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World: European Union ‘steadfast partner’ for UN in trying to steer global community away from conflict towards more peaceful, secure world, Security Council told

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Source: UN Security Council
Country: Mali, Serbia, Somalia, Syrian Arab Republic, World

SC/10916

Security Council
6919th Meeting (AM)

High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Briefs, As Council Considers Issue of Cooperation with Regional Organizations

The European Union harboured a strong belief in effective multilateralism and would remain a steadfast partner of the Security Council in its great responsibility of steering the international community away from conflict and confrontation towards a more peaceful and secure world, its High Representative pledged today, as she addressed the 15-member body.

Briefing the Council as it considered cooperation between the United Nations and regional and subregional organizations, Catherine Ashton told its members: “In carrying out your tasks, you can count on the full commitment and support of the EU.” The European Union, through its development cooperation and political support, contributed to lasting security, deep democracy and prosperity, she said.

Its contribution was three-fold: its ability to marshal a wide range of instruments for a comprehensive approach; its direct involvement in international negotiations, including mediation, on the international community’s behalf; and its close work with international and regional partners, of the view that only collective efforts could deliver results. The Union also had a range of tools with which to respond to a crisis, be it humanitarian, security or political.

Ms. Ashton highlighted the Union’s long-standing engagement in Somalia and the Horn of Africa, which, in close cooperation with the United Nations, had contributed to the recent breakthrough in both the political process and in terms of security in that region. Its support of Mali took the form of security-related measures, such as its training mission to help restructure the Malian army. Its political support focused on concrete implementation of the road map, the electoral process and, importantly, inclusive national dialogue.

The Union was also determined to works towards a solution of the Iranian issue based on the dual-track approach of pressure and engagement, she said, adding that it would also strive to build a firm and unified response to this week’s nuclear test by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to demonstrate that there were consequences for such continued violations.

In Serbia and Kosovo, the restoration of peace was not easy for either side, but both knew they had the Union’s full support, she said. The group was also working closely with partners to address some of the most difficult challenges to international peace and security — in the Middle East and Syria.

When the floor opened to Council members, the representative of Luxembourg — one of the 27 member States of the European Union — said that, together with the United Nations, the two organizations shared a “peace project”, with the goal of promoting peace and preventing future generations from the scourge of war.

The bloc remained a unique model of cooperation and integration in the service of peace and security, said France’s representative, noting the Union’s role in the heart of Africa and the Balkans, in Syria and Iran. The General Assembly, in an earlier resolution, had called the Union a partner and a friend of the United Nations, not only as a regional organization, but also as “a pillar of a coherent and effective international system”.

Morocco attached great importance to that cooperation, said its representative, of the view that the Union was making a significant contribution to conflict resolution, through its technological and economic assistance and its weighty and cumulative experience with several regions. Also noteworthy was its “neighbourhood policy”, with countries to the east and south. In the Mediterranean, that relationship had promoted economic development, democracy, and the integration of the six countries in the Mediterranean basin.

Also making statements were the representatives of Azerbaijan, Australia, Guatemala, China, Pakistan, United Kingdom, Togo, Russian Federation, Argentina, United States, Rwanda, and the Republic of Korea (national capacity).

The meeting was called to order at 10:19 a.m. and adjourned at 12:20 p.m.


Chad: L’OIM au secours de migrants tchadiens en détresse expulsés de Libye

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Source: International Organization for Migration
Country: Chad, Libya

Tchad – L’OIM a distribué de la nourriture, de l’eau et des médicaments à un groupe de 32 migrants tchadiens arrivés la semaine dernière (7/2/13) au bureau de l’OIM à Faya-Largeau, dans une région reculée au nord du Tchad, après avoir été expulsés de Libye.

Depuis juillet dernier, trois groupes de migrants tchadiens ont été expulsés de Libye. Plus de 150 000 travailleurs migrants tchadiens avaient déjà quitté le pays en 2011, après le renversement du régime précédent.

Epuisés et malades, les membres du groupe, tous des hommes, ont expliqué à l’OIM qu’ils travaillaient dans différents endroits en Libye, occupant généralement des emplois temporaires peu et non qualifiés. Ils ont dit qu’ils avaient été détenus, et certains ont affirmé avoir été maltraités.

Ils ont déclaré que par le passé, en tant que ressortissants tchadiens, ils n’avaient pas besoin de documents pour vivre en Libye. Mais, aujourd’hui, les autorités libyennes ont commencé à exiger des documents et ont fermé les frontières avec le Tchad, le Niger et le Soudan. La plupart des membres du groupe ont été arrêtés parce qu’ils n’avaient pas de permis de travail.

Mahamat Zene Issa a raconté à l’OIM qu’avant le déclenchement de la crise, il vivait depuis cinq ans avec sa famille, composée de trois personnes, à Sebha, une ville au sud de la Libye. Sa famille avait pu rentrer au Tchad avec un convoi d’évacuation de l’OIM, mais lui a décidé de rester en Libye pour continuer à y travailler.

« Un jour, alors que je me rendais chez mon cousin, près de chez moi, des hommes armés m’ont arrêté et fait monter dans leur véhicule lorsqu’ils ont compris que j’étais Tchadien. Ils m’ont battu pendant plusieurs heures jusqu’à ce que je perde connaissance » a-t-il déclaré.

« Lorsque j’ai repris connaissance, j’étais dans un centre de détention avec d’autres personnes. Personne ne m’a expliqué les raisons de ma détention. J’ai été détenu pendant un an et trois mois dans des conditions difficiles mais, grâce à Dieu, je suis vivant. Beaucoup n’ont pas survécu. Des compagnons de cellules ont été tués sous mes yeux, et d’autres sont morts de maladie. Ils nous ont traités comme des bêtes. »

« Il y a trois semaines, il nous ont amenés dans des camions à la frontière. C’était un voyage périlleux à travers le désert, et certains y ont laissé leur vie. Dieu merci, nous sommes à Faya. Bien que je ne sache pas comment je vais vivre demain, je suis content d’être de retour au pays, parce que personne ne me demandera mes papiers ni ne me battra ou me mettra en prison sans raison » a-t-il ajouté.

L’aide humanitaire de l’OIM aux migrants comprend les services suivants : enregistrement, établissement de profils, fourniture d’un abri temporaire au poste de secours de l’OIM, distribution d’articles de secours alimentaires et non alimentaires, soins médicaux, soutien psychosocial et transport jusqu’à destination finale au Tchad. La plupart des migrants expulsées viennent d’Abéché, Oum Hadjer et Biltine, à l’est, de N’Djamena, la capitale, et de Mao et Moussoro, à l’ouest du pays.

IOM cherche à obtenir des fonds pour offrir à 1 128 Tchadiens expulsés des formations visant à acquérir des moyens de subsistance, un soutien psychosocial et des orientations. Des fonds sont aussi nécessaires pour mettre en place des plans d’action en cas de crise pour assurer le retour d’autres Tchadiens expulsés de Libye et des pays voisins de la région en proie à l’instabilité.

