Weekly anb05101.txt #7

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WEEKLY NEWS ISSUE of: 10-05-2001      PART #1/7

* Africa. Slavery and racism talks in Austria  -  From 28-30 April, 
delegates from more than one hundred NGOs around the world met in Vienna 
(Austria) to prepare for the United Nations World Conference Against Racism 
(UNWCAR) to be held in Durban, South Africa, from 28 August-7 September 
this year. The choice of venue was no surprise. According to delegates, 
Vienna's historic image at the heart of Europe, made it a suitable venue 
for the gathering. To outside observers, the Vienna Conference represented 
a continuation of those discussions, concerns and issues tabled at other 
conferences around the world. Participants in the Vienna NGO meeting, 
emphasized the central position taken by Black people's culture, 
experiences, concerns and perspectives in the UNWCAR Agenda, a fact that 
they say "has traditionally been ignored by the International Community, as 
recently as the Strasbourg and Geneva Preparatory Conferences." The 
"Triangular Slave Trade" was another focus point. Participants agreed that 
it involved the largest forced migration in world history, and the death of 
tens of millions of Africans should be recognized and declared to be a 
Crime Against Humanity. Also, compensation and reparation measures should 
be implemented to address the ongoing legacy of depopulation, 
underdevelopment, exclusion, marginalization and exploitation inherited by 
Africans and people of African Descent. This meeting was a meeting of 
Africans and descendants of Africans.   (Issa A. Mansary, ANB-BIA, Sierra 
Leone, 2 May 2001)

* Africa. Plan to tackle sleeping sickness epidemic  -  The World Health 
Organisation (WHO) and Aventis Pharma on 3 May launched a five-year 
programme to combat a spreading epidemic of sleeping sickness in Africa, in 
the latest public-private initiative aimed at improving access to 
life-saving drugs in poor countries. Frankfurt-based Aventis Pharma is 
giving $25m over five years to the WHO's African Trypanosomiasis or 
sleeping sickness programme. Half of this will go on donations of three 
drugs -- pentamidine, melarsoprol and eflornithine -- essential for 
treating the disease at different stages. The remainder will go on 
bolstering surveillance and control activities and further drug research 
and development. Bernard Pecoul of Medecins sans Frontières, the medical 
humanitarian group that will distribute the drugs, said that the 3 May 
agreement was "a major step in the struggle to control sleeping sickness". 
Up to 500,000 people are estimated to be suffering from the disease, spread 
by the bite of the tsetse fly, which attacks the central nervous system and 
is fatal without treatment. However, only about 10 per cent of victims 
receive treatment and the disease, focused in remote rural areas of 
sub-Saharan Africa, is on the increase after its near-elimination in the 
early 1960s.   (Financial Times, UK, 4 May 2001)

* Africa. Media violations  -  South Africa fared very well in a report on 
the state of media freedom in Southern Africa, where Zimbabwe led the 
charts with the highest number of violations. 3 May was World Press Freedom 
Day, and the Media Institute of Southern Africa (Misa) released its report 
on the Southern African region titled "So This Is Democracy". The report 
said media freedom in the region was dealt a massive blow with the death of 
editor Carlos Cardoso in Mozambique. There was an increase in violations 
against the media in the past 12 months, with 46 of the 182 incidents 
recorded by Misa occurring in Zimbabwe. This was followed by Zambia with 31 
incidents, Angola 24, Swaziland and Namibia 18 and Malawi with 16. The 
lowest number of media violations in Southern Africa occurred in Lesotho 
with only two incidents. In the past year, compared to 1999, more 
journalists were assaulted. Zimbabwe once again had the highest number of 
assaults with six in the past year, Zambia two and Angola one. Media 
institutions were bombed in Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Misa recorded 26 
detentions of journalists, with nine in Zimbabwe, four in Tanzania, four in 
Botswana, three in Angola, two in Malawi, two in Zambia and two in 
Swaziland. "What put the media in Zimbabwe under siege and what pushed the 
country to the top of the charts for media freedom violations was the 
violent parliamentary election held in June 2000," the Misa report 
says.   (Mail & Guardian, South Africa, 4 May 2001)

