Nairobi, July 18, 2013–Two Somali journalists were wounded, one critically, when they came under fire on Wednesday while covering the aftermath of a landmine explosion in the southern port city of Kismayo, according to news reports and local journalists. The Committee to Protect Journalists calls for an immediate and thorough investigation.
Armed men shot at Mascud Abdulahi, correspondent for Dalsan Radio, and Mohamed Farah, correspondent for Goobjoog Radio, at 11:30 a.m., according to local journalists and news reports. The National Union of Somali Journalists blamed the government-affiliated militia Raskomboni for the shooting, according to Agence France-Presse. Armed militias, along with African Union troops, patrol Kismayo, where several clan-based rival militias are vying for control of the town, according to news reports.
Mascud was wounded in the back and the stomach, and Mohamed was hurt on the shoulder, the news reports said. Dalsan Radio Director Hassan Ali Gesey told CPJthat Mohamed had left the hospital after being treated for his wounds, but that Mascud remained in critical condition and was to be evacuated either to Mogadishu or Nairobi, in neighboring Kenya, for surgery.
“Reporting in Kismayo is extremely challenging with rival factions attacking the city and now even the press,” said CPJ East Africa Consultant Tom Rhodes. “The Somali government must investigate this attack, including the possibility that its military allies may have been responsible.”
Unidentified gunmen shot at Mustagbal Radio and Royal TV journalist Abdulkadir Abdirisak in May, according to news reports. Abdulkadir recovered from the attack, but the perpetrators were never apprehended.
For more data and analysis, visit CPJ’s Somalia page here.
Piracy off the coast of Somalia has dropped significantly for the first time since 2006 due to preventive measures deployed by the foreign warships to thwart such attacks, a global maritime body said.
The report by International Chamber Commerce (ICC) International Maritime Bureau (IMB)’s global piracy report attributes the fall in piracy to actions by the international navies as well as preventive measures by merchant vessels including deployment of privately contracted armed security personnel off the coast of Somalia.
“The navies continue to play a vital role in ensuring this threat is kept under control,” IMB Director Pottengal Mukundan.
According to the report, as at June 30, Somali pirates were holding 57 crew members for ransom on four vessels. They were also holding 11 kidnapped crew members on land in unknown conditions and locations.
The report says four of these crew have been held since April 2010 and seven since September 2010. In East Africa’s Gulf of Aden and Somalia, eight piracy incidents including two hijackings were recorded in the first six months of 2013, with 34 seafarers taken hostage.
“Two vessels hijacked were recovered by naval action before the pirates could take them to Somalia. Only the navies can take such remedial action after a hijack,” said Mukundan.
He said denying the pirates any success is essential to a sustained solution in the piracy which has seen the rise in insurance premiums and cost of goods across the region.
The Horn of Africa has itself also suffered considerably from the impact of piracy. Increased trade costs are estimated two years ago to cost the country 6 million U.S. dollars annually.
This figure does not take into account that Somalia cannot develop and expand its maritime trade and fisheries as long as pirates are allowed to operate in its waters.
Demanding millions of dollars in ransom for captured ships and their crews, Somali pirates had late 2011 intensified operations not just off their own coastline, but further afield in the Red Sea – particularly during the monsoon season in the wider Indian Ocean.
Tankers carrying Middle East oil through the Suez Canal must pass first through the Gulf of Aden. According to maritime officials, about 4 percent of the world’s daily oil supply is shipped through the gulf.
Before the capture of key port city of Kismayo by Kenyan soldiers late 2012, the Horn of Africa nation’s coastline was considered one of the world’s most dangerous stretches of water because of piracy.
“Pirates are known to operate in these waters. Despite the temporary protection provided by the southwest monsoon in some parts of the Arabian Sea, the threats remain and vessels are advised to be vigilant and comply with the industry’s Best Management Practices as they transit this area,” Mukundan said.
He said the threat is still present and Somali pirates usually attack ships in the northern Somali coast in the Gulf of Aden and southern Red Sea in the Bab El Mandeb TSS.
“All vessels transiting the area are advised to take additional precaution measures and maintain strict 24 hours visual and radar anti-piracy watch using all available means,” Mukundan said.
He called on watch keeping crews to lookout for small suspicious boats converging to won vessel.
