Author: Théophile Niyitegeka

{Benghazi Defence Brigades says in control of five cities and two major oil producing areas in the east of the country.}

The Benghazi Defence Brigades says it has captured five cities and two major oil-producing areas in the east of Libya after opposing forces carried out air raids around major oil ports overnight, seeking to regain control of the area.

At least nine men were killed in the fighting on Friday as the eastern-based Libyan National Army (LNA) and allied forces retreated from the oil ports of Es Sider and Ras Lanuf, two of Libya’s largest export terminals, following the attacks by the BDB.

The forces of eastern Libya’s military strongman Khalifa Haftar conceded the loss on Saturday.

“The attackers were armed with modern tanks,” spokesman for Haftar’s forces, Colonel Ahmad al-Mismari, said.

“We lost two men. But the battle is ongoing. The situation in the Oil Crescent remains under control.”

The assault raised the prospect of a new escalation of violence around the ports, and put at risk a sharp boost to Libya’s oil production achieved after the LNA took over four ports in September, ending a blockade at three of them.

Though Es Sider and Ras Lanuf have been reopened for exports, they were badly damaged in past fighting and are operating well below capacity.

It was not clear to what extent the BDB had gained control over the ports, or whether operations at the terminals had been affected.

“Haftar claims to control most of the eastern part of Libya around Benghazi,” Oliver Miles, 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.”

In response to the BDB advance, air raids were carried out in Ras Lanuf, Es Sidra, Ben Jawad and Harawa, Mismari added.

A resident in Ras Lanuf said they heard fighter jets over the town at dawn on Saturday, followed by explosions.

Residents posted pictures of fires and damage to buildings apparently caused by the strikes.

Libya’s oil production has recently been fluctuating around 700,000 barrels per day (bpd), more than double its output last year but still well under the 1.6 million bpd the OPEC member was producing before a 2011 uprising.

The Benghazi Defence Brigades are composed partly of fighters who were ousted from Benghazi by the LNA.

That battle is linked to a wider conflict between political and armed factions based in eastern and western Libya.

Source:Al Jazeera

{One-third of children in Somalia could drop out of school as the country is threatened with famine.}

A third of children in Somalia’s drought-affected areas are at risk of dropping out of school, the UN says, as a shortage of food and water has left more than 6.2 million people needing urgent help.

The drought is threatening the lives of millions and almost three million are going hungry. Three million children in the country are missing school and more than 100,000 could join them, according to the UN.

On Tuesday, Somalia’s newly elected President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed declared a “national disaster” due to the drought.

The Horn of Africa nation is one of three countries – along with Yemen and Nigeria – that the aid agencies say are on the verge of famine.

The desperate search for water and food proving particularly difficult for children.

“I’d love to go back to school, but I’ve been forced to leave because I’m the eldest child in my family and I need to work at home,” Sadia Omar, a former student, told Al Jazeera.

“I fetch water and grass for the animals, but now because of the drought there is more work.”

Al Jazeera’s Fahmida Miller, reporting from Dollow in southern Somalia, said severe drought was forcing families to migrate in search of help.

“The number of children at this school [in the Dhuma Dhuma area] has halved in just three months,” she said.

“Families here live off their livestock and they’re doing all they can to keep their animals alive. If that means keeping their children out of school to look after them, many families are prepared to make the sacrifice.”

On Monday, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned that Somalia was at risk of its third famine in 25 years. The last one, in 2011, killed almost 260,000 people.

The drought has led to a spread of acute watery diarrhoea, cholera and measles and nearly 5.5 million people are at risk of contracting waterborne diseases.

According to the WHO, more than 363,000 acutely malnourished children and 70,000 severely malnourished children need urgent, life-saving support.

“If the drought continues, these children will continue missing school and it will also impact their future learning and they won’t come back,” Abdihakim Ahmed, the headteacher at the school in Dhuma Dhuma, said.

Source:Al Jazeera

{A zoo in the Tunisian capital is to close temporarily after visitors stoned a crocodile to death.}

The Belvedere Zoo posted pictures of the bloodied reptile, with a paving stone and rock next to its head, on its Facebook page on Wednesday.

It died from an internal haemorrhage, the Tunis municipality said.

