L'Afrique du Sud attaque Monsanto

L'autorité qui statuait à la demande d'un consommateur sud-africain, a demandé à la Compagnie américaine Monsanto d'apporter les preuves scientifiques de cette affirmation, avant toute utlisation de cette formule.

Dans son arrêt, l'Adversiting Standard Authority (ASA), précise qu'elle est prête à lever l'interdiction pour Monsanto de soutenir dans ses publicités, que les Organismes Génétiquement Modifiés ne produisent 'aucune réaction négative' chez ceux qui les consomment.

Mais pour cela, indique l'autorité de régulation de la publicité, la firme américaine, leader mondial des OGM, doit apporter des preuves scientifiques de chercheurs indépendants, pour soutenir une telle affirmation.

Même si Monsanto a fourni «de nombreuses études contredisant le fait que les OGM seraient dangereux pour la santé, aucun de ces rapports ne fait référence à une « réaction négative », souligne l'autorité sud-africaine de régulation de la publicité dans sa décision.

La représentation sud-africaine de la firme américaine, a indiqué que «toutes les études biologiques effectuées sur les OGM dans les pays où ils ont été testés ont reconnu leur qualité nutritive et les ont déclaré propre à la consommation, au même titre que les autres semences conventionnelles».

Mais Mark Lewis, le Sud-africain qui a saisi l'autorité de régulation de la publicité, soutien que la formule «aucune réaction négative» utilisée par Monsanto dans sa publicité en Afrique du Sud est trompeuse.

Le plaignant a produit la copie d'une étude scientifique, qui conclu aux «effets dangereux de ces produits».

L'Afrique du Sud est l'un des premiers pays d'Afrique à autoriser la culture des OGM.

Mais le débat fait toujours rage entre scientifiques favorables aux organismes génétiquement modifiés et ceux qui y sont opposés.

Prières pour la pluie en Mauritanie

Apres les prières pour la pluie en Australie .....

Le président mauritanien Sidi Abdallahi a ordonné à tous les imams d'organiser à partir de dimanche des "prières pour la pluie" à travers le pays, menacé par la sécheresse.

Selon le directeur des Affaires islamiques, les prières auront lieu dans toutes les contrées du pays, "partout où existe une mosquée ou un regroupement d'habitants", et elles doivent se poursuivre, en principe, "jusqu'à ce que pluies
s'en suivent".

Rite connu depuis la vie du prophète Mohamed, la prière pour la pluie consiste en une procession où les fidèles implorent la générosité du ciel et conjurent "les maux qui s'abattent sur la terre du fait des infidélités des humains".

Le retard pris cette année par l'hivernage en Mauritanie est considéré comme étant l'un des "plus difficile" pour un pays aux trois quarts désertiques.

La Mauritanie compte pour l'essentiel sur la pluie pour la subsistance de ses populations et de son cheptel.

Les services de la météorologie agricole en Mauritanie font cas de quelques rares pluies tombées depuis le mois de juin, mais qui sont mal réparties dans le temps et dans l'espace.

Pourtant, le centre régional Agrhymet, institution spécialisée
des pays sahéliens (CILSS), a estimé récemment que le Sahel
connaîtra une pluviométrie "normale à excédentaire".

Concern over gorilla 'executions'

Some readers may find the enlarged image upsetting Enlarge Image

Conservationists have expressed concern over the "senseless and tragic" killing of four mountain gorillas in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The bodies of three females and one male were discovered by rangers earlier this week in the Virunga National Park.

Officials said the "executions" were not the work of poachers because they would have taken the bodies.

Since January, seven of the large apes in the region have been shot dead.

"This is a senseless and tragic loss of some of the world's most endangered and beloved animals," said Deo Kujirakwinja of the Wildlife Conservation Society's (WCS) Congo programme.

"This area must be immediately secured or we stand to lose an entire population of these animals," he added.

'Scare tactics'

The four animals belonged to a group of 12 gorillas, known to researchers as the Rugendo family, which was often visited by tourists.

Because poachers would have sold the bodies as food or trophies, conservationists think the apes were killed by a group that was trying to scare wardens out of the park.

The IWC said the protected area was coming under increasing pressure from "outside exploitation", including the charcoal trade.

"Whatever the motive underlying this tragedy, the gorillas are helpless pawns in a feud between individuals," said Mark Rose, chief executive of Fauna and Flora International.

"We are deeply concerned about this incident, which follows more than 20 years of successful collaboration for mountain gorilla conservation."

A census carried out in 2004 estimated that 380 gorillas, more than half of the world's population, lived in the national park and surrounding Virunga volcanoes region.

The latest killings take the number of shootings in the area to seven. Earlier this year, two silverback male gorillas were shot dead in the same area of the park, while a female was killed in May.

Le Niokolo-Koba en danger

Avec ses 913 000 hectares, le parc national du Niokolo-Koba vit des moments difficiles, même si les pouvoirs publics ont consenti beaucoup d’efforts pour sa conservation. La mobilité des agents pour sa surveillance pose toujours problème, à cause du manque de moyens logistiques suffisants, de pistes carrossables ; surtout en cette période d’hivernage où le par et ses environs sont presque inaccessibles.