« La principale difficulté à laquelle sont confrontés les migrants qui quittent la Libye est la réintégration dans des communautés qu’ils avaient quittées il y a très longtemps. Beaucoup d’entre eux n’avaient aucune relation avec elles et se considéraient comme des citoyens libyens. Ils parlent le dialecte libyen, et leurs enfants ne maîtrisent pas le français, la langue de l’enseignement au Tchad. Presque tous rentrent au pays les mains vides et n’ont rien pour recommencer leur vie. Ceux qui sont restés en contact avec leur famille leur apportaient un soutien matériel essentiel sous la forme de rapatriements de fonds mensuels. Leur retour n’est donc pas une bonne chose » a déclaré Qasim Sufi, Chef de mission de l’OIM au Tchad.

L’aide humanitaire de l’ONU aux migrants tchadiens est financée par le Gouvernement allemand, le HCR et la DG Aide humanitaire et protection civile de la Commission européenne (ECHO).

Pour plus d’informations, veuillez contacter

Qasim Sufi
OIM Tchad
Courriel: qsufi@iom.int
Tél: +235 62900674

Mali: Mali : Urgence complexe - Rapport de situation No. 25 (au 13 février 2013)

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Source: UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Country: Mali
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Faits saillants

  • L’accès continue de s'améliorer dans les régions du centre, et le gouverneur de Mopti a officiellement rouvert la route Sévaré

  • Douentza au trafic de jour. Dans le nord, les partenaires utilisent le Fleuve Niger pour acheminer l'aide vers une partie de la région de Tombouctou, et des de stocks sont en route pour Gao. A ce jour, les partenaires ont partagé 12 évaluations effectuées dans le nord et le centre du pays depuis le 17 janvier.

  • Une crise d’insécurité alimentaire potentielle menace une partie du nord du pays, où les populations sont fortement dépendantes des flux commerciaux de vivres qui sont en ce moment perturbés. Les partenaires craignent qu’une situation de crise (le niveau d'IPC 3) se répande dans le nord et certaines parties de la région de Mopti vers le mois d’avril.

  • Les nouveaux déplacements se sont stabilisés, bien qu'aucune information sur d’éventuels déplacements causés les récentes violences à Gao ne soit disponible. La plupart des PDI enquêtées à Bamako et à Koulikoro – plus d'un tiers des PDI – prévoit de retourner à la maison, sous la seule réserve de l’amélioration de la situation sécuritaire. Les retours observés jusqu'à présent restent limités.

  • L'insécurité demeure une menace grave. Les groupes armés ont déclaré avoir miné les zones autour des villes du nord, et deux attentats-suicides ainsi que des batailles de rue ont eu lieu à Gao cette semaine. Le 8 février, des tensions intra-militaires à Bamako ont suscité des inquiétudes.

Niger: Refugees from Mali

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Source: Catholic Agency for Overseas Development
Country: Mali, Niger

“I have a small child, so when armed men started shooting, I got scared and left town,” says Halima. “My whole family did.”

Halima and her family are among more than 400,000 people who have been forced from their homes since a loose coalition of Jihadist groups took control of northern Mali last year. She fled from her village, and is now living in a camp in the west of Niger, in a hard-to-reach area that was facing food and water shortages even before the crisis began.

The recent military intervention by France, in support of the Malian government, has led to thousands more people crossing the border into Niger and other neighbouring countries, adding to pressure on food, water and grazing land for animals.

Thanks to your support, we have pledged an extra £50,000 to ensure that our local Catholic partner, CADEV-Niger, can provide food, healthcare and emergency supplies like tents, jerrycans, blankets, pots and pans to the refugees.

Halima is grateful to have received millet and vegetable oil, but she is particularly happy to have received a 40kg bag of charcoal. Living in a camp on the edge of a desert, firewood has been in short supply. “I will be able to cook for the whole family for about three weeks with this,” she says.

Beyond the camps

As well as delivering aid within the camps, we are working with CADEV-Niger to support refugees who are herding their animals in the surrounding areas.

“We have two types of Malian refugees here in Niger,” says Abdou Douramane Amadou from CADEV-Niger. “We have Malians in the camps and we have nomads with camels and goats outside the camps. The nomads are not as easily accessed and assisted because their traditions dictate that they keep moving.”

CADEV-Niger are providing aid to the nomads, and, crucially, to the local communities who are sharing food and shelter with them. They have distributed seeds and tools and improved water supplies to local villagers, so that they are able to set up vegetable gardens and grow more food.

Hope for the future

According to Abdou Douramane Amadou, the mood of the refugees has greatly improved since the French army re-established telecommunication systems within Mali.

“Comforting information is coming in by phone,” he says. “It is so important psychologically for the refugees to find out how friends and families are doing. To know what has happened to their goods and houses, especially if they feared they had been lost. We see a lot more smiles.”

CAFOD’s Michel Monginda Mondengele says: “We are praying for a lasting peace in Mali, and we are continuing to monitor the situation very closely. At the moment, most of the refugees in Niger have no idea when they will be able to return home, but we will continue to support them while they are here.”

Mali: Mali: Humanitarian Snapshot (as of 13 February 2013) (EN/FR)

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Source: UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Country: Algeria, Burkina Faso, Mali, Mauritania, Niger
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Over 4.3 million people need humanitarian assistance in Mali. Partners have completed numerous assessments in Mopti, Ségou, Gao and Kidal regions, but operating conditions remain volatile. Recent assessments reveal important new needs, particularly in terms of rapidly deterioriating food security conditions in the north and among IDPs and their hosts.

Humanitarian assistance continues in the south and is resuming in the north where security permits.

Mali: Humanitarian crisis in northern Mali escalates: Tuareg civilians are fleeing from the conflict region near the Algerian border

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Source: Society for Threatened Peoples
Country: Algeria, Mali

Algeria denies protection – The number of civilian casualties is rising

Göttingen, 11. Februar 2012

The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) warns about an escalation of the humanitarian crisis in northern Mali. During the last five days, more than 6,000 Tuareg civilians fled from the embattled massif Adrar des Ifoghas – in the north-east of the country, near the Algerian border – reported the human rights organization in Göttingen on Monday. The number of women, children and elderly people arriving at the border is rising. There is no protection offered by Algeria, the state closed the southern borders to prevent the infiltration of Islamic extremists. "We fear another exodus of the civilian population of north- eastern Mali," said the STP's expert on questions regarding Africa, Ulrich Delius. The civilian population is expecting further heavy fighting in the remote mountainous areas.

