United States Africa Command

Public Affairs Office

10 May 2011

USAFRICOM - related news stories

TOP NEWS RELATED TO U.S. AFRICA COMMAND AND AFRICA

AFRICOM's Libyan Expedition (Foreign Affairs)

(Libya) Until Operation Odyssey Dawn began in Libya on March 19, U.S. Africa
Command -- the United States’ newest combatant command, established in October
2008 -- was largely untested. There was reason to worry that AFRICOM, which would
lead the operation, was too green, and its mandate too soft, for it to perform up to U.S.
standards.

Common interests, challenges discussed at African Air Chiefs Conference (Air Forces
Africa)
(Pan-Africa) Shared interests and common challenges topped discussions between
African air chiefs from 24 nations and their U.S. counterparts during the 2011 African
Air Chiefs Conference April 26 through 28 here.

Ghost of Osama Haunts East Africa - Will U.S. Cash in Death Dividend? (The East
African)
(East Africa) As the world celebrated the killing of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in
Pakistan Sunday by US Special Forces, East Africa stared at a possible new political
nightmare.

With Help From NATO, Libyan Rebels Gain Ground (NYT)

(Libya) Rebel fighters made significant gains Monday against forces loyal to Col.
Muammar el-Qaddafi in both the western and eastern areas of the country, in the first
faint signs that NATO airstrikes may be starting to strain the government forces.

Aid agencies: Refugee boat carrying hundreds sank off Libyan coast (Washington
Post)
(Libya) A boat packed with hundreds of refugees trying to flee Libya sank just off the
coast near Tripoli late last week, the United Nations’ refugee agency and the
International Organization for Migration said Monday.

UN Humanitarian Chief: Libyan Civilians Under Fire, Face Widespread Shortages

(VOA)
(Libya) The head of the United Nations humanitarian aid program said Monday that
Libya is facing widespread shortages and she called for a pause in the fighting in that
country to allow international aid agencies to address humanitarian concerns.

Libyan rebels meet in Abu Dhabi (Financial Times)

(Libya) Representatives of 25 town councils from the south and west of Libya travelled
to Abu Dhabi in an attempt to outflank the Libyan leadership and demonstrate
solidarity with rebels based in Benghazi.

Former Ivory Coast Leader Investigated (WSJ)

(Ivory Coast) Switzerland's federal prosecutor has opened a criminal investigation into
alleged money laundering by the regime of former Ivory Coast President Laurent
Gbagbo, the first such move against any of the recently deposed Middle Eastern and
African leaders.

UN: Sudan's north, south to withdraw Abyei forces (AP)

(Sudan) The United Nations says Sudan's north and south have agreed to withdraw all
"unauthorized forces" from a contested border hotspot, where fears are rising that a
new conflict could ignite as Southern Sudan prepares to become the world's newest
country.

Total Cost of Piracy Menace Hits U.S.$12 Billion (Business Daily)

(Somalia) The total cost of piracy in the Indian Ocean in 2010 - almost all of it by Somali
pirates - is estimated to be between $7 billion (Sh560 billion) and $12 billion (Sh960
billion), and could top $15 billion by 2015, according to analysts.

A Troubling Crackdown In Uganda (VOA)

(Uganda) Rising prices for food and fuel have sparked protests in East Africa, taking a
deadly turn in Uganda as authorities acted decisively to contain the demonstrations.
Dubbed "walk to work" actions by opposition leaders to highlight the rising costs of
driving, they have triggered violent clashes between protestors and police and soldiers
in the capital, Kampala, and at least five other towns. Political rivalries are helping feed
the clashes, in which five people have been killed, more than 100 injured and hundreds
more jailed.

Tackling Africa's economic problems (BBC)

(Pan-Africa) A Ugandan businessman and astronaut, he has a place on a flight of the
Virgin Galactic programme. This sci-fi image of Africa perhaps seems counter-intuitive,
but it represents a new confidence and a desire to re-brand the continent in the eyes of
the world. Africa is experiencing growth rates that are exceeding the global average,
and foreign direct investment has increased by more than 80% in the past decade.

UN News Service Africa Briefs

Full Articles on UN Website
  UN human rights staff discover mass graves in Ivorian city
 Sudan: UN welcomes agreement to withdraw forces from Abyei area
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
UPCOMING EVENTS OF INTEREST:

WHEN/WHERE: Friday, May 13th; CSIS 1800 K Street, NW, WDC 20006
WHAT: U.S. Trade Relations with Africa and Outlook for the AGOA Forum
WHO: Ambassador Demetrios Marantis, Deputy United States Trade Representative;
Dr. Mukhisa Kituyi, Former Minister of Trade and Industry, Republic of Kenya; Jack
Edlow, President of Edlow International, Co-Chair, Trade Advisory Committee on
Africa
Info: http://csis.org/event/us-trade-relations-africa-and-outlook-agoa-forum
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FULL ARTICLE TEXT

AFRICOM's Libyan Expedition (Foreign Affairs)

By JONATHAN STEVENSON
May 9, 2011
Until Operation Odyssey Dawn began in Libya on March 19, U.S. Africa Command --
the United States’ newest combatant command, established in October 2008 -- was
largely untested. There was reason to worry that AFRICOM, which would lead the
operation, was too green, and its mandate too soft, for it to perform up to U.S.
standards.

Yet in launching the U.S. intervention in Libya, AFRICOM, led by its commander,
General Carter Ham, acquitted itself well. On the first day of the operation, it
coordinated the combat operations of 11 American warships and dozens of aircraft,
fired 110 Tomahawk cruise missiles, and delivered 45 Joint Direct Attack Munitions to
ground targets. By March 23, AFRICOM-led coalition forces had steadily expanded the
no-fly zone from northwest Libya and parts of central Libya to the entire coastline. And
on March 26, AFRICOM began coordinating operations to destroy armored vehicles,
effectively (if not with specific intent) providing close air support to rebel forces.
AFRICOM lost only one aircraft -- an F-15 fighter that crashed on March 22 due to a
mechanical malfunction -- and suffered no fatalities.

