<http://www.google.ca/gwt/x?gl=CA&u=http://www.news1130.com/files/2014/01/13 89485407_NAI107-1223_2013_084716_low.jpg&hl=en-CA&ei=xu_RUsmiMIHIsweRkYCwDQ& wsc=yh> Description: FILE - In this Monday, Dec. 23, 2013 file photo, a young man reacts after his friend was badly injured by passing Chadian troops, during a protest outside Mpoko Airport in Bangui, Central African Republic. Sub-Saharan Africa has seen a very violent start to 2014 with raging conflicts in South Sudan and Central African Republic - the death tolls are huge and the individual incidents gruesome, with one estimate saying nearly 10,000 have been killed in South Sudan in a month of warfare. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File) FILE - In this Monday, Dec. 23, 2013 file photo, a young man reacts after his friend was badly injured by passing Chadian troops, during a protest outside Mpoko Airport in Bangui, Central African Republic. Sub-Saharan Africa has seen a very violent start to 2014 with raging conflicts in South Sudan and Central African Republic - the death tolls are huge and the individual incidents gruesome, with one estimate saying nearly 10,000 have been killed in South Sudan in a month of warfare. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File) AP PHOTO/REBECCA BLACKWELL, FILE
Africa sees violent, deadly start to 2014; Thousands killed, children
beheaded
Jason Straziuso, The Associated Press January 11, 2014 10:33 am
NAIROBI, Kenya The death tolls are huge and the individual incidents
gruesome. One estimate says nearly 10,000 people have been killed in South
Sudan in a month of warfare, while in neighbouring Central African Republic
combatants in Muslim-vs.-Christian battles have beheaded children.
Sub-Saharan Africa has seen a very violent start to 2014, with raging
conflicts in South Sudan and Central African Republic, as well as continued
violence in Congo, and attacks in Somalia and Kenya.
Compared to decades past, Africa and its people are suffering from fewer
conflicts today, but several recent outbreaks of violence are cause for
concern, said J. Peter Pham, director of the Washington-based think-tank
Africa Center at the Atlantic Council. The conflicts also lack strong
international peacekeeping, he said.
Peacekeeping in Africa, whether under the formal auspices of the United
Nations or those of the African Union, suffers today from the same two
limitations which they have been burdened with since the very first U.N.
peacekeeping mission, the 1960-1964 operation in the Congo (ONUC), namely
lack of political will resulting in a weak mandate and lack of adequate
forces, he wrote by email.
The conflict that broke out in South Sudan on Dec. 15 saw violence radiate
across the country as ethnic groups targeted each other. Shortly afterward
Uganda dispatched troops and military equipment to aid South Sudans central
government from breakaway units of that countrys military.
Casie Copeland, South Sudan analyst for the International Crisis Group, said
violence in Africa tends to involve other countries and noted a long
history of regional involvement in African conflicts.
The U.N. Security Council on Friday, however, strongly discouraged external
intervention that would exacerbate the military and political tensions. The
U.N. has said more than 1,000 people have died in the South Sudan conflict.
But Copeland, after speaking to U.N. workers, aid actors, government
officials and combatants, estimates nearly 10,000 have died.
Civilians in the Central African Republic a country where violence pits
Muslims against Christians have suffered terribly since armed rebels
overthrew the president in March 2013. The mostly Muslim fighters were
blamed for scores of atrocities after taking power, and inter-communal
violence exploded last month leaving more than 1,000 dead in a matter of
days.
The U.N. childrens agency UNICEF says that two children have been beheaded,
and that unprecedented levels of violence are being carried out on
children. An estimated 935,000 people have been uprooted throughout the
country. Thousands of French troops and regional African peacekeepers are
trying to temper the mob violence.
The countrys president, Michel Djotodia, the rebel leader who seized
control of the country, agreed to resign Friday along with his prime
minister. The resignations could create an even greater power vacuum in a
land with a history of coups and dictatorship. Djotodia had solidified his
power with the help of mercenary fighters from Chad and Sudan.
John Prendergast, co-founder of the D.C.-based activist group the Enough
Project, told a panel this past week at the Brookings Institution discussing
Africas greatest challenges in 2014 that international and regional
conflict management systems must stop addressing conflicts in isolation, but
rather deal with them as integrated conflict systems.
That includes adopting comprehensive peace processes and understanding
long-term drivers of conflict in negotiations, he said.
Al-Qaida-linked militants in Somalia, long one of the continents most
violent countries, detonated two car bombs on New Years Day, killing at
least a half dozen people. Neighboring Kenya, which has forces in Somalia,
was hit with a grenade attack the next day on a coastal bar and nightclub,
wounding 10 people. Kenya on Friday announced a military operation in
Somalia it said killed 30 militants.
Kenya has troops in Somalia, as does Uganda. But Pham argues that the
continents conflicts are not receiving enough international peacekeepers.
He notes that the U.N. Security Council, before the recent South Sudan
violence, had been asking if peacekeeping numbers there could be reduced.
Since the outbreak of violence in South Sudan, the Security Council reversed
course and increased troop numbers from 7,000 to 12,500.
Not only is there a dearth of political will and the lack of an adequate
mandate, for all the talk of African solutions to African problems, the
fact remains that there are inadequate investments of the right kind in the
security sector in Africa so that when crises erupt, one is left to rob
Peter to pay Paul, Pham said. Blue-helmeted forces are having to be
shifted from other missions to beef up (South Sudans U.N. mission) today,
just as French and Chadian troops were moved from Mali to the CAR just last
month.
Thé Mulindwas Communication Group
"With Yoweri Museveni and Dr. Kiiza Besigye Uganda is in anarchy"
Kuungana Mulindwa Mawasiliano Kikundi
"Pamoja na Yoweri Museveni na Dk. Kiiza Besigye Uganda ni katika machafuko"
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