Sudan: Nigeria Leads 12,000 Peacekeepers in Darfur

2 January 2009

The United Nations (UN) yesterday announced that 12,374 peacekeepers have so far been deployed to UN-AU hybrid force in Sudan's Darfur region.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) at the UN reports that the peacekeeping force, known as UN-AU Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) is expected to have 26,000 troops, police and civilian personnel at full deployment.

Nigeria has about 3,000 troops and police personnel in Darfur.

"The United Nations is pleased to confirm that 12,374 uniformed personnel have been deployed to UNAMID, representing 63 per cent of the mission's authorized military strength of 19,555 personnel," the UN said.

This was contained in a statement to mark one year of the hybrid force in Darfur.

It said that the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, applauded the efforts of the troop-contributing countries.

It said that "in reaching this target in the face of serious difficulties, including the volatile security situation in Darfur".

According to Ban, the cooperation of the Sudanese government in achieving this level of deployment, while also stressing the need for the continuation of the cooperation, however, stated that, "to ensure the mission continues to grow and reach full strength, troop-and-police-contributing countries will have to work together with the United Nations."

It said this was to "expedite the deployment of all outstanding capabilities".

It called on member states to step up efforts to provide the shortfall in troops, helicopters and other logistic support to enable the force to ensure peace and security in the war-torn region.

It also quoted the UN chief as calling on the international community to commit themselves to the volatile region, in order to counter the escalating threat to peace and security.

UNAMID was set up by the UN Security Council in 2007 to protect civilians in Darfur.

It is estimated that 300,000 people have been killed and another 2.7 million displaced following hostilities between rebels, government forces and allied militiamen, known as the Janjaweed, in 2003.

Nigeria's Gen. Martin Agwai is the force commander and the Chairman of the Darfur Ceasefire Commission.

NAN recalls that Ban recently warned that clashes between the warring factions in Darfur was threatening the UN-AU peacekeeping mission.

He urged all parties to end hostilities and work towards a comprehensive political solution in the region.

Civilians take brunt of 7th day of Gaza offensive

* Civilian death toll climbs

* Palestinian official says Egypt begins truce initiative

* Hamas leader threatens to abduct more Israeli soldiers

* Palestinian death toll reaches 429

* Protests turn violent in West Bank, Jordan

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

GAZA, Jan 2 (Reuters) - The civilian death toll climbed in Israel's air offensive against the Gaza Strip on Friday and Palestinian Islamists vowed revenge for the killing of a senior Hamas leader and his family.

There was no sign of a ceasefire on the seventh day of the conflict, in which at least 429 Palestinians have been killed and 2,000 wounded, but a Palestinian official told Reuters that Egypt had begun exploratory talks with Hamas to halt the bloodshed.

A United Nations agency said more than a quarter of those killed in Gaza were civilians. A leading Palestinian human rights group put it at 40 percent.

Exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal urged Arabs in a televised speech from Damascus to step up aid to Gaza and to send medical teams. European and Arab countries had contacted Hamas to discuss ending the fighting, but he did not name them.

The senior Palestinian official, who declined to be named and who has been close to previous talks between Egypt and Hamas, said the aim of the talks included promoting ideas that would culminate in a new truce.

Four Israelis have been killed by Palestinian rockets fired from Gaza, which strike southern cities and towns at random and cause property damage and panic among the local population.

Meshaal warned Israel that Hamas would resist any Israeli ground invasion of the strip and might abduct soldiers. Militants said all options including suicide bombings were now open to "strike at Zionist interests everywhere".

"If you commit a foolish act by raiding Gaza, who knows, we may have a second or a third or a fourth Shalit," Meshaal said. Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit was kidnapped more than two years ago.

Of 10 Palestinians reported killed on Friday in more than 30 Israeli air strikes, seven were civilians, including five children, local medics said.

One missile killed three Palestinian children aged between eight and 12 as they played on a street near the town of Khan Yunis in the south of the strip. One was decapitated.

Islamist fighters earlier fired rockets at Israel's ancient port of Ashkelon, one of which blew out windows in an apartment building. Another house took a direct hit from a long-range missile later in the day, and cars were set ablaze.

A FEW ESCAPE

Israel's armoured forces remained massed on the Gaza frontier in preparation for a possible ground invasion, despite international calls for a halt to the conflict. An Israeli naval vessel offshore fired at a greenhouse in southern Gaza.

