SOMALIA: AMISOM must Leave Somalia Before ‘Mission Creep’ Sets

A recent trip to the Burundian capital, Bujumbura, has in fact opened my eyes to what a typical peacekeeper expects to gain from his tour of duty in Somalia.

There, I met a Burundian peacekeeper who had returned from Mogadishu, the Somali capital. The officer, whose name I will keep it to myself, told me that, unlike the general belief that the African Union Mission in Somalia is there to finish off Al Shabaab and pacify the country, he was there for his own benefit and that Al Shabaab’s destruction was the least of his priorities.

With a monthly pay of US$1200 and an extra US$500 allowance to boot, he earns more than ten Burundian and Somali soldiers each of whose monthly salary is US$50 and US$160 respectively.

So this peacekeeper has every pretext to fear death and plan for a happy future back home. In fact, he was already building a new house, praying that he remains in Somalia until the building is finished.

“I don’t want to defeat Al-Shabaab. I would rather scatter them to prolong my mission,” he told me.

That peacekeeper’s position may not represent the view of all AU peacekeepers in Somalia who have sacrificed a lot to win the semblance of peace that now exists in that country.

But that should not distract us from the reality on the ground in Somalia that demonstrates the poor leadership exercised by the mission leaders who appear to lack clear-cut vision to defeat the militants and have so far did little to prepare for an exit strategy.

Such a laziness that could be the result of complacency could bring about disasters in the long run, especially in a country whose citizens are known for their open hatred towards foreigners on their soil.

And recent developments illustrate how the mission is staring what is known as the “mission creep” in the eyes, because the AU force is clueless about Somalis’ psyche, aspirations and anger.

A widely watched and popular satellite TV, Universal, has recently aired a string of satires about the lack of fighting prowess within the force, showing peacekeepers cowering behind a tree, while a lone Somali soldier took the bullet.

Another had it that the mission’s vehicles don’t stop when they cause accidents, mashing still bodies of killed people with the tyres of one car after another – of course for fear of stopping. In another show, a presenter has passionately appealed to the AU force to vacate the capital’s football stadium, saying Somalis need to have their land back.

It appears that the political section of the mission is doing little to advise commanders on the dangers of doing nothing on the battle front for almost one yea or of the risks of failing to nudge Somali leaders to deliver services to the citizenry.

Many policy makers, both local and international, are oblivious to recent changes in the country: What has been tolerable just a few years ago is unacceptable this time round.

Somalis expect services from their current government, the first non-transitional administration since the collapse of the country’s central government in 1991.

Lawmakers are now calling for the president to resign for his failure to address the insecurity in the country. When Hassan Sheikh Mohamud came to power in 2012, Somalis believed that he signaled a change because his declared that security, security and nothing but security will be his priority. Now that they got insecurity, they want him out.

It shouldn’t be a far-fetched notion, therefore, to expect a motion against the viability of the AU mission in the near future.

It is really sad that, instead of planning for an exit strategy, the mission is digging in, eroding its earlier successes and reputations.

AMISOM’s recent decision to add Ethiopian forces to the force were both mistakes of strategic and PR proportions, a bad way to lose the war on the hearts and minds of ordinary Somalis.

Source: stratrisks.com

First Reburial of War Victims in Somaliland Makes a Case for "Posthumous Rights"

Holly Praying to reburial of war victims in Somaliland

Hargeisa, Somaliland: Helped by a team of Peruvian experts, the government of Somaliland has reburied 45 victims from Somalia's vicious ethnic conflict of the 1980s, setting a precedent for other African nations and affirming the right to a dignified burial. The reburial - the first of its kind since Somalia emerged from civil war - took place on Sunday in an isolated corner of the Hargeisa cemetery, in the capital of the autonomous state of Somaliland. Muslim sheikhs wrapped the 45 sets of remains in shrouds and watched as they were buried in individual graves. Abdul Rahman, a local sheikh, observed: "Islam does not allow people to be buried without dignity."

The 45 victims were exhumed from three mass graves by the Peruvian Forensic Anthropology Team (EPAF). Jose Pablo Baraybar, the director of EPAF, helped to manage Sunday's ceremony and predicted that it will strengthen Somaliland's efforts at nation-building.

Equally important, said Mr Baraybar, the reburials will have an "illustrative impact" far beyond Somaliland and give credence to the idea that the dead deserve a dignified burial - something that Mr Baraybar has argued for during many years of forensic activity in conflict areas. 

