A chartered plane from the Nigerian city of Lagos landed at Yaounde’s international airport late Tuesday with 87 Cameroonian asylum-seekers and former separatists on board.
The group of mainly women and children was the first to return to Cameroon after fleeing to Nigeria to escape fighting between government troops and separatists in Cameroon’s troubled western regions.
Cameroon authorities say they returned voluntarily under an agreement with Nigeria and that at least 700 asylum-seekers and rebels are expected to return before the end of February.
Marie Nash, 29, fled the English-speaking southwestern town of Mamfe two years ago when fighting first broke out, but returned amid renewed talk of peace.
“Because of the war, I have experienced a lot of things,” she said. “I just thank God because they want to bring peace to Cameroon, and I am very happy for that. I want everybody to come back so that we should not fight again. Let us make peace.”
Among the returnees are former separatist fighters like Success Nkongho, who led an armed group called “Ground Zero” before fleeing to Nigeria in October.
He said he returned to Cameroon after the government showed efforts to address the conflict, including October’s national dialogue.
“Prior to the national dialogue, I was invited though I did not come there,” he said. “Today I am here with other combatants (ex fighters) and refugees, asylum seekers. We have come home, and we wish to say please kindly give us another chance.”
Former rebel Leonard Nyambere said he is still in touch with separatists who want to surrender but do not trust authorities’ offer of reintegration.
“Some of us (the fighters) think that the government wants to trick us or to kill us,” he said. “That is why most of our brothers are still in the forest. My friends and my brothers understand that the Cameroon of yesterday is not the Cameroon of today. Everything cannot be solved by the gun.”
On social media, other separatist fighters describe Nyambere and Nkongho as sell-outs to Cameroon’s government and call for their capture.
The former rebels will enter rehabilitation and reintegration programs before being released.
Despite the risk and ongoing conflict, Cameroon authorities are urging the asylum-seekers to return to their homes in the English-speaking, western regions.
Cameroon Territorial Administration Minister Paul Atanga Nji said there is peace in areas where they have been distributing aid, with no attacks from separatist fighters.
“It is a clear indication that there is no humanitarian crisis in Cameroon,” he said. “I think about 5,000 families have gone back to the northwest and the southwest regions of Cameroon, which is a clear indication that everything is coming back to normalcy.”
But the returnees are staying with relatives in Yaoundé and say they are reluctant to go home until all fighting ends and authorities reconstruct villages and towns destroyed in the conflict.
In December, Cameroon’s parliament gave special status for the English-speaking regions in a further effort to halt the conflict.
The special status creates more elected, local leader positions for the two English-speaking regions. It also cedes some powers to elected mayors, such as authority to recruit hospital staff and teachers.
Unrest erupted in Cameroon’s English-speaking regions in 2017 after teachers and lawyers protested discrimination by the country’s French-speaking majority. Cameroon’s military cracked down hard as separatists took up arms.
The UN says the conflict has left at least 3,000 people dead, displaced half a million, and led tens of thousands to flee to neighboring Nigeria.
Day: January 2, 2020
The number of deaths in major air crashes around the globe fell by more than half in 2019, according to a report by an aviation consulting firm.
The To70 consultancy said Wednesday that 257 people died in eight fatal accidents in 2019. That compares to 534 deaths in 13 fatal accidents in 2018.
The 2019 death toll rose in late December after a Bek Air Fokker 100 crashed Friday on takeoff in Kazakhstan, killing 12 people. The worst crash of 2019 involved an Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 MAX plane that crashed March 10, killing 157 people.
The report said fatal accidents in 2018 and 2019 that led to the grounding of Boeing’s 737 MAX raised questions about how aviation authorities approve aviation designs derived from older ones, and about how much pilot training is needed on new systems.
The group said it expects the 737 MAX to eventually gain permission to fly again in 2020.