* Afrique. 35 pays débattent de la sécurité  -  Du 8 au 10 mai, des 
diplomates et des militaires de haut rang venus de 35 pays se réunissent à 
Dar es-Salaam (Tanzanie) pour examiner les modalités du programme français 
Recamp. Celui-ci vise, sous l'égide de l'Onu et en accord avec l'OUA, à 
aider au renforcement des capacités militaires des pays africains à mener 
par eux-mêmes des opérations de maintien de la paix sur le continent. Ce 
programme porte sur la formation, l'entraînement et l'équipement de forces 
régionales spécialisées. Le bilan de la réflexion sera soumis aux instances 
de l'Union européenne. Un exercice d'état-major aura lieu à l'automne 2001, 
suivi par une manoeuvre de grande ampleur, prévue pour février 2002.   (Le 
Monde, France, 8 mai 2001)

* Africa. Pesticide waste endangers millions in poor nations  -  Last 
month, FAO officials accompanied by a Reuters correspondent, visited 
Ethiopia, where they found metal drums leaking toxic waste at obsolete 
pesticide dumps located in residential areas. Ethiopian and FAO officials 
said the build-up, dating back to 30 years or more, was due to bad 
management of pesticide deliveries by the government and donors, and 
unscrupulous marketing by the chemicals industry, of pesticides that often 
were not needed. In a new report entitled: "Baseline study on the problem 
of obsolete pesticide stocks", the FAO said that the build-up of toxic 
pesticides that have been banned or expired, is dramatically higher than 
previous estimates of around 100,000 tonnes.   (Reuters, 10 May 2001)

* Afrique centrale. Association de journalistes  -  Des journalistes de 
huit pays d'Afrique centrale, présents à la clôture de la conférence sur la 
liberté de presse à Windhoek, ont annoncé la création d'une association 
dénommée Organisation des médias d'Afrique centrale (OMAC). L'organisation 
devrait oeuvrer à la promotion et à la défense de la liberté de la presse, 
notamment à travers la création d'un mécanisme d'alerte sous-régional. Elle 
devrait également aider au développement économique et technique des 
entreprises de presse, et à la formation des journalistes. Bujumbura, la 
capitale burundaise, devrait servir de siège temporaire à l'organisation. 
Les pays membres de l'OMAC sont le Burundi, le Cameroun, le Gabon, la 
Guinée équatoriale, la RCA, la RDC, le Rwanda et le Tchad.   (PANA, 
Sénégal, 6 mai 2001)

* Algeria. Crackdown on Berbers  -  3 May: Thousands of anti-government 
demonstrators take to the streets of Algiers in protest against a violent 
police crackdown in the Berber region of Kabylia in which more than 40 
people have been killed. The march organized by the main opposition party, 
the Socialist Forces Front (FFS), was the biggest in the North African 
capital in four years. Organizers said it drew about 25,000 people, while 
police put the turnout at 10,000. Chanting "government, terrorist," the 
protesters called for an international inquiry into the killing by security 
forces of at least 41 young rioters last week in Kabylia. There were no 
reports of incidents at the march. "We're here to pay homage to the victims 
of the repression in Kabylie and to make sure it never happens again," one 
student said. Berber militants have long demanded official recognition of 
the Berber language. However, residents in Kabylie, a traditional hotbed of 
opposition to central rule, say the unrest goes far beyond the issue of 
regional identity and culture and includes wider social demands like access 
to jobs and better housing. 4 May: Human Rights Watch says that President 
Bouteflika's investigation into the clashes must be truly 
independent.   (ANB-BIA, Brussels, 5 May 2001)

* Algérie. Kabylie: calme relatif  -  Si le retour au calme se confirme en 
Kabylie, la tension n'est toujours pas retombée autour de cette région où 
les récentes émeutes ont fait plusieurs dizaines de morts. Le 3 mai, 
quelque 25.000 personnes ont défilé dans les rues d'Alger contre la 
répression des deux dernières semaines en Kabylie. La manifestation, 
organisée par le Front des forces socialistes (FFS), dénonçait le 
"terrorisme" du gouvernement et réclamait une enquête internationale. Elle 
s'est déroulée sans incident et s'est dispersée dans le calme. Le 7 mai, le 
Mouvement culturel berbère a appelé à son tour à une marche populaire de 
solidarité pour jeudi prochain à Alger. De son côté, le président de la 
commission nationale d'enquête sur les émeutes de Kabylie poursuit ses 
contacts pour en choisir les membres; voulant s'entourer d'une composante 
de qualité, il reconnaît la difficulté à joindre les personnalités 
pressenties dans des délais aussi courts. Pendant ce temps, en Kabylie, la 
vie reprend doucement. Les villes et les villages de la région vivent au 
rythme des communiqués et des appels à la grève des différentes 
associations et comités locaux. - Le 9 mai à Madrid, le ministre algérien 
des Affaires étrangères, Abdelaziz Belkhadem, a rejeté une demande des 
socialistes européens pour la création d'une commission d'enquête 
internationale sur les récentes émeutes en Kabylie.   (ANB-BIA, de sources 
diverses, 10 mai 2001)

