Month: March 2024

Geneva — April marks the one-year anniversary of the war in Sudan, sparked by a power struggle between two rival generals. Aid organizations say the war is having catastrophic consequences for the population of nearly 49 million people — more than half of whom need life-saving humanitarian assistance.

Since the conflict began April 15, 2023, tens of thousands of people have been killed and injured, millions have been forcibly uprooted from their homes and among the 18 million people suffering from acute hunger, 5 million are on the brink of famine, according to the World Food Program.

“And yet this catastrophic humanitarian situation in Sudan today hardly receives the international attention that it warrants,” said Dr. Richard Brennan, the regional emergency director for the World Health Organization’s regional office for the Eastern Mediterranean.

The Cairo-based Brennan, who went on his first mission to an emergency country early last week since assuming his post just over a month ago, noted that he has visited Sudan multiple times over the past 25 years and seen the country through many crises — such as floods, displacement, conflict and political turmoil.

Nevertheless, Brennan said he was taken aback by “the devastation that decades of fragility, and nearly a year of brutal war, have wreaked on the country.”

“In fact, I was just reading the report from my 2014 mission which described a desperate situation with over 6.1 million in need of humanitarian assistance.

“It is extraordinary to reflect that today over 24.8 million people are in need — four times what we observed 10 years ago,” he said, adding that the health needs are massive.

“We estimate that almost 14,000 have been killed and 28,000 injured; there are ongoing outbreaks of cholera, measles, dengue fever, and malaria; around 3.4 million children are acutely malnourished; and 70 percent of health facilities in conflict-affected areas are non-functional or only partially functional,” he said.

Early last week, Jill Lawler, chief of field operations and emergency for UNICEF in Sudan, led a team of 12 UNICEF staff on a mission to Omdurman – in the greater Khartoum area. Omdurman is a region that has been under near-constant fire since the war broke out.

She described the intolerable conditions under which millions of children are forced to live and told journalists in Geneva Friday about the difficulties of providing medical care to children in need.

She said, “At Al Nau Hospital, one of the only hospitals in Khartoum with a functional and very crowded trauma ward, we met with two young people who had recent amputations — two young lives changed forever — and we learned from the hospital director that about 300 had limbs amputated in the hospital in just the past month alone.”

She said Al Nau and other hospitals she and her team visited were overcrowded, with two or three patients having to share the same bed. She said medicine and equipment were in short supply, health care workers were overworked, exhausted, and that most “have not been paid regular salaries in months.”

“During our visit, we learned that women and girls who had been raped in the first months of war are now delivering babies — some of whom have been abandoned to the care of hospital staff, who have built a nursery near the delivery ward,” she said.

UNICEF projects nearly 3.7 million children in Sudan will be acutely malnourished this year, including 730,000 who need lifesaving treatment. “The scale and magnitude of needs for children across the country are simply staggering,” said Lawler, noting that Sudan is the world’s largest displacement crisis, adding, “Some of the most vulnerable children are in the hardest-to-reach places.”

The World Health Organization reports escalating fighting is preventing desperately needed humanitarian aid from reaching millions of people across the country.

“We are especially concerned about the situation in Darfur states, where no direct humanitarian access has been possible for several months, and only limited aid is reaching people in these areas,” said Dr. Hanan Balkhy, WHO regional director for the Eastern Mediterranean Region, in a statement Friday.

Balkhy, who went on the mission to Sudan early last week with her colleague, Richard Brennan, said, “Most health facilities have been looted, damaged, or destroyed. In West Darfur, the local health system has essentially ground to a halt.”

“We have consistently shown that when we are provided with sufficient access and resources, we achieve good health outcomes.

“During my meetings with the deputy prime minister and minister of health, I received reassurances that all efforts will be made to facilitate the scale up of the health response throughout Sudan,” she said.

UNICEF is appealing to the warring parties to enable rapid, sustained, and unimpeded humanitarian access both across conflict lines within Sudan and across borders with Sudan’s neighboring countries.

“Chad has provided a crucial lifeline to communities in Darfur, and access through its border remains absolutely critical, along with access through South Sudan,” Lawler said, adding that providing a lifeline for millions of destitute people will require generous support from the international community.