The report said the fatal accident rate for large planes in commercial air transport fell to 0.18 fatal accidents per million flights in 2019 from 0.30 accidents per million flights in 2018. That means there was one fatal accident for every 5.58 million flights.
The firm’s annual compilation of accident statistics stressed that aviation needs to keep its focus on the basics of having well-designed and well-constructed aircraft flown by well-trained crews.
Last year may have seen fewer deaths but did not equal the historic low of 2017, which saw only two fatal accidents, involving regional turboprops, that resulted in the loss of 13 lives.
This report is based on crashes involving larger aircraft used for most commercial passenger flights. It excludes accidents involving small planes, military flights, cargo flights and helicopters.
Taiwan’s top military officer was among eight people killed Thursday when their helicopter crashed in a mountainous area outside the capital, Taipei.
The defense ministry says the Blackhawk helicopter carrying Air Force General Shen Yi-ming, the chief of Taipei’s general staff, and 12 others took off from an air base in Taipei early Thursday on a flight to visit soldiers at a base in northeast Yilan county. The helicopter disappeared from radar screens just minutes later.
Three major generals were also among those killed in the crash, while five others survived.
Wednesday’s crash happened just nine days before Taiwan’s presidential and parliamentary elections. A spokesperson for President Tsi Ing-wen said she will suspend her re-election campaign until Saturday.
Taiwan has purchased Blackhawk military helicopters from the United States for decades, including a 60 Blackhawks in 2010. Six people were killed in 2018 when a Blackhawk helicopter crashed off Taiwan’s east coast.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Wednesday said he will seek immunity from criminal prosecution in three corruption cases dealing with bribery, fraud and breach of trust.
The announcement came in a rambling 11-minute press conference carried live on Israel television. Netanyahu insisted that the immunity would be temporary, lasting only as long as the Knesset that grants it stays in office.
According to Israeli law, a prime minister or Knesset member can ask for immunity, although it is rarely done.
Netanyahu was charged in three separate cases with bribery, fraud and breach of trust. In one case, he is accused of accepting valuable gifts from friends and acquaintances of cigars, champagne and jewelry. In the most serious case, which has become known as Case 4,000, Netanyahu allegedly promoted regulations that benefited the Israeli telecom giant Bezeq in exchange for favorable press coverage.
Earlier statements on immunity
“I intend to go to court to crush the fabricated tales against me,” Netanyahu said. “The immunity law is meant to protect public representatives from being framed. The law is meant to ensure that public representatives can serve the people according to the will of the people, and not the will of some clerks.”
The announcement, which had been expected, contradicts Netanyahu statements from recent months that he would not seek immunity and intended to prove his innocence in court. It also comes as Israel is at the beginning of its third election campaign in a year after neither Netanyahu nor rival Benny Gantz of the Kahol Lavan party was able to form a majority coalition with 61 out of 120 members of the Knesset.
Netanyahu’s request must first be considered by the Knesset House Committee, which deals with administrative issues, and then voted on by the whole Knesset. However, the current, outgoing Knesset has not formed a House Committee and is not expected to do so before the March elections. That means that Netanyahu’s request for immunity cannot be dealt with until after the March 2 election.
Netanyahu last week won an overwhelming victory in his Likud party’s primaries. He has been Israel’s longest-serving prime minister and in office continuously for more than a decade. The immunity request means he can conduct this latest election campaign without dealing with his upcoming trial.
“I intend to lead Israel for many years to come,” Netanyahu said.
Gantz, Lieberman opposed
Within minutes of the announcement, Gantz lambasted Netanyahu’s repeated statement during the last election campaign that “there will be nothing because there was nothing,” meaning the police would not find enough evidence against him to charge him.
“Netanyahu knows he’s guilty,” Gantz said. “Whoever thinks ‘there will be nothing because there was nothing’ should not be afraid to face trial.”