More guards and environmental police will be employed at the site after “emergency cleaning and maintenance works”, the environment ministry said.

Measures would be introduced to manage visitors entering and exiting, it said.
The zoo has long faced problems with litter and visitors’ behaviour, and been criticised over the condition of animals.

“It’s terrible. You cannot imagine what animals endure from some visitors,” Amor Ennaifer, a vet at the zoo, told AFP news agency.

“Citizens leave waste and plastic bags. They throw stones at lions and hippos.”

Source:BBC

{Four South Sudanese soldiers have been arrested over the mass rape of about a dozen women and girls in one village last month, the army spokesman said Friday.}

The incident took place in Kubi some 40 kilometres south of Juba as soldiers raided the village looking for suspects in the killing of an army general by unidentified gunmen.

Local media reported the soldiers had gone on a rampage, raping and torturing at least 11 women, including a 13-year-old girl.

{{Sexual assaults }}

“Investigations were carried out and four SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army) officers were arrested,” said spokesman Brigadier General Lul Ruai Koang.

One of those detained is the commander of the men accused of carrying out the sexual assaults, and will not himself face rape charges.

Another suspect had been arrested but managed to escape from a detention facility.

Koang said that the three accused of rape had been identified by the victims in a line-up and later confessed.

{{Misled by Satan }}

In their defence one soldier claimed to have been misled by Satan, while the others argued they were drunk.

“Let our people rest assured that SPLA will keep on doing its best to ensure that rogue soldiers are punished for crimes they commit,” Koang said.

President Salva Kiir’s troops and allied militia have been accused of ethnic massacres, rape and sexual slavery, looting, pillage and the forced recruitment of child soldiers in the country’s three-year long civil war.

Rebels have perpetrated similar crimes.

{{South Sudan crisis }}

The conflict broke out in 2013 after Kiir accused his rival and former deputy Riek Machar of plotting a coup against him.

A brief peace deal was left in tatters when fierce battles erupted in Juba in July last year.

The army announced in October it had arrested and convicted some 80 soldiers accused of looting and murder in the capital during the outbreak of fighting.

However none have been held for the widespread rape of locals and several Western aid workers.

AFP

{Almost 100 prisoners including rapists and robbers have been freed from Gambian jails as the new government struggles to reform an overcrowded system that long relied on strict mandatory sentencing.
}
Even first-time offenders were given sentences without parole under the former regime of Yahya Jammeh, and the new government has vowed to overhaul unsanitary penitentiaries they say are unfit for purpose.

A government source told AFP Friday that new President Adama Barrow had pardoned scores of prisoners from three different jails, some convicted of serious violent offences.

{{New facilities }}

“The Prison high command Thursday released 98 prisoners who were held at Mile Two, Old Jeshwang and Janjanbureh Prisons. They were discharged on the directive of President Adama Barrow,” the source said.

Among them were rapists, robbers, burglars and people convicted for firearms offences, the source added, and 16 were foreign nationals from Senegal, Guinea and Sierra Leone, the source added.

The pardons come two weeks after Barrow pardoned 174 other prisoners, and follows a vow by his Interior Minister Mai Fatty to build facilities in line with international norms after shocking footage emerged of prisoners kept in dark and bare concrete cells.

{{Overcrowded }}

A prison officer at the country’s most notorious jail, Mile Two, said Barrow may also have been forced to act after the interior ministry took stock of numbers at the facility.

“I believe the present government wants to tackle the problem of overcrowding in the prisons,” the source at Mile Two told AFP.

After seeing fellow prisoners released, those left behind protested, the source added. “They felt they should be granted amnesty so that they can have a fresh start in life.”

{{Prisons under Jammeh }}

The same source confirmed Friday that the former head of The Gambia’s prisons under Jammeh was being investigated in connection with the disappearance of a former head of Gambian intelligence who was accused of plotting a coup.

“(David Colley) is being investigated in connection with the disappearance of an ex-Director General of NIA, Daba Marenah, and senior military men who went missing in 2016 after President Yahya Jammeh accused them of trying to overthrow his government,” the source said.

Colley had run the penitentiary system nearly non-stop since 1997 under Jammeh, the longtime leader of the tiny west African state who was forced out of power in January after losing an election.

Source:AFP