"Everyone has a right to be buried like a human, and not an animal," he said in a telephone interview from Hargeisa.

The 45 Somali victims, all men, are assumed to have been members of the Isaaq clan, which opposed the rule of former Somali dictator Mohammed Siad Barre. The men were among many who were taken in for questioning by police in 1984 and never reappeared. According to estimates, over 60,000 people were killed during the repression in northern Somalia and buried in anonymous graves. Mr Baraybar described Hargeisa as "one mass grave." 

Muslim sheikhs prepare the remains for reburial in Hargeisa

After Siad Barre fell in 1991, Somalia plunged into chaos and split into three regions - Somaliland in the north, Puntland, and Somalia (with the capital of Mogadishu). Somaliland has functioned as a democratic state since 1991, and established a War Crimes Commission, but has not been recognized by the international community.

EPAF, a partner of The Advocacy Project (AP), has led efforts by Peru's civil society to identify victims of Peru's own dirty war (1980 to 2000) and is best known for exhuming almost 100 bodies from a mass grave at Putis in the province of Ayacucho (2008). AP covered the Putis exhumation and will send a Peace Fellow to EPAF this summer to help survivors of violence tell their story through an advocacy quilt.

Since Putis, EPAF has taken its expertise to other countries and conducted exhumations in Nepal, the DRC, Mexico and the Philippines. EPAF was invited to work in Somaliland after Mr Baraybar received an award in 2010 from the Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA), the San Francisco-based organization which takes legal action against human rights abusers.

The CJA has pursued a case against Mohamed Ali Samantar, a former general in Barre's army who led the repression in the north of Somalia and now resides in Virginia. A US court levelled a fine of $21 million on Mr Samantar in 2012. 

While the Somaliland project represents an important expansion in EPAF's model, it is not without challenges. EPAF is finding it hard to train Somalis to take over the work, because the War Crimes Commission is not providing funds and is not supported by foreign donors. Part of EPAF's own costs are covered by the Sigrid Rausing Trust in London.

But the shortage of funding has also led to innovations. EPAF has set up a field school in Hargeisa where foreign students can receive human rights training and assist in exhumations. Thirteen students - from Austria, Canada, China, Sweden, the UK and US - have spent a month at the school before returning home to embark on what Mr Baraybar hopes will be a life of advocacy. 

• For coverage of Sunday's reburials and photos of the Hargeisa exhumations, visit theWashington Post/Associated Press and BBC slide-shows. Please be advised that some of the photos may be unsettling.

• Watch AP's film on 2008 EPAF's exhumation of the Putis mass grave in Peru - "If I don'..."

• Read about the CJA's case against former General Mohammed Samantar and consult the transcript.

 Reburial Event Photos

 

Source: internationalpeaceandconflict.org

Malcolm X and Internationalization of the Black Struggle

50th anniversary of the OAAU’s memorandum to the OAU

 

Malcolm X was convinced that racism against Black people was a global problem. He campaigned in Europe, Middle East and Africa against the scourge. At the Second Annual Summit of the OAU in Cairo 50 years ago, he made a direct appeal to African leaders for solidarity in ending the plight of African Americans under US national oppression

Abayomi Azikiwe

In March of 1964, Malcolm X announced his official departure from the Nation of Islam where he had spent 12 years working on behalf of the organization led by Elijah Muhammad. Malcolm had been suspended and silenced for 90 days in the aftermath of an address he delivered at the Manhattan Center on December 1, 1963 entitled ‘God’s Judgment of White America.’

This rally organized by the NOI was planned well in advance of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy on November 22 in Dallas, Texas. Elijah Muhammad had ordered all of his ministers not to speak directly about the assassination since the country was still in a state of shock and mourning.

During the question and answer period of the meeting Malcolm X was asked about his response to the assassination and subsequently noted that the United States government and its leaders had engaged in targeted assassinations of foreign leaders. He specifically pointed to the murder of Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba in which the U.S. played a prominent role in the destabilization of his government in 1960 as well as his kidnapping, torture and execution in mid-January of 1961.

Within the course of his response he said the assassination was a ‘case of the chickens coming home to roost,’ a common phrase within the African American community suggesting that horrendous deeds committed against others will come back to haunt the perpetrators. At the conclusion of the 90-day suspension and silencing, word was sent from the national headquarters of the NOI in Chicago that the punishment for ostensibly violating the discipline of the leader would be extended indefinitely. 

