The United Nations (UN) under Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Stephen O’Brien has called upon the warring parties in Yemen to start a political dialogue to bring an early end to the devastating conflict and to avoid a famine before that. Last Sunday marked the second year of the ongoing Yemen conflict when O’Brien – also the UN emergency relief coordinator – in a statement said, “Most of all, the Yemeni people need the parties to commit to political dialogue, or this man-made crisis will never end.” UN urges aid access to Yemen ports to avert looming famine “In the meantime, together we can – we must – avert this famine, this human catastrophe.” He added, “The parties to the conflict must also facilitate immediate, timely, and unimpeded humanitarian access. They must also facilitate commercial access, which will be critical to reversing the massive food insecurity and ensuring that people’s basic needs can be met.” “Man-made conflict has brought Yemen to the brink of famine,” the statement said. “Today nearly 19 million Yemenis – over two-thirds of the population – need humanitarian assistance. Seven million Yemenis are facing starvation,” the UN official added. A famine, as per the UN, can only be declared when certain measures of mortality, malnutrition and hunger are met. For instance, when at least 20% of households in an area face extreme food shortages with a limited ability to cope; acute malnutrition rates exceed 30% and the death rate exceeds two persons per day per 10,000 persons. O’Brien believed that despite global political efforts to bring peace in Yemen, the sound of airstrikes, bombs, bullets and artillery were now familiar to the daily life. “They are too often the sound of another death.” Thousands of civilians have been killed or injured, including well over 1,400 girls and boys during the two-year civil war in Yemen. “But, casualty figures belie the magnitude of the tragedy unfolding in Yemen,” the statement said. Yemen minister claims rebels abducted Norwegian Refugee Council staff, NRC denies “Conflict, insecurity and the cynical tactics of the warring parties have wrecked Yemen’s economy, made food increasingly scarce, displaced three million people from their homes, and impeded the work of humanitarians – whose only aim is to alleviate suffering and save lives,” the statement continued. O’Brien recalled that during his third visit to Yemen weeks ago, he witnessed terrifying evidence of looming famine. “In the hospital ward, the complete stillness of the tiny malnourished child whose eyes focus on nothing,” the statement said. “The grim realisation that these patients were the fortunate ones who could access a hospital and might survive.” “What about all the others – out of sight? Out of mind?” the statement said. “That is precisely what we cannot allow to happen. There is still time to avert a catastrophe in Yemen.” The UN and partners are already providing life-saving assistance too 22 of Yemen’s governorates, reaching almost six million people every month, the statement said. “We can and must do more, but urgent funding is needed in coming weeks — or it will be too late,” it added. Earlier in March, the World Food Programme (WFP) had warned that families in Yemen’s most food insecure areas would die unless the international community provided additional resources and local authorities allow aid workers access to hungry people. The civil conflict in Yemen has continued since the UN-backed government was ousted by the Houthi militants in late 2014. It later triggered a Saudi Arabia-led military intervention in late March 2016. The two-year-long conflict worsened the chronic food insecurity in Yemen, a country already considered one of the poorest in the world. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Express Tribune

If we needed any confirmation of the supremely callous quid pro quo between Khartoum and the U.S intelligence community under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, it comes today in the form of a dispatch from Sudan Tribune (see below). The dispatch confirms that the Obama administration, during its last week in power, agreed to lift U.S. economic sanctions on the genocidal Khartoum regime—ignoring the putative “requirements” for such an action—this in exchange for whatever scraps of counter-terrorism intelligence this brutal regime is willing to disgorge. There has been no improvement in humanitarian access in Darfur or Blue Nile or South Kordofan, one of the key U.S.-stipulated requirements for lifting sanctions. And yet the Obama administration ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power, declared at the time of the sanctions decision that there had been a “sea change” of improvement in humanitarian access, a falsehood that even the U.S. State Department acknowledges as such. Military offensive action had diminished by January, but was hardly halted in the contested regions; and the Jebel Marra offensive that effectively ended rebel resistance in Darfur extended well beyond the July 2016 “look-back” period during which Khartoum has been credited with ending offensive military activity. Moreover, violence fully countenanced by Khartoum continues to create intolerable insecurity in Darfur for civilians and humanitarian workers. In particular, violence by Khartoum-backed Arab militias continues to threaten the non-Arab/African populations that make up the overwhelming majority of the 3 million people who have been violently displaced from their homes during 14 years of genocidal counter-insurgency in Darfur. The more than 200 locations to which Darfuri Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) have been scattered are more vulnerable than ever and face the clear prospect of a significant reduction in the already failing UN/AU mission (UNAMID), supposed to offer protection to civilians and humanitarians but performing miserably in this task. (See Appendix A for a summary of violence in Darfur since the January 13 announcement by the Obama administration that sanctions were being lifted.) Is Khartoum really to be credited in the forward-looking “testing period (January 2017 to July 2017) with a sufficient reduction in military activity? The genocidal counter-insurgency in Darfur has—after fourteen years of unfathomable violence, suffering, and destruction—been successful. Blue Nile is militarily helpless. And if Khartoum might forgo a new military offensive in South Kordofan this year, the regime will be as a consequence only the more determined not allow humanitarian access, especially to the rebel-controlled Nuba Mountains. As I have long argued (see "What Really Animates the Obama Administration's Sudan Policy?" | October 10, 2011 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-GT/), the Obama administration early on ceded control of Sudan policy to the U.S. intelligence community. Barack Obama promised so much, delivered so little on Darfur The consequences of that decision are now fully apparent: Sudanese intelligence chief meets CIA and FBI leaders | Sudan Tribune | March 27, 2017 (KHARTOUM) - The head of the National Intelligence and Security Services, Mohamed Atta [Mohamed Atta al-Moula Abbas], has visited Washington, DC, in response to an invitation extended by the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Mike Pompeo. According to a statement extended to a few number of local newspapers in Khartoum on Sunday and seen by Sudan Tribune, Atta met Pompeo and the FBI Director James Comey as well as a number of Congressmen. The statement didn’t specify when he arrived in the American capital. But it said the visiting Sudanese official discussed security, political and humanitarian issues in the region. Sudan is under economic sanctions since twenty years, the east African country is also on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism since 1993. However, the Department of State in a statement issued last September welcomed Sudanese government efforts to combat terrorism and its increased cooperation with Washington. Furthermore, former President Barak Obama eased economic sanctions on Sudan and the decision will be enforced following a review to be made by several agencies including the CIA and the FBI. American sources in Washington confirmed to Sudan Tribune the visit and said he has already left the American capital heading back to Khartoum on Saturday. The visit comes nearly three weeks after a visit by the speaker of the Sudanese parliament Ibrahim Ahmed Omer to Washington where he met Congressmen and U.S. officials. (emphasis added) The head of the National Intelligence and Security Services, Mohamed Atta [Mohamed Atta al-Moula Abbas] It is worth recalling here the prescient words of former Senator Russ Feingold, spoken while he was chair of the Africa Subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Senate Intelligence Committee. There was simply no one better positioned, or speaking with greater integrity, than Senator Feingold when he declared: "I take serious issue with the way the report [on international terrorism by the U.S. State Department] overstates the level of cooperation in our counterterrorism relationship with Sudan, a nation which the U.S. classifies as a state sponsor of terrorism. A more accurate assessment is important not only for effectively countering terrorism in the region, but as part of a review of our overall policy toward Sudan, including U.S. pressure to address the ongoing crisis in Darfur and maintain the fragile peace between the North and the South." (emphasis added) (Statement by Senator Russell Feingold, Chair of the Africa Subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a leading member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, May 1, 2009) Former senator Russ Feingold, an honest man work in the Washington cesspool... The wisdom of Feingold’s assessment is borne out by a key moment in minutes of a meeting of senior military and security officials of the Khartoum regime on August 31, 2014 (these minutes have been recognized as authentic by the U.S. State Department have been exhaustively vetted; see http://wp.me/p45rOG-1w5/). At one point then-Defense Minister Abdel Rahmin Mohamed Hussein declares: "Currently, there are twenty thousand (20,000) Jihadists and