“Early sightings/detention and accurate assessment will allow Master to increase speed and take evasive maneuvers to escape from the pirates and at the same time request for assistance from various authorities/agencies including the IMB,” he said.
The Somali pirates have also extended their attacks to vessels close to the coast of Tanzania, Kenya, Somalia, Yemen and Oman.
In the Gulf of Guinea, in addition to a rise in piracy and armed robbery, 31 incidents so far this year, including four hijackings — IMB reports a surge in kidnappings at sea and a winder range of ship types being targeted.
“This is a new cause of concern in a region already known for attacks against vessels in the oil industry and theft of gas oil from tankers,” says the report.
In April, the report says nine crew members were kidnapped from two container vessels, one of which was 170 nautical miles from the coast.
According to the report, pirates have used mother ships, some of which were smaller off-shore supply vessels hijacked by pirates to conduct the attacks and notes that there continues to be significant under-reporting in attacks — a phenomenon highlighted by the IMB year on year.
“There has been a worrying trend in the kidnapping of crew from vessels well outside the territorial limits of coastal states in the Gulf of Guinea,” Mukundan said.
He said armed pirates in the Gulf of Guinea took 56 sailors hostage and were responsible for all 30 crew kidnappings reported so far in 2013.
He said one person was reported killed and at least another five injured. The report says attacks off Nigeria accounted for 22 of the region’s 31 incidents and 28 off the crew kidnappings.
The attacks are being carried out by increasingly well- coordinated Somali gangs armed with automatic weapons and rocket- propelled grenades, maritime officials said.
The Horn of Africa nation has been without a functioning government since 1991, and remains one of the world’s most violent and lawless countries.
Combined Task Force 150, a naval alliance dominated by the United States and based in the Gulf of Aden nation of Djibouti, is patrolling an area within the Gulf of Aden to help protect ships from pirates Worldwide, the maritime watchdog recorded 138 piracy incidents in the first six months of 2013 compared with 177 incidents for the corresponding period in 2012.
The report says seven hijackings have been recorded this year compared with 20 in the half of 2012. The number of sailors taken hostage also fell dramatically to 127 in 2013 from 334 in the same period in 2012.
Western commercial oil exploration in disputed areas of Somalia and discrepancies over which authorities can issue licenses to companies could spark further conflict in the African nation, U.N. monitors warned in a confidential report.
In the U.N. Monitoring Group’s latest annual report to the Security Council’s sanctions committee on Somalia and Eritrea, the experts said the Somali constitution gives considerable autonomy to regional governments to enter commercial oil deals.
But a petroleum law that has not yet been adopted by the country’s parliament but is being invoked by federal officials in the capital Mogadishu says that the central government can distribute natural resources.
“These inconsistencies, unless resolved, may lead to increased political conflict between federal and regional governments that risk exacerbating clan divisions and therefore threaten peace and security,” the experts group said in an annex to its annual report, which was seen by Reuters.
The overthrow of a dictator in 1991 plunged Somalia into two decades of violent turmoil, first at the hands of clan warlords and then Islamist militants, while two semi-autonomous regions – Puntland and Somaliland – have cropped up in northern Somalia.
Around a dozen companies, including many multinational oil and gas majors, had licenses to explore Somalia before 1991, but since then Somaliland and Puntland and other regional authorities have granted their own licenses for the same blocks.
In some cases Somaliland and Puntland have awarded licenses for blocks that overlap. The experts said one such case involves Norwegian oil firm DNO and Canadian-listed Africa Oil Corp.
“Potentially, it means that exploration operations in these blocks, conducted by both DNO and Africa Oil under the protection of regional security forces, its allied militia or private forces, could generate new conflict between Somaliland and Puntland,” the report said.
“It is alarming that regional security forces and armed groups may clash to protect and further Western-based oil companies interests,” it said.
“In this case, the involvement of a Norwegian company on one side and of a Swedish-owned/Canada-based company on the other, is even more disturbing, considering the long-standing implication of Norway and Sweden in promoting peace and dialogue in Somalia,” the experts said.
Bjorn Dale, DNO’s acting president/managing director and general counsel, said he was not familiar with the U.N. experts’ recent report but said that the company would never engage in activities that threatened peace in Somaliland.
Africa Oil was not immediately available for comment.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST?
