United States Africa Command

Public Affairs Office

24 August 2010

USAFRICOM - related news stories

TOP NEWS RELATED TO U.S. AFRICA COMMAND AND AFRICA

Stuttgart Child Development Center first of four new CDCs to open (Stars and
Stripes)
(Stuttgart) A $5 million Child Development Center opened Monday at the U.S. Army
Garrison in Stuttgart, where the high demand for daycare has challenged the garrison’s
ability to accommodate the needs of its military community.

U.S. Indecisive As Tension Builds Up Over Vote (The East African)

(Sudan) With less than four months until South Sudan's scheduled referendum on
secession, the Obama administration as well as advocacy groups in Washington appear
uncertain as to what course of action the United States should take.

US Will Give Mozambique $1 Billion to Fight HIV (Voice of America)

(Mozambique) The United States says it will provide $1 billion over the next five years
to help fight AIDS in Mozambique, where some 1.5 million people are living with HIV,
the virus that causes AIDS.

Nigerian airlines approved for direct US flights: officials (AFP)

(Nigeria) The United States has granted Nigerian airlines permission for direct US
flights, officials said Monday, less than a year after a Nigerian allegedly tried to blow
up a Detroit-bound plane.

More AU troops arrive to boost Somalia peace force (Reuters)

(Somalia) Hundreds of mainly Ugandan troops have arrived in Mogadishu to
strengthen an African Union peacekeeping force helping Somalia's government battle
Islamist insurgents, an AU official said on Monday.

Rwandan Rebels Raped at Least 179 Women in Congo, Humanitarian Officials Say
(New York Times)
(Congo) A mob of Rwandan rebels gang-raped at least 179 women last month during a
weekend raid on a community of villages in eastern Congo, the United Nations said
Monday.

Some 200 women gang-raped near Congo UN base (AP)

(Johannesburg) Rwandan and Congolese rebels gang-raped nearly 200 women and
some baby boys over four days within miles of a U.N. peacekeepers' base in an eastern
Congo mining district, an American aid worker and a Congolese doctor said Monday.

Nile Basin states may resolve difference through negotiations (Xinhua)

(Tanzania) Nile Basin countries have built adequate confidence and trust amongst
themselves over the years through the Nile Basin Initiative transitional arrangements,
the existing difference may conveniently be resolved through further negotiations, a
senior Tanzanian government official has said.

Spanish hostages freed by al-Qaida-linked group (Associated Press)

(Mali) Two Spanish aid workers kidnapped almost nine months ago by an al-Qaida
affiliate were freed Monday in Mali after a multi-million-dollar ransom was reportedly
paid — a sign of the terrorist group's growing sophistication in bankrolling operations
through kidnappings, experts said Monday.

Anti-terror police arrest 12 with bomb materials (The Standard)

Anti-Terrorism Police Unit (ATPU) are holding 12 suspects they found with materials
for making bombs and instructions in Mpeketoni, Lamu Isla.

Al-Qaeda says demands were met on Spanish hostages: report (Expatica)

(Madrid) The North African branch of Osama bin Laden's terror network said it
released two Spanish hostages because some of its demands were met, the Spanish
newspaper El Pais on Monday quoted an audio statement from the group as saying.

Russian warship escorts int'l convoy through Gulf of Aden (Itar-Tass)

(Moscow) Russia's large anti-submarine ship Admiral Levchenko is escorting an

international convoy of ten civilian ships through dangerous parts of the Gulf of Aden
and off the Horn of Africa, a Navy official said.

UN News Service Africa Briefs

Full Articles on UN Website
 UN relief chief urges unfettered access for aid workers in Darfur
 UN aid agencies responding to cholera outbreak in West Africa
 UN environment agency stresses that Nigerian oil assessment is not yet
complete
 UN confirms reported gang rape of women by rebels in DRC Congo
 Number of Somalis needing humanitarian aid falls, UN agency reports
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UPCOMING EVENTS OF INTEREST:
There are no upcoming events at this time.
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FULL ARTICLE TEXT

Stuttgart Child Development Center first of four new CDCs to open (Stars and
Stripes)

STUTTGART, Germany — A $5 million Child Development Center opened Monday at

the U.S. Army Garrison in Stuttgart, where the high demand for daycare has challenged
the garrison’s ability to accommodate the needs of its military community.

