Bring hope to forgotten conflicts
13 April 2017
- Sudan, Burma and Nigeria, all countries that HART works in, have all ranked in the top 5 countries at most risk of experiencing a new episode of genocide – Yemen and Afghanistan make up the rest
Burma
- China and Burma have reached an agreement on an oil pipeline between the neighbouring countries after almost a decade of talks, with the project due to start “very quickly”, Chinese vice foreign minister Liu Zhenmin said on Monday
- Three civilians were shot dead in northern Shan State’s Kyaukme Township during armed clashes between Burmese government forces and the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) on Sunday
- A ferry, which was carrying around 66 people, capsized in the Ngawun River near Pathein after colliding with a boat carrying gravel around 7:30 p.m. on Friday. The death toll is currently at 30, with several people still missing
- National League for Democracy (NLD) member U Myo Yan Naung Thein and Ko Aung Myint Tun were each sentenced to six months in jail under Article 66(d) of Burma’s Telecommunications Law on Friday, taking the tally of people convicted under the controversial law to eight since the NLD took office – The act, enacted as part of an opening up of the telecoms sector in 2013, bans use of a telecoms network to “extort, threaten, obstruct, defame, disturb, inappropriately influence or intimidate
- Myanmar has reportedly started shutting down three displacement camps in strife-torn Rakhine state, a senior official said Tuesday, although it was not immediately clear where the inhabitants will go – The move to shutter the first of those camps comes after a commission led by former UN chief Kofi Annan last month called on the government to close them as part of a series of measures designed to heal simmering ethnic tensions
- Article 17(1) of the Unlawful Association Act is a colonial-era statute frequently used to prosecute members or suspected affiliates of ethnic armed groups – this week it has been used to arrest a monk and an activist Ko Nay Min organized football matches and a literary talk on April 10 as commemoration of the eighth anniversary of the establishment of the Arakan Army (AA) in 2009
Nigeria
- The United States will press ahead with the sale of 12 military aircraft to Nigeria to help the West African country fight Boko Haram, despite persistent concerns over human rights violations by the West African nation’s military – The Super Tucanos’ sale was held up when the Nigerian Air Force bombed a settlement for displaced persons in Rann, northeast Nigeria. At least 115 people were killed in the airstrikes. U.S. officials told the AP that the bombing occurred on the same day that the Obama administration was to notify Congress of the deal, and that it was quickly shelved
- Saturday marked the 3rd anniversary of the abduction of Chibok girls by Boko Haram
- The fear that more Nigerians may die from the ongoing epidemic of Cerebro Spinal Meningitis (CSM) has become more real as the country does not have enough vaccine doses to deal with the deadly meningitis outbreak, and the drugs are too expensive at the cost of $50 (N18, 000) per dose
- Amnesty International, in a new global review of death sentences handed down by the courts in 2016, has stated that Nigerian handed down the second highest number of death sentences in the world. China was ranked number one in the world. The massive and worrying spike in death sentences recorded in Nigeria in 2016 put the country at odds with the global trend towards the abolition of the death penalty
- Nigeria’s military said on Thursday that it had destroyed 13 illegal refineries in the restive Niger Delta oil hub, in an operation in which two soldiers died in clashes with “sea robbers” – Military authorities say there are hundreds of illegal refineries in the region, which process stolen crude from oil company pipelines
South Sudan
- Two months after the world’s youngest nation declared a famine amid its civil war; hunger has become more widespread than expected – in addition to the 2 counties were famine has already been declared, another 5 counties, with 290,000 people at risk of dying without sustained food assistance, now face the same issues
- Reports continue to come out claiming South Sudanese army are singling out civilians of the Fertit and Luo ethnic groups in retaliation for a rebel attack on government forces – U.N. officials have repeatedly warned that South Sudan is at risk of genocide
- The killings and other atrocities going on South Sudan amount to a genocide and African leaders need to “step up” and not just rely on others for a response, Britain’s secretary for international development, Priti Patel, said late on Wednesday
Timor Leste
Uganda
- The detention of a prominent feminist academic for criticising the Ugandan president on Facebook has been widely condemned by human rights groups – Stella Nyanzi, one of Uganda’s most controversial academics and activists, called president Yoweri Museveni “a pair of buttocks” and his wife, Janet, who is education minister, “empty-brained” in posts on her Facebook page. Nyanzi was arrested late on Friday, more than two months after the offending posts were published and charged with “cyber harassment”. She pleaded not guilty on Monday but was denied bail and has been detained in a maximum security prison ever since