Somalia is struggling to rebuild after decades of conflict and a U.N.-backed African Union peacekeeping force is trying to drive out al Qaeda-linked Islamist rebel group al Shabaab. Piracy off the Somali coast is also a problem.
The U.N. experts also expressed concern about a clash between a longstanding bid by Norway to urge Somalia to implement an exclusive economic zone (EEZ) off its coast with commercial interests by a Norwegian oil company.
Under the U.N. Convention of the Law of the Sea, an EEZ would allow Somalia 12 nautical miles of territorial control with claim to sovereign rights to explore, exploit, conserve and manage natural resources that exist within 200 nautical miles.
The U.N. convention then requires Somalia to negotiate a maritime boundary with Kenya, which the U.N. experts said could lead to several disputed oil exploration blocks being deemed to be in Kenyan waters.
The U.N. report said late last year that Kenya had suspended Statoil’s license for block L26 because the Norwegian company did not want to spend money on exploration while there was the legal uncertainty over the maritime border with Somalia.
A Kenyan government official told the U.N. experts that Statoil had expressed an interest to develop the area should a boundary be agreed with Somalia and the L26 block was deemed to be in Kenyan waters.
“Efforts by Norway to lobby Somali officials to adopt the EEZ now coincide with current Norwegian interest in the fate of L26 as well as with Norwegian involvement in the application of a Special Financing Facility donor fund of $30 million which has been allocated under the management of (Somali government) officials with a track record of corruption,” the report said.
The experts suggested that Norway’s development assistance to Somalia could be used “as a cover for its commercial interests there,” a claim it said Norwegian International Development Minister Heikki Eidsvoll Holmas has denied.
Norway’s U.N. mission did not immediately respond to a request for further comment.
Barclays bank plans to close about 100 UK accounts held by cash transfer businesses. These services have provided a vital lifeline for an estimated 42% of the Somali population that depend on remittances sent from families living abroad.
The funds sent to Somalia are used for food, education and medical expenses and one third of recipients said that without this support, they would not be able to afford basic food supplies.
On Wednesday 17th July, British MPs will campaign in Parliament for the UK Government to find a durable solution to the humanitarian crisis that will invariably follow the closure of transfer business accounts.
Please sign this petition in order to encourage the UK Government to solve Somalia’s financial crisis.
The government of the semi auotomunuos region of Puntland has today in a press release announced the indefinite suspension of the local government elections which were due to begin today the 15/7/2013.
The suspension of the local government elections came after President Abdurrahman Mohamed Faroole and his party (Horseed) had consultation on the current security situation of the country which is thought to be at risk of being hijacked by groups who have links with terrorists.
Reports indicated that electioneering equipment have been set ablaze in most parts of regions of Puntland opposed to the rule of President Abdurrahman Mohamed Faroole rejected the electoral process.
The press statement stated that the electoral process was that groups linked to terrorist groups were instigating unrest in the region; these after protests were held in most town calling for the ouster of President Faroole government.
Kismanyo, a small city with a very small population strategically rests on the peninsula of the Indian Ocean coast in the lower juba state in Southern Somalia. Kismanyo corridor, which was built in the early 1960s for Somali-navies, today acts as a key business causeway between Somalia, the gulf and the east African countries. After the collapse of the central government of Somalia, this resourceful town had unfortunately fallen into the hands of various malicious headed by some of the most notorious warlords before the up to date Kenyan backed forces who took the control from Islamist sect “Alshabab”. This town had since became one of the worst gateways for Somali natural resources outflow, where much of the intangible wealth had been shipped away, like mammalian-livestock and the living trees.
The climate deteriorations have touched the world at large, but the western countries in particular. Kyoto Protocol was therefore held in Japan on 11 December 1997 and came into force on February 2005, where several unanimously agreed pre-emptive measures were made. Many prominent countries worldwide were the official signatories of this environmental pact, as it has invited a contentious ecological, economic and political argument among the world’s industrialized countries whose major concern was seeking a mutual policy on cutting the green-house-emissions in an attempt to promote a healthy green environment for better living conditions.
According to the National geography forests only cover 30 percent of the world’s land area, but widths of the swath in miles are lost in every single day by the hands of modern sinister business mongers. The world’s rain forests could completely vanish during this century at the current rate of deforestation proportionately.