The new facility already has 83 students enrolled, and attendance is expected to grow to
100 in the months ahead.

“This is the first of four CDC’s to be built in Europe,” said garrison commander Col.
Carl Bird.

Within the next couple of months, child care centers also will open in Landstuhl,
Wiesbaden, and Ansbach, he said.

A shortage of CDC staff and facilities has long been an issue for many overseas military
communities.

The Stuttgart center opened at Kelley Barracks, which hosts U.S. Africa Command. In
recent years, the influx of personnel to support the new command has increased
demand for services such as child care. In the past three years, the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers has poured more than $70 million into construction and renovation projects
at the post, where AFRICOM’s staff of roughly 1,300 work.

AFRICOM commander Gen. William “Kip” Ward said the hope is that the new CDC
will give more peace of mind to working families.

“The entire Stuttgart community benefits from this facility,” Ward said at the opening
ceremony Monday.
--------------------
U.S. Indecisive As Tension Builds Up Over Vote (The East African)

New York — With less than four months until South Sudan's scheduled referendum on
secession, the Obama administration as well as advocacy groups in Washington appear
uncertain as to what course of action the United States should take.

The president's top advisors on Sudan are reported to be divided on US policy in the
run-up to the vote that is supposed to take place on January 9.
Citing multiple but anonymous sources, a blogger on the Foreign Policy magazine
website recently recounted a dispute over Sudan between Susan Rice, the US
ambassador to the United Nations, and Major General Scott Gration, President Obama's
special envoy for Sudan.

Ms Rice was said to be "furious" over Mr Gration's proposal at a White House meeting
to make the referendum, rather than the Darfur conflict, the Obama administration's top
Sudan priority.

Mr Gration was also reported not to favour additional US pressures on the Khartoum
government.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton endorsed Mr Gration's plan, as did most of the
meeting's participants, blogger Josh Rogin wrote.

Some Sudan-focused US activist organisations are also displeased with Mr Gration's

approach.

The Enough Project, which campaigns against mass killings in Sudan and the
Democratic Republic of Congo, complained last week that Mr Gration and Ms Clinton
"are now pushing a Sudan policy in which much-needed additional pressures are
markedly absent."

Enough and other groups argue that issues that could reignite armed conflict will
remain unresolved prior to the referendum unless the US takes a harder line toward
Khartoum.

These advocates emphasise that Sudanese leader Omar al-Bashir has been indicted for
war crimes and say he should be treated as an international pariah.

The Obama administration's approach has been too passive, Enough contends.

President Bush's envoys were instrumental in bringing about an agreement in 2005 that
put an end to the 20-year war between Khartoum and South Sudan that had taken an
estimated two million lives.

It is that agreement, which contains a provision for the secession referendum, that has
formed the framework for the Obama administration's own approach to Sudan.

When campaigning for the presidency, Mr Obama said he would push Khartoum to
end the war in Darfur and to adhere to the North-South treaty.
But many advocacy groups in Washington say the president's deeds have fallen far
short of his words on Sudan

Enough gave an account of a recent event at which Mr Gration expressed satisfaction

with moves by the ruling parties in Khartoum and South Sudan to negotiate on North-
South issues, with the United Nations and African Union, rather than the United States,
taking the lead role as mediators.

With the AU and UN having assumed leadership on the negotiations that will
presumably follow the referendum, the US will be able to concentrate on providing
food and similar types of support, Mr Gration said, according to the Enough account.

Such a focus by Washington would help "keep the place together," Mr Gration
reportedly suggested in regard to South Sudan in the aftermath of the referendum.

"General Gration and other US officials are increasingly voicing a mantra that the
United States has no influence in Sudan," Enough added.

The role of the UN Security Council in regard to the South Sudan referendum also
remains unclear.

Under the current leadership of Russia, the council has scheduled no discussions on
Sudan during the month of August.

The council did issue a statement in June urging parties in Sudan to implement the
peace agreement between them that calls for a secession referendum to be held in 2011.