There was, however, political backlash to AFRICOM’s active fighting role in the
conflict. Although the three African non-permanent members of the UN Security
Council -- Nigeria, South Africa, and Uganda -- had acquiesced to UN Resolution 1973,
the bill that green-lighted the intervention, the African Union unequivocally opposed it.
After the campaign began, the AU even tried to arrange a cease-fire, under which
Libyan leader Muammar al Qaddafi would have opened channels for humanitarian aid
and undertaken negotiations with the rebels but would also have been allowed to stay
in power.
Qaddafi, of course, had been the driving force behind the creation of the AU, in 2002 (an
effort he hoped would revitalize his geopolitical relevance). Many African leaders, from
relatively enlightened ones such as Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni to incorrigible
rogues like Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, could well view Operation Odyssey
Dawn as a harbinger of new liberal interventionism in Africa, and AFRICOM as its
principal instrument and a potential threat to regime security. Now, especially if NATO
and the Obama administration eventually use ground troops to ensure Qaddafi’s
ouster, as retired U.S. Army General James M. Dubik suggested it should in an April 25
New York Times op-ed, AFRICOM will have a hard time reestablishing its bona fides
with African governments, which were fairly tenuous even before the Libyan
intervention.

Although regaining African countries’ trust will be difficult, it is not impossible.

AFRICOM was created for relatively banal bureaucratic and planning reasons -- to
bring U.S. military activities in Africa, which had been inefficiently divided among
three existing commands (European Command, Central Command, and Pacific
Command), under a single one. But an awkward Pentagon rollout seemed to suggest
that it would entail increasing the number of U.S. bases in the region and an
intensification of military activity there. In particular, in 2007, the principal deputy
undersecretary of defense for policy, Ryan Henry, noted that the Command “would
involve one small headquarters plus five 'regional integration teams' scattered around
the continent,” and that “AFRICOM would work closely with the European Union and
NATO.” These remarks planted suspicions among African officials of the United States’
“militarization” and “recolonization” of the continent.

That perception seemed to jibe with the United States’ unabashed interests: ensuring
physical and diplomatic access to African oil and gas, containing growing Islamic
radicalization, and forestalling terrorist attacks on the United States -- the threat of
which loomed larger as al Qaeda established a franchise in North Africa (al Qaeda in
the Islamic Maghreb) and Somalia’s al Qaeda–linked al Shabab became increasingly
aggressive.

Until Operation Odyssey Dawn, however, AFRICOM had managed to ease Africa’s
fears. The Pentagon located the command’s headquarters in Stuttgart, Germany --
electing to end increasingly fraught efforts to find a continental headquarters -- and
AFRICOM’s biggest sustained military effort had been the benign Africa Partnership
Station, a group of U.S. Navy ships dispatched for six months of the year to train
African maritime forces. Its kinetic actions were limited to scattered counterterrorism
efforts in Somalia. Even U.S. naval measures to thwart proliferation and Somali piracy,
Africa’s most conspicuous international security problem in recent years, were assigned
to the battle-tested Central Command (CENTCOM).

The command’s sole ground presence in Africa was the 2,000 troop-strong Combined
Joint Task Force–Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA) in Djibouti, which operated in permissive
countries and through multilateral channels, and therefore constituted more of a
diplomatic asset than a military one. And much of AFRICOM’s time was spent
providing technical and financial support to cooperative governments and helping to
coordinate training for the AU’s five regional Africa Standby Brigades -- which are
intended eventually to become the continent’s peacekeeping and intervention forces.
Though fitful, these efforts have borne fruit. They culminated in a two-week
peacekeeping simulation held in October 2010 in Addis Ababa, which involved African
security forces, AFRICOM, and European military forces. Retired Nigerian Major
General Samaila Iliya, co-director of the exercise, acknowledged the urgent need for the
Africa Standby Force and deemed the exercise a success.

Although regaining African countries’ trust will be difficult, it is not impossible. In

Africa as in Washington, the intervention in Libya is increasingly interpreted as
signifying the Obama administration’s shift from a realist foreign policy to a more
idealist and interventionist one. And France’s significant military involvement in Cote
D’Ivoire in April, after Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo’s refusal to step down from
power when he lost re-election triggered a bloody civil war, would tend to bolster
African fears of neocolonialism. But influential members of Obama’s foreign-policy
team -- including Secretary of Defense Robert Gates (and his likely successor, current
CIA Director Leon Panetta), national security adviser Thomas Donilon, and deputy
national security adviser John Brennan -- still favor a realist approach. The
administration should signal through White House and State Department policy
statements that future humanitarian intervention is highly contingent on particular
diplomatic, military, and humanitarian circumstances, and that the Libyan intervention
constitutes neither the beginning of a trend nor a firm precedent. Secretary Gates struck
the right tone during an April 8 visit to Iraq, when he said, referring to the broad
political support for the Libya intervention, that “it's hard for me to imagine those kinds
of circumstances being replicated anyplace else.”

Together with its post-Somalia reluctance to intervene in sub-Saharan Africa, the United
States’ firm resistance to any impulse to deploy even military advisers on the ground in
Libya may also provide at least partial reassurance to African governments. More
broadly, AFRICOM can minimize turbulence in its relationships with them by reverting
after the Libya operation to its training and support function -- and executing that better
than ever. A larger budget would be required. Ramped up AFRICOM-assisted military
exercises and planning programs would communicate a commitment to steady
operational partnership. So would funding a long-term self-assessment of AFRICOM’s
programs -- something that a recent Government Accountability Office study found
that AFRICOM especially needed in order to serve the needs of its African partners.
Moving AFRICOM’s headquarters from Germany to Georgia or South Carolina, as the
Pentagon has planned, might also reinforce a healthy sense of distance among Africans.
In word as well as in deed, the idea should be to cast the Libyan operation not as a
mistake but as an exception.
----------------------
Common interests, challenges discussed at African Air Chiefs Conference (Air Forces
Africa)
By Staff Sgt. Stefanie Torres
May 9, 2011
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia - Shared interests and common challenges topped discussions
between African air chiefs from 24 nations and their U.S. counterparts during the 2011
African Air Chiefs Conference April 26 through 28 here.

The conference aims to foster communication and dialogue between regional and
multilateral partner nations facing common challenges, topics of security, partnership
programs, and to improve air safety across Africa. It was co-hosted by officials at Air
Forces Africa (17th Air Force) and the Africa Center for Strategic Studies.

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz and Chief Master Sgt. of the Air Force
James A. Roy, spoke during the conference, both noting the importance of discussing
issues that affect both U.S. and African air forces and how cooperation between nations
can benefit everyone.

"The future holds for us threats that have yet to be revealed, requirements and
challenges that have yet to materialize, and capabilities that have yet to be developed,"
General Schwartz said. "For those who embrace the spirit of cooperation and
advancement, it also holds opportunities that are to be explored and shared.

"As airmen, we share a storied heritage and boldness that resulted in humankind taking
to the skies, and throwing the door wide open to possibilities, bounded only by sky
itself," he said.

The African air chiefs in attendance identified common challenges, such as lack of
resources and insufficient training in many of the technical fields related to air safety
and security.

