Around 20 United Nations peacekeepers were wounded in an attack on their base in central Mali on Wednesday, a UN spokesperson said, offering a provisional toll.

Unidentified militants attacked a temporary base near Kerena, a village in the war-torn centre of the Sahel state, at around 7 am.

Olivier Salgado, the spokesman for the UN’s MINUSMA mission in Mali, said the position was “targeted by direct and indirect fire.”

First established in 2013, the 13,000-strong MINUSMA has suffered one of the highest death tolls of any mission in UN peacekeeping history.

Over 230 of its personnel have died since the mission began, and improvised explosive devices killed five peacekeepers last month alone.

The latest casualties were from a Togolese contingent of peacekeepers, according to an official briefed on the matter, who requested anonymity.

Some peacekeepers were gravely wounded, the official added.

A municipal government official, who declined to be named, also told AFP that militants drove an explosives-laden vehicle into the camp before opening fire.

Mali has been struggling to contain a jihadist insurgency which first emerged in the north of the country 2012, and has since spread to the centre of the country and to neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger.

Thousands of soldiers and civilians have been killed and hundreds of thousands more have had to flee their homes.

Four peacekeepers were killed by a roadside bomb in northern Mali on January 14, and one died the following day in a similar blast.

– Cycle of violence –

Central Mali is an epicentre of the Sahel conflict where assaults on soldiers and ethnic killings are common.

Ten Malian troops were killed in the same area last week when al-Qaeda-affiliated jihadists raided their camp.

The attack on the UN base comes ahead of several important political summits dedicated to curbing the Sahel conflict.

France and the G5 Sahel — a military alliance comprising Burkina Faso, Chad, Mauritania, Niger and Mali — are due to meet in Chad on February 15 and 16.

Signatories of the shaky Algiers peace accord are also due to meet in the northern Malian town of Kidal on Thursday.

Mali’s government and several armed groups signed that agreement in 2015. Among other things, it provides for decentralising governance in the vast and ethnically-diverse nation of 19 million people.

Although the implementation of the Algiers accord has been extremely slow, the deal is viewed as one of the few escape routes from Mali’s cycle of violence.

Source: AFP

Violence-torn Central African Republic is facing an increasingly dire humanitarian situation with high insecurity on the main supply route from Cameroon blocking humanitarian deliveries and prices for basic food prices soaring, the United Nations said Monday.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said this is happening as 2.3 million people are already projected to need food, while rapid assessments are showing “alarming figures of severe malnutrition among the newly displaced.”

The U.N. reported Friday that 200,000 people have fled their homes in the impoverished country in less than two months and are displaced inside and outside the country.

According to local authorities, 92,000 refugees have reached Congo from Central African Republic and over 13,200 have crossed into Cameroon, Chad and the Republic of Congo, with more continuing to arrive, Dujarric said.

Central African Republic’s former president, Francois Bozize, and his allies have been accused of inciting the latest violence, which erupted after the constitutional court rejected his candidacy to run for president in December.

President Faustin Archange Touadera won re-election in December to a second term with 53% of the vote, but he continues to face opposition from forces linked to Bozize.

On Jan. 13, rebels attacked the outskirts of Bangui, killing at least two U.N. peacekeepers and blocking important access roads to the capital, causing food prices to skyrocket. The rebel attack was the most serious threat to Bangui since 2013, when a coalition of predominantly Muslim rebels known as Seleka overthrew Bozize’s government.

The Seleka formed a new government that they said would redress the years of marginalization of the country’s Muslim population. Later that year, that government was challenged by militia fighters known as the anti-Balaka who attacked Bangui. The anti-Balaka began attacking Muslim civilians, beating people to death in the streets, destroying mosques and forcing tens of thousands of Muslims to flee Bangui in 2014.

The Seleka rebel president eventually stepped aside amid international pressure and an interim government organized democratic elections in 2016, which Touadera won.

Dujarric said a key cause of the current deteriorating humanitarian situation is the very high level of insecurity along the road link to Cameroon where over 1,600 trucks, including 500 with humanitarian supplies, have been blocked at the border since mid-December, causing a suspension of imports.

“Humanitarian organizations are beginning to report critical stock outages including food and trauma kits,” he said. “The closure of the supply route also caused a worrying increase in the prices of basic foodstuffs — that’s cassava, oil, meat and rice,” of between 75% and 220%.