Pour sauver ce qui reste du Niokolo Koba, la communauté internationale est vivement interpellée. A la direction du parc national du Niokolo-Koba, il y avait ce jeudi, un incroyable remue-ménage. Une importante équipe s’affairait autour de son départ pour un long séjour en brousse. L’objectif de la mission est d’établir un contact visuel avec des éléphants jadis très nombreux dans le parc maintenant rares, même si leurs traces sont souvent repérées ici et là dans les aires de la réserve mondiale de la biosphère. L’équipe devrait débarquer à Mako pour entamer ses recherches par la bourgade de Tambanouniya du côté sud du parc.

A la question de savoir ce qui a motivé la rareté de ces espèces, le commandant Samuel Diémé, conservateur du parc, soutient qu ’"il y a certes le braconnage,mais cela n’est pas suffisant, sinon nous allions trouver beaucoup de carcasses. Les éléphants ont dû migrer vers des horizons plus cléments et ont été coincés suite au bouchage des couloirs de migration."

Une quantité importante d’autres espèces telles que les lions, les panthères, les buffles, les élans de derby ou encore les cobas constituent, entre autres espèces, la faune en péril de ce patrimoine mondial aujourd’hui confronté à d’énormes difficultés.

Un parc à problèmes

De 70 agents, les effectifs ont plus que doublé grâce à un recrutement massif opéré en 2003. Aujourd’hui, ils sont 166 agents répartis dans les trois zones ( la partie ouest avec Dalaba comme base, la zone Est dont le quartier général est établi au Niokolo et la zone centre basée à Simenti) qui s’activent dans la surveillance de cette réserve de biosphère avec un véhicule positionné dans chaque zone pour les patrouilles.

Le budget est aussi passé de 16 millions de francs en 2000 à 57 millions en 2003 ; mais les problèmes demeurent entiers. Pour avoir un oeil sur tout le parc, il est nécessaire d’accroître la mobilité des agents et pour ce faire des moyens logistiques supplémentaires et adaptés doivent suivre. Il n’y a que des épaves dans l’enceinte de la direction, aussi des pistes carrossables doivent-elles être construites. Actuellement, sur les 900 Km de piste, seuls 340 Km sont ouverts avec la collaboration des populations riveraines."Il y a encore des zones inaccessibles et quand le fleuve Gambie fait le plein, le parc est coupé en deux", laisse entendre le commandant Diémé.

L’autre grosse difficulté est relative au déficit en moyens de communication mobiles."Quand nos équipes vont en patrouilles, elles n’ont aucun moyen pour communiquer avec la base. Les radios au niveau des postes fixes ont souvent des problèmes de batterie solaire, qui coûte entre 250 et 300 mille francs l’unité", explique le conservateur.

Il s’y ajoute les feux tardifs pour la gestion desquels le parc ne dispose d’aucun moyen, la pression des populations riveraines, la gestion des points d’eau et la construction en vue par l’Organisation pour la mise en valeur du fleuve Gambie (Omvg) du barrage de Samba Ngalou, sur le fleuve Gambie qui traverse le parc. Les études d’impact sont en cours mais "ce qui est indubitable, c’est que ce barrage aura des incidences plus ou moins négatives sur la faune. Nous ne connaissons pas encore le futur débit du fleuve, nous attendons de voir", renseigne le commandant Diémé.

Pour l’heure, le fleuve Gambie joue un rôle inestimable pour les animaux avec ses affluents que sont la Koulountou et le Niokolo qui permettent d’arroser le parc et de remplir les mares. Les agents en poste dans certains recoins du parc sont quotidiennement soumis à des corvées d’eau, tellement il en manque.

Burkina Faso: Un réseau d'abattage clandestin démantelé

L'Observateur Paalga (Ouagadougou)

19 Juillet 2007
Publié sur le web le 20 Juillet 2007

Dans le cadre de la lutte au quotidien contre les produits alimentaires impropres à la consommation, la section hygiène de la mairie de Nongr-Maasom a procédé, le 10 juillet 2007, au démantèlement d'un réseau d'abattage clandestin au secteur 23. Cette opération a permis de retirer de la consommation publique une importante quantité de viande non contrôlée.

Deux personnes arrêtées, six carcasses de petits ruminants saisies et trois bouchers verbalisés, c'est le résultat de la descente, le 10 juillet 2007, aux environs de cinq (05) heures du matin, de la section hygiène et assainissement et de la police municipale de Nongr-Maasom.

Sur plainte d'habitants résidant aux environs du lieu d'abattage clandestin, l'opération a conduit les services de la mairie de Nongr-Maasom au secteur 23 où les animaux étaient abattus au mépris de toute règle d'hygiène. Les animaux égorgés étaient dépouillés au milieu d'immondices composées d'excrétas et d'ordures de tout genre.

Les deux individus interpellés sur les lieux ont déclaré être au service de trois (03) bouchers officiant dans la ville de Ouagadougou. Informé, le maire de l'arrondissement, Zakaria Sawadogo, a instruit l'équipe qui fit une sortie sur les lieux de vente de ces bouchers pour non seulement vérifier la qualité de la viande vendue mais aussi les rappeler à l'ordre. C'est pourquoi après avoir été sensibilisés, ces bouchers se sont vu infliger une amende de vingt-quatre mille (24 000) F CFA chacun.