AFAFRICA Commander Maj. Gen. Margaret Woodward discussed ways of better

leveraging existing resources through partnership with the Air Force as well as with
each other.

"I think it's interesting to note that these themes -- the themes we hear from you -- are
identical to the issues you would hear from the United States Air Force as well,"
General Woodward said. "Like every region of the world, Africa faces security
challenges that are both unique to the continent ... and shared globally. We believe that
our only chance at truly confronting these challenges successfully is in partnership with
you."
One word that kept coming up during the conference was "trust." The venue provided
an opportunity to build relationships and establish trust between counterparts, not only
from neighboring countries, but within and across regions.

One way the U.S. works with African nations is through state-partnership programs.
The program links U.S. Guard or reserve units to a partner African nation. Together, the
partner units conduct a range of activities that may include bilateral familiarization,
medical-training exercises and leadership visits.

General Woodward said Air Forces Africa members, the air component command for
U.S. Africa Command, seek to partner with African nations to reach three common
objectives: to contribute when asked, such as offering assistance for humanitarian
missions; to foster strategic relationships that strengthen stability and promote
interoperability between militaries; and to provide the ability to respond to a crisis of
any kind.

"The bottom line is that these objectives help us focus on areas that provide the greatest
opportunity to strengthen security force cooperation between our militaries," she said.
"Like AFRICOM, we listen and learn from you and your perspectives. We recognize
what works in one country may not work in another, and we tailor our engagements
and operations according to your requirements."

More than 150 military and civilian aviation specialists attended, representing more
than 20 African air forces, as well as military and civilian aviation agencies and
organizations.
-------------------------
Ghost of Osama Haunts East Africa - Will U.S. Cash in Death Dividend? (The East
African)
By Charles Onyango-Obbo
May 9, 2011
Nairobi — As the world celebrated the killing of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in
Pakistan Sunday by US Special Forces, East Africa stared at a possible new political
nightmare.

Even with Osama's death, most analysts agree that the Al Qaeda threat has not been
buried with him, because in the last years when he has been underground and unable
to operate freely for fear that he would be killed or captured by the Americans, some
part of his loose terrorist network had drifted away and become even more fractured.

Osama though, according to US officials who have analysed materials taken from his
house after he was shot dead, still remained a rallying figure, and was still able to plan
operations and call Al Qaeda troops out of the trenches.
With Osama gone, and no one with his charisma in senior Al Qaeda ranks, his
international network is likely to disintegrate, and its regional affiliates will have to act
to raise their profile and attract financial support and recruits.

The only way they can do this is by carrying out attacks.

The wider East and North Africa are likely to pay a high price as these old Al Qaeda
affiliates bolster their brand because these groups are most active in East Africa, the
Horn, and North Africa.

The biggest and most active Al Qaeda associate in Africa is Al Shabaab in chaotic
Somalia.

East African intelligence forces say they have foiled many Al Shabaab attacks, but in
July 2010 it managed two deadly bomb attacks at venues in the Uganda capital
Kampala, where fans were watching the World Cup final. Nearly 70 people were killed,
and hundreds injured.

The Shabaab later said the attack was punishment for Uganda's interference in its
politics.

Uganda, with Burundi, mans the African Union peace-keeping force in Somalia,
Amisom.

Amisom has a decidedly aggressive policy in dealing with militants in Somalia.

The attacks on Uganda, though claimed by Al Shabaab in Somalia, were carried out by
a cell that is based in Tanzania together with elements from Kenya, indicating that the
organisation has spread its tentacles around the region.

In addition, Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, who is wanted for the terrorist bomb attacks
on the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in August 2007, which killed 244
people, is suspected to be hiding in Somalia.

Ethiopia and the US, meanwhile, have accused Eritrea of financing, training, and
harbouring Somali terrorists, and of being Al Shabaab's patron.

After the US recently dropped Sudan from its list of countries backing terrorism, Eritrea
enjoys the unique distinction of being the only African state sponsor of terrorism.

What makes Al Shabaab extremely dangerous is, as several reports have noted, what
even Al Qaeda itself considered to be the organisation's "lack of discipline".
This means that even Osama himself probably saw the Al Shabaab as an affiliate that is
likely to attack and cause many deaths, just for the sake of announcing its presence,
rather than to gain any strategic advantage or advance any cause.

The other notable Al Qaeda affiliates in Africa are Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb
(AQIM), headquartered in Algeria (formerly the Salafist Group for Call and Combat).

Another group, Armed Islamic Group (AIG), is also based in Algeria.

Then there is the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group; and in Egypt the Islamic Jihad
and the Abdullah Azzam Brigades.

Though their strength varies, put together they have left a chilling trail of killings over
the past 15 years in North and East Africa.

Though West Africa has witnessed some terrorist attacks, for some reason the region
and Southern Africa are not yet attractive destinations for the suicide bombers.

In addition to the need to mark out their territory and grab attention through new
attacks, terrorist groups in the region could feel emboldened if the US becomes content
with having killed Osama and draws down on its counterterrorism partnership with
East Africa countries.

Many of the United States' overt counterterrorism efforts in Africa are aimed towards
military assistance and surveillance, and security building.

At the continental level, its main programme is the Global Peace Operations Initiative
(GPOI) whose African face is the African Contingency Operations Training and
Assistance Programme (ACOTA).

Smaller regional programmes

This breaks down into smaller regional programmes: The Trans-Sahara Counter-
Terrorism Initiative (TSCTI); the Joint Task Force AZTEK SILENCE; and two touch on
the wider East Africa: The East African Counter-Terrorism Initiative (EACTI), and the
Combined Joint Task Force, Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA).

East Africa has attracted special interest from the international counter-terrorism
community because of its early links to transnational Islamist terrorism -- Sudan and
Somalia have both served as training grounds and transit routes for Al Qaeda, and the
agents who attacked the embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were closely linked to cells
in Sudan and Somalia.
Established in June 2003 as a programme of the Department of State, EACTI provides
states in East Africa with military training to strengthen coastal, border, Customs,
airport, and seaport security.

Under the East African Regional Strategic initiative, the American government has
spent $687 million over the past five years in Djibouti, Somalia, Kenya, Uganda,
Ethiopia and Tanzania helping the military and intelligence services in these countries
to boost their capacity.

The bulk of this money has gone to peacekeeping efforts in Somalia, which have so far
attracted $495 million.

Kenya and Ethiopia have also been big beneficiaries of the military assistance, with the
former getting $58 million and the later $35 million over the past five years. Uganda
and Tanzania got $25.41 million and $8.5 million respectively.

