World – Page 35 – The Speaker News Journal

Ethnic Massacre Kills 540 in Ethiopia

October 29, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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In Ethiopia’s western Gambella region, 540 people–mostly ethnic Amhara–were killed during a massacre that began in the town of Meti, Godere Zone.

The massacre took place September 10, and was not reported until Voice of America’s (VOA) Amharic Service covered the killings last week.

The massacre began after the Ethiopian government began to forcefully evict Mezenger people from their ancestral land as part of a plan to redistribute the land to recently retired TPLF Generals.

In the government program, the land is handed over to the retired servicemen for “investment” purposes. The effect of the plan has included an illegal campaign of selling lands, accompanied by the arrival of hundreds of “Tirgrayans’ as ‘workers’ for the TPLF land developers.

By Day Blakely Donaldson

Ethnically Targeted Violence in Ethiopia Uncovered by Amnesty International

November 3, 2014October 29, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

ethiopia, oromo, oromos, human rights, ethiopia oromos, ethiopia oromo human rights, ethiopia human rights violations, amnesty international ethiopia, claire beston, ethnic violence ethiopia

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The government of Ethiopia is guilty of ethnically targeted human rights violations, according to Amnesty International. The violence is directed against Ethiopia’s largest minority group, the Oromos, and is motivated by political fear. Thousands have been tortured, according the Amnesty’s report.

Amnesty based its report on 200 testimonies gathered in Ethiopia. “We interviewed former detainees with missing fingers, ears and teeth, damaged eyes and scars on every part of their body due to beating, burning and stabbing–all of which they said were the result of torture,” said Claire Beston, Amnesty International’s Ethiopia researcher.

The testimonies included extensive reports of torture and abuse, including prolonged detainment, detainment without charge, detention in unofficial military camps, mutilation using bayonets, hot coals, and hanging by wrists. Beatings, electric shocks, mock executions, burning with metal or molten plastic, rape and gang rape were common abuses reported.

The reason for the targeted abuse, according to Amnesty, is political. The government fears political opposition, stemming particularly from the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF), a regional armed group. Ethiopia will hold general elections in 2015, and Amnesty expects human rights abuses will continue or increase.

“The Ethiopian government’s relentless crackdown on real or imagined dissent among the Oromo is sweeping in its scale and often shocking in its brutality,” said Beston.

“This is apparently intended to warn, control or silence all signs of ‘political disobedience’ in the region.”

Numerous reports detailed arrests without cause or with only suspicion, arrests without charge or without trial, and arrests and retribution against uninvolved family members.

“People are arrested for the most tenuous of reasons: organizing a student cultural group, because their father had previously been suspected of supporting the OLF or because they delivered the baby of the wife of a suspected OLF member. Frequently, it’s because they refused to join the ruling party,” said Beston.

In April and May 2014, ethnic conflict in Ethiopia received international attention after security forces opened fire during a series of peaceful protests, and beat hundreds of protesters and bystanders. Dozens died and thousands were injured.

“These incidents were far from being unprecedented in Oromi,” said Beston. “They were merely the latest and bloodiest in a long pattern of suppression. However, much of the time, the situation in Oromia goes unreported.”

Approximately 5,000 ethnic Oromos have been arrested between 2011 and 2014 for political reasons, according to Amnesty.

Amnesty stated that it believed there was an urgent need for intervention in Ethiopia by regional and international humanitarian organizations that could conduct independent investigations into human rights abuse allegations in Oromia.

“The Ethiopian government must end the shameful targeting of thousands of Oromos based only on their actual or suspected political opinion. It must cease its use of detention without charge, torture and ill-treatment, incommunicado detention, enforced disappearance and unlawful killings to muzzle actual or suspected dissent,” said Beston.

Amnesty’s report, “‘Because I am Oromo’ – Sweeping repression in the Oromia region of Ethiopia,” was published on the Amnesty International website in late October.