Prior to the colonial land border demarcations, Somali people who are one of the largest ethnic societies that occupies much of the lands in the eastern part of the African continent were livestock herders, artisans and agro-pastoral societies as well. Even more than half of the current Somali population in today’s contemporary world belongs to the same conventional life-style, enjoying with the nature in their terrestrial strata. Remember, the recent famine in some parts of the south-Somalia that terribly invited international media attentions was due to the pro-longed draughts, the underlying cause of which was attributed to the meager rainfalls and loss of the rainy forests by the hands of the mindless loggers. The said draughts have also driven many people from their territorial lands to a shanty refugee camps temporarily built in Mogadishu suburbs, still severing and exposed to an endless abuses.
USA on Somali charcoal imports:
A UN resolution on the ban of commercializing the territorial animals and trees was adopted in the year 1975 by its members__ provided there should be a legal license formally issued by a legitimate government. Furthermore, two decrees numbered 20 and 27 issued by the last government of Somalia in the years 1967 and 1969 respectively__ were due to nix all exportations of mammalian animals and the charcoal. As there was no a functioning Somali central government for the past two decades the above said pact and decrees had dramatically disappeared, lawlessness and chaos taken the lead. Today’s international outcry on Somali charcoal exports was prompted not by global concerns over the environmental abuses but apprehensions on Al-shabab’s financial sources.
President Obama of the US has ordered the abrogation of the US imports of the Somali charcoal during his first tuner, not because of the appalling ecological situations there in Somalia but, his concerns over the Al-shabab’s significant revenues generated from this illegal source. It’s really disappointing that Obama only reiterated on the financial gains for Al-shabab but not on the environmental abuses caused by this cynical type of business.
According to the UN report on July 2011__ the tax revenue that al shabaab used to levy on charcoal exportations was about 15 million US dollars a year. This is why Al-shabab’s presence in many parts of southern Somalia was in existence, yet gained firm grounds for exercising their power. Thought Al-shabaab seems to be losing their last standing leg today, yet this type of business remains unchanged.
Where charcoal exports end up:
The relentless demand from the world in general and that of the Arabian countries in particular is what keeps this product’s market bullish. This lucrative business was said to had been involved in hundreds of thousands metric tons of charcoal exports per year, the revenues of which is narrowed into the best interest of small groups of business predatory. In the gulf, the charcoal consumption for households cooking is relatively less than that for shisha/hookah smoking. The number of Shisha outlets mushrooming in the Arabian Peninsula is well reflecting on the growth rate of the charcoal demand levels on daily basis. This smoking habit was originally generated from Egypt but later on exported to the Middle East and many other countries across the globe. The global fight against tobacco is less effective due to the fact that it’s facing a fierce resistance from such addictions.
Somali charcoal exports lifecycle:
As we are in bound with the time, as we are unsure about what tomorrow holds for the entire nation, if the current rate of deforestation keeps unchanged in Somalia, for how long it could take Somali forests to completely vanish?
Nairobi, July 8, 2013–Two unidentified gunmen killed TV reporter Liban Abdullahi on Sunday evening in Galkayo, a central town in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland, according to local journalists and news reports.
Liban, who was also known as “Liban Qaran,” had left his office and was headed to his home in Wadajir village in northern Galkayo when unidentified gunmen approached and shot him several times, according to Mohamed Gelle, an eyewitness to the attack, who spoke to Agence France-Presse. The assailants fled the scene before security officers arrived. Liban died from his injuries upon reaching a hospital, local journalists said.
Liban was covering the lead-up to the July 15 council elections as a correspondent for the newly launched, U.K.-based Kalsan satellite television station, according to news reports and local journalists. In Puntland’s first democratic council elections, four registered political associations will be competing for district council seats. Parliamentary elections will follow later this year, news reportssaid.
“The fatal attack on a journalist covering landmark elections in Puntland is alarming,” said CPJ East Africa Consultant Tom Rhodes. “Authorities must do their utmost to investigate and apprehend the perpetrators.”
Liban had worked for a variety of broadcasters in the past 10 years, including Radio SBC (Somali Broadcasting Corporation), Radio Daljir, Codka Nabadda (“Voice of Peace”), and Royal Television, local journalists said. He is survived by a wife and five children.