Kenya's position

In the war against terror, Kenya has served as the centrepiece of American counter-
terrorism strategy as evidenced by the fact that it received $38 million or 78 per cent of
the $49 million that has been spent since 2006.

This could account for Kenya's intelligence services' recent successes in help foiling a
major attack by Al Shabaab.

If the US strategy were to change to focus more attention on the Somalia crisis, Kenya,
Tanzania's and Uganda's share of US military assistance budget is likely to rise.

This is to support both military capability and intelligence gathering in the region. In
the period between 2009 and 2012, Kenya is expected to receive $3 billion of aid money
from America, which is the largest share in Africa.

The bulk of this money is for security assistance, and fighting child mortality and
HIV/Aids. Ethiopia, Sudan, and Nigeria are expected to get $2.5 billion each.

The monies poured into counter-terrorism, also enabled regional security agencies to
deal with other transnational crimes like human trafficking, in addition to drugs.

Should the US decide to cash in its Osama-death dividend cheque, and divert its
counter-terrorism money to fix its debt-burdened economy at home, international crime
syndicates could increase their activities, leading to a more fragile situation in East
Africa.
-------------------------
With Help From NATO, Libyan Rebels Gain Ground (NYT)
By C. J. CHIVERS
May 9, 2011
QARYAT AZ ZURAYQ, Libya — Rebel fighters made significant gains Monday against
forces loyal to Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi in both the western and eastern areas of the
country, in the first faint signs that NATO airstrikes may be starting to strain the
government forces.

In the besieged western city of Misurata hundreds of rebels broke through one of the
front lines late on Sunday, and by Monday afternoon were consolidating their position
on the ground a few miles to the city’s west.

The breakout of what had been nearly static lines came after NATO aircraft spent days
striking positions and military equipment held by the Qaddafi forces, weakening them
to the point that a ground attack was possible, the rebels said.

While not in itself a decisive shift for a city that remained besieged, the swift advance,
made with few rebel casualties, carried both signs of rebel optimism and hints of the
weakness of at least one frontline loyalist unit.

But more potential signs of loyalist weakness emerged in a battle near the eastern oil
town of Brega, where rebel fighters killed more than 36 Qaddafi soldiers and destroyed
more than 10 vehicles, according to a senior rebel military official, who requested
anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about military operations. Six rebel
fighters died in the battle, the official said, adding that the rebel troops retreated east
from Brega after the attack on orders from NATO, presumably in advance of airstrikes.

While the rebels’ tally of the dead could not be independently verified, if accurate it
would seem to represent — after the protracted battle for Tripoli Street in Misurata last
month — one of the largest tolls of Qaddafi soldiers killed in a single battle since
February. The battlefield success, if confirmed, might also signal a change in tactics —
or at least fortunes — for the reorganized Free Libya Forces, as the eastern fighters now
prefer to be called.

In an effort to prove their reach is nationwide, and not limited to eastern Libya, rebel
leaders arranged a meeting Monday of 25 local council leaders, representing areas of
central, western and southern Libya. The leaders, meeting in Abu Dhabi, in the United
Arab Emirates, expressed their support for the uprising and their recognition of the
rebel National Transitional Council and its leader, Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, Libya’s former
justice minister.

Signs of an enemy in disarray were evident in Misurata as the rebels moved west —
abandoned green uniforms, abandoned food and houses along the road with interiors
full of human waste, as if the Qaddafi soldiers, under threat of air attack, had been
afraid to venture outside.
Inside the shattered ruins of one compound, a petting zoo and poultry-breeding center,
the unburied body of a Qaddafi soldier, at least several days old, was sprawled face
down on the ground not far from a rotting ostrich, still in its cage.

The rebels had stopped in the afternoon just short of the town of Ad Dafniyah, where
they took up positions with rifles and machine-gun trucks against a Qaddafi position
that blocked their way.

The Qaddafi soldiers raked the air over the rebels’ heads with machine-gun fire and
dropped mortar rounds, grenades from automatic launchers and rockets in the field
and stands of trees around the rebels, to little effect. The rebels said they had
surrounded a few holdout Qaddafi positions and would soon push on, to Ad Dafniyah.

In recent weeks, the siege of Misurata has been fought on four principal fronts — the
one here is to the city’s west. The others include a wide and winding front line around
the airport, which the Qaddafi soldiers still occupy, and two to the east and southeast,
from where Qaddafi forces have been firing ground-to-ground rockets on the seaport,
the city’s lifeline to the world.

The breakout in the west did not appear to have an immediate effect elsewhere. At the
front near the airport, a commander there said that his fighters were in a strong
position, but that he wanted them to move methodically because the Qaddafi soldiers
had taken up strong defensive positions on both sides of the main road.

“Even now we could push them out,” the commander said. “But we are careful because
we would lose many lives. So we will wait until we finish our plan.” The commander, a
former lieutenant colonel in the Qaddafi military, asked that his name be withheld to
prevent retaliation against his relatives elsewhere in Libya.

The area around the seaport and the city’s fuel terminal also remained under pressure
on Monday.
Late last week, the port was struck by ground-to-ground rockets that scattered land
mines over part of the harbor. The fuel terminal was hit early Saturday by a separate
barrage of high-explosive Grad rockets, at least one of which ignited three storage
tanks, causing a fire that still burned on Monday.

Hafed Makhlouf, the port’s supervisor, said late on Monday that the harbor had not
been shelled in more than a day, and that the port was open. NATO warships had
helped by searching the channel with sonar, he said, and by assigning a minesweeper to
clear the approach to the jetties at the harbor’s mouth.

“The situation for the moment is O.K.,” Mr. Makhlouf said.

Two vessels — an aid ship and a fishing boat carrying rebel supplies — entered the
harbor on Monday and tied off at its piers, the first to arrive there since last Wednesday.

A few minutes after Mr. Makhlouf spoke, three mortar or artillery rounds exploded
nearby — a reminder that no matter the success at the city’s western front, at the eastern
front the Qaddafi forces remained within range.

Later in the evening, more shells landed in the city, apparently fired from the vicinity of
the airport. One of them struck a civilian neighborhood, wounding four women and
two children.

Rebel fighters said the advance to the west was significant. On at least this front, the
Qaddafi forces were now outside of mortar range of the city, they said, and
approaching the edge of the range of many of their heavier weapons.

The rebels have said that pushing the Qaddafi forces out of the range of Grad rockets
has been one of their immediate tactical goals. That would be about 12 miles for the
varieties the loyalists are known to possess, though newer generations of the rockets
can fly more than 20 miles.

