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/ 8 February 2008
Kenya’s political rivals tried to inject some momentum on Friday into slow-moving peace talks brokered by former United Nations head Kofi Annan, aimed at ending weeks of bloodshed. Four people were killed overnight in tribal violence in the Kisii region of Nyanza province in western Kenya, two of whom were ”hacked to death”, police said.
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/ 8 February 2008
An East African peacemaking body on Friday called for an end to Kenya’s post-election violence and expressed support for mediation talks led by former United Nations chief Kofi Annan. ”We urge all Kenyans to support the line of peace and dialogue and reconciliation and do away with the violence,” Ethiopian Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin said.
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/ 8 February 2008
On the shores of lake Nahuel Huapi, in the wild mountains of Argentina’s Patagonia, live some of the world’s most ancient trees. Known in Spanish as the alerce, the Patagonian cypress grows extremely slowly, but can reach heights over 50m and live for 2 000 years or more.
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/ 8 February 2008
Tobacco use could kill a billion people this century unless governments act now to reduce smoking, the United Nations said on Thursday. In a strongly-worded report the World Health Organisation, the UN’s public health arm, said no country was doing all it could to curb tobacco use.
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/ 7 February 2008
United Nations goodwill ambassador and Hollywood megastar Angelina Jolie visited Iraq on a humanitarian mission on Thursday and met top officials to demand help for people displaced by the war. "There are over two million displaced people and there never seems to be a real coherent plan to help them," she said.
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/ 7 February 2008
United States President George Bush will spend most of his time during a five-nation tour of Africa later this month in Tanzania, to spotlight development gains in the East African nation. "This is a success story," said US embassy public affairs officer Jeffery Salaiz of Tanzania, during a press conference held in Dar es Salaam on Tuesday.
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/ 7 February 2008
Information Minister Samuel Poghisio said on Thursday the violence in Kenya was diminishing and that most of the country was unaffected, so investors and tourists should not take fright. More than 1 000 people have been killed, mostly in ethnic clashes, after a disputed election on December 27.
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/ 6 February 2008
Chad’s government is in total control of the country after beating off a rebel offensive, President Idriss Déby Itno said on Wednesday. Making his first public appearance since rebels attacked the capital, Ndjamena, on the weekend, Déby accused the president of neighbouring Sudan of backing the rebel offensive.
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/ 6 February 2008
Kenya’s political rivals resumed crisis talks on Wednesday despite preparations for a meeting of East African foreign ministers which has angered opposition leaders. The opposition has threatened more street protests if the government chairs Thursday’s planned meeting of the regional body Igad.
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/ 5 February 2008
Kenya’s government and the opposition begin detailed negotiations on Tuesday to try to end political and tribal conflict that has killed about 1 000 people and brought one of Africa’s brightest economies to its knees. The two sides agreed on Monday on immediate steps to help the hundreds of thousands displaced by the violence.
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/ 5 February 2008
The United Nations Security Council on Monday unanimously condemned the rebel attacks in Chad and urged world support for the embattled government as the insurgents threatened a new assault on the capital. A statement drafted by France, Chad’s former colonial ruler, "strongly condemns these attacks and all attempts at destabilisation by force".
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/ 4 February 2008
Thousands of civilians fled Chad’s capital Ndjamena on Monday after rebel forces pulled back from a two-day assault, but the rebels said they would attack again to try to topple President Idriss Déby Itno, whose government said it had beaten off more than 2Â 000 insurgents.
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/ 4 February 2008
Five South Africans will be evacuated from Chad on Monday night, the Department of Foreign Affairs said. The French Military will fly the South Africans to Libreville in Gabon where they will be met by the South African ambassador to that country, Jomo Khasu.
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/ 4 February 2008
The Kenyan government on Monday lifted a ban on live broadcasts imposed over a month ago as violence erupted over the outcome of a hotly contested presidential election, the Information Ministry said. The government said the ban was in the ”interest of public safety and tranquillity” when it was announced on December 30.
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/ 4 February 2008
Egyptian security forces closed the border with the Gaza Strip on Sunday nearly two weeks after the wall was first breached. Gunmen from the Hamas movement, which controls Gaza, appeared to be cooperating with the Egyptians, turning back crowds of Palestinians as barbed wire and metal barricades were installed.
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/ 4 February 2008
South African business tycoon Cyril Ramaphosa, chosen by former United Nations chief Kofi Annan to head long-term mediation efforts in Kenya, pulled out on Monday because of reservations expressed by the Kenyan government. ”Kofi Annan reluctantly accepts the withdrawal of Cyril Ramaphosa from the role of chief mediator,” a UN official said.