fifteen (15) newly formed Jihadist Movements who are scattered all over from Morocco to Egypt, Sinai, Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq, all Gulf States, a wide presence in Africa and Europe and nobody else owns a data-base on that like the one we have. We release only limited information to the Americans, according to their request—and the price is the armed movements file." (emphasis added) Former Minister of the Interior (during the worst years of the Darfur genocide) and former Minister of Defense Abdel Rahmin Mohamed Hussein. the International Criminal Court has issued a warrant for his arrest, charging him with massive crimes against humanity. No American official has ever clarified precisely what this “price” entailed, and what form of betrayal of the rebel movements in Sudan it did or did not entail. Nor has there been any acknowledgement of the “limitations” Hussein speaks of—and clearly delights in. I have frequently encountered bewilderment or disbelief when I point out that the Obama administration has deliberately cut loose genocide in Darfur from the larger strategic issue between Washington and Khartoum: lifting of economic sanctions in return for counter-terrorism intelligence. After all, it was Obama who referred to Darfur as the site of “genocide”—as senator, as presidential candidate, and as President; it was Obama who unctuously declared during his first presidential campaign that Darfur was a “stain on our souls.” But the word “de-coupled” is exactly the word used by an unnamed senior administration official (unnamed, but whose words are contained in an officials State Department transcript) and it was perfectly apt (see http://wp.me/p45rOG-Gl/). The grimmest irony is how much the minutes from the August 31, 2014 meeting of senior regime security and military officials reveal about the attitudes of the regime toward radical Islamic groups: at several moments in these minutes, for example, officials speak of Khartoum’s support for the radical Islamic group “Libya Dawn,” which aimed by means of terrorism and ISIS-like brutality to undermine governance in Libya. Coptic Christians being marched to their beheadings by radical Islamic militants in Libya; Libya Dawn, one such group, was strongly supported by the Khartoum regime We get an especially clear look into the brutality and savage calculation that inform the views of Director General of the National Intelligence and Security Services Mohammed Atta, on whom Sudan Tribune reports today. In the course of the meeting these minutes record, Atta reveal a good deal of himself (the following is an extended excerpt from the comments of this ruthless man who heads one of the world’s most notoriously brutal security services): “There are certain [international] entities demanding that we publish a report on the events of September 2013 or else bring Sudan back to Chapter 4 [UN human rights monitoring]. [In September 2013, widespread popular demonstrations against the regime, in many Sudanese cities—not just Khartoum and Omdurman—were gaining momentum; the regime put down the demonstrations by issuing “shoot to kill” orders. Many hundreds were killed and wounded, although we have no firm figures. The determination that “shoot to kill” orders had been given was made by Amnesty International and the African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies—ER] “Other intelligence people are pushing to know whether we think that the September 2013 events were a conspiracy planned and financed by Egypt, Saudi and Emirates intelligence to create the Arab Spring in Sudan in order to change the regime and that we suppressed the demonstrations using brutal force to ensure this is not repeated [This of course is precisely what the “suppression” was; and in anticipation of similar popular demonstrations in December 2016, President Omar al-Bashir directly threatened to re-issue “shoot to kill” orders | http://sudanreeves.org/2016/12/13/7629/ )—ER] “We intercepted all the telephone calls coming from Saudi, Emirates and Egyptian intelligence. Some people from the political parties of the Sudan say they orchestrated the demonstrations, yet they brought experts to administer the demonstrations. We were monitoring the telephones and other communications and we managed to arrest the real players. They confessed and disclosed all the details about the conspiracy and the names of officers assigned to supervise the demonstrations and the leadership in each country who were receiving daily reports. That is why Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Emirates are concerned/afraid after all their agents have been exposed and arrested by our security forces. On our side we, did not disclose anything up until now; we want to use this file to blackmail them instead. “They have taken many measures fearing that we may use or release terrorist groups to take revenge on them. No need to fear or hurry, we shall use this file to the maximum.” This is the man so recently greeted warmly by officials of the U.S. intelligence community. The fear that Sudan would “use or release terrorist groups to take revenge on them [Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States]” was all too well-founded; moreover, it is foolish to think that NISS Director General Atta has changed his views or become less cynical or ruthless than the self-described blackmailer recorded in these remarks. To be sure, relations between Khartoum and Tehran have shifted dramatically in the interim between August 2014 and the present, but this is completely expedient—a desperate acknowledgement that without Saudi and Gulf State money the Sudanese economy would rapidly collapse. But the mentality of men like Atta is unchanged, something that neither the U.S. nor the Europeans are willing to acknowledge, if for different expedient reasons. Notably, Atta is fighting for even more repressive powers for NISS; see Radio Dabanga dispatch of February 28, 2017 | https://www.dabangasudan.org/en/all-news/article/constitution-should-strengthen-security-apparatus-sudan-niss-officials/. This comes at a time when regime repression of civil society, human rights advocates, and newspapers is at an all-time high. But even after abandoning its supposed key “strategic ally” Iran, Khartoum still faces an economy whose collapse has only been delayed. Moreover, there has been a continuing resurgence of civil society outrage, protest actions, and demonstrations. All of these efforts to bring about a democratization of Sudan are undermined by the U.S. decision to lift sanctions on Khartoum, and to make whatever trade-offs are required to secure counter-terrorism intelligence from the regime. This extends to refusing to pressure Khartoum publicly to allow desperately needed food and medicine into the Two Areas and to open Darfur fully to humanitarian relief aid. Here also, the NISS Director General has made his views known, if unwittingly. In the August 31, 2014 minutes, he declares: “We must not allow the delivery of humanitarian relief before we reach a comprehensive ceasefire and a full security agreement. We will not allow them to unite the opposition, and anybody who meets the rebels will be arrested, charged and taken to court.” One victim of Khartoum's denial of humanitarian access to more than 2 million people in Sudan By a “comprehensive cease-fire” and a “full security agreement,” Atta means a complete disarming of the people of the Nuba, who are now facing the second attempt by Khartoum to annihilate them (the first effort, in the 1990s, very nearly succeeded). He is asking for unconditional surrender by forces that, in the eyes of the Nuba people, are all that prevent a fully successful genocide. Here we should recall the savage ethnic targeting of Nuba civilians in Kadugli during the first month of conflict in South Kordofan (June 2011). This involved involving roadblocks, house-to-house searches, random murder, and other actions all too reminiscent of Rwanda in 1995. Hideous mass graves, capable of holding thousands of bodies, were first reported by the Satellite Sentinel Project and subsequently by the UN human rights team based in Kadugli that terrible month of June 2011. The supreme savagery of the assault on the people of the Nuba Mountains is captured in a comment by Atta’s intelligence services colleague, General Siddiq Amer (Director General of Intelligence and Security): “Let us continue to dismantle the armed movements. The mechanisms to do that are already in place and working. This year the Sudan People’s Army (SPLA) managed to cultivate large areas in South Kordofan State. We must not allow them to harvest these crops. Good harvest means supplies for the war effort. We must starve them, so that, commanders and civilians desert them and then we can recruit the deserters to use them in the war to defeat the rebels.” (emphasis added) Despite Siddiq Amer’s reference to “starving the SPLA,” and his suggestion that it was the SPLA that “cultivated large areas,” it was of course the civilians of South Kordofan who planted a good sorghum crop—and it was they who would starve if the harvest were not permitted or destroyed. The willingness to starve civilians as a means of weakening military rebellion is a tactic that the Khartoum regime has perfected over 28 years in power—first in South Sudan and the Nuba Mountains; then in Darfur; and now again in the Nuba Mountains and Blue Nile. The relentless, indiscriminate aerial assault on the agricultural economies of South Kordofan and Blue Nile has driven hundreds of thousands from their homes—many into neighboring Ethiopia or South Sudan—and has pushed malnutrition indicators into terrifying ranges in many areas. The ruthless men of the Khartoum regime have no intention of providing humanitarian access to rebel-controlled regions of the Two Areas, as should be perfectly clear from the fact that they have refused all proposals since the AU/UN/Arab League “Tripartite” access agreement was first put forward in February 2012—over five years ago. For the U.S. Charge d’affaires in Khartoum, Steven Koutsis, to blame the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army-North for failure to reach an access agreement is viciously disingenuous (see Sudan Tribune, March 3, 2017 | http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article61783/). Koutsis outrageously distorted account of the issues is finally of a piece with U.S. accommodation of Khartoum’s atrocity crimes in a wide range of arenas. Moreover, Koutsis seems oblivious to the fact that denial of humanitarian access is a “crime against humanity” under the terms of the Rome Treaty that is the statutory basis for the International Criminal Court (see | "On the Obstruction of Humanitarian Aid," African Studies Review, Volume 54, Number 3 (December 2011), pages 165 – 74 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-I6/). And yet Khartoum is treated by the U.S. and other consequential international actors not as the criminal regime it is but as a legitimate sovereign negotiating party. What We Have Known In an important sense, there is nothing particularly newsworthy about Atta’s trip to the U.S. His predecessor in the position of Director General of NISS, the notoriously savage Saleh Gosh, traveled to Washington under the Bush administration, a meeting that was to have been secret but was revealed in an extraordinary work of investigative reporting by Ken Silverstein for the Los Angeles Times. Gosh had been deeply complicit in a wide range of atrocity crimes at the time, but this seemed not to trouble the CIA in its insatiable quest for counter-terrorism intelligence: The CIA and Mukhabarat [Khartoum's intelligence and security services] officials have met regularly over the last few years, but Gosh had been seeking an invitation to Washington in recognition of his government's efforts, sources told The Times. The CIA, hoping to seal the partnership, extended the invitation. "The agency's view was that the Sudanese are helping us on terrorism and it was proud to bring him over," said a government source with knowledge of Gosh's visit. "They didn't care about the political implications." Saleh Gosh was flown to CIA headquarters in Langley (Virginia) aboard a luxurious executive jet. See also: • "What Really Animates the Obama Administration's Sudan Policy?" | October 10, 2011 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-GT/ • "Sudan, Terrorism, and the Obama Administration," 9 February 2011 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-B9 • "U.S. Counter-terrorism in Lieu of Foreign Policy: the Case of Sudan," The Huffington Post | 29 October 2013 | http://wp.me/s45rOG-4409 • "Sudan embraces genocide, terrorism — and Iran," The Washington Post, 30 November 2014 | http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/sudan-embraces-genocide-terrorism--iran/2014/11/30/2ed603ae-75bb-11e4-a755-e32227229e7b_story.html • "Khartoum: Really Out of the Terrorism Business?" Sudan Tribune, 8 March 2014 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1b1 http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article50222 • "The Obama Administration, Terrorism, and Hypocrisy," Sudan Tribune | 6 May 2014 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1i8 A recent dispatch from Sudan Tribune also gives us a sense of how extensive “cooperation” between Washington and Khartoum has become. The enormous and extremely costly new U.S. embassy in Khartoum has now, finally, been allowed to become the listening post that the U.S. intelligence community has long lusted for in Northern Africa, as huge quantities of surveillance equipment and other “spyware” are now set up and operational in the new embassy: CIA office in Khartoum is the largest one in the Middle East: official January 31, 2017 (KHARTOUM) - The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) office in Khartoum is the largest one in the Middle East, said the Sudanese intelligence General Hanafi Abdallah, to give an idea about the importance of of intelligence cooperation between the two countries. "There is communication between the two bodies and regular meetings. The CIA office in Khartoum is the largest office in the Middle East. Because the United States is aware of the Sudan strategic importance in the region, it has established one of the largest diplomatic missions in the region, even they had to expand their buildings," said Hanafi in an interview with the Khartoum based Al-Sudani newspaper published on Tuesday. The massive new U.S. embassy in Khartoum, CIA headquarters for Northern Africa Perhaps not the largest in the Middle East, but certainly the largest and most morally compromised in Northern Africa. A terrible “deal with the devil” has been consummated, and there is no sign that the current dysfunctional and hideously cynical Trump administration has any problem with this “deal.” APPENDIX A: Continuing violence following Obama administration lifting of U.S. sanctions on the Khartoum regime (a selective compendium) For an overview of the current levels of violence, destruction, displacement, and humanitarian shortfalls throughout Sudan, see | “Quantifying Human Destruction and Suffering in Sudan: The grim calculus of international policies and politics” | February 12, 2017 | http://wp.me/p45rOG-21m Violent events of particular note • The Nertiti Massacre: The real meaning of al-Bashir’s declared “cease-fire,” January 2, 2017 | http://wp.me/s45rOG-7710 We learn today from a wide range of sources just how meaningful Omar al-Bashir’s declaration of a one-month extension of his nominal “cease-fire” really is (see Sudan Tribune, January 1, 2017 | http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article61265/). Radio Dabanga, Sudan Tribune, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army-North, and the Darfur Union in the UK have all reported within the last 24 hours on the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) massacre of civilians in Nertiti, Central Darfur (formerly West Darfur). Figures for casualties vary but suggest that some 60 – 70 civilians were killed or wounded during the vicious SAF rampage (Darfur Union UK lists the names and ages of 11 people killed---five of them under the age of 17). Notably, Radio Dabanga reports that the UN/African Union "hybrid" Mission in Darfur did not respond in any way to the massacre—the perfect image of impotence and indifference that now define UNAMID. This brutal assault was forthrightly condemned by no international actor of consequence. The rape of women and girls, some younger than ten years of age, continues to be a primary instrument of war and intimidation throughout Darfur: • “Minor raped in South Darfur” | February 3, 2017| MANAWASHI Two gunmen raped a girl, 14 years old, in Musku in Manawashi locality on Thursday. A relative of one of the victims told Radio Dabanga that two armed men attacked a girl when she was on her way from Um Driseih to their village in Musku, South Darfur. The men grabbed her and raped her alternately. Locals found the girl after a couple of hours. The victim was brought to Manawashi health centre, however she was bleeding heavily and practically unconscious. She has been transferred to Nyala for treatment on Friday. • “Two West Darfur teachers raped at gunpoint” | February 2, 2017| EL GENEINA Two men have been arrested after a group of armed herders entered a school in West Darfur and repeatedly raped two teachers. Journalist Alauldin Babikir told Radio Dabanga that at 12 pm on Tuesday, three young herders allegedly stormed the hostel of El Addar School, about ten kilometres north of the West Darfur capital El Geneina. The gunmen seized two of the teachers, dragged them to a piece of open ground, and repeatedly raped them. Babikir reports that the attack was reported to El Geneina police, after which a team of local residents and police went in search of the perpetrators. Two suspects were arrested at one of the settlements northeast of El Addar, while a third suspect fled. He said that there is a strong feeling of outrage among residents of El Geneina, who strongly condemn and denounce the incident, and demanded tough penalties for the offenders. • South Darfuri husband shot defending his wife | February 20, 2017 | NYALA • Minor raped in South Darfur | February 3, 2017 | MANAWASHI • 12-year-old girl abducted in North Darfur | January 22, 2017 | DUBBO EL OMDA • Militiamen assault displaced woman in North Darfur | January 30, 2017 | FATA BORNO • ‘Darfur farmer killed by soldiers': MP | March 16, 2017 | ED EL FURSAN • North Darfur woman stabbed to death during rape attempt | February 17, 2017 | EL FASHER / KUTUM For a comprehensive analysis of the use of rape as a weapon of war, with particular focus on the years 2014 – 2015, see | “Continuing Mass Rape of Girls in Darfur: The most heinous crime generates no international outrage” | January 2016 | Eric Reeves, author | Maya Baca, research and editing | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1QG [Arabic translation of this report | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Rr ] [Arabic names for key locations on maps | http://wp.me/p45rOG-1Si ] See also the Human Rights Report on the mass rape of girls and women at Tabit, North Darfur in late 2014 by regular Sudan Armed Forces soldiers, acting on the orders of their nearby garrison commander: “Sudan: Mass Rape by Army in Darfur: UN, AU Should Press for Protection, International Investigation” | https://www.hrw.org/news/2015/02/11/sudan-mass-rape-army-darfur Needless to say, there was no meaningful pressure put on Khartoum to allow a meaningful investigation, and UNAMID failed miserably in its own cynical effort—yet again. Violence in all forms—including arson and attacks on IDP camps—continues relentlessly, evidently not troubling enough to the Obama administration to have been considered a test of Khartoum’s commitment to change: • Tabit in North Darfur ‘besieged by armed herders’ | January 26, 2017 | TABIT • Displaced man murdered, another ‘beaten, tortured’ in Darfur | January 26, 2017 | GIREIDA / TABIT • “South Darfur displaced decry 'bussed-in' new settlers” | January 25, 2017| SHATTAYA The displaced people of Shattaya have accused the local authorities in South Darfur of transferring large numbers of new settlers to the original areas from which they have been displaced since 2004. One of the sheikhs told Radio Dabanga of the arrival of large numbers of new settlers with their families in large lorries last week. He accused the authorities of lying to them and misleading