A coalition of Zimbabwean doctors said on Wednesday its members had seen and treated more than 150 patients who had been beaten and tortured since the elections at the end of March. The independent Zimbabwe Association of Doctors for Human Rights said 157 people had been treated between the elections on March 29 and April 14.
President Robert Mugabe’s security forces clamped down hard on unrest during a general strike in Zimbabwe, arresting dozens of opposition supporters before the stoppage fizzled out on Wednesday. The security forces scaled back their presence in the capital as it became clear that the call for people to remain off work had failed.
South African President Thabo Mbeki had intended to lead a summit on Wednesday at the United Nations in New York that would focus on the increasing peacekeeping chores of African Union troops. But on Tuesday, it became clear that Mbeki would not be able to dodge the ongoing election crisis in Zimbabwe.
Gunmen have attacked police from the African Union and United Nations peacekeeping force in Darfur for the first time, injuring one officer by beating him with a rifle butt, a UN spokesperson said on Thursday. The unarmed police were stopped at gunpoint as they returned from a routine patrol.
South Africa should use its powerful position on the United Nations Security Council to put the Zimbabwean election saga on the international body’s agenda, Democratic Alliance leader Helen Zille said on Wednesday. Zille, who is currently in New York, said in a statement she would meet South Africa’s ambassador to the United Nations.
Thousands of rebels massed in Sudan are about to attack neighbouring Chad in an attempt to destabilise it, Chad’s defence minister said on Wednesday. ”Once again the regime of [Sudanese President] Omar al-Bashir … is massing, training and heavily arming thousands of its mercenaries,” said Defence Minister Mahamat Ali Abdallah.
Islamist fighters in Somalia seized a strategic town north of Mogadishu on Wednesday for the second time in a fortnight, a spokesperson for the insurgents said. Jowhar is the most significant of several towns the rebels have captured in recent months, highlighting the inability of the Western-backed interim government to impose its authority.
Zimbabwe’s opposition slammed the ”deafening silence” on Tuesday of Africa in the aftermath of the country’s elections, warning of blood on the streets unless pressure is brought to bear on Robert Mugabe. Meanwhile, party lawyers argued at the High Court for an immediate announcement of the result of the presidential poll.
India sought to deepen strategic and economic ties with resource-rich Africa as it held its first summit meeting with African leaders on Tuesday and sweetened the pot by offering financial help. Indian Premier Manmohan Singh, playing host to the African leaders, announced export tariff cuts that he said would benefit 34 of Africa’s 53 countries.
Opposition parties on Monday criticised President Thabo Mbeki’s assessment of Zimbabwe’s elections. Mbeki’s remarks, made in Britain on Sunday, indicated he was either woefully out of touch with reality in Zimbabwe or he was attempting to ”deliberately mislead the world’s media”, the Democratic Alliance’s Dianne Kohler-Barnard said.
Girls as young as 11 have suffered rape by Sudanese government forces and armed groups across Darfur more than five years after war began there, a rights organisation said on Monday. Human Rights Watch said sexual violence is rife in Darfur, where neither Sudanese security forces nor international peacekeepers are properly protecting women and girls.
Troubled by a difficult case, doctor Asfaw Atnafu decides to seek advice. He walks into a consulting room at Black Lion Hospital in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa and greets a doctor at the Care Hospital in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad. Linked by a high-speed internet connection, the doctors study X-rays and laboratory results.
Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe’s deafening silence after weekend elections has raised increasing speculation about the fate of a strongman who has never previously found himself lost for words. Rumours have also been swirling around about him possibly preparing to depart for a foreign country where he will live out his twilight years in exile.
South Africa said on Wednesday it plans to use its presidency of the United Nations Security Council in April to enhance security cooperation between the world body and the African Union on the continent. Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Aziz Pahad said that South Africa would call a summit this month at the UN to discuss conflict resolution in Africa.
Comoros’ Anjouan island expects to organise democratic elections within three months, its interim leader said on Wednesday, a week after his predecessor was ousted in an African Union-backed offensive. Former president of Anjouan’s appeals court, Lailizamane Abdou Cheik, was sworn in as the tiny, wooded island’s interim leader on Monday to replace Mohamed Bacar.
Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai and the Zimbabwe government both denied on Tuesday that they were in talks to arrange the resignation of President Robert Mugabe. At a news conference on Tuesday evening, Tsvangirai confirmed, however, for the first time personally that his party had won the elections.