Liens Pertinents Afrique de l'Ouest Burkina Faso Corruption et Criminalité Justice

La viande saisie a été envoyée à l'abattoir pour inspection. Elle a ensuite été remise à un centre d'oeuvres sociales. Il faut noter que cette opération a été possible grâce à la collaboration de la population. Le maire Zakaria Sawadogo a apprécié très positivement cette contribution des populations face à un phénomène qui interpelle tout un chacun. Il a saisi l'occasion pour appeler à la vigilance, car des milliers de produits périmés et prohibés ont été retirés des boutiques et alimentations par ses services.

En effet, parallèlement aux opérations de contrôle sur l'abattage clandestin, le service hygiène et assainissement de l'arrondissement de Nongr-Maasom s'attelle au quotidien à la traque des produits alimentaires prohibés. A cet effet, des contrôles ont permis la saisie d'importants lots de produits alimentaires dont les dates de péremption sont dépassées.

De même, des opérations ont été menées contre des individus qui ont entrepris d'écouler sur le marché des produits alimentaires contrefaits. Ainsi, près d'une (01) tonne de produits alimentaires qui entrent dans la consommation quotidienne des citoyens ont été saisis. Ils devront être détruits dans les tout prochains jours.

Le jet d'eau de Genève coloré en rouge sang au nom du Darfour

(crédit photo: Genève Tourisme, AMAeschlimann)

Le jet d'eau de Genève, la plus célèbre attraction du lac Léman, devait se colorer en rouge sang, ce mardi soir, afin d'évoquer la souffrance du Darfour, cette province de l'ouest du Soudan en proie à la guerre civile depuis quatre ans.

Le jet haut de 140 mètres devait être illuminé de rouge à l'occasion de la journée de la justice internationale qui commémore l'accord de Rome du 17 juillet 1998, à l'origine de la fondation de la Cour pénale internationale de La Haye.

"Cette action doit permettre de briser le silence autour du drame du Darfour", où la guerre civile et ses conséquences ont fait 200.000 morts selon l'ONU depuis 2003, a observé le maire de la ville, Patrice Mugny. "L'illumination de cet important symbole de Genève, capitale des droits humains, est un geste fort pour marquer les consciences", a-t-il observé devant la presse.

"L'impunité est aujourd'hui la règle" au Darfour, a dénoncé de son côté Philip Grant, président de l'association TRIAL (Track Impunity Always) qui lutte contre l'impunité des auteurs de crimes internationaux et est à l'origine de cette initiative. (belga)

"The bilions" of Mobutu will be back

Mobutu left his country in ruins

Swiss authorities say they are ready to return millions of dollars frozen in accounts held by Mobutu Sese Seko, the former Congolese leader.

Swiss Confederation President Micheline Calmy-Rey said her government is holding $6.6m in Mr Mobutu's accounts.

But this is far less than the billions of dollars the DR Congo government had believed was stashed away.

The Swiss authorities froze bank accounts in 1997 belonging to President Mobutu soon after he was ousted.

He died in exile not long after rebels led by President Joseph Kabila's father, Laurent, had taken over the country.

"We discussed the question of Mobutu's funds and my government is prepared to restore the money to the DR Congo as soon as possible," Ms Rey told reporters in the DR Congo capital, Kinshasa, after talks with Mr Kabila.

The BBC's Lubunga By'aombe in Kinshasa says the newly elected government's interest has waned after establishing it was less than the amount they had hoped for.

Initial reports had indicated that the late dictator had stashed billions of dollars embezzled from the government treasury in Swiss accounts.

In 2001, items auctioned from his luxurious villa in Switzerland netted $100,000.

The late Congolese leader's son, Nzanga Mobutu, is the agriculture minister in President Kabila's government.

In the past, Switzerland has come under criticism for its role as a money-laundering centre, prompting the government to impose stiffer banking rules.

Two years ago, the Swiss returned some $500m to Nigeria that had been held in accounts owned by the later military leader, General Sani Abacha.

Profiles: The imprisoned medics

Hopes are rising that the six foreign medical staff condemned to death in Libya for infecting children with HIV may be freed as part of a financial settlement with the families of the children.

The medics, who all proclaim their innocence, were arrested eight years ago after an outbreak of HIV at a paediatric hospital in Benghazi.

A Libyan court has cleared nine policemen and a doctor of torturing the foreign workers into signing confessions.

All six are Bulgarian citizens with one, an Egyptian-born Palestinian, given citizenship in June 2007.

Sofia-based journalist Virginia Savova looks at each of their cases for the BBC News website.

ASHRAF ALHAJOUJ

Ashraf Alhajouj was a trainee at the al-Fateh Paediatric Hospital in Benghazi when he was arrested on 29 January 1999 along with the five Bulgarian nurses who were also working in the city.

It took Mr Alhajouj's family 10 months of searching to find the exact jail where he was being held.

"We were startled when Ashraf came into the room, we simply could not recognise him," his father said in an interview for Bulgarian media.

I was tortured like the rest of the accused and there are marks on the bodies of us all Ashraf Alhajouj

"He had been tortured with electricity and different devices. He had been locked in cages."

Mr Alhajouj was born in the Egyptian city of Alexandria in 1969 and went to Libya when he was two years old.

