Category: Health

Two men have been accused of defamation after they allegedly lied to a Burkina Faso journalist in a recent report, which found that those responsible for distributing aid in the country are exploiting internally displaced women, demanding sex in return for food. The government and the media outlet which published the story are now at loggerheads as the trial of the two men is set for the end of the month.

In the northern town of Kongoussi on Wednesday, two men displaced by Burkina Faso’s conflict stood accused of defamation after they told a local journalist that women in their community, including one of their wives, had been forced into sex in exchange for food aid distributed by the government.

A key witness, the director of Minute.bf, which initially published the story, did not arrive for the court hearing. The judge subsequently postponed the case until September 29.

Minute.bf published a statement on their website later in the day, claiming they had not received a summons to appear at the court.

Speaking to VOA Wednesday, Lassane Sawadogo, director of Minute.bf said he believes they spoke to credible witnesses despite doubts after publication.

“One of our sources clearly said that his wife traded sex for food. For us, a husband who makes such statements about his own wife cannot be lying. But how do we verify such information? We have now been told that the people we interviewed confessed they lied. What’s to say they are not lying again?”

Sawadogo went on to say he hopes the government will investigate the allegations of sex in exchange for food in other parts of the country too.

Last month, VOA and another news website focusing on aid, The New Humanitarian, also published stories documenting testimonies from nine women who said they had been forced into sex in exchange for food aid in the nearby city of Kaya.

One of the defendants outside the courtroom in Kongoussi told VOA he had lied to Minute.bf. Meanwhile, members of the government’s social action department responsible for distributing aid in the area spoke to members of the local press. When VOA asked for an interview, they said they were banned from speaking to international media without authorization.

At a press conference on Monday, the minister for humanitarian affairs, Laurence Ilboudo-Marchal blamed Minute.bf for rushing to publish without verification in response to a question on the matter.

“Minute.bf, what you did there, you almost destroyed families because you didn’t give us time to answer you,” she said. “You were making an important denunciation. Did you write to us? Let us listen to you? Or come to ask us and say, ‘Madam minister here are the accusations, what is your answer?’ If you had published our response, maybe this wouldn’t have gone to court,” she said.

At the press conference, the minister also faced questions about a recent report from aid group The Norwegian Refugee Council, which said the government was slow to register newly displaced people and was risking lives as a result.

Over the last year, the government has also implemented a ban on journalists trying to visit official camps for internally displaced people in the country.

With neither the government nor Minute.bf seeming ready to back down, Burkina Faso’s sex for food aid scandal remains unsolved.

Source: Voice of America

RABAT— The total number of people fully vaccinated against COVID-19 in Morocco reached 17,057,066, the Moroccan Ministry of Health said in a statement.

So far, a total of 20,561,862 first doses of COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in Morocco, said the statement.

The North African country launched a nationwide vaccination campaign on Jan 28 after the arrival of the first shipment of China’s Sinopharm vaccines.

Meanwhile, Morocco’s tally of COVID-19 infections rose to 910,991 as 2,642 new cases were registered during the past 24 hours, while the total recoveries increased by 3,240 to 869,304, the statement said.

The death toll from the coronavirus in Morocco rose by 46 to 13,729, while 1,681 people remained in intensive care units, it added.

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

The Nigerian air force confirmed Thursday an airstrike against suspected Islamic extremists that killed civilians in the northeastern state of Yobe.

A spokesman said the Wednesday attack was called in response to movements by suspected members of Boko Haram or Islamic State’s West African (ISWAP) branch, which broke away from Boko Haram in 2016.

“Unfortunately, reports reaching Nigerian Air Force headquarters alleged that some civilians were erroneously killed, while others were injured,” Air Commodore Edward Gabkwetin said in a statement.

“Therefore, a board of inquiry has been set up to thoroughly investigate the circumstances of the incident.”

Reports on the number of people killed range from six to 10.

Source: Voice of America

NEW YORK— All leaders and diplomats attending the United Nations General Assembly in New York next week will have to provide proof of vaccination, the city government said, sparking anger from Russia.

Delegates must be vaccinated to enter the debate hall, the mayor’s office told the assembly president in a letter dated Sept 9, but Moscow queried whether New York had the authority to enforce the mandate.

Attendees must also be vaccinated if they want to eat or exercise indoors, the letter added.

More than one hundred leaders including US President Joe Biden, Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson have announced they plan to attend in person. Others

will make an address via videolink.