And as more rebel forces flowed westward — hundreds of fighters were on the road
outside Ad Dafniyah on Monday afternoon — they spoke of pushing even farther, and
trying to connect with supporters in towns to the west, and demonstrating to other
Libyans that the Qaddafi military could be broken.

Outside the airport, the commander dared a sentence that mixed prediction with hope.
“I think the days of Qaddafi are now shorter,” he said. “Maybe he has only a few weeks
more.”
--------------------
Aid agencies: Refugee boat carrying hundreds sank off Libyan coast (Washington
Post)
By Michael Birnbaum
May 9, 7:17 PM
TRIPOLI, Libya — A boat packed with hundreds of refugees trying to flee Libya sank
just off the coast near Tripoli late last week, the United Nations’ refugee agency and the
International Organization for Migration said Monday.

The ship, which left from the Tripoli area, capsized just hundreds of yards from the
shore, the organizations said, citing accounts by refugees who arrived on the Italian
island of Lampedusa on Sunday on a vessel that left immediately after the one that
capsized. But precise details, including the number of people who died, remained
unclear.
Refugees said they saw bodies floating in the water as they sailed through the area, said
Laura Boldrini, a spokeswoman for the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for
Refugees.

“They said they saw the boat capsizing in front of them,” Boldrini said. It was not clear
how many bodies had been recovered. The Libyan government has severely restricted
the movements of reporters in Tripoli, hampering their ability to collect information.

Thousands of people have fled Libya since fighting started in February between rebels
and forces loyal to Moammar Gaddafi, who has led the country since 1969. Lampedusa,
which is about 180 miles off the coast of Libya, has been flooded with refugees. Aid
agencies have said that the refugees have made the sea journey in dangerous
circumstances.

Some have come over in small craft. More recently, Boldrini said, larger ships have been
making the voyage, and they are often overloaded. She said that the ship that arrived
immediately before the one that sank was carrying 655 people and that the one that
followed was carrying 798 people.

A spokesman for the International Organization for Migration, which has also been
involved in aid work in Lampedusa, said one survivor of the shipwreck told them that
she made it back to the Libyan shore but was forced onto the next ship by armed men. It
was unclear who the men were. Libyan officials did not respond to requests for
comment.

“Some of the people who survived this shipwreck were obviously not keen to get on
another boat,” said Jean-Philippe Chauzy, a spokesman for the International
Organization for Migration. “They and others waiting in the area were forced onto the
ship by armed men, who were apparently shooting into the air.”

Chauzy said that refugees had told his organization that they had to pay little or no
money for the passage to Lampedusa but that the people running the boats took all
their possessions before allowing them on the ship.

Tripoli’s Roman Catholic bishop, Giovanni Martinelli, who has close ties to Eritrean
Catholic migrants working in Libya, told the Italian daily Corriere della Sera that
Eritreans and Somalis were among those on board the ship that sank.

Ships in poor condition have made fleeing Libya extremely dangerous. The Guardian, a
British newspaper, reported Monday that 61 people died after their boat ran out of fuel
and was left to drift in the Mediterranean for 16 days at the end of March. The
newspaper reported that the migrants made contact with a NATO aircraft carrier and a
military helicopter, but that they were not rescued. NATO said it had not received any
distress calls.
And a ship carrying refugees ran aground near Lampedusa over the weekend. All
aboard were rescued.

Meanwhile, heavy fighting continued in the rebel-held city of Misurata on Monday,

according to residents there reached via Skype. The city is under siege by government
forces and has come under heavy assault in recent weeks.

The city’s main fuel depot, which was hit early Saturday, is still ablaze, said
Mohammed Abdullah, a professor. “It is still burning — the oil is still burning,” the
Misurata resident said. Rebel officials said this weekend that the city has enough
supplies to last three or four weeks.

A ship chartered by the International Committee of the Red Cross arrived in Misurata
Monday morning, bringing medical supplies for the hospital, spare parts to repair
water and electrical supply systems, and baby food for the civilian population,
according a Red Cross spokeswoman in the rebel headquarters of Benghazi.

Early Tuesday, planes and explosions were heard over Tripoli, and the Libyan
government took journalists to the site of a library and school that it said had been
bombed by NATO. It was the same site that had been bombed just over a week ago and
is 50 yards from a large communications tower, which was not hit. Several large
explosions and gunfire were heard hours later.
------------------
UN Humanitarian Chief: Libyan Civilians Under Fire, Face Widespread Shortages
(VOA)
By Larry Freund
May 9, 2011
The head of the United Nations humanitarian aid program said Monday that Libya is
facing widespread shortages and she called for a pause in the fighting in that country to
allow international aid agencies to address humanitarian concerns.

The humanitarian aid chief at the United Nations, Valerie Amos, told the U.N. Security
Council that the the breakdown of infrastructure, and shortages of cash and fuel are
causing serious problems for the Libyan people. Amos said more than 746,000 people,
most of them third-country nationals, have fled Libya. She said some 5,000 people are
stranded at border points in Egypt, Tunisia and Niger. About 58,000 internally
displaced people are living in settlements in eastern Libya.

Amos said widespread shortages are paralyzing Libya in ways that will seriously affect
the general population in the months ahead, particularly the poorest and the most
vulnerable. She said that despite repeated U.N. requests, civilians in Libya are still
coming under fire. "This has to stop. The Security Council must continue to insist that
all parties respect international humanitarian law and insure civilians are spared. The
reported use of cluster bombs, sea and land mines as well as deaths and injuries caused
by aerial bombing show a callous disregard for the physical and psychological well-
being of civilians," she said.

Amos called on all sides in the fighting to agree to a temporary ceasefire in Misrata and
other areas.

The U.N. humanitarian chief said that $144 million has been raised for relief work in
Libya, less than half of what is needed, although she indicated that additional funds
will be requested in the days ahead.
-----------------------
Libyan rebels meet in Abu Dhabi (Financial Times)
By James Drummond
May 10 2011 01:37
Representatives of 25 town councils from the south and west of Libya travelled to Abu
Dhabi in an attempt to outflank the Libyan leadership and demonstrate solidarity with
rebels based in Benghazi.

Spokesmen said about 60 people attended the meeting in the capital of the United Arab
Emirates on Monday to undermine claims by Colonel Muammer Gaddafi that the rebel
national council in Benghazi in the east of the country aimed to split Libya in two. They
said Libyans from the west and south also support the uprising, which began in March.

“All these councils called each other and requested the [United Arab] Emirates to host
this meeting,” Mr Zaidan said. “Most of the people came from inside either via Tunisia
or via Niger and they will return back.”