Last week – after dozens of air raids against the massif, where radical Islamists were suspected – France chose to stop the bombings because of a lack of targets. Chadian ground troops will now search the retreat areas of the radical Islamist insurgents to find Islamist fighters. "This means no good for the Tuareg living in the region by tradition," said Delius. Once again, their traditional land will be invaded by foreigners who don't care much about the civilian population.

"A high number of civilian casualties is to be expected in this difficult terrain," said Delius. "For how should soldiers from the Chad or from other African nations be able to distinguish between uninvolved civilians and radical Islamists?" We fear that the objective will be to kill anyone they encounter in the mountains." The STP sends an appeal to all the involved parties to ensure the protection of the civilians during the expected fighting.

The French troops dread the mountain massif because of its countless caves and valleys. The area offers several hideout places for the Islamist fighters and cannot be controlled easily. Military experts assume that the terrorist movement "Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb" (AQMI) and their allied militias have created an extensive system of caves and tunnels in which the fighters are now hiding – and storing their weapons and fuel supplies. Also, there are supposed to be seven French citizens being kept as hostages since they were kidnapped in Niger in 2010.

Ulrich Delius is available for further questions: +49 (0)551-49906-27.

Translated by Robert Kurth

Mali: La menace jihadiste demeure à Gao, le putschiste Sanogo réapparaît

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Source: Agence France-Presse
Country: Mali

02/14/2013 20:47 GMT

Par Serge DANIEL à Gao et Ahamadou CISSE à Bamako

GAO (Mali), 14 fév 2013 (AFP) - La menace jihadiste restait bien présente jeudi dans la région de Gao (nord du Mali) au lendemain de la découverte d'un engin explosif de 600 kilos, alors qu'à Bamako, le capitaine putschiste Amadou Haya Sanogo, discret depuis un mois, revenait sur le devant de la scène.

L'armée française a de son côté affirmé à Paris qu'elle se trouvait "dans une phase de sécurisation" des zones où elle est présente dans le nord du Mali, en particulier dans l'extrême Nord-Est, vers Tessalit, près de la frontière algérienne, où elle recueille également des renseignements.

C'est dans cette région du massif des Ifhogas qu'ont trouvé refuge une partie des chefs et combattants jihadistes - notamment du Mouvement pour l'unicité et le jihad en Afrique de l'Ouest (Mujao), un des groupes ayant occupé pendant plus de neuf mois ces zones avec Al-Qaïda au Maghreb islamique (Aqmi) et Ansar Dine - après avoir fui l'avancée des troupes françaises et maliennes.

Jeudi, les Etats-Unis ont annoncé avoir ajouté un des principaux commandants d'Aqmi, Yahya Abou El Hamame, à leur liste noire des personnes visées par leurs sanctions antiterroristes.

Le secrétaire d'Etat américain John Kerry a salué l'action militaire française "réussie" au Mali, et exhorté Bamako à organiser des élections et discuter avec une partie de la rébellion dans le nord du pays.

La question du scrutin a également été évoquée par Romano Prodi, envoyé spécial de l'ONU dans le Sahel, qui a insisté à Ouagadougou sur "la nécessité d'aboutir rapidement aux élections" dans le pays. Avant le Burkina Faso, M. Prodi s'était rendu mercredi au Sénégal, et jeudi en Mauritanie où il a annoncé la création d'un fonds destiné à aider le Sahel.

Si Gao (1.200 km de Bamako) a été reprise aux islamistes le 26 janvier par les soldats français et maliens, quasiment sans combats, elle a ensuite été le théâtre des premiers attentats suicides de l'histoire du Mali et de violents combats de rue entre ces soldats et des combattants jihadistes infiltrés dans la ville.

Mercredi, trois jours après ces combats de rue, l'armée française a désamorcé un énorme engin artisanal contenant 600 kilos d'explosifs, trouvé dans la cour d'une maison proche d'un hôtel où logeaient des journalistes étrangers.

Pendant l'occupation de la ville en 2012 par le Mujao, cette maison a été habitée plusieurs semaines par "Abdulhakim", chef de la police islamique de Gao qui y a commis de nombreuses exactions au nom de la charia (loi islamique).

Et dans une maison proche, d'autres importantes quantités d'explosifs ont également été trouvées, selon des militaires français.

L'Unesco "mobilisée" pour le patrimoine

L'armée malienne semblait se préparer à des opérations autour de Gao, dans des villages dont certains habitants seraient des islamistes ou leurs sympathisants.

Selon des habitants de Kadji, un village proche de Gao, une île sur le fleuve Niger, habitée par les membres d'une secte musulmane radicale, sert de refuge à des jihadistes du Mujao, d'où ils peuvent mener des actions violentes dans la région.

A Bamako, le capitaine Amadou Haya Sanogo, chef des auteurs du putsch du 22 mars 2012 contre le régime d'Amadou Toumani Touré, a refait surface après un mois de silence.

Il a été investi mercredi à la tête d'un comité chargé de la réforme de l'armée malienne, divisée entre ses partisans et ceux du président renversé, en présence du chef de l'Etat par intérim, Dioncounda Traoré, du Premier ministre Diango Cissoko et de hauts responsables militaires.

"Le comité militaire n'a aucune vocation politique et ne saurait se substituer à la chaîne de commandement militaire", a affirmé le capitaine tandis que le président Traoré a précisé que ce n'était pas "un prolongement" de la junte des putschistes ayant gardé le pouvoir deux semaines.

Le capitaine Sanogo a accepté de quitter son quartier général de Kati (près de Bamako), pour s'installer au siège de l'état-major des armées dans la capitale où il est plus facilement contrôlable selon des sources diplomatiques et militaires.

En visite à Dakar, Irina Bokova, directrice générale de l'Unesco, a pour sa part affirmé que son organisation était "très mobilisée" pour reconstruire les mausolées et sauver les manuscrits de Tombouctou dont une partie a été détruite par les islamistes.

bur-stb/cs/aub

Chad: ACT Appeal: Towards Sustainable Recovery in Eastern and Southern Chad - TCD131

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Source: ACT Alliance
Country: Central African Republic, Chad, Sudan
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Appeal Target: US$ 997,378

Balance Requested: US$ 715,760

Geneva, 14 February 2012

Dear Colleagues,

Chad has experienced chronic instability since its independence in 1960 and was heavily affected by conflicts in neighbouring countries such as Sudan, the Central African Republic and recently Libya. The outbreak of the Darfur crisis in 2003 has caused a major influx of Sudanese refugees and a flare-up of internal fighting had resulted in more than 180,000 internally displaced people (IDPs) within Chad.

Despite the challenging security situation, The Lutheran World Federation-Department for World Service (LWF-DWS) provides, since 2007, support to refugees from neighboring countries, internally displaced people, and host communities made possible through a unique combination of ACT members support and UNHCR funding.

DWS Chad is now involved in ten refugee camps, two IDP integration sites and 30 villages of return in three regions of the country. It operates from its N’Djamena office and field offices in Koukou, Farchana, Gaga, Hadjer Hadid, Goz Beida, Maro and Goré as well as a liaison staff in Abéché.