By Day Blakely Donaldson

Photo: Rod Waddington

Russian Rocket Launch, Bound for International Space Station, Successful

October 29, 2014October 29, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

Russia Rocket Launch, Bound for International Space Station, Successful

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Russia launched a Progress 57 Cargo Ship from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan Wednesday, bound for the International Space Station. The ship was launched just three hours after the failed launch of the American rocket Antares, which exploded over Wallops Island, Virginia. The Russian ship is expected to rendezvous with the International Space Station later Wednesday.

The Russian ship, a Progress M-25M space freighter, was launched on a Soyuz-2.1a from Baikonur space center Wednesday, according to Russian space agency Roscosmos.

“The launch was made at 10:10 AM Moscow time, Wednesday. All pre-launch operations and the launch of the space freighter by a new rocket were conducted as scheduled,” said Roscosmos.

The successful launch took place just three hours after the failed launch of the American Cygnus commercial cargo carrier Antares, which exploded after crashing back into the ground in Wallops Island, Virginia.

The Progress M-25M is expected to dock with the space station’s Pirs docking compartment exactly six hours after liftoff.

The Progress is carrying almost 5,200 pounds of food, fuel and supplies for the six-person International Space Station crew, including 1,322 pounds of fuel, over 100 pounds of oxygen, 925 pounds of fresh water, and 2,828 pounds of dry cargo.

Wednesday’s launch was Russia’s first using a Soyuz-2.1a rocket. Previous space freighters were launched atop Soyuz-U rockets. The 2.1a is a modernized version of the older launcher, and uses updated electronics, a digital flight control system, and is capable of lofting 300 more kilograms (660 pounds) to the International Space Station’s orbit, according to Roscosmos.

The upgraded rocket also uses less foreign parts than the Soyuz-U, which depended more heavily on components from Ukraine.

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Day Blakely Donaldson

Images: NASA

Cholera Outbreak on the Rise in Western Africa

January 26, 2021October 28, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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The Western African nation of Niger is experiencing an outbreak of cholera. To date, 51 people have died of the disease this year–deaths are on the rise, with 38 deaths taking place in September alone.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) reported that 1,300 people have been infected with cholera so far this year in Niger. The high rate of infection has been caused in part by the heavy flooding which has existed in Niger since June.

The outbreak involves four of Niger’s eight regions, and UNOCHA is taking steps to contain the illness and prevent it from appearing in new places, according to officials.

Cholera is a food- and water-borne disease, like salmonella, polio, hepatitis A, e. coli, and transmissible spongiform enephalopathies–although cholera is a particularly aggressive infection–and is prevalent in Asia, Africa and South America.

The ingestion of food or drink contaminated with human waste is the common means of cholera transmission. Symptoms include diarrhoea and dehydration, and death can result within 24 hours if the disease remains untreated.

The world is currently experiencing its seventh recorded cholera pandemic. Each has been devastating.

There are currently 100 active strains of cholera in the world, which makes development of an effective vaccine difficult, as each vaccine can only target one version of the bacterium.

The current outbreak in Niger involves the special concern of 105,000 refugees from Boko Haram and the Nigerian army have settled in Diffa, southeastern Niger. Many of these refugees have settled on the islands of Lake Chad where there is limited access to drinking water and hygiene and sanitation are precarious.

Photos: Oxfam East Africa, barth1003, mashroms

China to Send 100,000 Troops to Xinjiang – Rights Group

November 23, 2014October 26, 2014 by Daniel Jackson

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China is expected to send 100,000 troops into its restless western province of Xinjiang to reinforce the People’s Armed Police force already there, according to a Hong Kong based rights group. Hundreds of people have died in recent months in Xinjiang’s ethnic unrest.

The Chinese Communist Party’s 18th Congress discussed a number of problems facing the government in its ongoing Fourth Plenary Session. The problems were both internal and external, and included the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong, problems associated with the ouster of former security chief Zhou Yongkang, and the recent ethnic violence in the western province of Xinjiang.

