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Trente-huit membres de Boko Haram ont été tués et deux soldats ont été blessés, au cours "d'opérations de ratissage" menées cette semaine par les militaires du Niger et du Tchad, dans la

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La candidate à la présidentielle de 2017 réunit ses soutiens ce week-end à Fréjus pour tracer les lignes programmatiques de sa campagne et mettre ses troupes en ordre de bataille.

Il est jugé en Russie pour des accusations d'actes à caractère sexuel sur sa propre fille. Sa famille dénonce « des accusations montées de toutes pièces ». Yoann Barbereau, le directeur de l'Alliance française d'Irkoutsk, en Sibérie, a disparu : c'est ce qu'ont annoncé vendredi 16 septembre les autorités russes. Il était assigné à résidence depuis avril.

Amma Asante on bringing to the big screen the story of an African prince's controversial marriage to a white English woman in the 1940s.

Suite aux attaques à Toumour et Gueskérou en début de semaine, des opérations de ratissage sont effectuées par les armées nigérienne et tchadienne.

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Un collectif de 15 ONG ivoiriennes et internationales a appelé au report du référendum sur la n

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Des combattants islamistes shebab ont pris le contrôle vendredi d'une ville somalienne proche du Kenya après avoir attaqué sa base militair

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September 16, 2016 (JUBA) - South Sudan's President, Salva Kiir, has extended an official invitation to the president of South Africa, Jacob Zuma, expressing willingness to implement the collapsing peace agreement which he signed with his former first deputy, Riek Machar, in August last year.

South Africa's President Jacob Zuma (R) shakes hands with the visiting South Sudanese President Salva Kiir at his office in Pretoria on 24 October 2015 (Photo Moses Lomayat)

South Africa is one of the countries in the continent which played a supportive role to the regional led mediation to reunite fragmented ruling party in South Sudan, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), and to end the 21 months of civil war.

The invitation was delivered by the new First Vice President, Taban Deng Gai, who went to South Africa last week in an attempt to solicit support from the South African government and its ruling African national congress (ANC).

The support-seeking mission was based on the promise to implement the agreement and Arusha reunification of the SPLM.

The newly appointed Minister of Petroleum, Ezekiel Lol Gatkuoth, who acted as spokesperson during the visit to South Sudan, told reporters on Thursday upon arrival at Juba airport that the visit to South Africa was to discuss bilateral issues between the two countries and solicit recognition of the controversial leadership of the new vice president, Gai, who replaced Machar in July.

He said the South African president has accepted the invitation from president Kiir to discuss bilateral issues in Juba.

"The invitation has been accepted and President Zuma will be visiting South Sudan soon to show solidarity with the people of South Sudan and also the implementation of the agreement and all the bilateral issues," announced Gatkuoth.

He said Gai, while in South Africa, met his South African counterpart, Cyril Ramaphosa, to deliver an invitation from President Kiir to Jacob Zuma.

South Africa, he said, has been training South Sudanese on state and national administration and project implementation and still wants to continue with these trainings as part of its support to the young country.

(ST)

September 16, 2016 (KHARTOUM) - Three students were killed and two others injured on Thursday by armed groups in the locality of Kass, 86 km west of South Darfur capital, Nyala.

Hundreds of the victims' relatives have traced the perpetrators while the state's security committee held an emergency meeting to take the legal measures to bring the culprits to justice.

A traditional administration leader in the locality of Kass, who spoke to Sudan Tribune on the condition of anonymity, said 3 armed groups have deliberately shot 5 high schools students in Diginj area, 15 km south of Kass, pointing that 3 of them died immediately and 2 others sustained serious wounds and were transferred to Nyala Teaching Hospital.

He added the students were spending Eid al-Adha vacation with their families.
The same source pointed that the killing incident was carried out by armed groups who have seized homes and lands of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Shattaya area, stressing the same groups had threatened to obstruct the peace and social coexistence conference which was recently held in the area.

“The armed groups have bluntly said they don't recognize the Shattaya conference even if [its recommendations] are signed by the President of the republic” said the source.

He pointed the negative activities of the armed groups have significantly increased following the signing of the social and peaceful conference recommendations in clear defiance of the state government.

The same source said they submitted a formal complaint to the governor's office in Nyala demanding him to put an end to the outlaws who prevent the return of the IDPs to their original villages and undermine security, stressing the need to deploy troops to protect the residents according to the recommendations of the Shattaya conference.

Last August, the Shattaya conference for peaceful coexistence was held under the auspices of the Sudanese Presidency in order to encourage voluntary return of the IDPs in South Darfur.

The conference called for the need to end control of the armed militias and new settlers and hand over lands and villages to the IDPs.