Funding raised through the appeal on hand will significantly contribute to a larger LWF humanitarian programme budgeted at over 7 Million USD of which UNHCR will cover 80%. If fully funded, over 98,000 persons will receive direct assistance through the programme (300,482 indirect beneficiaries) which includes refugees, host communities and formally internally displaced people.

Main ACT members supporting LWF-DWS’ program in Chad are Finn Church Aid, Diakonie Katastrophenhilfe and Lutheran World Relief. The detailed budget (showing the UNHCR contributions) can be provided upon request.

Priority Needs

 Protection issues (conflict prevention, protection and response to GBV)

 Sustainable livelihoods for the refugees and Host Communities

 Durable solutions for integration of former IDPs

Proposed Emergency Response

  • Assist the affected populations with psycho-social support and activities

  • As part of Conflict prevention and Peace building efforts; assist the host communities with capacity building and construction of social infrastructure

  • Environmental activities- use of improved fuel stoves, establishment of tree nurseries

  • Provision of Non Food Items ( Quilts, soap, layettes, school kits )

  • Improve livelihoods through agricultural support and Income Generating activities

  • Strengthen local capacity to curb SGBV, increase respect for Human Rights and to prevent HIV/AIDS.

Planned duration: 1 January 2013- 31st December 2013

Geographic areas of response:

Eastern Chad: IDP villages of return around Koukou , Goz Beida and Farchana. IDP Integration sites of Koukou and Goz Beida

Eastern Chad: Sudanese refugee camps in Farchana, Gaga, Bredjing, Trequine, Goz Amir and Djabal

Southern Chad: CAR refugees in 5 camps - around Maro town Moula and Yaroungou now joined in one new site called Bélom - and around Goré the camps of Amboko, Dosseye and Gondje (including for all 3 areas the host community )

Projected Target Population: 98,047


Mali: Germany's govern­ment to resume de­vel­op­ment co­op­er­a­tion with Mali in stages

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Source: Government of Germany
Country: Germany, Mali

13.02.2013 -

Berlin – Mali's parliament has complied with the demands of the in­ter­na­tional community and adopted a roadmap for the country's return to democracy. In response, the German government will resume its de­vel­op­ment co­op­er­a­tion with the Malian government in gradual stages.

Dirk Niebel said, "This roadmap is an important first step towards normalising the situation in Mali. I want to acknowledge the effort Mali's interim gov­ern­ment has made to adopt the right priorities in such a difficult situation. It has committed itself to respecting human rights and the rule of law, and to en­gaging in dialogue with all of the country's pop­u­la­tion groups. That is why the Federal Govern­ment will now resume de­vel­op­ment co­op­er­a­tion with Mali's gov­ern­ment one step at a time. Our aim in doing so is to give a boost to the powers in favour of democratic reform. Mali's gov­ern­ment must now make an effort to imple­ment the roadmap with all due speed. Moreover, I shall be watching to make sure that the basic principles of good governance are observed."

The BMZ's first step will be to implement a measure to improve small-scale irrigation. The project, costing a total of 33.7 million euros, is being being funded with the help of the European Commission, with the EU providing 27.7 million euros and Germany 6 million euros. Dirk Niebel commented, "The EU Commission and Germany will be making a substantial contribution towards food security for Mali's people and, thus, directly to the country's political stability. In the current crisis, this is obviously a priority concern for the people of Mali."

Mali has been a partner in German de­vel­op­ment co­op­er­a­tion since the early 1960s. For many years, the country made good progress and was regarded, until the coup in March 2012, as a model of democracy in Africa. The German government made its last commitment – an amount of 125 million euros – to Mali in 2009.

Following the coup in early 2012, all further de­vel­op­ment co­op­er­a­tion at inter-governmental level was suspended, in accordance with the recommendations made by the in­ter­na­tional donor community. The precondition for gradually resuming co­op­er­a­tion between the two governments was for the Malian interim government to present a detailed roadmap charting the country's return to constitutional order.

Dirk Niebel emphasised, "At no time did we leave the people of Mali to fend for themselves. Rather, we continued to implement measures that were of direct help to the people but did not involve government authorities, in particular measures relating to food security. It is our intention to resume full-scale de­vel­op­ment co­op­er­a­tion with Mali's government. Before this can happen, however, we need to see free and fair presidential and parliamentary elections take place."

Chad: Tchad: Revue de Presse Humanitaire, du 8 au 14 février 2013

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Source: UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Country: Chad, Libya, Mali

LES TITRES

  • Stranded Chadian migrants deported from Libya receive emergency aid (IOM, 12 Feb.)

  • Tchad: le nouveau gouvernement fixe ses priorités pour le développement du pays (Xinhua, 11 fév.)

  • Tchad: les autorités démentent l'infiltration de membres de Boko Haram (RFI, 13 fév.)

  • Faux orphelins du Tchad: les responsables de l'Arche de Zoé condamnés et arrêtés (AFP, 12 fév.)

  • Tchad: débat à l'Assemblée nationale sur une révision de la Constitution (Xinhua, 13 fév.)

  • Le Tchad nomme un ambassadeur à l’organisation du sommet de L’Union africaine de 2015 (Xinhua, 13 fév.)

  • Global arms trade contributes to use of child soldiers (Amnesty, 11 Feb.)

Niger: Niger : Bulletin humanitaire numéro 6, 13 février 2013

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Source: UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Country: Mali, Niger
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Au sommaire

  • Malnutrition: Hausse des cas de MAM

  • Santé: Tillabéry demeure en état d’épidémie de Rougeole

  • Réfugiées: UNFPA et OXFA M prennent soin de la santé de la reproduction.

Mauritania: Conditions sanitaires précaires pour les réfugiés maliens

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Source: MSF
Country: Mali, Mauritania

Le conflit au nord du Mali continue d’entraîner le déplacement de dizaines de milliers de personnes dans la région africaine du Sahel. Dans les camps de réfugiés, les conditions de vie sont inacceptables et sont sources de maladie et de souffrance.

Selon le Haut commissariat aux réfugiés des Nations Unies, près de 150 000 réfugiés vivent aujourd’hui dans des camps de réfugiés au Burkina Faso (Ferrerio, Dibissi, Ngatourou-niénié et Gandafabou), en Mauritanie (Mbéra) et au Niger (Abala, Mangaize, Ayorou). Depuis mars 2012, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) est présente dans ces huit camps du Sahel afin de fournir des soins de santé primaires, maternels et un suivi nutritionnel à ces populations vulnérables. MSF, en collaboration avec les autorités locales, veille à offrir les premiers soins ainsi qu’une vaccination contre la rougeole aux enfants âgés entre six mois et 15 ans. Ce sont près de 12 000 consultations et 5 000 vaccinations qui ont été enregistrées depuis le début de l’année.