The vote should take place as scheduled in January, the council said.
--------------------
US Will Give Mozambique $1 Billion to Fight HIV (Voice of America)

The United States says it will provide $1 billion over the next five years to help fight
AIDS in Mozambique, where some 1.5 million people are living with HIV, the virus that
causes AIDS.

U.S. and Mozambican officials signed a partnership agreement in Mozambique's

capital, Maputo, on Monday. The U.S. embassy says the agreement is aimed at
reducing new infections, strengthening Mozambique's health system, and improving
access to treatment for people infected with HIV, and those suffering from AIDS.

It says another goal is for the government, aid groups, and private sector to harmonize
their efforts to combat HIV and AIDS.
The funding will mostly be supplied by the United States' anti-AIDS initiative, PEPFAR,
started under former president George W. Bush. The initiative dramatically increased
the funding dispersed internationally to fight HIV and AIDS.

Since PEPFAR began in 2003, U.S. funding of anti-AIDS programs in Mozambique has
increased from $37.5 million in 2004 to around $250 million in 2009.

In 2007, the United Nations estimated that about 12.5 percent of adults in Mozambique
were living with HIV, and some 400,000 children had been orphaned by AIDS.
--------------------
Nigerian airlines approved for direct US flights: officials (AFP)

ABUJA – The United States has granted Nigerian airlines permission for direct US
flights, officials said Monday, less than a year after a Nigerian allegedly tried to blow
up a Detroit-bound plane.

US ambassador to Nigeria Robin Renee Sanders lauded Nigeria on achieving so-called

category one status, but also said the country needed to do more to ensure the regular
use of full-body scanners.

"There are more things to be done ... to ensure 100 percent body checks at international
airports," she said, but added that patdowns were being employed effectively.

Nigeria has been using full-body scanners sporadically at its international airports, with
the civil aviation authority saying training has been ongoing to be able to employ them
full-time.

Air marshals have also been traveling on flights in recent months, though officials have
declined to provide details on the programme.

"Nigeria will do everything possible to sustain the rating," Aviation Minister Fidelia
Njeze said.

Category one status allows Nigerian carriers to fly directly to the United States using
their own aircraft and crews.

The announcement comes months after Nigerian national Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab,
23, was accused of trying to blow up a US airliner on Christmas Day as it approached
Detroit with explosives stitched into his underwear.

Passengers and crew were able to restrain Abdulmutallab and put out a small fire
aboard the flight, which was carrying 279 passengers and 11 crew members.
The explosives had not been detected during routine scans in Lagos and at
Amsterdam's Schipol airport.

Because of the plot, Nigeria was placed on a US list of countries requiring special
security for all flights heading to the United States.

Only five other African nations have category-one status: Cape Verde, Egypt, Ethiopia,
Morocco and South Africa.
--------------------
More AU troops arrive to boost Somalia peace force (Reuters)

NAIROBI – Hundreds of mainly Ugandan troops have arrived in Mogadishu to

strengthen an African Union peacekeeping force helping Somalia's government battle
Islamist insurgents, an AU official said on Monday.

Al Shabaab, which is linked to al Qaeda, and another Islamist militia have been fighting
Somalia's government since the start of 2007.

Uganda said last month it was willing to send an additional 2,000 peacekeeping troops
to the anarchic country after more than 70 people were killed in two coordinated blasts
while watching the World Cup final in Kampala.

Al Shabaab claimed responsibility for the attacks.

Ugandan soldiers make up the bulk of the 6,100 strong mission known as AMISOM,
while soldiers from Burundi protect the presidential palace and guarding the airport.

"The additional troops began arriving last Friday, they were airlifted to different areas
and of course they will continue to arrive," said Wafula Wamunyinyi, AU deputy
special representative for Somalia.

He declined to give further details at a news conference.

African leaders meeting in Uganda last month lifted a cap of 8,100 on troop levels in
Somalia. IGAD -- a bloc of East African Nations -- Guinea and Djibouti also pledged to
send troops.

Wamunyinyi said the AU had established the identities of those behind the training and
financing of al Shabaab.

"We have a list of 2,000 names," he said but declined to elaborate.

