Month: October 2021

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed that Ethiopia has no legal right to expel seven U.N. humanitarian officials.

Guterres told the Ethiopian leader in a phone conversation Friday that the world body does not accept Ethiopia’s decision to expel the senior U.N. officials, according to U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq.

Haq said the U.N. Office of Legal Affairs sent a note to Ethiopia’s U.N. mission in New York on Friday stating the U.N.’s “longstanding legal position” that the action of declaring someone “persona non grata” does not apply to U.N. personnel.

Ethiopia announced the expulsion on Thursday, giving the U.N. officials 72 hours to leave.

In a tweet, Ethiopia’s ministry of foreign affairs said the seven were “meddling in the internal affairs of the country.”

The tweet came amid growing pressure on the government over its deadly blockade of the Tigray region where children are reportedly starving to death. Ethiopia’s government has accused humanitarian workers of supporting the Tigray forces who have been fighting its soldiers and allied forces since November, a charge that aid workers deny.

Spokesperson Haq said the U.N. officials remained in the country. When asked by a reporter if the U.N. officials would leave Ethiopia by the end of 72 hours, Haq did not directly answer.

The U.N. officials include the deputy chief of the U.N. Office for Humanitarian Affairs and a representative of the U.N. Children’s Fund, UNICEF.

UNICEF said Friday the Ethiopian government’s decision to expel the U.N. officials from the country is “regrettable and alarming.”

Declaring its work “is more urgent than ever,” UNICEF said in a statement that children are bearing the brunt of the country’s worsening humanitarian crisis.

“We have full confidence in the teams working on the ground to save children’s lives, guided — as always — by the principles of impartiality, humanity, neutrality and independence. Our programs will continue,” UNICEF added, noting it has been present in the African nation for more than 60 years.

Conflict-induced hunger

The Ethiopian federal government has been engaged in an armed conflict with forces in the northern Tigray region for nearly one year. The government declared a unilateral cease-fire and withdrew its forces in June, but the conflict has continued to spill into the neighboring regions of Amhara and Afar.

Of the 6 million people who live in Tigray, the U.N. says 5.2 million need some level of food assistance. More than 400,000 people are living in famine-like conditions, and another 1.8 million people are on the brink of famine.

“It is critically important that the humanitarian operation continues, and it does,” OCHA spokesman Jens Laerke said Friday at a Geneva briefing, according to Reuters. “Until now there is no indication that [Ethiopia’s decision] stops the operation.”

U.N. human rights spokesperson Rupert Colville said at the briefing that the expulsion of the head of its reporting team was a “really grave step.”

On Wednesday, U.N. Humanitarian Chief Martin Griffiths said that after 11 months of conflict and three months of a de-facto government blockade, the humanitarian crisis in Tigray is spiraling out of control.

One hundred aid trucks are needed daily in the region, but in the past week, only 79 in total were allowed in, a U.N. spokesman said.

“Trucks carrying fuel and medical supplies still cannot enter into Tigray,” U.N. Spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Wednesday. “Trucks are waiting in Semera, in Afar, to travel to Mekelle.”

The federal government headed by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, blames the rebels for blocking aid deliveries.

U.S. condemnation

“The U.S. government condemns in the strongest possible terms the government of Ethiopia’s unprecedented action to expel the leadership of all of the United Nations organizations involved in ongoing humanitarian operations,” White House spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters Thursday.

Earlier this month, U.S. President Joe Biden signed an executive order allowing the government to impose financial sanctions on those who prolong the Tigray conflict.

“We will not hesitate to use this or any other tool at our disposal to respond quickly and decisively to those who obstruct humanitarian assistance to people of Ethiopia,” Psaki said.

The U.N. Security Council held private talks Friday about Ethiopia’s decision as well as North Korea’s recent missile launches.

Kenya’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Martin Kimani, who took over as the Security Council president for October, told reporters Friday, “A number of members expressed very strong concerns” about both situations during Friday’s talks, but said no resolutions were passed on either matter.

Diplomatic sources told Reuters news agency that any aggressive action by the council on Ethiopia’s actions was unlikely because China and Russia long have maintained the Tigrayan conflict is an internal matter.

Source: Voice of America

A major aid agency operating in Libya said Friday that it had reports that at least 500 migrants had been arbitrarily detained during a security operation in Tripoli announced by Libyan authorities.

“We are hearing that more than 500 migrants, including women and children, have been rounded up, arbitrarily detained and are at risk of abuse and ill-treatment,” Dax Roque, the country director of the Norwegian Refugee Council, said in a statement.

