Weekly anb01253.txt #6

[anb-bia <anb-bia@village.uunet.be>]

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WEEKLY NEWS ISSUE of: 25-01-2001      PART #3/6

* Egypt. Culture battle haunts Cairo fair  -  Cairo's annual international 
book fair, opened on 24 January by President Hosni Mubarak, is a 
prestigious event, sponsored by the state and intended to reflect Egypt's 
cultural weight in the Arab world. Officials say 3,000 Egyptian, Arab and 
international publishers are exhibiting and 7m visitors are expected. The 
fair is taking place, however, against the background of a big dispute 
between the country's intellectuals and the government over the sacking of 
a senior culture official earlier this month. They are alleging that the 
government has caved in without a fight to Islamists who want to impose 
their norms on the country's cultural life. Ali Abu Shadi, the head of the 
General Authority for Culture Palaces, a government body involved in a wide 
range of activities including literary publishing, was dismissed from his 
position two days after an Islamist deputy raised questions about three 
novels released by the authority. The deputy, Gamal Heshmat, said the 
novels violated the norms of decency because they contained sexually 
explicit passages. Mr Heshmat belongs to the banned but tolerated Muslim 
Brotherhood -- the largest opposition movement in Egypt. Despite repeated 
arrests and security crackdowns by the authorities, the movement is 
represented in the newly-elected parliament by 17 members who stood as 
independents. Analysts say the Brotherhood are treading carefully. 
"Attacking intellectuals is easier than attacking the state," said Mohamed 
Al Sayed Saeed, a political analyst. "The Brotherhood is trying to reduce 
the areas of confrontation with the state. They don't want to attack it 
over the issues it really cares about. Going for the intellectuals is a low 
cost alternative which creates the desired propaganda effect that there are 
Freemasons, and communists and agents who want to spread 
immorality."   (Financial Times, UK, 24 January 2001)

* Ethiopia. Urgent need for food aid  -  The authorities in Addis Ababa are 
appealing to donor countries for nearly 470,700 metric tonnes of food aid 
and 21.4 million US dollars to meet the needs of some 6.2 million 
Ethiopians this year. The head of the government's Relief Agency, Simon 
Mechale, launched the appeal on 22 January explaining that the announced 
food grain need does not include about 168,590 metric tonnes of net 
carry-over stocks from last year and undelivered pledges in the year 2000. 
He added that it does not include food and other assistance needed for 
people displaced by war and those deported from Eritrea, for whom separate 
appeals were made in November. Simon told diplomats representing the donor 
community, representatives of NGOs and international agencies that his 
appeal for the current year was for addressing "recovery, rehabilitation 
and preparedness programmes" in such areas like water, health, agriculture 
and employment generating schemes. He lauded the donor community's response 
to appeals last year to meet the food needs of some 10 million victims of 
severe drought that persisted for three years in parts of the country. 
However, Simon said the overall food situation in the country was expected 
to improve this year due to adequate rainfall in the country as a whole 
during the June-September main rainy season.   (PANA, Senegal, 23 January 2001)

* Ethiopie. Sécheresse et développement  -  Le 23 janvier, l'Ethiopie a 
lancé un appel à l'aide internationale pour fournir 470.000 tonnes aux 
populations touchées par la sécheresse. La situation est toutefois 
meilleure que l'an dernier: des récentes pluies ont réduit le nombre de 
personnes menacées de famine de 10,5 millions de personnes l'an dernier à 
6,2 millions cette année. - D'autre part, des ministres et experts 
d'Ethiopie, d'Egypte et du Soudan et des hauts conseillers de la Banque 
mondiale visitent actuellement le bassin du Nil du côté éthiopien, pour 
étudier comment le pays pourrait utiliser ses ressources hydrauliques pour 
réduire la pauvreté. La visite sera suivie d'une réunion des experts en vue 
de préparer une conférence ministérielle des trois pays qui vont explorer 
les domaines de coopération entre eux. La réunion discutera aussi de 
projets spécifiques que l'Ethiopie souhaite initier en matière de 
développement, y compris l'irrigation et d'autres plans destinés à 
améliorer les conditions de vie de sa population.   (ANB- BIA, de sources 
diverses, 24 janvier 2001)

* Ghana. Driving away a bargain  -  A controversy has erupted just two 
weeks after President Rawlings was replaced by John Kufuor as Ghana's 
president. Official cars belonging to ministers in the old administration, 
are being sold off at a small fraction of their market value. A slightly 
used Volkswagen Passat saloon is selling for only $1,000, a brand new 
Mercedes Benz E-Class, with all the bells and whistles, is going for just 
over $3,000. But these goodies are not for everyone. They are only for 
former ministers and senior officials who served under President Rawlings. 
Since losing the elections three weeks ago, more than 100 officials have 
driven off with vehicles belonging to the State.   (BBC News, 23 January 2001)

