Tag: AfricaNews

More than 600 people have been killed in insurgencies that erupted in two Sudanese states bordering South Sudan last year, Sudan’s interior minister said on Tuesday in the first official count.

Fighting between Sudan’s army and SPLM-North rebels broke out in the oil-producing state of South Kordofan in June 2011, shortly before South Sudan became independent.

Violence then spread in September 2011 to nearby Blue Nile state which also borders the new African republic.

The fighting has forced more than half a million people to flee and stoked tensions between Sudan and South Sudan, former enemies in a civil war that was fueled by oil, ethnicity and religion.

Khartoum accuses South Sudan of backing the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-North), charges dismissed by the South’s government.

A total of 633 people have been killed in both states since last year, Interior Minister Ibrahim Mahmoud told parliament. Most of the dead were civilians, the rest government soldiers, he said, without giving an estimate of rebel casualties.

Since the start of the year, 147 people have been killed in South Kordofan and 41 in Blue Nile state, he said.

A total of 791 people have been wounded since last year in South Kordofan, and 151 people were missing there, he added.

South Sudan declared independence from Sudan in July last year, under the terms of the 2005 peace deal that ended their civil war.

But the two countries have still not agreed on the ownership of a number of disputed territories and their armies have clashed a number of times across the border since the secession.

They agreed to set up a buffer zone along their shared boundary last month after coming under international pressure to end the violence.

But there has been scant progress in parallel indirect talks between Khartoum and SPLM-North, which fought as part of the southern rebel army during the civil war.

SPLM-North, which accuses the government of marginalising large parts of South Kordofan and other border areas, has formed an alliance with other rebel groups to try and topple the country’s veteran President Omar Hassan al-Bashir.

Morgan Tsvangirai and his estranged wife Ms Locardia Karimatsenga Tembo have agreed to settle their US$15 000 maintenance case out of court.

Lawyers representing both parties yesterday told Harare magistrate Mr Rueben

Mukavhi that they would present to the court an agreed position on the settlement of the case on Thursday.

Mr Mukavhi postponed the matter to Thursday to allow the parties to reach a settlement.

The parties’ lawyers appeared before Mr Mukavhi, sitting in his chambers at the civil courts, to apprise him of the latest development.

Mr Tsvangirai’s lawyers Advocate Thabani Mpofu and Mr Innocent Chagonda indicated that the decision for an out-of-court-settlement was made in the spirit of professionalism.

“We believe we owe it to the profession, court and the generality of Zimbabwe that we settle the matter,” said Adv Mpofu.

“We have been able to find each other and we believe there is a way to settle this issue that will not involve the court.”

Adv Mpofu added: “We have agreed that with the indulgence of the court, this matter will be postponed to allow the process we are carrying out to unfold.

“We both (lawyers for the two parties) believe we can settle this matter without the involvement of the court.”

Mr Everson Samukange of Venturas and Samukange confirmed the latest development saying by October 18, the parties would be able to come back to court with an agreed position.

Gunmen have abducted five aid workers and a driver in Niger, a country which borders troubled Mali and Nigeria and where Al-Qaeda’s regional branch has carried out kidnappings in the past.

The six were nabbed late Sunday in Dakoro, a village in southeastern Niger, halfway between the borders with Mali and Nigeria.

“Five aid workers, including a Chadian, and a driver were kidnapped at their home around 10:00 pm (2100 GMT) by armed men driving two 4×4 vehicles” in the village of Dakoro, local official Abou Mahamane said.

The abduction of the Chadian and the five of Niger nationality was confirmed by an aid group and a security source.

Mahamane, who is secretary general of the Dakoro region, said the abductors “spoke Arabic, Tamasheq (the language of the Tuareg tribes) and Hausa,” a regional language.

The aid workers were “kidnapped by men with pale skin and one with black skin, speaking Arabic. The Chadian probably tried to resist and was injured but he was still taken away,” said a humanitarian source.

Four of the six hostages, including a doctor and a nurse, are employed by the local aid group Befen, which fights against malnutrition, and the Chadian health group Alerte-sante.

In a joint statement, the two aid groups demanded “their release, with a priority for those who might have been wounded during the incident.”

They also stressed that they “are only medical NGOs with no other goal than to alleviate the most precarious humanitarian situations and completely politically independent.”

The kidnappers headed straight for the desert region of Agadez, further north, Mahamane said.

“Security forces lost track of them in the Abala zone, about 300 kilometres (185 miles) south of Agadez, in the Tahoua region,” he added.

“Reinforcements arrived at Dakoro, African humanitarian workers are still there and the site has been secured by reinforcements from Maradi and Tahoua,” he said.

A Niger-based humanitarian source later said, “It appears the Niger army in the north has located the kidnappers and it is determined to neutralise the kidnappers. That’s our worry.”