Peace Negotiations Watch
Monday, June 27, 2005
(Volume IV, Number 23)
Contents:
Armenia/Azerbaijan
Voters go to polls in disputed Nagorno
Karabakh enclave
Turnout
in controversial elections reported to be over sixty percent.
Russia says elections do not change
status of Nagorno Karabakh
Azerbaijan
considers elections to be illegal.
Burundi/Rwanda
Security Council asks Annan to negotiate
Burundi truth commission and war crimes chamber
Security Council resolution on justice
in Burundi adopted unanimously.
European Union deploys election
observers ahead of Burundi parliamentary poll next month
Burundian parliamentary poll scheduled
to be held July 4.
Chechnya
Kremlin seeks to defuse anger over
accusations of brutal raid in Chechnya
Russian security forces accused of
abducting eleven people.
Congo
U.N.: Rape As Weapon of War High in Congo
Sexual violence high in eastern
Congo and Darfur region of Sudan.
African Union say 45,000 troops may be
needed to forcibly disarm Rwandan rebels in Congo
Envoy states EU would support the
forcible disarmament and relocation of Rwandan rebels.
Democratic Republic of Congo Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the DR
Congo Negotiation Simulation.
Georgia/Abkhazia
Georgian prosecutors soon to reveal
identity of person suspected of Bush grenade throwing
Defective hand grenade landed within 100
feet of President Bush.
Indonesia
Jakarta hopes conflict in tsumai-hit
Aceh will be resolved in August
Both sides
reportedly closing in on a finalized agreement.
Red Cross worker shot and wounded in
Indonesia's Aceh province
Incident first
time since tsunami that an aid worker has been injured in Aceh.
Indonesia's Aceh to hold its first
public caning under Islamic sharia laws
Islamic
tribunal established in Aceh in 2003.
Aceh
Negotiation Simulation
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here to access the Aceh
Negotiation Simulation.
Ivory
Coast
Ivory
Coast warring parties won't begin disarming on June 27 as planned
Further
negotiations scheduled to take place in Pretoria.
New round of Ivory Coast peace talks to
be held in South Africa on June 28
Military governor
appointed for western Ivory Coast.
Kashmir
Pakistan submits request for minister to
travel on cross-Kashmir bus
Information
minister’s request tarnished by accusations he previously ran militant training
camp.
Kashmir separatists ready for talks with
India, hardliners opposed
Hardliners
want India to recognize human rights abuses.
Kashmir
Negotiation Simulation
Click
here to access the Kashmir
Negotiation Simulation
Kosovo
Kosovo Serbs block bridge in
ethnically-divided town
Fighting on bridge in Mitrovica leads to arrests.
Romania wants Kosovo to remain part of
Serbia
Romania weighs in on Kosovo final status debate.
Kosovo Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the Kosovo
Negotiation Simulation.
Liberia
Liberia's Taylor must face justice, US
warns Nigeria
American ambassador encourages Nigeria
to hand-over Charles Taylor.
Moldova
Russia
worried about economy of separatist region in Moldova after customs dispute
Voronin
rejects statehood for Transnistria plan considered by Moscow.
Moldovan
foreign minister calls on Russia to withdraw troops from Trans-Dniester
Russia has
failed to fulfill 1999 agreement with OSCE to withdraw troops and weapons.
Morocco
Western Sahara issue tests ties between
Morocco and Spain
Nine Spanish visitors denied entry into
Western Sahara for allegedly supporting separatists.
Nepal
First joint attack by Maoist rebels from
India and Nepal; 21 dead in India's Bihar state
Maoist
insurgents attack town near Nepali border in India.
More than half a dozen killed in Maoist
attack in west Nepal
Maoist
insurgents denied entry into security base.
Nepal Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the Nepal
Negotiation Simulation.
Philippines
Philippine forces capture Abu Sayyaf
guerrilla
Abu Sayyaf included on State Department
list of foreign terrorist organizations.
Serbia &
Montenegro
Serbian
president to attend 10th anniversary of Bosnian massacre
Tadic visit to Srebrenica draws
criticism from families of victims.
Serbia's
war crimes prosecutor to file charges next month in connection with Srebrenica
killings
Prosecutor notes Serbia has not
addressed Srebrenica massacre as of yet.
Prison Changes Milosevic, but Not His
Version of Events
Milosevic trial has set a record
for longevity in international law cases.
Somalia
Somali reconcilation talks fail,
homeless government faces new crisis
Negotiations held in Yemen break down
and end in no decision.
Sri Lanka
Sri
Lanka's Muslims accuse government of discrimination in tsunami aid deal
Second largest minority group in
Sri Lanka alleges discrimination in aid distribution.
Sri
Lanka signs tsunami aid deal with Tamil Tiger rebels
Marxists oppose aid deal, as well.
Sri Lanka Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the Sri
Lanka Negotiation Simulation
Sudan
AU mediators to restart Sudan peace
talks despite Chad hitch
Debate over whether to allow Chad as a
party to talks stalls proceedings.
Darfur rebels threaten to suspend Sudan
peace talks in Nigeria
SLM accuses Sudanese government of
attacking its forces in eastern Sudan.
Armenia/Azerbaijan
Voters go to polls in disputed Nagorno
Karabakh enclave
Agence France Presse, 6/19/05
Voters
cast their ballots Sunday in parliamentary polls in the self-proclaimed
republic of Nagorno Karabakh, a mostly ethnic Armenian enclave within
Azerbaijan, amid strong opposition from Azeri authorities. Seven parties and 185 candidates were vying
for places in Nagorno Karabakh's fourth parliament, with two thirds of the
parliament's 33 seats to be elected directly and one third under a proportional
system. No major violations had been
reported by the time polling stations closed at 8:00 pm (1500 GMT) with
preliminary results expected Monday morning.