Several bomb attacks and riots have left hundreds dead in Xinjiang over recent months.

According to Hong-Kong based Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy, the Chinese government is to deploy 100,000 troops to Xinjiang to assist local police already there.

The decision to send the troops is expected to be made at the ongoing Forth Plenary Session.

By Daniel Jackson

Photo: Andrew An

Mullah Jailed 20 Years for Raping Child

October 26, 2014October 26, 2014 by Sid Douglas

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A twenty-year sentence has been handed down to a mullah in an Afghan court. The man was found guilty of raping a 10-year-old girl known as Brishna. The girl has faced death threats from her community in the wake of her bringing suit against the man.

A Kabul judge handed down the sentence Saturday, hailed as a rare victory for women’s rights by support groups.

Hassina Sarwari, who runs a women’s shelter in Brishna’s province, said that the decision would most likely have been different except that the trial had been transferred from the girl’s village to Kabul.

Rape is often viewed as adultery in Afghanistan, where rape victims have been jailed themselves.

Brishna was violently raped last May in the village of Kunduz, Kunduz province.

While recovering in hospital, community members threatened her and her family, speaking of killing Brishna and dumping her in the river.

The threats of “honor killing” continued when Brishna was removed from the shelter by police and returned to her family.

Sarwani was also threatened by members of the girl’s family and powerful community members. She faces threats of “honor killing” for protecting Brishna.

By Sid Douglas
Photo: isafmedia

World Bank-Backed Corps and Small-Scale Fishers Fight Over Fishing Rights

October 26, 2014October 25, 2014 by Sid Douglas

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Enclosures of water are being dispossessed from small-scale markets in a rising trend of so-called “ocean grabbing,” according to a recent report by Transnational Institute (TNI) and Afrika Kontakt. Claiming that seas and shores must be taken from common fisher people in order to preserve sustainability, the World Bank is backing corporate interests and a rise in large-scale aqua-industry market-based fishing policies.

“Ocean grabbing is occurring in varied ways,” stated TNI in their report. “One common denominator is the exclusion of small-scale fishers from access to fisheries and other natural resources and access to markets through the adoption or reinterpretation of laws, regulations or policies affecting fisheries governance.”

“Throughout the world, legal frameworks are emerging that undermine the position of small-scale fisheries producers and systems, while strengthening or reinforcing the position of corporate actors and other powerful players. Such ‘perfectly legal’ reallocation processes may or may not involve coercion and violence, but are far from being considered as socially legitimate. They typically involve three types of mechanisms.”

Some key examples offered by the report were used to illustrate the variety of ways in which common access to fishing was being blocked. Luxury beach-resorts occupying long swathes of coastal land, destruction of mangrove areas for purposes of promoting export-oriented shrimp farms, and the rise of Rights Based Fishery (RBF) policies were some of the “technically legal” ways listed by which fisher people were dispossessed or their waters were destroyed in Sri Lanka, Ecuador, Europe, Canada and elsewhere.

The World Bank enabled “ocean grabbing” through legal frameworks such as its Global Partnership for Oceans (GPO), the report found. GPO enabled the spread of private property rights over the ocean’s fish resources, and was justified by the lack of economic and environmental “sustainability” in the world’s fisheries.

Growing populations around the world are placing stress on fish resources, according to the justification for GPO. For example, in South Africa, access to fish was curtailed for over 60,000 fisher people when a similar privatization program was passed.

The numbers of fisher people wanting access to water resources worldwide is in the billions.

“FAO estimates that 58 million people are engaged in the actual fishing and harvesting in wild-capture fisheries and aquaculture, and that more than 800 million people worldwide depend on fisheries in various ways,” stated TNI. “In addition to these figures, a large number of rural peasants and other people working in rural areas also depend on fishing as a supplement to their main livelihoods.”