“This is impacting several markets in the country, including that of the capital, Bangui, and we’re also seeing the closure of several markets because of the impossibility for traders to restock,” Dujarric said.

The United Nations is appealing for $444.7 million to assist 1.84 million people in Central African Republic in 2021, he said.

U.N. refugee spokesman Boris Cheshirkov warned Friday that tens of thousands of refugees from the country are facing dire conditions.

In Congo, he said, new arrivals who crossed the Ubangi, Mbomou and Uele border rivers told refugee officials they fled in panic when they heard gunshots, leaving their belongings behind.

Most refugees are living in dire conditions in remote, hard-to-reach areas close to the rivers without basic shelter and facing acute food shortages, Cheshirkov said. They are dependent on catching fish and on what local villagers with extremely limited resources can spare.

For many, he said, the rivers are also the sole water source for drinking, washing, and cooking, and malaria, respiratory tract infections, and diarrhea have become common.

The U.N. refugee agency is urgently appealing for food, shelter, drinking water, sanitation and health care to help those who fled Central African Republic and prevent the spread of COVID-19 and other diseases, Cheshirkov said.

Source: AP

A “tragic” shipwreck in the Mediterranean Sea off Libya’s coast killed at least 43 migrants bound for Europe, the U.N. migration agency said Wednesday.

The International Organization for Migration said the shipwreck that took place a day earlier was the first maritime disaster in 2021 involving migrants seeking better lives in Europe.

The IOM said coastal security in Libya’s western town of Zuwara rescued 10 migrants and brought them to shore. It said the dead were all men from Western African nations, according to survivors.

It said the boat left the western city of Zawiya early Tuesday and capsized a few hours later after its engine stopped working amid rough seas.

Libya, which descended into chaos following the 2011 uprising that toppled and killed longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi, has emerged as a major transit point for African and Arab migrants fleeing war and poverty to Europe.

Most migrants make the perilous journey in ill-equipped and unsafe rubber boats.

Source: AP

The latest inter-ethnic violence to rock Sudan’s restive Darfur region had killed nearly 140 people by Monday, tribal leaders said just weeks after a peacekeeping mission ended operations.

Clashes left 55 people dead in South Darfur on Monday, after a separate round of violence in West Darfur reportedly killed 83 and displaced tens of thousands over the weekend.

It was the worst violence reported since the signing of a peace agreement in October, which observers had hoped would end years of war.

The bloodshed, which appeared not to involve any signatories to the deal, came just over two weeks after the United Nations / African Union peacekeeping force UNAMID ended years of operations.

While former rebels have committed to laying down their arms, decades of conflict have left the vast, impoverished region awash with weapons and divided by bitter rivalries over land and water.

In South Darfur, fighting broke out early Monday between the powerful Arab Rizeigat tribe and the Fallata, a cattle and camel-herding people who trace their roots to the Fulani of western Africa.

“The clashes between the Rizeigat tribe and the Fallata tribe have killed 55 people, and wounded 37 others,” local Fallata leader Mohamed Saleh told AFP.

Saleh said that several homes were torched in the attack, which appeared to be in revenge for Fallata tribe’s killing of a Rizeigat member around a week ago.

‘Deficient’ peace deal

The fighting in South Darfur comes after at least 83 people were killed in clashes between rival ethnic groups on Saturday and Sunday in El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur state.

On Monday, SUNA news agency quoted the West Darfur governor as saying the death toll was yet to be confirmed as uncounted bodies remained at the scene of the fighting.

Aid group Save the Children urged all sides to lay down their arms “before the situation gets out of control.”

The charity’s Sudan director Arshad Malik said the wounded had overwhelmed healthcare centres and that “we have seen disturbing photos of injured and dying people on the floors and corridors of hospitals”.

The group warned that “many children will have been separated from their parents, and will now be at risk of exploitation”.

Sudanese authorities said they had sent a “high-profile” delegation to calm tensions.

The vast north-east African country has been undergoing a fragile transition since the April 2019 ouster of president Omar al-Bashir following mass protests against his rule.

The Sudanese Professionals Association, an umbrella group which spearheaded the protests against Bashir, said Sunday that the violence showed the “deficiencies” of the peace deal, saying it failed to address the root causes of the conflict.

Bashir, who is in custody and on trial in Khartoum, is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged genocide and war crimes in Darfur.