The UAE is one of two Arab states, alongside Qatar, which have sent planes to help
enforce a Nato-enforced no-fly zone over Libya. Mr Zaidan insisted that Monday’s
meeting was not directly funded or initiated by the UAE.

The representatives will travel to Doha, the Qatari capital, on Tuesday and will fly to
Benghazi ahead of Friday prayers. “Then we will have meeting in Court Square in
Benghazi to show that the all Libyan regions are behind the council in Benghazi,” Mr
Zaidan said.

The main courthouse in Benghazi has become a focal point for the anti-Gaddafi
opposition in Libya.
--------------------
Former Ivory Coast Leader Investigated (WSJ)
By DEBORAH BALL And CASSELL BRYAN-LOW
ZURICH—Switzerland's federal prosecutor has opened a criminal investigation into
alleged money laundering by the regime of former Ivory Coast President Laurent
Gbagbo, the first such move against any of the recently deposed Middle Eastern and
African leaders.

Meanwhile, a Swiss lawyer raised allegations that Mr. Gbagbo diverted the proceeds of
the sale of a luxury Swiss villa that belonged to the Ivory Coast state.

Bruno de Preux, a prominent Geneva lawyer, filed a complaint with Switzerland's

federal prosecutor on behalf of the Ivory Coast government in March against Mr.
Gbagbo, his family and a number of close associates whom the attorney declined to
name. The move wasn't made public then.

The prosecutor subsequently opened an investigation into unknown persons associated

with the regime, although a spokeswoman declined to specify when. According to Mr.
de Preux, the complaint is signed by Ivory Coast's Justice Minister Jeannot Ahoussou-
Kouadio and Finance Minister Charles Koffi Diby. The complaint alleges that the
wealth controlled by Mr. Gbagbo and his inner circle is inconsistent with the salaries
earned by public officials.

A lawyer for Mr. Gbagbo said Swiss authorities haven't informed him or his client
about any investigation. He said Mr. Gbagbo doesn't have a bank account in
Switzerland and would deny accusations of money laundering.

"I am not at all worried," said Marcel Ceccaldi, Mr. Ggagbo's lawyer. Mr. Ceccaldi said
he would deal with the other allegations against his client in due course.

Mr. de Preux and Mario Stasi, a Paris lawyer, also have raised questions regarding the
sale of a villa near Geneva for 15 million Swiss francs ($17.1 million) in May 2010. They
have evidence that at least a portion of the money was deposited into an account
controlled by a Parisian notary, rather than in the Ivory Coast's official account in Paris,
according to Mr. de Preux. Mr. Stasi added that the lawyers are looking into assets Mr.
Gbagbo may have in France.

In January, the Swiss government ordered a freeze on assets belonging to Mr. Gbagbo
and 90 other people associated with his regime, as well as 11 banks and businesses with
close ties to his government.

Last week, the government said Swiss banks had frozen a total of 80 million francs of
assets.

Also last week, Alassane Ouattara took the oath as president of the Ivory Coast after
months of civil conflict. Supporters of Mr. Ouattara fought the forces of Mr. Gbagbo
after he refused to relinquish his president's post following his election defeat in
November 2010.
The push to recover assets comes as Ivory Coast prosecutors over the weekend
questioned Mr. Gbagbo, who has been under house arrest since April 11, regarding his
role in the post-electoral violence that left at least 3,000 dead. Ivory Coast prosecutors
have said they also would question the former president over allegations that he stole
proceeds from the country's central bank.

Mr. Ceccaldi and another lawyer for Mr. Gbagbo have complained they were denied
entry into the Ivory Coast and couldn't represent his client during his questioning on
Saturday.

In Ivory Coast, fighting has continued in the southwestern region of Bas-Sassandra,

some 62 miles east of the border with Liberia. Residents there said the army has sealed
routes leading to the border, trapping pro-Gbagbo soldiers and Liberian mercenaries
believed to have fought for the former president in the heart of the cocoa-producing
belt.

"The mercenaries can't blend in because of their accents and we also know who is pro-
Gbagbo here," said Aboubacar Ouedrago, a resident in the important growing region of
Soubre. Heavy-weapons fire was heard across the area all day, he added.

The Hague-based International Criminal Court has said it was planning to launch an
investigation into alleged widespread killings in Ivory Coast, a probe that could involve
both sides of the conflict.

Ivory Coast government officials have promised to investigate the mass graves of about
800 people found in the western town of Duekoue last month. Human-rights groups
said forces loyal to Mr. Ouattara were behind the massacres. Mr. Ouattara has
previously said no crime would be left unpunished, even if perpetrated by his
supporters.

Meanwhile, new governments in Tunisia and Egypt are pressing ahead with efforts to
recover assets after regime changes. Tunisia has been in discussions with lawyers and
other advisers about assisting with the asset-recovery process.

Switzerland and other financial centers have frozen hundreds of millions of dollars of
assets belonging to former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Tunisia's former
president, Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali. However, no charges have been filed outside these
countries.

In Egypt, a court has sentenced the former interior minister to 12 years in prison for
corruption, the first conviction of a senior former regime official since a popular
uprising drove Mr. Mubarak from power on Feb. 11. Many top officials from Mr.
Mubarak's regime are behind bars pending corruption investigations, including the
former prime minister and Mr. Mubarak's two sons, Gamal and Alaa.
----------------------
UN: Sudan's north, south to withdraw Abyei forces (AP)
The United Nations says Sudan's north and south have agreed to withdraw all
"unauthorized forces" from a contested border hotspot, where fears are rising that a
new conflict could ignite as Southern Sudan prepares to become the world's newest
country.

The northern and southern governments agreed to deploy a joint north-south force in
Abyei and withdraw the forces that are stoking tensions in the area, the U.N. in a
Sunday statement.

The deal is the latest effort to quell tensions in Abyei, a fertile and oil-producing border
region to which both north and south Sudan stake claim.

The north and south have signed several U.N.-brokered deals on the status of Abyei
this year, but none of them have been fully implemented and the status of the territory
remains unresolved.

The International Crisis Group warned Sunday that "Abyei is on the brink of dangerous
new conflict."

"Failure to halt the downward trend toward violence in Abyei could unravel the
tenuous peace that has been strong enough to get through the Southern Sudan
referendum," the Brussels-based think tank said in a statement.

A land of blond grasslands during the dry season and lush green expanses during the
rainy season, Abyei is home to Ngok Dinka subsistence farmers who are loyal to the
south.

The region is also used by the Misseriya people, Arab cattle-herders who graze
seasonally through Abyei, moving south to water their cattle at the River Kiir, which
they call the Bahr el-Arab. Even the name of this treasured water source is contested by
these two populations who warily coexist on this land.