By Sid Douglas

Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis Rising to Global Threat – WHO

January 26, 2021October 25, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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Tuberculosis is a disease that is seldom heard about these days, but the WHO and MSF have said that forms of TB known as multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) have risen to the level of a global threat. TB is already carried in a latent form in approximately one-third of the global population, and MDR-TB is increasingly the form that is being passed from person to person. Additionally, an even more dangerous form of the disease–extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB)–has been reported in 100 countries.

Tuberculosis has faded into the background of threatening diseases in the West. It saw renewed interest in 1991 when MDR-TB became epidemic in New York–nearly one-fifth of cases did not respond to treatment. That epidemic cost over $1 billion and several years of effort to bring under control.

Today in the US only 1.4 percent of an annual 9,500 TB cases are drug resistant, but the threat remains, according to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) global TB program director, Dr Mario Raviglione.

“They believe that TB is an extinct disease,” Raviglione said of the threat. “I don’t know why.”

WHO released a report this month that reported that nine million people became sick with TB in 2013–half a million more than previously thought. Of these, 3.5 percent of new cases were drug resistant.

“In many settings around the world the treatment success rate is alarmingly low,” WHO stated. “Furthermore, extensively drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB), which is even more expensive and difficult to treat than MDR-TB, has now been reported in 100 countries.”

Some countries currently have very high rates of MDR-TB. Belarus, for example, has a rate of 35 percent.

It is estimated that one-third of the global population harbors TB bacteria, but most are not aware that they carry the latent disease. The virus, however, continues to transmit to others while in its latent phase.

When TB enters its active phase–commonly when a person’s immune system is lowered–it becomes dangerous.

Children can be protected from TB–even its worst forms–by a widely distributed vaccine. Adults are usually protected by the same vaccine.

DR-TB is treatable, but the treatment requires long, expensive, painful side-effects to the antibiotics, including psychosis, deafness and constant nausea. The treatment takes around two years, and 50 percent of patients die. When it comes to XDR-TB, 80 percent of patients die.

Drug resistant TB is created by humans. Incomplete treatment allows the TB to adapt to antibiotics. When a person develops DR-TB they pass that form of TB on to others.

Of the TB cases that have been documented by the WHO worldwide, 3.5 percent are DR-TB cases passed on from people who have DR-TB.

“We think that drug-resistant TB is really becoming an epidemic in its own right,” said Dr. Grania Brigden, TB adviser for Médecins Sans Frontieres (MSF).

Photos: Gates Foundation and Microbe World

Cambodian Land Grabbing Is “Crime Against Humanity” – British Lawyer Files with International Court

October 26, 2014October 25, 2014 by Sid Douglas

Evicted: Borei Keila and Cambodian Land Grabbing.

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Cambodian land-grabbing constitutes a “crime against humanity,” British lawyer Richard Rogers has told the International Criminal Court (ICC). The lawyer is officially representing 10 Cambodian victims of the alleged abuse in the suit.

“I am confident,” said Rogers, who is a member of the Global Diligence LLP as well as the Cambodian Nation Rescue Party’s (CNRP) international counsel. “The law is very clear.”

Rogers has filed for the International Criminal Court to investigate a wave of violent land-grabbing in Cambodia which has displaced approximately 770,000 people. The land grab has been carried out by Cambodia’s ruling elite, Rogers alleges, and constitutes a crime against humanity.

The land grab has been “widespread and systematic” over the past 14 years, Rogers has stated. The elite classes have perpetuated mass rights violations in pursuit of wealth and power, “include murder, forcible transfer of populations, illegal imprisonment, persecution and other inhumane acts,” according to Rogers, who says that the acts amount to international crimes.

The elite has accomplished the land grab by exploiting land tenure insecurity in post-war Cambodia (particularly when the Khmer Rouge abolished land titles) and exploiting a corruptible judiciary and state security forces.

“The question for the ICC is, at what point do these types of human rights violations become so grave that (when taken together) they amount to an international crime and meet the gravity threshold? Do we wait until 5 percent of the population has been affected, or 10 percent?” Rogers said.

