Tag: GreatLakesNews

{The United States is deeply concerned about the events depicted in a shocking video that appears to show the summary execution of unarmed civilians by elements of the armed forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo.}

“Such extrajudicial killing, if confirmed, would constitute gross violations of human rights and threatens to incite widespread violence and instability in an already fragile country,” said State Department Acting Spokesperson, Mark Toner.

According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, “There are multiple, credible allegations of massive human rights violations in Kasai, Kasai Central, Kasai Oriental and Lomami provinces, amid a sharp deterioration in security situation there, including people being targeted by soldiers for their alleged affiliation with a local militia.”

The Democratic Republic of the Congo continues to confront significant political, economic, social, and security challenges. Key among these challenges is the need for security sector reform and an end to impunity. Progress in this area, not just in the Kasais but throughout the DRC’s vast territory, will require significant political leadership and will. A more stable security environment and long-lasting peace will also require political stability and accountability.

To this end, we continue to urge all sides to make swift progress in implementation of the December 31 agreement, so that the DRC can hold credible elections in 2017 and proceed to a peaceful, democratic transfer of power.

“We call upon the Government of the Democratic Republic of Congo,” said Acting Spokesperson Toner, “to launch an immediate and thorough investigation, in collaboration with international organizations responsible for monitoring human rights, to identify those who perpetrated such heinous abuses, and to hold accountable any individual proven to have been involved.”

At the same time, we cannot lose focus on continued insecurity in eastern DRC where decades of conflict between rival militias have resulted in human rights violations, economic hardship, and continued insecurity. The financing of armed groups from the illicit trade in minerals remains a concern despite progress in responsible sourcing.

Peace, security, and political stability are all keys to the DRC realizing its potential. The United States continues to stand as a partner with the Congolese people to hold those who commit human rights violations accountable as we work together to support a stable, democratic and prosperous DRC.

Source:Voice of America

{Kenya’s Wilson Kipsang stormed to victory in the Tokyo Marathon on Sunday in the fastest race ever run in Japan.}

The former world record holder clocked 2hr 3min 58sec over a flatter course than in previous years as he added the Tokyo title to victories in London, New York and Berlin.

Sarah Chepchirchir won the women’s race in a personal best 2:19:47 — the first sub-2:20 in Japan — to complete a perfect day for Kenya.

The top six men’s finishers were all Kenyans with Gideon Kipketer runner-up in 2:05:51 and former winner Dickson Chumba third in 2:06:25.

Evans Chebet (2:06:42), Alfers Lagat (2:07:39) and Bernard Kipyego (2:08:10) all finished ahead of Eritrean Yohanes Gebregergish, who clocked 2:08:14 to edge out Japan’s Hiroto Inoue.Kipsang had targeted countryman Dennis Kimetto’s world record of 2:02:57.

Kipsang had targeted countryman Dennis Kimetto’s world record of 2:02:57 and he got off to a quick start in the Tokyo sunshine.

However, the tough running conditions were not favourable for a fast race.

The 34-year-old’s pace dropped over the final 10 kilometres running into a slight breeze but still ran a fourth sub-2:04.

“I felt good today and I was trying to go for a world record,” said Kipsang, who held the world mark with a 2:03:23 run at the Berlin Marathon in 2013 before Kimetto surpassed that a year later.

“It was a little bit windy,” added the London Olympic bronze medallist. “That’s why I couldn’t run that time, but I look forward to coming back and hope to compete at the Tokyo Olympics in 2020.”

Chepchirchir left a quality field in her wake, former champion Birhane Dibaba of Ethiopia finishing second over a minute and a half behind in her bid to win a second Tokyo title in three years.

Source:Daily Nation

{Cabinet has approved amendments to the Wildlife Act and toughened the penalties against wildlife crimes.}

The review of the Uganda Wildlife Act 1996, seeks to address emerging challenges in conservation, including poaching, illicit trans-boundary wildlife trade and increasing human wildlife conflicts.