Libya’s Interior Ministry said security services had carried out a “major security operation” against what it called criminals, liquor and drug dealers, and illegal immigrants. Pictures posted by the Interior Ministry showed dozens of migrants sitting with hands cuffed behind them or being taken away in vehicles.

Hundreds of thousands of migrants live in Libya, many hoping to pass through and cross the Mediterranean to reach a better life in Europe.

Libya has had little peace or stability, however, since the 2011 NATO-backed uprising that toppled Moammar Gadhafi, and rights groups say migrants face threats of detention, extortion and abuse.

Thousands of refugees and migrants are held in official detention facilities, some controlled by armed groups. An unknown number are held in squalid centers run by traffickers.

Source: Voice of America

The United Nations is calling on the Ethiopian government to rescind its decision to expel top U.N. officials from the country, warning the action puts life-saving humanitarian operations at risk. Lisa Schlein reports for VOA from Geneva.

On Thursday, the Ethiopian government told seven senior officials, including the heads of the U.N. Children’s Fund and OCHA, the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, that they had 72 hours to leave the country.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michele Bachelet says she deplores the government’s decision to declare the U.N. officials as persona non grata, or as unwelcome persons.

She rejected allegations that one of her staff and four human rights monitors were meddling in the internal affairs of Ethiopia. Her spokesman, Rupert Colville, said no warning of the impending expulsions was received.

“Basically, this was a bombshell that dropped suddenly yesterday afternoon and I think we were all caught completely by surprise. Also, by the scale of it. Seven staff across three agencies is extremely rare if not unprecedented,” Colville said.

OCHA spokesman Jens Laerke said the senior U.N. officials are responsible for overseeing the humanitarian operations of many agencies, including non-governmental organizations. He warned their expulsion will have serious repercussions for millions of destitute, homeless people in northern Ethiopia’s conflict-ridden Tigray region.

“It remains very dire and there is a spillover of the conflict into neighboring Amhara and Afar regions, which rapidly means that the humanitarian needs are increasing and also the number of internally displaced people is increasing.…The food insecurity continues to increase with at least 5.2 million people targeted for emergency food assistance in Tigray,” Laerke said.

However, trucks containing emergency food and other humanitarian supplies are stuck in Afar. They are not moving on to Tigray because of insecurity and other restrictions.

Laerke said only 11% of designated humanitarian trucks have entered Tigray since July.

U.N. agencies are appealing to Ethiopian authorities to reconsider Thursday’s decision and allow the U.N. officials to remain in the country to continue their human rights and humanitarian work.

Source: Voice of America

In Cameroon, scores of seniors marked Friday’s International Day of Older Persons by calling on authorities to do more to support the elderly in the country’s conflict areas.

Many of those demonstrating in Yaounde fled from Boko Haram terrorism in the north or Cameroon’s separatist conflict in the west. They say hundreds of seniors remaining in those regions have been left to fend for themselves.

Sixty-seven-year-old Veronica Ngum, an activist for the elderly in Cameroon, said a majority of protesting seniors are suffering.

She said they lack energy to work, are frail, and lack the financial means to buy healthy food or be treated in hospitals.

The Cameroon Association of Elderly Persons organized the 30-minute walk to raise awareness of what they said is the plight of older persons in the country. Similar protests took place Friday in the cities of Bafoussam and Douala.

The Timely Performance Care Center for disabled children and older persons helped organize the protest.

The manager of the Yaounde-based center, Betty Nancy Fonyuy, said older persons suffer neglect from their families and communities.

“Most of them that are here are the elderly that have been abandoned by their families,” she said. “Some of them are already visually impaired. The center gives them ambulatory materials, medications and reading glasses, with food supplies, bathing supplies, and their basic needs.”

Fonyuy said her center has received at least 120 older persons displaced from Cameroon’s English-speaking regions since January. Some have no relatives in Yaounde. She said her center is finding it difficult to help all elderly in need, and pleaded with donors to help.

Pauline Irene Nguene, Cameroon’s minister of social affairs, said Cameroon has a national solidarity plan that includes the treatment and resettling of people, especially vulnerable civilians like older persons affected by Boko Haram terrorism and separatist conflicts.

Nguene said the government is inviting older persons who have been displaced to report to social affairs offices of their choice for medical assistance.

The United Nations General Assembly instituted the International Day of Older Persons in 1990 to examine issues and challenges faced by the elderly. The day is marked every year on October 1.

A 2020 government report indicates there are about two million people older than 60 among Cameroon’s 25 million population. The report says most of them are poor and need lodging, food and health care.

Source: Voice of America