Sudan’s RSF to ‘cooperate’ on aid: Swiss talks

Sudan's paramilitaries have agreed to cooperate on humanitarian deliveries, following the Sudanese government's decision to open a key border crossing with Chad, countries staging talks in Switzerland said Saturday. (SPA/File)
Short Url
Updated 17 August 2024
Follow

Sudan’s RSF to ‘cooperate’ on aid: Swiss talks

  • “We also welcome the RSF’s commitment to cooperate with humanitarian deliveries, notably through the crucial Dabbah route to Darfur and Kordofan,” they said
  • “These constructive decisions by both parties will enable the entry of aid needed to stop the famine”

GENEVA: Sudan’s paramilitaries have agreed to cooperate on humanitarian deliveries, following the Sudanese government’s decision to open a key border crossing with Chad, countries staging talks in Switzerland said Saturday.
War has raged since April 2023 between the Sudanese army under the country’s de facto ruler Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), led by his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.
The brutal conflict has triggered one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
The United States is staging ceasefire and aid talks, which began at an undisclosed location in Switzerland on Wednesday.
While an RSF delegation has come to Switzerland, the Sudanese armed forces (SAF) are unhappy with the format and are not participating.
The talks are co-hosted by Saudi Arabia and Switzerland, with the African Union, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and the United Nations acting as a steering group.
In a joint statement, the five countries, the UN and the AU welcomed the decision to open the crossing from Chad into North Darfur for the coming three months.
“We also welcome the RSF’s commitment to cooperate with humanitarian deliveries, notably through the crucial Dabbah route to Darfur and Kordofan, and to protect humanitarian personnel in their work,” they said.
“These constructive decisions by both parties will enable the entry of aid needed to stop the famine, address food insecurity and respond to immense humanitarian needs in Darfur and beyond.
“The parties should immediately communicate and coordinate with humanitarian partners to efficiently operationalize these corridors with full and unhindered access.”
The statement also called on the international community and humanitarian organizations to “seize this moment” to move aid and help save the lives of the most vulnerable.
The fighting has forced one in five people to flee their homes, while tens of thousands have died.
More than 25 million across the country — more than half its population — face acute hunger. Famine has been declared in a Darfur displacement camp.
The closure of the Adre crossing has been a longstanding concern for aid groups struggling to get food and supplies into Sudan’s Darfur region.


Iran, Iraq funerals for general killed with Hezbollah chief

Updated 8 sec ago
Follow

Iran, Iraq funerals for general killed with Hezbollah chief

  • Nilforoushan is a top commander in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force foreign operations arm was killed alongside Nasrallah
Tehran: Iran and Iraq will both stage funerals for Revolutionary Guard General Abbas Nilforoushan, killed in an Israeli air strike alongside Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, the Guards’ news agency said Sunday.
Nilforoushan, a top commander in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force foreign operations arm, was killed on September 27 alongside Nasrallah in the strike on south Beirut.
The IRGC said Friday his body had been recovered from the site of the strike on the Lebanese capital’s southern suburbs, a Hezbollah stronghold.
Funeral ceremonies will be held in “Najaf and Karbala” in Iraq on Monday before the body is transferred to Iran’s holy city of Mashhad, the Sepah news agency said.
Another ceremony will take place at Tehran’s Imam Hossein Square on Tuesday before burial Thursday in the central city of Isfahan, his hometown, Sepah said.
On October 1, Iran fired some 200 missiles at Israel in retaliation for the killing of Nasrallah, Nilforoushan and Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh in late July.
Israel said it carried out the Beirut strike but did not comment on Haniyeh’s death in Tehran, where he had attended the inauguration of the Islamic republic’s new president.
Israel has vowed to retaliate for the Iranian missile attack, with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant saying the response would be “deadly, precise, and surprising.”

Iran condemns ‘illegal and unjustified’ US sanctions on oil industry: ministry

Updated 13 October 2024
Follow

Iran condemns ‘illegal and unjustified’ US sanctions on oil industry: ministry

  • US on Friday slapped Iran with a spate of new sanctions on the country’s oil and petrochemical industry in response to Tehran’s October 1 attack against Israel.