The acting commissioner of conservation in the Ministry of Tourism, Wildlife and Antiquities, Dr Akankwasah Barirega, said the proposed law spells out a life sentence for a person convicted of wildlife crimes such as poaching and illegal wildlife trade.
“Cabinet already approved the Uganda Wildlife Bill 2015 and, among other things, the law is addressing is the issue of illegal wildlife trade and the penalties that come along with the offenders,” Dr Akankwasa said.

“If Parliament agrees with what Cabinet has already approved, wildlife criminals will face a maximum sentence of life in prison,” Dr Akankwasah added.

He said Cabinet approved the Bill towards the end of last year, noting that what remains is its gazetting by the Ugandan Printing and Publication Corporation before it can be tabled before Parliament.

He added that once finally tabled, this legislation, which will repeal the current Wildlife Act cap 200, is to be a game changer in the fight against wildlife crime by making the penalties more deterrent.

{{New law}}

According to Dr Akankwasah, currently, the biggest sanction or penalty is seven years of imprisonment and since a judge has the discretion to set the sentence, sometimes the offenders are not given the maximum sentence but rather asked to pay a small fines or three months in jail and are willing to pay and be released.
The new piece of legislation also provides for compensation for people affected by stray animals from protected areas.

In late December last year, the Acholi paramount chief, Rwot David Onen Acana II threatened to mobilise his subjects to kill all elephants that stray from Murchison Falls and Kidepo national parks and destroy crops in Acholi sub-region, a plan that has attracted protests from the Uganda Wildlife Authority.

Source:Daily Monitor

{Presidnet John Magufuli and his Ugandan counterpart, Mr Yoweri Museveni, have agreed to maximise business opportunities in a move that aims at boosting the economies of their two neighbouring countries.}

The two leaders, who met at the State House in Dar es Salaam yesterday, also asked TOTAL, an investor in the project for the construction of the 1,443-kilometre pipeline to transport crude oil from Hoima in Uganda to Tanga Port, to start the work immediately. President Museveni is in the country for a two-day state visit following an invitation extended to him by Dr Magufuli.

Speaking at a joint press briefing at State House after a closed door meeting, the two heads of state said they also held an intensive discussion regarding the signing of the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) with the European Union (EU).

According to Mr Magufuli, Tanzania was against the signing of the EPA deal, insisting that it was another form of colonialism. “We discussed this in detail with President Museveni and agreed that as we continue with discussions, a team of experts should go to Uganda to give further clarification on the matter on March 18,’’ he insisted.

Mr Museveni said that it was prudent to have one stance maintaining that strengthening the relationship between the two countries was much more important than extending relationships with Europeans. “I decided to come and hold discussions with Mr Magufuli because we need to come out with a proper and clear stance,’’ insisted the Ugandan leader.

On maximising business opportunities, Dr Magufuli invited Ugandan businesspeople to come and invest in Tanzania urging Tanzanian traders to equally explore investment opportunities that are available in Uganda. “In 2016 business between our two countries stood at 178.19bn/- and now it stands at 193.59bn/- but I think we need to expand these figures further,’’ said President Magufuli.

In maximising business, Mr Magufuli added, Tanzania was currently implementing a project for construction of a Standard Gauge railway from Dar es Salaam to Mwanza, Isaka, Rwanda and Burundi.

He added that the two leaders agreed to establish a dry port in Mwanza for Ugandan businesspeople only, as well as repairing MV Umoja so that it can ferry goods from Mwanza to Uganda, in order to reduce the cost of transporting cargo.

The move was welcomed by his Ugandan counterpart who said it was the second liberation offered by Tanzania to Uganda after the support it offered Uganda in liberating the country from the Leadership of Idd Amin Dada.

“I salute the government of Tanzania for the envisaged construction of a standard gauge railway and modernising the Mwanza port as the services will now be cheaper, faster, more efficient and modern,’’ Mr Museveni said.

Regarding the oil pipeline, the two leaders said an investor should put measures in place for the inauguration of the project by laying a foundation stone and avoid senseless reasons that were delaying the implementation of the project.

