O golpe eleitoral da ZANU-Frente Patriótica

It was a tactical master-class from Robert Mugabe and his high command. The MDC floundered, hit by trickery, bad planning and split votes Harare has been eerily quiet since the elections – in shock at the Movement for Democratic Change's disastrous electoral performance. Former Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s triumphalist eve-of-poll rally had convinced the capital that a change of regime was at hand, so it was unprepared for President Robert Mugabe’s win with 61% of the national vote, with the Zimbabwe African National Union–Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) taking three quarters of the 210 parliamentary seats. Few people expect the MDC's electoral petition, submitted to the Constitutional Court on 9 August, to succeed in getting the rerun it requests. In fact, Tsvangirai's faction of the MDC did fairly well in the towns, polling 70% in many of the 23 (out of 29) seats it won in Harare Province. In Bulawayo it won all 13 seats with ZANU-PF struggling to get 25% of the vote. The MDC repeated the pattern in the smaller cities of Gweru (Midlands) and Mutare (Manicaland) and even the smaller towns where it won a few and had near misses in others. Africa Confidential --- E o Mundo fecha os olhos. Já ninguém se está a preocupar tanto com o Zimbabwe, hoje em dia, como há nove ou 10. Mistérios? Ou será que o crime compensa?

Mali: Keita foi eleito Presidente

BAMAKO, Aug 12 (Reuters) - Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, an ex-prime minister with a reputation for firmness, won Mali's presidential election after his rival conceded defeat on Monday in a poll meant to draw a line under more than a year of turmoil. Keita, 68, universally known by his initials IBK, will now have access to $4 billion in international development aid to rebuild the West African country after a French military intervention in January ended Islamist rebels' occupation of the northern two-thirds of Mali. He inherits a broken nation and must move quickly to overhaul the armed forces, tackle ingrained graft and negotiate peace with northern Tuareg fighters clamouring for more autonomy from the southern capital Bamako. The concession by his rival Soumaila Cisse, who had complained only hours earlier that Sunday's second-round vote had been marred by fraud, hands Keita a strong mandate to undertake reform in the landlocked former French colony, one of the world's poorest countries. "My family and I went to congratulate Mr Keita, the future president of Mali, on his victory. May God bless Mali," Cisse, a former finance minister, said on his official Twitter feed. A spokesman for Cisse, who comes from northern Mali, said his candidate had admitted defeat after it became clear Keita had won even in Gao, the largest town in the north. Keita, who earned his reputation for firmness by crushing student protests as prime minister in the 1990s, had been widely expected to clinch Sunday's runoff. He swept a July 28 first round with nearly 40 percent of votes on a ticket to restore dignity and order to a nation once regarded as a model for democracy in a turbulent region. International and local observers said that, barring some small irregularities, the election was exemplary. France had pressed for the vote to go ahead quickly as it draws down its 3,000 remaining troops in Mali and hands over to a U.N. peacekeeping mission, despite fears a rushed process might undermine the legitimacy of a new president. "This election, from a democratic standards point of view, is a success," said the head of a European Union observer mission, Louis Michel. "It is an election that allows Mali now to start finishing the process that it has begun: the return to a normal democracy." LASTING PEACE IN NORTH TOP PRIORITY Keita has said his top priority will be to secure lasting peace for northern Mali, which has been racked by five bloody rebellions since independence from France in 1960. Light-skinned Tuaregs have accused successive black African governments in the south of marginalising the underdeveloped region. Tuaregs took up arms again early last year, alleging Bamako had violated a 2006 peace accord meant to develop the north. Former President Amadou Toumani Toure's failure to tackle that revolt led to the coup which tipped the country into chaos. Keita has promised to open inclusive talks with all the peoples of northern Mali - black African, Arab and Tuareg - but many in the south are hostile to funnelling more of Mali's scarce resources to a region they see as responsible for the country's plight. "There is a challenge of national reconciliation," said Chris Fomunyoh, senior associate for Africa at the National Democratic Institute in Washington. "There is a lot of unease between ethnic groups, not just north versus south, but even within the north itself." The 12,600-strong U.N. peacekeeping mission being deployed will take over responsibility for security as France whittles down its contingent to just 1,000 troops - a rapid reaction force meant to tackle any outbreaks of Islamist violence. A EU mission is also retraining and equipping Mali's armed forces, demoralised by last year's defeats at the hands of the Tuaregs and al Qaeda-linked Islamist rebels. MUJWA, one of three Islamist groups which seized control of northern Mali last year, had threatened to carry out attacks on polling stations in northern Mali before the July 28 first round but the electoral process passed off without any violence. "This was an important stage in the transition in Mali towards peace and reconciliation," U.N. Special Representative for Mali Bert Koenders said. "The lack of violence was impressive in a country which has just emerged from conflict." (Additional reporting by Adama Diarra; Editing by David Lewis and Eric Walsh)