‘Ugly face of war’

Darfur endured a bitter conflict that erupted in 2003, leaving roughly 300,000 people dead and 2.5 million displaced, according to the UN.

The war had erupted when ethnic minority rebels rose up against Bashir’s Arab-dominated government, which responded by recruiting and arming a notorious Arab-dominated militia known as the Janjaweed.

The main conflict has subsided over the years but ethnic and tribal clashes still flare periodically, largely pitting semi-nomadic Arab pastoralists against settled farmers.

On December 31, the UNAMID force formally ended its 13 years of operations in the region. It plans a phased withdrawal of its approximately 8,000 armed and civilian personnel within six months.

Fearing deadly violence, Darfur residents held protests in late December against UNAMID’s departure.

The UN secretary-general’s spokesman Stephane Dujarric called on Sudanese authorities to “bring an end to the fighting”.

“Escalating inter-communal violence has resulted in scores of deaths and injuries, the displacement of nearly 50,000 people and the destruction of property,” he said in a statement.

Jan Egeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, warned that “the ugly face of war” could return to Darfur and called for more aid and protection.

“International support must not fade,” Egeland tweeted.

Sudan’s transitional government, a power-sharing arrangement between generals and civilians, signed a peace deal with rebel groups in Sudan’s main conflict zones, including Darfur, in October.

Gibril Ibrahim, leader of the Justice and Equality rebel movement, wrote on Twitter that the violence in West Darfur was “a human tragedy”.

Another rebel leader, Mini Minawi, urged implementation of the peace deal and called for “reconciliation” between Darfuri tribes.

Two groups have refused to join the peace deal, the latest in a string of agreements, including the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) faction led by Abdelwahid Nour, which is believed to have considerable support in Darfur.

(AFP)

Two U.N. peacekeepers were killed in an attack Monday in the Central African Republic, the United Nations said.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the peacekeepers came under fire on the Bangasso-Gambo axis.

Dujarric said nine U.N. peacekeepers have been killed “in hostile incidents” in the last seven days in Central African Republic and Mali.

The mineral-rich Central African Republic has faced deadly inter-religious and inter-communal fighting since 2013, when predominantly Muslim Seleka rebels seized power after long claiming marginalization. Resistance to Seleka rule eventually led to Muslims being targeted en masse, with some beaten to death, mosques destroyed and tens of thousands forced from the capital in 2014.

Violence has stepped up following recent presidential elections.

The Associated Press

United Nations peacekeeping troops have retaken control of a city in the south eastern Central African Republic (CAR), which was captured by armed rebels two weeks ago.

A spokesman for the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA) told AFP that the peacekeeping forces were in control of Bangassou, lying on the north bank of the Mbomou River.

The spokesman said that the rebels had abandoned their positions following a UN ultimatum on Friday.

Bangassou was captured early this month by armed groups waging an offensive against troops loyal to President Faustin Archange Touadera.

Touadera, who gained power following the December presidential election, accuses former president Francois Bozize of leading the armed rebellion wreaking havoc in CAR.

Bozize, who had gained power in a coup in 2003, recently returned after years in exile. He was barred from running in the election by the country’s top court and faces charges of murder, arbitrary arrest, and torture.

The African country with a population of 4.7 million has endured waves of violence since Bozize, 74, was toppled in 2013.

The violence has left thousands of people dead and forced more than a million from their homes. 

UN peacekeepers, who have been deployed to restore peace and stability to CAR, come from about a dozen countries and consist of some 11,650 blue-cap troops, 150 military observers, 300 staff officers, 2,000 police officers and 1,400 civilian personnel, in addition to about 200 UN volunteers.

Since 2014, 82 members of MINUSCA have lost their lives during their mission in CAR.

The former European colony is landlocked between Cameroon, Chad, Sudan, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Republic of the Congo.

Despite being rich in energy and mineral resources, CAR is one of the world’s most impoverished countries.

Source: Presstv

Armed rebel groups in the Central African Republic (CAR) have attempted to seize the capital Bangui, but saw their push thwarted by the security forces.

Prime Minister Firmin Ngrebada said in a post on Facebook on Wednesday that although the assailants were “in large numbers to take Bangui” at dawn, the security forces managed to “vigorously” push the rebels back.