Israeli leaders were in conference on Friday evening and media reports said they were discussing an "imminent" incursion.

The White House said on Friday that Israel must decide for itself whether to go into the Gaza Strip with ground forces, but it cautioned any actions should avoid civilian casualties and ensure the flow of humanitarian goods.

In Gaza City, a few hundred foreign passport holders boarded buses in the pre-dawn murk to quit the Strip, with the help of the International Committee of the Red Cross, their governments and Israeli compliance.

"The situation is very bad. We are afraid for our children," said Ilona Hamdiya, a woman from Moldova married to a Palestinian. "We are very grateful to our embassy."

They left behind 1.5 million Palestinians unable to escape the conflict, a city facing another day of bombs, missiles, flickering electricity, queues for bread, taped-up windows and streets littered with broken glass and debris.

"We will not rest until we destroy the Zionist entity," said Hamas leader Fathi Hammad at the funeral of Nizar Rayyan, a senior Hamas leader who was killed along with four wives and 11 children in an air strike on Thursday.

The bearded Rayyan, who mentored suicide bombers and sent one of his sons on a "martyrdom" mission, was the highest ranking Hamas official to be killed in the current offensive. He had called loudly for bombings in Israeli cities.

Bracing for protests and retaliatory violence, Israel sealed off the occupied West Bank to deny entry to most Palestinians and beefed up security at checkpoints.

There were protests by Palestinians in West Bank cities. In Ramallah, Hamas supporters scuffled with the Fatah faction of Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, taunting them as collaborators. Elsewhere, protesters stoned soldiers at checkpoints and some were wounded by rubber bullets.

In the Jordanian capital, Amman, riot police fired teargas to disperse hundreds of protesters marching on the Israeli embassy, chanting: "No Jewish embassy on Arab land".

Ethiopia begins withdrawal from Somalia

By Ibrahim Mohamed

MOGADISHU (Reuters) – Ethiopia has started pulling its troops out of Somalia, where they have been helping the Western-backed government fight an Islamist insurgency for the past two years, a senior official said on Friday.

A convoy of trucks laden with Ethiopian soldiers, mattresses and other equipment left Mogadishu earlier, although some troops remained in Somalia's capital, witnesses said.

The departure of an estimated 3,000 Ethiopian troops risks leaving a potentially dangerous power vacuum in the anarchic Horn of Africa nation unless more African peacekeepers are sent quickly to strengthen an existing force of 3,200 in Somalia.

Bereket Simon, special adviser to Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, said Ethiopian, African Union (AU) and government force commanders had met in Addis Ababa and agreed on a plan for handing over security responsibilities.

"This process is now being conducted and the Ethiopian troop withdrawal movements have started," Simon told Reuters. "The withdrawal is not an event that can be completed within a day. It will be finalized as quickly as possible."

Residents saw a convoy of about 30 trucks with Ethiopian soldiers arriving in Afgoye, a town 30 kms (19 miles) southwest of Mogadishu, on Friday morning.

Residents also reported that Ethiopian troops were strengthening security along the road which leads from Mogadishu to Baidoa, the seat of parliament.

Somalia's parliament speaker and interim president, Sheikh Aden Madobe, appealed to the African Union during a visit to Kenya to strengthen its AMISOM force now.

"The agreement that we have with Ethiopia is that they will leave Somalia as soon as full AMISOM forces come to Somalia, but now it seems the Ethiopian government has decided to leave," Madobe told reporters in Nairobi. "We don't want a vacuum."

MORE ATTACKS

The international community has been racing to beef up peacekeeping operations in Somalia but the United Nations has ruled out any quick deployment.

African Union officials say some 2,500 soldiers from Uganda, Burundi and Nigeria are ready to deploy but financial and logistical obstacles have so hindered them.

Without central government since 1991, Somalia has become the epitome of a failed state and the chaos onshore has fueled rampant piracy in the busy shipping lanes off the coast.

More than 10,000 civilians have been killed in a two-year Islamist insurgency, a million people have fled their homes and a third of the population rely on emergency aid.

Diplomats say the Ethiopian departure may take the sting out of the insurgency, which has become a nationalist cause and holds sway in much of southern and central Somalia.

They also hope this week's resignation of President Abdullahi Yusuf will be an opportunity to forge an inclusive government which can work for peace.

