United States Africa Command

Public Affairs Office

11 August 2010

USAFRICOM - related news stories

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

Capacity Building In Mozambique (Voice of America)

(Mozambique) Modeled on similar operations with Benin, Ghana and Senegal, U.S.
military personnel recently conducted joint training exercises with the armed forces of
Mozambique. The 10-day operation, dubbed SHARED ACCORD, was designed to
build the Southern African nation's capacity for conducting peace and stability
operations.

Lt. Gen Smith On Africa's Security Threat (Peace FM Online)

(Ghana) Defence Minister Lieutenant General Joseph Henry Smith on Monday, urged
African states to collaborate their efforts, to enable them to effectively counter threats to
peace, security and stability on the continent and globally. Lt Gen. Smith was speaking
at the opening of the two-week 2010 Africa Endeavour (AE) military communications
exercise at the Ghana Armed Forces and Staff College at Teshie, near Accra.

Why U.S. Favours Jonathan for 2011 (Vanguard)

(Nigeria) As President Goodluck Jonathan prepares to visit the United States of
America next month for the United Nations General Assembly, Vanguard can reveal
that America's determination to secure its interest in the global energy war is the
strongest motive for Washington's preference for the candidacy of Dr. Goodluck
Johathan in the 2011 presidential election.

U.S. Gives Shs10 Billion in Relief Food to Karamoja (The Monitor)

(Uganda) The US government has offered $4.8m (about Shs10b) to buy relief food for
people in Karamoja sub-region.

Central African Republic asks U.N. council for help (Reuters)

(Central African Republic) The Central African Republic on Tuesday pleaded with the
U.N. Security Council for help as it grapples with rebels ahead of an expected
withdrawal of U.N. peacekeepers stationed there and in neighboring Chad.

Kagame Wins Rwandan Election in Landslide (Wall Street Journal)

(Rwanda) The country's election commission said Tuesday preliminary results
indicated Mr. Kagame would win more than 90% of Monday's vote. The final tally
could take a few more days. Mr. Kagame won election in 2003 with 95% of the vote.

Congo sets date for 2011 presidential vote (Associated Press)

(Congo) Congolese politicians say the date set for 2011 presidential elections is
unconstitutional. The Nov. 27 election date announced late Monday is less than a
month before the end of President Joseph Kabila's term in December 2011.

Gravity Returns to Liberian's Trial (Wall Street Journal)

(Liberia) Judges in the Dutch courtroom trying Mr. Taylor, Liberia's former president,
are continuing the slow, methodical task of assessing his responsibility for nearly six
years of horrors during Sierra Leone's civil war.

UN News Service Africa Briefs

Full Articles on UN Website
 As cholera outbreak hits Cameroon, UN agencies send medical supplies
 World must boost efforts to protect Somali civilians, UN expert says
 Central African Republic: UN outlines options to tackle security threats
 External help raises Zimbabwe’s food production but some still hungry – UN
 UN welcomes Ethiopian policy to allow Eritrean refugees to live outside camps
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Capacity Building In Mozambique (Voice of America)

The security challenges facing the nations of Africa are as daunting as they are familiar.
Ranging from piracy to illegal trafficking to irregular militaries to resource pilferage
and terrorism, threats to peace and stability in the region abound. As with others in the
international community, the United States has a strong national interest in a stable and
prosperous Africa, and by working together with our partners in the region we can
pursue our shared interests more effectively.

Modeled on similar operations with Benin, Ghana and Senegal, U.S. military personnel
recently conducted joint training exercises with the armed forces of Mozambique. The
10-day operation, dubbed SHARED ACCORD, was designed to build the Southern
African nation's capacity for conducting peace and stability operations. Hundreds of
members of both armed forces took part in various types of military training, including
command exercises and live-fire small arms practice. The troops also provided free
medical and dental care to 3 communities and helped renovate 2 local schools and
several clinics. Above all, training was the goal, and all U.S. military personnel will
return to their home bases in Europe and the U.S. by the end of the month.