Voting
was brisk, with lines forming outside polling stations and officials reporting
turnout at 60.5 percent by 5:00 pm, exceeding the 25 percent minimum needed for
the vote to be declared legitimate. The
central market in Stepanakert, the enclave's main city, was unusually empty as
traders deserted their stalls to vote. "Everyone's
gone to vote," said one trader, gleeful at her temporary monopoly. Nagorno Karabakh's authorities have said the
vote is a chance to prove to the world the territory's independence.
"I
voted for stability, independence and prosperity," Nagorno Karabakh's
leader, Arkady Gukasyan, said after casting his ballot. It was essential, Gukasyan said earlier, that
the vote meet European standards in order to avoid harming Nagorno Karabakh's
image and "the process of peaceful settlement with Azerbaijan". But Azerbaijan, which claims the territory,
said any vote in the region would remain illegal until hundreds of thousands of
Azeris banished from Nagorno Karabakh and seven surrounding regions were
allowed to return.
"Armenia
is zealous to legalize the occupation... elections and referendums on the
occupied territories must be conducted only after the territory's restoration
to Azerbaijan," Azerbaijan's election commission said in a written
statement on Saturday. Nagorno Karabakh
is widely seen as propped up by Armenia, which fought a war with Azerbaijan
over the territory in 1993 and 1994 that left an estimated 25,000 people dead
and forced a million people from their homes, three quarters of them Azeri. On Friday, Turkey, long at odds with Armenia
and a staunch supporter of Azerbaijan, joined its ally in criticizing the poll.
"Turkey
believes that such unilateral initiatives... will not help efforts for a
peaceful settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh problem and considers those
elections as illegitimate," foreign ministry spokesman Namik Tan said in a
statement. No foreign governments have
sent observer missions, reflecting the territory's unresolved status. But as voting got under way Sunday, monitors
from non-governmental organizations reported a number of minor violations.
Supporters
of Araig Horutyunyan, a candidate closely linked to Nagorno Karabakh's leader,
"were actively proselytizing" near polling stations, said Antranig
Kasabaryan, local representative of the Tufenkyan foundation, a New York-based
aid group. Earlier, Gukasyan had rounded
on opposition parties, accusing them of "insinuations" and
"libel" after they accused senior Karabakh officials of abusing their
positions in order to win support.
"False
rumors were circulated that the authorities sanctioned pressure on the
electorate, threatened people... this didn't and couldn't happen,"
Gukasyan said. The unrecognized Nagorno
Karabakh Republic has a population of 145,000. It is spread over eight regions
of Azerbaijan including Karabakh itself and comprises 14 percent of
Azerbaijan's overall territory. The
parliament is elected for a five-year term.
Russia says elections do not change
status of Nagorno Karabakh
Agence France Presse, 6/22/05
Russia
said Wednesday a solution to the dispute over the self-proclaimed republic of
Nagorno Karabakh should not depend on elections held there, and that the
presence of Russian observers at the vote did not imply recognition. "Moscow considers that the resolution of
the conflict should not depend on the organization of such and such elections
in Nagorno Karabakh," Russia's foreign ministry said in a statement.
Officials
of the breakaway state have argued that Sunday's vote, from which the ruling
party emerged victorious, was a step toward international recognition. "The Russian citizens who traveled there
as observers are in Karabakh on their own accord and exclusively in a personal
role," the statement said. The
ministry reiterated that Russia "has never recognized Nagorno Karabakh as
an independent state," and "always supported the territorial
integrity of Azerbaijan."
Azerbaijan
considers any vote in the region illegal until hundreds of thousands of Azeris
banished from Karabakh and seven surrounding regions are allowed to return. The enclave is widely seen as being propped
up by Armenia, which fought Baku in a war for control over Nagorno Karabakh
between 1993 and 1994 that claimed some 25,000 lives and forced another million
residents -- mostly Azeris -- from their homes.
Armenia is the only country to recognize Nagorno Karabakh as an
independent state.
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Security Council asks Annan to negotiate
Burundi truth commission and war crimes chamber
Edith
M. Lederer, Associated Press, 6/20/05
The
U.N. Security Council asked Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Monday to start
negotiations with the key parties in Burundi on creating a truth and
reconciliation commission and a special chamber to prosecute alleged war crimes
in the central African country.
In
a resolution adopted unanimously, the council said it was convinced of the need
to bring to justice those with the greatest responsibility for genocide, war
crimes and crimes against humanity since Burundi became independent in 1962 to
deter future crimes and end "the climate of impunity" in the country
and in the Great Lakes region. The
council also acknowledged "the crucial importance of reconciliation for
peace and national unity in Burundi" and said a truth commission would
contribute to achieving that goal.
Assistant
Secretary-General for Legal Affairs Ralph Zacklin told the council last week
that because of Burundi's deeply divided society and history of violence, a
U.N. mission had recommended a dual effort "to clarify the historical
truth, investigate the crimes and bring to justice those responsible."
The
Security Council asked Annan to start negotiations with the government and all
concerned Burundian parties on how to establish a truth commission and a
special war crimes chamber in the country's court system. It called for a
report by Sept. 30 including costs, structures and a time frame for the
commission and chamber to start operating.
Burundi
has been embroiled in repeated ethnic violence since independence in 1962.
After a 12-year civil war that began in 1993 and killed 250,000 people, most of
them civilians, the country is in the throes of a peace process meant to return
democracy to the central African nation.
The civil war began after Burundi's first democratically elected
president, a Hutu, was assassinated by Tutsi paratroopers and pitted the
Tutsi-dominated army against rebels from the Hutu majority.
Despite
being in the minority, Tutsis have effectively controlled Burundi for all but a
few months since independence from Belgium in 1962 - and there have been
inter-ethnic killings in 1965, 1972, 1988 and 1991 as well as 1993.
A
series of peace deals led to the creation of a transitional government in 2001
and only one rebel group now remains outside the peace process, although it has
agreed to a cease-fire. Local government elections were held earlier this
month, members of the lower house of parliament will be elected July 4, and the
new legislature will then elect a new president on Aug. 19.