Sudão do Sul: Burocracia mata crianças

NAIROBI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Many children living in South Sudanese refugee camps have died needlessly because of bureaucratic delays rolling out new vaccines, the medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said on Thursday. MSF said it had taken 11 months to procure affordable drugs to vaccinate children against pneumonia in Yida refugee camp in South Sudan due to bureaucratic and legal red tape. It said it had obtained the vaccine from pharmaceutical firm GlaxoSmithKline to start vaccinating children in Yida camp and this should lead to a substantial cut in the number of deaths. Sudanese refugees began streaming across the border into South Sudan in June 2011, fleeing conflict between the Khartoum government and rebels in South Kordofan. Large numbers of children died in MSF’s hospital in the camp last year. Respiratory tract infections, such as pneumonia, were one of the main causes of death. “The situation in Yida last year was excruciating, with children dying of diseases that vaccines could have protected them against,” Audrey Landmann, MSF project coordinator in Yida at the time, said in a statement. Children in refugee camps are highly vulnerable to disease as they are often malnourished and living in overcrowded conditions with inadequate shelter, clean water or sanitation facilities. The pneumococcal vaccine is a new vaccine, first introduced by the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI Alliance) to Kenya in 2011. Pneumococcal disease, which can cause pneumonia, meningitis and sepsis, kills more than half a million people a year, half of them children under five. BLIND SPOT GAVI, set up in 2000, uses private and government donor backing to negotiate down vaccine prices for the developing world and then bulk-buy and deliver them to some of the world’s poorest countries. It has made major strides in rolling out new vaccines in poor countries at affordable prices - but it does not cover vaccination in refugee and crisis-affected populations. Pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer and GSK sell their new vaccines to GAVI at a discount but do not offer the same prices to medical charities like MSF. MSF paid GSK $7 per dose for the vaccine, compared with the $3.40 a dose GAVI pays as a result of signing a 10-year deal with Pfizer and GSK to buy millions of doses of their patented pneumonia vaccine. Three doses are needed per child. “Why do we keep hearing the players in the global vaccination community tell us these kids aren’t their problem?” said Kate Elder, Vaccines Policy Advisor at MSF’s Access Campaign. “We should be making every effort for refugee children to benefit from the newest vaccines, instead of letting them languish in the global community’s blind spot.” FRUSTRATED At the heart of the dispute is a difference in philosophy between GAVI’s development-oriented approach and MSF’s humanitarian creed. GAVI is focused on building up governmental vaccination programmes. It funds and supports governments to develop the health systems, staff and expertise needed to immunise their children over the long term. The governments also pay a percentage of the price of the vaccines with a view to taking on the cost themselves in future. “The whole idea is to build up their immunisation system so that they can eventually do it themselves,” said a GAVI spokesman. “We don’t just parachute in when we feel like it and start immunising kids.” In contrast, MSF works in some of the world’s toughest humanitarian disaster zones where there is often no government presence at all. In South Sudan, the fledgling two-year-old government is not yet providing the pneumococcal vaccine to its own children.

