The British High Court ruling on Friday allowing three elderly Kenyans to sue the British government for colonial-era abuses represents a watershed moment in British imperial history, and the possibility for further claims from …
kenya
Countering al-Shabab: How the War on Terrorism Is Being Fought in East Africa
Two bombings of churches in Kenya pointed to the resurgence al-Qaeda-linked terrorist groups in East Africa. But a TIME investigation into how the region’s countries (and the U.S.) are handling groups like Somalia’s al-Shabab …
Must-Reads from Around the World, May 17, 2012
Suspicious Minds – Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reveals that elderly Communist Party members in the Chinese province of Yunnan have been questioned after they penned a letter calling for the sacking of Zhou Yongkang, the country’s top security official, amid rumors of continued infighting following the downfall of Bo Xilai. …
A Decision in The Hague Sends Tribal Tremors Through Kenya
With its ruling Monday that Kenya’s deputy prime minister and richest man must stand trial for crimes against humanity, the International Criminal Court delivered a body blow to the impunity enjoyed by the elites who all too …
Fatal Failure: Did Aid Agencies Let Up To 100,000 Somalis Die in 2011?
Even the best aid agencies find they can rarely admit their faults. Aid depends on donations, and donors need to feel confidence and trust to hand over money to an aid agency, which means the $126-billion-a-year foreign aid …
Bombardment of Somali Refugee Camp Is Symbolic of Kenya’s Doomed Invasion
Kenya’s hasty invasion of its northern neighbor Somalia took a tragic turn late Sunday when, according to witnesses on the ground, the Kenyan air force bombed a refugee camp sheltering those fleeing Somalia’s famine, killing three children and two adults. A spokesman for the Kenyan military in Nairobi insisted that the bombers killed …
A Novel Response to the World’s Worst Famine: War.
In September, Somalis kidnappers kill a British tourist and his wife; later they kidnap a disabled French tourist, who subsequently dies; then in October they abduct two Spanish aid workers. In reply Kenya, whose economy depends heavily on tourism, sends hundreds of troops into southern Somalia in pursuit of an al-Qaeda affiliate, …
Kenya Invades Somalia. Does It Get Any Dumber?
If the history of war teaches us anything, it’s that invading a foreign country is dicey. Storming across too many borders was the undoing of many of the world’s great conquerors, from Alexander the Great to Napoleon to the Nazis. The last few decades of US foreign policy – Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq – only underline how tricky …
Will We Really Let 750,000 People Starve to Death?
Are we really about to let three-quarters of a million people starve to death? The U.N. thinks we might. Figures describing the famine in Somalia from the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) paint a consistent, horrifying picture. As of late September, hunger is besieging 12.4 million East Africans, with …
Somalia: A Very Man-Made Disaster
The difference between a drought and a famine is down to man. Texas is in the middle of its worst drought on record right now but cowboys aren’t starving – because Texas, and the US, have government and economy enough to ensure they don’t. Somalia doesn’t have any government worthy of the name and that’s one reason why persistent …
Famine in Somalia: How Do You Feed Four Million Hungry People?
As 13 million in the Horn of Africa seek food assistance, aid workers are facing unique political and logistical challenges in helping an estimated 3.7 Somalis facing the threat of malnutrition and starvation.
While international organizations such as UNICEF and UNHCR, the U.N.’s refugee agency, work with local governments to …
World’s Greatest Ongoing Humanitarian Disaster Reaches a Crisis Point
With more than 60,000 starving and thirsty Somalis camped outside of the world’s largest refugee camp, what some aid agencies deem the world’s worst humanitarian crisis is facing its “critical days,” according to a UNICEF spokesperson.
Kenya’s Dadaab refugee camp, originally constructed to hold 90,000 people — making it the …
Tragic Deaths Underscore the World’s Worst Humanitarian Crisis
197 mostly Somali migrants died when their overladen boat capsized in the Red Sea. Escaping a world desperately short of water, they met their end by drowning.
That sad irony underscores the collective misfortune of those enveloped by the worst ongoing humanitarian crisis in the world: they were fleeing the parched Horn of Africa, …