them by the formation of a committee last year in order to return them back to their areas of origin after the expulsion of the militias which have occupied their villages and farms… At least 2,700 people fled from Shattaya locality to Kai and Kalma camps following militia attacks on their villages and farms in 2004. • Two dead, nine injured, three kidnapped in Darfur violence | January 16, 2017 | DARFUR • Firewood collector beaten comatose, Central Darfur | January 17, 2017 | TUR • Abu Karinka in East Darfur calm after 12 farmers die in clashes | February 22, 2017 | ABU KARINKA • South Darfur displaced to UN delegation: ‘We refuse to return’ | March 15, 2017 | KASS • Gunmen abduct family in North Darfur | February 10, 2017 | TABIT • UXO kills Darfur herder, women assaulted, market raided | March 15, 2017 | DOBO EL OMDA / KOBE / GILDO • Insecurity grows at hands of militias: Kutum residents, North Darfur | March 12, 2017| KUTUM / KASSAB • Darfur: Boy, two men killed in shootings | January 13, 2017 | KUTUM / NYALA And the consequences of displacement are at this point all too familiar; stories such as the following could be multiplied endlessly: • “Attacks cause new displacement from Darfur’s Jebel Marra” | February 9, 2017| SHANGIL TOBAYA 40 families representing a total of 530 people who have fled from Darfur’s East Jebel Marra arrived at camp Shaddad of Shangil Tobaya in North Darfur at the beginning of this week. A leader of the camp told Radio Dabanga that these families came to the camp on February 2. They were fleeing militia and herder attacks on Balidy Serif, Libi, and Swanee. The camp elder said that the new arrivals have not received any aid thus far. He said that a team from UNAMID visited the newly displaced on Tuesday, and “promised to notify the humanitarian organisations to provide them with aid.” • “Families who fled Jebel Marra clashes face food shortage” | Radio Dabanga | March 5, 2017| SINAR About 2,000 families that fled various areas of Darfur’s Jebel Marra to the Sinar area ten months ago face an acute shortage of food and cover. The families fled the clashes between the government and the armed movements and fled to Sinar area, which is under the control of the armed movements. are facing acute shortage of food, medicines and cover. A number of those who fled told Radio Dabanga that since their arrival in Sinar they have not received any food aid or medicines which led to the prevalence of malnutrition among the elderly and children. They revealed the death of two children, Mohammed Hassan Ibrahim and Nurelhuda Saleh Abakar, due to diarrhoea and vomiting. They have appealed the humanitarian organisations to speed up provision of food and medicines to them. • Displaced short of food, water in Darfur's Nierteti and Kassab | March 17, 2017 | NIERTETI / KUTUM • Darfur camp residents complain of attacks, poor services | February 19 - 2017 MURNEI / MERSHING • Health, water crisis spreads disease in Darfur camps | February 15, 2017 | KASS / TAWILA (c) 2017 SUDAN Research, Analysis, and Advocacy _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Painful memories: A display at the Bangladesh Deputy High Commission, Kolkata, on ‘Genocide Day’. Veteran broadcaster recalls the 1971 Liberation War Veteran broadcaster Upen Tarafdar was seemingly perturbed from what he experienced before and during the Bangladesh’s Liberation War of 1971. “Sometime in March of 1971, a Bangladeshi youth, somehow managed to cross over to India, and was waiting outside the Akashvani Bhavan in Kolkata to meet me,” Mr. Tarafdar paused. He was known for his emotional coverage of the 1971 war, with Debdulal Bandyopadhyay, another veteran radio news anchor of the time. “The young man brought a cassette with him which contained only scenes of fear…[of those] who were killed and tortured,” Mr. Tarfadar closes his eyes perhaps to visualise the man. “It was around the time we realised we have to play our role as newsmen,” he added. He recollected another incident when a Bangladeshi youth was admitted to a hospital in Bangaon in North 24 Paraganas. “I rushed with my tape recorder [and] saw that the youth had severe bullet wounds. He pleaded with doctors to save his life as he wanted to go back to continue with his fight,” Mr. Tarafdar said from a makeshift stage, set up on the premises of the Bangladesh Deputy High Commission office in Kolkata. The building near the seven-point crossing in Kolkata’s Park Circus itself has a rich history. It was the Pakistan’s Deputy High Commission at the time of Bangladesh’s independence. The then Deputy High Commissioner of Pakistan, Hossain Ali, was posted in the building, which has an elegant mishmash of religious and Bengal’s typical bungalow-style architecture. Ali was the first government official to declare Bangladesh an independent country by lowering the Pakistan’s flag to replace it with Bangladesh’s, according to chroniclers of war time history. Ali later joined the Foreign Affairs Ministry of Bangladesh and was posted as a diplomat. For the first time, along with Bangladesh, the Deputy High Commission in Kolkata observed March 25 as ‘Genocide Day.’ “On this fateful night in 1971, the Pakistani military junta launched ‘Operation Serachlight’ and killed thousands of people, including teachers, students, police EPR [formerly East Pakistan Rifles] members, and commoners at the dormitories of Dhaka University, Pilkhana, Rajarbagh Police Lines and other areas of Old Dhaka,” a Deputy High Commission release said. Photo exhibition About 50 photographs by Bangladeshi, Indian and international lensmen, with newspaper clippings, depicting military actions and its impact on the people through summer to winter of 1971, were exhibited at the programme. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Hindu Editorial

Aid agencies are re-evaluating risks in light of the weekend attack Aid agencies say the "shocking" killing of six aid workers in South Sudan on Saturday is causing them to re-assess how and when they can deliver supplies. The victims were ambushed by unknown attackers when travelling between Juba and the town of Pibor to the northwest. Oxfam said the attack "demonstrates how dangerous it is here" and was leading agencies to re-evaluate "what is mission-critical and what is not". Aid deliveries would continue but could be delayed, it said. The latest fatal attack on humanitarian workers came a month after famine was declared in parts of South Sudan. The UN says the famine - the first to be announced anywhere in the world in six years - is man-made, resulting from a political conflict that escalated into war in 2013. Oxfam humanitarian campaigns manager Dorothy Sang, who is in South Sudan, told the BBC it was "one of the most difficult countries to operate in right now". She said attacks on aid workers "unfortunately aren't uncommon" - 12 have been killed this year alone and there have been a number of other, non-fatal attacks on aid convoys and warehouses. She said Oxfam would continue delivering aid but was reassessing how this could be done with least risk. Transporting aid by road was now "extremely dangerous" and agencies were considering whether they could step up transportation by air, and whether risks on the road could be reduced by aid organisations travelling in convoy. This re-evaluation of risks could mean that aid deliveries were delayed, Ms Sang said. "The brutal killing... has sent shockwaves through us all," said Care International country director Fred McCray. "It is unacceptable that those trying to alleviate the suffering... are attacked for what they do." Agencies are trying to pre-position aid before the rains arrive The Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) programme director for South Sudan Monica Blagescu said: "This is the crude reality of the situation in South Sudan, where humanitarian workers put their lives at risk while providing life-saving assistance to people affected by conflict and drought. "Those in a position of power must step up to their responsibilities and stop such heinous incidents from happening again." In many cases of assaults on aid agencies, it is not known who the attackers are. There are many armed groups in South Sudan, engaged in a battle for power and resources. South Sudanese rebels have blamed government forces for the killings on Saturday. A spokesman for the Sudan People's Liberation Movement - In Opposition, which is led by former Vice-President Riek Machar, condemned the attack and called for an investigation. "The area where this barbaric incident took place is under the control of [the] Juba regime and its militias," the spokesman, Paul Gabriel Lam, was reported by the Paris-based Sudan Tribune as saying. The government has said it is too early to say who was behind the attack and it would be "counterproductive" to assign blame "at this stage". 'No guns' Grieving families went to the morgue in Juba on Monday to collect the bodies of their relatives. "This is very painful for all of us," Levis Kori, whose 30-year-old brother John Riti was killed in the attack, told AP new agency. "They were humanitarians there to do good. They're not soldiers, they have no guns." Grieving relatives of the aid workers were at Juba's morgue to collect the bodies for burial he attack comes at a critical time for aid agencies in South Sudan, which are trying to pre-position stocks in key areas before the expected arrival of the rains in the coming weeks. The rainy season makes access much harder for aid agencies and brings greater risk that malnourished people, already vulnerable to illness, will catch water-borne diseases. The DEC has warned that "a toxic mix of drought and violent conflict" means South Sudan is now the world's fastest growing refugee crisis. It says 6,000 people a day - equating to four people a minute - were forced to flee to neighbouring Uganda last month. There are now more refugees fleeing to Uganda than across the Mediterranean, the DEC says. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 BBC News