RCA: Bozizé quer voltar ao poder

PARIS, Aug 10 (Reuters) - Deposed former Central African Republic (CAR) President Francois Bozize still nurtures ambitions of returning to power, he told French media, ending months of silence since he was ousted by rebel forces in March. Bozize, who ruled the mineral-rich former French colony for a decade, fled to Cameroon after rebels overthrew his government and captured the riverside capital Bangui. In an interview with Radio France International broadcast on Saturday, Bozize said he had formed, along with some compatriots, a political organisation called the Front for the Return of Constitutional Order in CAR, or Frocca. He said its objective was to "follow and denounce everything that is happening in the country and inform the international community which does not yet seem to have realised the grave crisis, the drama, unfolding in Central African Republic." The rebellion in landlocked CAR - one of the poorest places on earth - triggered a humanitarian crisis after many aid groups and U.N. agencies pulled out, leaving its 4.5 million inhabitants to fend for themselves. The new government, headed by interim President Michel Djotodia, the head of the Seleka rebels, has issued an arrest warrant against Bozize, accusing him of "crimes against humanity and incitement to genocide." Asked if the formation of a new political entity meant he aimed to return to power, Bozize said: "Yes, return to power. If the occasion arises, I will do it." Bozize said he was in Paris to visit relatives, and aimed to organise meetings with French officials, although they were on holiday for now. France was, he said: "the best placed to help solve the problem, with a contribution from the African Union." A spokeswoman for the French foreign ministry said there had not been any contact with Bozize and none was planned. Central African Republic has rich, under-exploited deposits of gold, diamonds and uranium but has been plagued by political instability and coups since independence from France in 1960. Bozize seized power in a 2003 coup backed by neighbouring Chad and succumbed in March to an offensive by Seleka rebels after failing to make good on a promise to share power. (Reporting by Astrid Wendlandt; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Iraque: O reacender da guerra

More than 1,000 Iraqis were killed in sectarian violence in July, the highest monthly death toll since 2008, the United Nations said on Thursday, as Sunni Islamist groups stepped up their insurgency against Iraq's Shi'ite-led government. Most of the 1,057 victims were civilians, killed in a relentless campaign of bombings and shootings that some Iraqis fear could drag the country into another war. "We haven't seen such numbers in more than five years, when the blind rage of sectarian strife that inflicted such deep wounds upon this country was finally abating," Gyorgy Busztin, acting UN envoy to Iraq, said in a statement. He called on Iraqi leaders to take immediate and decisive action to stop the "senseless bloodshed" and prevent a return to the "dark days" of 2006-07, when the number of people killed per month sometimes exceeded 3,000. In recent years violence has fallen and a steady rise in oil production has made the country richer, but the conflict in neighbouring Syria has inflamed sectarian tensions across the region and invigorated Sunni insurgents in Iraq, including al Qaeda. July's toll brought the number of people killed in militant attacks since the start of the year to 4,137. The worst affected governorate was Baghdad, where 238 people were killed in July, followed by Salahuddin, Nineveh, Diyala, Kirkuk and Anbar. Many of these provinces are dominated by the country's Sunni minority, which deeply resents Shi'ite ascendancy since the U.S.-led invasion that vanquished Saddam Hussein in 2003. Sunnis there have been holding anti-government protests for months. Iraq's deteriorating security was highlighted last week when hundreds of convicts ran free after simultaneous attacks on two high-security prisons, raising questions about the ability of the security services to combat al Qaeda. The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, which was formed earlier this year in a merger between al Qaeda's affiliates in Iraq and Syria, claimed responsibility for the jail breaks. (Reporting by Raheem Salman; Writing by Isabel Coles; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)