This isn't the first instance of the U.S. working with the Mozambican military. Training
is offered on an on-going basis in the removal of landmines, the remnants of 3 decades
of fighting during the struggle for independence and subsequent civil war. Tens of
thousands of the still-deadly weapons are buried in the fields and forests of
Mozambique, and the U.S. is committed to helping Mozambicans to remove the threat.

Such cooperative efforts will help develop Mozambique's ability to offer additional
security for its neighbors, keep itself free from threats to its own security and enhance
stability for a more prosperous future.
--------------------
Lt. Gen Smith On Africa's Security Threat (Peace FM Online)

Defence Minister Lieutenant General Joseph Henry Smith on Monday, urged African
states to collaborate their efforts, to enable them to effectively counter threats to peace,
security and stability on the continent and globally.

He noted that changing trends in global security, particularly terrorism, drugs, small
arms trafficking and disasters, which “knew no borders”, necessitated that, Africa
formed a united front to “confront them decisively before they bring any destabilising
situations on us”.“Our inaction today can be a recipe for disaster tomorrow…. Our
children’s future needs to be guaranteed and protected”

Lt Gen. Smith was speaking at the opening of the two-week 2010 Africa Endeavour
(AE) military communications exercise at the Ghana Armed Forces and Staff College at
Teshie, near Accra. The “Africa Endeavour" programme is a United States African
Command (AFRICOM) initiated annual communications exercise, that focuses on inter-
operability and information sharing among African Militaries, to strengthen their
communications capabilities.

The programme is aimed at increasing the capacity of the African Union and the Africa
Standby Force to provide support for humanitarian missions and peace support
operations. Lt. Gen Smith said the continent should be guided by the belief that no one
nation could build a better and safer world and that Ghana was committed to working
together with all peace loving nations towards the realisation of peace and stability.

He lauded the Africa Endeavour exercise, touting it as initiatives that could harmonise
the doctrines of sub-regional militaries, to ensure their inter-operability, one of the
components to the realisation of peace and stability.
The Defence Minister urged participants to commit themselves to formulating workable
concepts of Command, Control and inter-operability standards to support the
employment of the African Standby Force.

Military representatives from 37 African countries and delegates from the AU,
ECOWAS, European Union and the United States are taking part in the exercise.The
first Africa Endeavour was held in South Africa in 2006, the second in Nigeria in 2008
and the third in Gabon, 2009. This year's exercise, aimed at building upon the successes
of previous exercises, would showcase the operational relevance of "Africa Endeavour,"
and tackle networking fundamentals, server administration and management and core
services of participating countries.
--------------------
Why U.S. Favours Jonathan for 2011 (Vanguard)

LAGOS, Nigeria — As President Goodluck Jonathan prepares to visit the United States
of America next month for the United Nations General Assembly, Vanguard can reveal
that America's determination to secure its interest in the global energy war is the
strongest motive for Washington's preference for the candidacy of Dr. Goodluck
Johathan in the 2011 presidential election.

While Nigerian political actors across the geopolitical divide are bogged down with
argument on power shift, informed diplomatic source told Vanguard at the weekend
that America's energy security interest in Nigeria and the Gulf of Guinea is the key edge
that Jonathan has over all those that have so far shown interest in the Presidency in the
2011 polls.

Apart from President Jonathan, other known aspirants to the Presidential seat are Gen.
Muhammadu Buhari, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida, Otunba Dele Mommodu and Alhaji
Ibrahim Shekerau.

Among the listed aspirants, some of them lack the experience at national politics,
especially at the presidential level.

Those that occupied the office as military leaders from 1983 to 1993 have issues
concerning mismanagement of public funds and abuse of human rights which does not
say well of the country in the area of public auditing of leaders in a fast changing global
environment.