NEW DELHI (REUTERS) - One person was killed and about 14 injured when violence erupted following a scuffle between Muslim and Hindu school students in Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's home state of Gujarat, a senior administrative official said on Sunday (March 26). A crowd of about 5,000 people attacked Muslim residents and set dozens of homes and vehicles on fire at Vadavali village in Patan district on Saturday after Hindu students complained of misbehaviour by Muslim students, said K. K. Nirala, the district's top administrative official. Members of the Muslim community retaliated by throwing stones and police used teargas and fired seven rounds to disperse the crowd and control the violence, Nirala said. Gujarat has a history of serious communal trouble. Rioters killed about 1,000 people, most of them Muslims, in the state in 2002, according to estimates. Modi was chief minister at the time and he was accused of turning a blind eye to one of the worst outbreaks of religious violence in independent India. Modi denied any involvement in the unrest and in 2013 a panel appointed by the Supreme Court said there was insufficient evidence to prosecute him. Nirala said the situation had been brought under control and three companies of the State Reserve Police have been asked to stay in the village to maintain peace. (c) Reuters 2017

An armed individual in the town of Pibor, in Jonglei state. Pibor has seen violent clashes and confrontations that have resulted in displacement as well as destruction of livelihood and property. (File photo) OCHA/Cecilia Attefors Six aid workers from a national non-governmental organization were killed when their convoy was ambushed yesterday while travelling along the Government-controlled area on the Juba-Pibor road, the United Nations mission in the country (UNMISS) has said. Their bodies were found on the road by others members of the convoy who were some way behind. “The United Nations condemns this appalling and pointless loss of life,” said the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for South Sudan and the head of UNMISS, David Shearer in a news release issued by the mission. “This cold-blooded killing is utterly reprehensible, not least, because these aid workers were dedicated to alleviating the ongoing suffering of the people of South Sudan,” he added, urging the Government to investigate and apprehend the killers. The attack – the single worst incident targeting aid workers in the African country since the outbreak of hostilities in December 2013 – comes at a time when humanitarian needs have reached unprecedented levels. “[Such attacks] not only put the lives of aid workers at risk, they also threaten the lives of thousands of South Sudanese who rely on our assistance for their survival,” said Eugene Owusu, the Humanitarian Coordinator for South Sudan, stressing that security of relief workers has to be ensured so that they are able to provide relief to those with immense needs across the nation. The conflict has taken a devastating tool on the people of South Sudan: around 7.5 million people are in need of relief and protection, and the humanitarian crisis has deepened further with localized famine declared in parts of the country. No safety when attacks met with silence At least 79 aid workers have been killed in South Sudan since December 2013, including at least 12 this year. The last two months alone have seen a sharp increase of attacks on humanitarians and looting of supplies intended for people suffering from the famine. On 14 March, one health worker and a patient were killed in an attack on a humanitarian convoy that was responding to a cholera outbreak in Yirol East (in the central part of South Sudan). Earlier, on 10 March, staff of an international non-governmental organization were detained by non-state armed individuals during fighting in Mayendit town (also in central South Sudan). They were released four days later. “Every time an attack of this nature happens, we say that it must never happen again. And yet it does [...] there is no safety when attacks are met with silence and inaction,” said the Humanitarian Coordinator, underscoring that the impunity that has prevailed for such crimes must end, and that perpetrators must be brought to justice. “I implore all those in positions of power to step up to their responsibilities and stop this, as they are ultimately accountable for what happens under their watch.” (c) 2017 United Nations

On the morning of March 8 2016, while women around the world were preparing to observe International Women’s Day with a global strike, 43 girls burned to death in a shelter in San José Pinula, Guatemala. The Hogar Seguro Virgen de la Asunción, located on a hillside 15 kilometres from Guatemala’s capital, housed some 800 girls and boys who’d been abused or neglected in their homes, as well as young offenders of both genders. For months, the girls’ wing had complained about systematic rape and sexual abuse as well as overcrowding, disappearances, murder and generally bad conditions. The scandal had been exposed in November 2016 by the investigative reporting outfit Plaza Pública and the home was under investigation. Reporter José David López Vicente wrote that while the shelter is “in theory a state centre for the protection of children and adolescents…in reality it is an inferno where people rape and mistreat those they should protect.” Residents chose International Women’s Day to demand a safe and decent home. By the end of the protest, the girls had set fire to mattresses and furniture in the dormitories. And, survivors say, instead of freeing them from the flames and entering discussions, shelter officials locked the girls in their room, where dozens perished. Who’s to blame? “Fue el estado”, citizens cried, blaming the government for the girls’ deaths. And they’re right. Of course, it was the state. But as Guatemalan activist Leslie Lemus recently opined, a general assertion of guilt is not enough: those responsible must be brought to justice. Three civil servants of the Guatemalan social well-being department – secretary Carlos Rodas, deputy secretary Anahi Keller and shelter director Santos Torres – have been arrested. But society must also hold legally responsible Guatemala’s president, Jimmy Morales, because there is a chain of command here that can be traced all the way up to the executive. Beyond criminal justice, it is also important to place the girls’ sexual exploitation and murder within the broader context of Central American feminicide and generalised violence. Friends and family mourn one of the victims. Saul Martinez/Reuters These are related phenomena. Guatemala has an alarmingly high rate of feminicide, that is, the killing of women based on their social or biological gender. From 2000 to 2012 over 6,000 women were murdered, and according to the Global Burden of Armed Violence report, Guatemala ranked first in female homicides committed with firearms from 2007 to 2012.Gender-based violence has been increasing in Guatemala since 2013, together with sexual abuse. And the combined threat to women is forcing them to flee the country. The Hogar Seguro deaths also occurs in the context of the lethal gang and criminal violence impacting Central America’s Northern Triangle regon, not to mention a history of political violence, civil wars and drug trafficking-related violence that has always targeted women. The girls’ deaths then were not accidental. They form part of a trend in Central America and Mexico, in which women’s bodies are routinely used, exploited, destroyed, possessed, profited from and violently appropriated. A necropolitical war The murders support an idea developed as part of my research on the causes of and social impacts of drug violence. The “necropolitical war” is a conflict typology that explains criminal and sexual violence as part of a continuum that may include torture, forced disappearance, and sex trafficking. It aims to dominate populations and secure criminal markets, in part by commodifying women’s bodies. The frequent assassinations of Latin American environmental activists are part of this strategy, too. Drug traffickers, gang members and security guards, among other armed actors, sell their killing expertise to repressive governments to help secure the domestic business interests of transnational corporations. In Central America and Mexico’s regime of widespread corruption and impunity, anyone is vulnerable to violence and death. Necropolitics, though, particularly impacts society’s most marginalised – not only indigenous activists and but also, quite explicitly, women and girls.At least two necropolitical wars are currently underway in Central America. The first is that waged by cartels to obtain state “partnership” – that is, to gain privileged, protected access to trafficking routes and other critical business resources.Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel obtained this elite status during the fiercest years of the country’s war on drugs. From 2006 to 2012, it was not the target of military operations in the same way as other cartels.The second war seeks to dispossess women of their bodies. Dispossession in the Marxist sense means taking away one individual’s possessions for another to accumulate capital. In the 19th century, workers’ most valued possession was their labour, as socialist theorists well knew. Central America’s poor, rural and unemployed women often do not even have that: they have only their bodies to offer. That’s actually a valuable commodity, both in Central America’s highly machista society and in the sex trade.But bodies can cease to be valuable to the people who hold power. They get old, are unattractive or, in the case of women who refuse to be subjugated, far too rebellious to be worthwhile. Then, they become disposable. The flag in front of Guatemala’s national palace flew at half-mast after the Hogar Seguro fire. Saul Martinez/Reuters In those cases, women begin to run serious risks. Hence, the violent end met by 43 Guatemalan girls, aged 12 to 17, who, after refusing to be raped and exploited any longer, were burned to death. While these two necropolitial conflicts have different aims, they share a common feature: a dysfunctional, permanently corrupt and deadly legal-spatial realm in which impunity secures their main strategies – massacre, feminicide and forced disappearances. This machinery gives the agents of war control over drug markets and the sex trade of women and girls in their thrall, subordinating women’s rights and bodily integrity to the economy. In Mexico, where criminal violence is part of a dangerous combination that serves to “cleanse” communities of people who defend their home territory, this dynamic is clear. Guatemala’s shelter fire exposes the same malignant logic. Testimonies and reports indicate that the girls were systematically exploited for many years. Then, on International Women’s Day 2017, they finally fought back, and were summarily disappeared. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Conversation

