Author: Théophile Niyitegeka

{Eleven killed and five wounded in attack on base near border with Burkina Faso, defence ministry says.}

Eleven soldiers have been killed and five wounded in an attack on a military base in Mali as rival armed groups surrounded the city of Timbuktu.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack near the border with Burkina Faso on Sunday but armed groups, including al-Qaeda affiliates, have been increasingly active in recent months, attacking army posts beyond their usual strongholds in the north.

“The post was attacked between 4am and 5am in Boulikessi,” defence spokesman Abdoulaye Sidibe told the Reuters News Agency, adding that reinforcements had been sent to the area.

Armed group such as Ansar Dine have increased the frequency of their attacks over the past year.

In 2016, the group carried out scores of attacks, including on United Nations peacekeepers, while spreading into the south and other areas previously deemed secure.

Al-Qaeda’s North African ally, al-Mourabitoun, claimed responsibility for an attack on a military camp in January that killed up to 60 people and wounded at least 100.

Mali is awash with weapons and home to several rival armed groups. Its northeast has been in a state of emergency, which gives security forces extra powers, since a wave of violence last year.

The north of the country fell under the control of Tuareg-led rebels and groups linked to al-Qaeda in 2012, who were largely ousted by a French-led assault in January 2013.

The implementation of a peace deal agreed in 2015, though, has been piecemeal and, despite the presence of at least 11,000 UN peacekeepers, armed groups who refused to sign are active across large parts of the country.

Source:Al Jazeera

{A former British army officer has been shot dead in Kenya, police in the country have said.}

Tristan Voorspuy was killed by pastoral herders on Sunday in Laikipia while inspecting some of his lodges, a local police official told Associated Press.

It follows a pattern of traditional herdsmen invading ranches in the area to seize pasture amid an ongoing drought.

Mr Voorspuy was the founder of luxury safari company Offbeat Safaris.

Martin Evans, chairman of the Laikipia Farmers Association, said Mr Voorspuy was attacked while inspecting a lodge that had been set alight by so-called “land invaders”.

When he did not return by Sunday afternoon, an aerial search spotted Voorspuy’s injured horse but did not catch sight of the rancher, Mr Evans said.

A ground team later found his body by the ruins of the house.

{{Herders overrun Kenya tourist ranch}}

Some officials have blamed the land invasions on a severe drought that has made poor herders desperate.

But ranchers say they are politically-motivated and part of plans to take over their land.

Some have accused local politicians of inciting the violence in the run up to the general election in August.

Mr Voorspuy, who was born in South Africa but schooled and raised in Sussex, was in the British army for six years, leaving in 1981.

After leaving the army, he drove a motorbike from London to Cape Town for nine months, looking for work in Africa.

He created Offbeat Safaris in 1990.

Mombasa-based business Scenic Air Safaris posted a tribute on its Facebook page, saying: “Our thoughts and prayers go to his wife Cindy and family and to his friends and partners at Sosian Lodge and Offbeat Safaris.

“A true officer and a gentleman.”

A Foreign Office spokesman said: “We are offering support to the family of the British national who has died in Kenya and we are in touch with local authorities.”

Source:BBC

{Haftar’s LNA launches air strikes in attempt to regain control of Es Sider and Ras Lanuf ports seized by BDB fighters.}

An eastern Libyan group says it is carrying out air strikes against rival factions as part of its attempt to push them back from positions around the major oil terminals of Es Sider and Ras Lanuf.

The Libyan National Army (LNA) is attempting to regain control of the ports after being forced to withdraw on Friday by an attack by the Benghazi Defence Brigades (BDB).

The BDB is composed partly of fighters who were expelled from Benghazi by the LNA.

LNA warplanes targeted on Sunday afternoon positions near Es Sider [Al Sidra] and south of the coastal town of Ben Jawad, about 30km to the east, General Ahmed al-Mismari, LNA spokesman, told Reuters news agency.

There were also clashes between the rival groups on the ground, security and oil officials said, though it was not immediately clear whether either side had advanced.

The ports are among Libya’s largest, though both terminals were badly damaged by previous rounds of fighting and have been operating far below their pre-conflict capacity.

