8132019 Congo Warlord

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The Epoch Times A4

CHILD SOLDIER A young rebel soldier poses with his machine gun in Kalemie southeastDemocratic Republic of Congo ABDELHAK SENNAAFPGETTY IMAGES

South Africa Hosts RegionalSummit on Zimbabwe Crisis

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters)mdash Zimbabwean President RobertMugabe meets regional leaders ata summit in South Africa on Mon-day seeking a nod to form a gov-

ernment with or without his rivalsin a stance critics say will deepenhis countrys crisis

Mugabe and Morgan Tsvangiraileader of the opposition Movementfor Democratic Change (MDC)have been deadlocked in talks toform a unity government since apower-sharing agreement in Sep-tember with neither side showingany sign of compromise

Mugabe has urged the opposi-tion to join a unity government buthas made it clear he would not hesi-tate to name one without them Ts-vangirai has said no deal is possibleunless party activists are releasedfrom jail

The 15 state Southern AfricaDevelopment Community (SADC)summit hosted by South AfricanPresident Kgalema Motlanthe

hopes to break the impasse as Zim-babwe teeters on the brink of eco-nomic collapse and grapples with ahumanitarian crisis

Similar summits have failed to

push the political process forwardlargely because SADC is dividedover how it should deal with Mu-gabe analysts say

SADC members such as Bot-swana and Zambia have taken atough line on Mugabe who hasbeen in power since independencefrom Britain in 1980 but others stillrevere him as a former liberationhero

Botswanas President SeretseKhama Ian Khama one of Mu-gabes harshest critics will also at-tend the summit Ties between Zim-babwe and neighboring Botswanabecame strained after Khama saida new election was the only solutionto the crisis

Regional leaders includingSADC mediator and former SouthAfrican President Thabo Mbeki

failed last week to persuade the ri-vals to form a government

Mugabe has accused the MDCof working with Western powersto oust him He has remained de1047297-

ant through several rounds of talksthat have stalled over the control ofcabinet ministries

Western leaders want Mugabe tostep down and are also pushing fora democratic government to em-brace economic reforms before bil-lions of dollars in aid is offered

Without a political settlement itis also unlikely sanctions imposedon Zimbabwe by Western countrieswill be lifted

Zimbabwe ravaged by theworlds highest rate of in1047298ation se-vere food and fuel shortages and avirtually worthless economy alsofaces Africas biggest cholera epi-demic in a decade

The water-borne disease haskilled nearly 2800 people and in-fected more than 40000 since itbroke out in August

Congo Warlord StandsTrial in Child Soldier Case

THE HAGUE (Reuters)mdashACongolese militia leader ac-cused of using child soldiers tokill members of an ethnic mi-nority goes on trial Monday atthe 1047297rst ever war crimes trialat the International CriminalCourt

Thomas Lubanga founderand leader of the Union of Con-golese Patriots (UPC) in Con-gos eastern Ituri district denieshe enlisted and conscripted chil-dren under 15 to kill ethnic Len-dus in a 1998-2003 war in theDemocratic Republic of Congo

ICC prosecutors allege thatchild soldiers recruited by theUPC were involved in hostili-ties between Oct 2002 and June2003 and that some of them wereforced to kill and that others losttheir lives in combat Lubanga isalso alleged to have used childsoldiers as bodyguards

More than 30000 childrenwere recruited during the DRCcon1047298ict many plied with mari- juana and told they were pro-tected by witchcraft accordingto Bukeni Waruzi the Africaand Middle East coordinator forhuman rights group Witness

The three-judge court is ex-pected to give Lubanga 48 the

chance to re-enter a plea whenthe case gets under way in theworlds 1047297rst permanent warcrimes tribunal

Lubangas trial had been dueto start in June 2008 but judgessuspended it on concerns thatLubanga might be denied a fairtrial because the defense wasunable to view some evidenceagainst him

The matter was resolved inNovember when prosecutors be-gan releasing documents to thedefense that had been providedon condition of con1047297dentiality

to protect sources in war zonesJudges have allowed 93 victims

to take part in the case and giveevidence and be represented byeight legal representatives