Netanyahu’s former ally and current nemesis, Avigdor Lieberman, also said he would act to prevent Netanyahu from getting immunity. Lieberman, who heads the hard-line Russian immigrant Yisrael Beitenu party, could have given his former boss the seats he needed to form a coalition after both of the elections earlier this year.
“Now it’s clear beyond a doubt: the only thing Netanyahu cared for and continues to care for is immunity,” the former defense minister said.
Along with the request for immunity, Netanyahu has launched an all-out attack on Israel’s judicial institutions and press, accusing them of being left-wing and using illegal means to try to stop him from being reelected.
“There are people who, unlike me, did commit grave crimes and they have lifelong immunity,” he said. “They are just on the right side of the media and the left wing.”
Later he accused Gantz and his co-leader, former finance minister Yair Lapid, of vague crimes but did not give details.
Limiting immunity
Netanyahu is being criticized for the immunity request even though it is enshrined in Israeli law.
“Democracies around the world now understand that it is best to significantly limit immunity for elected officials,” the Israel Democracy Institute, an Israeli think tank specializing in issues of democracy, responded.
“In Europe there is a tendency to lessen the scope of immunity and not to expand it. In France and Italy for instance, automatic immunity was abandoned in the 1990s and today it is limited to exemption from arrest and imprisonment. It is also important to note that international bodies like the European Union emphasize that immunity is needed specifically in countries where there is real danger of political persecution against members of the opposition.”
It is too early to tell how the immunity request will affect Netanyahu’s election bid. A poll by the institute after the indictments against him found that 35% of Israelis wanted Netanyahu to step down and stand trial.
Coalition proposals
There was also an idea floated during the last round of post-election coalition negotiations for a unity government between Netanyahu and Gantz. Netanyahu said he would be prime minister for six months and then let Gantz take over for two years while he fought his case in court. If he won, he would then come back for the last 18 months of the government’s term.
Gantz refused, reportedly because he did not trust Netanyahu to step aside as promised.
Another idea that was proposed by Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein during the last round of Knesset negotiations was that President Reuven Rivlin would pardon Netanyahu, and that the former prime minister would become the president when Rivlin’s term is up next year.
In 2008, when then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was about to be indicted on corruption charges, Netanyahu insisted he had to resign, which Olmert did. Olmert served 16 months of a 27-month sentence for fraud.
Netanyahu insists he will be Israel’s next prime minister and he still has support from his hard-line base. However, many analysts in Israel say this could be the beginning of the end for Netanyahu.
“Netanyahu knows that the best he can hope for is damage control,” Anshel Pfeffer, a liberal journalist and columnist, wrote in the left-wing Ha’aretz newspaper.
“Few if any politicians have his knack for shifting and shaping media cycles. But he is starting to lose his touch and Kahol Lavan [Gantz’s party] is getting better at dictating events. … Six days ago he won the Likud primary by a landslide and felt he had momentum going into the general election campaign. His plans are already going badly awry,” Pfeffer wrote.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un may not have formally abandoned nuclear talks in his New Year’s comments published Wednesday. But Kim appears to be preparing his domestic audience for a long-term future without sanctions relief, effectively dismissing the possibility of progress in negotiations that have been stalled for months.
In his comments at the end of a four-day ruling party meeting, Kim unveiled a defiant new stance toward the U.S. and warned his country of possible hard times ahead. Because of the “long-term confrontation with the U.S.,” Kim said, “it should be seen as a “fait accompli that we have to live under the sanctions by the hostile forces in the future.”
“The DPRK-U.S. stand-off which has lasted century after century has now been compressed to (a) clear stand-off between self-reliance and sanctions,” Kim said, using the acronym for North Korea’s official name.
Kim also threatened to resume intercontinental ballistic missile or nuclear tests and warned the world would soon witness a “new strategic weapon” — comments that dominated most international media coverage of the speech.
But his domestic messages are also revealing, especially after Kim, who tries to project an almost godlike status in North Korea, returned home empty-handed following his February summit in Hanoi with U.S. President Donald Trump.
