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Tag: Cease fires

  • Pakistan Taliban ends cease-fire with govt, vows new attacks

    Pakistan Taliban ends cease-fire with govt, vows new attacks

    ISLAMABAD — The Pakistani Taliban on Monday ended a monthslong cease-fire with the government in Islamabad, ordering its fighters to resume attacks across the country, where scores of deadly attacks have been blamed on the insurgent group.

    In a statement, the outlawed Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan said it decided to end the 5-month-old cease-fire after Pakistan’s army stepped up operations against them in former northwestern tribal areas and elsewhere in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan.

    Pakistan and the TTP had agreed to an indefinite cease-fire in May after talks in Afghanistan’s capital.

    There was no immediate comment from the government or the military.

    The Pakistani Taliban are a separate group but are allies of the Afghanistan Taliban, who seized power in Afghanistan more than a year ago as the U.S. and NATO troops were in the final stages of their pullout. The Taliban takeover in Afghanistan emboldened TTP, whose top leaders and fighters are hiding in Afghanistan.

    Monday’s announcement was a setback to efforts made by the Afghan Taliban since earlier this year to facilitate a peace agreement aimed at ending the violence. The latest development comes months after the Afghan Taliban started hosting negotiations in the capital Kabul between the TTP and representatives from the Pakistan government and security forces.

    It also comes a day before Pakistan’s outgoing army chief Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa — who had approved the controversial cease-fire with TTP in May — is to retire after completing his six-year extended term.

    Bajwa will hand over command of the military to the newly appointed army chief Gen. Asim Munir at a ceremony in the garrison city of Rawalpindi on Tuesday amid tight security because of fears of violence.

    Gen. Bajwa during his tenure carried out a series of military operations against TTP before agreeing to the peace talks with the militant, who have waged an insurgency in Pakistan for 14 years. The TTP has been fighting for stricter enforcement of Islamic laws in the country, the release of their members who are in government custody, and a reduction of Pakistan’s military presence in the country’s former tribal regions.

    During the talks, Pakistan had asked TTP to disband.

    Pakistan also wanted the insurgents to accept its constitution and sever all ties with the Islamic State group, another Sunni militant group with a regional affiliate that is active in both Afghanistan and Pakistan.

    However, both sides apparently stuck to their positions since the peace talks began.

    In a separate statement, the TTP claimed that it targeted a vehicle carrying Pakistani troops in the district of North Waziristan near the Afghan border, causing casualties. There was no confirmation of the attack from the military and the statement did not provide details.

    The Pakistani Taliban have for years used Afghanistan’s rugged border regions for hideouts and for staging cross-border attacks into Pakistan.

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  • UN envoy: Delaying elections could risk partition of Libya

    UN envoy: Delaying elections could risk partition of Libya

    UNITED NATIONS — The new U.N. special envoy for Libya warned Tuesday that the first anniversary of Libya’s postponed elections is quickly approaching and that further delaying a vote could lead the troubled north African nation to even greater instability, putting it “at risk of partition.”

    Abdoulaye Bathily told the U.N. Security Council that the October 2020 cease-fire continues to hold despite escalating rhetoric and a buildup of forces by rival governments in the country’s east and west.

    Oil-rich Libya plunged into chaos after a NATO-backed uprising toppled and killed longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011. In the chaos that followed, the county split with the rival administrations backed by rogue militias and foreign governments.

    The country’s current political crisis stems from the failure to hold elections on Dec. 24, 2021, and the refusal of Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah — who led a transitional government in the capital of Tripoli — to step down. In response, the country’s east-based parliament appointed a rival prime minister, Fathy Bashagha, who has for months sought to install his government in Tripoli.

    Bathily, a former Senegalese minister and diplomat who arrived in Libya in mid-October and has been traveling to all parts of the country, told the council that he has found Libyans hope “for peace, stability and legitimate institutions.”

    “However, there is an increasing recognition that some institutional players are actively hindering progress towards elections,” he said.

    He warned that further prolonging elections “will make the country even more vulnerable to political, economic and security instability” and could risk partition. And he urged Security Council members to “join hands in encouraging Libyan leaders to work with resolve towards the holding of elections as soon as possible.”

    Bathily urged the council “to send an unequivocal message to obstructionists that their actions will not remain without consequences.”