Informed diplomatic contacts told Vanguard in Lagos that Washington was involved in
a high level oil diplomacy aimed at securing its energy interest in Nigeria especially in
the Gulf of Guinea. The country is engaged in extensive diplomatic consultations at
home and abroad to ensure that it stays on top of the situation in Nigeria.

Meddling in domestic affairs

The country has been using its former diplomats to penetrate into those areas that its
serving envoys would not enter to avoid being accused of meddling in the domestic
affairs of the African country but at the same time it has been making top level
consultations through their officials of state.

Former US Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Walter Carrington, was in Nigeria last month
on a private visit with his Edo State-born wife, Dr. Arese. Nigeria's Foreign Affairs
Minister, Mr. Odein Ajumogobia met with his United States counterpart, Mrs. Hillary
Clinton in Washington last week in what diplomatic watchers regard as smoothening
the path of Jonathan in the international arena.

The President has another opportunity to up the ante when he meets with world
leaders in New York next month at the UN General Assembly gathering.

"These are solid credentials that are so tempting for any politician that is already in
office to ignore, especially if there are constitutional lee ways to exploit. I think the
political class should be wise enough to put their bet on a horse that has the potentials
to win. That is how to play the game, it is not by sowing seeds of discord and mayhem
which will be of no benefit to them and the country," said the source.

The United States through its diplomats has stated that it will continue its investment in
the oil sector and to that extent, the country is interested in consistency and continuity
in policies and stability in the polity.

Nigeria's ambassador to the US, Chief A. Adefuye who is saddled with organising the
next month visit, has been making contacts with key sectors of the US sectors and
investors that will meet with the Nigerian leader in New York. A strong delegation of
Nigerians in the Diaspora has been programmed to meet with the President and drum
up support for a possible 2011 contest.

The US scale of preference

The source told Vanguard that "the United States will not go beyond providing
technical and logistic support to the Independent National Electoral Commission,
INEC, to organise a credible and acceptable election but we expect that Nigerians
should elect a leader who will, among other things, show commitment to reforms,
consistency in policies and stability in the polity.

"It is important to elect a leader who has the intellectual capacity to understand the
complex global energy demand in the 21st century. This will be a person who could win
the confidence of the oil host communities and promote regional security especially in
the Gulf of Guinea.
"The success of the amnesty programme in Niger-Delta, tackling the internal insecurity
challenges and global war against terrorism, maintaining the anti-corruption campaign
in the public sector and ensuring stability and security in the oil supply source are
critical to national and international development for Nigeria at this moment.

"The focus of US oil diplomacy also entails having a measure of policy stability
especially in seeing the completion of reforms embarked on in the oil sector of which
Jonathan is part of the Yar' Adua administration that embarked on the much awaited
programme to restructure and reorganise the Oil and Gas industry instituted, financial
and commercial policy and legislative reforms, especially in the Nigerian Content Bill,
restructuring the Downstream Gas Bill now called the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB.

Jonathan and global energy war

The global war is between the United States, China and India on one hand and the
unstable supply source in the Middle East and Africa. The battle is on who controls the
supply source. At stake is the $16 trillion investment in global development of oil
production and distribution between 2011 to 2030 in anticipation rise in energy demand
which the US-based International Energy Agency, IEA, puts at 35 per cent.

The IEA believes that for Nigeria to remain relevant in the global energy equation, it
must be part of the global community. The report of IEA available to Vanguard states
that about $16 trillion will be spent on infrastructure and facilities to produce and
deliver energy, transport fuels and refined products from producing countries to
consuming countries.

United States Secretary of State, Mrs. Hillary Clinton, told her Nigerian counterpart, Mr.
Odein Ajumogobia, last week that the United States remained committed to future
investment in the oil sector in Nigeria where its multinational companies are fully
involved in the extraction of hydrocarbons in the volatile Niger Delta. The US
Government wants a leader who can see the full implementation of the amnesty
programme to bring about peace in the oil rich region.