Mr Magufuli further said that he requested Mr Museveni to allow Tanzanian aircraft to launch direct flights to Entebbe Airport so as to help the ailing Uganda airline industry, a request that was accepted by the Ugandan leader.

Earlier, Uganda and Tanzania through the foreign Affairs ministers signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for strengthening diplomatic relations between the two countries. The signatures were appended to the documents by the Minister for Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation, Dr Augustine Mahiga, on the Tanzanian side and Ugandan Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister, Oryemu Okello.

President Museveni arrived in the country yesterday morning. He was received by Dr Magufuli.

At the Julius Nyerere International Airport (JNIA), he received a 21-gun salute from members of the Tanzania People’s Defence Forces (TPDF) and inspected a special guard of honour before receiving entertainment from various traditional dancers.

Today, Mr Museveni is expected to visit a Vingunguti based factory owned by the Bakhresa Group, one of Tanzania’s largest conglomerates with investment in Uganda and other African countries before leaving the country later in the evening.

Source:Daily News

Three suspected remnants of the Sabaot Land Defence Force were on Friday lynched by irate residents in Cheptais, Mt Elgon.

The angry residents also torched the suspects’ houses.

According to the residents the three youths allegedly killed an elderly man whose body was found in Mt Elgon forest.

The residents say the elderly man was abducted by the suspects who wanted to kick him out of his land.

Cheptais police boss Ezekiel Kiche said the three were hunted down, seized by angry villagers before they were stoned to death.

“Investigation is ongoing, the law does not allow mob justice they should have arrested them and handed them to us,” he said.

He said security personnel have been deployed in the area to stop further killings.

Mr Kiche added that two other suspects are receiving treatment in hospital while 10 youths have been arrested and are being held at Cheptais Police Station.

Source:Daily Nation

{Former presidential candidate Kizza Besigye has implored the European Union (EU) to investigate the post 2016 election violence especially in the “traditional strongholds of the Opposition” such as Kasese District.}

Dr Besigye made the request in Brussels on Wednesday during a closed-door meeting with Mr Koen Vervaeke, the European External Action Service (EEAS) managing director for Africa.

“I briefed Mr Vervaeke about the post-election situation in Uganda, including the Kasese violence, and our continued demand for an internationally-supervised audit of the 2016 election,” he said.

The EU, alongside other international regional bodies, observed the 2016 polls and concluded that the Electoral Commission lacked independence and transparency and fell short of international standards.

Dr Besigye, in his fourth unsuccessful shot at the presidency, stood on the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) party ticket.

Mr Dickson Wasajja, the FDC UK Chapter chairperson and the party’s envoy to the European Union who attended the meeting, said: “current political and economic crisis in Uganda and matters of mutual interest between Uganda, the Great Lakes Region and the European Union dominated the talks”.

Dr Besigye, during the meeting accused President Museveni and government of intentionally targeting the leadership and subjects of the Rwenzururu kingdom, according to Mr Wasajja.

A combined army and police force bombed out the kingdom headquarters and arrested King Charles Wesley Mumbere now facing trial for multiple crimes, including treason and murder.

In their latest report, Human Rights Watch (HRW) accused security forces in the country of carrying out at least 13 extra-judicial killings of people in the Rwenzori region shortly after the February 18, 2016 general elections.

The New York-based rights group said it documented cases where the army and police allegedly executed unarmed civilians following violence in the region between February and April, 2016. 30 people reportedly died at the time.

The 687-page report, however, did not include the November, 2016 violence in Kasese that left more than 100 people dead after the army and police raided Rwenzururu Kingdom palace outside Kasese Town. Government denied the HRW allegations, saying the people killed were armed combatants who attacked police stations, other security installations, and police and army personnel.

The EU, according to Mr Wasajja, promised to work with all groups and individuals that are calling for a thorough investigation into the Kasese massacre.

Dialogue
Mr Vervaeke had earlier on February 21, tweeted a photo of him and Dr Besigye saying he had discussed with the former presidential candidate “national dialogue and political reforms in Uganda”.

On Monday Daily Monitor broke the story that President Museveni and Dr Besigye had agreed on a foreign mediator and broad agenda for expected talks to resolves Uganda’s intractable political problems.