Tehran: Iran condemned Sunday what it called an “illegal and unjustified” expansion of US sanctions targeting its oil industry following Tehran’s missile attack on Israel earlier this month.
In a statement, foreign ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei defended Iran’s attack on Israel and “strongly condemned” the sanctions, saying they were “illegal and unjustified.”
The United States on Friday slapped Iran with a spate of new sanctions on the country’s oil and petrochemical industry in response to Tehran’s October 1 attack against Israel.
Baghaei defended Iran’s attack on Israel as being legal and insisted on Iran’s right to respond to the new sanctions.
The US Treasury Department said it targeted Iran’s so-called shadow fleet of ships involved in selling Iranian oil in circumvention of existing sanctions.
It said it had designated at least 10 companies and 17 vessels as “blocked property” over their involvement in shipments of Iranian petroleum and petrochemical products.
The State Department also announced it was placing sanctions on six further firms and six ships for “knowingly engaging in a significant transaction for the purchase, acquisition, sale, transport, or marketing of petroleum or petroleum products from Iran.”
Baghaei said “the policy of threats and maximum pressure” had no impact on “Iran’s will to defend its sovereignty, territorial integrity, national interests and citizens against any violation and foreign aggressions.”
He said the sanctions would enable Israel “to continue killing innocents and pose a threat to the peace and unity of the region and the world.”
The new wave of sanctions comes as the world awaits Israel’s promised response to Tehran’s missile attack, with oil prices hitting their highest levels since August.
Earlier this month, US President Joe Biden advised Israel against targeting oil infrastructure in Iran, one of the world’s 10 largest producers.
Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi last Tuesday warned that “any attack against infrastructure in Iran will provoke an even stronger response.”


Israel widens Lebanon strikes as troops fight Hezbollah along border

Updated 13 October 2024
Follow

Israel widens Lebanon strikes as troops fight Hezbollah along border

  • Hezbollah says fighting Israeli troops near Ramiya village, southern Lebanon
  • Third UN peacekeeper wounded in Israeli strike in Lebanon

BEIRUT: Israel expanded its aerial bombardment of targets in Lebanon, hitting areas both in and outside traditional Hezbollah bastions, as its troops battled militants across the border on Sunday.
In areas where Hezbollah holds sway, Israeli warplanes hit a marketplace in the southern city of Nabatiyeh on Saturday, and then a 100-year-old mosque in a village near the border on Sunday, according to Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA).
There have also been deadly strikes in other areas of Lebanon — one on a Shiite Muslim village in a mostly Christian mountain area, and another in north Lebanon, the health ministry said.
AFP footage shot from the northern Deir Billa area after the strike there showed rescuers and villagers digging with bare hands through rubble as smoke rose from the site.
The mayor of Kfar Tibnit, where the NNA said a strike destroyed a mosque, said he felt he had lost a beloved site that brought people together.
“It was a significant place because families used to gather in the square right next to it on special occasions,” Fuad Yassin told AFP, adding that the mosque was at least 100 years old.
Lebanon’s health ministry said strikes on three villages on Saturday killed 15 people.
Israel has alleged that militants use civilian infrastructure in Lebanon and Gaza to conduct operations — a claim the groups have denied.
The Israeli military said its 36th division continued “targeted and limited operational activity” in southern Lebanon against Hezbollah.
In a statement, it said Israeli jets had hit “Hezbollah launchers, anti-tank missile posts, weapons storage facilities, and additional terror targets.”
On the ground, soldiers had “eliminated dozens of terrorists.”
According to the NNA, Israeli forces have “escalated their attacks” on southern Lebanon, with “successive air strikes from midnight until morning” pounding several border villages.
Iran-backed Hezbollah said it clashed with Israeli troops who tried to “infiltrate” twice into a border village, sparking an hour-long battle.
It later said it shelled Israeli soldiers gathered in Maroun Al-Ras village.
Early Sunday, Israel said it intercepted five more projectiles fired from Lebanon as air raid sirens sounded.
The military said Hezbollah launched about 320 projectiles into Israel over the weekend of Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.
It also said roughly 280 “terror targets” were attacked in Lebanon and Gaza over the same period.
Israel on Saturday told residents of south Lebanon not to return home, and issued new evacuation warnings for several villages.

Targetting peacekeepers
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told his US counterpart Lloyd Austin that Israel will continue to take measures to avoid any harm to UN peacekeepers deployed in southern Lebanon, the defense ministry said Sunday.
“Minister Gallant emphasized ... the IDF (Israeli military) will continue to take measures to avoid harm to UNIFIL troops and peacekeeping positions” in southern Lebanon, the ministry said in a statement following overnight talks between the pair. At least five peacekeepers have been wounded in recent days as Israeli forces fight against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.
The peacekeeping mission, UNIFIL, has accused the Israeli military of “deliberately” firing on its positions.
UNIFIL said that, in recent days, its forces have repeatedly come under fire in the Lebanese town of Naqura where it is headquartered, as well as in other positions.
“Such actions must stop immediately and should be adequately investigated,” 40 nations that contribute to the force including Indonesia, Italy and India said in a joint statement on Saturday.
UNIFIL, which involves about 9,500 troops of some 50 nationalities, is tasked with, among other things, monitoring a ceasefire that ended the 33-day 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah.