On Wednesday, Governor of South Darfur state Adam al-Faki said that arrangements are underway for the visit of President Omer al-Bashir to the locality of Shattaya to attend the social peace conference.

Al-Faki pointed that 113 IDPs have received their original homes and lands in the locality of Shattaya, vowing to reinstate all residents' rights in the locality.

He accused those who seek to achieve personal interests of obstructing peace efforts, stressing they would deal with them decisively.

UN agencies estimate that over 300,000 people were killed in Darfur conflict since 2003, and over 2.5 million were displaced.

(ST)

September 16, 2016 (JUBA) – Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning in South Sudan has introduced new measures which restrict medical referrals abroad due to the ongoing economic crisis in the young country.

South Sudan minister Stephen Dhieu Dau (Getty photo)

Minister of Finance, Stephen Dhieu Dau, in an order issued on Wednesday, said there is no budget allocated for medical referrals this year. He said any claims of payment for the referrals has therefore been cancelled.

“All requests for payments and claims from all public institutions, meant for treatment of public officials outside the country are hereby cancelled by this order until the approval of 2016/2017 Financial Year Budget,” Minister Dau wrote in the statement dated 14 September.

“Any public institution or agency that intends to budget for medical referrals must also be done in controlled and verifiably admissible cases,” he further directed in the order seen by Sudan Tribune.

The country has been spending hundreds of thousands of US dollars every year to refer abroad some of its officials for medical treatments. The new order instead suggested the need to improve on the existing hospitals in the country which can be used for the referrals instead of to abroad.

Dau said the ministry together with the ministry of health were working on mechanisms for future referrals.

It remains unclear how the country, hit by economic crisis, plans to secure funds for upgrading of the existing poorly equipped hospitals.

(ST)

September 16, 2016 (KHARTOUM) - The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on Friday said the number of South Sudanese refugees living in neighbouring countries “has this week passed the one million mark”.

South Sudanese refugees perform a traditional dance as President Omer Hassan al-Bashir addresses a crowd a rally held in Ed Daein, East Darfur, April 5, 2016. April 5, 2016. (Photo Reuters/Mohamed Nureldin Abdallah)

UNHCR spokesperson Leo Dobbs told reporters in Geneva on Friday that South Sudan, with this milestone, joins Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia as countries which have produced more than a million refugees.

“Most of those fleeing South Sudan are women and children. They include survivors of violent attacks, sexual assault, children that have been separated from their parents or travelled alone, the disabled, the elderly and people in need of urgent medical care,” he said.

According to the UNCHR, more than 185,000 people have fled South Sudan since fresh violence erupted in the country in Juba on July 8.

Dobbs noted that “more than three quarters of the recent arrivals have crossed into Uganda, but a growing number of people have entered Ethiopia's western Gambella region in the past week and others have been heading to Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Central African Republic (CAR)”.

According to the UNHCR, “Uganda is hosting the lion's share of South Sudanese refugees, with 373,626, more than a third of them arriving since early July. They keep coming; over the past week more than 20,000 new arrivals were recorded, primarily through the Oraba crossing in the northwest”.

SUDAN SAYS RECEIVED HALF OF SOUTH SUDAN'S REFUGEES

Meanwhile, Sudan's refugee commission has put the number of South Sudanese refugees who arrived in Sudan at 500,000, saying most of them are living in the White Nile, East Darfur, West and South Kordofan states.

The Sudanese Red Crescent Society (SRCS) on Friday said that 82,000 South Sudanese refugees have arrived in the gathering points in the localities of Al-Gabalain and Al-Salam since 2014.

SRCS executive director Osama Osman Talha pointed that 40 to 50 South Sudanese families arrive in Sudan daily through three crossing points in the White Nile state including Al-Migaines, Al-Kowaik and Joddah.

He added the refugees are received at eight gathering points, stressing the health conditions in these points are stable.

Talha further said that government organs, UN agencies and civil society groups provide all food and health services for the refugees.

In December 2013, Sudan's President Omer al-Bashir decided to treat South Sudanese refugees as citizens and refused establishing refugee camps for them, saying they can live and work all over Sudan.

However, earlier this month, Sudan decided to treat South Sudanese that fled the conflict in their country as refugees, enabling United Nations to provide assistance and raise funds for aid operations.

(ST)

September 16, 2016 (JUBA) – The top leadership of the armed opposition faction of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM-IO) under the leadership of the former First Vice President, Riek Machar, will meet in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, in the next few days, opposition officials have confirmed.

South Sudan's former FVP Riek Machar, speaking to visitors at his residence in Khartoum, on 1 September 2016 (courtesy photo of SPLM-IO)

“Yes, our leadership will meet in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum. It will take place in the next few days,” confirmed James Gatdet Dak, opposition leader's spokesperson.

