Category: Key Issues

OUAGADOUGOU— Security forces have fired tear gas at protesters barricading the streets and throwing rocks in Burkina Faso’s capital, as anger grows at the government’s inability to stop armed attacks spreading across the country.

 

Several hundred people marched through downtown Ouagadougou on Saturday chanting for President Roch Marc Christian Kabore to resign.

 

“The jihadists are hitting [the country], people are dying, others are fleeing their homes … We want Roch and his government to resign because their handling of the country is not good. We will never support them,” protester Amidou Tiemtore said.

 

Some people were also protesting in solidarity with neighbouring Mali, whose citizens are angry at the West African economic regional bloc, ECOWAS, which imposed sanctions on the country after the military government delayed this year’s elections.

 

Burkina Faso’s protest comes amid an escalation in attacks linked to al-Qaeda and the Daesh group that has killed thousands and displaced 1.5 million people.

 

The worsening security situation has led to street protests calling for Kabore to step down.

 

Nearly 12,000 people were displaced within two weeks in December, according to the United Nations.

 

Four French soldiers were also wounded during a joint operation with Burkina Faso’s military. This is the first time French soldiers have been injured in the country since two men were killed in 2019 during a hostage release operation, Pascal Ianni, spokesman for the chief of defence for the French armed forces, said.

 

France has some 5,000 soldiers in the region but until now has had minimal involvement in Burkina Faso compared with Niger or Mali.

 

This is the second government crackdown on protests since November, which comes after the government shut down access to Facebook last week citing security reasons and after arresting 15 people for allegedly plotting a coup.

 

As tensions mount, the government is struggling to stem the violence. Last month, the president fired his prime minister and replaced most of the cabinet.

 

The government’s national security arm is also said to be preparing to reopen negotiations with the armed rebels, according to a military official and a former soldier who did not want to be identified. The last time the government negotiated secret ceasefire talks with the rebels was around the 2020 presidential elections when the fighting subsided for several months.

 

But locals say it is too late for talks and that the country is being overrun by armed groups that control swaths of land, plant their flags and make people abide by their interpretation of Islamic law.

 

”They just come and are squeezing people [out of their homes] and there is no [government] strategy,” said Ousmane Amirou Dicko, the emir of Liptako. For the first time since the conflict, he said he no longer feels comfortable driving from the capital to his home in the Sahel.

 

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

Authorities in Burkina Faso’s capital, Ouagadougou, have banned an anti-government protest planned for Saturday, two months after another rally turned violent.

 

The demonstration, called by a civil society movement called Sauvons le Burkina (Save Burkina), was prohibited for “security reasons”, Christian Charles Rouamba, municipal secretary, said in a letter on Thursday.

 

The same group had staged another banned protest in late November 2021 against the failure of President Roch Marc Christian Kabore’s government to stop attacks by armed groups affiliated with Daesh and al-Qaeda. Hundreds of demonstrators defied the ban to take to Ouagadougou’s streets on Nov 27 and about a dozen people were injured in clashes with security forces.

 

A separate demonstration also planned for Saturday in support of neighboring Mali, whose military government is under sanctions imposed by the regional bloc the Economic Community of African States, was also banned.

 

Two officials of the Coalition of African Patriots-Burkina Faso, which had called the rally, were arrested on Thursday, the group said.

 

Burkina Faso’s government has come under sustained pressure over failures to stem the bloodshed of the brutal six-year conflict which has killed some 2, 000 people, forced 1.4 million from their homes and spawned an immense humanitarian crisis.

 

The worsening security situation has led to street protests calling for Kabore to step down.

 

Following waves of protests, Kabore last month replaced the entire government and named Lassina Zerbo as the country’s new prime minister, the latest upheaval in a leadership shake-up that has included military top brass and heads of intelligence agencies.

 

Earlier in January, Burkinabe authorities arrested eight soldiers, including a high-ranking commander, in connection with an alleged plot to “destabilize” the country’s institutions.

 

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

The discovery of the decomposing body of five-year-old schoolgirl Hanifa Abubakar has triggered shock and outrage across Nigeria, where the hashtag #JusticeForHanifa is trending.

 

The owner of her school, Abdulmalik Mohammed Tanko, has been arrested and the establishment closed.

 

He allegedly kidnapped Hanifa in the northern Kano state in December to demand a ransom of $14,600.

 

Police say he later killed Hanifa after realising she had recognised him.

 

According to the authorities, Tanko, 34, led officers to the school premises where he had buried the schoolgirl’s body in a shallow grave.

 

Her remains were then exhumed for medical examination and a proper burial by her family.

 

Tanko has not yet been charged.

 

Hanifa was allegedly abducted in early December outside an Islamic school that she also attended.

 

Two other suspects have been arrested, police say.

 

Kano state commissioner of education Sanusi Sai’du Kiru described the kidnapping as a betrayal of trust.

 

Nigeria is grappling with a wave of kidnappings for ransom, mostly by armed gangs who frequently target schools for mass abductions of students but the kidnapping of students by school officials is extremely rare.

