Oxfam criticizes approach to Somalia, calls for humanitarian focus

REPORTING FROM JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA -- The international aid agency Oxfam said in a report Wednesday that Western policy on Somalia had failed and called for a new approach emphasizing humanitarian aid instead of counter-terrorism and military intervention.

The organization said the focus of the United States and other Western countries had failed to build a stable country and only exacerbated the country’s problems.

The agency called on leaders of 40 countries and representatives of international agencies meeting in London on Thursday to discuss Somalia to develop a better policy that took into account the humanitarian cost of military action in Somalia –- adding that global players, including the United Nations, have failed to do so in the past.

“While the conflict in Somalia remains a source of legitimate concerns for regional and international security, policies focused more on these concerns than on the short- and long-term needs of Somali people have not worked, inadvertently fueling the conflict and exacerbating the humanitarian crisis,” the agency said in a report released on the eve of the London conference.

When thieves struck, this Kenyan chief turned to Twitter

When Francis Kariuki got a 4 a.m. call that thieves were breaking into a home in his Kenyan village, he turned to a technological tool  for help -- Twitter. He put the word out in less than 140 characters.

Minutes later villagers gathered and the thieves fled, the Associated Press reports. Shooing thieves isn't the only way that Kariuki, an administrative chief in the west Kenyan village of Lanet Umoja, has deployed Twitter. His tweets range from philosophical ruminations to alerts about missing sheep:

What Kariuki is doing is part of a wider trend that challenges stereotypes about who uses social media and where.

 Though Twitter is often associated with the Arab Spring uprisings,  countries like South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria each send out more tweets than Egypt, according to a recent study by Portland Communications and the trend-analysis group Tweetminster called "How Africa Tweets."

Kenya, the second most prolific country for tweets on the continent, sent out nearly 2.5 million tweets in three months. Most of the African Twitter users surveyed in the study said they used it to communicate with friends. But 68% said they also used it to get news, especially international news.

Want to see which countries tweet the most? Here's a map created by Portland Communications:

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Photo: Chief Francis Kariuki, left, is shown a gap in a fence that thieves escaped through by village elder Peter Ndungu in the Kenyan village of Lanet Umoja on Monday. Credit: Khalil Senosi / Associated Press

Think kidnapping is bad in Somalia? It's worse in Mexico

Somalia is a hot spot for kidnapping, as the rescue Wednesday of two hostages by U.S. Navy SEALs has spotlighted. But Mexico, Afghanistan and Venezuela are even worse, according to a company that tracks threats across the world.

Somalia and Kenya together ranked ninth in the world for kidnapping foreigners from October to December of last year, with two kidnappings a month, the Britain-based company AKE found. (Somali waters, where piracy has been a persistent problem, ranked fifth, with 13 crew members taken a month.)

It may seem surprising that a private company is gathering these statistics. Taryn Evans, an analyst at AKE, said that governments do release data on kidnapping, but they are often skewed for political reasons. Even if governments don’t fudge the numbers, many kidnappings are never reported.

The results from official sources aren't so believable: Canada had the highest kidnapping rate in the world as of 2009, according to the most recent United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime data. So to get better information, the British company uses on-the-ground experts to track kidnappings.

Here are its most recent rankings for the worst kidnapping spots in the world:

1. Mexico 
2. Venezuela
3. Afghanistan/Pakistan
4. Colombia
5. Somali waters
6. Gulf of Guinea waters
7. Philippines
8. Sahel region
9. Somalia/Kenya
10. Iraq
11. Democratic Republic of the Congo
12. Nigeria
13. Sudan/South Sudan
14. Yemen

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Photo: A woman hides her face behind a screen door where she lives in secret far from her ancestral home. She and her family fled their remote ranch near the U.S.-Mexico border after members of the  Beltran-Leyva drug cartel kidnapped her brother and took over her house. Credit: Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times

4 Kenyan politicians to stand trial over post-election violence

 

This post has been updated. See the note below for details.

REPORTING FROM JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA -- The International Criminal Court has ordered four powerful politicians in Kenya to stand trial for crimes against humanity, a rare legal challenge to an elite that has long enjoyed impunity in the East African nation.

