THE Kenyan government has cut down 167_000 acres of forest to settle the landless, but have inadvertently contributed to the drought gripping the central African country, warns the leader of the Green Belt Movement, Professor Wangari Maathai. Maathai and Norway’s ambassador to Kenya, Per J. Haugestad, inspected the Aberdares forest, where millions of trees were planted between 1982 and 1998 with huge grants from Norwegian Aid. But they found that illegal logging for timber and charcoal, as well as farming, had caused massive devastation. – African Eye News Service