The gathering will be the first since 8 July when fighting erupted in the South Sudan's capital, Juba, between forces loyal to President Salva Kiir and bodyguards of Machar.

Dak said the meeting will review the situation following the violence “which was ordered by Salva Kiir in an attempt to kill Dr. Riek Machar.”

The renewed war has threatened the collapse of the peace deal signed in August 2015 to end 21 months of the civil war that started in December 2013.

The opposition leader's spokesman said members of the political bureau and the national liberation council of the SPLM-IO have travelled from Juba, Kampala, Nairobi and Addis Ababa to take part in the Khartoum's consultative meeting.

He said the meeting may begin on Sunday or Monday.

Machar was transferred to Khartoum from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) after he was extracted by the United Nations at the South Sudan-DRC border.

He fled Juba during the July fighting and walked for 40 days to the neighbouring nation.

He was hospitalized in both DRC and Khartoum on "humanitarian grounds" due to swollen legs and extreme exhaustion.

His health has however stabilized and has been released from hospital weeks ago.

(ST)

Challenge: How to detect and map deep-sea ore bodies using autonomous underwater vehicles Idea: Use small AUVs working in coordinated packs. And the target? Commercially viable deposits of what geologists call sulphide deposits or, more precisely, ‘volcanic-associated massive sulphide’ deposits. Incidentally, the ‘massive’ in VMS does not necessarily mean big, but formless and rich in metals.

• Lire la suite de AUVs to pack-hunt for seabed ore bodies

On October 3rd and 4th 2016 in the city of Nantes, the best international experts will share their work at the Symposium Human Sea & Marisk, taking into account the latest scientific and technological progress in terms of maritime and port safety and security. Will be discussed the issues of security management, protection of offshore wind farms, IT security of ports, ships and offshore platforms...

• Lire la suite de Human Sea & Marisk: high level speakers have confirmed their participation

Az EU27-ek pozsonyi informális találkozója után egyes vezetők köntörfalazás nélkül hozták a brit kormány tudomására, hogy szó sem lehet az európai munkavállalók jogainak korlátozásáról, ha Nagy-Britannia hozzáférést akar a belső piachoz.

La ville de Berlin, une des 16 régions allemandes, sera sans doute lors des élections de dimanche le dixième Land où sera représentée l'Alternative pour l'Allemagne (AfD), un parti populiste de droite fondé il y a trois ans. Face à ce qu'il considère comme un danger, le maire sortant, un social-démocrate à la tête d'une grande coalition droite/gauche, a rappelé le passé nazi de son pays pour dissuader les électeurs de se laisser séduire par le nouveau parti. Un argument-choc qui a provoqué des réactions.

Az EU27-ek pénteki pozsonyi informális találkozójukon megállapodtak, hogy új fejezetet nyitnak és fél éven belül konkrét eredményeket próbálnak felmutatni a migrációs kihívás, a belbiztonság javítása, a védelmi politika, a beruházások és a fiatalok esélyeinek javítása terén. Merkel kancellár célzott rá, hogy nem fognak többségi szavazást kikényszeríteni a menekültek elosztásáról.

By Eric Reeves

In both the 2004 and 2008 presidential campaigns, the Darfur region of western Sudan was an unlikely but entirely appropriate topic. After all, the U.S. Congress had—in a remarkable bipartisan, bicameral vote in July 2004—declared that what was occurring in Darfur at the hands of the Khartoum regime was “genocide.” So too did President George W. Bush, as did then-Secretary of State Colin Powell in a speech to the UN, citing a detailed and rigorous assessment by a nongovernmental human rights groups. The 2004 campaign of then-Senator John Kerry asked me to vet closely their own statement on Darfur.

In 2008 candidate Obama's campaign made much of Darfur and the continuing rape, slaughter, and displacement of civilians belonging to Darfur's African (non-Arab) tribal groups, a brutal counter-insurgency campaign conducted by Khartoum's regular and militia forces. At one moment in his campaign, Obama declared that Darfur was a “stain on our souls,” and vowed that as president, he did not “intend to abandon people or turn a blind eye to slaughter.” Candidate Hillary Clinton in 2008 also made strong statements about genocide in Darfur, and the issue actually emerged in one question posed in the final presidential debates of that year between John McCain and Obama.

In the campaign of 2016 there has been no mention of Darfur, hardly surprising for Donald Trump, given his vast deficit in knowledge of foreign policy issues. But there is nothing on the Clinton website, no public statement, no indication that she understands the current realities in Darfur are every bit as bad as when she was making her own unctuous declarations in 2008.