Two potential candidates in next year's presidential elections, Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta and former Education Minister William Ruto, were among those indicted in connection with the political violence that wracked the country after the 2007 presidential election. The charges included murder and forcible removal of people from their homes.

Cabinet secretary Francis Muthaura and radio executive Joshua Arap Sang face similar charges.

Kenyatta, a close ally to President Mwai Kibaki, is a member of one of Kenya's influential political dynasties and the son of the country's first president, Jomo Kenyatta.

He is accused of hiring members of Kenya's biggest criminal gang, the Munyiki, to kill and rape supporters of Raila Odinga, a 2007 presidential candidate who is now prime minister. Ruto is accused of masterminding attacks on Kibaki supporters, who defeated Odinga in the widely disputed balloting.

Doctors on strike in Kenya seek higher pay, better conditions

REPORTING FROM NAIROBI, KENYA, AND JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA -- Public-sector doctors on strike in Kenya marched in the capital of Nairobi on Wednesday, demanding more pay and better equipment as patients sought care in public hospitals manned by trainees and teaching staff.

On day three of their countrywide strike, the doctors also demanded improved facilities and a better stock of drugs in hospitals.

Marching in their white coats to the Health Ministry and the Finance Ministry, the protesting doctors shouted, "Shame, Shame!" and "Doctors' power!"

Unless the government offers higher pay and better conditions, doctors will continue to flood out of the country for well-paying jobs in Western countries, said Dr. Victor Ng’ani, chairman of the Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union.

"Six months ago, we were 2,900 doctors," he said, referring to public-sector doctors. "Now, just six months later, we are 2,334 doctors, and this is an unacceptable rate of exit."

Ng’ani said public-hospital doctors were overworked and underpaid. The starting pay for doctors in Kenya is reportedly about $400 per month.

"If they pay doctors better, [the doctors] will be willing to stay here for longer," he said in an interview during the doctors' protest rally. "Underpayment results in this exodus, and the few doctors are overworked."

Ng'ani said there are about 5,000 doctors in Kenya, including private-sector doctors. Hospitals and doctors have not received appropriate support for years, he said.

"Our union is founded on two pillars: The first is to improve the welfare of the doctors, and second and more important is to improve public healthcare provision, which has been neglected in the last 20 years."

Canadian research published last month in the British Medical Journal found that African countries had spent nearly $2.2 billion training doctors who left the continent to work in wealthy nations such as the U.S., Britain, Canada and Australia.

The government is using consultants, teaching staff and trainees to try to provide emergency care at hospitals during the strike, but many patients have been left unattended and Kenyan media reported at least one patient died because trainees couldn't diagnose him.

There have been long lines of patients waiting at the country's biggest public hospital, Kenyatta National Hospital.

"I have been here all day. I brought my child for an operation to treat a stomach ailment, but she has not been attended to," Anne Nduta, 32, told Reuters news agency as she cradled her 6-year-old child.

Kenya's Daily Nation newspaper quoted Medical Services Assistant Minister Kambi Kazungu as saying that the government couldn't meet doctors' demands because it had channeled resources to the military, which is engaged in operations in Somalia.

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Photo: Striking Kenyan doctors march through Nairobi on Wednesday. Credit: Katharine Houreld / Associated Press

On World AIDS Day, activists condemn global donor shortfalls

REPORTING FROM JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA -- Activists marked World AIDS Day on Thursday with warnings that severe shortfalls in global AIDS funding by donors would cost many lives, particularly in hard-hit southern Africa.

After scientific research this year concluded that aggressive treatment of HIV from an early stage with anti-retroviral medications could save lives, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria announced last week it was canceling funding for new programs until 2014 because it had not received adequate donations.

The organization is the biggest fund offering grants to fight the diseases and provides anti-retroviral medication for about half the people in sub-Saharan Africa taking the drugs. Globally it is providing such medications for 3.2 million people.