Abyei was promised its own self-determination vote in the 2005 north-south peace deal
that ended decades of war. That referendum was set to occur at the same time as
Southern Sudan's January independence vote, but it did not happen due to a dispute
between north and south over who should be eligible to vote.

As southerners headed peacefully to the polls in January, clashes broke out in Abyei.
The militarized zone has been on edge since then, with more than 100 people killed in
clashes.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Friday that the military standoff is
unacceptable and threatens peace.

Hollywood star and activist George Clooney's satellite monitoring project has released
images showing hundreds of torched huts and burned villages after some of these
attacks.

At least 14 people died in a clash between armed forces earlier this month.

Diplomats hope the removal of forces from Abyei could reduce the chances of further
violence. Both sides have traded accusations that the other is supporting proxy forces in
Abyei.

"There was good will from both sides and we hope to follow-up on this spirit," said
Major Gen. Moses Bisong Obi, the commander in charge of the 10,000 peacekeepers in
the U.N.'s Sudan mission, after Sunday's meeting in the northern town of Kadugli.

However, both north and south Sudan have made official overtures suggesting they
control the disputed region.

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir threatened last month he would not recognize the
new southern nation if it includes Abyei.

And the first draft of Southern Sudan's interim constitution, approved by the cabinet
last week, refers to Abyei as part of the south.

Al-Bashir and southern leader Salva Kiir pledged earlier this year to resolve the Abyei
stalemate by the end of March. That deadline passed with no further progress
announced by either side.

Sudan has endured various civil wars for all but a few years of its independent history.
The oil-rich south will become the world's newest country on July 9, though analysts
say the nation will struggle to address security and development challenges within its
borders.
----------------------
Total Cost of Piracy Menace Hits U.S.$12 Billion (Business Daily)
By Christine Mungai
9 May 2011
The total cost of piracy in the Indian Ocean in 2010 - almost all of it by Somali pirates - is
estimated to be between $7 billion (Sh560 billion) and $12 billion (Sh960 billion), and
could top $15 billion by 2015, according to analysts.

This bill includes ransoms, insurance payments, the cost of naval operations,
prosecutions and of rerouting ships.
A recent study reported that Somali pirates are earning up to $79,000 a year, 150 times
the average annual income in Somalia.

The study by political and economic intelligence consultancy firm, Geopolicity,

revealed that the area under the threat of piracy has steadily extended to some 2.5
million square nautical miles off Somalia's coastline, an increase of one million nautical
miles from two years ago.

Another study by anti-piracy organisation, Oceans Beyond Piracy, forecasts piracy

could cost $15 billion in the next four years, as more pirates sign up and bigger
intervention measures are consequently rolled out.

The Indian Ocean accounts for fully half of the world's container traffic, and 70 per cent
of total global petroleum traffic passes through it.

The gulfs of Aden and Oman are among the world's major shipping lanes: About 21,000
ships, and 11 per cent of global crude oil traffic, cross the Gulf of Aden every year.

The ports of Mombasa and Dar es Salaam handled a combined cargo of 25 million
tonnes in 2008 - not just for Kenya and Tanzania respectively, but also for inland
countries such as Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Southern Sudan,
Rwanda and Burundi.

Together, East Africa's ports account for approximately a fifth of sub-Saharan Africa's
container traffic, with an average annual growth of 6 per cent since 1995.

The Indian Ocean is particularly significant for the region in terms of communication: A
17,000 km undersea fibre-optic cable connects South Africa, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda
and Mozambique to Europe and Asia.

Incidents of piracy have soared from 276 in 2005 to 445 in 2010. According to the
International Maritime Bureau, there were 142 attacks between January and March 2011
- 97 off the coast of Somalia - up from 35 in the same period the previous year and an
all-time high.

Pirates managed to seize 18 vessels worldwide, capturing more than 340 hostages in
attacks in which seven crew members died and 34 were injured.

Over the past five years, Somali pirates' ransom demands have increased a staggering
thirty-six fold, from an average of $150,000 in 2005 to $5.4 million in 2010.

The largest known ransom payment was for the South Korean oil tanker Samho Dream,
for which a record $9.5 million was paid in November 2010.
Somali pirates' income for 2010 was around $238 million.

Oceans Beyond Piracy estimates that the total excess costs of insurance due to Somali
piracy are between $460 million and $3.2 billion per year, which have steadily increased
since the Gulf of Aden was classified as a war risk area in May 2008.

The cost of piracy trials and imprisonment in 2010 was around $31 million, and the
excess cost of re-routing ships to avoid risk zones is estimated to be between $2.4 billion
and $3 billion per year.

This, coupled with the cost of naval forces and protection, puts the total bill at between
$7 billion and $12 billion.

The study reports that the continued growth of piracy could see the numbers of pirates,
estimated to be at least 1,500, rise by up to 400 every year.

As a result, the costs of piracy could reach more than $15 billion by 2015.

Currently there are three international naval task forces in the region, with numerous
national vessels and task forces entering and leaving the region, engaging in counter-
piracy operations for various lengths of time.

The primary mission is Combined Task Force 151 (CTF-151), also patrolling are
warships from Russia, China and India, among others.
------------------------
A Troubling Crackdown In Uganda (VOA)
By Unattributed Author
May 9, 2011
Rising prices for food and fuel have sparked protests in East Africa, taking a deadly
turn in Uganda as authorities acted decisively to contain the demonstrations. Dubbed
"walk to work" actions by opposition leaders to highlight the rising costs of driving,
they have triggered violent clashes between protestors and police and soldiers in the
capital, Kampala, and at least five other towns. Political rivalries are helping feed the
clashes, in which five people have been killed, more than 100 injured and hundreds
more jailed.

The United States is deeply troubled by this tragic loss of life and injury. That Uganda's
security forces have arrested political opponents of the government who have taken
part in the protests is of equal concern. The government's crackdown has even extended
to the press with attempted restrictions on media coverage of the protests and on at
least one occasion the blocking of social networking websites.
With consumer prices in Uganda rising more than 11 percent in the month of March
alone, the protestors' concerns are real and the demonstrations will likely continue. The
government's heavy handed reaction increases the chances of further clashes in a cycle
of violence that can feed on itself.

Uganda is a valued friend and partner of our nation and we renew our call for the
government there to respect the opposition's right to express its views and the people's
rights to demonstrate peacefully and without fear of intimidation. Freedom of
expression and peaceful assembly are fundamental human rights and a critical
component of democracy.
----------------------
Tackling Africa's economic problems (BBC)
By Karen Allen
May 9, 2011
A Ugandan businessman and astronaut, he has a place on a flight of the Virgin Galactic
programme.

