Amid
Somali
Famine, Former FM Boosts Idd Beddel, Mogadishu in
Manhattan II
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
July 27 -- As famine wracks Somalia and aid groups scramble
to know if they can or cannot work in the country, a new controversy
has erupted at Somali Mission to the UN in New York: another
iteration of Mogadishu in Manhattan.
With
Permanent Representative Elmi Ahmed Duale on leave in Tanzania, the
now deposed Somali foreign minister Mohamed
Abdullahi
Omar signed
a
letter raising Idd Beddel Mohamed from the level of Minister
Counselor to “Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary...
Alternative Permanent Representative.” Click here for
letters,
which Inner City Press has obtained.
Idd
Beddel Mohamed then left New York, such that on July 27 during
business hours no one answered the phone at the Somali Mission to the
UN on 61st Street in Manhattan.
Inner
City Press called Elmi Ahmed Duale, reaching him in Dar Es Salaam. Elmi
Ahmed Duale told Inner City Press that “Idd Beddel Mohamed was
now named by the former foreign minister, who is not the foreign
minister now, as alternative Ambassador. This after I left -- the
foreign minister took the opportunity, I don't know for what reason,
to name Idd Beddel Mohamed to be alternative Ambassador.”
Elmi
Ahmed
Duale said he would be traveling to Somalia tomorrow, or
Friday. Inner City Press asked him, “does the letter still stand?”
Elmi
Ahmed Duale, does the letter stand?
“This
I will know when I go to Mogadishu tomorrow, I will know if it stands
or not stands.”
This
comes at a time not only when the UN has declared famine in Somalia,
and efforts are being made at the UN in New York to increase
sanctions on Eritrea for allegedly supporting Al Shabaab. Watch this
site.
* * *
On
Somalia,
as
UNSC Issues Statement, Legal Blocks to Aid Not Discussed
By
Matthew
Russell
Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
July
25 -- Amid conflicting reports of whether the
Al-Shabaab rebels will allow humanitarian access to southern Somalia,
the UN Security Council issued a press statement midday on Monday,
read out by July's Council president Peter Wittig of Germany.
Inner
City
Press
asked Wittig if there had been a discussion of what would be done if
access were blocked to people starving to death. There was a
discussion of access, Wittig said.
Following
reports
that
US law prohibits funding that might “materially benefit”
listed groups like Al Shabaab, Inner City Press asked if there had
been any discussion in the Council of lifting such legal impediments.
No, Wittig said, there had only been discussion of access.
In
the run
up to
the briefing after which the Press Statement was issued, Security
Council sources told Inner City Press of a worry that the Council
could “raise expectations” unrealistically by holding a public
briefing.
The
briefer, it
turned out, was deputy OCHA chief Catherine Bragg and not John Ging,
previously of UNRWA. Other than Wittig, no one spoke at the media
stakeout. Danger averted: expectations not raised.
On
Friday July 22,
Inner City Press asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman
Martin Nesirky:
Inner
City
Press:
on Somalia and the UN’s response, now that Al-Shabaab’s
spokesman is saying that in fact it’s not true that they’re
granting access, that they continue to block groups that they have
banned. It seems from what Mr. Bowden said, that there was access or
that there was some acknowledgment by Al-Shabaab that there was a
problem and food was getting in. What should we make of this
Al-Shabaab statement about blocking groups?
Spokesperson
Nesirky:
Well,
I think it’s clear that different parts of the UN
system are operating in Somalia in different ways, in different
places. Our only interest in Somalia at this moment is to save
lives. And we welcomed the previous statement from Al-Shabaab
welcoming humanitarian agencies to resume operations in areas under
their control. And we reiterate now, today, the need to increase
assistance to populations in acute distress wherever they are. So,
you will also have seen that for example, the World Food Programme,
UNICEF, are speaking on their own behalf, if you like, on the ground,
and I think that I would refer you to what they have also been
saying...
There's
a
lot of talking...
Ban shakes w/ Eritrea FM, OCHA's Bragg at
right, famine action not shown (c) MRLee
Footnote: later on
Monday, OCHA's Catherine Bragg showed up for Ban Ki-moon's meeting for
Eritrea's foreign minister
Osman Saleh Mohammed,
Permanent Representative Desta & Presidential adviser Yemane
Ghebreab -- who on July 21 in an interview with Inner City Press chided
Ethiopia for buying 200 tanks while asking for food aid. Click here for video. Presumably
Bragg's
presence concerned the impact of the drought on hunger in
Eritrea. But will the UN say anything? Watch this site.
* * *
At
UN,
Eritrea's
Yemane
Interviewed
on
Sanctions, Somalia &
Human Rights
By
Matthew
Russell
Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
July
21
--
After
the Eritrea
meeting
of
the UN Security
Council on July 19, which Inner City Press was one of only two
media
outlets to go to cover, and of the two the only one to write about it,
Eritrea's
Mission
to
the
UN
reached out to offer an interview with Yemane
Ghebreab, special political adviser to President Isaias Afwerki.
Afwerki
had
met
with
UN
Secretary
General Ban Ki-moon on July 8 in Juba, the day
before South Sudan's independence. In the UN read-out afterward, and
in response to questions from Inner City Press, the UN insisted that
the topic of Somalia was not discussed, that “the read out speaks
for itself.”
But
Yemane
Ghebreab on July 21 told Inner City Press that Somalia was in fact
discussed with Ban. Video here.
As
sources in the
Security Council's closed door July 19 meeting said happened there,
Yemane Ghebreab denied that Eritrea has supported the Al Shabaab
rebels in Somalia. For this proposition, he argued that Eritrea is a
secular country, half Christian, and would not support Islamists.
Yemane
Ghebreab
said
that
in
the
close door meeting the US, represented by Ambassador
Susan Rice, had urged further sanctions on Eritrea, including some
that would bar the diaspora from sending money home for development
projects, and block investment in mining, including by American
firms.
Inner
City
Press
asked
Yemane
Ghebreab
to contrast the positions of the US under
Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Yemane Ghebreab replied
that “we knew Susan Rice when she was with the Clinton
administration,” but now things were very hostile, that the US
alone wanted more sanctions. (Other Security Council sources later
disagreed with this assessment, while identifying the US as “the
most anti-Eritrea.”)
Yemane
Ghebreab
said
that
the
US
will support Ethiopia whatever it does, including
“violating international law” by holding on to Eritrean territory
including Badme, and buying 200 tanks while asking for aid money.
Inner City Press asked if he thought that Ethiopia being tapped as
provider of troops for Abyei in Sudan further isolated Eritrea. We do
not begrudge them their peacekeeping role, Yemane Ghebreab in essence
replied.
Inner
City
Press
asked
Yemane
Ghebreab
about the recent defections by Eritrean
athletes; he replied that was merely “migration."
Inner City
Press asked if military aged males are not allowed passports. There
is “national service,” he said, like the draft the US had in the
Vietnam War era.
Inner
City
Press
asked
if
the
family of people who defect are punished. “Only if
they are complicit,” Yemane Ghebreab said. He said his country
became independent as the Cold War ended and things have not worked
out in the Horn of Africa as they had hoped. He said there is hope.
We'll see.
These
reports are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click here
for a Reuters
AlertNet piece by this correspondent
about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click
here
for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali
National
Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an
undefined trust fund. Video
Analysis
here
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