His Egyptian mother Afifa was a computer literacy teacher and his Palestinian father Ahmed was a professor of mathematics.

Mr Alhajouj has said it is inconceivable he could harm Libyan children.

"I am innocent on all of the charges," he said at the final court hearing in 2006. "I was tortured like the rest of the accused and there are marks on the bodies of us all."

Mr Alhajouj's father insists his son is not yet a doctor but a student, as the Libyan authorities claim.

"If he really is a doctor, then Libya should show his diploma to the world," he said.

Mr Alhajouj's family also denies claims by the Libyan authorities that at the time of his arrest he lived in a luxurious property in Benghazi, and says he lived on a student campus.

After Mr Alhajouj's detention, his mother was sacked from her job and his sisters were expelled from university.

The family left Libya in December 2005 and went to the Netherlands, where they were granted political refugee status.

On 19 June, 2007 Bulgaria announced that it had granted citizenship to Mr Alhajouj, a decision that would enable him to leave Libya with the rest of the medics, if they are pardoned by the Supreme Judicial Council.

VALIA CHERVENIASHKA

Valia Cherveniashka, 52, is a nurse from the small north-west Bulgarian town of Biala Slatina.

She worked in a hospital in the Libyan city of Tarbouha from between 1984 and 1997 before moving to the al-Fateh Hospital.

She says she was beaten by Libyan guards but did not confess to infecting the children.

In 1999, Mrs Cherveniashka's husband, Emil Uzunov, was the first to bring the arrest of the medics to the public's attention in Bulgaria. In 2003, he staged a hunger strike at the Libyan embassy in Sofia.

If Bulgaria wants to wipe off the shame on its face, it should convict the inquisitors of the medics Emil Uzunov husband of Valia Cherveniashka

Mr Uzunov and Mrs Cherveniashka's two daughters, Gergana and Antoaneta, have criticised Sofia's handling of the case, saying dozens of nationals from Poland, Thailand and other countries were also arrested but later released.

Mr Uzunov plans to initiate court proceedings against Bulgarian government officials, including the former foreign ministers of Bulgaria, Nadezhda Mihailova and Solomon Pasi, for failing to secure the release of the medics.

"If Bulgaria wants to wipe off the shame on its face, it should convict the inquisitors of the medics," he said.

Dr Anton Antonov, who was head of the paediatric ward of the hospital in Biala Slatina, where Mrs Cherveniashka first worked, told reporters that in a letter she wrote a month before her arrest, she wrote about the HIV/Aids outbreak in her ward and expressed fear for herself.

Dr Antonov described Ms Cherveniashka as a very good specialist and a lively person.

"It's absurd [to think of] her committing such an infernal act," added the doctor.

SNEZHANA DIMITROVA

Snezhana Dimitrova, 54, worked as a nurse in two hospitals in the Bulgarian capital Sofia. She applied for jobs in Libya in the hope of earning a better salary, so that she could support her family.

She was arrested six months after her arrival at the al-Fateh hospital in 1998. She says it is inconceivable that a nurse and a mother could commit the crime of which she has been convicted.

Mrs Dimitrova claimed that during the initial stage of detention she was subjected to torture and inhuman treatment.

She has diabetes, had a nervous breakdown in 2005 and broke her leg last autumn.

Her husband George refuses to talk about his wife and family's ordeal.

Mrs Dimitrova has a daughter, a son and a seven-year-old granddaughter, whom she has only seen in pictures.

The health of her father, Ivan Klisurski, has suffered during the trial. After suffering a stroke 20 years ago, Mr Klisurski suffered another one after the announcement of the death sentence for his daughter in 2006.

He has only been able to speak with Mrs Dimitrova on the phone, and in an interview in 2007 he said he thought that he would not live long enough to see her again.

NASYA NENOVA

Nasya Nenova, 41, began her career as a nurse at the main hospital in the eastern Bulgarian city of Sliven, where she remained until she left the country to work in Libya.

She arrived in Libya in 1998 and started working at the al-Fateh. She was arrested just when she was preparing to return to Bulgaria.

During the investigation, she signed confessions, in which she stated that she had deliberately infected Libyan children in order to receive money.

At a court hearing in June 2001, Mrs Nenova and co-accused Kristina Vulcheva withdrew their testimony, explaining that they had been coerced by torture to confess to offences they had not committed.

Libya will trade the Bulgarian medics at the price it wants Ivan Nenov husband of Nasya Nenova

Mrs Nenova told her husband Ivan later that she had been beaten with a cable on her hands and feet. As a result she said she could not walk for a week. A month later, she says she was subjected to electric shocks and threatened to be infected with HIV if she did not confess.

After three months in jail, she tried to commit suicide. Asked by a judge whether her suicide attempt was a result of a guilty conscience, she replied that she had tried to end her life because she could not bear to be tortured.

Ivan Nenov, an anaesthetist in the Intensive Care Unit of the Sliven's hospital, has strongly criticised the Bulgarian authorities for not succeeding in freeing the medics. He and Antoaneta Uzunova, the daughter of Valya Cherveniashka, were the first relatives to visit the medics in 2001.

From Libya they issued a joint declaration in which they accused the Bulgarian authorities of hiding the information about the tortures on their relatives for more than a year.

"Now the authorities are concerned about our relatives, but it is hopelessly late," Ms Uzunova and Mr Nenov said at the time.