The LNA forces, who are loyal to General Khalifa Haftar, conceded the loss of Es Sider and Ras Lanuf on Saturday.

The latest fighting, which is linked to a broader, stop-start conflict between political and military factions based in eastern and western Libya, threatens efforts to revive Libya’s oil production.

National output more than doubled after the LNA took control of the oil ports of Es Sider, Ras Lanuf, Zueitina [Zuwaytania] and Brega in September.

All the ports except for Brega had long been blockaded.

{{Chaos and fighting}}

Production has recently been fluctuating around 700,000 barrels per day (bpd), but remains far below the 1.6 million bpd Libya was pumping before the 2011 uprising that toppled its longtime ruler Muammar Gaddafi.

Since then, the North African country has been riven by chaos and factional fighting.

The LNA has been waging a military campaign for nearly three years against Islamists and other opponents in the eastern city.

“Haftar claims to control most of the eastern part of Libya around Benghazi,” Oliver Miles, a former British ambassador to Libya, told Al Jazeera.

“But control is a loose word. He’s been fighting for a long time to deal with them, and it has taken a long time time to clear them up. He’s repeatedly said they’ve dealt with the problem, but they keep reuniting.”

Source:Al Jazeera

Sudanese rebels have released at least 125 prisoners they had captured in fighting with government forces, most of them soldiers, an AFP journalist said.

Their release was secured thanks to mediation from Uganda, while the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) played a facilitating role.

{{109 soldiers }}

The rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) had captured the prisoners in Blue Nile and South Kordofan states, where the group has been fighting Sudanese government forces for years.

The longest-held prisoners had been captured in June 2009 and the most recent about six months ago.

While the ICRC said 125 people had been freed, Sudanese military spokesman Brigadier Ahmed Khalifa al-Shami put the number at 127 — including 109 soldiers and 18 civilians.

“The Sudanese army recognises this as a positive step towards achieving peace in the country,” Shami said in a statement.

{{No-go areas }}

Ethnic minority rebels in Blue Nile and South Kordofan have been fighting government forces since 2011, accusing President Omar al-Bashir’s Arab-dominated government of politically and economically marginalising the two regions.

Fighting in the two areas and in Darfur has left tens of thousands of people dead and displaced millions.

Khartoum announced a unilateral ceasefire in June 2016 in all three conflict zones, which it extended by six months in January.

UN officials say that for years Blue Nile and South Kordofan have been no-go areas for aid officials, leaving thousands of people without access to humanitarian relief.

{{Four days }}

In a statement, the ICRC said it had “facilitated the release and repatriation of 125 people”.

The agency said it had transported the released prisoners from South Sudan to Entebbe in Uganda and onward to Sudan.

“The entire transfer operation took place over four days,” the ICRC said, adding that it had followed a request from Kampala, Khartoum, Juba and the SPLM-N.

“We are very pleased that these people will finally return to their families,” the ICRC’s head of delegation in Sudan, Gerard Peytrignet, said.

GOLD MINES

Speaking to AFP, SPLM-N Secretary-General Yasir Arman described the prisoners’ release as a humanitarian gesture of goodwill, “to bring happiness to their families”.

Mohamed Saied Hassan of the Sudanese foreign ministry told a press conference that 19 of the men were civilian miners caught up in an internal SPLM-N dispute over control of gold mines in Blue Nile state.

However, Arman claimed that the 19 men were members of a militia allied to the government.

The prisoner release negotiations were chaired by officials from the Ugandan government and included direct talks between Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni and Bashir.

{{No ill treatment }}

Thanking the Ugandan government for mediating the release, Hassan said: “This operation paves the way for more cooperation between the two countries.”

Speaking to AFP on the tarmac at Entebbe airport about 35 kilometres (22 miles) from Kampala as he and his men prepared to board the flight to Khartoum, Colonel Lirifat Abdala Ahmed, the most senior captive officer, said he had been treated well since his capture in May 2013.

“There was no bad treatment, no bad behaviour. I have served 25 years in the Sudanese army and now I want to go home to rest,” a smiling Ahmed said.

Source:AFP