The insurgents, who control much of the capital and large areas in central and south
Somalia, have attracted foreign fighters to the lawless country.
Eleven militiamen, mostly foreign fighters, were killed when their own bombs went off
prematurely in Mogadishu over the weekend. The dead were from Pakistan, India,
Afghanistan, Algeria and Somalia.

More than 21,000 Somalis have been killed in fighting since the start of the insurgency,
1.5 million have been uprooted from their homes and nearly half a million are
sheltering in other countries in the region.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said in a report on Monday that a quarter
of Somalia's population, or 2 million people, needed humanitarian aid.
--------------------
Rwandan Rebels Raped at Least 179 Women in Congo, Humanitarian Officials Say
(New York Times)

GOMA, Democratic Republic of Congo — A mob of Rwandan rebels gang-raped at

least 179 women last month during a weekend raid on a community of villages in
eastern Congo, the United Nations said Monday.

The Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, or F.D.L.R., was blamed for the
attack. The F.D.L.R. is an ethnic Hutu rebel group that has been terrorizing the hills of
eastern Congo for years, preying on villages in a quest for the natural resources beneath
them.

The raided villages are near the mining center of Walikale, known to be a rebel
stronghold, and are “very insecure,” Stefania Trassari, a spokeswoman for the United
Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said Sunday. “Rape is
something we get quite often.”

But she and other United Nations and humanitarian officials said that this attack was
unusual because of the large number of victims and the fact that they were raped by
more than one attacker simultaneously.

On the evening of July 30, armed men entered the village of Ruvungi, in North Kivu
Province.

“They told the population that they were just there for food and rest and that they
shouldn’t worry,” said Will F. Cragin, the International Medical Corps’ program
coordinator for North Kivu, who visited the village a week after their arrival.

“Then after dark another group came,” said Mr. Cragin, referring to between 200 and
400 armed men who witnesses described as spending days and nights looting Ruvungi
and nearby villages.
“They began to systematically rape the population,” he said, adding, “Most women
were raped by two to six men at a time.”

The attackers often took the victims into the bush or into their homes, raping them “in
front of their children and their families,” Mr. Cragin said. “If a car passed, they would
hide.”

The rebels left on Aug. 3, he said, the same day the chief of the area traveled through
the villages and reported horrific cases of sexual violence. “We thought at first he was
exaggerating,” Mr. Cragin said, “but then we saw the scale of the attacks.”

Miel Hendrickson, a regional director for the International Medical Corps, which has
been documenting the rape cases, said, “We had heard first 24 rapes, then 56, then 78,
then 96, then 156.”

“The numbers keep rising,” she said. The United Nations maintains a military base
approximately 20 miles from the villages, but United Nations officials said they did not
know if the peacekeepers there were aware of the attack as it occurred. A United
Nations military spokesman, Madnoje Mounoubai, said information was still being
gathered.

The F.D.L.R., which began as a gathering of fugitives of the Rwandan genocide in 1994,
has grown into a resilient and savage killing machine and an economic engine in the
region.

The United Nations, Congo and Rwanda began a military offensive against the group in
early 2009, but since then, humanitarian organizations say, cases of rape have risen
drastically.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton visited eastern Congo in 2009 to raise
awareness about widespread rape in the region, calling it “evil in its basest form,” and
the United States pledged $17 million to the Congolese government to fight sexual
violence. The raid came two weeks before three armed Indian peacekeepers were
slaughtered during an ambush by Mai-Mai rebels who were carrying only spears and
machetes.
--------------------
Some 200 women gang-raped near Congo UN base (AP)
JOHANNESBURG - Rwandan and Congolese rebels gang-raped nearly 200 women and
some baby boys over four days within miles of a U.N. peacekeepers' base in an eastern
Congo mining district, an American aid worker and a Congolese doctor said Monday.

Will F. Cragin of the International Medical Corps said aid and U.N. workers knew
rebels had occupied Luvungi town and surrounding villages in eastern Congo the day
after the attack began on July 30.
More than three weeks later, the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Congo has issued no
statement about the atrocities and said Monday it still is investigating.

Cragin told The Associated Press by telephone that his organization was only able to
get into the town, which he said is about 10 miles (16 kilometers) from a U.N. military
camp, after rebels ended their brutal spree of raping and looting and withdrew of their
own accord on Aug. 4.