“The communication contends that senior members of the Cambodian government, its security forces, and government-connected business leaders carried out an attack on the civilian population with the twin objectives of self-enrichment and preservation of power at all costs.”

Individual perpetrators are not specifically indicated in the complaint, but it does recommend that court prosecutors investigate the role played by specific police and military units involved in evictions. “Deportation or forcible transfer of populations” falls under the ICC’s definition of crimes against humanity, Rogers has pointed out.

Approximately 770,000 people–6% of the Cambodian population –have felt the effects of land grabbing since the year 2000, according to Rogers’s evidence.

More than 145,000 people have been forcibly relocated from Phnom Penh.

Dissent and criticism have also been silenced through human rights abuses, Rogers contends. Lawyers, activists, journalists, unionists and opposition members have been silenced through threats and violence in order to protect the interests of the ruling elite.

“I am confident that the ICC will initiate a preliminary examination. The law on this is very clear. The definition of crimes against humanity does not require an armed conflict.” Rogers said.

The actions of land grabbers in Cambodia represent “widespread and systematic attack against the civilian population” and are “pursuant to state policy”, according to Rogers’s complaint.

Cambodian officials are attempting to discredit Rogers’s claims.

Government spokesman Phay Siphann called the complaint “a joke”–the complaint was not only exaggerated, but politically motivated as well, Siphon stated.

“It’s polarised by politics. We might know who sponsors or who pays money for him and who belongs to whom. I understand [opposition deputy leader] Kem Sokha’s daughter is also involved in the complaint… It was [started] during the [post-election] campaign and related to the political deadlock.”

CNRP spokesman Yim Sovann countered Siphan’s criticisms, stated that although Rogers was CNRP counsel, the complaint was not politically motivated.

“Because Cambodian courts have proved unwilling and unable to deal fairly with human rights violations raised in the ICC complaint,” said Sovann, “we support the request for an investigation by the ICC prosecutor.”

By Sid Douglas

Photo: Luc Forsyth

New Cash Transfer Program to Send 73,000 African Girls to School Over Next Two Years – UNICEF

January 26, 2021October 24, 2014 by The Speaker Editors

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A new UNICEF program is helping tens of thousands of African girls to get an education. The initiative is a cash transfer program–the most effective type of program in promoting development that includes the poor, according to UNICEF officials, and the current phase of the program will help send 73,000 girls to school over the next two years.

“There is substantial evidence from around the world that investing in girls’ education has the highest economic rate of return of any kind of intervention a government can implement,” said Michael Samson, Director of Research at the South Africa–based Economic Policy Research Institute, which is collaborating with UNICEF on the project.

“The idea that girls should not go to school belongs to the past,” said a Nigerian father of three school age daughters who were forced to leave school when the family’s economic ability decreased and books, uniforms and other costs became unaffordable.

His three daughters are now back in school under the UNICEF program. “I am now the happiest man in the world,” said Umar.

“With education, my daughters will not be a liability to their husbands. They will be earning money, and they will not be relegated to the background,” said Atika Adamu, a mother of 12- and 13-year-old daughters who are also now attending school under the new program.

Under the UNICEF Girls’ Education Programme (GEP), Nigerian parents receive quarterly payments of 5,000 naira ($US31) for each girl to help cover costs associated with sending the girls to school.

GEP is funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID).

“This kind of programme is among the most effective in promoting pro-poor, inclusive development,” said Samson.

“This intervention is part of what the Nigeria at the state and federal levels is trying to do in terms of setting up a full social protection system, so that people can lead a life of dignity and opportunity,” said Enrique Delamonica, who heads UNICEF Nigeria’s Social Policy and Gender Equality unit.

Under GEP, 23,000 girls will be helped to attend school in the Sokoto and Niger states of Nigeria this year, and next year another 50,000 will be helped.

The program is expected to be expanded to reach other states of Nigeria.

