Blog

‘You are being lied to about pirates’ - Johann Hari

By ACAS | 5 January 2009

Who imagined that in 2009, the world’s governments would be declaring a new War on Pirates? As you read this, the British Royal Navy – backed by the ships of more than two dozen nations, from the US to China – is sailing into Somalian waters to take on men we still picture as parrot-on-the-shoulder pantomime villains. They will soon be fighting Somalian ships and even chasing the pirates onto land, into one of the most broken countries on earth. But behind the arrr-me-hearties oddness of this tale, there is an untold scandal. The people our governments are labelling as “one of the great menaces of our times” have an extraordinary story to tell – and some justice on their side.

Video: Confusion over Guinea coup after president dies - Al Jazeera

By ACAS | 23 December 2008

Mugabe’s Endgame

By Clapperton Mavhunga | 18 December 2008

Could it be possible that while the public, the press, and the international community were busy with cholera, the illegal regime in Harare actually declared a state of emergency under cover of a “national emergency” (ostensibly against cholera)? I may not be the only one seeing the reality that what has intensified is not the energy with which Mugabe is combating cholera, but, rather, abducting human rights activists collecting information on human rights abuses and MDC activists.

Political poison sickening Zimbabwe : Human Rights Watch

By ACAS | 16 December 2008

‘As the cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe spreads across regional borders, southern African governments have come together to discuss a regional strategy to stem the outbreak. But the cholera outbreak and other emergency conditions are symptoms of the broader political crisis in Zimbabwe. There will be no end to the suffering unless regional leaders acknowledge this fact,’ writes Tiseke Kasambalam of Human Rights Watch.

‘So Much to Fear’: War Crimes and the Devastation of Somalia

By ACAS | 15 December 2008

New from Human Rights Watch: ‘The 104-page report, “So Much to Fear: War Crimes and the Devastation of Somalia,” describes how the Somali Transitional Federal Government (TFG), the Ethiopian forces that intervened in Somalia to support it and insurgent forces have committed widespread and serious violations of the laws of war. Frequent violations include indiscriminate attacks, killings, rape, use of civilians as human shields, and looting. Since early 2007, the escalating conflict has claimed thousands of civilian lives, displaced more than a million people, and driven out most of the population of Mogadishu, the capital. Increasing attacks on aid workers in the past year have severely limited relief operations and contributed to an emerging humanitarian crisis.’

On press freedom in Tunisia

By ACAS | 15 December 2008

Resist Africom: the movie

By ACAS | 12 December 2008

‘A major strategic shift in U.S. attention toward’ Africa: New American Foundation

By ACAS | 12 December 2008

“U.S. arms transfers to Africa are being carried out against the backdrop of a major strategic shift in U.S. attention toward the continent, as embodied in the creation of the Africa Command,” writes the New American Foundation.

The risk of wider violence in the Central African Republic is today at its highest point since the coup d’état of 2003.

By ACAS | 9 December 2008

“…the danger of a humanitarian catastrophe and new instability in the country and the wider region is high because both the regime and the main opposition forces see armed conflict as the ultimate way out of the long crisis,” writes the International Crisis Group in a new briefing on the Central African Republic.

HIV/AIDS: Obama’s easy win

By Kristin Peterson | 9 December 2008

Amid international financial meltdown and recession, the challenge of withdrawal from Iraq and the growing crisis in Afghanistan, there will be few “quick wins” available to President Obama. But fixing the US response to HIV/AIDS is one way he can do a lot of good relatively quickly and begin the move towards a new standard for international engagement. As the world prepares to reflect on its response to the pandemic, it is worth asking what Obama might achieve by World AIDS Day 2009.