This sci-fi image of Africa perhaps seems counter-intuitive, but it represents a new
confidence and a desire to re-brand the continent in the eyes of the world.

The spaceship that will send Mr Thakkar to the stars will be launched thousands of
miles away in Philadelphia, but it represents a desire for the continent to be taken
seriously in an increasingly hi-tech world.

Africa is experiencing growth rates that are exceeding the global average, and foreign
direct investment has increased by more than 80% in the past decade.

"It's a great time for Africa," grins Mr Thakkar. "It's a time to focus on taking advantage
of our natural resources and gain from technological knowledge transfer."

Sourcing own power

But getting products out to customers in many countries in Africa continues to be as big
a challenge as sending a man to the moon.

"Forty per cent of agricultural produce perishes on the way to market," says Professor
Mthuli Ncube, chief economist and vice president of the African Development Bank.

Microsoft's Mteto Nyati says Africa has a skills problem He says infrastructure,
especially transport and power, will be the single biggest factor that helps transform the
continent.
The World Bank estimates that $93bn (£57bn) worth of infrastructural investment is
needed in Africa. That includes everything from roads, railways and schools to reliable
energy sources.

Many businesses in Nigeria have taken to developing their own power sources because
the national grid cannot be relied on - despite the country's considerable oil wealth.

Without these bare essentials operating costs remain high, making businesses
uncompetitive. But less than half the amount needed is actually being spent on
infrastructure, and grand cross-border projects sometimes hit the buffers.

Prof Ncube concedes part of the challenge is down to is down to operational problems.
Legal hurdles can impede the rolling out of big projects across national boundaries.

And poor leadership has caused many infrastructural initiatives to remain pipe dreams.

Yet the roll-out of technological infrastructure - like the East African cabling system
which provides fibre optic cables from Mombasa to the United Arab Emirates -
demonstrates the enormous potential to transform a region.

Not only is the project a template for public-private partnerships, but it has also
provided a platform for thousands of new tech-based businesses to grow.

Everything from computerised real-time mapping services like Ushahidi in Kenya, to

telephonic banking services which are set to expand massively in the region, have
sprung up on the back of this kind of development.

And on top of that, the middle classes are becoming a rapidly growing domestic market
for home-grown services.

Agricultural advantage

But Africa needs to be cautious about adopting an Asian model of business

development in a bid to stave off their markets being flooded by cheap Chinese
imports.

That's a view that's increasingly gaining traction in Africa's business world.

Many believe Africa should concentrate on building up its agriculture sector Mteto
Nyati, managing director of Microsoft South Africa, argues that with 70% of the
population on the continent living in rural areas - and roughly the same number under
the age of 30 - the emphasis must be on creating jobs in areas where Africa has
resources.
"We have a problem with skills, so I don't think we necessarily should be looking at
manufacturing expansion and too much large scale hi-tech," he says.

"[We should] look at where we have a comparative advantage and it is in agriculture.

We should be feeding the rest of the world."

He wants Africa's leaders to study best practices in areas such as agriculture and
emulate them, rather than being seduced by the model of China.

"We cannot be China, we don't have a billion people, we have got people who are
illiterate, we have to train them so we have to look at agriculture," he says.

But he fears the continent's leaders have yet to drive this through. Farmers are leaving
countries like South Africa and being hired for their skills further north, at a time when
Africa could be feeding the world.

Social entrepreneurship

On the demand side, Africa is seeing a growing domestic market with a middle class
that now represents about 34% of the continent's population.

Some social entrepreneurs are offering help to pull people out of poverty But the
African Development Bank warns that more than half of them risk slipping back to join
the poorer classes unless their spending and earning potential is harnessed.

A growing middle class buys mobile phones, travels in cars and requires housing. Yet
mortgages have been risky business in a continent which has been prone to instability.
Now though in East Africa mortgage markets have been on the rise.

The demand for cheap houses has attracted the innovative flair of the social
entrepreneurship sector.

Social entrepreneurs like Aleke Dondo step onto the scene when "market fails", to use
the economic jargon, often leveraging funds from donors to establish operations, which
in time will flourish into fully-fledged revenue-generating businesses.

Aleke's project in Kenya provides low-cost mortgages to former slum dwellers to pull
themselves out of poverty, asset financing for smallholder farming, and rural banking
services in areas where previously there were none.

"We need the government to help create an enabling environment to help initiatives like
these to flourish," he says.

Do this for a period of five years and you will really start to see change, he says.
Tackling unemployment

But one of the biggest challenges for the coming decade, with a huge political price tag
attached, is how to create more jobs.

South Africa may be the powerhouse of the continent but it is also one of the most
unequal societies in the world - one in four people is unemployed, according to official
figures - and right across the continent unemployment breeds instability.

Coupled with perceptions of poor leadership, as we've seen in North Africa and more
recently in Uganda, and it can prove positively toxic.

Some commentators see Kenya's Raila Odinga as heralding a new style of leadership in
Africa South Africa's Jacob Zuma has pledged to create five million jobs and cut
unemployment by 15% by 2022, but getting a quality workforce requires good
education.

Geoff Rothschild, director for the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, puts education right at
the very top of the continent's priorities in helping to groom the next generation of
workers.

But it requires leadership and commitment, and Mr Rothschild is among the optimists
who see a new style of political leadership slowly emerging in Africa.

He's clearly impressed about a new generation of leaders such as Kenya's Raila Odinga
and Zimbabwe's Morgan Tsvangarai.

Both prime ministers were forced into uncomfortable power-sharing deals, from which
many hope they will emerge humbled rather than vengeful.

Both men will face elections next year so let us wait and see the results.

The vast majority of Africans have yet to feel the direct benefits of growth rates of 5.5%.

But what is beginning to emerge is a consensus over what should be the priorities to
sustain such growth and ensure that this - as so many analysts are saying - is Africa's
decade.
--------------------------
UN News Service Africa Briefs
Full Articles on UN Website

UN human rights staff discover mass graves in Ivorian city

9 May – United Nations human rights workers have found the bodies of nearly 70
people, apparently the victims of a militia backing the former Ivorian president Laurent
Gbagbo, in a series of graves in a suburb of Côte d’Ivoire’s biggest city, Abidjan.

Sudan: UN welcomes agreement to withdraw forces from Abyei area

9 May – The United Nations peacekeeping mission in Sudan (UNMIS) has welcomed
the commitment of the northern and southern sides to withdraw their forces from
Abyei and to immediately deploy combined teams to the disputed area to provide
security.