Improvements in the education of girls has been found to be one of the most important factors in improving economic rates. Evidence has also shown that educated girls more frequently grow up to have healthier children and contribute more to their family’s income.

Photo: Pierre Holtz for UNICEF

Deforestation Now Driven by “Globalization and Commercialization” – Report

October 24, 2014 by Sid Douglas

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The nature of deforestation has changed dramatically in recent years, according to a new study by Chalmers University Scientists. Deforestation today is driven by globalization and commercialization to a large and increasing degree–international trade is contributing to deforestation through a demand for beef, soy, palm oil and timber.

“From having been caused mainly by smallholders and production for local markets, an increasing share of deforestation today is driven by large-scale agricultural production for international markets,” said Martin Persson, lead researcher on the study.

Persson’s team looked at seven major deforestation case countries–Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay, Indonesia, Malaysia and Papua New Guinea–and found that one-third to one-half of deforestation could be attributed to overseas trade.

Deforestation Now Driven by Globalization and Commercialization, Deforestation, Globalization, Commercialization, rain forests — Martin Persson

“More than a third of global deforestation can be tied to rising production of beef, soy, palm oil and wood products,” said Persson. “If we exclude Brazilian beef production, which is mainly destined for domestic markets, more than half of deforestation in our case countries is driven by international demand.”

“The trend is clear, the drivers of deforestation have been globalized and commercialized.”

The study was commissioned by the Center for Global Development (CGD) and was completed by Martin Persson of Chalmers University of Technology and colleagues in Linkoping, Sweden, and Vienna, Austria.

In addition to their findings about market trends, the research team found that 1.7 billion tons of carbon dioxide emissions could be linked to production of the commodities analyzed in the study–and one-third of that amount was due to commodity exports.

The research also found trends in the response of companies to the negative publicity associated with deforestation.

“Another key trend is that more and more corporations have pledged to rid their supply chains from deforestation,” said Persson. “Pushed by environmental organizations and seeing the risks of being associated with environmental destruction, companies like Unilever and McDonalds are pressuring their suppliers to stop expanding production on forest land.”

The countries on the receiving end of the commodities produced through deforestation were China and EU nations. It was not enough, Persson said, to blame the nations in which deforestation occurs.

“Today both public and private consumers, be it individuals or corporations, have the possibility to contribute to the protection of tropical forests by holding suppliers accountable for the environmental impacts of their production,” Persson concluded.

By Sid Douglas

Photo: gillyan9

1,000 Malaria Cases This Week in Yei, South Sudan

October 24, 2014October 24, 2014 by Sid Douglas

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Over 1,000 cases of Malaria have been diagnosed in Yei River County, Central Equatoria State, South Sudan this week.

“In total those who are registered on OPD we have is one thousand eighty three cases of malaria, and among these cases we have four hundred and fifty four under five, with three dead which means these cases are increasing weekly,” said County Disease Surveillance Officer Michael Lugala.

Three children among the new cases have died.

Reasons for the increase in cases were attributed by Lugula to limited access to mosquito nets and dirty conditions in an interview with South Sudan’s Eye Radio.

Mosquito nets should be made available to residents by health partners and the State Ministry of Health, and living environments should be kept cleaner, Lugula advised.

Mosquito nets, which cost a couple of dollars and last a few years, are the most effective means of preventing malaria is sleeping under a mosquito net, specifically long-lasting insecticide treated nets (LLIN).

It is estimated that for every 50-250 nets that are put over the beds of people in malaria-prone areas, one child is saved from death.

The malaria organization Against Malaria has stated that “Mosquito’s typically bite between 10 o’clock at night and two in the morning – and that’s one of the most important things we have on our side: if we can protect people in affected areas when they sleep at night we have a very good chance of preventing them contracting malaria.”

Each net costs about $3, lasts for 3-4 years, and protects, on average, two people.

The statistics are well known given the scale of the problem. Every 50-250 nets we put over heads and beds, one child doesn’t die.

By Sid Douglas