Rigging fears were increasing in Zimbabwe on Tuesday three days after the election commission failed to release results from the presidential vote, in which the opposition Movement for Democratic Change claims to have ousted authoritarian President Robert Mugabe.
Comorian rebel leader Mohamed Bacar was put in military custody on the French island of Reunion on Saturday pending a decision on whether to deport him after charges against him were dropped, authorities said. Bacar fled the Indian Ocean island of Anjouan this week when Comorian and African Union troops toppled his renegade government.
It is a matter of hours to go before voting stations open for Saturday’s elections in Zimbabwe. The Mail & Guardian Online spoke to South African political parties and NGOs ahead of the controversial poll. ”Mugabe will rule again. It would be a miracle if he didn’t,” said the Inkatha Freedom Party’s Musa Zondi.
Somalis uprooted by fighting in Mogadishu looted trucks carrying United Nations food aid on Friday, peacekeepers said, highlighting what relief agencies warn is a fast deteriorating humanitarian catastrophe. Somalia now has one million internal refugees, aid workers say, and their numbers are swelled by an exodus of about 20 000 civilians each month.
The military operation to oust the rebel leader of the Comoros island of Anjouan was hailed on Friday as a success by the African Union, in dire need of a boost to its conflict-resolution record. The first ever AU-backed plan to remove a renegade leader came after failed negotiations.
Somalia’s Islamist insurgents vowed on Thursday to launch more hit-and-run attacks against the government, saying their tactics were designed to reduce civilian casualties. Islamist fighters briefly seized the town of Jowhar, north of Mogadishu, on Wednesday, highlighting the interim government’s inability to assert its authority.
Comoros demanded on Thursday that France hand over a rebel leader wanted by the Indian Ocean archipelago for crimes against humanity and troops fired teargas to stop protests against the former colonial power. Paris confirmed late on Wednesday that Mohamed Bacar, the self-declared leader of Anjouan island, had fled to nearby French-run Mayotte.
France is considering giving asylum to a renegade Comoran leader who fled an invasion by Comoran and African Union troops, a minister said on Thursday. French security forces guarded the main airport on the French Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte where Bacar was taken on Thursday.
Comorian rebel leader Mohamed Bacar has fled to the French-run Indian Ocean island of Mayotte from nearby Anjouan, where Comorian troops had been searching for him, French and Comorian officials said on Wednesday. Joint African Union and Comorian forces attacked and seized control of Anjouan island on Tuesday to topple Bacar.
Comoran and African forces on Wednesday battled die-hard supporters of Anjouan’s fugitive strongman as the federal authorities pledged a transition government in the Indian Ocean isle by the end of the week. Mohamed Bacar (45) was still on the run on the second day of the military operation.
South Africa has steadfastly refused to join in the chorus of criticism of Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe despite paying an ever higher price for the crisis across its northern border. As Zimbabwe goes to the polls this weekend, analysts believe South African President Thabo Mbeki may feel little enthusiasm towards Mugabe but will never embarrass his fellow leader.
A coalition of Comoran and African Union (AU) troops on Wednesday combed Anjouan hunting for its renegade leader after invading the Indian Ocean island the day before. The coalition staged its long-awaited landing in Anjouan’s capital and main port of Mutsamudu, where they were greeted by cheering residents.
Troops from the Indian Ocean archipelago of Comoros seized the rebel island of Anjouan on Tuesday with African Union military help, and the government said its self-declared leader had fled dressed as a woman.
The Indian Ocean archipelago nation of Comoros said it had captured the capital and airport of the rebel island of Anjouan on Tuesday in a African Union-backed seaborne assault. ”Our troops have their feet on the ground … The assault has started well and good,” Mohamed Bacar Dossar, a presidential official in charge of defence, said.
The road from Harar runs for more than 960km east towards the border with Somalia, penetrating deep into the desiccated badlands of the Ogaden desert, the dusty heart of Ethiopia’s war-torn Somali regional state. This is the land that the self-styled separatists of the Ogaden National Liberation Front claim as their own.
A fresh batch of African Union (AU) troops arrived on the Comoros island of Moheli on Friday, joining Comoran forces massed for a military offensive to retake the rebel island of Anjouan. The Indian Ocean archipelago — between Madagascar and Mozambique — did not recognise the re-election of Anjouan leader Colonel Mohamed Bacar in June 2007.