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/ 4 February 2008
The death toll from a series of earthquakes that hit Central Africa rose on Monday to 43 as a major aid operation for hundreds of injured and thousands of homeless gathered pace amid new aftershocks. Thirty-seven of the deaths were reported in Rwanda’s Western Province and six around the Democratic Republic of Congo city of Bukavu, which was near the epicentre.
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/ 4 February 2008
Sudan and the joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force have agreed the terms under which the 26Â 000-strong force will deploy in western Darfur, removing a major barrier to its operations. Experts estimate about 200Â 000 people have died and 2,5-million been driven from their homes.
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/ 4 February 2008
Resolutions at the United Nations or African Union could alter the mission of French troops in Chad, France’s Foreign Minister said on Monday as a first planeload of evacuees landed at a Paris airport. Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner and Defence Minister Herve Morin said French forces secured Chad’s airbases and were protecting French and foreign civilians.
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/ 3 February 2008
Fierce fighting with tanks and helicopter strikes rocked the capital of Chad for a second day on Sunday as rebels surrounded President Idriss Déby Itno in his palace and hundreds of foreigners fled the country. International aid organisations reported bodies in the streets and hundreds of people wounded.
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/ 3 February 2008
Kenyan opposition chief Raila Odinga on Sunday called for the deployment of foreign peacekeepers to stem the country’s escalating violence, saying security forces were not impartial in crackdowns. Kenyan police have admitted to killing dozens of arsonists, looters and people who have attacked them during violent demonstrations.
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/ 3 February 2008
Two strong earthquakes shook the African Great Lakes region on Sunday, killing at least 34 people in Rwanda and six in the Democratic Republic of Congo, according to officials and hospital sources. Hundreds of people were wounded, many with fractured limbs, after the two quakes struck close together along the western Rift Valley fault.
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/ 3 February 2008
Marguerite Sabamahoro, a survivor of the Rwandan genocide, remembers the moment she was woken at her home in Kigali on April 7 1994 by the sound of gunfire and bombing as if it were yesterday. ”I lost aunts, uncles, cousins and friends to the genocide,” Sabamahoro tells visitors to a new genocide exhibition at the Apartheid Museum.
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/ 3 February 2008
The United States of Africa is one of few concrete plans on which African leaders agreed as they struggled with issues of peacekeeping and political disputes at this week’s continental summit. The problem is, so many countries want to be Washington, DC, and presidential candidates are already rumoured.
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/ 2 February 2008
African Union leaders condemned the latest unrest in Chad and Kenya on Saturday at the close of a summit overshadowed by new crises on the continent and which saw little headway achieved on older ones. The pan-African body’s summit wrapped up even as military sources said that rebels had seized control of the Chadian capital.
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/ 2 February 2008
Rebels seized Chad’s capital, Ndjamena, on Saturday after intense fighting with government forces, military and rebel sources said, as President Idriss Déby Itno remained holed up in the presidential palace. ”The whole of the city is in the hands of the rebels. It’s down to mopping-up operations,” said a military source.
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/ 2 February 2008
The death toll from ethnic fighting and a police crackdown in western Kenya rose to 44 on Saturday, a day after the feuding political sides agreed to a framework to try to end weeks of violence. Thirty-four people have died in fresh clashes, police said on Saturday, including in western Nyanza province.
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/ 2 February 2008
Rebels penetrated the capital of Chad on Saturday, clashing with government troops and moving toward the presidential palace after a three-day advance through the Central African nation, a French military spokesperson and witnesses said. Witnesses reported looting and gunfire near government buildings.
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/ 2 February 2008
Fighting broke out between Chadian rebels and government forces just north of the capital on Saturday, both sides said, as France prepared to evacuate its nationals in the face of the rebel advance. ”Fighting between government forces and rebels has started at about 20km north of Ndjamena,” a military source said.
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/ 2 February 2008
Kenya’s government and opposition struck an agreement on Friday to take immediate steps to try to end tribal bloodshed in a five-week-old political stand-off in which about 850 people have been killed. Meanwhile, 27 people have been killed in fresh violence in western Kenya, police said on Saturday.
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/ 1 February 2008
Prominent South African businessman Cyril Ramaphosa was expected in Kenya later on Friday to help mediate in talks between the government and the opposition aimed at ending a month of post-election violence. Ramaphosa led the African National Congress in negotiations with the National Party to end apartheid in the early 1990s.
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/ 1 February 2008
Mozambique’s poverty-alleviation programme this week received a boost following the approval of a further -million loan by the World Bank. ”The council of executive directors of the World Bank has approved a credit for the International Development Association to the value of -million,” the bank said in Maputo on Friday.