Interior Minister Henri Wanzet Linguissara told AFP that two army brigades were targeted by the rebels nine and 12 kilometers from the capital.

The assaults were the first close to the capital and mark an escalation in the violence that erupted when President Faustin Archange Touadera was re-elected in December.

“We heard gunfire from six this morning. We’re staying home – there’s panic. We’re scared of stray bullets,” said north Bangui resident.

Explosions were also heard during the clashes.

A coalition of rebel groups accused of an attempted coup after their offensive to disrupt the December 27 election have vowed to march on Bangui.

The army, supported by the armed forces of France, Russia, Rwanda and the United Nations, has been battling those seeking to derail the disputed election.

Former President Francois Bozize came to power in a coup in 2003. He was ousted by a rebellion in 2013.

Ever since, chaos and clashes over power have killed thousands of people and forced over a million from homes.

The former president stands accused of plotting a coup with the help of armed groups. He denies the allegation.

Source: Presstv

Rebel fighters captured the southern diamond-mining city of Bangassou in the Central African Republic on Sunday, weeks after they were accused of an attempted coup and ahead of partial results from a tense presidential election.

At least five rebels were killed and two army soldiers wounded in the clashes in the Central African city of Bangassou, which lies on the southern border with Democratic Republic of Congo, the UN peacekeeping mission MINUSCA said in a statement.

Rebels, whom the government and UN say are backed by ex-president François Bozizé, launched an offensive last month after the constitutional court rejected Bozizé’s candidacy to challenge President Faustin-Archange Touadera in last Sunday’s vote.

Bozizé’s party officially denies he is working with the rebels, but some in the party have suggested they are working together.

The coalition of armed rebel groups, which control two thirds of the coup-prone country, launched an offensive on December 19 aiming to disrupt last weekend’s elections and “march on Bangui”.

They have been kept away from the capital so far by federal soldiers, UN peacekeepers and reinforcements sent from Russia and Rwanda.

‘They are everywhere’

But the rebels attacked Bangassou, about 750 km (470 miles) from Bangui, at dawn on Saturday.

“The rebels control the town,” Rosevel Pierre Louis, head of the UN peacekeeping force MINUSCA’s regional office in the city, told AFP. “They are everywhere.”

Government troops had “abandoned their position and are at our base”, he added.

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said it had transported 15 wounded in the fighting.

Bangassou resident Ismail said Sunday’s attack had been expected locally for around two weeks, and many had fled over the border to DR Congo.

“My children left, I stayed with my wife,” Ismail told AFP as gunshots could be heard over the phone.

Bangassou has previously been the target of brutal assaults.

Trying to ‘suffocate Bangui’

Rebel fighters also attacked Touadera’s hometown of Damara, about 80 km (50 miles) north of Bangui on Saturday, MINUSCA said.

Roland Marchal, a specialist on the Central African Republic at France’s Sciences Po University, said “the rebels thought they could reach Bangui, but they did not expect the arrival of the Russians and Rwandans”.

Conflict analyst Nathalia Dukhan said the rebels have adopted “a long-term strategy by securing the resources to suffocate Bangui”.

The landlocked country is one of the poorest in the world and among the most volatile, suffering coups and wars since independence from France in 1960.

In 2013, it spiralled once more into bloodshed when then-president Bozizé, who had himself seized power in a coup a decade earlier, was ousted by a mainly Muslim coalition called the Seleka.

Five years later,”anti-balaka” militiamen, drawn mainly from Christian communities, attacked the city, slaughtering dozens of Muslim civilians as well as 12 UN peacekeepers.

Country ‘at war’

In a year-end speech on December 31, Touadera said  his country “is at war” and that its “survival is threatened. We are going to win this asymmetrical war,” he added.

The capture of Bangassou comes on the eve of partial results being published for the presidential election.

Lack of security meant that voting did not take place in 29 of the country’s 71 sub-prefectures, while thousands were prevented from casting ballots or never received their voting cards.

Touadera’s party claimed victory, while a coalition of opposition groups called for the election to be annulled, claiming ballot stuffing and electoral rigging.

MINUSCA spokesman Vladimir Monteiro accused the opposition of making “false and baseless” allegations.

“Bizarrely, they don’t say anything about former president François Bozizé, an ally of the armed groups who are responsible for the current violence,” he tweeted.