Consequently, Malcolm X called a press conference where he announced not only his departure from the NOI but the establishment of another organization, the Muslim Mosque Inc., a religious group that would also involve itself in electoral politics and community organizing. For several years before his split with Elijah Muhammad and the NOI, Malcolm X had sought to build alliances between African Americans, Africans from the continent along with Muslim nations and communities outside the U.S.

At his ‘Message to the Grassroots’ speech in Detroit on November 10, 1963, just three weeks prior to his suspension from the NOI, he would say that genuine independence struggles were bloody and that the people of Algeria, Kenya, China and other countries only gained their independence and sovereignty because they were willing to engage in an armed struggle. 

Malcolm X would return to Detroit in April 1964 to deliver his legendary ‘Ballot or Bullets’ speech. ‘It’s freedom for everybody or freedom for nobody,’ Malcolm X declared. He said that if African Americans were willing to go and fight on behalf of U.S. imperialism against armed revolutionaries in Vietnam and Korea then there should be no problem with them taking up guns to defend themselves against the Ku Klux Klan and other racists inside this country.

TRAVELS TO THE OAU SUMMIT, THE AFRICAN CONTINENT AND THE MIDDLE EAST

Later in May 1964 Malcolm X embarked upon the hajj, the religious pilgrimage that all Muslims strive for in their lifetimes. Under the NOI, the hajj was not mandatory and therefore the organization lacked what was perceived as authenticity within the Islamic communities in the East. 

After making his religious pilgrimage he added to his existing Muslim name of Malik Shabazz, El-Hajj, stressing his acceptance within the orthodox Muslim faith. During this same trip, Malcolm would also travel to several African states including Egypt, Nigeria and Ghana. 

He would return to the U.S. in June and found a new political group, the Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU), patterned on the Organization of African Unity (OAU), the continental organization of independent states formed the year before in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Malcolm set out for the Second Annual Summit of the OAU being held in Cairo, Egypt in July 1964 to make a direct appeal to African leaders for solidarity and support in resolving the plight of African Americans under U.S. national oppression.

In an eight-page memorandum to the African heads-of-state in Cairo, Malcolm X, writing on behalf of the OAAU, said that ‘Our problem is your problem. No matter how much independence Africans get here on the mother continent, unless you wear your national dress at all times when you visit America, you may be mistaken for one of us and suffer the same psychological and physical mutilation that is an everyday occurrence in our lives.’ 

He went on to illustrate that ‘Our problem is your problem. It is not a Negro problem, nor an American problem. This is a world problem, a problem for humanity. It is not a problem of civil rights it is a problem of human rights.’ 

Malcolm went ever further saying that the formerly-racist apartheid regime of South Africa was less of a threat than the U.S. He wrote in the memorandum to the OAU that ‘America is worse than South Africa, because not only is America racist, but she is also deceitful and hypocritical. South Africa preaches segregation and practices segregation. She, at least, practices what she preaches. America preaches integration and practices segregation. She preaches one thing while deceitfully practicing another.’

LESSONS FROM THE LEGACY OF MALCOLM X 

Malcolm X on his second visit to Africa and the Middle East in 1964 would stay outside the country for four months until November. He would stop over in France and England on his way back to the U.S. in order to enhance relations between African Americans and the African Diaspora in Western Europe. 

After returning to the U.S., his speeches during rallies for the OAAU, often held at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem, he would share platforms with members of the Pan-African Students Organization of the Americas (PASOA) and other African leaders such as Tanzanian revolutionary Abdul Rahman Mohamed Babu, a Marxist and a Pan-Africanist who advocated socialism as the only solution for the continent. 

He would meet with Che Guevara during his visit to the United Nations in December 1964. Che sent a statement of solidarity to an OAAU meeting that was read by Malcolm X. 

Later in February 1965 on the eve of his assassination, Malcolm attempted to enter France again but was denied entry by the government. The French government would not provide a specific answer as to why he was being denied admission.

After returning to the U.S. and a brief stopover in Britain, Malcolm’s home was bombed during the early morning hours of February 14. He would travel to Detroit and deliver another speech which encompassed themes of Pan-Africanism and Internationalism.

In one of his final addresses delivered at the Corn Hill Methodist Church in Rochester, New York on February 16, Malcolm said that ‘in no time can you understand the problems between Black and white people here in Rochester or Black and white people in Mississippi or Black and white people in California, unless you understand the basic problem that exists between Black and white people—not confined to the local level, but confined to the international, global level on this earth today.’