Information minister Frank Tumwebaze later denied any dialogue is in the works and FDC said its preconditions for talks had not been met.

These include a mutually agreed foreign mediator, agenda for the dialogue, implementation mechanism for decisions reached, and treatment of parties to the talks as equals.

FDC has also insisted on an independent audit of the 2016 presidential election results.

“Yes, we discussed having dialogue with Mr Museveni and our position was made clear that any dialogue cannot be a Besigye-Museveni affair, but national, with an agreed agenda, respected facilitator and international guarantors,” Mr Wasajja said.

The EU is reported to have expressed readiness to assist with the facilitation of any such dialogue, if asked.

“Talks have got to be meaningful and aimed at solving Uganda’s mountain of problems,” he said.

Source:Daily Monitor

{Two media outlets have been fined a total of 6m/- for violating regulations governing broadcasting services in the country.}

These are Times FM Radio and Sahara Media group, which have both been ordered to pay 3m/- each and issued with strong warning.

Reading the judgment to reporters in Dar es Salaam yesterday, Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority’s Content Committee Chairperson, Valerie Msoka, said the communications regulator also issued a strong warning to other two media outlets to ensure that they observe content regulations when airing their programmes.

She explained that Times FM has been fined 3m/-for airing a program dubbed ‘Twenzetu’, which in its segment known as ‘Mkubete’ violated content regulations. In the first offence committed last year, Msoka said through the segment, the presenter conducted an interview with a woman who betrayed her husband by having an affair with her husband’s younger brother.

He said during the interview, the presenter interviewed the woman and the husband’s young brother, an act which endangered the lives of the two people and interfering in their private affair, which is against the law.

She noted that the programme aired was contrary to Broadcasting Services Regulations (2005), which require every licensee to ensure that the programmes aired does not injure the reputation of individuals and does not interfere with peoples private affair.

While Sahara Media group through Star TV was charged for airing ‘Futuhi’, a comedy programme on October 13 last year, which depicted students attacking their teacher with crude weapons, which portrays disrespect for the teaching profession and also encourages bad habit in teenagers.

The two media houses have also been ordered to air an apology to the public for three consecutive days in their news bulletin.

TCRA Content Committee also issued a strong warning to Channel Ten and Clouds Entertainment FM for violation of broadcasting regulations, and they have also demanded the two stations to air an apology to the public in their news bulletin for three consecutive days from 24 and 25 February respectively.

Channel Ten which is under the Africa Media Group Limited (AMGL), was charged for broadcasting a news bulletin on November 16 last year concerning a primary school boy who was sodomized by a bodaboda driver at Buguruni Shule bodaboda station, while disclosing the name of the victim’s mother and the place they reside contrary to regulations.

She said that the law restricts identifying and disclosing rape victims or victims of other sexual offences without prior consent of the victim, or disclosing the identity of minors who are victims of rape or any other crime.

Meanwhile, Clouds FM through it’s ‘Jahazi’ programme aired every weekdays in the evening on its ‘Mastori ya town’ segment on October 3 last year, one of its presenters’ aired words which disrespect a pastor who impregnated a form two student in Shinyanga.

According to Msoka, the regulations also require the presenter to air programmes that do not incite or perpetuate hatred against or vilify any group or person on the basis of ethnicity, race, gender religion or disability.

The station also discussed sexual affairs and aired their program at a time when a substantial number of children were likely to be part of the audience, thus violating the regulations governing broadcasting services (content) which restrict such programme to be aired between 5.30am and 21pm.

Source:Daily News

{Sixteen people have been killed in three days of fighting this week that pitted the Democratic Republic of Congo’s army against a rebel militia, a military spokesman told this reporter on Thursday.}

Guillaume Djike, a spokesman for the army in troubled North Kivu province in the east of the nation, said 16 people had been killed from Monday to Wednesday, while five rebels from the M23 militia had been captured and 58 others had surrendered.

Djike did not specify whether the dead were rebels, troops or civilians.