Four of the victims are amongthe 34 witnesses that chief pros-ecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampowill call during the trial whichis expected to be completed be-fore the end of the year

It is not known how many wit-nesses the defense will call

Ethnic violence in the Ituriregion between the Hema andLendu and clashes between mi-litia groups vying for control ofmines and taxation have killed60000 people since 1999

Lubanga was handed over tothe court in 2006 after the DRCreferred the case to the ICCprosecutor in March 2004

The ICC is investigating casesin Congo the Central AfricanRepublic Sudans western Dar-fur region and Uganda Foursuspects have been arrested

The court has the backing of108 nations but experts say itstill faces many challenges in-cluding winning endorsementfrom powers such as the UnitedStates and China and scrutinyover its effectiveness

More than30000 childrenwere recruited

during the DRCconflict

European Parliament Members SendStrongly Worded Invitation to EutelsatEUTELSAT CONTINUED FROM A1

The incriminating evidenceagainst Eutelsat includes a recordedphone conversation in which anRSF investigator posing as some-one from the Chinese governmentgot an admission from a Eutelsatemployee that the companyrsquos moveto cut NTDTV was indeed politi-cally motivated

The Department for ForeignAffairs of Berlin has classi1047297ed therecording as credible The Depart-ment said that when they contactedEutelsats German representativethe representative admitted that itwas a politically motivated decision

and asked for anonymity

In response to the 1047297rst invitationto Eutelsat the company presidentsaid he could not attend and invitedthe MEPs to Eutelsatrsquos headquar-ters in Paris France instead

MEPs have questioned the integ-rity of Eutelsatrsquos 1047297rst response

ldquoItrsquos obvious that hersquos afraid tocome Hersquos afraid to come and facethe Members of Parliament becausethere is no explanation for closingthe signal [into China] and that isobviousrdquo said Foltyn-Kubickathrough a translator

MEPs have pointed out three ar-eas of pressing concern for humanrights in China including the per-

secution of the Falun Gong spir-

itual group and the suppression ofrights in Tibet The third area is theChinese regimersquos ldquoorgan harvest-ingrdquo the name for the fatal removaland sale of organs from death rowprisoners and from Falun Gongpractitioners held for their beliefs

The EP is one of two legislativebodies that make up the legislativebranch of the European Union agoverning body including 27 Euro-pean nations

ldquoThe EU is based upon and de-1047297ned by its adherence to principlesof freedom democracy and re-spect for human rights fundamen-tal freedoms and the rule of lawrdquo

reads the resolution

Unpopular Japan PMs WoesDeepen With Poll Loss JAPAN CONTINUED FROM A1

A series of policy 1047298ip-1047298ops andgaffes have pushed Asos approvalratings to below 20 percent a 1047297g-ure reaf1047297rmed by two polls pub-lished by Japanese newspapers onMonday

Asked which party they plan tocast their ballots for in the next gen-eral election 40 percent of votersopted for the Democrats against

21 percent for the LDP a survey bythe Nikkei business daily showedThe DPJ a mix of former LDP

members one-time socialistsand younger conservatives haspledged to put immediate priorityon creating jobs strengthening thesocial safety net and boosting do-mestic demand to rescue the econ-omy from recession

DPJ leader Ichiro Ozawa lastweek went to Yamagata to cam-paign for Yoshimura who hadcriticized the pain caused by struc-

tural reforms under former PrimeMinister Junichiro Koizumi in2001-2006

The Democrats and smallerallies took control of parlia-ments less powerful upper housein 2007 allowing them to de-lay legislation and stymie policyimplementation

Asos two predecessors quitabruptly after they failed to breakthe political deadlock and sawtheir popularity slide amid policymissteps and scandals making

Aso Japans third prime ministersince the last general election in2005

Zanzibar Clove Farmers Still Await Free Market

PEMBA Tanzania (Reuters)mdashItsan idyllic sight farmer Salim Jumayells at his agile sons as they clamberin high trees on Zanzibars northernisland of Pemba to harvest cloveswhose spicy-sweet aroma 1047298oats onthe breeze