At least two journalists were killed earlier in 2013 in direct relation to their work in Somalia, which CPJhas ranked the deadliest place in Africa to practice journalism. Twelve journalists were murdered for their work in the country in 2012, with none of the killings resolved, according to CPJ research. Somalia ranks second-worst on CPJ’s 2012 Impunity Index, which spotlights countries where journalists are murdered regularly and killers go free.
·For more data and analysis on Somalia, visit CPJ’s Somalia page here.
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CPJ is an independent, nonprofit organization that works to safeguard press freedom worldwide.
The plane of Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud made an emergency landing in Mogadishu Monday after experiencing engine problems.
The president was unharmed in the incident, and there were no reports of any injuries.
Government spokesman Abdirahman Omar Osman says the plane took off from Mogadishu’s airport at 9:00 a.m. local time but returned to the capital when, about 20 minutes into the flight, a technical problem developed in one of the plane’s two engines.
An airport official tells VOA’s Somali Service that the plane suffered a punctured tire on landing. Airport officials deny media reports that the plane had caught fire.
The president and a delegation were traveling to South Sudan for celebrations marking that country’s independence day. The group later boarded another flight and departed for South Sudan.
8 July 2013 – The United Nations envoy in Somalia today underscored the importance of protecting journalists and defending press freedom, following the killing of a television reporter on Sunday.
Libaan Abdullahi Farah ‘Qaran,’ a reporter for Kalsan TV based in Gaalkacyo, the capital of the north-central region of Mudug, was reportedly shot dead while returning home from work.
Nicholas Kay, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative and head of the UN Assistance Mission in Somalia (UNSOM), expressed his heartfelt condolences to the family and friends of the deceased, and to all media professionals in Somalia.
“UNSOM is dedicated to working with Somali authorities to strengthen the security and justice sectors in order to ensure that Somalia is safe and that perpetrators of violent crime are brought to justice,” he stated in a news release.
Mr. Kay also noted that this is a “politically tense” period in Puntland ahead of local elections, and he called for restraint on the part of all political actors.
UNSOM said the latest killing brings to five the number of journalists murdered this year in Somalia, which continues to be one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a media professional.
(Reuters) – At least four foreign crew members and seven Somali pirates died when a cargo ship that the pirates were holding to ransom off the Somali coast sank on Sunday, and 13 others were missing, a pirate who works with the gang said.
The Malaysian-owned MV Albedo cargo vessel and its crew were hijacked 900 miles off Somalia on Nov. 26, 2010 while sailing from the United Arab Emirates to Kenya.
“The ship has been gradually sinking for almost a week, but it sank totally last night,” the pirate said on Monday by telephone from Haradheere, Somalia’s main pirate base.
“We have confirmed that four foreign (crew) and seven pirates died. We are missing 13 in total,” said the pirate, who gave his name as Hussein. “We had no boats to save them.”
The Albedo had 23 crew from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Iran when it was seized.
Hussein said the captain had died earlier and four of the crew had previously been taken off the ship. With four dead, this would leave 14 to be accounted for, and it was not clear why there was a discrepancy with the pirates’ figures.
The EU Naval Force, a European Union anti-piracy unit that protects merchant shipping off the Horn of Africa, said the whereabouts of 15 crew were still unclear.
“EU Naval Force can confirm that the Malaysian flagged motor vessel MV Albedo, held by armed pirates at an anchorage close to the Somali coast, has sunk in rough seas,” a statement on the force’s website said.
“An EU Naval Force warship and Maritime Patrol Aircraft have closed the sea area and are carrying out a search and rescue operation to search for any survivors. The whereabouts of the 15 crew members from MV Albedo is still to be confirmed.”
Some hostages are held on land while pirates demand ransoms from ship owners, with some kept onboard to maintain the ships.
The number of attacks by Somali pirates has fallen over the last two years due to increased naval patrols and the presence of well-armed security teams on ships.
The local administration said the Albedo had been the last ship held off Haradheere, because it had convinced many pirates to quit the business and given them training in legal trades.
But piracy emanating from the lawless Horn of Africa may still cost the world economy about $18 billion a year, the World Bank said in a report in April. (Reporting by Abdi Sheikh in Mogadishu and Daniel Fineren in Dubai; Editing by Kevin Liffey)