At U.N. headquarters in New York, spokesman Martin Nesirky said Monday that a
U.N. Joint Human Rights team verified allegations of the rape of at least 154 women by
combatants from the Rwandan rebel FDLR group and Congolese Mai-Mai rebels in the
village of Bunangiri. He said the victims are receiving medical and psycho-social care.

Nesirky said the U.N. peacekeeping mission has a military company operating base in
Kibua, some 30 kilometers (about 19 miles) east of the village, but he said FDLR
attackers blocked the road and prevented villagers from reaching the nearest
communication point.

Civil society leader Charles Masudi Kisa said there were only about 25 peacekeepers
and that they did what they could against some 200 to 400 rebels who occupied the
town of about 2,200 people and five nearby villages.

"When the peacekeepers approached a village, the rebels would run into the forest, but
then the Blue Helmets had to move on to another area, and the rebels would just
return," Masudi said.

There was no fighting and no deaths, Cragin said, just "lots of pillaging and the
systematic raping of women."

Four young boys also were raped, said Dr. Kasimbo Charles Kacha, the district medical
chief. Masudi said they were babies aged one month, six months, a year and 18 months.

"Many women said they were raped in their homes in front of their children and
husbands, and many said they were raped repeatedly by three to six men," Cragin said.
Others were dragged into the nearby forest.

International and local health workers have treated 179 women but the number raped
could be much higher as terrified civilians still are hiding, he said.

"We keep going back and identifying more and more cases," he said. "Many of the
women are returning from the forest naked, with no clothes."

He said that by the time they got help it was too late to administer medication against
AIDS and contraception to all but three of the survivors.
Spokeswoman Stefania Trassari said her U.N. Organization for the Coordination of
Humanitarian Aid was monitoring the situation but that access for humanitarian
workers remains "very limited due to insecurity."

Luvungi is a farming center on the main road between Goma, the eastern provincial
capital, and the major mining town of Walikale.

Kacha said on one day during the rebel occupation Indian peacekeepers had provided a
military escort against the rebels to a large commercial truck traveling from Kemba to
Luvungi, which is near a cassiterite mine and about 88 miles (140 kilometers) south of
Goma.

U.N. mission spokesman Madnodje Mounoubai promised to get military comment on

the assumption that the peacekeepers were protecting commercial goods but not
civilians, which is their primary mandate.

Survivors said their attackers were from the FDLR that includes perpetrators of the
Rwandan genocide who fled across the border to Congo in 1994 and have been
terrorizing the population in eastern Congo ever since, according to Cragin. The
Rwandans were accompanied by Mai-Mai rebels, he said, quoting survivors.

Masudi, the civil society leader, said the rebels arrived after Congolese army troops
without explanation redeployed from Luvungi and its surroundings to Walikale. He
said this happened after some soldiers deserted and joined rebels in the forest.

Rape as a weapon of war has become shockingly commonplace in eastern Congo,

where at least 8,300 rapes were reported last year, according to the United Nations. It is
believed that many more rapes go unreported.

Congo's army and U.N. peacekeepers have been unable to defeat the many rebel groups
responsible for the long drawn-out conflict in eastern Congo, which is fueled by the
area's massive mineral reserves. Gold, cassiterite and coltan are some of the minerals
mined in the area near Luvungi, with soldiers and rebels competing for control of
lucrative mines that give them little incentive to end the fighting.

"The minerals are our curse with the FDLR looting on one side and the soldiers looting
on the other," said Masudi.

The Congolese government this year has demanded the withdrawal of the $1.35 billion-
a-year U.N. mission, the largest peacekeeping force in the world with more than 20,000
soldiers, saying it has failed in its primary mandate to protect civilians.

Mission officials have said that the peacekeeping army is too small to police this
sprawling nation the size of Western Europe, and that its peacekeepers are handicapped
by rebels using civilians as shields and operating in rugged terrain where they are
difficult to pursue.

The mission also has a difficult mandate of supporting the Congolese army, whose
troops often also are accused of raping and pillaging.
--------------------
Nile Basin states may resolve difference through negotiations (Xinhua)

DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania - Nile Basin countries have built adequate confidence and
trust amongst themselves over the years through the Nile Basin Initiative transitional
arrangements, the existing difference may conveniently be resolved through further
negotiations, a senior Tanzanian government official has said.