    He said the council make clear that ending the cease-fire and resorting to violence and intimidation “will not be accepted and that there is no military solution to the Libyan crisis.”

    Russia called for the briefing, and its deputy ambassador, Dmitry Polyansky, described the situation in the country as “very tense” and “rather unstable,” with no sign of an end to the rival governments anytime soon.

    That “means no inclusive nationwide elections or unification of Libyan state organs in the short term,” he said.

    Polyansky warned that “the situation risks spiraling out of control under the influence of divergent interests of external stakeholders.”

    He accused Western nations, singling out the United States, of prolonging the Libyan crisis by using the turbulent situation in the country to pursue their own interests — namely unhindered access to Libyan oil.

    Polyansky claimed Western governments set a goal “to turn Libya into a `gas station’ to meet their energy needs.” And he claimed the U.S. administration “still considers the Libyan political process only through the lens of American economic interest … with a view to preventing the growth of prices for the `black gold.’”

    U.S. Deputy Ambassador Richard Mills shot back saying: “The United States rejects accusations that somehow access to Libyan oil reserves is the cause of the political impasse in Libya today.”

    Referring to Russia, he said the U.S. is dismayed that a council member that violated the U.N. Charter by invading and occupying its neighbor continues “to shift the focus of this council with unfounded conspiracy theories.”

    “It is simply a failed attempt to shield themselves from legitimate criticism,” Mills said. “Libya’s leaders must shoulder the responsibility of achieving sustainable peace, good governance, and ultimately prosperity for the people of Libya. And the United States stands to support them.”

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  • UN urges revival of negotiations on disputed Western Sahara

    UN urges revival of negotiations on disputed Western Sahara

    UNITED NATIONS — The U.N. Security Council called for a revival of U.N-led negotiations on the disputed Western Sahara in a resolution adopted Thursday that expressed “deep concern” at the breakdown of the 1991 cease-fire between Morocco and the pro-independence Polisario Front whose decades-old dispute shows no sign of ending.

    The vote was 13-0 with Russia and Kenya abstaining.

    Morocco annexed Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony believed to have considerable offshore oil deposits and mineral resources, in 1975, sparking a conflict with the Polisario Front. The United Nations brokered the 1991 cease-fire and established a peacekeeping mission to monitor the truce and help prepare a referendum on the territory’s future that has never taken place because of disagreements on who is eligible to vote.

    Morocco has proposed wide-ranging autonomy for Western Sahara. But the Polisario Front insists the local population, which it estimates at 350,000 to 500,000, has the right to a referendum.

    The U.S.-drafted resolution extended the mandate of the U.N. peacekeeping mission charged with carrying out the referendum, known as MINURSO, until Oct. 31, 2023.

    The resolution calls on the parties to resume U.N.-led negotiations without preconditions, “taking into account the efforts made since 2006 and subsequent developments with a view to achieving a just, lasting and mutually acceptable political solution, which will provide for the self-determination of the people of Western Sahara.”

    It says this should be done “in the context of arrangements consistent with the principles and purposes of the Charter of the United Nations and noting the role and the responsibilities of the parties in this respect.”

    Kenya’s U.N. Ambassador Martin Kimani said his government voted for the resolution last year in hopes that the U.N. mission would return “to its core objective of implementing a referendum for the self-determination of the people of Western Sahara.

    But he said progress has been limited and the resolution adopted Thursday “continues a gradual but noticeable shift away from the mandate and will not assist the parties to achieve a just, lasting, and mutually acceptable political solution as originally intended.”

    U.S. deputy ambassador Jeffrey DeLaurentis welcomed the council’s support, saying the Biden administration continues “to view Morocco’s autonomy plan as serious, credible, and realistic.”

    He called a political solution “vital to promoting a peaceful and prosperous future for the people of Western Sahara and the region.”

    But the Polisario Front ended the cease-fire in November 2020 and resumed its armed struggle following a border confrontation with Morocco which continues today, and in comments after the vote the two sides remained at odds about the future.

    The resolution calls on the parties to “to demonstrate political will and work in an atmosphere propitious for dialogue in order to advance negotiations.” It expresses “strong support” for Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ personal envoy for Western Sahara, Staffan de Mistura, and “strongly encourages” Morocco, the Polisario Front and neighboring countries Algeria and Mauritania to engage with him.