“We need a massive mobilization of resources by the end of March so that humanitarian partners can get the supplies and capacity on the ground, in time, to limit the impending humanitarian catastrophe that we are seeing,” she said.
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DAKAR, Senegal — The United States scrambled on Sunday to assess the future of its counterterrorism operations in the Sahel after Niger’s junta said it was ending its yearslong military cooperation with Washington following a visit by top U.S. officials.

The U.S. military has hundreds of troops stationed at a major airbase in northern Niger that deploys flights over the vast Sahel region — south of the Sahara Desert — where jihadi groups linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group operate.

Top U.S. envoy Molly Phee returned to the capital, Niamey, this week to meet with senior government officials, accompanied by Marine Gen. Michael Langley, head of the U.S. military’s African Command. She had previously visited in December, while acting Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland traveled to the country in August.

The State Department said Sunday in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that talks were frank and that it was in touch with the junta. It wasn’t clear whether the U.S. has any leeway left to negotiate a deal to stay in the country.

Niger had been seen as one of the last nations in the restive region that Western nations could partner with to beat back growing jihadi insurgencies. The U.S. and France had more than 2,500 military personnel in the region until recently, and together with other European countries had invested hundreds of millions of dollars in military assistance and training.

But that changed in July when mutinous soldiers ousted the country’s democratically elected president and months later asked French forces to leave.

The U.S. military still had some 650 personnel working in Niger in December, according to a White House report to Congress. The Niger base is used for both manned and unmanned surveillance operations. In the Sahel the U.S. also supports ground troops, including accompanying them on missions. However, such accompanied missions have been scaled back since U.S. troops were killed in a joint operation in Niger in 2017.

It’s unclear what prompted the junta’s decision to suspend military ties. On Saturday, the junta’s spokesperson, Col. Maj. Amadou Abdramane, said U.S. flights over Niger’s territory in recent weeks were illegal. Meanwhile, Insa Garba Saidou, a local activist who assists Niger’s military rulers with their communications, criticized U.S. efforts to force the junta to pick between strategic partners.

“The American bases and civilian personnel cannot stay on Nigerien soil any longer,” he told The Associated Press.

After her trip in December, Phee, the top U.S. envoy, told reporters she had “good discussions” with junta leaders and called on them to set a timeline for elections in return for restoring military and aid ties. But she also said the U.S. had warned Niamey against forging closer ties with Russia.

Neighboring Mali and Burkina Faso, which have experienced two coups each since 2020, have turned to Moscow for security support. After the coup in Niger, the military also turned to the Russian mercenary group Wagner for help.

Cameron Hudson, who served with the Central Intelligence Agency and State Department in Africa, said the incident shows the diminution of U.S. leverage in the region and that Niger was angered by Washington’s attempt to pressure the junta to steer clear of Russia. “This is ironic since one mantra of the Biden Administration has been that Africans are free to choose their partners,” he said.

The U.S. delegation visit coincided with the start of Ramadan, a month of dawn-to-dusk fasting and intense prayer for Muslims. Niger’s junta leader, Gen. Abdourahmane Tchiani, refused to meet them. A U.S. press conference at the embassy in Niger was canceled.

The junta spokesperson, speaking on state television, said junta leaders met the U.S. delegation only out of courtesy and described their tone as condescending.

Aneliese Bernard, a former U.S. State Department official who specialized in African affairs and director of Strategic Stabilization Advisors, a risk advisory group, said the recent visit had failed and the U.S. needs to take a critical look at how it’s doing diplomacy not just in Niger but in the whole region.

“What’s going on in Niger and the Sahel cannot be looked at continuously in a vacuum as we always do,” she said. “The United States government tends to operate with blinders on. We can’t deny that our deteriorating relationships in other parts of the world: the Gulf, Israel and others, all have an influential impact on our bilateral relations in countries in West Africa.”

 
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Cairo — The European Union on Sunday announced a $8 billion aid package for cash-strapped Egypt amid concerns that economic pressure and conflicts and chaos in neighboring countries could drive more migrants to European shores.

The deal is scheduled to be signed during a visit by European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and the leaders of Belgium, Italy, Austria, Cyprus and Greece, according to Egyptian officials. 

