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From Comoros to Yacht Taken by Somalia
Pirates, France Looms Large in African Seas, UN Not in Sight
Byline:
Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at
the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
April 8 -- France's
role in the seas off Africa is in the news, but not at the UN. Inner
City Press
on Tuesday asked Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson
if the UN has any involvement in trying to
free from the French
yacht off Somalia's coast the
crew, not only French but Ukrainian and
reportedly Filipino. No,
the spokesperson said, "the UN has no involvement in
this."
So
who beyond France does? Inner City Press asked French Ambassador
Jean-Maurice
Ripert if his country is coordinating with, for example, the
Philippines or
Ukraine. Ripert answered that France maintains contacts with many
countries,
particularly in this case with the government of Somalia. That would be
the
Transitional Federal Government, the one opposed by the insurgents, the
Islamic
Courts formations and, separately, by the pirates.
Nor
did the UN get involved in the conflict about the breakaway Comorian
island of
Anjuan. The African Union, under Tanzania's leadership, went in guns
blazing.
(Insiders tell Inner City Press that South Africa, for one, was urging
further
negotiation). France was accused of harboring lead rebel Mohammed
Bacar, first
on Mayotte and now on the island of Reunion. French mission sources
scoff at
these accusations, countering that it was France which transported the
African
Union troops to retake Anjuan. Zut alors! As
some have noted, "since independence in 1975,
Comoros has had 19 coups and attempted coups."
AU in Anjuan, France not shown (but present)
It
is also said that the Zoe's Ark six, recently pardoned for kidnapping
103
children from Chad and Sudan, face some unspecified further
investigation in
France. We'll see.
* * *
These reports are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click
here for a Reuters
AlertNet piece by this correspondent
about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click
here
for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali National
Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an
undefined trust fund. Video
Analysis here
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[at] innercitypress.com
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Other,
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