crops,” Yiwendenda Tiemtore, a farmer in the working-class Boulmiougou district on the city outskirts, told AFP.

Tiemtore has been busy harvesting the red fruit since dawn, before temperatures rise to 40 degrees Celsius.

He harvests about 25 to 30 kilograms of Burkina’s popular strawberry varieties, “selva” and “camarosa,” every three days, watering his plots from wells.

Cultivating strawberries, which thrive on ample sunlight and water, might come as a surprise in this semi-arid West African country.

But Burkina Faso leads the region’s strawberry production, growing about 2,000 tons a year.

Despite being prized by local customers, more than half is exported to neighboring countries.

“We receive orders from abroad, particularly from Ivory Coast, Niger and Ghana,” said market gardener Madi Compaore, who specializes in strawberries and trains local growers.

“Demand is constantly rising and the prices are good.”

In season, strawberries tend to be sold at a higher price than other fruit and vegetables, fetching $5 per kilogram.

Production has remained strong despite insecurity in the country, including from jihadi violence and the repercussions of two coups in 2022.

As well as in Ouagadougou, strawberry production is prominent in Bobo-Dioulasso — Burkina’s second city — even though “the sector’s not very well organized” there, Compaore said.

Since the 1970s

“You might think it’s an oddity to grow strawberries in a Sahelian country like Burkina Faso, but it’s been a fixture since the 1970s,” Compaore added.

The practice began when a French expatriate introduced a few plants to his garden in the country. Now more and more people are growing them.

“It’s our red gold. It’s one of the most profitable crops for both growers and sellers,” he explained.

Seller Jacqueline Taonsa has no hesitation in swapping from apples and bananas to strawberries in season.

“With the heat, it’s hard to keep strawberries fresh for long,” said Taonsa, who cycles around Ouagadougou neighborhoods balancing a salad bowl on her head.

“So, we take quantities that can be sold quickly during the day,” she explained. That usually amounts to about 5 or 6 kilograms.

Adissa Tiemtore used to be a full-time fruit and vegetable seller.

She has mainly switched to selling woven loincloths now but takes up her strawberry business again in season because of the lucrative margins, as high as “200-300%.”

“I start strawberry selling again when they’re in season to make a bit of money and satisfy my former customers, who continue to ask for them,” she said.

“We go round the different growers depending on what day they’re harvesting. That way we get enough to sell every day during the three fruit-producing months,” she said.

The end of April spells the end of the bonanza. “We go back to our other activities, and we wait for next season,” Tiemtore said. 
…

GENEVA — Warning that the war in Sudan risks triggering the world’s worst hunger crisis, the World Food Program said Friday that it finally has managed to bring desperately needed food aid into the war-wracked Darfur region for the first time in months.

The U.N. food agency said two convoys crossed the border from Chad into Darfur late last week, carrying food and nutrition assistance for about a quarter-million people in north, west and central Darfur.

It said the long-delayed mission was given the go-ahead following lengthy negotiations to reopen convoy routes after the Sudanese Armed Forces had revoked permission for humanitarian corridors from Chad in February.

“Cross-border operations from Chad to Darfur are critical to reach communities where children are already dying of malnutrition,” said Leni Kinzli, the WFP communications officer for Sudan.

Speaking in Nairobi, Kenya, she said that “All corridors to transport food must remain open, particularly the one from [the city of] Adre in Chad to West Darfur, where levels of hunger are alarming.”

While expressing relief that lengthy negotiations to reopen the routes have paid off, she warned that unless the people of Sudan receive a constant flow of aid through all possible humanitarian corridors, “the country’s hunger catastrophe will only worsen.”

Since the rival Sudanese Armed Forces and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces plunged the country into war nearly one year ago, the United Nations says more than 8.5 million people have become displaced — 6.5 million within the country.

The WFP says 18 million people are facing acute hunger, 90% of them in hard-to-reach areas. A World Health Organization Public Health Situation Analysis of the Sudan conflict finds a record 24.8 million people — almost every other person — need urgent humanitarian assistance in 2024.

“This is 9 million more than in 2023. So, how catastrophic is that,” said Margaret Harris, a WHO spokesperson.

“People have been forced to flee their homes due to the humanitarian situation and the destruction of essential infrastructure, such as roads, hospitals, medical facilities and schools.

“Also, power, water, communication services, everything — all the infrastructure you need to lead a normal life” has been destroyed, she said.

The WHO says at least 14,600 people have been killed and 33,000 injured. It says two-thirds of the population lack access to medical care, noting that disease outbreaks, including cholera, measles, malaria, poliovirus type 2 and dengue, are increasing.

“Food insecurity is also at a record high, with nearly half of children acutely malnourished,” said the WHO, underscoring that “urgent action is needed to prevent further catastrophe.”

The WFP’s Kinzli said it was critical that aid be quickly and easily delivered to needy people in Darfur through the Tine border crossing or across conflict lines from within Sudan.

She said, however, that “fierce fighting, lack of security and lengthy clearances by the warring parties” have led to delays in the distribution of assistance. She noted it was impossible for aid workers to provide help “to people trapped in Sudan’s conflict hotspots.”

The “WFP needs aid to be consistently reaching war-ravaged communities through every possible route,” Kinzli said, warning that hunger in Sudan will increase as the lean season starts — the period of the year when food stocks are at their lowest.

“Our greatest fear is that we will see unprecedented levels of starvation and malnutrition sweep across Sudan this lean season, and that the Darfur region will be particularly hard hit.”

She pointed out that crop production is at an all-time low because the fighting is preventing farmers from harvesting their crops.

“Recent crop reports show that the harvest for cereals in Darfur this year was 78% below the five-year average,” she said. “That is why WFP is deeply concerned about how serious the hunger crisis will get this lean season.”

Kinzli expressed deep concern that the lean season, which normally runs from May to September, could begin as early as next week and last much longer than usual.
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