The revelation is so disturbing that it might once have shocked the world into action: the mounting evidence that an oil-rich regime is using the brutal tactic of deliberate starvation to crush a revolt by its own citizens. Yet as famine and death spread in the world’s newest country, there is little sign of any urgent response by the world’s most powerful leaders. Instead there are growing fears that political apathy and U.S. budget cuts will make the catastrophe even worse. The man-made disaster is unfolding with relentless momentum in South Sudan, where three years of civil war have brought famine and forced nearly two-thirds of its 11 million people to depend on humanitarian aid. At least 79 aid workers have been killed since the war began, including six killed on Saturday in an ambush in government-controlled territory. The famine, declared last month, is the first anywhere in the world in nearly six years. South Sudan is now one of four countries where 20 million people are on the brink of famine – one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises since the Second World War. Less than six years ago, the United States and Canada were among the many nations celebrating South Sudan’s hard-fought independence from the Sudanese dictatorship. With its oil wealth and strong Western support, South Sudan seemed to have a bright future. Instead it has collapsed into deadly anarchy, with repeated warnings that it could be on the verge of genocide. Tens of thousands of civilians have died. Half of the government’s budget is reportedly being spent on weapons and soldiers for the war. And now the government is using its chokehold on relief supply routes to starve its opponents and control the impoverished population. United Nations officials have reported that South Sudanese soldiers are blocking the roads into regions where aid is desperately needed, demanding money and forcing dozens of relief convoys to turn back, and sometimes even attacking the convoys. In effect, the regime is using food blockades as a weapon of war, at a time when 100,000 people are officially in famine and another million are on the brink of famine. Because so many roads are blocked or dangerous, the UN has been forced to drop its food aid from airplanes flying above the malnourished regions, at a far higher cost than land routes. A leaked UN report has concluded that the famine in South Sudan is largely due to the “cumulative toll” of government military operations and restrictions on relief operations. The famine, unsurprisingly, is in an opposition-controlled region. To make the crisis even worse, the government is creating new obstacles for relief agencies, demanding an extortionate fee of $10,000 (U.S.) for every work permit for a foreign aid worker. (The fee was previously $100.) “The government’s continued unconscionable impediments to humanitarians … may amount to deliberate starvation tactics,” said Michele Sison, the U.S. deputy representative to the United Nations, at a Security Council meeting last Thursday. She said the government was using a “scorched earth campaign” to destroy thousands of homes. “The famine is not a result of drought,” she said. “It is the result of leaders more interested in political power and personal gain than in stopping violence and allowing humanitarian access.” At the same Security Council meeting, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the government is refusing even to acknowledge the existence of the crisis. “The government continues to impede deliveries of life-saving assistance, including through access denials and bureaucratic impediments,” he told the council. “The government has yet to express any meaningful concern or take any tangible steps to address the plight of its people.” The disaster is so devastating that South Sudan has become the world’s fastest-growing refugee crisis, with 1.6 million of its people fleeing across borders into Uganda and other countries. The UN is seeking $4.4-billion by the end of March to prevent a catastrophe in South Sudan and three other famine-threatened countries: Yemen, Somalia and Nigeria. Yet by February, only 2 per cent of this target had been raised. The Canadian government this month announced $119.25-million (Canadian) in humanitarian aid for the four famine-threatened countries, and other countries are beginning to chip in. But the UN’s food agency, the World Food Programme, has been so underfinanced for years that it has had to cut rations to refugees and other recipients. At the same time, U.S. President Donald Trump is proposing sharp cuts to foreign aid, including UN agencies. The United States is traditionally the biggest donor to UN relief operations, so the cuts could have a far-reaching effect. The cuts wouldn’t take effect until next year, even if they are confirmed by Congress, but they are sparking fears that the South Sudan crisis could accelerate in the longer term, with less global support. Despite the mounting outrage over the widening famine and the deliberate blocking of relief operations, the UN Security Council has failed to come up with any fresh tactics to solve the crisis. Several of its members, including the United States and Britain, have talked of international sanctions and an arms embargo to put pressure on the government. But when the United States pushed for an arms embargo against South Sudan last December, eight of the 15 council members abstained and the proposal failed. The UN is also pushing for a Regional Protection Force to provide greater security in the country, but the South Sudan government has thrown up obstacles to delay it. As frustration grows, an increasing number of independent analysts and think tanks are suggesting a more radical alternative: removing the entire government and putting South Sudan under an international trusteeship. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 The Globe and Mail

Body of a Somali refugee, killed in an attack by a helicopter while travelling in a vessel off the coast of Yemen, is carried at the Red Sea port of Hodeidah, Yemen, March 17, 2017. © 2017 Reuters An apparent Saudi-led coalition attack on a boat carrying Somali civilians off the coast of Yemen highlights the need for accountability on the second anniversary of the Yemeni armed conflict, Human Rights Watch said today. Several witnesses reported that on March 16, 2017, a helicopter fired on the boat, killing at least 32 of the 145 Somali migrants and refugees on board and one Yemeni civilian. Another 29, including six children, were wounded, and 10 more remain missing. Photos of the boat taken the next day show damage consistent with gunfire from an aerial attack. All the parties to the conflict denied responsibility for the attack. Only the Saudi-led coalition has military aircraft. The Houthi-Saleh forces do not. Somalia, which supports the coalition, called on the coalition to investigate. But the coalition has repeatedly shown itself unable or unwilling to credibly investigate its own abuses. “The coalition’s apparent firing on a boat filled with fleeing refugees is only the latest likely war crime in Yemen’s two-year-long war,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “Reckless disregard for the lives of civilians has reached a new level of depravity.” One of the boat’s four Yemeni crew members told Human Rights Watch that the boat was about 50 kilometers off the coast of the Yemeni port city of Hodeida, traveling away from Yemen, when it was attacked. That evening the captain had told the passengers to be quiet as they were transiting through “a very dangerous place,” two people onboard told Human Rights Watch. Earlier in the journey a vessel had approached and told the crew to stop the boat, but the boat continued. Four people aboard the boat said that at about 9 p.m. they saw a helicopter repeatedly shoot at the boat. A Somali woman refugee, 25, who was wounded in the attack, said, “All of a sudden, I saw a helicopter above us. ... They attacked abruptly. … When they kept firing at us, those of us who spoke Arabic kept saying, ‘We are Somalis!’” Another woman said that she was hit by a fragment from an explosive weapon. A crew member and others said a large naval ship also fired on the boat. The remains of a community hall in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen, after Saudi-led coalition warplanes attacked a funeral ceremony there on October 8, 2016. © 2016 Khaled Abdullah/Reuters After the attack, the boat docked at Hodeida port at about 4:30 a.m. The head of the fishing port, Daoud Fadel, said, “We couldn’t find a place to put the bodies, so we had to put them in the place where we store the fish.” Another witness said that, in addition to those who had been taken to nearby hospitals for treatment, about 15 men were wounded from bullets or fragments during the attack. Both the Saudi-led coalition and the Houthi-Saleh forces denied carrying out the attack. The official state news agency of the United Arab Emirates reported that a UAE military source denied that its forces had been involved and welcomed an international investigation into the incident. Coalition members have naval vessels patrolling access to the Hodeida coast, while Houthi-Saleh forces maintain control over the port. The US, which has been carrying out airstrikes in Yemen against Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), also denied carrying out the attack. Under the laws of war, attacks against civilians that are deliberate or reckless are war crimes. Since March 26, 2015, the Saudi Arabia-led coalition has carried out military operations, supported by the United States, against Houthi forces and forces loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh. The coalition has conducted numerous