“I think the failure of Hanoi created some audience costs for him and those advocating for diplomacy with the U.S.,” said Andray Abrahamian, a visiting scholar with George Mason University Korea. “They looked weak by asking for sanctions relief, now they’re signaling that they don’t need it.”
Frustrated elite
In Hanoi, Kim offered to dismantle at least parts of his key Yongbyon nuclear complex in exchange for a relaxation of sanctions that have held back North Korea’s economy. But Trump rejected the offer, a potential embarrassment for Kim, whose train ride home took more than two days.
North Korea has been under United Nations sanctions since 2006, and unilateral U.S. sanctions for even longer, as a result of its nuclear and missile programs. Trump has refused to relax sanctions until North Korea agrees to give up its entire nuclear weapons program.
Failure to secure sanctions relief is likely a major frustration for both North Korea’s rising merchant class, which is being pinched by the economic restrictions, and for hard-line members of the country’s traditional elite, many of whom oppose talks that may result in Pyongyang giving up its nuclear weapons.
Kim’s speech may have been designed in part to convince those groups to stick with the regime — a call for continued loyalty, self-reliance, and determination in the face of hardship.
“Kim Jong Un’s message about sanctions was a very ‘learning to live with them’ attitude,” said Jenny Town, a Korea specialist at the Washington-based Stimson Center. “It is using this reality to justify economic and institutional changes.”
‘Hard times ahead’
One important possible change: a more stark turn toward North Korea’s byungjin policy of simultaneously prioritizing nuclear and economic development. In effect, what it means is spending more money on defense.
Kim alluded to the possibility of ‘belt-tightening,’ a euphemism for sacrificing the civilian sector to build up national defense, which has been closely associated with byungjin, said Rachel Minyoung Lee, a Seoul-based analyst with NK News, a North Korea-focused website.
“North Koreans should know what that implies, and that that implies hard times ahead,” she said.
In 2012, Kim vowed North Koreans “will never have to tighten their belt again.” A year later, Kim announced his byungjin policy. In 2018, Kim reversed track, declaring the country could focus on economic growth. Kim now may have signaled a de facto return to byungjin, said Lee, the NK News analyst.
“It is very important that we keep a close eye on how the state propaganda machine runs with ‘belt-tightening’ from here on out,” she said.
It’s not the only way in which North Koreans may be negatively impacted. Kim also called for a greater crackdown on “anti-socialist and non-socialist deeds,” suggesting possible restrictions on private markets that have been allowed to emerge in recent decades. Kim also called for “tightening moral discipline throughout society.”
“The prospects for ordinary North Koreans sound discouraging,” said Joshua Pollack, a North Korea researcher at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies.
Rejecting Washington’s offer
At several points, Kim seemed to acknowledge that sanctions are hurting his country, but he insisted that “we cannot give up the security of our future just for the visible economic results and happiness and comfort.”
“They’re basically saying that nuclear weapons are integral to their economic success,” said Duyeon Kim, a senior adviser for Northeast Asia and nuclear policy at the International Crisis Group. That amounts to a rejection of Washington’s argument that scrapping nuclear weapons guarantees economic prosperity, she says.
North Korea will now try to become a “nuclear and economic powerhouse,” she added. “It’s telling that (Kim) stressed self-reliance as North Korea’s primary duty and responsibility for achieving that goal, regardless of what happens outside its borders.”
While Kim’s speech did not completely reject nuclear negotiations, it did suggest a more hard-line stance in 2020, regardless of the impact on North Korea’s economy.
“Kim asserts that North Korea’s military strength is more than a match for ‘external hostile policies’ and that the country is on a path of economic development based on indigenous ideas and capabilities,” says Leif-Eric Easley, associate professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul.
“He wants the U.S. to negotiate with North Korea as if it were a full-fledged, responsible nuclear power.”