Depuis janvier 2012, près de 67 000 réfugiés, majoritairement des femmes et des enfants, sont arrivés en camion ou à dos d’âne dans la ville de Fassala en Mauritanie. « Au poste frontière de Fassala, certains sont arrivés assoiffés et ont présenté des signes de fatigue », explique Nawezi Karl, responsable des projets MSF en Mauritanie. Après avoir été enregistrés par les autorités, les réfugiés patientent dans un camp de transit avant d’être transférés vers le camp de Mbéra, un village perdu au milieu du désert mauritanien, à 30 kilomètres de la frontière malienne.

Conditions d’accueil précaires dans les camps

À Mbéra, les réfugiés sont entièrement dépendants de l’aide humanitaire nécessaire à leur survie. À ce jour, le nombre de tentes distribuées reste insuffisant. Ainsi, les familles restent réunies sous de grandes tentes appelées « sites d’accueil » où elles sont exposées aux intempéries. Lassées d’attendre, elles se voient contraintes de construire elles-mêmes des abris de fortune à l’aide de nattes de paille et de morceaux de tissu afin de se protéger des tempêtes de sable et de la poussière. « En Mauritanie, comme ailleurs, en raison des conditions précaires, les réfugiés souffrent principalement de diarrhées, d’infections respiratoires et d’infections cutanées », constate Nawezi Karl.

Les familles fuient dans la panique

En 2012, les réfugiés traversaient la frontière de manière organisée, mais en raison de l’augmentation des activités militaires au Mali, près de 14 000 réfugiés ont quitté en hâte les villes de Tombouctou, Léré, Goundam, Larnab et Nianfuke. Beaucoup sont arrivés avec presque rien après avoir voyagé pendant plusieurs jours. « Les récents développements du conflit ont créé la panique au sein de cette population qui a fui par peur d'être prise entre deux feux », raconte Nawezi Karl.

La malnutrition comme préoccupation constante

En novembre 2012, une enquête nutritionnelle menée à Mbéra révélait que près d’un enfant sur cinq (17 pour cent) était malnutri et que 4,6 pour cent des enfants souffraient de la forme la plus sévère de malnutrition après leur arrivée dans le camp. Les équipes médicales de MSF ont donc renforcé leurs activités pour prévenir et soigner les cas de malnutrition sévère. « Le principal défi est de s’assurer que les enfants soient vaccinés, soient protégés du paludisme et aient accès à une nourriture adaptée à leurs besoins », précise Nawezi Karl.

Afin de prendre en charge les enfants les plus sévèrement malnutris, MSF a mis sur pied des centres de nutrition thérapeutique qui ont déjà admis 1000 enfants dans les trois pays. Les enfants malades sont nourris avec du lait spécial, puis des aliments thérapeutiques riches en nutriments. Comme les enfants malnutris sont les plus susceptibles de contracter d’autres maladies (par ex. rougeole, paludisme et diarrhée), une surveillance médicale étroite est nécessaire.

Pour ses activités au Mali, MSF ne reçoit pas de fonds des gouvernements, ses activités étant exclusivement financées par des dons privés.

Chad: Prévisions inquiétantes de la malnutrition chez les enfants et les personnes âgées

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Source: UN Radio
Country: Chad

Ecouter

Au Tchad, le nombre total d'enfants souffrant de malnutrition aiguë sévère en 2012 est largement au-dessus des prévisions des organismes humanitaires. L'UNICEF et le cluster nutrition notent que les 127 300 cas dépassent les prévisions de près de 147.000 cas de 2012. Autre signe inquiétant, la prévalence de la malnutrition aiguë globale chez les personnes âgées qui ne sont pas généralement incluses dans les programmes nutritionnels ni dans les distributions alimentaires. Au total, plus de 1,8 million de personnes sont en insécurité alimentaire au Tchad.

Face à cette situation, le Programme alimentaire mondial espère venir en aide à un million de personnes en 2013. Pour financer ses opérations, le PAM a besoin de 71 millions de dollars pour ses programmes de nutrition. Cela permettrait d'apporter une assistance à 845 écoles primaires, soit 265.000 enfants. Mais pour y arriver, le PAM espère recevoir ces fonds et pré positionner ainsi 49.000 tonnes de nourriture.

Pour illustrer la situation au Tchad, les humanitaires onusiens notent que le nombre de centres nutritionnels a presque doublé, passant de 261 à 426. « Cet alourdissement du bilan pousse donc à se demander si ces chiffres sont dus à une augmentation de la couverture de la réponse nutritionnelle ou si la crise a été plus sévère que prévue », fait remarquer le bulletin humanitaire du Bureau de coordination humanitaire à Ndjamena qui attend les résultats d'une autre une revue participative de la réponse à la crise alimentaire et nutritionnelle en avril 2013.

En outre, une enquête nutritionnelle, menée par HelpAge International en 2012 auprès des personnes âgées de 60 ans et plus dans le département de Haraze Albiar (région du Hadjer Lamis) au Tchad, montre que les personnes âgées du district souffrent de malnutrition modérée ou sévère. Quelque 721 personnes âgées dans 47 villages ont été interrogées, et leur périmètre brachial (PB) a été mesuré.

Les résultats de l'enquête montrent que 284 à 647 personnes âgées sont modérément ou sévèrement dénutries au Haraze Albiar, et ont besoin de soins et d'attention. Ainsi le rapport note que la prévalence de la malnutrition aiguë globale est de 6.1%, pour un intervalle de confiance de 4.0 à 9.1%. En utilisant les données de population utilisées couramment par les autorités de santé, le nombre de personnes âgées dénutries dans le district est passé de 496 à 1 129.

Les facteurs de risque associés à la malnutrition de façon significative sont liés à un âge avancé, un score faible pour les activités de la vie quotidienne, la présence de handicaps (notamment visuels ou auditifs), la faiblesse physique, ou la non fréquentation de centre de sante en cas de maladie. Au Tchad, les personnes âgées ne sont pas incluses dans les programmes nutritionnels ni dans les distributions alimentaires, et il n'existe pas de prise en charge intégrée des maladies chroniques dans les soins de santé primaires. HelpAge recommande que les personnes âgées soient reconnues comme un groupe prioritaire pour les interventions alimentaires et nutritionnelles, et que des soins à domicile et des services communautaires soient intégrés dans les soins de santé primaires.

Pour son appel global consolidé de 501 millions en 2013, le Tchad n’a reçu que 38 millions de dollars, soit 7,7%.

(Interview : Elisabeth Byrs, porte-parole du PAM à Genève ; propos recueillis par Alpha Diallo)

Niger: Sahel Region Learning to Reap the Benefits of Shade

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Source: Inter Press Service
Country: Niger

WASHINGTON, Feb 14 2013 (IPS) - In Africa’s Sahel region, agroforestry techniques using traditional plantings known as “fertiliser trees” to increase soil fertility, as well as harvesting and grazing regulations, are offering new solutions to both food and human security.

