Africa

By Manipadma Jena
NAIROBI, Kenya, Jun 9 2016 (IPS)

Water scarcity, conflict and refugee exodus is the strongest megatrend in West Asia, indicating the status of current trends and how these factors may shape the future, according to UN Environment Programme’s sixth Global Environment Outlook – GEO-6 Regional Assessment for West Asia released May 2016.

Families travel in search of water. Credit: Irfan Ahmed/IPS

Only 4 out of 12 countries in West Asia remain above the water scarcity limit of 1,000 cubic metres per person per year, the minimum limit viable for human population, the assessment warns.

“Water shortage potentially could have more impact on sovereign credit ratings than natural catastrophes as water scarcity conditions are slow onset impacting larger societies,” Moritz Kraemer, Managing Director of S&P Global Ratings told IPS adding, “water scarcity, migration and conflict has yet not been factored into the Environmental Risk Integration in Sovereign Credit Analysis (ERISC) but certainly we need to.”

The ERISC aims to help financial institutions to integrate environmental risks in their overall risk assessments and investment decisions by identifying and quantifying how they can affect countries’ economic performance and thereby their cost of credit in the sovereign debt market.

The analysis premise is that sovereign credit risk can be materially affected by environmental risks such as climate change, water scarcity, ecosystem degradation and deforestation.

“So far we do not have sufficient liquid data on the potential economic implications of water shortage or change in rainfall patterns to be able to simulate numerically what the outcome would be, but we know countries with big water problems will have repercussions well beyond their boundaries, triggering migratory movements to start with. Europe is an example,” Kraemer said.

West Asia has a significant geopolitical location linking three continents Asia, Europe and Africa.

“Jordan in 2013 was the world’s fourth most water-scarce country but within just two years by 2015, it’s status deteriorated to second place, when hundreds of thousands Syrian and Yemen refugees migrated into Jordan,” Carl Bruch, legal expert on armed conflict and the environment, climate change, and water rights at Washington DC-based Environmental Law Institute (ELI) told IPS, illustrating impacts of migration on a natural resources and economy.

“Many of the economies with water problems that we have rated such as Jordan and Morocco have low credit ratings already, so part of their vulnerability has already been baked in like, though not explicitly. Still more research needs to be done,” Kraemer told IPS on the sidelines of the second UN Environment Assembly (UNEA) in Nairobi where world’s environment ministers gathered to take action on the 2030 agenda for sustainable development last week of May.

Political, social coupling with environmental issues trigger migration and conflict

“There is a tight coupling between political and social issues around displacement, but why people ultimately decide to move is often due to environmental problems, increasingly now due to water scarcity recurring very much in West Asia,” Jacqueline McGlade, UNEP’s chief scientist and Director of early warning and assessment division, told IPS.

Land degradation, desertification and scarcity of renewable water resources are currently Western Asia region’s most critical challenges as rolling conflicts damage environment and human health denting the region’s ability to produce enough food to meet the growing population’s needs especially in the Mashriq sub-region ( includes Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, the Occupied Palestinian Territories , Syria; and Yemen of West Asia), according to GEO-6 which offers a policy vision and good governance outlook over the next 25 years.

Increasing water demand resulting in diminishing per-person availability, West Asia now faces deteriorating water quality because of groundwater overexploitation, seawater intrusion, depletion and salinization of aquifers, and rising pumping costs. The region has already surpassed its natural capacity to meet its own food and water demand.

Water, land resource degradation and conflict in a vicious cycle

While peace, security and environment are the region’s topmost priority, the vicious cycle of land degradation leading to, and resulting from conflict, can prevent people from returning home and normalizing life (and economy), Daria Mokhnacheva , migration, environment and climate change specialist at International Organisation for Migration (IOM) told IPS.

“The majority of refugees from conflicts in Iraq will not be able to return home to normalize life even if they want to, without clearance of mines and unexploded ordnance planted in what used to be their farms. Clearing of mines and can take decades,” Mokhnacheva said.

Moreover although Iraq has the largest area of available farmland in the region, it suffers the most from soil salinity and wind erosion; 97 percent of its total area is arid, desertification affects 39 per cent of the country’s surface area with an additional 54 per cent under threat according to GEO-6.