Washington Mutayoba, director of Water Resources in the Ministry of Water and

Irrigation made the remarks in a recent written interview with Xinhua through email
for the ministry Permanent Secretary Christopher Sayi.

"It should be noted that presently all parties agree to the formation of the Nile River
Basin Commission. The existing single difference in opinion concerning water security
in the Cooperative Framework Agreement (CFA) document should not obstruct the
establishment of the Commission and that the remaining issue may conveniently be
resolved through further negotiations," said the official.

The Tanzanian official also dismissed the notion of confrontation over Nile waters.

On the Tanzanian government's suggestion for the solution to the dispute of Nile River
water resources for better cooperation and development, Mutayoba said, "the Nile
River Basin is a shared water resource among the 10 sovereign states, namely Kenya,
Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia,
Eritrea, Sudan, and Egypt. After 10 years of negotiations the Nile Basin members have
developed a Cooperative Framework Agreement (CFA), which accommodates the
principles of the well established rules of International Law for the common shared
resources."
-------------------
Spanish hostages freed by al-Qaida-linked group (Associated Press)

OUAGADOUGOU, Burkina Faso – Two Spanish aid workers kidnapped almost nine
months ago by an al-Qaida affiliate were freed Monday in Mali after a multi-million-
dollar ransom was reportedly paid — a sign of the terrorist group's growing
sophistication in bankrolling operations through kidnappings, experts said Monday.

Aid workers Roque Pascual and Albert Vilalta were abducted last November when
their convoy of 4-by-4s was attacked by gunmen on a stretch of road in Mauritania.
They were whisked away to Mali, whose northern half is now one of the many stretches
of remote desert where al-Qaida of Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM, has stretched its
tentacles.

Late Monday afternoon, the pair stepped out of a helicopter that landed on the grounds
of the presidential palace in Burkina Faso and were handed a cell phone. Reporters
overheard them saying into the phone 'muchas gracias' — or many thanks.

Spanish newspaper El Mundo reported that Spain had paid euro3.8 million in ransom
to secure the aid workers' release. The government refused to comment.

Originally based in Algeria, AQIM had limited reach until 2006, when the organization,
then called the Salafist Group for Call and Combat, brokered a deal with al-Qaida's
leadership in the Middle East, allowing them to become in essence a franchise of the
larger terrorist network.

Since then they have abducted Austrian, Swiss, Italian, French and Canadian nationals.
Experts say the majority were released after multimillion dollar ransoms were paid,
money that is being reinvested to grow the group's footprint.

In February 2008, AQIM abducted two Austrian tourists vacationing in Tunisia. They
were released eight months later after the Austrian government paid $5 million,
according to reports in the Algerian press. In December of the same year, the group
abducted Canadian national Robert Fowler, the U.N. special envoy to Niger, who was
released after a reported $8 million was paid, according to an article in the World
Defense Review by Africa expert Peter Pham.

"It's clear that ransoms are being paid, since no political demand is usually made in
connection with these kidnappings," said Pham, who is the senior vice president at the
National Committee on American Foreign Policy and who recently traveled to
Mauritania and Morocco in order to research the growth of the group.

"It would be illogical to assume that AQIM is carrying out these kidnappings and
making no demands for their hostages. The dangerous innovation that we have seen in
recent years is that the ransoms have gone beyond acting as startup money. It's now
been incorporated into their business model and has become a major component of
their strategy," he said.

He pointed to the prisoner exchange that is believed to have taken place last week
before the release of Pascual and Vilalta.

Soon after they were kidnapped on Nov. 29, Mauritanian commandos led a raid across
the border into Mali, where the terrorist group is believed to have an operating base.
There they seized Omar Ould Sid Ahmed Ould Hama. He was sentenced by a
Mauritanian court to 12 years in prison for taking part in the kidnapping of the aid
workers.

Just one week before they were freed, Hama was quietly extradited to Mali, where a
diplomatic source at a Western embassy said he was handed back to AQIM. The official
spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak.