M23 is a mostly ethnic Tutsi rebel group that mutinied against DR Congo in 2012, saying a peace accord signed in 2009 had not been respected by the government.
The militia was defeated the following year, and hundreds of fighters fled the country.

But in January, the government and residents of North Kivu said they had seen M23 fighters return from neighbouring Uganda.

The United Nations MONUSCO peacekeeping mission on Wednesday said the militia posed “a real threat” to security in eastern DR Congo.

It said it had evidence that members of the group had returned to the country.
Liberata Buratwa, a local official, called on people who had fled the latest wave of clashes to neighbouring Uganda to return home.

“Today the situation is calm. We ask the people who fled the fighting to Uganda to return to the country because the situation has returned to normal,” Buratwa said.
In a statement from the Ugandan capital Kampala on Wednesday, M23 blamed the Congolese government for the spike in violence.

“Ex-fighters who returned to their country were unarmed and had no intention to wage war,” M23 said.

“The government’s decision to push returning ex-fighters into war, forcing them to defend themselves, sends a negative signal to their colleagues” in Uganda and Rwanda, the statement said.

Uganda in January said that 40 M23 rebels living at a military base since 2014 had disappeared, and that about 100 more had been caught trying to cross into DR Congo.

The Congolese government, for its part, said this month that some 200 former M23 fighters had occupied a village in North Kivu province.

Source:Daily Monitor

{Police in Nairobi shot dead three suspected robbers early Friday morning.}

Police seized an AK-47 rifle, several license plates, a pistol, a magazine and several rounds of ammunition from the suspects.

Another suspect that police said was armed escaped during the 3am shooting in Tena estate, dropping a magazine loaded with three rounds of ammunition.

Police said officers on patrol in Kayole had earlier asked the suspects to stop when they noticed that they were behaving suspiciously, but they defied the orders and the officers alerted their colleagues in Buruburu.

The suspects’ silver Toyota Axio, registration number KBC 879L, was again stopped in Buruburu but on realising that they were driving into a trap, they tried to escape, shooting at police officers on Manyanja Road.

The three died in the shootout that also resulted in the injury of an officer attached to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations office in Buruburu.

The officers seized a Tokalev pistol, a motor vehicle, several vehicle ignition keys, seven motor vehicle switches, four mobile phones, cash and other items.

Buruburu OCPD Geoffrey Maiyek said the identities of the suspects were unknown as they had no identification documents on them.

Source:Daily Nation

{Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation Minister, Ambassador Augustine Mahiga said yesterday that the ministry is closely watching Tanzanians currently deported from Mozambique to ensure that they are safe.}

The minister insisted that immigration officials in Mtwara Region were conducting a rigorous vetting of the travel documents to ensure non-Tanzanians are not using the loophole to sneak into the country, illegally.

Speaking at a news conference in Dar es Salaam, Dr Mahiga came out strongly to deny reports that security machineries in Mozambique were subjecting Tanzanian deportees to torture and excessive use of forces.

“In any operation, there are always such complaints where some security personnel can sometimes push a person or do anything in the course of discharging their duties. “But we have been making close monitoring in collaboration with the Ministry of Home Affairs and Tanzanian authorities in Mozambique and found out that the claims are false,” he explained.

The minister further allayed fears among Tanzanians that the operation to flush out illegal immigrants in Mozambique was targeting Tanzanians, saying it was a normal crackdown on illegal immigrants. He said even Tanzania had previously conducted similar operations to kick out undocumented immigrants.

However, the minister said that Southern African Development Community (SADC) Foreign Ministers are meeting in Dar es Salaam today at the Mwalimu Nyerere Convention Centre to discuss various issues in the region.

He hinted that the Foreign Affairs and Cooperation minister of Mozambique is among the 14 foreign ministers who were expected in the country yesterday to attend the crucial meeting.

Dr Mahiga who will chair the meeting was however not certain if the ongoing crackdown on illegal immigrants would feature in the deliberations.

President John Magufuli currently chairs the SADC, with Dr Mahiga chairing the Council of Ministers.

Source:Daily News