airstrikes that have unlawfully struck homes, markets, hospitals, and schools. Remnant of a wing assembly that is mounted on a US-made GBU-12 Paveway II laser-guided 500-pound bomb found at the Arhab water drilling site, Sanaa governorate, where at least 31 civilians were killed in an airstrike on September 10, 2016. According to the manufacturing date as well as the national stock number, this wing assembly was produced by Raytheon Company, a US defense contractor, in October 2015. © 2016 Priyanka Motaparthy / Human Rights Watch The Houthi-Saleh forces have indiscriminately shelled civilian neighborhoods, recruited child soldiers, and arbitrarily detained and forcibly disappeared scores of civilians. Since the start of the current conflict, at least 4,773 civilians had been killed and 8,272 wounded, the majority by coalition airstrikes, according to the United Nations human rights office. Human Rights Watch has documented 62 apparently unlawful coalition airstrikes, some of which may amount to war crimes, that have killed nearly 900 civilians, and documented seven indiscriminate attacks by Houthi-Saleh forces in Aden and Taizz that killed 139 people, including at least eight children. Human Rights Watch has also documented the Houthi-Saleh forces use of banned antipersonnel landmines and the coalition’s use of widely banned cluster munitions. Both parties have blocked or restricted critical relief supplies from reaching civilians. On March 23, 2017, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights called for an international, independent commission of inquiry into allegations of violations of international human rights and humanitarian law by all sides in Yemen, a call repeatedly made by national, regional, and international organizations over the past two years. The UN Human Rights Council fell short of establishing a full stand-alone inquiry in September 2016, but passed a resolution mandating the UN human rights office to deploy additional human rights experts to investigate abuses by all sides. Governments should fully support the office’s expanded investigative mandate in the absence of a standalone international inquiry, Human Rights Watch said. The Saudi-led coalition-appointed Joint Incidents Assessment Team (JIAT) has failed to meet international standards. It has absolved the coalition of responsibility in nearly all of the 17 incidents it has so far investigated and released findings that differed drastically from those of the UN and others. Although the coalition has conducted widespread unlawful attacks, the United States, United Kingdom, and France continue to sell billions of dollars of weapons to Saudi Arabia. Human Rights Watch was not able to determine which coalition member carried out the attack on the refugee boat, but the US State Department has approved licenses for the sale or servicing of military helicopters to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and Jordan. Governments should suspend all weapon sales to Saudi Arabia or risk complicity in future unlawful coalition attacks, Human Rights Watch said. “Despite the growing mountain of evidence of coalition abuses, the US, UK, and France seem more focused on selling arms to the Saudis than on their possible complicity in coalition war crimes,” Whitson said. “After two years of unlawful attacks on civilians and civilian structures, Saudi Arabia’s allies should reconsider their support and use their leverage with Riyadh to end the violations.” ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Human Rights Watch

Uruguayan peacekeepers in Congo this month. Mounting accusations of violence against civilians and the discovery of mass graves in the Kasai-Central province have prompted the chief of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Congo to urge the U.N. Security Council to press the government to open an investigation. CreditAaron Ross/Reuters KINSHASA, Democratic Republic of Congo — Members of a militia ambushed and then beheaded about 40 police officers on Friday in a central province of the Democratic Republic of Congo, officials said on Saturday. In recent months, the provinces in the Kasai region, in south-central Congo, have been the scene of fighting between the police and a local tribal militia called Kamuina Nsapu. Violence in the area has claimed more than 300 lives since August and displaced more than 200,000 people. Military authorities reported on Friday that they had lost contact with a police convoy from the capital, Kinshasa, that was making its way toward Kananga, southeast of the capital. François Kalamba, the speaker of the Kasai provincial assembly, confirmed on Saturday that the convoy had been ambushed by Kamuina Nsapu fighters between the city of Tshikapa and Kananga, and that about 40 officers had been decapitated. The central region of the country is particularly volatile because of an insurgency, with frequent clashes between militia fighters and the military and security forces, despite the presence of United Nations peacekeepers. Civilians are often caught up in the violence. Last week, the Congolese military’s auditor general announced that seven officers had been arrested and charged with war crimes after a video surfaced last month depicting soldiers shooting a group of civilians in Kasai-Central Province, a massacre that left at least 13 dead. At least five other videos that appear to show members of Congo’s military shooting civilians are now also circulating on social networking platforms Amid the mounting accusations of violence against civilians, and the discovery of 10 mass graves dug in January and February in Kasai-Central, the chief of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Congo urged the United Nations Security Council this week to press the government to open an investigation into possible human rights violations. Some elected leaders and human rights advocates in Congo have called for an independent international inquiry. This month, two United Nations officials — an American and a Swede — were among six people abducted in the Kasai-Central Province by unknown assailants. Some insurgents, however, are reportedly surrendering to the authorities. Justin Milongo, the deputy governor of Kasai-Central Province, said on Saturday that 400 Kamuina Nsapu militia fighters had “laid down their arms” in Kananga and were being detained. (C) 2017 The New York Times

Robert Lynn and Susan Howarth were tortured at their farm in South Africa. WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT LAST month, British woman Sue Howarth and her husband Robert Lynn were woken at 2am by three men breaking into a window of their remote farm in Dullstroom, a small town in the northeast of South Africa, about 240km from the nearest capital city. The couple, who had lived in the area for 20 years, were tied up, stabbed, and tortured with a blowtorch for several hours. The masked men stuffed a plastic bag down Mrs Howarth’s throat, and attempted to strangle her husband with a bag around his neck. The couple were bundled into their own truck, still in their pyjamas, and driven to a roadside where they were shot. Mrs Howarth, 64, a former pharmaceutical company executive, was shot twice in the head. Mr Lynn, 66, was shot in the neck. Miraculously he survived, and managed to flag down a passer-by early on Sunday morning. Mrs Howarth, who police said was “unrecognisable” from her injuries, had multiple skull fractures, gunshot wounds and “horrific” burns to her breasts. “Sue was discovered amongst some trees, lying in a ditch,” writes Jana Boshoff, reporter for the local Middelburg Observer newspaper. “Her rescuers managed to find her by following her groans of pain and then noticing drag marks from the road into the field. “Her head was covered with a towel. Her eyes were swollen shut. She was partially clothed with just scraps of her shirt remaining. Her breasts and upper body was bloody. The plastic bag, shoved down her throat, took some effort to remove because her jaw was clamped down tightly. “How she managed to breathe with the bag in her throat remains a mystery. One of her rescuers later recalled how Sue was unresponsive except for the constant groaning. Whilst the man ran back to the road to see if an ambulance has not arrived yet, she managed to curl one of her arms around her breasts in a last attempt to protect herself.” She was rushed to hospital and placed on life support, but died two days later. Due to her British nationality, her murder attracted an unusual amount of overseas media attention. Robert Lynn managed to survive the attack.Source:Supplied Mr Lynn shows how he was tortured with a blowtorch. Picture: ITV NewsSource:Supplied In any other country, such a crime would be almost unthinkable. But in South Africa, these kinds of farm attacks are happening nearly every day. This year so far, there have been more than 70 attacks and around 25 murders in similar attacks on white farmers. Earlier this month, for example, 64-year-old Nicci Simpson was tortured with a power drill during an attack involving three men at her home on a farm in the Vaal area, about two hours drive from Johannesburg. When paramedics arrived, they found three dead dogs, and the woman lying in a pool of blood, spokesman Russel Meiring told News24. “They used a drill to torture her,” police spokesman Lungelo Dlamini said. Official statistics on farm attacks are non-existent, due to what human rights groups have described as a “cover-up” by the notoriously corrupt — and potentially complicit — South African government. The most reliable numbers are released by the Transvaal Agricultural Union, which represents commercial farmers, and civil rights group AfriForum. According to the TAU, last year there were 345 attacks resulting in 70 deaths — the highest death toll since 2008. In 2015 there were 318 attacks resulting in 64 deaths, and the year before there were 277 attacks resulting in 67 deaths. In total, between 1998 and the end of 2016, 1848 people have been murdered in farm attacks — 1187 farmers, 490 family members, 147 farm employees, and 24 people who happened to be visiting the farm at the time. While South Africa has one of the highest rates of violent crime anywhere in the world, the attacks on white farmers are no ordinary crimes. In