“Traditional farmers and herders can lag in temporary camps for years and these if based in water-scarce or drought-prone areas, may drive multiple displacements. Migration to urban areas destroys their lifestyles, customs and livelihoods completely, increasing vulnerability. Camped long-term, girls and women become traffickers’ targets and girls as young as nine years of age are forced into marriage to reduce household’s pressure on food,” she said.

Early identification of water scarcity and migration hotspots critical for conflict prevention

“We have evidence from West Asia that the transition from the rural to the urban starts to sow the seeds of displacement which ultimately can lead to conflict,” McGlade said.

“So the real issue for environmental governance is can we detect early enough the conditions under which either food or water security is likely to fail, can we identify these ‘hotspots’ to take preventive action so that people do not leave the lands that already supports them,” she said.

“We are already seeing three million people from Syria and Yemen on the move towards the borders of Jordan. Could this exodus have been prevented?” she added.

“We need to integrate migration and environmental research with that of social vulnerability to identify hotspots early,” Mokhnacheva of IOM said, adding, “We also need to improve very local evidence to inform migration policies that can respond to actual need.”

Poor governance of natural resource also responsible for conflict

“Poor governance is a deep-rooted problem we have picked up throughout GEO-6 assessments. The other fundamental cues for resource conflict are lack of access and inequality. Conflict can arise from multiplicity of lack of access, whether to justice or to resources themselves,” McGlade said.

“Climate change causes stress on societies but these impacts by themselves do not necessarily indicate water wars in future. How the government institutions, civil society and international community respond to that stress and address the different interests, greatly influences whether a country will cope or whether it will degrade into tensions, disputes and ultimately into conflict,” Bruch said.

“For instance, both Lebanon and Syria experienced precipitation changes that stressed their respective economies. Why then did Syria alone plunge into conflict?” Bruch added.

“Unfortunately there is no legal framework to pin institutional responsibility for forced migration,” said Mokhnacheva.

Good governance implies that issues such as conflict resolution, food, water and energy are examined in a holistic framework,” said Achim Steiner, Executive Director of UNEP.

“The Gulf countries can invest around water scarcity, creating artificial, energy-intensive, expensive water but most countries including those in West Asia or the Sahel and Burkina Faso have very little resilience, economic or environmental,” Kraemer said.

Environmental governance could be the key to a nation’s access to international credit and investment in the near future, experts said.

Peru's president-elect, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, outside his home in Lima, while waiting for the vote count to be completed. Credit: Courtesy of La República

By Ángel Páez
LIMA, Jun 9 2016 (IPS)

It is finally official: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski won Peru’s presidential elections by the thinnest of leads, and Keiko Fujimori once again just barely missed becoming president – although her party holds a solid majority in Congress, which means it will have a strong influence during the next administration.

With all of the votes counted, the national election office, ONPE, reported Thursday afternoon that the 77-year-old Kuczynski was ahead with 50.121 percent, against the 41-year-old Fujimori’s 49.879 percent.

The difference was 41,438 votes, which makes the triumph of the centre-right candidate of the Peruanos por el Kambio (PPK) party irreversible, even though some ballots were sent for review.

In the 2011 elections, Fujimori, the candidate for the right-wing Fuerza Popular, was defeated by a narrow margin, when nationalist President Ollanta Humala beat her in the runoff by 51.45 percent to 48.55 percent."The mandate that the people gave us is very clear. We joined the vote for Kuczynski in the second round to block a victory by Keiko Fujimori because she represented the threat of a return to corruption, to drug trafficking's influence on politics, to anti-democratic practices to gain power at any cost." -- Indira Huilca

The near-tie in the Sunday Jun. 5 runoff election has kept the country and the candidates’ campaign teams on edge, waiting for the ONPE to announce the result when 100 percent of the ballots had been counted, although analysts had clarified that it was impossible for the daughter of, and political heir to, imprisoned former president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000) to overcome the slight difference.

Among the last ballots to be counted were the ones coming in from Peruvian voters in Germany, where Fujimori took aaround 18 percent of the vote and Kuczynski reached 51 percent, in the first round of the elections, on Apr. 10.

The last ballots from within Peru, meanwhile, came from remote villages in the Apurímac, Ene and Mantaro rivers valley (VRAEM), a broad area in central and southern Peru.