Bolsonaro, who had the virus last year, has said he would be the “last Brazilian” to get vaccinated. His office did not immediately respond to requests for comment regarding the New York announcement.

New York began enforcing a vaccine mandate on Monday, requiring proof of at least one shot for many indoor activities, including restaurants and entertainment venues.

The letter signed by New York City’s health commissioner and confirmed by his spokesman said the UN debate hall was classified as a “convention center,” meaning all attendees must be vaccinated.

“They must also show proof of vaccination prior to dining, drinking or exercising indoors on the UN campus, and in order to partake in all of New York City’s wonderful entertainment, dining and fitness activities,” he said.

But Russia’s ambassador requested an urgent meeting of the General Assembly to discuss the move.

Vassily Nebenzia wrote to assembly president Abdulla Shahid Wednesday saying he had been “very much surprised and disappointed” by a letter Shahid wrote to members in which he supported the proof of vaccination requirement.

“We strongly object that only people with a proof of vaccination should be admitted to the GA hall,” Nebenzia wrote in the letter.

He described it as “a clearly discriminatory measure,” adding that preventing delegates to access the hall was a “clear violation of the UN charter.”

New York accepts all vaccines that have been approved by either the World Health Organization or America’s federal Food and Drug Administration.

Nebenzia said the “rights of people who have received vaccines that are not approved by the CDC” must also be taken into consideration.

He added that the agreement between the United States and the UN over the world body’s headquarters prohibited US actors from regulating the running of the UN.

The city’s letter also reminded diplomats that New York state requires everyone to wear masks on public transport.

“New York City strongly encourages universal mask use indoors regardless of vaccination status,” the note added.

Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a statement that the city would set up a pop-up vaccination site at the UN headquarters next week offering free single-dose Johnson & Johnson shots.

The high-level week of the 76th session of the General Assembly starts on Tuesday and finishes the following Monday.

It will be a combined in-person and remote event after last year’s UNGA took place virtually because of the pandemic.

Dozens and sometimes hundreds of people usually accompany leaders on foreign trips but because of coronavirus each delegation is only allowed seven people into the UN headquarters and only four into the hall.

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

PARIS— The head of Daesh in the Greater Sahara, who was wanted for deadly attacks on US soldiers and foreign aid workers, has been killed in an operation by French troops.

Adnan Abu Walid al-Sahrawi was “neutralised by French forces”, President Emmanuel Macron tweeted early Thursday.

“This is another major success in our fight against terrorist groups in the Sahel,” Macron said, without giving the location or details of the operation.

The jihadist leader was behind the killing of French aid workers in 2020 and was also wanted by the United States over a deadly 2017 attack on US troops in Niger.

Daesh in the Greater Sahara is blamed for most of the jihadist attacks in the Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso region.

The flashpoint “tri-border” area is frequently targeted by ISGS and the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (GSIM).

ISGS has carried out deadly attacks targeting civilians and soldiers in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso.

The United States had offered a $5 million reward for information on the whereabouts of Sahrawi, who was wanted over an Oct 4, 2017 attack in Niger that killed four US Special Forces and four Niger troops.

On Aug 9, 2020, in Niger, the ISGS head personally ordered the killing of six French aid workers and their Niger guides and drivers.

Sahrawi was formerly a member of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and also co-led Mujao, a Malian Islamist group responsible for kidnapping Spanish aid workers in Algeria and a group of Algerian diplomats in Mali in 2012.

The French military has killed several high-ranking members of ISGS under its strategy of targeting jihadist leaders since the start of its military intervention in Mali in 2013.

In June this year, Macron announced a major scaleback in France’s anti-jihadist Barkhane force in the Sahel after more than eight years of military presence in the vast region to refocus on counter-terrorism operations and supporting local forces.

“The nation is thinking this evening of all its heroes who died for France in the Sahel in the Serval and Barkhane operations, of the bereaved families, of all its wounded.

“Their sacrifice is not in vain. With our African, European and American partners, we will continue this fight,” Macron added in another tweet.

The north of Mali fell under jihadist control in 2012 until they were pushed out of the cities by France’s military intervention in 2013.

But Mali, an impoverished and landlocked nation home to at least 20 ethnic groups, continues to battle jihadist attacks and intercommunal violence, which often spills over to neighbouring countries.

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

LIBREVILLE— Gabon’s defense ministry has said the United Nations will withdraw the country’s 450-strong peacekeeping contingent from the Central African Republic (CAR) over sexual abuse allegations.

