Monday, February 16, 2015

UK envoy: if Libya fails it could be Somalia on the Mediterranean | World news | The Guardian

Libyan protesters at a rally in Tripoli’s Martyr’s Square in support of “Fajr Libya” (Libya Dawn). Delegates from Libya’s rival parliaments recently held indirect talks aimed at ending months of of violence.


 Libyan protesters at a rally in Tripoli’s Martyr’s Square in support of “Fajr Libya” (Libya Dawn). Delegates from Libya’s rival parliaments recently held indirect talks aimed at ending months of of violence. Photograph: Mahmud Turkia/AFP/Getty Images


International efforts to resolve the crisis in Libya after the fall of Muammar Gaddafi must forge agreement between the warring parties to forestall the emergence of a failed state that could become a “Somalia-on-the-Mediterranean,” the UK government’s special envoy has urged.
Jonathan Powell, a veteran of the Northern Ireland peace process, warned in an interview that violent chaos in Libya will spread to its neighbours and to Europe and Britain if left unchecked.




Powell was speaking before news emerged on Sunday of the beheadings of 21 Egyptian Christians by Islamic State (Isis) fighters near Sirte and Monday’s retaliatory bombing raids by the Egyptian air force on Isis training locations and weapons stockpiles in Libya.
The brutal killings and the continuing flight of migrants via the Mediterranean coast are bleak reminders of the repercussions of the country’s breakdown. François Hollande, the French president, and Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, his Egyptian counterpart, called on Monday for the UN security council to meet over Libya and to take new measures.
“Libya is in a downward spiral that we need to reverse and turn into an upward one,” Tony Blair’s former chief of staff told the Guardian. “There is a good deal of immediacy about this. But these things don’t happen overnight. You’ve got to rebuild trust that has been badly broken.”
Powell, appointed by David Cameron last spring, is talking to the armed groups that have pushed the oil-rich north African country to the brink since its 2011 revolution, Nato and Arab military intervention and bloody regime change.




Libya, he argues, has the advantage of not being plagued by religious sectarianism as most of its 6 million people are Sunni Muslims. “If you look down a telescope from Washington or London or Brussels it is easy to make all these places look the same,” he said. “But this is a struggle for power and for money to a certain extent. It ought to be possible to reach agreement more easily than it is in Iraq or Syria.”

Monday, February 2, 2015

UNPO: Ogaden: Refugee Council Requests Extra Protection during Upcoming Elections

Head of the Ogaden Refugee Council, Mr Ahmed Sadik, has urged Kenyan authorities to exercise extreme vigilance during upcoming Ethiopian elections on 15 May 2015. There are fears that cross-border persecutions of Ogaden refugees will increase as was seen in the run-up to the 2010 Ethiopian elections, and Mr Sadik has requested tighter security for the Ogaden refugees currently residing in Kenya.
Below is a report published in Waagacusub Media:
Mr Sadik called on the government of Kenya to be aware of Ethiopian assailants and those conspiring with them to ensure that they would not harm anyone on Kenyan territory.



The Kenya-Ogaden Community is taking all possible precautions as they have one eye on the upcoming Ethiopia elections on [15 May 2015].
Eng. Ahmed Sadik, Head of the Ogaden Refugee Council, has urged the communities and refugee leaders in Kenya to be extremely cautious.
He said, "It is time for the communities and refugee leadership to be vigilant," he said on Wednesday [28 January 2015].
Speaking with Radio Xoriyo, also known as Radio Freedom, he said Ethiopia exports its domestic problems to the neighboring countries like Kenya, Djibouti and Somalia. "Ethiopia does not hesitate to attack refugees, mainly Ogaden, Anuak and Oromo community leaders, which have fled from the brutality of its army, as was the case during the 2010 elections."
He continued, "When Ethiopian elections were happening in 2010, Ethiopian Security Forces attempted to kill activists, opposition figures and community leaders from the Ogaden region, Oromia and Gambella".
Mr Sadik added that the EPRDF-dominated government will undoubtedly control the voting and that nothing good can be expected to happen in the May 2015 election.
Human Rights Watch has accused the Ethiopian government of systematically cracking down on media ahead of the May 2015 election.
According to Africa Intelligence, Ethiopia's Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn asked Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to act as mediator between the government and the ONLF, taking advantage of Erdogan's visit to Ethiopia.