"Libya will trade the Bulgarian medics at the price it wants," Mr Nenov said in 2005.

Mrs Nenova has had the unanimous support of her colleagues at the city hospital in Sliven throughout the past eight years.

They have held rallies calling for her and her colleagues' freedom.

Mrs Nenova has a son who was in secondary school when she was arrested and is now at a university in France.

VALENTINA SIROPOULO

Valentina Siropoulo, 48, was a nurse for 18 years in the Intensive Care Unit of the hospital of the Bulgarian city of Pazardjik. She went to Libya so that she could earn more money to send her only child to university.

Mrs Siropoulo had been working at the al-Fateh since February 1998.

She says she is innocent and that she showed compassion to the children in the Aids ward where she worked.

"They... have done to me so many things but they can't take my innocence from me," she said in court in 2006.

The belief in good and truth, in the fact that you exist, that there is someone thinking about me, that I want very much to see you, gives me strength to fight the evil and to continue to live Valentina Siropoulo

She said beatings and torture with electric shocks during the investigation left her with partial paralysis to her face and unable to talk for months.

In her first card to her family after 22 months of detention, she wrote:

"Hello, dear family. I am allowed to write you a letter, which doesn't mean it will reach you or that there'll be another one. Physically I am relatively fine, but my soul is incurably ill.

"The belief in good and truth, in the fact that you exist, that there is someone thinking about me, that I want very much to see you, gives me strength to fight the evil and to continue to live."

Ms Siropoulo's former colleagues from the hospital in Pazardjik have held rallies and silent vigils.

KRISTINA VALCHEVA

Kristina Valcheva, 48, arrived in Libya from Bulgaria with her second husband, Dr Zdravko Georgiev, in 1991.

She was working in the Hauari Hospital in Benghazi when she was arrested over the outbreak of HIV/Aids among children in the Paediatric Hospital.

Libyan prosecutors say she is the mastermind behind the case, basing their evidence on HIV-infected blood bags found in her house in Libya, although she never worked in the Paediatric Hospital itself.

Mrs Valcheva has said that during the investigation she was subjected at least 10 times to electric shocks. She was undressed and beaten with an electric cable.

I'll hold her and won't let her leave my arms for a whole night Zorka Nachkova mother of Kristina Valcheva

In February 1999, her husband was also arrested when he went to look for his wife in the police office. Dr Georgiev was detained and accused with the five other Bulgarians although he did not work in the same Paediatric Hospital.

On the day his wife was sentenced to death in 2004, Dr Zdravko Georgiev was released from jail, but he is still not allowed to leave Libya. He is staying at the Bulgarian Embassy in Tripoli.

Mrs Valcheva has a 29-year-old son from her first marriage.

Zorka Nachkova, Mrs Valcheva's mother, says she dreams of the day she returns home.

"'I'll hold her and won't let her leave my arms for a whole night," she said.

BURKINA FASO • Réussir loin du mirage occidental

Au "pays des hommes intègres", la société multiplie les initiatives pour trouver un modèle de développement fondé sur une gestion responsable, constate le quotidien suisse Le Temps.


Une vue aérienne de la ville de Ouagadougou



Des feux épars dans la brousse. Lorsqu'on survole de nuit le Burkina Faso, on aperçoit à des kilomètres à la ronde les lumières d'Ouagadougou, la capitale, une multitude de points incandescents : la lumière de foyers isolés. Autant de flammes éparpillées à perte de vue qui grignotent l'obscurité. Le développement de ce pays subsaharien – l'un des plus pauvres du monde – est à l'image de ces feux.

Il est facile de s'effrayer face à la profondeur des ténèbres africaines. Mais on peut aussi apprécier le nombre des lueurs, comme autant de balises qui guident jusqu'à l'aube. Elles sont comme les progrès d'un pays en mouvement : autant de bornes sur la voie du développement. Dans la lutte contre la pauvreté, les réussites au "pays des hommes intègres" sont nombreuses. Le Burkina Faso reste, il est vrai, un pays pauvre, enclavé, sans ressources. Les Objectifs du millénaire pour le développement (OMD) de l'ONU sont loin d'y être atteints. Mais on y parle aujourd'hui ouvertement de corruption, on y crée des entreprises et développe des partenariats de commerce équitable.

Et, peut-être plus que les progrès mesurables à l'aune d'indices économiques, le changement des mentalités est le plus important. "Nous avons la malchance, ou peut-être la chance, d'être loin de la mer pour rêver d'Europe." Souvent, dans la bouche des jeunes Burkinabés, revient l'idée de réussir sur place, loin du mirage occidental. Fières de leur pays, les forces vives ne cèdent pas à la tentation de l'eldorado européen. Trop de jeunes Burkinabés, partis chercher fortune dans la riche Côte-d'Ivoire voisine, sont souvent revenus les mains vides.

