Media Review for February 21, 2012

By Africa Center for Strategic Studies
Updated: 02/21/2012

Please note: The following news items are presented here for informational purposes. The views expressed within them are those of the authors and/or individuals quoted, not those of the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, the National Defense University, or the Department of Defense.

Today’s News

Special ops forces killed in air crash in Horn of Africa
Four U.S. soldiers returning from a reconnaissance mission have been killed in an air crash near a U.S. military base in Djibouti in the Horn of Africa, U.S. officials said. The four were killed when their U-28 aircraft crashed on Saturday, a statement released by the Department of Defense late Monday said. MSNBC

DOD identifies four airmen killed in Djibouti crash
The Defense Department on Monday identified four Florida-based U.S. airmen who died Saturday when their military aircraft crashed near Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti, home to the United States’ only major military base in Africa. Stars and Stripes

France recalls Rwanda envoy
France said Monday it had recalled its ambassador to Rwanda after authorities in Kigali refused to accept Paris’s choice of a new envoy. “The Rwandan authorities refused to give this approval” and “we have recalled our ambassador (Laurent Contini) for consultations in order to study the situation,” said a French foreign ministry spokesman, Vincent Floreani. AFP

AQIM emir believed dead in Algerian army airstrike
Algerian experts believe one of three terrorists killed in a recent Algerian army airstrike near the Malian border to be a senior member of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), based on DNA evidence, El Khabar reported. Samples are being compared with DNA from family members of Yahia Djouadi, alias Abou Ammar, known also as Abu Al Hammam, and of his military commander Mohamed Ghedir, alias Abdelhamid Abou Zeid, and Mokhtar Belmokhtar, among other AQIM leaders. Magharebia

Algeria seizes missiles smuggled from Libya: source
Algerian security forces have found a large cache of weapons, including shoulder-fired missiles, which they believe were smuggled in from neighboring Libya, a security source briefed on the discovery told Reuters on Saturday. Reuters

Mali polls to go ahead despite rebellion-president
Mali will hold its presidential election on time in April despite a heavily armed Tuareg rebellion in the north that has killed scores of people and displaced thousands more, President Amadou Toumani Toure said on Sunday. AlertNet

Time to act over looming food crisis in Africa’s Sahel
The widely documented signs of a looming food security crisis in the Sahel region of Africa, where acute food shortages threaten some 12 million people, are a cause of increasing alarm. A series of factors including rising food prices, migration from insecurity in Libya, failed harvests and the impact of climate change on the Sahara desert are having an impact. The Irish Times

Senegal Protests Grow Before Presidential Poll
Protesters demanding the departure of Senegal’s aging president on Sunday seized control of a three-block stretch in the heart of the capital, erecting barricades and lobbing rocks at police as demonstrations intensified just days before a contentious presidential poll. Time

Senegal’s government: Candidate has recruited militia
Serigne Mbacke Ndiaye, spokesman for Senegal’s 85-year-old President Abdoulaye Wade, refused to identify the candidate and said that authorities would reveal the breadth of the plot in coming days. He said that the unnamed candidate had appointed a retired army colonel to recruit a militia, made-up of 200 ex-soldiers. AP

African Union’s Charter on Democracy
EU welcomes entry into force of AU Charter on Democracy – The European Union (EU) has welcomed the entry into force of the African Union’s Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance, which requires free and fair polls and abhors unconstitutional takeover of power in Africa. “The EU Delegation warmly welcomes the entry into force of the African Charter on 15th February 2012,” the EU Delegation to the AU said in a statement obtained by PANA here Sunday. afrique en ligne

Benin’s AU meeting begins with security threat talks
African leaders on Saturday began talks on insecurity in the Sahel region, where fresh violence in Mali has sparked what rights groups say is the area’s worst human rights crisis in 20 years. As many as 25 government leaders were expected for the meeting, but more than a dozen, including the host, were present at the start of closed door talks in the small West African country of Benin. Mail and Guardian

Ivory Coast president named head of West Africa bloc
Ivory Coast’s president was named the new head of West Africa’s regional bloc on Friday at a summit dominated by a security crisis in the Sahel that a rights group said could spark chaos in the desert region. AFP

Senator ‘optimistic’ Egypt NGO standoff near end
A key U.S. senator said Monday he has high hopes for a positive resolution soon to the growing diplomatic crisis revolving around 19 American overseas aid workers facing charges as part of an Egyptian crackdown on nongovernmental organizations. CNN