There are two reasons for this. The Darfur civil society movement in this country—as remarkable as any since the time of apartheid-era South Africa—had largely disappeared by the 2008 – 2009. The reasons for this are many, but central was the decision by the Obama administration to “de-couple” Darfur from the key bilateral issues between Washington and Khartoum, namely (1) the U.S. intelligence community's desire for counter-terrorism from a regime that remains one of three countries on the State Department's annual list of “State Sponsors of Terrorism”; (2) Khartoum's desperate desire to be removed from that list and to see the lifting of comprehensive economic sanctions first imposed during the presidency of Bill Clinton.

“De-couple” is not my word choice: it is that of a “senior administration official” referred to as such in a background interview given in November 2010 (for which there is an official State Department transcript). And though articulated explicitly only two years after Obama's election, it reflected policy priorities articulated by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Obama's first, disastrous choice for the role of Special Envoy for Sudan, Air Force Major-General (ret.) Scott Gration.

Gration had no diplomatic experience, no significant knowledge of Sudan or its history, or any relevant language other than English. His policy views were animated by the absurdly naïve belief, as reported by the Washington Post, that a regime of hardened génocidaires could be appealed to with “cookies”: “We've got to think about giving out cookies… Kids, countries—they react to gold stars, smiley faces, handshakes, agreements, talk, engagement."

Obama's Sudan policies have ensured that there is little interest in Darfur within his administration that is not guided by the lust for counter-terrorism intelligence. And yet the carnage continues, indeed has escalated significantly over the past four years, culminating this year in a savage assault on the civilians in the last rebel redoubt in the Jebel Marra mountains of central Darfur.

Reports from the past thirteen years of ethnically-targeted conflict strongly suggest that in excess of 500,000 people have been killed, directly or indirectly, by violence; more than 3 million Darfuris have been displaced from their homes—some 300,000 as refugees in the harsh environs of neighboring eastern Chad; tens of thousands of girls and women have been raped, often gang-raped, while those assaulting them hurl hateful racial epithets.

The violent expropriation of farmland that has also accelerated, ensuring that peace will be much more difficult to achieve than when Obama assumed office, despite his soaring campaign rhetoric of 2008. We hear nothing of this. Hillary Clinton is unlikely to speak about Sudan since she was Secretary of State when Darfur began to tip into greater violence. Donald Trump probably couldn't locate Darfur on a map, and all indications are that he would take no interest in Darfur [see “Political Postscript” below]. And debate moderators have either themselves forgotten Darfur or can't imagine it of interest to television viewers. Syria will serve as a surrogate for all “troubled regions.”

The brutal men in Khartoum will watch all this with the keenest interest as they contemplate their next offensive in Darfur, which—coincidentally—will begin in November, when the seasonal rains have ended. They will conclude that genocide is simply no longer a political issue of interest for the American people.

Political Postscript:

In almost eighteen years of committed research and advocacy for a just peace in greater Sudan, I have tried assiduously not to allow my work to be determined or influenced by American political issues unrelated to Sudan. The same is true for issues elsewhere in Africa and the Middle East, if unrelated to Sudan—this despite many requests for broadcast interviews. My view has been simple: I should speak about what I have come to know well over these years, and that partisanship cannot help advance the cause of Sudan in the United States, where Sudan has traditionally bi-partisan issue. I have at times been sharply critical of the Clinton administration, the George W. Bush administration, and most fiercely of the Obama administration.

But the candidacy of Donald Trump does not permit me to stay silent, given my primary concern at present for the people of Darfur—people who are universally Muslim; who are all “African” in the broadest sense, and “dark-skinned”; and who offer nothing of interest to a a Trump administration, should it be our great misfortune to see this “national disgrace” (to borrow the word's of Colin Powell, Secretary of State during a Republican administration) become president.

Trump's racism, his xenophobia—extending to a virulently anti-Muslim campaign rhetoric—and his stunning ignorance of world affairs (declaring, for example, in an ABC Television news interview that he would prevent Russian troop from entering Ukraine, despite the fact they are have been present since 2014)…all suggest that Darfur and Sudan as a whole would suffer greatly from policies guided by ignorance and hatred. Caring for the innocent civilians of Darfur and other marginalized regions of Sudan is a compelling reason not to vote for Donald Trump.

Eric Reeves has written extensively on Sudan for almost two decades; he is a Senior Fellow at Harvard University's François-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights

C'est à Genève que l'inauguration de l'exposition « Besa » aura lieu. L'Université populaire albanaise (UPA) convie tous les intéressées le 5 septembre 2016 à 19h30, à la Plaine de Plainpalais, avec la participation de personnalités de la politique fédérale, cantonale et communale, de la culture, des communautés religieuses de Genève, de la diplomatie et du monde associatif.
L'exposition se tiendra du 5 au 16 septembre 2016 à la Plaine de Plainpalais.
Besa, code moral albanais, est la promesse de protéger (...)

/ Suisse, Albanie