In the VRAEM districts – which are mainly communities from the Andean highlands regions of Ayacucho, Huancavelica, Apurímac and Junín, and to a lesser extent jungle areas in Cuzco – the left-wing candidate of the Broad Front, Verónica Mendoza, won more votes than Fujimori in April.

On Jun. 2, Mendoza, who came in third in the first round, urged her voters to cast their ballots for Kuczynski, to block the return of Fujimorismo to the country.

Fujimori’s father is serving a 25-year sentence for corruption and crimes against humanity.

These votes from rural Peru were Fujimori’s last hope, and all the way up to the release of the official ONPE bulletin, she maintained that they could turn the results around.

Political scientist and university professor Fernando Tuesta told IPS that actually, the results from the first round of voting had made it clear that the votes from abroad and from isolated communities would not significantly modify the general tendencies.

Fujimori’s stronghold: Congress

But while voters once again kept Fujimori from reaching the presidential palace, her party will be able to influence the direction taken by the country, from the single-chamber legislature, when the new government takes office on Jul. 28.

On Apr. 10, Fuerza Popular won a strong majority in Congress: 73 out of 130 seats, followed by Mendoza’s Broad Front (20), and Kuczynski’s PPK (18).

The Fujimorista bloc in Congress is known for blocking investigations of cases of corruption involving their representatives, and for pressuring their adversaries.

The big challenge facing the other two parties is keeping Fujimorismo from using its majority to control the government from Congress, and from pushing through measures in favour of its interests.

“The authoritarian temptation is part of the DNA of Fujimorismo,” Broad Front congressswoman-elect Indira Huilca told IPS. “We will never allow Fuerza Popular to use Congress to promote its impunity, to block the fight against corruption, or to cover up for and protect its supporters.”

“We haven’t come to Congress to be witnesses to the eventual destruction of democracy through authoritarian actions,” she said.

But, she warned, “it doesn’t mean that we will give carte blanche to Kuczynski.”

“The mandate that the people gave us is very clear,” said Huilca. “We joined the vote for Kuczynski in the second round to block a victory by Keiko Fujimori because she represented the threat of a return to corruption, to drug trafficking’s influence on politics, to anti-democratic practices to gain power at any cost.”

She is all too familiar with these practices: her father, Pedro Huilca, the long-time leader of Peru’s Confederación General de Trabajadores central trade union, was assassinated eight months after Alberto Fujimori’s self-coup in 1992.

The recent elections were characterised by a lack of transparency and irregularities.

The national election board, the JNE, implemented electoral reforms approved at the last minute by Congress, which gave rise to confusion and the questioning of authority, and undermined the legitimacy of the election board’s decisions.

Two important presidential candidates, Julio Guzmán and César Acuña, both of whom were doing well in the polls, were eliminated by the JNE amidst a climate of suspicion regarding the board’s independence.

What the elections made clear, analysts say, was that Peru needs better electoral laws.

“The anomalies seen in the elections were basically due to the modifications to the election law, and also to the positions taken by the JNE,” a former secretary general of the board, Juan Falconí, told IPS.

“There was a point where people did not know who the presidential candidates would be due to the confusing implementation of the new rules,” he said.

As a result, he said, there were “incidents that cast a shadow over the elections, and people no longer trust the electoral authorities.”

“The JNE has lost legitimacy in the view of voters because it has been clear that it failed to act in a decisive manner and that it lacked credibility and managed things poorly,” he said.

During the debate of the electoral reform proposed by the JNE, Fujimorismo opposed oversight of private campaign funding, and also rejected mandatory supervision by the electoral authorities of internal party elections to select their candidates.

Now that Fujimorismo will be a majority in Congress, a new reform to correct errors and make elections more transparent is unlikely.

“Without Fujimorismo, no electoral reform will be possible. And I don’t think it’s a priority for them,” said Professor Tuesta.

He said that while anti-Fujimorismo defeated the Fuerza Popular candidate, the president-elect will not be able to govern without negotiating with that bloc, which will influence the administration from the legislature.

Edited by Estrella Gutiérrez/Translated by Stephanie Wildes

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June 8, 2016 (KHARTOUM) - The opposition National Consensus Forces (NCF) Wednesday has distanced itself from a meeting that between the leader of the National Umma Party (NUP) and the African Union High Level Implementation Panel (AUHIP) on the Roadmap Agreement for peace and dialogue in Sudan.