Such approaches were nearly lost in recent decades following devastating droughts in the Sahel. Now they are making a belated but welcome comeback. According to a 2012 U.S. Geological Survey, “regeneration agroforestry” in the Sahel stands at over 5 million hectares of agricultural fields newly covered by trees – and growing.

“Agroforestry is the future of agriculture in the drylands and sub-humid regions,” Chris Reij, a senior fellow at the World Resources Institute, a Washington-based think tank, told IPS. “In southern Niger, for instance, farmers have improved millions of hectares of land through regenerating and multiplying valuable trees whose roots already lay beneath their land.”

The effect for local communities over the past 20 years has been immediate and staggering—”more than 500,000 additional tonnes of food per year,” Reij said.

Collectively known as “evergreen agriculture”, these techniques have not only been changing landscapes and breathing new life into soils long depleted of their nutrients and productivity, but also affecting political and social realities.

The ideas behind evergreen agriculture began during the 1980s, in the midst of a severe and prolonged period of drought in the Sahel. This period was disastrous for the region’s inhabitants as crop production plummeted and vast numbers of livestock had to be killed off.

The region’s trees also began to disappear, since local communities were forced to offset their lost assets through practises that slowly destroyed the forests – the only profitable resource left in the Sahel. These communities resorted to cutting and selling wood to buy food and survive, with multiple effects of this deforestation felt in the intervening decades.

For eons, farmers in the Sahel grew trees on their farmlands because they acted as a natural fertiliser. Not only did they improve fertility by adding nitrogen to the soil; they also offered a critical shading effect, which improves moisture conditions in both the local atmosphere and the soil.

Buffering crops of maize sorghum and millet below them, the trees used by farmers in the Sahel are unique and known as Faidherbia albida. According to the World Agroforestry Centre, the tree exhibits the unusual characteristics of becoming dormant and leafless in the wet season – when crops are growing – but leafing out thereafter, when farmers can harvest the trees’ leaves and pods for fodder for their livestock.

When scientists began looking more closely at this phenomenon, they discovered a virtual underground ecosystem in these areas, with root systems and perennials from various species of valuable indigenous trees, which farmers can now cultivate.

These trees grow naturally each year, and with the grazing of livestock managed to give the trees time to grow, the landscape is being transformed, with the implications of this growth possibly extending beyond food security.

Regenerating security

Africa’s “drylands”, the vast swath of the Sahara Desert stretching across North Africa from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea, have risen in the past year to the top of the global agenda. The insurgency in Mali and the ensuing French military intervention have received the most attention recently, following kidnappings in Algeria and wars in Mauritania and Niger.

“If you look at the dimensions of where terrorism and political insecurity are most acute, throughout the entire globe, it is a map of the drylands of Africa and West Asia,” Dennis Garrity, U.N. Drylands Ambassador and director-general of the World Agroforestry Centre in Nairobi, said at a recent event here in Washington.

“The situation emphasises how fragile the underlying development pathways are under conditions of extremely low literacy, health and other human development indicators in the drylands.”

While the Sahel suffers from both an accelerated degradation of land and low rates of female literacy, these two indicators aren’t generally conflated. Yet according to Garrity, a connection can be found in factors such as high population growth rates.

According to the World Agroforestry Centre, the population in the Sahel doubles every 20 years, a rate that is reflected in the rapidly declining size of farm plots on which rural communities depend for food. Meanwhile, availability of new farmland is rapidly dropping, and studies regularly report a steady decline in soil fertility.

Above all looms the long-term prospect of the region’s vulnerability to climate change, making these agroforestry initiatives all the more urgent. Garrity and other experts warn climate change will play out in terms of more extreme droughts – higher temperatures and low and uncertain rainfall – that will significantly affect crop yields.

“It is not a military or security problem,” said Garrity. “There is a pressing confluence of food insecurity, economic insecurity and a big lag in human development indicators that emphasises that this is a multidimensional problem.”

Mali: Évaluation de la situation humanitaire - Cercle de Niono

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Source: Agency for Technical Cooperation and Development
Country: Mali
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Contexte et objectifs de l'évaluation rapide

Le 14 janvier 2013, la ville de Diabali a été cible d’attaques et est rapidement passée sous contrôle de différents groupes armés en provenance du Nord Mali. Suite aux combats menés par les forces armées fran çaises et maliennes (précédés de bombardements aé riens), la zone de Diabali est revenue sous contrôle gou vernemental le 21 janvier 2013. C’est à la suite de ces événements et des opérations de déminage menées par les forces armées présentes sur place qu’ACTED, avec le soutien d'UNICEF et en coordination avec CARE et WeltHungerHilfe (WHH), a envoyé une équipe dans cette zone afin de mener une évaluation rapide des infrastuctures de la ville et des principaux eau, hygiène et assainissement (EHA), écoles, centres de santé et marchés) du 31 janvier au 8 février.


Mali: Impending planting season at risk, support to agriculture critical

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Source: Food and Agriculture Organization
Country: Mali

FAO Director-General and Mali’s Minister for Agriculture stress need to restart local food production, build communities’ resilience

15 February 2013, Rome - With Mali's next agricultural season set to begin in May, there is an urgent need to help displaced farmers return to their lands and resume food production when and where the evolving security situation permits, FAO said today following talks between Malian Minister for Agriculture Baba Berthé and the Organization's Director-General, José Graziano da Silva.

Minister Berthé stressed the importance of targeting assistance to returning farmers in areas which have seen an improvement in their security situation, as well as the need to build the resilience of smallholder farmers across all of Mali.

"Mali's primary planting season is set to begin in May. As the security situation continues to evolve, FAO, our partner agencies and the international community must do everything we can to help the government support farmers returning to their land, where it is safe to do so, and get back to growing food," said Graziano da Silva. "Mali simply cannot afford to write off the next growing season".

All told, an estimated 2 million people in the West African country are food insecure. Half of them are in the north, but the lingering effects of the 2011-12 food and nutrition security crisis, brought on by a combination of drought, high grain prices and environmental degradation, coupled with internal displacements, mean that another million in the south remain food insecure.

An evolving situation

More than 400,000 people have fled from their homes since conflict erupted in northern Mali last year, further exacerbating the pre-existing crisis.

Many of the displaced are farmers, who remain in refugee camps or host families in neighboring Burkina Faso Mauritania, and Niger. Other smallholders have temporarily relocated to southern Mali, placing strains on local food resources.

Although some people have started to return home and resume farming, they have not been able to cultivate their land as they have little or no access to the tools, seeds and animals necessary to begin production.

Meanwhile, despite improvements in the security situation in the north, most markets there remain closed.