* Guinée. Cri d'alarme  -  250.000 civils "terrifiés et pris au piège" dans 
le sud-est de la Guinée, devraient être transférés de toute urgence à 
l'intérieur du pays, a demandé Médecins sans frontières (MSF) dans un 
communiqué qualifié de "cri d'alarme". Selon l'organisation humanitaire, 
environ 180.000 réfugiés sierra-léonais et libériens ainsi que 70.000 
Guinéens sont exposés, dans la "langue de Guékédou" (qui s'enfonce dans le 
territoire voisin de la Sierra Leone), aux combats transfrontaliers qui y 
ont lieu depuis septembre. "Un retard dans leur relocalisation, aussi petit 
soit-il, peut provoquer une crise humanitaire majeure", estime MSF. - Le 23 
janvier, de nouveaux combats ont été signalés dans la zone de Guékédou. On 
ignore encore le bilan des victimes. Selon des sources officieuses, la 
gendarmerie de la ville a été prise par les assaillants.   (ANB-BIA, de 
sources diverses, 24 janvier 2001)

* Guinea. Guinea's crisis the "worst in the world"  -  The United Nations 
refugee agency says that the security situation in southern Guinea is 
deteriorating on a daily basis. The UNHCR now describes the situation as 
the most dramatic faced by the agency anywhere in the world. A UNHCR 
spokesman in Guinea, Peter Kessler, told the BBC that 250,000 refugees lie 
trapped in the area where the army and rebels are battling for control. No 
food aid has reached the area around the town of Gueckedou for four months, 
and the last aid workers were forced to withdraw over a week ago as the 
fighting intensified. There are reports of heavy gunfire and a renewed 
rebel attack on the area along the border with Liberia. Truckloads of 
Guinean soldiers were seen heading towards Gueckedou to try to expel the 
insurgents. The refugees caught between the warring factions had fled into 
Guinea to avoid other regional conflicts, now they are forced to run for 
their lives once again. Access for aid workers is extremely dangerous, and 
in large parts of the border region law and order has broken down 
completely. The borders of three countries join around Gueckedou and all 
three -- Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone -- are in a state of political 
and military turmoil. The rebels fighting the Guinea army are believed to 
be a mixture of Guinean dissidents and mercenaries from Liberia and Sierra 
Leone. The chaos in the area is so severe that many of the Sierra Leonean 
refugees there say they would rather return to their own country, which has 
itself been described by the UN as one of the most dangerous places in the 
world. Plans are now being drawn up for regional countries to send 1,600 
peacekeeping troops to the area in the coming weeks. But the UNHCR says 
that in the meantime, hundreds of thousands of civilians are having to move 
across a region where there is no security.   (BBC News, 24 January 2001)

* Guinea-Sierra Leone. Bigger boats for refugees  -  The United Nations 
High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Guinea and other humanitarian 
organisations have decided to increase the number of departures for Sierra 
Leonean returnees to Freetown by chartering a second 500-seater boat. The 
agency said the need for a bigger vessel had become urgent, as more 
refugees need to be sent home. It said the smaller boat called "Over beck", 
with a capacity of 350 seats currently in used could no longer bear the 
heavy load. The UNHCR has since 20 December been involved in repatriating 
Sierra Leonean refugees home following appeals by Guinean authorities to 
evacuate them. They say fresh fighting between Guinean troops and 
insurgents believed to come from across the border between Sierra Leone and 
Liberia had made the evacuation necessary. The boats would transport 
returnees throughout the week except on Mondays, in a bid to increase the 
number of weekly average departures from 1,400 to 2,550 returnees, the 
organisation said. Even though the security situation in Sierra Leone is 
not conducive for repatriation, the UNHCR said it undertook the task only 
to ensure that refugees returned home in more human and secure conditions. 
It said that the living condition of Sierra Leonean refugees who managed to 
reach their embassy in Conakry (Guinea), was deplorable. This it said, 
forced as many as 2,500 people to cross in boats whose capacity was 500. 
The UNHCR and the Organisation of International Migrations (OIM) in a news 
briefing in Geneva on 23 January, said they have already repatriated 4,700 
Sierra Leonean refugees.   (PANA, Senegal, 24 January 2001)

* Guinea-Bissau. Coalition threatened  -  The junior party in the ruling 
coalition in Guinea-Bissau is reviewing its future within the government 
following the reshuffle announced by President Kumba Iala earlier today. Mr 
Iala appointed new ministers at foreign affairs, justice and communications 
and increased the number of cabinet members from his own party for Social 
Renovation from fourteen to seventeen. Correspondents say the influence of 
the junior party, the Bafata Movement and its leader, Helder Vaz, was 
diminished by the reshuffle and they are considering whether to leave 
government. The Bafata Movement withdrew from the coalition last September 
after all five of its cabinet members were dismissed in an earlier 
reshuffle, but agreed to return when Mr Iala backed down and reinstated 
those he had sacked.   (BBC News, 23 January 2001)

Weekly anb0125 - End of part 3/6