* Angola. President challenges rebel leader to peace dialogue  -  Angolan 
president Jos Eduardo dos Santos has signalled new willingness to find a 
political solution to a long-running civil war by challenging Unita rebel 
leader Jonas Savimbi to explain possible ways to find peace. "It is now 
necessary for him to say when he is going to finish the war and how he is 
going to fulfil the terms of the Lusaka protocol," Mr dos Santos said in a 
speech at the start of a conference on peace and democracy in Luanda. "This 
way, a road to peace will open up." Since the collapse in late 1998 of the 
Lusaka peace agreement, the MPLA government had steadfastly refused to 
speak to Mr Savimbi, saying he cannot be trusted. However, despite 
significant army successes, the government has failed in its declared aim 
of capturing or killing him, or forcing his surrender. Diplomats in Luanda 
say emphasis on a military solution is now being tempered. "There seems to 
be a definite shift here the speech reflects an effort to start something 
new to find a way to peace that does not rely on military action," one 
said. "It is an opening, though not necessarily an olive branch. The next 
step is Savimbi's to take."   (Financial Times, UK, 3 May 2001)

* Angola. UN fears disease epidemic  -  Floods that have killed about 48 
people and forced some 50,000 from their homes across Angola could spawn 
disease epidemics, the United Nations health unit warned on 7 May. "The 
concern now is about the spread of diseases," a World Health Organization 
(WHO) spokeswoman told Reuters. "We need to be particularly alert to the 
possibility of cholera," Nsala Domingos said. "Thousands of homes have been 
levelled...and living conditions in the areas where people are resettling 
are precarious," Domingos said. Heavier than usual rains this season have 
also ruined thousands of hectares (acres) of crop land, punishing a 
population already weary from a 26-year civil war.   (CNN, USA, 7 May 2001)

* Angola. Offensive de l'Unita  -  Le 7 mai, les rebelles de l'Unita ont 
attaqué la ville de Uije, à 350 km de Luanda. Selon la radio privée 
catholique Ecclesia, de nombreux habitants des bidonvilles ont fui vers le 
centre-ville sous les feux des mitrailleuses et des obus. Une intervention 
de l'armée gouvernementale aurait mis les combattants de l'Unita en 
déroute. Au cours de ces dernières semaines, les opérations de la rébellion 
se sont multipliées dans tout le pays. Une attaque contre Caxito, à 60 km 
de la capitale, a fait une centaine de morts et autant de disparus, le 5 
mai, selon un bilan donné par la télévision publique. Le 8 mai, les Nations 
unies ont exigé la libération de 60 enfants, âgés de 10 à 18 ans, que 
l'Unita a enlevé près de Caxito. L'Onu déplore aussi la mort de quatre 
agents angolais d'organisations humanitaires.   (Libération, France, 8-9 
mai 2001)

* Angola. Setting up an election fund  -  The Angolan government says it 
has set up an election fund worth thirty-million dollars. The Finance 
Minister, Julio Bessa, told the state newspaper -- the Jornal de Angola 
--that the National Assembly had approved the measure. Mr Bessa said the 
fund would provide for general elections scheduled for next year. He said 
details on the measure would be given soon. Two years ago, President Jose 
Eduardo dos Santos announced elections would take place this year, but he 
later put them back to 2002. He now insists they won't be held until UNITA 
rebels agree to end the country's long-running civil war. UNITA rejected 
the outcome of Angola's first multi-party elections in 1992.   (BBC News, 
UK, 10 May 2001)

* Angola. Unita "lying" over abducted children  -  The aid official in 
charge of the Angolan school where 60 children were seized at the weekend 
has angrily rejected a statement by the rebel movement Unita, which tried 
to deny that the children had been abducted. There is still no information 
about the whereabouts of the children, taken from a school at the town of 
Caxito less than 80km from the capital, Luanda. On 8 May, a Unita spokesman 
based in Portugal told the BBC that the children had not been abducted, but 
that Unita fighters had returned the children to their families in areas 
under Unita control. But Rikke Viholm, chair of People to People 
Development Aid (DPPA), said she was shocked by what the Unita spokesman 
had said. "It's awful how many lies can be told in this world," she said. 
Ms Viholm said Unita forces had committed a crime, which the spokesman was 
now trying to deny.   (BBC News, UK, 10 May 2001)

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