The
truth and reconciliation commission the U.N. mission proposed would be
established under Burundian law and have five members - three international and
two national, Zacklin said last week. Its mandate would be "to establish
the historical facts and determine the causes and nature of the conflict in
Burundi, classify the crimes committed since independence in 1962, and identify
those responsible," he said.
If
the commission was established quickly, the results of its investigation could
be shared with the prosecutor of the special chamber, who would prosecute those
with the greatest responsibility for genocide and war crimes, he said. The mission called for a majority of
international judges and an international prosecutor, but Zacklin stressed that
the Burundian people must feel a "deep and genuine" sense of national
ownership of both bodies.
He
said both operations would have to rely almost entirely on international
funding. Burundi's Justice Minister
Didace Kiganahe told the council last week that his government supported the
recommendations, but was concerned about the risk of overlap. It also believes
that reconciliation should be at the heart of peace and national unity, he
said.
European Union deploys election
observers ahead of Burundi parliamentary poll next month
Agence France Presse, 6/22/05
The
European Union has deployed 12 election observers to monitor campaigns and
other election-related issues in the leadup to parliamentary elections next
month, a spokeswoman said Wednesday. Burundi's
parliamentary poll is scheduled to be held July 4 and is part of a process to
establish an elected and democratic government in the central African country
in a bid to end an 11-year conflict. Another
64 observers will arrive in Burundi later this month but will only stay a few
days after the elections, Manuela Melchioli, a spokeswoman for the observers,
told The Associated Press. The 12
observers who are already in the country will stay until Burundi's electoral
process ends with the election of a president in August, Melchioli said.
Burundi's
war began in October 1993 after its first democratically elected president, a
Hutu, was assassinated by Tutsi paratroopers. Some 250,000 people, most of them
civilians, have been killed in the war. A
series of peace deals led to the creation of a transitional government in 2001,
which most of the rebels have joined. Only one rebel group remains outside the
peace process, but it has agreed to a cease-fire. An upper house of parliament will be elected
on July 25, which, together with members to the lower house, will elect a new
president on Aug. 19.
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Kremlin seeks to defuse anger over
accusations of brutal raid in Chechnya
Steve
Gutterman, Associated Press, 6/22/05
The
Kremlin tried to resolve a potentially explosive situation in Chechnya
Wednesday, where residents of a village say 11 people were abducted and one
killed in a brutal raid by Russian-backed security forces earlier this month. President Vladimir Putin's envoy to southern
Russia met with residents of Borozdinovskaya, a village near the border with
the Dagestan region, and federal prosecutors launched an investigation into the
June 4 violence there.
"If
what Borozdinovskaya residents are saying is true, then what was done in the
village is an act of direct sabotage against Russia, Dagestan and
Chechnya," Russian news agencies quoted Putin's envoy, Dmitry Kozak, as
saying. Russian media also reported that
the federal prosecutors for the region are investigating the raid, which has
drawn the attention of human rights groups and heightened tension between
Chechnya and Dagestan. The involvement
of Kozak and federal prosecutors suggests the Kremlin is concerned that anger
over the raid could lead to a spread of violence in the volatile North Caucasus
region beyond Chechnya.
Most
residents of Borozdinovskaya are of Dagestani descent and hundreds have fled to
Dagestan since the raid, which they say was carried out by members of Vostok, a
mostly ethnic Chechen force subordinate to the Russian Defense Ministry. "If we start having massive migrations
of people for these reasons, the North Caucasus will burn," Kozak said in
a televised comment. "If anyone thinks banditry and lawlessness can be
fought with bandit methods, he is sorely mistaken."
Chechnya's
Moscow-backed president Alu Alkhanov said he had fired Khusein Nutayev, the
chief of the district that includes Borozdinovskaya, for failing to avert the
violence. Kozak threatened other dismissals.
After a meeting with Kozak and a delegation of Borozdinovskaya
residents, Alkhanov set a deadline of 10 days for authorities to find out what
has happened to the abductees, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported. The top federal prosecutor for southern
Russia, Nikolai Shepel, said on state-run television that authorities had
identified some of the participants in the raid. He confirmed that members of
Vostok had entered the village that day.
Chechnya,
ravaged by two separatist wars in the past decade, has been plagued by
abductions. Rights groups have accused Russian troops and Moscow-backed Chechen
security forces of widespread abuses of civilians during raids ostensibly
conducted to detain rebels or their accomplices. Residents and officials in Dagestan have
accused Chechen security forces of abducting Dagestanis in cross-border
operations.
The
secretary of Dagestan's Security Council, Akhmednabi Magdigadzhiyev, told a
news conference Wednesday that Dagestani authorities want the people who have
fled the Borozdinovskaya area for Dagestan to return to their homes, but said
Chechen authorities have done little to persuade them to come back.
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U.N.: Rape As Weapon of War High in Congo
Bryan Mealer, Associated
Press, 6/22/05
The teenager with flowers in her hair crossed her
hands to keep them from trembling and described how she was raped by 10
militiamen. Abducted two years ago when
she was 16, Ombeni was kept as a concubine in the forests of eastern Congo. She
became pregnant and at nearly nine months gestation, her captors cut her vagina
with a machete, leaving the baby dead and abandoning the teenager in the
forest. "I laid there for one
week," Ombeni said. "Until insects came out of my body." Ombeni
was eventually rescued by a woman who was foraging for food and made her way to
a clinic for rape victims.
She is one of thousands of women who are brutally
raped each year in Congo, another layer of degradation in a war that never
seems to end. In a briefing before the
U.N. Security Council on Tuesday, U.N. humanitarian chief Jan Egeland said rape
as a weapon of war was at its worst in eastern Congo and the Darfur region of
Sudan. Egeland said the scale,
prevalence and profound impact of sexual violence made it one of the most
serious challenges facing those trying to protect civilians caught up in war.