Chairman of the National Consensus Forces Farouk Abu Issa (File photo/ST)

Following a meeting held last week to discuss the opposition refusal of the Roadmap Agreement, NUP leader Sadiq al-Mahdi said he agreed with the AUHIP chairman Thabo Mbeki to hold a meeting with the Sudan Call forces to discuss the matter.

Al-Mahdi stressed that the roadmap includes positive aspects as it provides to stop war and ensures humanitarian access to civilians in the war affected areas. But, it considers the government controlled conference as basis of the national dialogue and that's where the rub".

"The ongoing talks with the African Union mediator do not mean anything for the National Consensus Forces" said NCF chairperson Farouk Abu Issa in a statement issued on Wednesday.

These talks "are between the mediator and the Ingaz regime, seeking a way out for the regime and not the people who are suffering under its rule," he added.

The NCF is a member of the Sudan Call coalition but says the regime is not credible and points that the popular uprising is the best way to achieve regime change.

The chief mediator form his side, deals in his peace initiative with the forces that signed an agreement with his panel on the national dialogue on 5 September 2014: Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), NUP, Sudan Liberation Movement-Minni Minnawi and (SLM-MM) and the SPLM-North.

The NCF consists of Sudanese Communist Party, Sudanese Congress Party, a faction of the Democratic Unionist Party, some national Arab groups.

(ST)

By Ahmed H Adam and Ashley D. Robinson

A new protest movement is gaining momentum in Sudan as thousands of young people across the country unite against the government.

Last week two students joined dozens others currently being held in detention, after fresh protests against attacks on civilians in west and south Darfur.

Human Rights Watch issued a statement in response to the arrests, warning: “Sudan is cracking down on activists, students, and even their lawyers, with abusive and thuggish tactics.”

Coordinated via the encrypted messaging service, WhatsApp, and on social media, waves of unrest first swept the capital after the killings of two young men in separate campus attacks by forces loyal to Omar al-Bashir's government.

Abubakar Hassan, an 18-year-old student, was shot and killed after taking part in a march at the University of Kordofan after nominating himself to be the new head of the student union. The region is currently being bombed by the government in an attempt to crush the various rebel groups operating there.

Just days later, 19-year-old Mohamed El Sadiq was at an event celebrating Nuba culture when he was shot by student militants loyal to the ruling party, the National Congress, who opened fire on the meeting.

In a country known for its violent intolerance of dissent, such displays of public discontent are rare. In September 2013, thousands of anti-government protestors took to the streets inspired by the Arab Spring movements, but the government responded by killing nearly 200 civilians, many of whom were said to have been shot in the forehead.

More than 800 people were subsequently arrested, with detainees, particularly those from Darfur, subjected to torture and other forms of ill-treatment.

But despite this memory still fresh in the minds of many of the protesters, Mohamed Salah, a leader in the student wing of the Sudanese Communist Party at Khartoum University, said there have been an increasing number of “initiatives of unity and solidarity with the Darfuri students and other students from the war-torn regions.”

Students in Khartoum and on campuses in El-Fashir and Nyala in Darfur and Kassala in east Sudan have started speaking out against the status quo, in favour of unity with marginalised non-Arab factions.

After the killing of Ali Abbakar, a Darfuri student taking part in a peaceful protest in Darfur last year, large numbers of students “[sent] a clear message to the regime that ‘we are all Darfurians' and made clear the entire nation was rejecting the bloody targeting of the Darfurian students,” Salah said.

“The Darfuri students have become the soul of the resistance.”

According to Adam Musa, a leader in the Darfuri Student Leagues Coalition, 23 students have been killed since the regime came to power in a coup in 1989, 16 of whom were from the war-torn state.

“I am confident that the situation will eventually reach the tipping point and succeed in changing the regime,” he said. “It is time to unite and work together.”

June 8, 2016 (JUBA) – The management of South Sudan's state television (SSBC) has cautioned media against disseminating news on the station, which went off air Monday.

State-owned SSTV has not been tranformed into SSBC (File photo)

SSBC's managing director, James Magok Chilim said the state-run broadcaster would resume normal broadcast anytime soon.