Malcolm X was assassinated on February 21 before addressing an audience of the OAAU at the Audubon Ballroom. Although his assassination has been attributed to members of the NOI, many have believed since 1965 that the federal government was behind his death due to his uncompromising militancy and his political evolution towards Revolutionary Pan-Africanism and Internationalism.

In addition to seeking the assistance of the African governments and national liberation movements in the struggle of African Americans, Malcolm X, like William Patterson, Paul Robeson and W.E.B. Du Bois of the Civil Rights Congress (CRC) in 1951, sought to take the plight of African Americans before the United Nations seeking sanctions against the U.S. for crimes against humanity. He also said that through his travels he keenly observed that countries which were making the most progress were moving towards socialism and the liberation of women. 

These words hold true today. The African and Middle Eastern communities in Europe have also exploded in urban rebellions in the same fashion as they developed inside the U.S. after 1963. 

Until the system of international racism and economic exploitation is confronted by oppressed peoples collectively on a global level there will not be a solution to the crisis. Youth today must study the works of Malcolm X and apply the lessons of his life and struggles to the monumental challenges facing the workers and oppressed in the 21st century. 

 

America’s ‘big ears:’from one scandal, another

A debate has started about the code of conduct that will define the preservation of public liberties. The courageous Edward Snowden has achieved his goal to a large extent. His action should also contribute to a reflection on whistleblowers and their protection

 

by Michel Rogalski

“No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.”The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Art. 12, United Nations, 1948)

The revelations of Edward Snowden, the courageous whistleblower and former contractor for the NSA (National Security Agency) which is responsible for surveillance, confirmed, supported by evidence, what all the heads of state have always known: the United States has undertaken a vast program of interception of telephone and electronic communications on a worldwide scale, making no distinction between friendly or hostile countries. Their ambition is to know everything that goes on around the planet and they are on their way to achieving it through the modern technology that governs our lives and which we cannot do without. In short, if we want to use credit cards, telephones, cell phones, computers, the internet, and the other tools that facilitate our daily lives, we must pay the price. And the scale of the revelations has contributed to the idea that it is a technological inevitability.

AMERICA MUST CONTROL THE PLANET AND ALL HUMANS 

Because no one is safe from this project. Thus, thanks to the cooperation of Internet giants (Microsoft, Apple, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Skype…) and the complicity of countries that have elected to participate in the system, telephone calls, email correspondence, sms, bank transactions, online purchases, websites visited, books checked out from the library, travel, cell phone roaming charges, unanswered calls, and electronic address lists are intercepted and stocked in an immense site in Utah that covers an area three times the surface of the Pentagon. There, the intercepted data – metadata – can be used and analyzed without your knowledge, and even without the intervention of any judicial authority.

These revelations concerning the American surveillance system follow on the heels of the Wikileaks affair that exposed a host of diplomatic documents of the State Department. Divulged by Julian Assange and a group of “anti-secrecy” activists who define themselves as the people’s intelligence agents with a mission to divulge secrets that those in power wish to hide, the documents analyzed and published by the world press embarrassed the American government to the point where Hilary Clinton went on an apology tour to minimize revelations that concerned mainly Afghanistan and Iraq. One could say 1-all! They know everything about us, but we will know everything about them. This is simplistic reasoning, because the asymmetry is flagrant.

LIVING WITH BIG BROTHER 

Julian Assange and Edward Snowden are in hiding, hunted and liable to prosecution, while the boss of the NSA and his peers go free. The latter meticulously modified existing laws in the aftermath of September 11 and put in place a legal arsenal legitimizing this type of general surveillance, while whistleblowers are unfortunately still far from gaining acceptance by the powers that be or being granted any protection. 

No, the cursor is not on the right side and, in any case, one cannot prevent breaches of individual liberties by keeping an eye on the authorities. Invasion of privacy cannot be traded for more democracy because it is unjustifiable and non-negotiable.

Only those in the know – including governments – knew. The public, even if it did suspect something, was literally flabbergasted by the scope of what was revealed. Secret services everywhere were created in order to carry out illegal or immoral activities that governments cannot take upon themselves and for which they do not wish to be held accountable. And they cannot be prosecuted for such activities since they are protected by state secrecy or defense secrecy. What was shocking was that one thought that only the enemy was targeted, for reasons of national security. These revelations show that surveillance has become a mass phenomenon, that we have entered the Big Brother era and can find out everything about everyone. In short, this fearsome intelligence weapon has become indiscriminate, spares no one, and can turn against us.

