China Tries to Block UN Darfur Report

New York, United States

China is trying to block the release of a new United Nations report that claims Chinese bullets were used in attacks on UN peacekeepers in Darfur, diplomats have said.

 Beijing had threatened to block the report being discussed by a UN committee that monitors sanctions against Sudan and arms embargo on the troubled region of Darfur, unless its wording is changed.

According to the report by a panel of experts, bullet casings found at the scene of attacks on UN troops in Darfur were made in China, Sudan and Israel. The report was intended to be published after an official presentation before the UN Security Council.

No proof so far has been made that the bullets were directly supplied to Sudan, as there are possibilities that they could have been bought elsewhere on the African arms market.

 After the meeting, Chinese diplomat to the committee Zhao Baogang termed the report as ‘full of flaws with too many unconfirmed facts’ according to Beijing’s opinion.

“Where did they get the informed sources? No evidence is given,” he said, adding that the report lacks ‘confirmed facts’. “How can we agree on those recommendations? We ask them to improve the work of the methodology.” Zhao said.

Over 300,000 people have been killed and over 2.6 million displaced by fighting in Darfur according to UN sources since 2003 when two rebel factions took up arms against the government.

Under the 2005 arms embargo, arms sales to the Khartoum government are legal as much as it assures that the supplies do not end up in Darfur. The UN panel on Darfur’s arms embargo had claimed earlier that conflict between government and rebels in Darfur is being fuelled by large amounts of foreign arms and ammunition trafficked into the region.

Last week China had threatened to block a resolution to extend the mandate of the Sudan sanctions panel but refrained following talks with the US. China is one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and can block any ruling by the council.

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Ethiopian Govt Using Aid to Suppress Dissidents

The Ethiopian government is using development aid to suppress its political dissidents by conditioning access to essential programmes with ruling party support, Human Rights Watch says.

The US-based group has urged aid donors to ensure that their aid is used in a transparent manner which would not support political repression.

The World Bank and donor nations provide direct support to local governments in Ethiopia for basic service provision such as health, education, agriculture, and water, and support of other development projects for the country's poorest people. The European Union, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany are the largest bilateral donors.

The 105-page report “Development without Freedom: How Aid Underwrites Repression in Ethiopia” documents the way the government uses donor-supported resources and aid as a tool to consolidate power of the ruling Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF).

“The Ethiopian government is routinely using access to aid as a weapon to control people and crush dissent,” said Rona Peligal, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “If you don't play the ruling party's game, you get shut out. Yet foreign donors are rewarding this behaviour with ever-larger sums of development aid.”

The rights group has accused the donors of focusing only on development, while ignoring the repression as they continue to pour money into the country.

Ethiopia is one of the world’s largest recipients of development aid, receiving over $3billion in 2008 alone.

An Ethiopian government spokesman has dismissed the report as the ‘usual lies’, while the UK denied turning a blind eye to the misuse of its aid. He told the BBC that the report was the “expression of frustration from Human Rights Watch for failing to achieve regime change through the elections”.

The report is based on findings of a six-month investigation in 2009 where the rights group interviewed over 200 people in 53 villages across the country’s three regions. Human Rights Watch accuses the donors of focusing only on the development and ignoring the repression as they continue to pour money into the country.

Rural families of opposition members have been denied services and access to donor-funded programmes by local officials throughout the country, with villagers who are often subsistence farmers being denied privileges to micro-loans, food aid, housing, seeds and fertilizers.

Ruling party membership was a condition for promotion in the civil service, training opportunities and university placement, where students, teachers and civil servants were forced to attend indoctrination sessions on party ideologies as part of the capacity building programme funded by foreign donations.

Over 200 people died and thousands of opposition supporters and politicians detained in a crackdown following a post-election violence in which the opposition was deemed to have won. The donors suspended aid in fear of political capture of donor funds by the ruling party.