Families are relying on household food stocks, and will be forced to turn to markets just as the lean season starts and prices are highest. They could resort to consuming or selling off seed stock intended for planting, as well as selling off other assets, like farming tools and supplies, to get by.

The World Food Programme is working to deliver emergency food supplies to the displaced (read more), targeting life-saving food relief to some 564,000 people in Mali and neighboring countries.

But in their meeting Berthé and Graziano da Silva stressed that in addition to this critical emergency relief, jump-starting local food production ahead of the upcoming growing season - which runs from May through July - has emerged as a critical need.

Resolving the ongoing conflict and restoring security throughout the country will be essential to improving Mali's food security over the long term.

Building resilience, restoring livelihoods

FAO has requested nearly $12 million in humanitarian support aimed at helping 490 000 families to not only cope with the impacts of past droughts but also build stronger livelihoods and more resilient agricultural systems through a wide range of farming and livestock support. An additional $10 million is needed to assist new IDPs, returnees, and host families in Mali, FAO estimates.

This includes the provision of quality seeds, farming tools and supplies, and veterinary health services, as well as extension programmes aimed at giving farmers the means to better produce, process and conserve, their production (more details).

Speaking with Graziano da Silva, Berthé stressed the importance of strengthening existing irrigation projects that have been very effective in drought recovery. Livestock breeders across the country need assistance restoring depleted animal stocks, as well, he said.

Conflict has disrupted FAO's ability to monitor locust movements in Mali, and Berthé and Graziano da Silva stressed the need to resume monitoring activity as soon as possible, in order to stave off any potential outbreaks of the pest following the summer rains. [2013/17/en]

Mali: L’assistance alimentaire offre une bouée de sauvetage à une famille déplacée par les violences

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Source: World Food Programme
Country: Mali

Alors que le conflit s’intensifie au Mali, des milliers de personnes qui ont été obligées de fuir leur maison, luttent pour leur survie dans d’autres régions du pays. Aissata Walet en fait partie. Obligée de louer une hutte qu’elle partage avec 30 personnes à Bamako, Aissata explique qu’elle ne saurait pas comment nourrir ses enfants sans le soutien du PAM.

par Daouda Guirou

BAMAKO – Lorsque le conflit a éclaté au nord du Mali au printemps dernier, Aissata Walet a fui avec ses enfants vers Bamako. Depuis, ils se sont installés sur place, partageant une hutte à deux pièces avec 30 autres personnes. Le soir, il n’y a pas assez de place pour héberger tout le monde donc ses enfants dorment sur le toit. «Lorsqu’il pleut, ils se mettent sous les escaliers. Ils mettent les coussins contre le mur pour dormir», indique-t-elle. Aissata, 43 ans, fait partie de ces dizaines de milliers de maliens du nord qui sont venus au sud pour se réfugier.

Beaucoup ont été accueillis chez des familles qui les ont hébergés. Mais d’autres comme Aissata ont dû se débrouiller eux-mêmes. «J’ai dû louer une maison et payer les frais de scolarité pour mes enfants. Je dois payer pour tout», explique-t-elle.

Néanmoins, il y a une chose pour laquelle Aissata ne doit rien dépenser : les rations de farine, d’huile, de sucre et de haricots qu’elle reçoit de la part du PAM. «Sans ce précieux soutien, je serais obligée de mendier», confie-t-elle.

Loin de chez eux

Aissata vient de Gao, une ville qui se trouve sur le front des combats. Les violences ont déplacé plus de 480 000 personnes depuis avril 2012. Loin de chez elle et sans emploi, elle n’a aucun moyen de s’occuper de sa famille. «Deux de mes enfants ne sont pas allés à l’école depuis une semaine car ils ont attrapé la grippe et je ne peux même pas acheter des médicaments », nous dit-elle. Un nombre croissant de familles se retrouvent dans la même situation alors que le conflit s’intensifie au nord du Mali.

Les affrontements militaires en janvier ont provoqué une nouvelle vague de déplacés. Près de 10 000 personnes sont parties vers Mopti et Ségou. À l’approche du conflit, le PAM a dû temporairement suspendre ses opérations dans la région. Quelques jours après, l’agence a repris ses activités pour venir en aide à plus de 58 000 personnes déplacées.

Situation très volatile

Les familles qui sont restées au nord sont plus difficiles à atteindre même si le PAM a envoyé des vivres vers Tombouctou et Gao par bateaux sur le fleuve Niger.

Alors qu’il est encore impossible de mener des missions d’évaluation dans le nord du pays, selon certaines indications, dans les endroits comme Mopti près de 70 pourcent des familles luttent pour leur survie. «Le PAM continuera à surveiller de tout près la situation et à explorer d’autres solutions pour acheminer de l’assistance humanitaire comme, par exemple, des opérations transfrontalières à travers le Niger et le pré-positionnement de vivres en Mauritanie et au Burkina Faso» a déclaré Zlatan Milisic, Directeur du PAM au Mali.

Au total, le PAM prévoit de soutenir plus de 564 000 personnes touchées par le conflit au Mali et dans les pays voisins.

Mali: EU releases extra €20 million crisis response and stabilisation support package for Mali

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Source: European Commission
Country: Mali

Brussels, 15 February 2013

A first 20 million Euro stabilisation support package was approved today under the Instrument for Stability (IfS) to provide immediate support to Mali's law enforcement and justice services, the Malian local authorities, dialogue and reconciliation initiatives at local level, and the first phases of the upcoming electoral process. This decision puts into practice commitments agreed by the extraordinary Foreign Affairs Council of 17 January.

This much needed package is an early instalment of the EU's comprehensive response to the crisis in Mali, and complements the on-going efforts of the Union through other instruments, in particular the financial and logistical support to the African-led International Support Mission to Mali (AFISMA), the EUTM and EUCAP Sahel CSDP missions, the current IfS long-term Counter-Terrorism project for the Sahel, the EU-INTERPOL Western Africa Police Information System, ongoing EU humanitarian aid, and development cooperation. Commissioner for Development Andris Piebalgs announced on 12 February the fully fledged resumption of development aid to Mali for an amount of some €250 million.

To swiftly deliver concrete results under this first stabilisation support package, the EU intends to rely on the implementation expertise of a mix of EU Member State agencies and other partners, including the UNDP and civil society organisations.

EU High Representative Catherine Ashton said: "This first stabilisation support package is yet another contribution from the EU to assist Mali to fully restore State authority and stability. It will also help the Malian people through support for the restoration of basic State services. In the coming weeks, the EU will take further decisions to contribute to international efforts in support of Mali and to help the Malian Government and people achieve long term stability, security and development."