The package includes both grants and loans over the next three years for the Arab world’s most populous country, according to the European Union Mission in Cairo. 

According to a document from the EU mission in Egypt, the two sides have promoted their cooperation to the level of a “strategic and comprehensive partnership,” paving the way for expanding Egypt-EU cooperation in various economic and non-economic areas. 

The EU will provide assistance to Egypt’s government to fortify its borders especially with Libya, a major transit point for migrants fleeing poverty and conflicts in Africa and the Middle East, and will support the government in hosting Sudanese who have fled nearly a year of fighting between rival generals in their country. 

Egypt has for decades been a refuge for migrants from sub-Saharan Africa trying to escape war or poverty. For some, Egypt is a destination and a haven, the closest and easiest country for them to reach. For others, it is a point of transit before attempting the dangerous Mediterranean crossing to Europe. 

While the Egyptian coast has not been a major launching pad for people smugglers and human traffickers sending overcrowded boats across the Mediterranean to Europe, Egypt faces migratory pressures from the region, with the added looming threat that the Israel-Hamas war will spill across its borders. 

The package drew criticism from international rights groups over Egypt’s human rights record. Amnesty International decried the deal and urged European leaders not to be complicit with human rights violations taking place in Egypt. 

“EU leaders must ensure that the Egyptian authorities adopt clear benchmarks for human rights, said Amnesty International’s Head of the European Institutions Office, Eve Geddie in a statement. Geddie pointed to Egypt’s restrictions on media and freedom of expression and a crackdown on civil society.
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JUBA, South Sudan — South Sudan’s government is closing down all schools starting Monday as the country prepares for a wave of extreme heat expected to last two weeks.   

The health and education ministries advised parents to keep all children indoors as temperatures are expected to soar to 45 degrees Celsius (113 Fahrenheit), in a statement late Saturday.

They warned that any school found open during that time would have its registration withdrawn, but didn’t specify how long the schools would remain shuttered.   

The ministries said they “will continue to monitor the situation and inform the public accordingly.”   

Peter Garang, a resident who lives in the capital, Juba, welcomed the decision. He said that “schools should be connected to the electricity grid” to enable the installation of air conditioners.   

South Sudan, one of the world’s youngest nations, is particularly vulnerable to climate change with heatwaves common but rarely exceeding 40C. Civil conflict has plagued the east African country which also suffered from drought and flooding, making living conditions difficult for residents.   

The World Food Program in its latest country brief said South Sudan “continues to face a dire humanitarian crisis” due to violence, economic instability, climate change and an influx of people fleeing the conflict in neighboring Sudan. It also stated that 818,000 vulnerable people were given food and cash-based transfers in January 2024. 
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CAPE TOWN, South Africa — Mice accidentally introduced to a remote island near Antarctica 200 years ago are breeding out of control because of climate change, and they are eating seabirds and causing major harm in a special nature reserve with “unique biodiversity.”

Now conservationists are planning a mass extermination using helicopters and hundreds of tons of rodent poison, which needs to be dropped over every part of Marion Island’s 297 square kilometers (115 square miles) to ensure success.

If even one pregnant mouse survives, their prolific breeding ability means it may have all been for nothing.

The Mouse-Free Marion project — pest control on a grand scale — is seen as critical for the ecology of the uninhabited South African territory and the wider Southern Ocean. It would be the largest eradication of its kind if it succeeds.

The island is home to globally significant populations of nearly 30 bird species and a rare undisturbed habitat for wandering albatrosses — with their 10-foot wingspan — and many others.

An undisturbed habitat, at least, until stowaway house mice arrived on seal hunter ships in the early 1800s, introducing the island’s first mammal predators.

The past few decades have been the most significant for the damage the mice have caused, said Dr. Anton Wolfaardt, the Mouse-Free Marion project manager. He said their numbers have increased hugely, mainly due to rising temperatures from climate change, which has turned a cold, windswept island into a warmer, drier, more hospitable home.

“They are probably one of the most successful animals in the world. They’ve got to all sorts of places,” Wolfaardt said. But now on Marion Island, “their breeding season has been extended, and this has resulted in a massive increase in the densities of mice.”