La société a fait sienne l'idée d'un développement non pas tombé du ciel mais qui repose sur la création de bases pérennes : un socle ancré par la bonne gouvernance et la gestion responsable des finances publiques et la décentralisation. A tous les échelons, elle affiche la volonté de se relever ; une idée chère au grand intellectuel Joseph Ki-Zerbo. Le vieux sage, partisan du développement endogène, cultivait le refus de la fatalité. "Il n'y a pas de développement clés en main mais clés en tête", aimait-il à répéter. Un leitmotiv qui a germé dans les esprits et que l'aide internationale doit interpréter comme le signe d'une Afrique devenant responsable. Le signe aussi qu'il est grand temps pour nous les Occidentaux de changer notre regard sur un continent qui, malgré les famines et les guerres, se tient debout.

L'affaire Borel

Les juges chargées d'enquêter sur d'éventuelles pressions sur la justice dans l'affaire Borrel ont perquisitionné, lundi 9 et mardi 10 juillet, les domiciles de Michel de Bonnecorse, l'ancien responsable de la cellule africaine de l'Elysée. Les magistrates, Fabienne Pous et Michèle Ganascia, ont notamment saisi un carnet lors de ces perquisitions. Les deux juges s'étaient déjà rendues en avril au Quai d'Orsay et à la chancellerie, avant d'être refoulées aux portes de l'Elysée où elles voulaient visiter le bureau de M. de Bonnecorse.

Elisabeth Borrel, veuve du juge Bernard Borrel, mort en 1995 à Djibouti dans des circonstances non élucidées, a porté plainte avec constitution de partie civile le 25 juin contre M. de Bonnecorse pour "pression sur la justice". Cette plainte vise une déclaration de M. de Bonnecorse au journal Jeune Afrique dans lequel il indique : "Contrairement à ceux qui préjugent de l'assassinat de Bernard Borrel sur ordre des autorités djiboutiennes, je préjuge, moi, qu'il s'est suicidé." La plainte est instruite par les juges Pous et Ganascia, déjà en charge depuis octobre 2006 d'une information judiciaire sur ces mêmes faits, à la suite d'une première plainte de M^me Borrel visant l'ex-porte-parole du Quai d'Orsay Hervé Ladsous.

Par ailleurs, selon le témoignage cité par l'AFP d'un ex-membre du renseignement militaire français, recueilli le 27 juin par la juge Sophie Clément qui enquête sur les circonstances du décès du juge Borrel, le magistrat français aurait été chargé d'investiguer sur les agissements d'Ismaël Omar Guelleh (dit "IOG"), actuel président de la République de Djibouti. Selon ses sources et celle d'un autre officier dont il cite le nom, "le ministre de la justice (djiboutien), Moumin Badon Farah, avait chargé M. Borrel de constituer un dossier sur l'ensemble des trafics auxquels Ismaël Omar Guelleh était mêlé", explique le militaire. "Il s'agissait d'avoir des arguments pour écarter IOG de la course au pouvoir."

M^e Francis Szpiner, l'avocat de Djibouti, s'insurge : " Quand on connaît les rapports exécrables qu'entretenaient le juge Borrel et le ministre de la justice djiboutien, relatés par M^me Borrel dans son livre (Un juge assassiné), je serais étonné qu'une enquête de ce type ait pu être confiée au juge Borrel. En effet, (il) avait demandé sa mutation en raison de ses différends avec le ministre !"

Gérard Davet

Gabon's leader "racist" and "colonial".

Denis Sassou-Nguesso is thought to own several houses in France
Congo's president has condemned a French investigation into alleged embezzlement by him and Gabon's leader as "racist" and "colonial".

"In France, all the world's leaders have castles and so on. I am very surprised that only two people are targeted," said Denis Sassou-Nguesso.

The complaint was made by three groups, which claim that properties in France were bought with stolen funds.

Gabon's Omar Bongo Ondimba has also reportedly angrily denied the charges.

Both countries are oil exporters.

Mr Sassou-Nguesso said he would have ignored the complaint had it not been linked to racism and colonialism.

'Considerable resources'

The properties include flats linked to Mr Sassou-Nguesso's family in Paris's Foch Avenue, in Parisian suburbs such as Courbevoie and Velizy, and in expensive areas in the south of France such as the Cote d'Azur, the BBC's Catherine Zemmouri in Paris says.

President Omar Bongo of Gabon
President Bongo has also dismissed the charges

The three groups making claims against the two leaders were Survie (Survival), which has criticised France's support of African dictators in the past, an international network of legal experts called Sherpa and the Federation of Congolese from the Diaspora.

Survie wants the properties to be seized and sold, with the proceeds being used to build schools and hospitals in Africa.

"The properties never belong directly to presidents themselves but instead to their daughters, sons, nephews or [are] registered to property companies," Benjamin Mutsila, president of Congolese Diaspora, told the BBC.

"It is not a president's salary that could have generated the considerable resources needed to acquire such property," said lawyer William Bourdon, president of the Sherpa group, quoted by the AFP news agency.

Mr Bongo, 71 and Africa's longest-serving head of state, won re-election last year for another seven-year term.

He has ruled the oil-rich country since 1967.

Mr Sassou-Nguesso, 63, ruled Congo from 1979 to 1992, and then returned to lead the country after a coup in 1997.

Threat to kill' missing UK girl

Mike Hill, Oluchi Hill
Mrs Hill says her husband was willing to give-in to the demands
Kidnappers who seized a three-year-old UK girl in Nigeria have threatened to kill her unless her father agrees to take her place, her mother says.

Margaret Hill, the daughter of an expatriate worker, was grabbed from a car on her way to school in the oil city of Port Harcourt.