 

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

NEW YORK — U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned Friday that the world is facing “a five-alarm fire” that requires urgent and united global action to be extinguished.

“I want to begin the year by raising five alarms — on COVID-19, global finance, climate action, lawlessness in cyber space, and peace and security,” he told the U.N. General Assembly in a wide-ranging speech laying out his top priorities for 2022.

On the coronavirus pandemic, he said the international community must go into “emergency mode” particularly in ramping up global vaccinations.

“Manufacturers worldwide are now producing 1.5 billion doses per month,” he noted. “But the distribution is scandalously unequal – and we need to convert vaccines into vaccinations everywhere.”

Vaccinating the world

The World Health Organization said last week that 90% of countries did not meet the goal of vaccinating 40% of their population by the end of 2021. In Africa alone, about one billion people have not yet received a single vaccine dose.

The United Nations chief urged countries and producers of the vaccine to prioritize supplying COVAX, the global vaccine coalition, which is supplying developing nations. COVAX has delivered one billion doses worldwide so far.

Guterres had strong words for the international financial system, which he said is in dire need of comprehensive reform.

“Let’s tell it like it is: the global financial system is morally bankrupt,” the world’s top diplomat said. “It favors the rich and punishes the poor.”

He said it has particularly failed developing countries in one of its main functions – ensuring stability and supporting economies through financial shocks, such as those caused by the pandemic.

“Unless we take action now, record inflation, soaring energy prices and extortionate interest rates could lead to frequent debt defaults in 2022, with dire consequences for the poorest and most vulnerable,” he warned. “The divergence between developed and developing countries is becoming systemic – a recipe for instability, crisis and forced migration.”

Call for climate action

The U.N. chief has been a leader in the global movement for climate action and he reiterated his concern that the planet is “far off-track” to meet minimum targets for reducing global warming.

“This year, we need an avalanche of action,” he said. “All major-emitting developed and developing economies must do much more, much faster, to change the math and reduce the suffering – taking into account common but differentiated responsibilities.”

He said that includes phasing out the use of coal and ramping up the transition to renewable energy, including investing $5 trillion annually in renewable infrastructure by 2030. It also means rich countries increasing their financial commitments to adaptation measures in poorer countries.

The secretary-general said those three challenges – the pandemic, the global financial system and the climate crisis amplify social problems.

“They undermine human rights and are a powder keg for social unrest and instability,” he said.

The secretary-general also called for better management of digital technologies, including “strong regulatory frameworks” and getting internet connections for the nearly 3 billion people who do not have them.

Push for global stability

Guterres said conflict prevention is at the heart of his agenda.

“I pledge to spare no effort to mobilize the international community – and step up our push for peace,” Guterres said, as he ticked off conflicts and crises from Afghanistan to Ethiopia to Myanmar and Mali.

“Geo-political divides must be managed to avoid chaos around the globe,” he urged. “We need to maximize areas for cooperation while establishing robust mechanisms to avoid escalation.”

He said the United Nations needs a more united Security Council to tackle issues of international peace and security, as well as the financial and moral support of all 193 member states.

“Now is not the time to simply list and lament challenges,” he conceded. “Now is the time to act.”

Source: Voice of America

The U.S. government says it is sanctioning four Ukrainians “engaged in Russian government-directed influence activities to destabilize Ukraine.”

“The individuals we are targeting, two of whom are members of Ukraine’s parliament, act at the direction of the Federal Security Service (FSB) and support Russia’s destabilizing and dangerous influence operations, which undermine not just Ukraine but also the fundamental principles of democracy,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement.

The U.S. accuses the four Ukrainians of helping Russia “gain access to sensitive information” and “create instability in Ukraine.”

Those sanctioned are Taras Kozak, Oleh Voloshyn, Volodymyr Oliynyk and Vladimir Sivkovich.

“Russia has used hybrid tactics, including disinformation and other influence campaigns, to destabilize Ukraine for years,” Blinken said. “In 2020, Kremlin officials launched a comprehensive information operation plan designed in part to degrade the ability of the Ukrainian state to independently function; the individuals designated today played key roles in that campaign.”

Blinken said the sanctions are “separate and distinct from the broad range of high impact measures the United States and its allies and partners are prepared to impose in order to inflict significant costs on the Russian economy and financial system if it were to further invade Ukraine.”

Blinken is in Berlin Thursday for consultations with key allies about the situation along the Russia-Ukraine border as he prepares for talks Friday with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Geneva.

Blinken is meeting with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian and British Minister for Middle East and North Africa James Cleverly, before delivering an address about the crisis in Ukraine.

U.S. President Joe Biden said at a news conference Wednesday he thinks Russia will invade Ukraine, reiterating warnings to Russian leader Vladimir Putin such actions would be met with economic sanctions and other consequences.

Russia has denied it has intentions of invading Ukraine and is seeking security guarantees, including that Ukraine is not allowed to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

 

Source: Voice of America