Pressed by Unrest and Money Woes, Egypt Accepts I.M.F. Loan
Egypt’s transitional government announced plans on Sunday to sign a loan agreement with the International Monetary Fund worth $3.2 billion, less than a year after abruptly turning its back on a loan from the international lender, according to state media. NY Times

First major city holds local council election in Libya
The Libyan city of Misrata has been voting to elect a local council, the first major city to hold a democratic poll since the fall of Colonel Gaddafi. It has been exactly one year since Misrata rose up against the Gaddafi regime. Most of Libya will have to wait for the national elections, which are due to take place later this summer. BBC

Religious divide in Africa
Sudan SUDAN was bombing South Sudan again last week, only a couple of months after the two countries split apart. Sudan is mostly Muslim, and South Sudan is predominantly Christian, but the quarrel is about oil, not religion. Dawn.com

30 killed in attack on Nigeria market: medic, witness
Suspected Nigerian Islamists opened fire and set off bombs at a market in the northeastern city of Maiduguri on Monday, killing at least 30 people, a medic and a witness said. Gunmen believed to be members of the Islamist sect Boko Haram stormed the fish section of Baga market and sprayed stallholders and vendors with bullets, traders said, reporting that women and children were among the dead. AFP

Somalia: Can Amisom cause a miracle?
[...] As the London Conference on Somalia takes place on Wednesday, Uganda People’s Defence Forces chief, Gen Aronda Nyakairima, says the situation has changed in Mogadishu since five years ago. With Amisom forces controlling Somalia’s capital, and Kenya on the offensive from the south, Somalis could see light at the end of the tunnel soon. Daily Monitor

Africa’s oceans: A sea of riches
[...] Two-thirds of African countries have access to the sea. Some are making good use of it through fishing and tourism. But the productivity of African waters is plummeting. Kenyan fishermen now catch an average of 3kg of lobster on each trip, compared with 28kg in the 1980s. Grouper fish appear to have become extinct in the Comoros in the 1970s. South Africa’s fishy haul is lower today than in the 1950s. The Economist

Kenyan chief foils robbery via Twitter, highlights reach of social media
A Kenyan chief in a town far from the bustling capital foiled a predawn robbery recently using Twitter, highlighting the far-reaching effects of social media in areas that don’t have access to the Internet. Chief Francis Kariuki said he got a call in the dead of the night that thieves had broken into a neighbor’s house. He turned to Twitter, which allows users to send messages in 140 characters or less, to reach his community instantly. CNN

$50bn exported illegally from Africa annually – Mbeki
Former South African President, Thabo Mbeki, says an estimated 50 billion dollars is exported from Africa illegally every year. Mbeki made the statement in Johannesburg at the inauguration of a UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) investigative panel, saying such money could be used to develop the continent. Vanguard

Algeria: Russia to export tanks to turbulent regions
Russia is to supply Algeria and Turkmenistan with its latest model of T-90C tanks. In total, Russia plans to sell 150 tanks at a cost of around $500 million – 30 to Turkmenistan and 120 to Algeria, a Russian military insider told Vedomosti. The relevant contracts were drawn up in 2009 and 2010, when the Arab World was rocked by protests in Algeria’s neighbors Egypt, Tunisia and Libya. Among other countries that received Russian tanks were India, Uganda and Kazakhstan. RT.com

Nigeria’s defence budget approves dozens of Navy acquisitions
Nigeria’s Navy will be receiving nearly two dozen new acquisitions under the 2012 defence budget, including two offshore patrol ships and numerous patrol craft, as it modernises and expands its military. DefenceWeb

Why China Succeeds in Africa
China’s investment in Africa is far more nuanced than cozying up to dictators. Rather than indulging in alarmism, the West could learn something. The Diplomat

Young, urban and culturally savvy, meet the Afropolitans
Young, urban and culturally savvy, meet the Afropolitans — a new generation of Africans and people of African descent with a very global outlook. Something of a buzzword in the diaspora, the term “Afropolitan” first appeared in a 2005 magazine article by Nigerian/Ghanaian writer Taiye Selasi. Selasi wrote about multilingual Africans with different ethnic mixes living around the globe — as she put it “not citizens but Africans of the world.” CNN

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This entry was written by Africa Center for Strategic Studies, posted on February 21, 2012 at 7:41 am, filed under Media Review. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.