But some insurgents have vowed to fight the government even when its allies leave, and a hardline opposition group seen as key to lasting peace is snubbing the idea of power-sharing.

Without the Ethiopians, analysts say there is a risk the Islamists will seize the capital, where there are daily attacks.

Ethiopian troops in Mogadishu were targeted by a large blast earlier on Friday on the road to the airport. Witnesses said two soldiers and a number of civilians were killed.

The United Nations also denounced the killing of several prominent Somalis over the past week, including a well-known radio journalist and the deputy minister for reconciliation.

"The perpetrators should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law," said Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the U.N.'s special envoy to Somalia. "The focus should now be moving toward peace and stability and addressing impunity."

AirTran apologizes for removing Muslim passengers

WASHINGTON – AirTran Airways apologized Friday to nine Muslims kicked off a New Year's Day flight to Florida after other passengers reported hearing a suspicious remark about airplane security. One of the passengers said the confusion started at Reagan National Airport just outside Washington, D.C., when he talked about the safest place to sit on an airplane.

Orlando, Fla.-based AirTran said in a statement that it refunded the passengers' air fare and planned to reimburse them for replacement tickets they bought on US Airways. AirTran also offered to take the passengers back to Washington free of charge.

"We apologize to all of the passengers — to the nine who had to undergo extensive interviews from the authorities and to the 95 who ultimately made the flight," the statement said. "Nobody on Flight 175 reached their destination on time on New Year's Day, and we regret it."

AirTran said the incident was a misunderstanding, but the steps taken were necessary.

Two U.S. Muslim advocacy groups, however, were critical of the airline's actions. The Muslim Public Affairs Council called on federal officials Friday to open an investigation. And the Council for American-Islamic Relations filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Transportation, saying "It is incumbent on any airline to ensure that members of the traveling public are not singled out or mistreated based on their perceived race, religion or national origin."

Bill Adams, a DOT spokesperson, said the department thoroughly investigates discrimination complaints but would not comment further.

One of the Muslim passengers, Atif Irfan, said the family probably would not fly home with AirTran because members had already booked tickets on another airline, but appreciated the apology.

"It's definitely nice to hear," he said.

Irfan said when he boarded the flight Thursday, he mentioned something to his wife and sister-in-law about having to sit in the back. His sister-in-law replied that she believed the back of the airplane was the safest, but Irfan believed it was better to be by the wings.

"She said, 'Yes, I guess it makes sense not to be close to the engine in case something happens,'" Irfan recalled Friday. "It was a very benign conversation."

Shortly after taking their seats, members of the group were approached by federal air marshals and taken off the plane, Irfan said. They stood in the jet bridge connected to the airport and answered questions while other passengers exited and glared at them.

Irfan said he thought he and the others were profiled because of their appearance. The men had beards and the women wore headscarves, traditional Muslim attire.

"My wife and I are generally very careful about what we say when we step on the plane," he said, adding that they have received suspicious looks in the past. "We're used to this sort of thing — but obviously not to this extent."

Irfan, 29, is a lawyer who lives in Alexandria, Va. He was traveling to a religious retreat in Florida with his wife, along with his brother and his family, including three children, ages 7, 4 and 2. They were joined by his brother's sister-in-law and a family friend.

Federal officials ordered the rest of the passengers from the plane and re-screened them before allowing the flight to depart about two hours behind schedule. The family and friend eventually made it to their destination on a US Airways flight.

Family members were upset that AirTran didn't allow them to book another flight. The airline said in a news release Friday that one of the passengers became irate, made inappropriate comments and had to be escorted away from a gate podium by local law enforcement.

"We felt very disrespected," Irfan said. He said FBI agents had cleared their names and asked AirTran to put them on another flight, but to no avail.

Christopher White, a federal Transportation Security Administration spokesman, said the security concern on the plane was handled appropriately.

White said the pilot, after being informed of the remarks, requested that two federal air marshals on board remove the nine passengers. TSA then alerted authorities, including the FBI, which conducted an investigation.

"Our role, basically, is to determine whether (those) in question pose a threat," FBI spokesman Bill Carter said.

He and White said that once authorities determined there was no security threat, it was up to the airline on how to proceed.

"If the pilot is uncomfortable with someone flying on their plane, that's their decision," White said.

Discount carrier AirTran Airways is a subsidiary of AirTran Holdings Inc. Its hub is in Atlanta.