“The South Sudan Broadcasting Corperation – SSBC Management and Leadership of the Ministry of Information, Communication, Technology and Postal Services under the leadership of Honorable Minister Michael Makuei Lueth is hereby informing the people of South Sudan and public that the SSBC Television (formerly known as SSTV) is off air for technical fault,” partly reads a statement the state-owned broadcaster issued on Tuesday.

“This technical failure occurred yesterday on Monday 6th June 2016 at 1pm within normal broadcasting hours,” it adds.

Adel Faris, a director at SSBC told a local daily on Monday that there was damage to some devices, which could not be purchased due to lack of foreign currency.

Up to $200,000, he said, was needed to rectify ongoing technical fault at the station.

But SSBC's refuted what was published in the Arabic newspaper interview on Monday.

“The SSBC would like to dispute any allegation published by Al Mougif Arabic newspaper misinforming the public that TV is off air due to lack of dollars. This is [a] lie and baseless,” said Chilim.

“SSBC is hereby warning any media house or individual journalist reporting wrong story against SSBC without verification. In case of any inquiry please contact the Managing Director of SSBC,” he further stressed.

What occurred at SSBC TV, he said, could happen anywhere and “it has nothing to do with dollar or money.”

“We regret the inconvenient cause by this technical faulty and we promise the station will be back on air soon,” he assured, but did not specify when broadcast will resume.

South Sudan's information and broadcasting minister, Michael Makuei Lueth said government was doing everything to restore the station, but did not elaborate further.

ACTIVIST SPEAKS OUT

Felix Dara, a human rights activist, said he was disappointed with the interference in SSBC's usual news broadcast.

“We were prepared to watch our usual 8:00 pm news, but unfortunately we were disappointed not to have viewed anything. This is a big blow to a sovereign nation like South Sudan where a national-owned TV went off air” said Dara.

He said information black out in the country would create a vacuum for rumors and fabricated information which is dangerous for a sovereign country like South Sudan.

According to Dara, it was the right of every South Sudanese to access information as provided for in the constitution.

“We all know that article 32 of our constitution provides for the right to access to information whether inform of an audio or electronic record. So going off air means a violation of the provision of the constitution,” he stressed.

War-ravaged South Sudan is facing an economic crisis with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) warning of difficult days ahead unless economic reforms were put in place.

(ST)

June 8, 2016 (KHARTOUM) - Sudanese authorities Wednesday have opened two advanced camps to combat commodity and illegal drugs smuggling along the border with South Sudan.

Sudanese military personnel inspect the belongings of South Sudanese on the Sudanese border on 18 April 2014 (Photo: Reuters/Mohamed Nureldin Abdallah)

The director of the Counter-Narcotics Department at the Sudanese Customs Authority Razeen Suleiman Mustafa has inaugurated the Al-Magabi and Al-Akaf camps in two localities of the border state of the White Nile.

Mustafa said these camps aim to stop the smuggling of the illegal drugs and the harmful foodstuff, pointing the camps would also assist the security organs to maintain security and stability on the border with South Sudan.

He added that the camps will be equipped with well-trained personnel and the appropriate vehicles to carry out its task along the 160 kilometers border area.

For his part, the director of the White Nile state police Ghorashi Salih stressed the importance of these advanced camps to protect the border and maintain the community security.

He pointed the camps would also help the security organs impose security and stability, stressing that the Counter-Narcotics Department continued to carry out its tasks fully and was praised by the White Nile governor and the security committee in the state.

Imad al-Din Mohamed, the director of the Counter-Narcotics Department at the Sudanese Customs Authority in the White Nile state, pointed that one of the camps is located at Al-Magabi area in the locality of Al-Gabalein while the other is located at Al-Akaf area in the locality of Al-Salam.

He pointed that these camps would serve political, security and economic objectives, saying the move comes within the framework of the Sudanese Customs Authority strategy to develop ways to combat smuggling and to keep up with the development and construction boom taking place in the White Nile state.

Sudan shares a border of more than 2,000 kilometres (1,200 miles) with South Sudan.
Smuggling goods from Sudan into South Sudan became increasingly risky after a short border conflict in April 2012, with Khartoum warning that anyone caught taking goods across the border could be shot.