Her mother, Oluchi, told the BBC that the kidnappers had called her demanding a meeting in a town in the Niger Delta.

She said they then allowed her to speak to her daughter who was crying.

Margaret was snatched by gunmen at 0730 (0630 GMT) on Thursday after they smashed a window of her car as it stood in traffic.


They say I can bring my husband to swap with the baby
Oluchi Hill

Oil rich city's woes
Oil worker recalls kidnap

Her father Mike Hill, who has lived in the country for 10 years, runs a bar in Port Harcourt.

The region's main militant group - the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend) - has offered to help find the girl, according to the AP news agency.

"We will join in the hunt for the monsters who carried out this abduction and mete out adequate punishment for this crime - We abhor all forms of violence against women and children," the group said in an e-mail sent to AP.

Mrs Hill, a Nigerian national, said the kidnappers told her to meet them in a town in Bayelsa State in the Niger Delta region, but that neither she nor the police had been able to locate it.

"They say I can bring my husband to swap with the baby," she said. "He wanted to go down for his baby but the police commander told him not to."

The kidnappers then threatened to kill Margaret if Mr Hill did not come within three hours, she said.

After the deadline had expired, Mrs Hill said Margaret was being fed just "bread and water".

"The people who are holding her just called again and they were threatening to kill the baby," Oluchi Hill was quoted as saying by Reuters news agency.

"They accused me of trying to play games with them."

The UK's Foreign Office has called for the "immediate safe release" of the girl.

'Big business'

The BBC's Alex Last in Lagos says Mr Hill is ill and had been due to fly to the UK for medical treatment.

He says that no hostages had ever been killed by Nigeria's oil militants and that most situations are resolved after a ransom is paid.


MEND
map
Formed early 2006
Close links to militant Mujahid Dokubo-Asari's Niger Delta Volunteer Force
Split into two rival groups late 2006
Demand 100% control of Nigeria's oil wealth
Demand release of impeached Bayelsa governor on trial for money laundering
Operate from creeks of Niger Delta
Communicate with media by e-mail

Nigeria's shadowy militants
The kidnapping follows that of five oil workers on Wednesday, the first since Mend called off a month-long ceasefire.

Mend has said it had nothing to do with that attack.

Our correspondent says there are a plethora of armed gangs operating in the Niger Delta and kidnapping for ransom has become big business.

More than 100 foreign oil workers have been taken hostage in the region this year.

Mend called off its ceasefire on Tuesday, saying it has been kept on the sidelines of government-led talks about the future of the Niger Delta.

Although the Delta accounts for more than 90% of Nigeria's income, the region remains highly impoverished, a situation the militants say they want to change with their campaign.

The France conference for Darfour

Representatives of the US, France, the European Union, the Arab League, Russia and China met June 25 in Paris to discuss possible peacekeeping operations in the war-torn Sudanese province of Darfur. The press widely presented it as a means for newly elected French president Nicolas Sarkozy and his foreign minister Bernard Kouchner to demonstrate a more accommodating attitude toward Washington than Sarkozy’s predecessor, Jacques Chirac.

Amongst the conference’s proposals were the deployment of a 20,000-strong joint UN-African Union (AU) peacekeeping force in Darfur and the use of French troops in neighboring Chad to open “humanitarian corridors” into Darfur. Sarkozy said France would donate 10 million euros to the current 7,000-strong AU force in Darfur. EU officials promised 42 million euros for relief efforts. France may also increase the number of troops it stations in Chad, ostensibly to deliver more humanitarian aid to Darfur refugees there.

The conference had almost entirely a symbolic character. As the French daily Le Monde pointed out before the gathering, “the delegations will have only three hours for discussion, and no final press statement is even planned. Pledges of financial aid and of contributions to future peacekeeping forces are hoped for.” However, besides the small-scale French and EU donations, no such pledges were forthcoming. AU countries, who would provide a large part of the troops in any future peacekeeping force, were not even invited to attend!

Even if the proposed measures were fully carried out, however, they would be completely incapable of resolving the tragic consequences of the Darfur conflict. On the contrary, the intervention of outside forces in the area would be part of a wider effort to exploit the Sudanese tragedy to advance Western geopolitical ambitions. The oppression and misery in Sudan would continue unabated.

The denunciations of the janjaweed militias armed by Khartoum in Darfur that the US and European press routinely publish obscure a complex situation of spreading violence and militarization in the region. The atrocities carried out by the janjaweed are far from being the only factor in the carnage in Darfur.

Military forces in Darfur opposing Khartoum—at first led by the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLM/A) of Minni Minawi and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) of Khalil Ibrahim—have begun fighting amongst themselves, notably splintering over the issue of whether to respect the May 2006 Abuja peace agreement.

Fighting has continued almost without interruption since April 2003, when a joint SLM-JEM force stormed the airport of North Darfur’s capital, el-Fasher. Khartoum then armed local tribes, typically of Arabic nomadic herdsmen, and organized them into janjaweed groups to attack areas where the SLM and JEM were thought to have support. The SLM and JEM have reportedly begun forcibly recruiting men from Sudanese refugee camps in Chad; highway robbers and tribal gangs have also claimed many casualties. According to UN statistics, SLM fighters and intertribal fighting are responsible for 20 and 36 percent, respectively, of the total number of displaced since the beginning of 2007.