Ensuring rapists were punished and restoring local justice systems were key to
addressing the problem, he said.
In Congo, for those who manage to survive
kidnappings and gang rapes, there is the clinic at Panzi General Hospital.
Located on the outskirts of the provincial capital Bukavu, it treats more than
300 rape victims each month. Ombeni has
spent months at the clinic, undergoing three operations to repair her bladder
and awaiting a fourth. She says her captors were not trying to "deliver my
baby, but to kill me and the baby."
With funding from the European Commission, the
clinic provides medical and psychiatric care, as well as counseling to help
women re-enter society. Rape victims are often ostracized in Africa, where
husbands and families routinely kick out their wives and mothers if they have
been raped. The United States government
also provides funding to over a dozen organizations in the region offering
counseling, family mediation, medical care and legal representation to victims
and their families. Since 2003, the combined programs have helped over 16,000
women.
Most rapes in the area are committed by Rwandan Hutu
rebels, who fled into eastern Congo after Rwanda's 1994 genocide, said Panzi's
medical director Denis Mukwege. Generally,
militiamen will circle a village and rape all the women, he said. Then they'll
choose the young ones and take them as slaves into the forest-covered
mountains. "I had a 60-year-old
woman who was raped with bamboo. Can you imagine?" Mukwege asked.
"Yesterday she died."
"This is not an issue of sexual desire,"
he added. "The aim is to destroy."
The number of rape cases is increasing, he said. Since January, 1,700
women have been admitted to the clinic. The clinic expects to treat about 3,600
women by year's end - up from 2,700 last year.
Mukwege said this number is only a fraction of the women who are raped
in outlying villages. Most choose to keep silent, fearing reprisals by militia
or banishment.
When victims arrive at Panzi clinic, they're put in
touch with Cecile Mulolo, a psychologist who counsels the women, who often turn
up alone and terrified. Mulolo, a
preacher's wife with a broad smile, visits a recovery ward where a dozen
patients have undergone surgery to treat injuries from brutal rapes. The room
is dim, and catheters dangle from each bed.
"I praise God that I'm alive, that I made it here," said one
girl, who's school books lay wrapped in her bed sheets.
At a halfway house down a dusty road from the
clinic, 22 recovering rape victims learn to weave handbags and how to make
bread and soap, in the likelihood their families will reject them and they will
have to make their own way in the world.
"This way they feel useful, and maybe can recover some respect from
their families," said Mulolo. "Even though they were raped, they must
know they're still important."
Every woman in the home says she was raped by Hutu
rebels, who continue to wreak havoc on Congo as it tries to recover from years
of war. Rwanda invaded Congo twice, in 1996 and 1998, under the auspices of
driving the rebels out, but never seemed to catch them. Many argue there will never be peace in
eastern Congo until the rebels are gone.
Back in her office, Mulolo chats with Nabintu, a
41-year-old woman who was raped by militiamen two years ago and contracted
AIDS. Her husband banished her to a spare bedroom after the rape, but doesn't
know about her sickness.
"He'll chase her off if he finds out,"
said Mulolo. "These are the consequences of rape." Hearing this, Nabintu buries her face in a
scarf and cries. Mulolo reaches across the desk and takes the woman's hands. "Courage, mama," she says.
"Courage."
African Union say 45,000 troops may be
needed to forcibly disarm Rwandan rebels in Congo
Anthony Mitchell, Associated Press, 6/24/05
Disarming Rwandan rebels who continue to rape, kill
and kidnap civilians in lawless eastern Congo could take some 45,000 soldiers,
the African Union said Friday. The
53-nation bloc plans to send experts to Congo next month to explore the
possibility of deploying African troops to the region to disarm the insurgents,
AU Peace and Security Commissioner Said Djinnit said.
A report released Friday by the AU Commission
Chairman Alpha Oumar Konare said "forcible disarmament" of the rebels
would entail a mission of between 30-45,000 soldiers, "assuming an
anticipated degree of resistance." Thousands
of Rwandan Hutus, the country's ethnic majority, fled to eastern Congo after
taking part in the 1994 genocide of more than 500,000 people, most of them
minority Tutsis. They then took up arms against the Tutsi-dominated government
that took over after the genocide and began fighting from bases in eastern
Congo.
Rwanda has twice invaded Congo to hunt down the
rebels, and in 1998 sparked a five-year war in Congo that sucked in six African
nations and killed nearly 4 million people, aid groups say. Some of the rebels have returned to Rwanda in
recent years under a program sponsored by the Rwandan government. But hundreds or thousands are thought to
remain in Congo, and Rwanda threatened in December to invade a third time,
prompting Congo to send thousands of soldiers to the border in a tense
face-off.
The European Union said Friday it would support the
use of force to disarm and remove Rwandan rebels from Congo. "Political means are not producing any
result ... so we keep preparing the military option, if they don't want to come
we implement the military option," said Aldo Ajello, the EU special envoy
for the African Great Lakes region. Speaking
in Kigali, Rwanda, he said the EU was helping train the Congolese army to go
after the rebels.
He said the U.N. mission in Congo could aid with
such a mission, "and if this will not be enough, we still have the option
of inter-African force." The
African Union pledged in January to send some 7,000 troops to help restore
order in eastern Congo, the scene of one of the world's worst humanitarian
crises. But no African country has
committed forces for the operation and no date has been set for their arrival
in Congo, Djinnit said.
"These rebel forces intend to complete the
genocide they didn't complete in 1994," Rwanda's presidential envoy
Richard Sezibera told reporters on the sidelines of the AU peace and security
council meeting. "It is up to the
international community to answer that. They need to deal with these forces as
expeditiously as possible," Sezibera said.
Democratic Republic of Congo Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the DR
Congo Negotiation Simulation prepared by the Public International Law &
Policy Group.