Mice don’t need encouragement. They can reproduce from about 60 days old and females can have four or five litters a year, each with seven or eight babies.

Rough estimates indicate there are more than 1 million mice on Marion Island. They are feeding on invertebrates and, more and more, on seabirds — both chicks in their nests and adults.

A single mouse will feed on a bird several times its size.

Conservationists snapped a photo of one perched on the bloodied head of a wandering albatross chick.

The phenomenon of mice eating seabirds has been recorded on only a handful of the world’s islands.

The scale and frequency of mice preying on seabirds on Marion has risen alarmingly, Wolfaardt said, after the first reports of it in 2003. He said the birds have not developed the defense mechanisms to protect themselves against these unfamiliar predators and often sit there while mice nibble away at them. Sometimes, multiple mice swarm over a bird.

Conservationists estimate that if nothing is done, 19 seabird species will disappear from the island in 50 to 100 years, he said.

“This incredibly important island as a haven for seabirds has a very tenuous future because of the impacts of mice,” Wolfaardt said.

The eradication project is a single shot at success, with not even a whisker of room for error. Burgeoning mice and rat populations have been problematic for other islands. South Georgia, in the southern Atlantic, was declared rodent-free in 2018 after an eradication, but that was a multiyear project; the one on Marion could be the biggest single intervention.

Wolfaardt said four to six helicopters will likely be used to drop up to 550 tons of rodenticide bait across the island. Pilots will be given exact flight lines and Wolfaardt’s team will be able to track the drop using GPS mapping.

The bait has been designed to not affect the soil or the island’s water sources. It shouldn’t harm the seabirds, who feed out at sea, and won’t have negative impacts for the environment, Wolfaardt said. Some animals will be affected at an individual level, but those species will recover.

“There’s no perfect solution in these kinds of things,” he said. “There is nothing that just zaps mice and nothing else.”

The eradication project is a partnership between BirdLife South Africa and the national Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, which designated Marion Island as a special nature reserve with the highest level of environmental protection. It has a weather and research station but is otherwise uninhabited and dedicated to conservation.

The department said the eradication of mice was “essential if the unique biodiversity of the island is to be preserved.”

Wolfaardt said the amount of planning needed means a likely go-ahead date in 2027. The project also needs to raise about $25 million — some of which has been funded by the South African government — and get final regulatory approvals from authorities.

Scientists have tried to control the mice of Marion in the past.

They were already a pest for researchers in the 1940s, so five domestic cats were introduced. By the 1970s, there were around 2,000 feral cats on the island, killing half a million seabirds per year. The cats were eliminated by introducing a feline flu virus and hunting down any survivors.

Islands are critical to conservation efforts, but fragile. The Island Conservation organization says they are “extinction epicenters” and 75% of all species that have gone extinct lived on islands. About 95% of those were bird species.

“This really is an ecological restoration project,” Wolfaardt said. “It’s one of those rare conservation opportunities where you solve once and for all a conservation threat.”
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Niamey, Niger — Niger’s government announced Saturday that it was breaking off “with immediate effect” its military cooperation agreement with the United States.  

The declaration came a day after a senior U.S. delegation left Niger, following a three-day visit to renew contact with the military junta that ousted the president and moved closer to Russia. 

The statement said the government had decided to “denounce with immediate effect” the agreement relating to U.S. military and civilian employees of the U.S. Department of Defense inside Niger.  

It was read out Saturday evening on national television.  

The United States still stations about 1,000 troops in Niger at a desert drone base built at a cost of $100 million. 

Movements there have been limited since the July 2023 coup and Washington has curbed assistance to the government. 

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken paid a rare visit to Niger a year ago in hopes of shoring up President Mohamed Bazoum, a stalwart ally in Western security efforts against jihadis. 

Four months later, the military deposed Bazoum and put him under house arrest.  

The junta took a hard line against former colonial power France, forcing the withdrawal of French troops in place for nearly a decade. 

Niger’s military had in the past worked closely with the United States. 

But the junta has sought cooperation with Russia, while stopping short of the full-fledged embrace of Moscow by military-run neighbors Mali and Burkina Faso.  
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