The United States has been working on boosting its sourcing oil from the relatively
peaceful Gulf of Guinea which has in recent times become troubled by militancy and
piracy even when the African Command, Africom, a volunteer military alliance put
together by Washington to respond to security emergency in African, became
operational in 2008.

At the height of the militancy crisis in the Niger Delta, Nigeria's production level fell
from 2.2 million bpd to about 1.2 millionbpd which contributed to the steep rise in the
global crude oil price to $147 per barrel in the last quarter of 2008.
Vanguard learnt the recent massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico was an issue in the US
oil diplomatic moves in the Gulf of Guinea where Nigeria is a major player. It is
expected that by the year 2030, the global energy need will be 35 per cent higher than
the levels it were in 2003.

Oil diplomacy

The world total energy demand is expected to climb by about 50 per cent by the end of
2030. This expected rise is driven by the emergence of Brazil, China and India as new
industrial powers accounting for more than 40 per cent of the global energy demand.

The US is equally worried that interest oil will face increased threatens at the supply
source by the aggressive oil diplomacy of China which is active in Sudan, Chad, Angola
as well as Nigeria. Access to affordable energy source is essential to sustain business
development in US and keep people in employment in its economy that is making
sluggish recovery from the recession of 2009.

This means a stable global political economy is import especially from Nigeria which
controls substantial oil and other maritime resources in the Gulf of Guinea which
America regards as the alternative supply source from the highly unpredictable Middle
East.

Prof. Kayode Soremekun of the Political Science Dept, Covenant University Ota, Ogun
State told Vanguard that interest of the United States in who emerges as the next
president of Nigeria is in line with its position as a global power which studies
"situational realities and align its interest with forces that can best protect such interests
at any given time, especially as it affects its multinational oil companies.

"The US had a defined interest in having access to resources like oil and to that extent it
will seek to ensure stability that will allow its multinational companies in the oil sector
to thrive; and to the extent that Nigeria after 50 years of independence has no so clearly
defined interest. It will have to rely on extra African powers to define its political and
economic interest.

"Nigeria is a sub imperial power that has remained a toddler at 50, hence it must go
through this phase where external powers will continue to shape its political destiny.

"Oil is a global energy commodity which is the life wire of industrial economy, and the
global nature of the world economy has created a situation where it has become
necessary to pay greater attention to events at the supply source of the commodity.

Said Soremekun" Oil Industry experts are quick to warn that the continued rise in oil
prices would upset the global economy, consequently the United States has shown
considerable interest in oil supplies from the relatively secured Gulf of Guinea, where
Nigeria is a major player.

The Middle East remains a source of concern as the US leads the global anti terror war
and sanctions on Iran over its nuclear programme.
--------------------
U.S. Gives Shs10 Billion in Relief Food to Karamoja (The Monitor)

The US government has offered $4.8m (about Shs10b) to buy relief food for people in
Karamoja sub-region. The money is being delivered to the UN World Food Programme
and will be used to buy food for people threatened by hunger in Kotido, Kaabong,
Moroto, Nakapiripirit and Abim districts.

The UN food agency said prolonged drought and failed crop harvest for three
successive years has left thousands of people vulnerable to hunger and starvation.
Almost three-quarters of Karamoja's close to a million pastoralist population rely
largely on food aid from the WFP.

"The donation is in response to poor harvests in the region in the past three consecutive
years due to the erratic rainfall. With the return of rains to Karamoja this year, we are
optimistic about the upcoming harvest," said Mr David Eckerson, the USAID mission
director in Uganda.

"We, however, have serious concerns that the nutritional status of the most vulnerable
people in Karamoja will deteriorate before the harvest. Therefore, an immediate
response is critical to prevent the population from resorting to destructive coping
mechanisms."

Food assessment

According to a WFP assessment conducted in December 2009, about 22 per cent of

households in Karamoja did not cultivate any food crops in 2009 and of the 78 per cent
that did, over 70 per cent of them did not harvest substantial amounts.