    Two round-table meetings of the four parties in December 2018 and March 2019 failed to make any headway on the key issue of how to provide for self-determination.

    But Morocco’s U.N. Ambassador Omar Hilale said after Thursday’s vote that they were “very fruitful and positive and substantial” because “we had very deep discussion on autonomy, on the guarantees, on the need for Polisario to design and to accept autonomy, and also on the elections.”

    He expressed hope that de Mistura “will succeed in calling for another round-table,” lamenting that a year has been lost because Algeria, which backs the Polisario, has said it will not attend.

    “Let’s hope that the wisdom will prevail in Algeria, and we can come back to the round-table because there will be no solution without discussion all together and having compromise” on Morocco’s autonomy proposal, Hilale said.

    He claimed that the resolution adopted Thursday “irreversibly consecrates, like the resolutions of the council since 2007, the pre-eminence, credibility and seriousness of the Moroccan autonomy initiative as the sole and only solution to this regional dispute.”

    The Polisario Front’s U.N. representative, Sidi Omar, strongly disagreed.

    He said the Security Council resolution refers to the referendum but again fails to empower MINURSO with “practical and concrete measures” to implement its mandate and carry out a referendum.

    The Saharwi people “will continue using all legitimate means, including the armed struggle, to defend our inalienable and individual rights to self-determination, independence, and to restore the sovereignty over the entire territory of the Saharwi, our democratic republic,” Omar said.

    He said the Polisario Front will only participate in direct negotiations with Morocco under the auspices of the U.N. and the African Union to enable the Saharwi people to exercise their free and democratic right to self-determination.

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  • Calls grow for Ethiopia peace effort as fighting intensifies

    Calls grow for Ethiopia peace effort as fighting intensifies

    ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — Diplomats are calling on Ethiopia ’s federal authorities and their rivals in the northern region of Tigray to agree to a cease-fire as heavy fighting raises growing humanitarian fears.

    African Union Commission Chairman Moussa Faki Mahamat expressed “grave concern” in a statement Sunday over the fighting and called for an “immediate, unconditional cease-fire and the resumption of humanitarian services.”

    AU-led peace talks were due to take place in South Africa earlier this month, but were postponed because of logistical and technical issues.

    The warring parties had said they were ready to participate in the process, even though fighting persists in Tigray.

    “The Chairperson urges the Parties to recommit to dialogue as per their agreement to direct talks to be convened in South Africa by a high-level team led by the AU High Representative for the Horn of Africa, and supported by the international community,” Mahamat said in a statement.

    The AU statement followed one issued late Saturday by a U.N. spokesman who said Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was “gravely concerned about the escalation of the fighting” and called for an immediate cessation of hostilities.

    Fighting resumed between the Tigray forces and the federal troops in August, bringing an end to a cease-fire in place since March that had allowed much-needed aid to enter the region. Fighting has drawn in forces from Eritrea, on the side of Ethiopia’s federal military.

    USAID Administrator Samantha Power called on Eritrean forces to withdraw from Tigray and urged the parties to observe a cease-fire, warning in a tweet that up to a 1 million people are “teetering on the edge of famine” in the region.

    “The conflict has displaced millions of people, and camps for displaced Ethiopians have also fallen under attack,” said Power, who warned of further bloodshed if Eritrean and Ethiopian federal forces take charge of the camps.

    The cease-fire calls came as heavy clashes were reported near the northwestern Tigray town of Shire, where an attack on Friday killed a International Rescue Committee worker who was distributing aid supplies.

    European Union foreign policy chief Joseph Borrell said he was “horrified by the reports of continuous violence, including the targeting of civilians in Shire.”

    Tigray forces said in a statement that they welcomed the AU’s cease-fire call.

    “We are ready to abide by an immediate cessation of hostilities,” the statement said. Ethiopia’s federal government has yet to respond.

    Aid distributions are being hampered by a lack of fuel and an ongoing communications blackout in Tigray. The Associated Press reported Saturday that a U.N. team found there were “10 starvation-related deaths” at seven camps for internally displaced people in northwestern Tigray, according to an internal document prepared by a humanitarian agency.

    Millions of people in northern Ethiopia, including the neighboring regions of Amhara and Afar, have been uprooted from their homes and tens of thousands of people are believed to have been killed since the conflict broke out in November 2020.

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