With no sign of a let-up in the violence, UN peacekeepers in Lebanon warned against a “catastrophic” regional conflict.
In an interview with AFP, Andrea Tenenti, spokesperson for the United Nations peacekeeping mission, UNIFIL, said he feared an Israeli escalation against Hezbollah could soon spiral “into a regional conflict with catastrophic impact for everyone.”
There is “no military solution,” Tenenti said.
Hamas sparked the year-long war in Gaza by launching the deadliest-ever attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, resulting in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli figures.
The number includes hostages killed in captivity.
The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza says 42,175 people, a majority civilians, have been killed since Israel’s military campaign began there. The UN acknowledges these figures to be reliable.
In support for its ally Hamas, Hezbollah started firing into northern Israel in October last year, triggering a near-daily exchange of fire that even before the current escalation had led to the displacement of tens of thousands of people.
In September, Israel expanded its focus to Lebanon, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowing to fight Hezbollah until Israelis displaced by the violence could return to their homes.
Since Israel began a wave of air strikes on targets around Lebanon and sent troops across the border, more than 1,200 people have been killed, according to an AFP tally of Lebanese health ministry figures, and a million others have been displaced.
Efforts to negotiate an end to the Lebanon and Gaza wars have so far failed.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said his government would ask the UN Security Council to issue a new resolution calling for a “full and immediate ceasefire.”
French President Emmanuel Macron repeated his call for a ceasefire and said Hezbollah must “immediately stop” attacking Israel.
In a show of support for Hezbollah — which Tehran arms and finances — the speaker of the Iranian parliament, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, on Saturday visited the site of an earlier deadly Israeli strike.
A source close to Hezbollah said the strike had targeted the group’s security chief Wafiq Safa, something neither Hezbollah nor Israel has confirmed.
Ghalibaf’s visit, a signal of Tehran’s defiance, came after Israel vowed to respond to Iran’s second-ever direct attack, after an earlier missile barrage in April.
Tehran said the barrage was retaliation for the killing of top militants and an Iranian general.

Deeping push in Gaza
In Gaza, Israeli forces have focused on an area around Jabalia in the north, causing more suffering for hundreds of thousands of people trapped there, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, said.
Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee posted an evacuation warning on X on Saturday for an area near Jabalia, saying it was “considered a dangerous combat zone.”
“There is no safe place, neither in the south nor in the north — everyone is at risk of death,” Gaza resident Sami Asliya, 27, told AFP.


Israeli strikes kill 29 people in Gaza, medics say, as tanks push deeper in the north

Updated 13 October 2024
Follow

Israeli strikes kill 29 people in Gaza, medics say, as tanks push deeper in the north

  • Israeli forces continue to pound Jabalia from air, ground
  • Around 150 killed in Jabalia over past week

CAIRO: Israeli military strikes on Gaza on Saturday killed at least 29 Palestinians, medics said, and forces kept pushing deeper into the Jabalia area, where international relief agencies say thousands of people are trapped.
Residents said Israeli forces continued to pound Jabalia, in the north of the enclave, the largest of its historic refugee camps, from the air and ground.
Nineteen people were killed in Gaza overnight, and 10 more died on Saturday evening after Israel struck two houses in Jabalia and the Nuseirat camp in central Gaza. The death toll could rise as many of the wounded are in critical condition, medics said.
The Israeli military published new evacuation orders on Saturday to two neighborhoods on the northern edge of Gaza City, which also lies in the north of the enclave, saying the area was a “dangerous combat zone.”
In a statement, Gaza’s Hamas-run interior ministry urged residents not to relocate within northern areas of the enclave and also to avoid heading south “where the occupation is conducting continued bombing and killing every day in the areas it claims to be safe.”
The Israeli military said it had been operating against Hamas fighters who had been using civilian buildings and said clear evacuation instructions had been issued over recent days to areas including the Kamal Adwan Hospital.
It said an evacuation convoy to take patients from the hospital to Gaza City had arrived on Saturday with a supply of fuel for the facility.
In recent days, the military had said that forces operating in Jabalia and nearby areas killed dozens of militants, located weapons and dismantled military infrastructure.
On Saturday, it said more than 20 fighters had been killed by tank fire, close range gunfire and airstrikes as forces continued operations throughout the Gaza Strip.
The operation in this area began a week ago and the military said then it aimed to fight against militants waging attacks and to prevent Hamas from regrouping. Hamas denies that its fighters deliberately use civilian areas as bases.
Palestinian health officials put the number of people killed in Jabalia over the past week at around 150.
SHORTAGES

Displaced Palestinians make their way as they flee areas in the northern Gaza Strip, following an Israeli evacuation order, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Gaza City October 12, 2024. (REUTERS)