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Georgian prosecutors soon to reveal
identity of person suspected of Bush grenade throwing
Associated Press, 6/24/05
Georgia's
Prosecutor-General Zurab Adeishvili said on Friday that authorities will soon
be in a position to say who allegedly threw a hand grenade that landed within
100 feet (31 meters) of U.S President George W. Bush during his visit last
month to the former Soviet republic.
"In
the interests of the investigation I cannot yet give any details, but in the
nearest future, the public will be informed who carried out this crime,"
he told reporters. The FBI has said that the grenade, which was live but did
not explode, was a threat to the U.S president's life.
Bush
on May 10 spoke to tens of thousands of people in Freedom Square, a main plaza
in Tbilisi, as part of a visit aimed at cementing relations between the United
States and Georgia's new pro-Western leadership. He offered strong support for
Georgia's democratic developments, and the crowd response was overwhelmingly
favorable.
President
Mikhail Saakashvili also was on the podium when Bush spoke, raising the
prospect that the grenade could have been directed at him. Saakashvili, who
came to power after the 2003 Rose Revolution that ousted Eduard Shevardnadze, has
provoked enmity with anti-corruption initiatives and insistence on restoring
control over two de-facto independent separatist regions.
Bush
spoke from behind bulletproof glass and the White House initially said Bush
never was in danger in the incident. A
reward of about $11,000 (€9,120) was offered for information about those
responsible. According to the FBI's
initial investigation, the grenade failed to explode only because of a
malfunction.
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Jakarta hopes conflict in tsumai-hit
Aceh will be resolved in August
Agence France Presse, 6/20/05
The
Indonesian government said Monday it hoped a long-running separatist conflict
in its tsunami-hammered western province of Aceh could be resolved by August
through peace talks in Finland. Information
Minister Sofyan Djalil said that several rounds of talks between Jakarta and
the rebels in Helsinki had resolved almost all of their differences and both
sides were closing in on a finalised agreement.
"We
expect the whole issue will be solved by August," Djalil, who is part of
the government's negotiation team, told reporters. "About 90 percent of
the issues have been actually settled."
His comments contradicted earlier signals from the government that it
was losing faith in the talks as a medium through which to resolve the
three-decade conflict, in which more than 14,000 people have lost their lives.
A
fragile peace deal between the government and the Free Aceh Movement guerrillas
-- who accuse Jakarta of exploiting the province's rich resources -- collapsed
in 2003 prior to the launch of a major military offensive. Both parties agreed to reopen the dialogue in
the wake of the December 26 tsunami, which killed more than 126,000 people in
Aceh, in order to safeguard the relief and reconstruction effort.
But
fighting has continued with almost daily loss of life. The peace process has been undermined by a
growing chorus of dissent, with Indonesian lawmakers and military officials
denouncing efforts to negotiate with the rebels.
Indonesia's
senior security minister Widodo Adisucipto said last week that Jakarta would
not bow to rebel demands for political representation, a key point in the peace
talks. The military has meanwhile
repeated its rejection of rebel calls for a post-tsunami ceasefire in the
province.
Red Cross worker shot and wounded in
Indonesia's Aceh province
Irwan
Firdaus, Associated Press, 6/23/05
Shots
were fired at a Red Cross vehicle in Indonesia's tsunami-ravaged Aceh province,
wounding a female Chinese delegate in the neck, a spokesman for the federation
said Thursday. The circumstances of the
shooting were not immediately clear, but the incident is the first time since
the tsunami that a foreign aid worker has been the victim of serious violence
in the province, which is home to a longrunning separatist war.
Two
shots were fired at the vehicle close to the west coast town of Lamno on
Wednesday evening, said Virgil Grandfield, a spokesman for the International
Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. Eva Yeung, a 28-year-old resident of Hong
Kong, was shot in the neck and is in a stable condition. She was flown to the
city of Medan by a U.N. helicopter on Thursday. Three other people in the car
were unharmed, he said.
Aceh
province is home to a longrunning separatist conflict that has killed some
12,000 people since 1976. Clashes between the rebels and government troops have
continued since the Dec. 26 tsunami, but have been less frequent than before
the disaster. "We don't know if she
was shot in a cross fire incident, or by the military, guerrillas or
bandits," said Grandfield. "It is not clear." A Red Cross security delegate was
investigating the incident. Rebel
spokesman Sofyan Dawood said he had no reports of any clashes between
insurgents and army troops in Lamno district on Wednesday night.
"We
have heard of this shooting, but if anyone accuses GAM of carrying it out we
deny it because GAM fighters only shoot in self-defense," he said by cell
phone from an undisclosed location in the province. GAM is the Indonesian
acronym of the Free Aceh Movement. A
military spokesman said he had yet to hear of the incident. Both sides have pledged to avoid targeting
the thousands of international aid workers that have flocked to the region
since the tsunami, which killed more than 130,000 people in Aceh.
Relief
agencies have said that the ongoing conflict has not affected their work there. Since the tsunami, government and rebel
negotiators have met three times in Finland to seek a peace deal in the
province. The government has said it hopes to sign a deal by August.
Indonesia's Aceh to hold its first
public caning under Islamic sharia laws
Agence France Presse, 6/23/05
Indonesia's
province of Aceh, where partial Islamic law is in force, is to hold its first
public caning on Friday, an official said Thursday. Twenty-six Acehnese Muslims found guilty of
gambling will be caned after Friday's prayers outside the main mosque in
Bireuen district, some 165 kilometers (102 miles) southeast of the provincial
capital Banda Aceh, the district chief said.
"The flogging will be performed on a stage using a rattan
cane," Bireuen district chief Mustafa Abdullah Geulanggang said.
The
government allowed Aceh to implement sharia, or Islamic law, in 2001 as part of
limited self-rule to pacify clamor for independence, but an Islamic tribunal
was only established in late 2003 in the province. Geulanggang said officials covering their
head and face would cane each of the convicted gamblers between six and eight
times depending on the severity of their crime, he said.