Fighting has spilled over into neighboring Chad and the Central African Republic (CAR). Both these countries are desperately impoverished and highly indebted, hence dependent on the International Monetary Fund (IMF). IMF insistence on government loan repayments has, in both countries, led to mutinies by sections of the army that the government had declined to pay. France also has troops and aircraft stationed in the two nations.

The situation in the CAR has descended into chaos, with the central government of François Bozizé apparently controlling little outside the capital city of Bangui. In a recent statement Amnesty International declared that “The northern areas [of CAR] have become a free-for-all—a hunting ground for the region’s various armed opposition forces, government troops, and even armed bandits.” The situation in Chad is also highly unstable; France intervened in April 2006 to help put down a Khartoum-backed coup.

The Darfur conflict is also fueled by increasingly desperate struggle over land. Climbing temperatures and decreasing rainfall have reduced land productivity, impacting the livelihood of farmers and herdsmen who make up the bulk of the area’s population. According to Jeune Afrique, Khartoum encourages janjaweed recruits by offering them the right to keep whatever land they can conquer. Desertification (degradation of land in arid areas) also threatens Darfur, as climate change pushes the Sahara south into the region.

In truth, the Paris conference last Monday had little to do with a serious attempt to resolve the Darfur crisis. None of the social problems underlying this tragedy—the crisis of agriculture, IMF-supervised destruction of public finances, the absence of industrial and sanitary infrastructure, and the state of permanent civil warfare—can be resolved by placing a few thousand more troops in afflicted areas, which span hundreds of thousands of square miles. Nor was that the intention of the Paris conference participants.

In part Sarkozy is trying to show that French imperialism’s African resources make it a valuable junior partner for Washington. As the conservative French daily Le Figaro noted, “After Lebanon, the Iranian nuclear program, and anti-terrorist operations, there is the possibility of unifying our efforts to end a tragedy the US has labeled ‘genocide’ and France a ‘humanitarian catastrophe.’”

Le Monde noted contentedly: “A French role in Darfur is considered useful in Washington, as Paris has levers in the region (Chad, CAR) and contacts (Eritrea) that the US lacks.” It did not spell out how France’s “levers” would help. However, Chad (which backs the JEM), Eritrea (which backs the SLM) and CAR contain all the main bases and local supporters of Darfur’s competing anti-Khartoum forces. Implicit in Le Monde’s comment is the notion that France can organize Darfur’s opposition groups into a coherent whole.

At stake are valuable resources in Sudan, notably its considerable oil reserves, which currently generate $2 billion in revenue, and investments linked to those resources. Most of the purchasing of Sudanese oil at present is done by China, which gets roughly 8 percent of its oil from the East African nation and has invested approximately $6 billion there. Major US newspapers, perhaps most notably the New York Times and its columnist Nicholas Kristof, have repeatedly demanded that China scale back its presence in Sudan for the duration of the Darfur crisis.

This demand became part of the formal policy record when, on May 9, prominent US Democratic Congressman Rep. Tom Lantos sent a letter to Chinese President Hu Jintao. In the letter he applauded China’s decision to end incentives for its companies to invest in Sudan and attacked China for selling weapons and giving loans to Khartoum. After threatening that US activists might succeed in branding the 2008 Beijing Olympics the “Genocide Olympics,” he concluded, “unless China does its part to ensure that the government of Sudan accepts the best and most reasonable path to peace, history will judge your government as having bank-rolled a genocide.”

Washington’s insistence on describing the Khartoum-backed janjaweed as engaged in “genocide” is an attempt to force a UN military intervention, which is obligatory, under the 1948 UN Convention on Genocide, once an act of genocide has been universally recognized.

France’s willingness to serve US imperialist interests in the Sudan does not, however, extend to unambiguous support for military action in Sudan. As Le Figaro noted, the French government has pointedly labeled Darfur a “humanitarian catastrophe,” not genocide. The decision of the public television station France 24 to grant an extensive interview to Rony Brauman, a French academic and sympathizer of the Darfur rebel groups, who criticized plans for military intervention in Sudan, suggests divisions and anxieties within the French foreign policy establishment.

This temporary alignment between French and US imperialism is not likely to endure. Indeed, much of their common history in Africa has involved direct opposition, notably during the Rwandan genocide of 1994 and in Congo/Zaire’s civil war.

The role of French foreign minister Bernard Kouchner is instructive. Having started as a Communist Party member in the 1960s, he moved to the right after the student protests and general strike of 1968. Frustrated with the bureaucracy of the International Red Cross that he experienced as a doctor in Biafra during the 1967-1970 Nigerian Civil War, he founded Doctors without Borders (MSF), an international humanitarian organization.

As head of MSF, he received considerable positive coverage in the French and international press. He re-entered French politics as a member of the Socialist Party, serving in various administrations in the 1980s. He moved rapidly to adapt to the explosion of US militarism, developing concepts of “humanitarian intervention” and even “humanitarian pre-emptive strike.”

Now, in his first major act as foreign minister, the former leftist and much-heralded humanitarian has presided over a meeting whose fundamental aim, if one puts aside the hypocritical platitudes, is to facilitate the new colonial “scramble for Africa.”