South Sudan seceded from Sudan on July 9th 2011 following a referendum on whether the semi-autonomous region should remain a part of the country or become independent. 99% of the southern voters chose independence.

Relations between the two nations soured after South Sudan's independence following a series of disputes over a number of issues.

On Sunday, the two countries signed a series of security agreements, including immediate re-deployment of joint military forces along the Safe Demilitarized Border Zone (SDBZ), and approved a plan to stop supporting and harbouring rebels as well as open the crossings points.

(ST)

By Tesfa-Alem Tekle

June 7, 2016 (ADDIS ABABA) – Senior military officials from Ethiopia and Sudan on Monday began holding security talks in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.

The secretive Red Sea nation, bordering Sudan and Ethiopia, has been dubbed the North Korea of Africa (HRW)

The two East African nations are consulting on ways of how to combat regional security threats, ensure peace and safeguard their common border.

Among others, terrorism, extremism, human trafficking, uncontrolled migration, cross-border crime, and illicit trade are issues being discussed.

It was disclosed at the meeting that the strategic relations between the two neighbors particularly in military cooperation has boosted border peace and security.

In 2014, Ethiopia and Sudan reached an agreement establish a joint military force which would operate under the same command. The joint military cooperation also aims to jointly defend external aggression and terrorist attacks.

The military leaders are consulting on much better ways to reinforce the existing security cooperation aimed on curbing border insecurity and on safeguarding the sovereignty of the shared border.

Similar security talks were also held in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum last year.

Ethiopia and Sudan have a number of cooperation agreements, including on security, trade, transport and investment.

PORT SUDAN

Ethiopia signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Sudan for the better utilization of Port Sudan, the state-run Ethiopia Broadcasting Corporation reported.

The MOU was signed last week after both sides discussed ways of boosting bilateral trade and investment partnership. It was signed between Debretsion Gebremichael, Ethiopia's Finance and economic cluster and communication and information technology minister and Sudan's vice president Hasabu Mohamed Abdelrahman.

Gebremichael said the MOU is meant to develop Port Sudan for the mutual benefit of both countries.

The agreement will allow Ethiopia to better utilize Port Sudan for its import-export trade.

Sudan's vice president to his part stressed a need from the two sides to translate the political will in to economic advantage.

The two nations have agreed to work in order to enhance their economic cooperation.

(ST)

June 8, 2016 (JUBA) - South Sudanese rival leaders have issued two separate statements approving and disowning an opinion article purporting to have been written by President Salva Kiir and his First Deputy in government, Riek Machar, in which they allegedly called for global support for reconciliation at the expense of justice.

Riek Machar, left, first vice president of the Republic of South Sudan, and Salva Kiir, the president, at the first meeting of the new transitional coalition government in Juba, South Sudan, in April, 2016 (Jason Patinkin/AP)

Presidential spokesperson, Ateny Wek Ateny, confirmed the authenticity of the article co-authored by the two leaders, asserting that the duo wanted to inform the leaders of working together to implement the peace and to build trust between them in order to move the nation forward.

“The intention is that President and the First Vice President wanted to inform the international community that you know they have now come back to cooperation and they are listening to each other. You know they have actually built mutual trust between themselves and they are now for full implementation of the peace agreement on the resolution of the conflict in the Republic of South Sudan and they are appealing to the international community to help in building the nation and reconcile the people of South Sudan in as much as they can,” said Ateny on Wednesday.

But while Ateny confirmed the veracity of the article, Machar's spokesperson, James Gatdet Dak, dismissed as untrue that neither his boss nor the leadership of the armed opposition of SPLM-IO had knowledge or approval of the document.

"The article published by New York Times alleging that First Vice President, Dr. Riek Machar, had agreed with President, Salva Kiir, to avoid justice or trials for those responsible for the atrocities committed in the war is not true. Somebody must have written it without the knowledge and agreement of the SPLM-IO leadership. We dismiss this allegation as false,” Dak wrote on his Facebook page.

Reacting to the report, Peter Gatdet Yak, one of rebel commanders who defected from Machar's SPLM-IO faction said he was not surprised the two leaders were only after their interest and careless about the victims of the war they caused.