"The
caning should not shed blood," Geulanggang said. "If blood flows, the
flogging should be halted and the convicted be treated until the wound heals
before he can again face the rest of his canning sentence. "The aim of the caning is to make
violators of sharia deterred and embarrassed so that they will not repeat the
deed in the future." Another man
convicted of gambling has been exempted after he paid a hefty fine of 25
million rupiah (about 2,600 dollars), said the local chief prosecutor, Adnan.
Most
of the convicted men were arrested in February, before authorities in Bireun
agreed on the use of caning as punishment for drinking, gambling and sexual
offences. They were sentenced by the
Bireuen district sharia court in April and May.
The caning would be the first in staunchly Muslim Aceh since the
government allowed the province to implement sharia as part of an autonomy
package four years ago.
Aceh,
where armed separatists have been fighting since 1976, has so far only
partially implemented sharia, enforcing Muslim dress codes and obligations such
as daily five-time prayers, fasting and alms.
Gambling is illegal throughout Indonesia.
Aceh
Negotiation Simulation
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here to access the Aceh
Negotiation Simulation prepared by the Public International Law &
Policy Group.
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Ivory
Coast warring parties won't begin disarming on June 27 as planned
Serme Lassina, Associated
Press, 6/22/05
Warring parties won't begin laying down weapons next
week as planned, further delaying a campaign seen as crucial for lasting peace
in Ivory Coast, the top disarmament official said Wednesday. Rebel troops and government-allied militia
fighters were to begin giving up arms on June 27 under a peace pact meant to
knit Ivory Coast together after its 2002-2003 civil war.
But the official overseeing the disarmament
campaign, Alain Richard Donwahi, said Wednesday that another peace conference
was scheduled in South Africa's capital of Pretoria next week and a new
disarmament launch date wasn't likely to be known until after the meeting's
conclusion. "I believe that as we
leave the Pretoria summit, only then could we exactly say what will
happen," he told reporters in the northern rebel stronghold of Bouake.
A further delay was widely expected in the
long-stalled drive to get fighters to disarm.
South African President Thabo Mbeki brokered the latest Ivory Coast
peace deal in April to end the civil war sparked by a failed coup in September
2002 that left the northern half of the world's largest cocoa grower in rebel
hands.
A French-backed 2003 peace deal ended major fighting
but left the country divided and tense. Mbeki,
as the African Union mediator in the conflict, had called for a nationwide
disarmament campaign to begin mid-May. Earlier attempts to begin disarmament
had also met with repeated failure.
In late April, both sides pulled back heavy weapons
from front lines that divide the nation, where about 10,000 U.N. and French
troops have been deployed to bolster security and help prevent all-out war. President Laurent Gbagbo's government said
long-awaited presidential elections would be held Oct. 30.
New round of Ivory Coast peace talks to
be held in South Africa on June 28
Pauline
Bax, Associated Press, 6/23/05
New
talks to jump-start Ivory Coast's stalled peace process will be held in South
Africa on June 28, officials said Thursday.
President Laurent Gbagbo will attend the meeting in Pretoria along with
opposition rivals Henri Konan Bedie and Alassane Dramane Ouattara, presidential
spokesman Desire Tagro told The Associated Press.
South
African President Thabo Mbeki brokered the latest Ivory Coast peace deal in
April, but a nationwide disarmament campaign that was due to begin June 27 has
been delayed amid rising tension and new violence in the war-divided West
African country. Rebels have also
accused the government of preparing to launch new attacks, charges Gbagbo's
government has denied.
Rebels,
who have held the northern half of Ivory Coast since a failed 2002 coup
attempt, were also expected in Pretoria, officials said. Earlier this week, a top disarmament official
said warring parties won't begin laying down weapons next week as planned and a
new date wasn't likely to be known until after the latest South African talks
end.
On
Saturday, Gbagbo announced he had appointed a military governor for volatile
western Ivory Coast, where up to 70 people were hacked or shot to death in
recent violence. Both sides have accused each other of being behind the
violence in Duekoue, a western town nominally controlled by the government
where pro-government militias are active.
Mbeki,
as the African Union mediator in the conflict, had called for a nationwide
disarmament campaign to begin mid-May. Earlier attempts had also met with
repeated failure. In late April, both
sides pulled back heavy weapons from front lines that divide the nation, where
about 10,000 U.N. and French troops have been deployed to bolster security and
help prevent all-out war. President
Laurent Gbagbo's government has said long-awaited presidential elections would
be held Oct. 30.
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Pakistan submits request for minister to
travel on cross-Kashmir bus
Roshan
Mughal, Associated Press, 6/23/05
Pakistan
on Thursday submitted a request for its chief government spokesman to travel on
a cross-Kashmir bus later this month for a private visit to the
Indian-administered portion of the divided Himalayan region, officials said. Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed's
planned visit has been surrounded by controversy over allegations - denied by
the minister - that he once ran a camp to train militants fighting Indian rule
in Kashmir.
On
Thursday, Pakistani and Indian officials met at the militarized border in
Kashmir to exchange a list of passengers to travel on the June 30 run of the
fortnightly service, which links the capitals of the Pakistani- and
Indian-administered portions of Kashmir, said Liaquat Hussain, deputy
commissioner of Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-administered Kashmir. Authorities in each country approve the
other's list before the passengers travel.
Ahmed
- who has relatives in the Indian part of Kashmir and says he wants to travel
as a private citizen rather than in an official capacity - said Pakistan's
Foreign Ministry told him that India would make a decision on June 27. "The ball is now in India's court, and
let us see what they do and how they move," he told The Associated Press.