Hama, says Pham, is an example of the group's growing reach and its use of its new
capital to recruit the most able fighters. Hama, who is from Mali, is neither Algerian nor
Mauritanian — as was the case for the majority of the group's recruits in its early years.

Pham says Hama, who goes by the alias 'Omar Sahraoui' is believed to have been a
senior commander of the Polisario Front in Western Sahara, a Muslim group trained by
the Soviets. Their fighters are far more skilled then the typical AQIM recruit. And
unlike AQIM, the Polisario is a nationalistic movement and is not linked to militant
Islam.

"It's an example of how the cash flow from these kidnappings is enabling them to hire
the best guns," says Pham. "If you're reaching into the Polisario, you're no longer
looking for true believers. ... Now they can afford well-trained mercenaries. So the
success rate of their operations will also go up," he said.

Rudolph Atallah, who recently retired from his post as Africa Counterterrorism
Director in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, says that it's against international law
for Western governments to pay ransoms to terrorists. But there is no question, he says,
that AQIM is making money from kidnappings. The money is funneled through
intermediaries, he said.

The helicopter sent to Mali to retrieve the aid workers also included high-level officials
from the entourage of Burkina Faso's President Blaise Compaore. An adviser to
Compaore is believed to have helped in the hostage negotiation.

When they stepped off the plane, the two aid workers appeared clean, wearing polo
shirts and khaki pants. One of them propped himself up on a cane as he walked.

It was most likely Vilalta, who suffered multiple bullet wounds to his leg when he tried
to flee his abductors on the day of the kidnapping last November. The two were driven
to the Ouagadougou airport where they were expected to board a Spain-bound flight.

"This has been 268 days of suffering for them and their families," Spanish Prime
Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero told reporters in Madrid.
-------------------
Anti-terror police arrest 12 with bomb materials (The Standard)
Anti-Terrorism Police Unit (ATPU) are holding 12 suspects they found with materials
for making bombs and instructions in Mpeketoni, Lamu Isla.
The suspects include three Tanzanians who allegedly arrived from Somalia with maps
of buildings in Nairobi, and instructions on assembling a bomb.
The others are Kenyans, and police said they are still interrogating them to know their
mission.
The three Tanzanians had arrived in Lamu from Somalia aboard a speedboat they
hired, after paying Sh20,000.
They also had bomb-making materials, which detectives believe they got from
Somalia.
"We do not know their mission, but all I can say is that we have averted something,"
said a source that declined to be named.
The suspects were arrested on Saturday morning and later brought to Mombasa,
where they were being grilled on Sunday.
And after interrogation, the suspects are said to have disclosed the location of their
accomplices who were picked up from Malindi Town.
Police said they got tips on the arrival of the Tanzanians before they moved into
action.
linked to Al-Shabaab
The arrests came barely a month after terrorists linked to Al-Shabaab detonated bombs
in Kampala, Uganda, killing more than 80 people.
At least ten Kenyans are being held in Uganda over the bombings.
The latest arrest was of Suleiman Abdul Hamid who was arrested from his South C
house, in Nairobi, in an operation mounted by tens of hooded police led by detectives.
The arrest came three days after three Ugandans arrested in Mombasa over the same
crime confessed to getting training in Somalia.
Anti Terror Police Unit said the arrests came after a month of thorough investigation.
-------------------
Al-Qaeda says demands were met on Spanish hostages: report (AFP)

MADRID - The North African branch of Osama bin Laden's terror network said it
released two Spanish hostages because some of its demands were met, the Spanish
newspaper El Pais on Monday quoted an audio statement from the group as saying.
Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) also said the release was a "lesson for the
French secret services to take into consideration in the future".

It was referrring to a failed Mauritanian-French raid in Mali on July 22 that aimed to

rescue French hostage Michel Germaneau and in which seven AQIM members were
killed.

El Pais released a Spanish translation of the full text of the audio statement, delivered in
Arabic, on its website.
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Russian warship escorts int'l convoy through Gulf of Aden (Itar-Tass)

MOSCOW - Russia's large anti-submarine ship Admiral Levchenko is escorting an

international convoy of ten civilian ships through dangerous parts of the Gulf of Aden
and off the Horn of Africa, a Navy official said.

"There 46 Russian citizens in the crews of the ships being escorted," the official told Itar-
Tass on Monday, August 23.