The IfS stabilisation support package includes five main components:

(i) Support for the restoration of security and protection of civilians: through the provision of urgently required equipment (vehicles, communication equipment, etc.) to enable the re-deployment of civilian security services, especially in the north, and to protect against terrorist threats in urban areas and critical infrastructures – including in Bamako;

(ii) Support to Malian local authorities, to re-establish the presence of the State throughout Mali, especially in the north, with a focus on the resumption of basic social services (by providing administrative, school, medical, veterinary and technical equipment and related training and maintenance);

(iii) Promotion of dialogue and reconciliation initiatives at local level, and support for efforts to reduce radicalisation and violent extremism (notably through community-based radio programmes);

(iv) Contribution to the first phases of the electoral process (through support to a sensitisation campaign and to the update of the electoral register); and

(v) Technical assistance to support the Malian authorities in their efforts to stabilise Mali (through the provision of technical expertise, services and training in areas such as security, justice, reconciliation).

Background

The Instrument for Stability (IfS) is a key external assistance instrument, enabling the EU to contribute to international conflict prevention and provide urgent responses to current and emerging crises. Every year, EU IfS support is deployed for around 40 crisis response actions worldwide.

In the Sahel region, the IfS is currently supporting projects focusing on the reinforcement of border management capacities in Mauritania, security and stabilisation in the northern regions of Niger and Mali, and the building of national capacities for the fight against terrorism and organised crime networks in the region.

Ethiopia: Education: giving children what they want in emergencies

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Source: Save the Children
Country: Ethiopia, Somalia

I’m sitting with four boys who attend Save the Children’s child-friendly space (CFS) in Helewyn refugee camp in Ethiopia.

Jibriel, Nuur, Hussein and Ahmed are between 13-15 years and have been living in the camp for over a year. it’s one of five camps established to support the 172,000 Somali refugees who have sought refugee since 2009.

Education is so important to the children here, yet drought and conflict back home have made it a challenge for almost every child to complete their basic education. Ahmed attended school before coming to the camp but recalls that “the people who were affected by the drought, the poor students, were chased away from the school if they could no longer pay the fees.”

Until recently, there’s been no formal education programme for out-of-school children, despite there being 18,391 children between the ages of 11 and 14 across the five camps.

Save the Children will begin its Alternative Basic Education (ABE) programme – an accelerated learning programme this month and the demand is high.

Let us learn

“We want to get our school back,” Jibriel states plainly. “We fled from a country, from hunger and lack of education. We want to develop here because one day, it will be safe to return and we want to return back to our country educated.”

Save the Children has for a long time advocated that education in emergencies is a vital means of psycho-social support and Hussein, an unaccompanied minor, highlights this:

“You know, those who don’t have families used to stay in school all day. We are thinking about our parents a lot. Some of us who do not have parents here spend all day missing them.

“Save the Children, when they arrived, arranged foster families for them and psycho-social support. Now we stay only with the foster families as we do not have school and this makes us miss our families more.”

To ensure children like Jibriel, Nuur, Hussein and Ahmed have a safe place to learn, staff receive on-going training including innovative approaches such as HEART, a new global child development and education approach created by Save the Children. HEART promotes artistic expression and aims to support children to heal emotionally and learn critical skills.

Listening to children in emergencies

Finally, I ask them what would they like to see humanitarian agencies doing more of in the camps.

Nuur answers quickly, “We request only education as we do not think we will return soon. One day, we want to participate in our government and make them push education. In the camps we want primary, even secondary schools.”

Listening to the children, they’re not making exceptional demands, after all, children have a fundamental right to education. And it looks like, thankfully, 2013 will be a big year for education in the Dolo Ado refugee camps at least.

The first ever Education in Emergency funding from the European Community Humanitarian Office (ECHO) will be going, in part, to ABE programming in Dolo Ado. It’s uplifting to know that we’ll be able to support more children and help them fulfil their dreams of accessing education.

Please support our work in emergencies

Mali: “It’s not peaceful in my head”

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Source: Save the Children
Country: Mali

This is what 15-year-old Aissatou* finishes with. We’ve been talking for almost an hour – she has had so much to tell me.

It’s hardly surprising, after everything she’s been through.

Aissatou’s story

Forced from her home over a year ago, Aissatou was more than eight months pregnant.

She was 14, and gave birth to her son Salam less than a month later, on the run and staying in Gao.

She still remembers the day the rebels first entered her town, but the words come hesitantly at first, in short pieces.

“I was really scared,” she starts. I ask what she was doing before the attack started. “I had been having fun. I was playing with my friends. Everyone was outside. It was a Friday.”

“First we heard gunfire,” she remembers. “We thought it was the military. Then we started seeing people running everywhere.”

Aissatou tells me she started running too, straight into her house. She stayed there for two days without leaving.

It was on the second day that she finally came out and heard what happened.

The aftermath

One of her friends had been hit by a stray bullet. She was alive, but needed urgent medical treatment, and was fleeing the town for a refugee camp in Niger.

Aissatou’s family had also been directly affected. As she describes what happened, her pace picks up, rushed, as if she wants to get the words out as quickly as possible.

She tells me how her brother-in-law had been accused of stealing. She explains how, under the rebels, the punishment for this was amputation.

She saw him after it happened – his hand had been cut off at the wrist. As she explains this to me, Aissatou looks down at her own hands, drawing a thin line with her finger over her wrist, over and over again.

“It wasn’t true,” she says, looking back up at me. “He said he hasn’t stolen anything.”

But what hit Aissatou the hardest wasn’t either of these things. It was what happened to her friend Ines. And it’s now, telling Ines’ story, that the words pour out of Aissatou’s mouth.

She stares me straight in the eyes, and I can see the horrific events playing back in her mind as she describes them.

Girls taken

“The rebels went into the village and took girls – not women, but girls. They were 15, 16, 17. They said they needed the girls to go prepare food for them. They took them into their cars and brought them into the bush.

“They left them in the bush after they were done raping them – but they beat them before leaving. I know because my friend was one of them.

“There were 16 girls in total. My friend’s name is Ines*, she is 15 now. She was 14 then, like me – we went to school together,” Aissatou starts, and then paints a vivid picture of just what happened to Ines.

“She told me that they took her by force. They threatened her with their weapons to make her sleep with them. There were 20 men but only 16 girls – so some of the men shared the same girl between them. Ines was lucky; there was only one man who took her.

“Afterwards though, he hit her five times with a long rod before she managed to escape.”

Impossible to forget

Beaten and abused, Aissatou’s 14-year-old classmate ran from the bushes, but in her fear and confusion, fell when she reached the road.

Aissatou says that’s how the men from her village found Ines, and brought her home again. Ines told her classmate the whole story before Aissatou got her brother and brought her to the hospital.

Aissatou and her family fled the town the next day, and she hasn’t seen Ines since.

As she finishes her story, Aissatou pauses. She looks at the ground down for a second, almost self-conscious.

“Even now, even if I’m here,” she starts, “I can’t forget what happened. My head is full of these things – what happened to my friends, my family…”

She looks up one more time at me, willing me to understand.

“It’s not peaceful in my head.”

  • Names changed to protect children’s identities.

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