Palestinian and United Nations officials say there are no safe areas in Gaza. They have also voiced concerns over severe shortages of food, fuel, and medical supplies in northern Gaza, and said there is a risk of famine there.
Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, aimed at eliminating the militant group Hamas, has killed more than 42,000 Palestinians since it began a year ago, according to Gaza’s health ministry, and has laid waste to the enclave.
The war began after a Hamas-led assault on Oct. 7, 2023, on southern Israeli communities in which 1,200 people were killed and about 250 were taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
In a statement on Saturday, Hamas said Israel’s “massacre against the civilians” aimed to punish the residents of Jabalia for refusing to leave their homes. It also said it was a sign of Israel’s military failure to defeat the group.
Israel has denied it targets civilians.
The armed wings of Hamas, the Islamic Jihad, and smaller other factions said their fighters attacked Israeli forces in Jabalia and nearby areas with anti-tank rockets, and mortar fire.
United Nations officials said on Friday an Israeli offensive and evacuation orders in northern Gaza might affect the second phase of its polio vaccination campaign set to start next week.
The territory’s health ministry announced on Saturday that the campaign would begin on Monday in central Gaza Strip areas and would last three days before moving to other territories.
Aid groups carried out an initial round of vaccinations last month after a baby was partially paralyzed by the type 2 poliovirus in August, the first such case in the territory in 25 years.
As in the first phase, humanitarian pauses in the fighting in Gaza are planned, in order to reach hundreds of thousands of children.


Morocco’s tribeswomen see facial tattoo tradition fade

Updated 13 October 2024
Follow

Morocco’s tribeswomen see facial tattoo tradition fade

  • Many attribute the near-disappearance of facial tattoos to Morocco’s changing religious attitudes in recent decades
  • The markings vary in design between the minority’s tribes and were used to signify the wearer’s origin while offering beauty and protection

IMILCHIL, Morocco: As a young girl growing up in the Atlas mountains, Hannou Mouloud’s family took her to have her chin tattooed with the cherished lines that generations of Moroccan Amazigh tribeswomen wore.
“When I was six, they told me tattoos were pretty adornments,” recalled the 67-year-old from Imilchil village of the once-common practice among women in North Africa’s Amazigh groups.
Long referred to as Befcerbers, many tribespeople from the area prefer to be called Amazigh, or Imazighen, which means “free people.”
Today, like in many of the Indigenous cultures across the world where facial tattoos were long prevalent, the practice has largely faded.
Many attribute the near-disappearance of facial tattoos to Morocco’s changing religious attitudes in recent decades, with interpretations of Islam where inked skin and other body modifications like piercings are prohibited taking hold.
“We would use charcoal to draw the designs on our faces, then a woman would prick the drawing with a needle until blood came out,” Mouloud told AFP, adding that they would rub the wound daily with a chewed green herb to deepen the tattoo’s color.
The markings vary in design between the minority’s tribes and were used to signify the wearer’s origin while offering beauty and protection.
Being tattooed would hurt, said Hannou Ait Mjane, 71, and “we couldn’t hold back our tears” but it “remains a tradition that our ancestors passed down to us.”

Amazigh women show their tattooed chin in the village of Imilchil in central Morocco's High Atlas Mountains on September on August 19, 2024. Many attribute the near-disappearance of facial tattoos to Morocco's changing religious attitudes in recent decades, with interpretations of Islam where inked skin and other body modifications like piercings are prohibited taking hold. (AFP)


Morocco has the largest Amazigh population in North Africa, with Tamazight, the community’s language, recognized as an official language alongside Arabic.
According to the most recent census in 2014, more than a quarter of Morocco’s 35 million inhabitants speak at least one dialect — Tarifit, Tamazight or Tachelhit.
Abdelouahed Finigue, a geography teacher and researcher from Imilchil, told AFP that women often had their chins, foreheads or hands tattooed.
“Some women had intimate areas tattooed as a wedding gift, expressing their love for their husband,” he added.
The designs held different meanings to the different communities.
“The woman, through her tattoos, expresses her beauty and her value as an individual independent of the man,” he said, explaining what the different shapes can mean.
“The circle, for example, represents the universe and beauty, just like the moon and the sun which occupied an important place in local rites,” he said.
But changing religious trends means fewer women are getting inked.
“In recent years, this custom has been tainted by preconceived ideas from Salafist currents,” he added, referring to a Sunni Islamist movement that seeks to return to the practices and teachings of the Prophet Muhammad.
Bassou Oujabbour, member of local development association AKHIAM, said women with the markings have faced social pressure.
“Fundamentalists sometimes describe tattooing as the devil’s book or as the first thing to be burned on the human body,” he said.
“Some women even removed the tattoos long after getting them for fear of punishment after death.”