COMPLICITY OF WESTERN GOVERNMENTS 

A debate has started, which will be largely public, about the code of conduct that will define and position the cursor on the preservation of public liberties. The courageous Edward Snowden has therefore already achieved his goal to a large extent. His action should also contribute to a reflection on whistleblowers and their protection.

But this initial scandal, the massive breach of privacy perpetrated against millions of individuals principally for the benefit of the United States, has been followed by another. It soon became clear that this vast web of massive intrusion was enabled by the docile cooperation of governments which today take umbrage – or pretend to take umbrage – in order to save face. Revealing that Mrs. Merkel’s cell phone, and that of several other heads of state, was being listened to sends a double message. To some, that enough is enough, don’t go too far, and to the others: See? Me too!

All these revelations show the scope of the cooperative process that accompanied the implementation of this vast network of surveillance. Certainly, it benefited mostly the United States, but thanks to the complicity of the heads of those governments that present themselves as victims today. The half-heartedness of their protestations is due to the fact that they might be reminded of their involvement and should therefore avoid adding fuel to the fire. Moreover, all those governments are embarrassed, because Snowden has until now revealed only a tiny portion of the documents in his possession and the destructive potential of what remains has still to be assessed. Reactions are prudent because they could easily be contradicted or ridiculed.

SUBSERVIENT WESTERN GOVERNMENTS 

When the American secret services wrongly suspected Edward Snowden of travelling in the presidential plane of Moralès, the president of Bolivia, in an attempt to flee to Latin America at the first challenge, four heads of state (of France, Italy, Spain, Portugal) banned the plane from their air space and therefore prevented it from refueling, blocking it in Austria, where a meticulous search was carried out. This speaks volumes about the degree of subservience of those governments which, in all logic, should instead have thanked Edward Snowden for informing them of their misfortunes. 

It is a cruel reality. One country, together with several other beneficiaries – in fact, an Anglo-Saxon community – has conceived the ambition to achieve planetary surveillance in real time, and by stocking the information thus collected for use at a later stage is able to crosscheck and compare the data to profile any individual in time and space. Invoking its strategy for the “war on terror,” modifying existing laws to enable ever more intrusion and secrecy, enrolling allied countries in this project, the United States has succeeded in creating an immense surveillance network which has turned against those that had accepted to take part in it. Caught red-handed, the various governments must face public opinion.

The American position is easier to manage: reassure American citizens that they are not concerned by the surveillance and that these measures, which only target foreigners, are meant to protect them. This message is not well received and President Obama has had to make some concessions on form, not on the principle of data collection but on how it is used. But regarding substance, he is behind the American project. Thus, in an interview for the German television program Zdf (on 18 January 2014) he drove the message home: “Our intelligence agencies, like German intelligence agencies and every intelligence agency out there, will continue to be interested in the government intentions of countries around the world. That’s not going to change. And there is no point in having an intelligence service if you are restricted to the things that you can read in the New York Times or Der Spiegel. The truth of the matter is that by definition the job of intelligence is to find out: Well, what are folks thinking? What are they doing?” They also have to reassure friendly presidents that they will not be peering through the keyhole of their bedrooms and that they will not tap their cell phones. After all, we are well-mannered people… But such promises are binding only on those to whom they are made.

European governments are in a more delicate position. They must protest. But not too much, since their part in the project would soon be pointed out. For the same reason, they cannot claim to have been duped, because everything they gave up was given willingly. Their backs are to the wall and they would like their citizens to forget that they voluntarily gave away vast amounts of their personal data to the USA in exchange for negligible reciprocity. Any citizen would be handcuffed, thrown into a cell and accused of jeopardizing national security for less than that. All of this was decided in high places and has certainly been confirmed several times over. An enquiry should be opened on how such important decisions can be taken unbeknownst to all.

But it is a safe bet to say that this will not happen.

* Translated from French for Pambazuka News by Julia Monod.


** Michel Rogalski is the Director of Recherches internationales 
This column is produced in partnerhip with the magazine Recherches internationales. Numerous academics and researchers contribute to the magazine, which examines the important questions that confront today’s world, the challenges posed by globalization, the solidarity struggles that develop and are increasingly inseparable from what is happening in every country.