“Have you not seen how selfish they have become? They caused the war to kill innocent people in fulfilment of their ambitions and interests and now they are saying accountability can be compromised because they have gotten what they want. Kiir has retained his position and Riek returned to his position. South Sudan does not belong to them and the children of the people they have killed do not belong to them. The people have now seen what they [Kiir and Riek] have become,” said General Yak when reached to comment on the report on Wednesday.

The two leaders, according to the report by the New York Times, declared commitment to ensuring that the country never again goes through a civil war. They said they have come together after a peace agreement signed in August 2015 as brothers once more in government and determined to reconcile communities and create unity.

“We intend to create a national truth and reconciliation commission modelled on those of South Africa and Northern Ireland. This commission would have wide-ranging powers to investigate and interview the people of South Sudan — from the poorest farmer to the most powerful politician — to compile a true account of events during the war. Those who tell the truth about what they saw or did would be granted amnesty from prosecution — even if they did not express remorse,” the article published on Tuesday carrying the names of president Kiir and Machar reads in part.

In Northern Ireland, according to the piece, a peace process brought bitter enemies to the negotiating table under a pledge of legal amnesty, and then into high office.

“Now, the country has guaranteed peace. “The same is possible in South Sudan,” it argued.

The leaders allegedly further argued that they did not wish to forget what happened during the civil conflict but that it should serve as opportunity and a lesson to avoid a repeat of similar incident in future.

“The recollection of the catastrophe unleashed during those terrible months must remain in our memories as a warning. Neither side won our war. But both sides, together, must now win the peace. That is all that matters. In that quest, it is why anything that might divide our nation is against our people's best interests,” the alleged opinion article further stressed.

However, opposition faction of the SPLM-IO said the document was falsified and were not aware of it.

(ST)

June 8, 2016 (JUBA) – South Sudanese first vice president, Riek Machar, who also leads the armed opposition faction of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM-IO), has dismissed the allegation that he and President Salva Kiir had launched a joint appeal to scrap justice and accountability mechanism from the August 2015 peace agreement.

SPLM (IO) Chairman, Riek Machar, addressing the 2nd National Liberation Council (NLC) meeting in Pagak, November 5, 2015 (ST Photo)

In a letter published by The New York Times on Tuesday as well as later by other international media houses including the Guardian, the document allegedly authored by both President Kiir and his first deputy, Machar, called on the international community to avoid establishment of a tribunal court for the crimes committed during the war.

The two leaders, in the document, allegedly instead asked for support in supporting truth and reconciliation mechanisms, citing pursuit of justice and accountability as problematic.

“In contrast to reconciliation, disciplinary justice — even if delivered under international law — would destabilize efforts to unite our nation by keeping alive anger and hatred among the people of South Sudan,” partly reads the alleged joint appeal published by US-based The New York Times on Tuesday, bearing names of President Kiir and First Vice President, Machar.

The two top rival leaders in the country allegedly called on the international community to consider the current state of South Sudan, arguing that years of war have left South Sudan with one of the highest levels of military spending by gross domestic product in the world.

“That is why we call on the international community, and the United States and Britain in particular, to reconsider one element of the peace agreement to which they are cosignatories: support for a planned international tribunal, the Hybrid Court for South Sudan. We call on them instead to commit to global backing for a mediated peace, truth and reconciliation process,” they said.

The army and its former opponents, the document argued, now need to be integrated and this would involve tens of thousands of soldiers who must be decommissioned and introduced into civilian life.

“We fear that this task could be put in jeopardy if members of once opposing forces — from officers to privates — find themselves targeted with legal action. It is easy to see how some people, having known nothing but war, may prefer to return to the battlefield than stand trial in a foreign country.”

However, in response to the allegation, Machar's press secretary, James Gatdet Dak, said the SPLM-IO's leader had never authored the alleged document, saying the opposition's leadership is committed to justice and accountability.

“The alleged joint appeal to drop the justice and accountability mechanism in the August 2015 peace agreement is untrue. His Excellency Dr. Riek Machar Teny-Dhurgon has never authored that article,” Dak told Sudan Tribune on Wednesday.

Dak said Machar and the SPLM-IO leadership is committed to both justice and accountability on one hand and reconciliation and reconciliation on the other.

“SPLM/SPLA (IO) leadership is committed to justice and accountability as it is also committed to truth, reconciliation and healing. These two mechanisms are stipulated in the peace agreement,” he said.