He also mentioned successful missions carried out by other Russian ships. The heavy
nuclear-powered cruiser Pyotr Veliky has made a trip to the Suez Canal and is now
sailing in the Mediterranean.

The Black Sea Fleet's missile cruiser Moskva ended a business visit to the port of
Salalah, Oman, and is on the way to its home base in Sevastopol.

"Technical means and arms aboard the ships are functioning normally, the crews are
keeping watch on schedule," the Navy official said.

A new group of Russian warships led by the Northern Fleet's large antisubmarine ship
Admiral Levchenko arrived in the Gulf of Aden in early July.

"The ships of the Russian Navy will continue the regular presence in the area of the
Horn of Africa and the Gulf of Aden in order to ensure safe navigation. The group will
include the Olekma and the SB-36. The chief of staff of a squadron of Northern Fleet's
surface ship, Captain 1st Rank Vladimir Kondratov will command the group," the
Defence Ministry said.

A squadron of ships of the Russian Pacific Fleet led by the antisubmarine ship Marshal
Shaposhnikov ended its mission in the Gulf of Aden and arrived at its homeport of
Vladivostok.

"During the three-month participation in the U.N. anti-piracy mission the Marshal
Shaposhnikov escorted 11 international convoys in the Gulf of Aden, including over 100
civilian ships flying the flags of different countries," a spokesman for the Pacific Fleet,
Captain First Rank Roman Martov told Itar-Tass earlier.

"On May 6, the ship successfully conducted an operation to free the Russian crew of the
Moscow University tanker attacked by pirates. It began its mission in the Gulf of Aden
on April 4 to complete it in early June," Martov said.

On August 2, the Russian rescue tugboat SB-36 averted a pirate attack on the Russian
tanker Dafna in the southern part of the Red Sea, the press service of the Russian
Defence Ministry told Itar-Tass on Tuesday, August 3.

"The rescue tugboat SB-36, which is one of the Russian warships that are performing
anti-piracy missions off the Horn of Africa and in the Gulf of Aden, averted on Monday
evening an attack by two pirate boats on the tanker Dafna en route from the southern
part of the Red Sea under the Russian national flag," the press service reported.

"Two boats, which were carrying six and eight people respectively, started approaching
the tanker dangerously closely at the fore angle. After the warning fire from firearms
aboard the rescue tugboat SB-36 the boats stopped and then retreated towards the
islands. The rescue tugboat landed an anti-terrorist task force aboard the tanker Dafna,
which has 15 Russian crewmen," the press service said.

"A unit of Russian warships led by the big submarine chaser Admiral Levchenko keeps
performing a navigation security mission off the Horn of Africa and in the Gulf of
Aden," the Defence Ministry press service reported.
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UN News Service Africa Briefs
Full Articles on UN Website

UN relief chief urges unfettered access for aid workers in Darfur

23 August – The top United Nations humanitarian official today urged all parties to the
conflict in the war-torn Sudanese region of Darfur today to ensure that humanitarian
workers are free of harassment and intimidation as they endeavour to help those in
need.

UN aid agencies responding to cholera outbreak in West Africa

23 August – An outbreak of cholera in the three neighbouring West African countries of
Cameroon, Nigeria and Niger has infected nearly 4,000 people and killed more than 260
others since May, the United Nations health agency reported today, blaming the
epidemic on poor hygiene and inadequate access to clean water.

UN environment agency stresses that Nigerian oil assessment is not yet complete
23 August – An assessment of the environmental impact of oil spills across Ogoniland
and the Niger Delta regions in Nigeria is not yet complete, the United Nations
Environment Programme (UNEP) stressed today as it refuted allegations in the media
that it has already reached key findings.

UN confirms reported gang rape of women by rebels in DRC Congo

23 August – A United Nations human rights team has confirmed that members of two
armed groups in the volatile east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) raped
more than 150 women during an attack on a village in North Kivu province last month,
a UN spokesperson said today.

Number of Somalis needing humanitarian aid falls, UN agency reports

23 August – The scale of the humanitarian crisis in Somalia has eased this year, with the
number of people needing aid falling by 25 per cent to 2 million, the United Nations
Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reported today.