a 2014 report, “The Reality of Farm Tortures in South Africa”, AfriForum wrote that “the horror experienced during farm tortures is almost incomprehensible”. “The well-known ‘blood sisters’ from the South African company Crimescene-cleanup have rightly indicated that, in their experience, farm tortures are by far the most horrific acts of violence in South Africa,” the report said. “They are of the opinion that the term ‘farm murders’ is misleading and that the terms ‘farm terror’ and ‘farm tortures’ are more suitable.” An image of an elderly farm attack victim uploaded to Facebook.Source:Facebook Human rights groups say the number of attacks is increasing.Source:Facebook While sometimes farmers and their families are tortured to obtain information, such as the whereabouts of keys to the safe, human rights groups say the excessive brutality may be intended to send a message to the general farming community — get out of our country. Victims are often restrained, harmed with weapons such as machetes and pitchforks, burned with boiling water or hot irons, dragged behind vehicles and shot. Female victims are often raped during attacks. AfriForum warns that the attacks are becoming increasingly sophisticated, military-style raids, but says community farm watch groups and sharing of information on WhatsApp and Facebook were thwarting a “significant” number. The three men responsible for killing Mrs Howarth — Themba William Yika, Nkosinathi Yika and Lucas Makua — were arrested soon after, and more than 150 farmers turned up to demonstrate outside court. But any form of justice is incredibly rare, and white farmers are increasingly questioning their future. The number of white farmers in South Africa has halved in a little over two decades to just 30,000. Thousands more farms are up for sale. “The farmers live in fear, because being a farmer in South Africa is the most dangerous occupation in the world,” Henk van de Graaf, spokesman for the TAU, told Swedish newspaper Nya Tider last year. “The average murder ratio per 100,000 or the population in the world is nine, I believe. In South Africa, it is 54. But for the farming community it is 138, which is the highest for any occupation in the world.” Since 2007, at the direction of the government, South African police have stopped releasing statistics about the race of the victims. Monitoring group Genocide Watch says the cover-up has been exacerbated by American and European governments, which have “remained silent about the problem, reinforcing the campaign of denial”. The rise in farm attacks has been blamed on increasingly anti-white hate speech, particularly from the ruling African National Congress. The home of Robert Lynn and Susan Howarth. Picture: ITV NewsSource:Supplied Security footage uploaded to Facebook by Intelligence Bureau SA.Source:Facebook In 2010, high-profile ANC member Julius Malema sang “Shoot the Farmer, Kill the Boer”, which Genocide Watch describes as “once a revolutionary song, but now an incitement to commit genocide”. Malema was convicted for hate speech and the singing of the song was banned, but just seven months later president Jacob Zuma sang the song himself at an ANC event, in direct contempt of the judge’s ruling. Malema was later kicked out the ANC, forming his own Marxist party, the Economic Freedom Fighters, which is now the third-largest party in parliament. Recently, Malema has been travelling the country urging black South Africans to take back land from “Dutch thugs”. “People of South Africa, where you see a beautiful land, take it, it belongs to you,” Malema was quoted in The Telegraph as telling parliament. Perhaps in response to populist pressure from Malema, Zuma earlier this month called for the confiscation of white-owned land without compensation. Zuma urged the “black parties” in the parliament to unite to form the two-thirds majority that would be needed to make the necessary change to the country’s constitution. Last week, during a debate in parliament about the farm attacks, an ANC MP shouted “Bury them alive!” while MP Pieter Groenewald was speaking about the plight of white farmers. “This is proof that the utterances of political leaders could lead to violence and murders and that the issue of farm murders is of little importance to the ANC,” AfriForum’s head of community safety, Ian Cameron, said in a statement afterwards. “Certain members of the ANC were chatting during the debate and not listening nor partaking at all.” While right-wing groups have claimed South Africa is experiencing “white genocide”, Genocide Watch disputes that characterisation. According to the group’s founding president, Dr Gregory Stanton, “early warnings of genocide are still deep in South African society, though genocide has not begun”. South Africa president Jacob Zuma. Picture: Mujahid Safodien/AFPSource:AFP Economic Freedom Fighters leader Julius Malema.Source:AFP“ The fact that farm murders do not comply with the legal definition of genocide in no way renders the crisis that white farmers in particular face in South Africa as less imminent,” AfriForum deputy CEO Ernst Roets wrote in a report this month. “It is important to note that not all who are murdered on farms are white people. On the other hand, it is equally important to note that black farmers are not subjected to the same levels of torture as their white counterparts.”Australian rice farmer Graeme Kruger, who emigrated from South Africa to New Zealand in 1997 before coming to Australia in 2012, said an increasing number of white farmers were getting out. “I would like to say, I certainly have never been and was never a supporter of the apartheid regime, and I certainly didn’t immigrate because I wanted to get away from South Africa,” said Kruger, now executive director of the Ricegrowers’ Association of Australia.“We supported and openly celebrated the changes. But equally what is happening now is not right. To me it’s about humanity. Whether it’s the old apartheid regime or black-on-black violence or xenophobia, leaders need to be very careful with their positions and inciting violence towards anyone.”Kruger’s family, like many, has been touched by violence. “My wife’s aunt — it wasn’t a farm situation — they broke in through the roof, stole her TV, tied her up with cords and she was killed,” he said. Asked whether he feared South Africa would become another Zimbabwe, where white farmers have all but been driven out, Kruger was uncertain.“My family back in South Africa have chosen not to [get out], and they love living there,” he said. “They have a very hopeful, pragmatic view, but they are also concerned.“South Africans have got this undying ability to believe in the bigger picture, and I’m talking about many blacks. There are lots of wonderful people of all colours that believe all of this stuff is wrong. “The question I would ask, given the rhetoric, is there a future for farming in South Africa? It’s not just about, is there a future for white farmers. It’s three times more dangerous to be a farmer than it is to be a policeman. It’s sad — it’s not what we want.” ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 News AU

South African President Jacob Zuma in November 2016. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi, File) Last month, British woman Sue Howarth and her husband Robert Lynn were woken at 2am by three men breaking into a window of their remote farm in Dullstroom, a small town in the northeast of South Africa, about 150 miles from the nearest capital city. The couple, who had lived in the area for 20 years, were tied up, stabbed, and tortured with a blowtorch for several hours. The masked men stuffed a plastic bag down Howarth’s throat, and attempted to strangle her husband with a bag around his neck. The couple were bundled into their own truck, still in their pyjamas, and driven to a roadside where they were shot. Howarth, 64, a former pharmaceutical company executive, was shot twice in the head. Lynn, 66, was shot in the neck. THE WEEK IN PICTURES Miraculously he survived, and managed to flag down a passerby early on Sunday morning. Howarth, who police said was “unrecognizable” from her injuries, had multiple skull fractures, gunshot wounds and “horrific” burns to her breasts. “Sue was discovered amongst some trees, lying in a ditch,” writes Jana Boshoff, reporter for the local Middelburg Observer newspaper. “Her rescuers managed to find her by following her groans of pain and then noticing drag marks from the road into the field. NJ MAN FINDS WIFE, 6-YEAR-OLD SON STABBED TO DEATH IN HOME “Her head was covered with a towel. Her eyes were swollen shut. She was partially clothed with just scraps of her shirt remaining. Her breasts and upper body was bloody. The plastic bag, shoved down her throat, took some effort to remove because her jaw was clamped down tightly. “How she managed to breathe with the bag in her throat remains a mystery. One of her rescuers later recalled how Sue was unresponsive except for the constant groaning. Whilst the man ran back to the road to see if an ambulance has not arrived yet, she managed to curl one of her arms around her breasts in a last attempt to protect herself.” She was rushed to hospital and placed on life support, but died two days later. Due to her British nationality, her murder attracted an unusual amount of overseas media attention. In any other country, such a crime would be almost unthinkable. But in South Africa, these kinds of farm attacks are happening nearly every day. This year so far, there have been more than 70 attacks and around 25 murders in similar attacks on white farmers. Earlier this month, for example, 64-year-old Nicci Simpson was tortured with a power drill during an attack involving three men at her home on a farm in the Vaal area, about two hours drive from Johannesburg. When paramedics arrived, they found three dead dogs, and the woman lying in a pool of blood, spokesman Russel Meiring told News24. “They used a drill to torture her,” police spokesman Lungelo Dlamini said. Official statistics on farm attacks are non-existent, due to what human rights groups have described as a “cover-up” by the notoriously corrupt — and potentially complicit — South African government. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (c) 2017 Fox News