This has resulted into high malnutrition rates especially among children with acute
malnutrition in the region estimated to be bordering emergency levels. The WHO said
cases of malnutrition usually occur when children don't have enough food with all the
required nutrients to eat.
--------------------
Central African Republic asks U.N. council for help (Reuters)

UNITED NATIONS – The Central African Republic on Tuesday pleaded with the U.N.
Security Council for help as it grapples with rebels ahead of an expected withdrawal of
U.N. peacekeepers stationed there and in neighboring Chad.
Last month the Central African Republic announced it would delay presidential and
legislative elections until January 23, 2011 from October 24 due to insecurity caused by
rebels in the northeastern part of the country.

Bowing to demands from Chad, the Security Council in May instructed U.N.
peacekeepers in Chad and Central African Republic, known as MINURCAT, to
withdraw from the impoverished part of Africa by the year's end.

But Central African Republic's Foreign Minister Antoine Gambi asked the council not to
abandon his country.

"Now that the mandate of MINURCAT is coming to an end, there is a need to protect
the very future of this part of the country, still precarious, which can at any point
stumble back into violence given the many destabilizing factors," he said.

He said his country was confronting rebellion, banditry and inter-ethnic conflict and
"other emerging threats."

"The announcement of the withdrawal of the United Nations mission to the Central
African Republic ... will have dangerous consequences if we're not careful," he told the
council.

After the council meeting, Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, this month's
president of the 15-nation body, told reporters it had discussed the consequences of
MINURCAT's withdrawal from the CAR "and the need to avoid any vacuum of
security in the sub-region." He gave no further details.

Several different rebel groups, including the feared Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army,
are active in the country's north and east, and recent attacks have reinforced doubts it
would be able to adequately prepare for an election.

In his latest report on MINURCAT to the Security Council, U.N. Secretary-General Ban
Ki-moon presented several options for helping the CAR deal with the departure of
peacekeepers.

One option, Ban said, was creation of a new peacekeeping force of around 1,000 troops
and civilian personnel just for the Central African Republic, which he said would aim to
"deter insecurity in the area" and to provide security and evacuate humanitarian aid
workers when necessary.

A better option, Ban told the council, would be for the United Nations to help the
country build up its own security sector and armed forces, which could be boosted with
the creation of a joint Chadian-Central African Republic border patrol and patrols on its
Sudanese border.

Several Western diplomats said Gambi met privately with council members on
Monday. They said most council members appeared amenable to providing his country
with the necessary support once MINURCAT is gone.
--------------------
Kagame Wins Rwandan Election in Landslide (Wall Street Journal)

The country's election commission said Tuesday preliminary results indicated Mr.
Kagame would win more than 90% of Monday's vote. The final tally could take a few
more days. Mr. Kagame won election in 2003 with 95% of the vote.

Voters turned out early and in high numbers to cast ballots, according to Manoah
Esipisu, a deputy spokesman for the secretariat of the Commonwealth, a coalition of
governments, most of which were once British colonies. The group sent an election-
monitoring mission to Rwanda, its newest member. On Monday afternoon, Mr. Esipisu
said the team hadn't reported any major problems with the vote.

Mr. Kagame, who has been in power effectively for the past 16 years, appeared at the
top of Monday's ballot. Running against him were three candidates from minor parties
that usually align with the platform of his ruling party.

Under Mr. Kagame, Rwanda's economy has made significant gains, expanding 11% in
2008 from a year earlier before slowing last year during the global downturn. Growth is
expected to reach at least 5% this year.

Mr. Kagame is trying to turn the tiny east African nation into an information-
technology hub, boost investment and cut the country's dependence on aid.

As a guerrilla commander, Mr. Kagame played a leading role rescuing Rwanda from
the 1994 genocide, which killed about 800,000 ethnic Tutsi, as well as some Hutu. Now,
on the cusp of a second seven-year term, he is touting the country's economic potential,
saying that its recovery from ethnic slaughter shows how much it can achieve.