Dak said it is up to The New York Times to reveal its source of the false document, saying the SPLM-IO leader, Machar, is not aware of the document.

When asked whether President Kiir was aware of the document, Dak replied that he could not speak for the president's office.

“Well, I don't speak on behalf of the President's office. I don't know if they knew about the alleged appeal to drop justice and accountability mechanism or what they thought about it,” he added.

“As for the First Vice President, he has nothing to do with the alleged document. I did consult with him and he was surprised to learn about the document being circulated in the media. The document is falsified,” Dak added.

He said the document could have been written by those who attempted to dodge justice and accountability for gross crimes they committed during the 21 months of the civil war.

(ST)

June 8, 2016 (KHARTOUM) - A joint operation among Sudan, Italy and the United Kingdom has led to the arrest of an Eritrean man suspected of controlling one of the world's four largest criminal migrant trafficking organizations.

This handout picture released by the Italian police on June 8, 2016 shows Medhanie Yehdego Mered, 35, an Eritrean suspected of controlling a migrant trafficking network, escorted by policemen upon his extradition from Sudan to Italy late on June 6, 2016. (AFP Photo)

In a joint statement Wednesday, the Sudanese Ministry of Interior, the British Embassy and the Italian Embassy in Khartoum said that “Mered Yehdego Medhanie, a 35 year old Eritrean national, was extradited from Sudan to Italy yesterday after being arrested in Khartoum on 24 May”.

“The arrest was only possible thanks to intense international cooperation between the Sudanese National Police and the United Kingdom National Crime Agency together with the Palermo Prosecutors, the Italian Police, the Sudanese and Italian Ministries of Justice and Interior,” read the statement.

According to the statement “Medhanie is accused of masterminding one of the major criminal groups operating in central Africa and Libya, smuggling migrants across the Sahara desert and the Mediterranean Sea”.

It pointed that the charges against Medhanie show that “he was moving hundreds of people a month across the Mediterranean”, saying he has been involved in this activity since 2013.

The statement said that an investigation conducted by the Italian authorities has led to the issuance of 24 arrest warrants on 24 April, 2015.

“Italian telephone interceptions showed that users of monitored mobile phones were constantly on the move, between Libya, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, the UAE and a number of European countries, highlighting the transnational dimension of the criminal activity,” added the statement.

The Italian investigation confirmed Medhanie's frequent involvement in organising ‘journeys' across the Mediterranean towards the Sicilian shores.

“Medhanie remained at large for several months before becoming the subject of an international arrest warrant requested by Palermo judicial authority in Italy” said the statement.

According to Reuters, Medhanie is suspected of working with an Ethiopian, Ghermay Ermias, who is still at large, prosecutors said. He is reportedly still in the lawless Libya.

On Wednesday, the United Nations said that the number of people who have died crossing the Mediterranean in an attempt to reach Europe has topped 10,000 since 2014, pointing that this year has seen a sharp uptick in deaths, with more than 2,800 people drowning since January alone.

It is worth to mentions that Sudan has forged a strategic partnership with several European countries and the European Union (EU) to combat illegal migration and human trafficking.

Sudan has been under EU sanctions since the 1989 coup d'état and didn't receive any development aid from Europe.

However, the European body reconsidered its position following the weaves of illegal migrants from Syria, Iraq, and Horn of Africa countries. Sudan is identified as a source of migrants to Europe and a transit country for migrants from Eritrea, Ethiopia and Somalia.

Last April the EU officially allocated Sudan 100 million Euro to improve the living conditions for refugees, help Sudanese returnees to reintegrate back into society, and to improve security at the border.

In addition to this support, Sudan benefits from additional funding under the EU Emergency Trust Fund for Africa, in particular from a €40 million programme to better manage migration in the region.

Also, the German government has earmarked €12 million for projects aimed at stemming illegal immigration of Africans across Sudan to Europe.

In January 2014, the Sudanese parliament approved an anti-human trafficking law which punishes those involved with human trafficking with up to 20 years imprisonment.

Also, in 2014, Khartoum hosted a conference on human trafficking in the Horn of Africa, organised by the African Union (AU), the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the Sudanese government.

Fifteen countries and EU representatives attended the meeting, during which a joint strategy and action plan to combat human trafficking was adopted.

(ST)