The global financial crisis and the uncertainty created by the Eurozone meltdown are major causes of the shortfall in donations, according to analysts. Corruption in some agencies that received Global Fund grants was another issue, leading the fund to tighten its accountability procedures.

Kenyan court orders arrest of Sudanese President Bashir

Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir should be arrested and turned over to the International Criminal Court in The Hague if he visits Kenya again, a Kenyan court ruled Monday.

Judge Nicholas Ombija said in the ruling that Bashir, who is wanted by the ICC on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity, should be arrested "should he set foot in Kenya," according to news reports. The charges against Bashir are tied to his government's crackdown on rebels in Sudan's western region of Darfur.

Sudan responded to the court action Monday by ordering Kenya's ambassador to leave the country and recalling its own ambassador, according to news reports.

The African Union has urged members not to honor the arrest warrant for Bashir. But Kenya is an ICC member obligated to cooperate with the court.

Kenyan officials were criticized by the ICC and others for allowing Bashir to visit Nairobi last year without facing arrest. The Kenyan section of the International Commission of Jurists then sought a new arrest warrant for Bashir.

Ombija reportedly said Kenya should arrest the Sudanese president to show its respect for human rights.

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-- Times staff and wire reports

Photo: President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir in Khartoum, Sudan's capital, on Oct. 30. Kenya was criticized for allowing him to visit Nairobi last year without facing arrest. Credit: Reuters 

 

 

Somalia's famine eases in some areas

REPORTING FROM JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA -- Somalia's hunger crisis has eased somewhat, with the U.N. announcing that three of six famine regions were no longer technically in famine after aid trickled into the country.

But those regions -- Bay, Bakool and Lower Shabelle -- remain in a critical situation and 250,000 people are still predicted to die in southern Somalia because of the crisis.

Three other areas -- Middle Shabelle, Afgoye and including sprawling refugee camps in the capital, Mogadishu -- will remain in famine until at least the end of the year. Somalia's hunger emergency is the worst in the world and the worst in Somalia since its last famine in 1991.

"Death rates, especially for young children, remain extremely high, in part due to continued outbreaks of measles, cholera and malaria. Tens of thousands of people have died since April and deaths are likely to continue over the coming months," the U.N. Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit and U.S.-funded Famine Early Warning System announced in a joint statement.

According to aid agencies, all of southern Somalia is in an acute situation and death rates are still high. UNICEF said tens of thousands of children's lives were still at risk. "While the global acute malnutrition and crude death rates have declined in many areas, malnutrition rates continue to remain above the famine threshold levels in a large part of southern Somalia.

U.S. warns of possible terror attack in Nigeria

REPORTING FROM NAIROBI, KENYA -- Days after a series of coordinated attacks in northern Nigeria  killed more than 100 people, the U.S. State Department has warned travelers to stay away from three major hotels in Abuja, the Nigerian capital, after learning of a possible new assault.

The warning by the U.S. Embassy in Abuja comes two weeks after the State Department warned of a possible terror strikes in Kenya.

On Monday, Nigerian police said they were hunting members of the shadowy underground movement Boko Haram, which carried out the attacks in the north. The rebel group based in the mainly Muslim region claimed responsibility Friday for suicide bombings and attacks in Damaturu, capital of Yobe state, and Maiduguri, in Borno state.

The group attacked police stations, an army base and churches in Damaturu before launching gun battles against security forces.

Kenya tweets of new threat in war against militants: donkeys

REPORTING FROM NAIROBI, KENYA -- Pity the donkeys of northern Kenya: The country's military announced Thursday that those sold to the wrong people would be bombed.

The Twitter feed of Kenyan military spokesman, Maj. Emmanuel Chirchir, who is rapidly becoming the public face of Kenya's incursion into Somalia, warned that his forces had identified a new threat in the war against Al Shabab militants: loaded donkeys.

In conventional wars (if they even exist any more), intelligence is concerned with mass movements of tanks and troops, but Kenya is watching out for mass movements of donkeys, which would be considered an enemy activity.

The reason, Chirchir explained in a flurry of messages late Thursday, was that "information reaching us confirms that Al Shabab has resorted to using donkeys to transport their weapons."