"If we started from scratch in 1994, what is to stop us from building on these
accomplishments to reach even greater heights?" he said in a posting on his website
Thursday.

Critics say the election has highlighted simmering divisions, with the government using
the ghosts of genocide to justify a crackdown on political dissent.

Ahead of the election, three of Mr. Kagame's opponents were disqualified, two because
they have been charged with genocide ideology—essentially ethnic hate speech. The
third, Frank Habineza, was unable to register his party in time, he says because of
government harassment. The government says it hasn't harassed any political figures.

"Rwanda is still a country where people can't speak freely and where there's increasing
resentment and increasing disillusion," said Carina Tertsakian, a senior researcher for
Human Rights Watch, an independent watchdog group based in New York. "As long as
that situation continues it's difficult to talk about long-term stability."
--------------------
Congo sets date for 2011 presidential vote (Associated Press)

KINSHASA, Congo – Congolese politicians say the date set for 2011 presidential
elections is unconstitutional.

Opposition senator Moise Nyarugabo said Tuesday the constitution requires

presidential polls to be held 90 days before the end of the president's term. The Nov. 27
election date announced late Monday is less than a month before the end of President
Joseph Kabila's term in December 2011.

The electoral commission has said they need some $700 million in foreign assistance to
hold the poll in the large Central African nation.

Kabila was first elected in 2006 in Congo's first democratic election and is likely to run
again. He succeeded his father, who seized power in 1997 but was later assassinated.
Veteran opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi said he will also run.
--------------------
Gravity Returns to Liberian's Trial (Wall Street Journal)

Gone was Naomi Campbell, supermodel, in her bangs and sheer cream-colored top.
Gone was Mia Farrow, movie star.

In their place on the witness stand Tuesday at the trial of Charles Taylor was Issa Sesay,
a convicted war criminal in an ill-fitting gray sport coat.

Judges in the Dutch courtroom trying Mr. Taylor, Liberia's former president, are
continuing the slow, methodical task of assessing his responsibility for nearly six years
of horrors during Sierra Leone's civil war.

In a trial that has now run three years, prosecution witnesses have testified to gruesome
violence and sexual terror when rebels swept in—men and boys executed with axes, the
lucky ones having their hands cut off, gang rapes of girls, orders to burn villages to the
ground.
Mr. Taylor isn't charged with committing atrocities himself. He is accused of directing
and supporting those who did, under the principle that leaders high in the hierarchy
can be held responsible for the actions of their underlings.

Elise Keppler, senior counsel for the International Justice Program at Human Rights
Watch, says a key point for the prosecution has been testimony of "insiders" who say
Mr. Taylor was indeed in charge, even indirectly, of the fighters. "The real issue in the
case is not so much whether the atrocities occurred but Taylor's link to them," she says.

Before Ms. Campbell took the stand, prosecutors trying Mr. Taylor had called 91
witnesses; his lawyers have so far summoned 19. Mr. Taylor took the stand in his own
defense for 13 weeks.

Ms. Campbell, Ms. Farrow and Carole White, who was Ms. Campbell's agent and who
testified Monday and Tuesday, were hardly the most crucial of witnesses. But they
served another cause—drawing global attention to a trial whose purpose is in part for
the world to reckon with the brutal fighting.

"More attention to this trial is a good thing," said Ms. Keppler. The prosecution is "an
important chip in the chipping-away of impunity for these kinds of crimes."

The three women were called to establish that Mr. Taylor regularly dealt in so-called
blood diamonds; prosecutors allege he used the trade in diamonds to arm and support
rebel factions in Sierra Leone while he was president of neighboring Liberia. Mr. Taylor
denies trading in diamonds, or doing anything in Sierra Leone other than acting as a
peace mediator.