Iraque: Dezenas de mortos em atentados

BAGHDAD, Aug 10 (Reuters) - A series of car bombs in mainly Shi'ite areas of Baghdad killed 57 people and wounded more than 150 on Saturday, in what appeared to be coordinated attacks on people celebrating the end of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. The 12 separate blasts targeting markets, busy shopping streets and parks where families like to mark Eid were part of a surge in sectarian violence in Iraq since the start of the year. This has been one of the deadliest Ramadan months in years, with regular bomb attacks killing scores of people, especially in the capital. The latest bombings were similar to attacks in Baghdad on Tuesday in which 50 died. More than 1,000 Iraqis have been killed in July, the highest monthly death toll since 2008, according to the United Nations. The Interior Ministry has said the country faced an "open war" fuelled by Iraq's sectarian divisions and has ramped up security in Baghdad, closing roads and sending out frequent helicopter patrols. Eighteen months since the last U.S. troops withdrew from Iraq, Sunni Islamist militants have been regaining momentum in their insurgency against the Shi'ite-led government, and have been emboldened by the civil war in neighbouring Syria. On Saturday, the president of Iraqi Kurdistan said his region was prepared to defend Kurds living in neighbouring Syria, in what appeared to be the first warning of a possible intervention and a further sign that the conflict is spilling over Syria's borders. Outside Baghdad, a suicide bomber detonated a bomb in a car on a busy street in the town of Tuz Khurmato, 170 km (105 miles) north of the capital, killing at least 10 people and wounding 45, medical and police sources said. Tuz Khurmato is located in a particularly violent region over which both the central government and autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan claim jurisdiction. Police believe the bomber was trying to reach the local headquarters of a Kurdish political party, but was unable to reach the building because of increased security in the area, a police source said. In the town of Nassiriya, 300 km (185 miles) southeast of Baghdad, twin car bombs near a park killed six people and wounded 25, police and medical sources said. Pictures showed metal shop fronts contorted by one of the blasts, with blackened scraps of debris littering the ground. Two tyres on an axle were all that was left of one of the cars used in the attack. Car bombs also hit the Shi'ite city of Kerbala, killing four and wounding 11, and targeted a Shi'ite mosque in the northern city of Kirkuk, killing one worshipper and wounding five. Tensions between Shi'ite, Kurdish and Sunni factions in Iraq's power-sharing government have been rising, and the renewed violence has sparked fears of a return to the sectarian slaughter of 2006-2007. Iraqis have endured extreme violence for years, but since the since the start of 2013 the intensity of attacks on civilians has dramatically increased, reversing a trend that had seen the country grow more peaceful. In recent months insurgents have moved beyond attacking shopping districts to targeting youths playing football and people watching matches on television at the Baghdad cafes which have dared to stay open. (Additional reporting by Mustafa Mahmoud in Kirkuk, Gassan Hassan in Tikrit, Ali al-Rubaie in Hilla and Aref Mohammed in Basra; Writing by Sylvia Westall; Editing by Mike Collett-White and Sonya Hepinstall)

Darfur: Uma centena de mortos

De nouveaux combats entre deux tribus au Darfour, région de l'ouest du Soudan plongée dans la violence depuis dix ans, ont fait une centaine de morts samedi 10 août près d'Adila. "Nous avons affronté les Ma'alia (...) et nous avons détruit l'une de leurs bases et tué 70 d'entre eux. Nous avons perdu 30 hommes", a déclaré un membre de la tribu Rezeigat. "La tension est toujours vive, et des deux côtés, les hommes sont rassemblés", a-t-il ajouté. "Nous nous attendons à de nouveaux combats aujourd'hui", a assuré un membre de la tribu Ma'alia, accusant les Rezeigat d'avoir "attaqué" et incendié des villages. Il n'a pas donné de bilan des victimes Ma'alia mais a affirmé que les membres de sa tribu avaient tué 40 adversaires. Fin juillet, des affrontements entre d'autres tribus dans l'ouest du Darfour avaient déjà fait des dizaines de morts. Selon la mission commune ONU-Union africaine au Darfour (Minuad), les rivalités tribales sont la principale source du regain de tension qui a fait près de 300 000 nouveaux déplacés dans les cinq premiers mois de 2013, soit deux fois plus que pendant le total des deux années précédentes. Le Monde