UN Condemns Al-Shabaab Attack On KDF Troops in Somalia

 

 

The United Nations has condemned Friday's attack on Kenya Defence Forces troops in an African Union Mission (Amisom) base in Somalia.

 

The UN Security Council affirmed their support to reduce the threat posed by Al-Shabaab and armed opposition groups in Somalia, urging more efforts to cut off finances for the terrorist group.

 

"The members of the Security Council condemned in the strongest terms the attack on 15 January 2016 perpetrated by Al-Shabaab in El-Ade, Somalia, which has resulted in a number of deaths and injuries," it said in a statement.

 

The UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon also condemned the attack, commending the efforts of the Amisom troops working for peace in Somalia.

 

"He affirms that this attack will not diminish the resolve of the United Nations to work hand in hand with the African Union and AMISOM to support the people and Government of Somalia," said a statement issued by his spokesman.

 

The Security Council members underlined the need to bring perpetrators, organisers, financiers and sponsors of terrorism to justice and hold accountable those responsible for the attack. They urged all states to cooperate with relevant authorities in that regard.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The 15-member body paid tribute to all international actors working to bring peace and stability in Somalia.

FAST RESPONSE

While also condemning the attacks, the Special Representative of the Chairperson of the African Union Commission (SRCC) for Somalia, Ambassador Francisco Madeira also commended the fast response by its troops.

 

"Attacks such as this further demonstrate the vile nature of Al-Shabaab, whose sole purpose is to spread terror and continue the destabilisation of Somalia.

"Our resolve can only be rejuvenated, to fight on until Somalia is freed of all elements of terror," he said.

 

On Friday morning, Al-Shabaab militants attacked an Amisom camp in El-Adde, in Gedo Somalia, killing an unknown number of KDF soldiers.

 

The Kenyan military confirmed the deaths but did not give the number of those killed in combat, saying efforts to "consolidate" returns from the battlefield were still ongoing.

 

Some media reports, quoting Al-Shabaab forces, said that 60 Kenyan soldiers were killed, while other sources indicated a higher death toll.

 

Other unconfirmed reports indicated that a number of KDF personnel who survived the ambush could have been taken as Prisoners of War (POWs).

 

 

allafrica.com

214 ‘Rescued’ Girls And Women Are Pregnant–UNFPA

 

The United Nations Populations Fund (UNFPA), on Sunday said about 214 of the 687 women and girls so far rescued by the Nigerian Army from the dreaded Sambisa Forest in Borno State are at various stages of pregnancy. 

 

Addressing newsmen in Lagos, UNFPA’s Executive Director, Prof. Babatunde Osotimehin said: “Consequently, since we have discovered that the magnitude of the challenge on ground is huge and there aren’t sufficient human resources to cope with this, we have sought for foreign assistance in human resources to help in the recovery process for these women and young girls.” 

 

Osotimehin is in the country to establish the level of activity that is being coordinated by the UNFPA country office since the army began to free many of the abducted women and with many more others in various camps returning to their traditional homes, so as to facilitate more assistance to federal government.
He said the assistance needed for the freed women and girls would include essentially psycho-social and trauma management among others.

Speaking on his encounter with some of the returnees and freed women, the UNFPA boss who was also a former minister of health said, “I saw so many women and children who have so much stress written all over them, some were lost in their lonely world oblivious of where they are and many showed signs that they obviously had been traumatized by their various experiences.

“There is no doubt that these women and their children had gone through so much since they were abducted or kidnapped and it would definitely take a lot of effort to give them the needed psycho-social support in order to reintegrate them into the real lives they had been used to prior the abduction”, observed Osotimehin.

According to him, “Already, as at yesterday (Saturday), many of them are undergoing screening for various diseases, infections including HIV/AIDS and about 214 of those already screened were discovered to be at various stages of pregnancies, some visibly pregnant and some just tested pregnant; but we are supporting all of them with various levels of care to stabilize them”. 

 

The UNFPA boss also disclosed that the UN agency which has been at the forefront of providing necessary human and material resources, especially family planning commodities for the country, has been training support staff for over a year in preparation for the return of the abducted women and girls in the Northeast.
“In 2014 alone, UNFPA gave assistance to the federal government by providing commodities which aided the delivery of 16, 000 pregnant women in various camps for the internally displaced”, said Osotimehin.

“Some of the children that were freed along the women it was discovered were born in the forest and had never been out in the open until their release by the Nigerian Army”, Osotimehin disclosed.
He added that from Monday, (today) some medical commodities that had been stored in preparation for the return of the women would be deployed from the various stores in the North to Borno State to help put smiles on the faces of the women and girls.

He said some of the kits tagged ‘human dignity kits,’ contain personal effects like sanitary wares, undergarments, changing clothes and dresses, soaps among others which the counselors already deployed would use to part of materials to help stabilise the women whose dignities he said had been abused for too long.

Meanwhile, the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), on Sunday said it has established contacts with the military authorities to deliver relief materials to the women that were rescued by the troops from the insurgents in Borno.

The Army had last Tuesday announced the rescue of 293 girls and women from the forest which covers about 60,000sqm, followed by another 160 and 234 on Friday, who were expected to begin the process of profiling to determine their true identity, amidst initial hopes that some could be among the 219 girls abducted from Government Secondary School, Chibok.

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Nepal earthquake: Relief starts reaching remote villages

Aid has begun to reach remote regions near the epicentre of Saturday's devastating earthquake in Nepal.

As relief efforts continue in the Kathmandu Valley, the UN says the response is broadening to include areas such as Dhading and Gorkha.

The 7.8-magnitude quake killed more than 5,000 people. Many survivors are in desperate need of food and water.

Thousands of people are queuing to board buses and leave the capital, amid fears of further aftershocks.
The government is providing free transport for Kathmandu residents. School buses have been sent to supplement overstretched services.

"We are scared of the epidemics that may spread because of all those dead bodies," a man waiting at the main bus station told the BBC. "Just to be safe, I'm leaving town for a while."
Early on Wednesday police at the station scuffled with people trying to get on to crowded buses.

Thousands of people are desperate to leave Kathmandu

At the scene: Sanjoy Majumder, BBC News, Kathmandu

There's a rush to get out of Kathmandu. Thousands of people are trying to flee - some trying to head out to the remote districts to see how their families are, others including tourists trying to head towards India by road.

But there simply aren't enough buses to take them out and the highways are choked with vehicles, people and relief convoys. Tempers are flaring. The police came to the bus station to restrain those trying to board crowded buses, which made it worse.

Outside Kathmandu airport, there are lines of tourists trying their best to get a ticket to fly home. The airlines have laid on extra flights but it's not enough and also, the airport is finding it hard to cope with the additional rush as well as the influx of cargo aircraft bringing in relief material.

Overwhelmed

Rescue operations resumed on Wednesday following bad weather.

Bella Messenger, an NGO worker in a remote part of Gorkha district, told the BBC that Chinese lorries had brought aid to the area, but many people remained cut off.

"You can't get to some villages without a helicopter," she said. "Some villages you can get to with a two-hour hike."

Some villages have been almost totally destroyed. There are accounts of desperate residents rushing towards relief helicopters begging to be airlifted.

"We haven't had any food here since the earthquake," Sita Gurung, whose home in Gorkha was destroyed, told AFP news agency. "We don't have anything left here."

More than eight million people have been affected by the quake, the UN says. About 10,000 people have been injured.

Hundreds of thousands of people continue to live in temporary camps, in squalid conditions with very little food and water, says the BBC's Sanjoy Majumder in Kathmandu.

Anger and frustration have been mounting, with many people sleeping out in the open for a fourth night.

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