In
a statement, the Indian External Affairs Ministry said: "We have received
the application of Sheikh Rashid, which will be processed in due course." Opposition in India to the Pakistani
minister's planned visit has grown since Yasin Malik, a former Kashmiri
militant leader-turned politician, reportedly told a gathering in Islamabad
earlier this month that Ahmed had once helped train 3,500 militants at a camp
near the capital.
Malik,
who was visiting Pakistan as part of a delegation of moderate Kashmiri
separatist leaders, later claimed that he had been misquoted. A retired former Pakistan army chief,
however, acknowledged the camp existed and was shut down in 1991. Ahmed says
the camp only provided shelter for Kashmiri refugees. Kashmir is divided between Pakistan and
India, which have fought two of their three wars over the region after gaining
independence from Britain in 1947.
New
Delhi has long accused Islamabad of backing militants fighting Indian troops in
the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir. Pakistan says it only gives Kashmiris
political, moral and diplomatic support.
More than 66,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in
insurgency since 1989. In April,
Pakistan and India initiated the cross-Kashmir bus to boost to a
year-and-a-half-long peace process aimed at ending hostilities.
Meanwhile
on Thursday, members of a Pakistani committee on Kashmir, meeting in Islamabad,
demanded that Kashmiri leaders be involved in India-Paksitan talks over the
territory. "Kashmiris are the
affected party and without their involvement there could be no lasting peace in
the region," a government statement said.
Kashmir separatists ready for talks with
India, hardliners opposed
Agence France Presse, 6/25/05
Moderate
members of Indian Kashmir's separatist alliance said Saturday they were ready
to reopen a stalled dialogue with India on the disputed region's future as
hardliners branded such an exercise as "meaningless." "We have held meaningful talks with
Pakistan. We are ready to reopen talks with New Delhi," said Mirwaiz Umar
Farooq, head of the moderate faction of the alliance, the All Parties Hurriyat
Conference. The call to renew the
dialogue aimed at helping resolve the future of Kashmir follows the return of
Kashmiri separatist leaders from groundbreaking talks in Pakistan earlier this
month.
The
trip was part of a wider peace process between nuclear-armed rivals India and
Pakistan which have fought two of their three wars over the Himalayan territory
of Kashmir, which each holds in part but claims in full. The moderates held two rounds of talks with
New Delhi early last year but sought to travel to Pakistan before resuming
discussions. Farooq and eight other
moderate separatists travelled to Pakistan for the first-ever talks with the
Pakistani government and politicians in the Pakistani zone of Kashmir.
"We
have already conveyed to New Delhi through informal channels that we are ready
to take the peace process forward," said Farooq. "It's now up to New Delhi to
decide," said Farooq, who is also head of the region's main mosque, the
Jamia Masjid in Srinagar, summer capital of Indian Kashmir where rebels took up
arms 16 years ago against New Delhi's rule.
But hardliners said they opposed talks with the Indian government. "Those who are begging for a dialogue
with India are doing a disservice to the cause and dignity of Kashmiris,"
Syed Ali Geelani, who heads the hardline faction of Hurriyat, said.
All
the rebel groups back Geelani's stand on Kashmir, where the Islamic insurgency
against Indian rule has since 1989 left more than 40,000 people dead by
official count. Separatists say the toll is twice as high. "Our people are giving large sacrifices.
They (moderates) are insulting those sacrifices by knocking at the doors of New
Delhi," said the firebrand leader. He
said the holding of talks would be "meaningless until India declares
Kashmir a disputed territory, stops human rights violations and frees political
prisoners."
New
Delhi says Kashmir is an integral part of India and that there can be no
redrawing of boundaries. Geelani wants
tripartite talks involving India, Pakistan and the "true
representatives" of Kashmiris or implementation of decades-old UN Security
Council resolutions calling for a plebescite in the region on its future. India calls the UN resolutions obsolete and
says the dispute over Kashmir must be resolved bilaterally with Pakistan.
Kashmir
Negotiation Simulation
Click
here to access the Kashmir
Negotiation Simulation prepared by the Public International Law &
Policy Group.
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Kosovo Serbs block bridge in
ethnically-divided town
Agence France Presse, 6/19/05
Kosovo Serbs blocked on Sunday a bridge separating
districts of the ethnically-divided flashpoint town of Kosovska Mitrovica in
northern Kosovo, an official said. The
blockade came days after the UN mission to Kosovo temporarily reopened the
bridge separating ethnic Serb and ethnic Albanian districts of the town, some
40 kilometers (25 miles) north of the provincial capital Pristina.
Gyorgy Kakuk, spokesman for the UN Mission in
Kosovo, told AFP that three people -- two ethnic Albanians and one Serb -- had
been detained after "the incident which happened when one car with Kosovo
license plates tried to cross the bridge from south to north of
Mitrovica." A group of Serbs gathered
on the bridge dividing the town, throwing stones at the car approaching from
the district populated by ethnic Albanians, breaking its windows and forcing
the vehicle back, witnesses said.
A group of ethnic Albanians retaliated by stoning
two Serb cars nearby, reportedly injuring one man, they added. The bridge over the Ibar River has been the
scene of constant ethnic tension and occasional violence and Serbs living in
the northern district have been constantly blocking the bridge since it was
re-opened.
The United Nations, which has run Kosovo as a
protectorate since the end of the 1998-99 war, plans to open the bridge to
civilian traffic for just two hours a day at first. If no serious incident is registered, the
bridge would be completely re-opened by July 18.
In mid-May, NATO-led international peacekeepers
handed over control of the bridge to local police, after patrolling it for more
than five years. Kosovo came under UN
administration after NATO intervened militarily to end a war between Serbian
forces and ethnic Albanian separatist guerrillas.
Romania wants Kosovo to remain part of
Serbia
Associated Press, 6/23/05
Romania wants the disputed Kosovo province to remain
within the borders of Serbia, Romanian Foreign Minister Mihai Razvan Ungureanu
said Thursday. Ungureanu pledged to help
find a solution for Kosovo after meeting with Serbia's president, Boris Tadic,
who is on a two-day visit to the neighboring country.
Tadic also met with Romania's president, Traian
Basescu, with whom he discussed bilateral ties. During the meeting, Tadic
reaffirmed his plans to participate in the commemoration of the 10th
anniversary of the massacre of about 8,000 boys and men by Serb forces in the
Bosnian province of Srebrenica.
"This crime has its regional importance because
there were also many crimes against my people, too," he said, adding that
he hoped the Balkans would end "this vicious circle" and become a
truly European region. Romania's
President Traian Basescu hailed Tadic's decision to go to Srebrenica as
"extraordinary."
The Srebrenica massacre is considered to be Europe's
single worst war crime since World War II. The U.N. war crimes tribunal in The
Hague, Netherlands, has indicted former Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic as
well as several wartime Bosnian Serb political leaders and army commanders in
connection with the massacre.
The commemoration is scheduled for July 11. Tadic also met with Senate Chairman Nicolae
Vacaroiu, who called for more rights for the Romanian minority in Serbia. He will travel Friday to the western city of
Timisoara where he will attend a business forum. Many Serbs live in the region,
which is close to the border with Serbia.
Kosovo Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the Kosovo
Negotiation Simulation prepared by the Public International Law &
Policy Group.
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_____________________________________________________________
Liberia
Liberia's Taylor must face justice, US
warns Nigeria
Agence France Presse, 6/23/05
Nigeria
should surrender the former Liberian leader Charles Taylor to face war crimes
charges, the US ambassador to Abuja told reporters on Thursday as pressure
mounted on President Olusegun Obasanjo. Taylor
has lived in exile in Nigeria since August 2003, when Obasanjo granted him
asylum in exchange for his stepping down from power in Liberia and allowing a
UN-led peacemaking effort to begin in his wartorn country.
Nigeria
initially won international praise for its intervention but has since come
under increasing pressure to arrest Taylor and hand him over to a UN-backed war
crimes tribunal in Liberia's neighbour Sierra Leone. Obasanjo insists that he cannot go back on his
word and will only surrender his guest to an elected Liberian government,
despite allegations that Taylor has breached the terms of his asylum by
interfering in Liberian affairs. "Nigeria
played an exemplary role in ending the bloodshed in Liberia and that included
the acceptance of Taylor at the request of the Economic Community of West
African States," US ambassador John Campbell told reporters here.
But
he added: "The United States believes that Taylor must be brought to
justice for the crimes which he has been accused of." International prosecutors at Sierra Leone's
war crimes tribunal allege that as leader of Liberia in the 1990s Taylor
sponsored a brutal rebel movement in his neighbour which regularly tortured and
murdered civilians. In addition, they
allege, Taylor has continued to stir trouble in west Africa from exile, sending
funds to Liberian militias and political parties and attempting to organise the
assassination of Guinea's President Lansana Conte.
Nigeria
says it has seen no evidence to support these later claims. Campbell said that the United States was in a
"discussion" with Nigeria about Taylor's case. "It's not a question of the US punishing
Nigeria," he said. "The crucial issue of the conversation is to bring
Taylor to justice."
Since
accepting asylum in Nigeria, Taylor has lived with family members and several
aides in a luxury riverfront villa in the southeastern city of Calabar. Liberia is due to go to the polls in October
to elect a government to replace a UN-backed interim regime which was put in
place in 2003 to bring an end to the country's latest 14-year-old period of
civil war.
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Moldova
Russia
worried about economy of separatist region in Moldova after customs dispute
Associated
Press, 6/21/05
Russia is concerned about a customs dispute affecting
the economy of a Moscow-backed separatist province in eastern Moldova, the
Russian ambassador said Monday. The
Moldovan government tried to reassert control of its borders, and ended
permission for Trans-Dniester to issue customs documents after separatist
leaders there closed Moldovan-language schools. Russia, which has backed the Russian-speaking
eastern enclave since it broke away from Moldova in 1992, urged Moldova to remove
trade barriers for Trans-Dniester.
"Russia will make supplementary efforts to
diffuse the situation," Ambassador Nikolai Reabov said meeting with
Trans-Dniester's leader, Igor Smirnov. Moldovan
authorities did not comment on Reabov's statements. Moldova's move did not have an immediate
impact, as national authorities have no effective control over the eastern
border, and neighboring Ukraine continued to allow transit for Trans-Dniester
goods.
Earlier this month, however, Ukraine's President Viktor
Yushchenko agreed to a Moldovan request for joint monitoring of the
Trans-Dniester border and asked for European observers to be stationed at the
border. Moldova's relations with Russia
have been tense since 2003, when Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin rejected a
Russian-backed plan to give Trans-Dniester statehood status and renew a deal to
keep Russian troops in the region. Moldova's
government has asked Russia to pull its 1,800 troops from Trans-Dniester,
calling them an "illegal occupation force," as current agreements say
the troops should have been withdrawn by 2003.
Resolving
Moldova's dispute with separatists crucial for regional security, officials say
Associated
Press, 6/21/05
Resolving Moldova's dispute with separatists in the
breakaway region of Trans-Dniester is crucial for regional security, officials
said Wednesday. The dispute over the
enclave is disrupting the security situation in Moldova, Ukraine, Romania and
Russia, said William Hill, the head of the Organization for Security and Cooperation
in Europe's mission in Moldova.
The Russian-speaking region broke away from Moldova in
1992 following a short war that killed about 1,500. Russia maintains almost
1,500 troops in the region, which during Soviet times was an important base for
Soviet troops. Russia has argued that
the remaining troops are crucial to keeping the peace in the region and to
protect large amounts of ammunition still stored there. The country has failed
to fulfill an agreement with the OSCE that said the troops and the military
material should leave Trans-Dniester by the end of 2002.
Hill told a news conference the withdrawal, which has
been stalled since 2004, could be &q