The celebrity testimony was contradictory and at times befuddling. Ms. Campbell said
she received a few "dirty-looking stones" for no apparent reason from two strangers
after a 1997 charity dinner in South Africa at which she met Mr. Taylor. Ms. Farrow says
Ms. Campbell gushed over breakfast the next morning that she got a diamond from Mr.
Taylor overnight. Ms. White said she heard Ms. Campbell and Mr. Taylor discussing
the delivery of diamonds, and that she was in Ms. Campbell's room later when a few
uncut stones were delivered.

The celebrity disagreements pale next to the other evidence presented.

Among the early prosecution witnesses was an unidentified man who worked as a
radio operator for the rebels. He testified that in 1998, Sam Bockarie, a leader of a rebel
group called the RUF, turned up in new fatigues and a jeep, saying he was just back
from Liberia and "had been promoted by the chief, Charles Taylor, to the rank of a
general." Mr. Taylor, the witness said, gave Mr. Bockarie the jeep.
He testified that the contacts grew. The radio operator said he relayed messages
between Mr. Bockarie or other rebels, and Mr. Taylor and his aides. The witnesses said
the rebels would arrange to deliver diamonds to Mr. Taylor in exchange for arms.

Another witness said he saw Mr. Sesay return from Liberia with a jar full of diamonds.

One witness testified, as an indictment of Mr. Taylor's character, that he and Mr. Taylor
together ate the liver of a Liberian rival alleged to have been killed on Mr. Taylor's
orders.

In court on Tuesday, Mr. Sesay testified that "the RUF had no contact with Mr. Taylor."
Mr. Sesay was sentenced in 2009 to 52 years in prison. Judges determined that he
commanded forces that slaughtered civilians and killed peacekeepers, and that he was
instrumental in assembling an army of child soldiers, a coterie of whom were his
personal bodyguards.

Mr. Bockarie, who was also indicted by the Special Court, was killed in 2003.

On the stand, Mr. Taylor broadly denied involvement with the rebels. His lawyers
called a witness who disputed the liver-cooking incident.

A verdict won't come this year. Before Tuesday's testimony got under way, prosecutors
urged the court to order Courtenay Griffiths, Mr. Taylor's lawyer, to wrap things up by
the end of September, pointing out that Mr. Sesay alone had already testified for more
than 85 hours. Mr. Griffiths said he had as many as seven more witnesses; the judges
gave him until mid-November.

There is no jury, and the three-judge panel will issue a judgment with its verdict. It
won't be simple to write. In the trial that convicted Mr. Sesay and two other rebel
leaders, the judgment ran 824 pages.

The gravest penalty is a long term of imprisonment. The U.K. agreed to take Mr. Taylor
to serve his sentence in a British prison if he is convicted.
-------------------
UN News Service Africa Briefs
Full Articles on UN Website

As cholera outbreak hits Cameroon, UN agencies send medical supplies

10 August – Five United Nations humanitarian agencies are rushing medical supplies
and other materials to northern Cameroon, where the country’s worst outbreak of
cholera in six years has already claimed at least 155 lives.

World must boost efforts to protect Somali civilians, UN expert says

10 August – An independent United Nations human rights expert today called on the
international community to step up efforts to protect civilians in Somalia, where the
world body is hoping to boost its presence in a bid to advance the peace process in the
war-torn country.

Central African Republic: UN outlines options to tackle security threats

10 August – The United Nations has proposed strengthening the capacities of the
Central African Republic (CAR) to enable it to effectively tackle security and
humanitarian challenges when the world body’s peacekeepers withdraw from the
country at the end of this year.

External help raises Zimbabwe’s food production but some still hungry – UN
10 August – An estimated 1.68 million Zimbabweans still require agricultural assistance
and food aid despite an improvement in the country’s food production thanks to
Government efforts and a $70 million international assistance programme for farmers in
the Southern African nation, United Nations agencies said today.

UN welcomes Ethiopian policy to allow Eritrean refugees to live outside camps

10 August – Ethiopia has recently decided to take a new approach to Eritrean refugees
by allowing them to live outside camps, a move welcomed by the United Nations
refugee agency.