But the scene belies the slow de-cline of the spice for Zanzibar asemi-autonomous archipelago in theIndian Ocean off Tanzania that wasonce the worlds largest producer

With the islands revenue fromtourism hit by global recessionthe spices potential as a foreign-exchange earner is sharpened evenas the trade has been declining Forthat farmers blame persistent gov-ernment interference

Since the African majority over-threw a minority ruling Arab elitein a revolution in 1964 governmentmonopoly Zanzibar State Trad-ing Corporation (ZSTC) has set theprices farmers are paid for cloves andtourism is now Zanzibars economicpriority

Zanzibar once enjoyed a near-monopoly in world markets and itscloves still reputedly yield the high-est-quality oil 1047298avor and aromabut its production of the spice hasslipped to less than 10 percent of theworld market

Now it lags far behind Indonesiaand Madagascar for the spice usedin cigarettes such as those known askretek in Indonesia perfume cook-ing and herbal medicine

Juma instructs his sons Salim Ma-brouk 13 and Twahir Khamisi 16

as they collect fresh green buds Ifyou come across dry stems bringthem down because they will weakenthe trees

The farmer whose 1047297ve acres lie

just outside Mchanga Kwale villagein the rolling hills of central Pembasays it has been another unproduc-tive season for the family farm

Since the 1950s clove productionin Zanzibar has fallen to 10000 tonsper year from 24000 and the numberof clove trees has more than halvedto about 2 million said AbubakarMohamed Ali executive director ofthe Zanzibar Clove Producers Or-ganization ZACPO

Those which are still in existenceare old and non-productive he said

Cloves were 1047297rst grown on the ar-chipelago in the 18th century at onepoint cultivation in plantations usedslave labor They generated wealthand riches for rulers including Sul-tans of Oman

Tourism

The government focus on tour-ism since the 1980s has been part ofa drive to liberalize the economy butthe global economic slowdown hashit tourist numbers

Just under 128500 holidaymakersvisited the islands in 2008 comparedwith 143300 in the previous year ac-cording to the state-run ZanzibarCommission for Tourism

Maabad Muhiddin the commis-sions senior marketing of1047297cer saidarrivals began dropping in June Taxcollector Zanzibar Revenue Boardsays tourism accounts for about 44percent of Zanzibars gross domesticproduct

In the year ending October thesector earned $412 million down 48

percent compared with a similar pe-riod in 2007 according to the centralBank of Tanzania

By comparison in the year to Oc-tober clove exports fetched $63 mil-

lion down from $89 million in thesame period in 2007

Hesitation

International clove prices havetrended higher in recent years withsharp seasonal variations those fromZanzibar hit a high of $5800 per tonexcluding freight in 2008 accordingto the Public Ledger a publicationthat tracks the prices of over 700 in-ternationally traded commodities

But farmers say this has not trans-lated into higher prices for them Inthe 2008 season they were paid be-tween $215 and $269 per kg for theirclovesmdashabout half the selling price

We ship export our productmostly to the UK to our agent thereWe give all of our product and hesells to other countries there saidAli Abeid the ZSTC clove oil distill-erys assistant producer

Under Zanzibar law farmersmay only sell cloves to ZSTC Manysmuggle their crop to neighboringKenya in search of higher prices

Clove trees take at least 1047297ve yearsbefore they start 1047298owering so poorprices have dissuaded farmers fromreplacing old or diseased trees andsome have abandoned their 1047297elds

The government of the ChamaCha Mapinduzi (CCM) party underthe islands President Amani AbeidKarume has for years vowed to lib-eralize the clove industry and in2003 hired the Economic ResearchBureau at the University of Dar EsSalaam to formulate a developmentstrategy to be in place by the end of

2007But little has been done prompt-

ing many of Zanzibars farmers toturn to crops such as seaweed andcoconuts which are freely traded