Noli Irritare Leones

Janjaweed killed 30 in an ambush and then took some African Union investigators hostage

The United Nations said armed men ambushed the civilian truck transporting medicine and relief items between the towns of El Geneina and Sirba.

…

An international aid worker said the assailants were government-backed janjaweed _ members of an Arab tribal militia _ and that they attacked the convoy with rocket-propelled grenades, then executed survivors. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of restrictions the Sudanese government has placed on aid workers.

In Chad, the UN warns that refugees face a health and security crisis. The BBC reported heavy fighting in eastern Chad between government troops and rebels, with both sides claiming victory.

With the help of the French army, the government of the Central African Republic reports that it has taken again all the towns in northwestern CAR that had been seized by rebels. Also, South Africa has offered training to Central African Republic troops.

Sudan blogger news: Congratulations to Drima the Sudanese Thinker for being nominated for the 2006 Weblog Awards. Want to send Christmas cards to a peacekeeper in Darfur? Werner has posted his address and welcomes cards.

More background to the crisis:

Water: In US: Eating and drinking Africa, sokari of Black Looks has a lot more to say about climate change and water issues in Africa, which affect Sudan (desertification) as well as other parts of Africa in various ways:

One of the consequences of global warming is desertification and one of the worst hit countries in Africa is Somalia (also recently a dumping ground for nuclear waste) . But many other countries particular those bordering the Sahara savannah regions in West Africa and the Horn of Africa will suffer from severe drought, failed crops and floods. Access to water is a major issue through out Africa where privatisation of water supplies are adding to the lack of water availability on very basic levels in countries such as Nigeria, Kenya, Niger and South Africa to name just a few.

More (including lots of internal links that I didn’t reproduce).

Failed governments: Back in May 2006,

Foreign Policy magazine and a US-based think-tank, the Fund for Peace, ranked 146 nations by their viability to prepare the 2006 Failed States Index. 12 social, economic, and political indicators were used to arrive at the rankings. The ranking defines the term ‘failing state’ as: ‘a failing state is one in which the government does not have effective control of its territory, is not perceived as legitimate by a significant portion of its population, does not provide domestic security or basic public services to its citizens, and lacks a monopoly on the use of force. A failing state may experience active violence or simply be vulnerable to violence

Here’s the list of the 60 most vulnerable states. The top ten include Sudan and Chad. The Central African Republic is number 13. The troubled neighbor of the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, makes the top ten. (And, off the topic of Africa, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan make the top ten, so US foreign policy hasn’t been going tremendously well.)

Outside powers involved in Sudan, Chad, and the CAR: I’ve mentioned France. Another major player is Libya. While actively organizing mini-summits for African countries to discuss Darfur, Libya has opposed the use of UN troops in Darfur, arguing that the UN troops are a ploy for Western powers to gain control of Sudanese oil. Libya has been involved in the politics of both Chad and the Central African Republic in the past. Devilstower at the Daily Kos says that the current government of the CAR gained power in a coup backed by Libya, but I can’t confirm the part about Libyan backing from a reliable non-blog source (it’s definitely true that Bozize originally came to power in a coup in 2003). I did find, though, in a BBC country profile for the Central African Republic, that Libyan troops had been used to put down an earlier coup attempt in 2001.

Libya was at war with Chad for seven years starting in 1980. In this war, Idriss Deby, later to become president of Chad, distinguished himself by inflicting heavy losses on Libyan troops in Chad. However, when he later came to power, overthrowing then president Habre (who was reportedly himself no great friend to human rights, but that’s another story), Deby operated out of Sudan and benefited from Libyan backing.

More analysis: CAR: Staging ground for regional conflicts.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 11th, 2006 at 7:30 am and is filed under Africa news and blogwatch, Climate Change and Desertification, Darfur/Chad/Central African Republic. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.