On Sunday the UN mission said in a statement that the main armed groups “the UPC, the MPC, the 3R, the FPRC, the anti-balakas and former president Bozizé are responsible for these attacks and the grave consequences for the civilian population”.

The definitive results from the first round are not expected before January 18, and if there is no outright winner a runoff will be held on February 14.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP and REUTERS)

At least 70 civilians in Niger were killed by suspected militants on Saturday, in the latest attacks to rock the landlocked Sahel nation’s troubled western Tillaberi region, security sources said.

About 49 villagers were killed and 17 people wounded in the village of Tchombangou, said a security source, who requested anonymity.

“The attackers came to surround the village and killed up to 50 people. The wounded were taken to Ouallam hospital,” a local radio station journalist said on condition of anonymity.

A second source, a senior official in Niger’s interior ministry who also spoke on condition of anonymity, said that around 30 other villagers had been killed in the village of Zaroumdareye.

Niger’s government was not immediately available to comment.

The attacks took place as election officials announced results for the first round of Niger’s presidential vote that put ruling party candidate and former government minister Mohamed Bazoum in the clear lead, with a runoff set for next month.

The vast and unstable Tillaberi region is located in the so-called tri-border area, a jihadist-plagued zone where the porous borders of Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso converge.

Four thousand people across the three nations died in 2019 from jihadist violence and ethnic bloodshed stirred by Islamists, according to the UN.

Seven Nigerien soldiers were killed in an ambush in Tillaberi on December 21.

Niger is also being hammered by jihadists from Nigeria, the cradle of a decade-old insurgency launched by Boko Haram.

Last month 34 villagers were massacred in the southeastern region of Diffa, on the Nigerian border, the day before municipal and regional elections that had been repeatedly delayed because of poor security.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP and REUTERS)

Cameroon says hundreds of Central African Republic (CAR) civilians have fled across the border in the past few days to escape election-related violence. Bangui is holding elections later this month and those fleeing into Cameroon say sporadic clashes are already breaking out.

 Local residents say Garoua Boulay’s public square in the past four days has seeing an unusual influx of civilians from neighboring CAR. 

 Gregoire Mvongo, the governor of Cameroon’s East region which includes Garoua Boulay, says about a thousand people have crossed over into Cameroon since Friday to escape violence in the lead-up to the December 27 poll.   

 Mvongo said the situation in the CAR is very troubling.  He said he traveled to Garoua Boulay Sunday and ordered the military to porous border areas to limit the spill-over into Cameroon from the new wave of fighting.  

 Among those who fled the CAR is 32-year-old agricultural engineer Jean Paul Nambobona.  He says he trekked with his wife and two children through the bush before finding transport to Garua Boulay.  He said on the road they saw many people struggling to leave the CAR. He added that he wanted former president Francois Bozize to remember that the CAR has gone through very difficult moments and its civilians want a return to peace.  

 On Saturday, the CAR government accused Bozize of organizing a rebel alliance to attack the capital, Bangui, a week before the election. 

 Bangui said U.N. peacekeepers dispersed armed rebels loyal to Bozize who were occupying areas near the capital.  

 Bozize, whose candidacy for the presidential election was rejected, denied he organized any rebel attack. His opposition coalition on Sunday demanded the election be postponed due to the violence, but the government insisted the vote will go ahead.

 Speaking on Radio RCA, self-declared youth leader Rigobert Ngaissio said that young people should not listen to rebels who call for taking up arms against the state.

 He said he is calling on all Central Africans, especially the youth, to be vigilant and patriotic because the threats to stability are real and serious. Ngaissio said it is imperative for everyone to contribute to stability in the Central African Republic.

 A government spokesman on Monday confirmed reports that Russia and Rwanda had each sent several hundred troops to the country.  

 Rwanda on Sunday said its troops were dispatched in response to rebels supported by Bozize targeting its peacekeeping forces.  

 Russia has been supplying the Central African Republic with arms and security contractors.  

 CAR descended into violence in 2013 when Bozize was ousted by the Séléka, a rebel coalition from the Muslim minority, which accused him of breaking peace deals.

 But Bozize maintains a large following, especially in the army and among the country’s largest ethnic group, the Gbaya.

 The December 27 election is seen as an important step in bringing stability to the CAR.  

 In the past seven years of fighting, close to a million Central Africans have fled to neighboring Cameroon, Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Nigeria.

Source: VOA