“In recent weeks, exceptionally serious acts that go against military ethics and the honor of the armed forces, committed by certain elements in the Gabonese battalions have been reported,” the ministry said in a statement.

One of the world’s poorest countries, CAR has been chronically unstable since it gained independence from France in 1960.

It is currently suffering from the aftermath of a brutal civil conflict that erupted in 2013 after a coup against then-President Francois Bozize.

MINUSCA was deployed by the UN in April 2014 to end the conflict pitting the Seleka coalition of armed groups that overthrew Bozize against militias supporting him.

The conflict has dramatically reduced in intensity but MINUSCA has 15,000 personnel in the country, of whom 14,000 are in uniform.

Their main mission is to protect civilians.

Allegations of sexual crimes involving peacekeepers have been recurrent, and while some contingents have been withdrawn in the past, no investigations have resulted in convictions to date, at least publicly.

If the “alleged facts are proven, the perpetrators will be brought before the military courts and judged with extreme rigor”, Gabon’s defense ministry said.

“Gabon has always demanded irreproachable and exemplary behavior from its army, both on its territory and abroad,” it added.

In early 2017, judges in France decided not to bring charges against French soldiers accused of having sexually abused minors while on a peacekeeping mission in the CAR. Following an investigation, the prosecutor dropped the case saying there was not enough evidence to charge the soldiers allegedly involved.

The UN has struggled for years with allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse by UN peacekeepers around the world.

Since 2010, it has posted 822 such allegations on its website.

By nationality, the peacekeepers with the most allegations against them since 2015 have been Cameroon, with 44 cases, South Africa (37), the Democratic Republic of the Congo (32), Gabon (31), and the Republic of the Congo (26).

In March 2018, Gabon said it planned to withdraw its contingent because the conflict was abating.

However, three months later, at the behest of the CAR’s President Faustin-Archange Touadera, his Gabonese counterpart Ali Bongo Ondimba said the contingent would stay on.

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

GENEVA— The World Health Organization (WHO) and its partners have said they hope to provide Africa with about 30 percent of the COVID-19 vaccines the continent needs by February, badly missing the 60 percent vaccination coverage goal that African leaders had once hoped for this year.

Out of 5.7 billion doses of coronavirus vaccines administered around the world so far, only 2 percent have been in Africa.

The African Union accused manufacturers of COVID-19 shots of denying African countries a fair chance to buy them and urged manufacturing countries – in particular India to lift export restrictions on vaccines and their components.

“Those manufacturers know very well that they never gave us proper access,” Strive Masiyiwa, AU Special Envoy for COVID-19, told a WHO briefing from Geneva. “We could have handled this very differently.”

But the companies that manufacture the vaccines including Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna have shown no indications they are eager to switch their current tactics, which involve appealing to rich countries and their regulators to authorize booster shots.

Masiyiwa stressed that, in aiming to vaccinate 60 percent of its population, the African Union and its partners had expected to buy half the doses needed, while half were expected to come as donations through the COVAX program, backed by the WHO and the GAVI global vaccine alliance.

“We want access to purchase,” he said.

GAVI CEO Seth Berkley said his organization had been counting on supplies from India the world’s largest vaccine manufacturing center at the start of the outbreak but had received no doses from India since March when India imposed export restrictions.

Masiyiwa added: “The suppliers over the last eight to nine months have made it clear that the biggest challenge they face is export restrictions.”

He urged the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to begin working on a standby pandemic readiness fund to help poorer nations buy vaccines in the future, instead of having to rely on a sharing facility like COVAX – which has so far managed to provide only 260 million doses.

“Vaccine sharing is good but we shouldn’t have to be relying on vaccine sharing, particularly when we can come to the table with structures in place and say we also want to buy,” he said.

He reiterated a demand for patent waivers on vaccines, saying that Africa wanted to set up its own manufacturing capacity.

Tedros called last week for a “moratorium” on the use of boosters in healthy populations until the end of the year. Countries including Israel, France, and Germany have already started dispensing third doses to certain groups.

In the US, the FDA is going to publicly debate the topic of boosters this week. In an opinion piece on Monday, two top FDA officials and senior WHO scientists wrote in the Lancet that the average person does not need a booster shot.

To date, fewer than 4 percent of Africans have been fully immunized and most of the vaccine doses administered around the world have been given in just 10 rich countries.

COVAX is set to fall nearly 30 percent short of its previous goal of two billion shots this year. GAVI and the WHO have blamed the shortfall on a range of factors including export restrictions on the Serum Institute of India (SII).

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK