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Somali gunmen have kidnapped two Western aid workers from a town near the Ethiopian border, residents said Tuesday.
"We are not aware of their nationalities, but they are a white man and a white woman," Ali Isse Osman, a resident in the town of Gura'el, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
Osman said that the pair were...
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A Greek-owned bulk carrier cargo ship was attacked Thursday by armed pirates off the eastern coast of Somalia, an anti-piracy watchdog said.
The ship had been travelling to Kenya when a group of pirates launched an attack about 200 nautical miles, or 370 kilometres, off the coast of Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, Noel Choong of the...
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The 22 crew members of a ship hijacked by Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden are reportedly safe, an Indian Defence Ministry release said Wednesday.
The merchant tanker, owned by a Panamanian company and registered in Hong Kong, was hijacked on Monday with 18 Indian crew members, plus two Filipinos, a Russian and a Bangladeshi, the...
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The Executive Director of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) said Monday she was "shocked" at the killing of an employee in Somalia, as Islamic insurgents continue to target aid workers.
Abdulkadir Diad Mohamed, who worked for the WFP as an administration and finance assistant, was apparently shot by armed men...
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A flurry of readings, literary debates and music events focused on African literature have brought dozens of African authors, poets and musicians here for the Berlin International Literary Festival.
Big African names like veteran Somali-born author Nuruddin Farah, Fatou Diome of Senegal, Lebogang Mashile of South Africa and Helon...
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Winners from Germany, India, Somalia and the United States were cited Wednesday for peace work and social justice when the 2008 Right Livelihood Awards, often called the Alternative Nobel Prize, were announced.
Four of the five prize winners were women, Ole von Uexkull of the Right Livelihood Foundation said, noting the awards have a...
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The European Union will soon deploy a warship fleet tasked with defending commercial vessels from attacks by pirates off the Somali coast, officials said Wednesday.
The move follows reports that pirates took control of a Kenya-bound cargo ship carrying 33 Russian-built T-72 tanks, armoured personnel carriers and munitions and held...
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A jury Wednesday named winners from Germany, India, Somalia and the United States as recipients of the 2008 Right Livelihood Awards, often called the Alternative Nobel Prize.
Two of the award winners were from the North and have worked to create ties with the so-called developing world, Ole von Uexkull of the Right Livelihood...
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European Union defence ministers were due to meet in the French coastal town of Deauville on Wednesday as the bloc's observers began a delicate ceasefire monitoring mission in Georgia.
Some 350 observers from 22 EU countries are tasked with ensuring that Russian troops withdraw to the positions they held prior to the August conflict,...
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Spain is sending a maritime patrol aircraft with 90 soldiers on board to ward off pirates operating off Somalia, Defence Minister Carme Chacon said Wednesday.
The P3-Orion plane was due to reach the Indian Ocean over the week- end. It will inform fishing vessels, freighters and ships transporting humanitarian aid about the movements...
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The European Union is considering the launch of a naval operation in Somalia to protect European vessels from pirate attacks in the region, the bloc's foreign ministers said Monday.
EU ministers meeting in Brussels said they had approved "a strategic military option for a possible European Union naval operation."
The move...
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 Helicopter-borne French troops are holding six pirates after the 30-member crew of the luxury yacht “Le Ponant” hijacked a week ago, were released, officials said Friday. It appears that sacks of money were also recovered – apparently, ransom paid by the yacht’s owners, the Associated Press reports. French President Nicolas Sarkozy...
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 Pope Benedict XVI, who turns 81 next month, celebrated
Easter Sunday Mass in heavy rain in St
Peter's Square. In his “Urbi et Orbi” blessing to
the world he said there are “many wounds that continue to disfigure humanity in
our own day” and called for an “active commitment to justice”...
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 Pope Benedict XVI on Tuesday in his traditional Christmas Day greeting
and Urbi et Orbi message "to the city and the world" urged the faithful
to accept God's "great light" of peace.
Christmas is the "holy day on which the 'great light' of Christ
shines forth, bearing peace," the pontiff said from the...
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Tensions are rising at the sprawling Dadaab refugee camp complex in North-West Kenya as a massive influx of Somali refugees fleeing a brutal insurgency across the border stretches the facilities to breaking point, a UN official said Thursday.
The complex, made up of three separate camps stretching over 50 square kilometres, now hosts...
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The presence of international warships has provoked a gunbattle that led to three Somali pirates being shot dead aboard a hijacked Ukrainian cargo ship carrying tanks, a maritime official said Tuesday.
"There was a shootout because of a misunderstanding between the gunmen," Andrew Mwangura of the East African Seafarers'...
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Three Somali pirates were shot dead in an apparent argument with their
mates aboard a hijacked Ukrainian cargo ship carrying tanks, the
Itar-Tass news agency reported on Tuesday.
None of the 20 crew being held hostage on the freighter Faina were
injured in the exchange of fire stemming from a alleged dispute between
the pirates,...
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Three Somali pirates were shot dead in an apparent argument
with their mates aboard a hijacked Ukrainian cargo ship carrying tanks, the
Itar-Tass news agency reported on Tuesday.
None of the 20 crew being held hostage on the freighter Faina were injured in
the exchange of fire stemming from a alleged dispute between the...
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Three warships are hemming in Somali pirates who hijacked a Ukrainian cargo ship carrying tanks and other military supplies, a US Navy official said Monday.
"There are now three ships in the vicinity," Lieutenant Nathan Christensen, Deputy Spokesman for the US Navy's fifth fleet, told Deutsche Presse Agentur dpa.
The MV...
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Pirates have seized a Ukrainian cargo ship carrying military tanks off the coast of Somalia, a maritime official said Friday.
"The ship was grabbed yesterday evening as it sailed to (the Kenyan port of) Mombasa," Andrew Mwangura of the East African Seafarers' Assistance Programme told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
"It...
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At least 13 civilians died and more than 35 were wounded during the latest round of heavy fighting between Islamic insurgents and African Union (AU) peacekeepers in the Somali capital Mogadishu, witnesses and officials said Wednesday.
Islamist forces attacked the Ugandan KM4 base in Mogadishu late on Tuesday night, prompting AU troops...
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The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) on Monday appealed for 460 million dollars as a food crisis in Ethiopia and the wider Horn of Africa continued to grow.
"The Horn of Africa region is facing the worst humanitarian crisis since 1984, and Ethiopia is caught in the middle," WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran...
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Police have freed a German citizen and his local wife who were kidnapped Saturday by gunmen in the breakaway northern Somali region of Puntland, an official said Monday.
"The Somali police used force, injuring two of the gunmen; the operation was successful," Andrew Mwangura of the East African Seafarers' Assistance...
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A German man and his Somali wife were abducted by armed men in northern Somali region of Bossaso, an official reported Sunday.
According to Yusuf Ahmed Jama, head of local rights agency Action Against Human Trafficking, the couple were kidnapped at gunpoint on late Saturday while visiting relatives in the area, and were taken away to...
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Almost 9,500 Somali civilians have been killed since early 2007 as the government battles a bloody insurgency, a human rights body said Tuesday.
Ali Sheikh Yasen, deputy chairman of the Mogadishu-based Elman Peace and Human Rights Organization, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that a total of 9,474 civilians had died in the...
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Somali pirates on Wednesday hijacked a South Korean cargo ship with 21 crew onboard but failed in an attempt to seize a Greek vessel in the Gulf of Aden, a maritime official said.
"Pirates attacked a fully loaded South Korean bulk carrier en route from Europe to Asia and successfully hijacked her," Noel Choong of the...
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Piracy off the coast of Somalia reached new heights last week when four ships - German, Japanese, Iranian and Malaysian - were seized within 48 hours.
Yet this may not represent the peak of pirate activity as gunmen with possible links to Islamic insurgents cram into the Gulf of Aden to get their share of the hefty ransoms shipping...
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Somali pirates have hijacked a Japanese tanker and an Iranian cargo ship in the Gulf of Aden just two days after a Malaysian ship was seized, the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) said Thursday.
The BBC quoted IMB head Noel Choong as telling reporters in Kuala Lumpar that the ships were seized on Thursday morning.
There are...
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Pirates have hijacked a Malaysian tanker with over 20 crew members on board in the Gulf of Aden, the International Maritime Bureau's piracy reporting centre said Wednesday.
The body said that the ship, which is carrying crude palm oil, is thought to be heading into Somali coast waters.
A ransom demand is expected to be issued...
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Six civilians died and four were wounded when Ethiopian troops opened fired on a minibus just south of the Somali capital Mogadishu, witnesses said Thursday.
A witness told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that the Ethiopians "opened fire indiscriminately" shortly after a gun battle between Islamic insurgents and Ethiopian...
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The European Union on Friday allocated an extra 21 million euros (32.4 million dollars) in emergency aid to Somalia, Eritrea and Ethiopia, officials said.
"The challenges in the Horn of Africa are huge and multi- dimensional ... Humanitarian aid is an expression of Europe's solidarity with those who are the most vulnerable,"...
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Somali gunmen have shot and killed a truck
driver for the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), the fourth
this year, the agency said Wednesday. Ahmed Saalim was part
of a convoy of trucks carrying 602 metric tons of food from Mogadishu
to Bay and Bakool regions, the WFP said. The agency called on all parties to ensure the...
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Unknown gunmen have shot and killed the head of the United Nations' Development Programme in Somalia, reports said Sunday.
The BBC reported that Osman Ali Ahmed was shot as he left a mosque in
the Somali capital Mogadishu. He died in hospital of his injuries. Ahmed's son and another man were reportedly wounded in the attack. ...
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 The violent conflict between Ethiopian troops and Islamist
fighters trying to bring down Somalia’s
government killed 81 people over the weekend and wounded 119. Most of them were
civilians. After the bloody attack, hundreds of residents evacuated the area,
abandoned their homes trying to escape Mogadishu.
Others removed corpses from...
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 Heavily armed Islamist militants took over a central Somali
town Sunday and killed two British and two Kenyan teachers, the Associated
Press reports. It appears that three of the victims are women and the fourth
victim is reported to be a Somali man with British citizenship, returned to his
hometown in order to build a...
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 Three U.S. high precision missiles hit a Somali town in which Islamic extremists were taking shelter early Monday. The village of Dhoobley became a target for the U.S. military because it includes a "facility where there were known terrorists" affiliated with East African al Qaeda operations, U.S. military official said. The...
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 Somali police exchanged fire with a group of armed men who kidnapped
two foreign aid workers in the semi- autonomous Puntland region
Wednesday, hours after they were taken captive.
"I heard heavy gunfire between the policemen and the kidnappers. I
don't know whether the kidnappers were captured or whether the aid
workers were...
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 US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met with leaders from troubled
African nations Wednesday, calling for greater vigilance in keeping out
"negative forces" from Congo and a robust peacekeeping force for
war-torn Somalia.
Rice's 24-hour visit to the vast Horn of Africa nation was meant to
spur movement on...
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 Latest estimates regarding the number of people displaced in
the war-torn Afghanistan nation of Somalia "has risen sharply to a
staggering 1 million,” according to The U.N. refugee agency.
The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees said on Tuesday that
about 60 percent or 600,000 people are thought to have fled from the capital...
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 According to a local media report, at least three Ugandan
soldiers have been injured in an attack on African Union troops in Somalia's
capital where the 1,600 peacekeepers are based. AU spokesman Paddy Ankunda told the BBC that soldiers were
guarding Mogadishu's port when
mortars were fired at them. He called for more peacekeepers to...
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"We are trying to determine the cause of the
accident," spokesman Maj. Felix Kulayigye said after a truck transporting
more than 100 soldiers and their families crashed. The accident took place on
Monday in the eastern part of Uganda,
Kampala, after
the truck hit the concrete side railing. The cause of the event is...
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 The general director of a local independent radio station in Mogadishu and another colleague have been brutally assassinated Saturday in Somalia, apparently for criticizing the poor conditions of Somali people today and the people responsible for it. They are Ali Iman Sharmarke, the owner of the Somali media group HornAfrik, and Mahad...
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 A recent UN report reveals that almost 22 per cent of children under five years living in Kenyan refugee camps suffer from malnutrition.The level of malnutrition reached “crisis level” according to the international organization, who urged the assignment of 32 million dollars to redress the dramatic situation.“One in every five children...
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 Somalia’s capital Mogadishu and the south-central city of Baidoa were seriously shaken by two blasts that killed more than nine people, media reported Friday. After the guns were silenced in Somalia, bomb attacks resumed bringing new turmoil in the African country. The first incident occurred late Thursday in Baidoa, where five people...
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 The calm didn’t last to much in Somalia’s embattled capital
Mogadishu, a fierce gunbattle leaving six dead behind on Monday, just a day
after the country’s prime minister was nearly killed by a bomb explosion.
A group of suspected Islamist militants opened fire on police
officers, killing two and sparking an intense fire exchange...
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 With their souls still ravaged by the explosions and flying
bullets, thousands of people have returned to Somalia’s
capital Mogadishu, the United
Nations reported.
More than a thousand persons were killed by violent clashes
between governmental troops and insurgents, as 400,000 people were forced to
take the lonely roads of...
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Two South Korean fishing boats have been captured by pirates off the coast of Somalia, officials informed.The Mavuno 1 and Mavuno 2 vessels have been seized Tuesday, when armed men fired from speedboats towards the ships and eventually took control of the two ships and the multinational crew. "The crew are safe. The ship is anchored...
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Four soldiers belonging to the African Union peacekeeping mission in Somalia were killed Wednesday by the explosion of a bomb in Mogadishu.The Ugandan soldiers were patrolling in the Somali capital when their vehicle was partially destroyed by a roadside bomb. Five other soldiers were gravely wounded, an official of the African Union...
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 More than 200 million children under age 5 do not receive basic health care in case of illness. Poor children are visibly more exposed to sickening and death risk than the well-off ones.
About 10 million of these die annually, having treatable diseases like diarrhea and pneumonia as a cause, according to the ninth annual State of the...
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 Two pilots were wounded by a
woman in an attempt to hijack a regional domestic flight in New Zealand
Friday, the Associated Press reports.
The woman was carrying a knife
and stabbed the two pilots, and also threatened to blow up the 19-seat
Jetstream J32, which had on board four New Zealanders, an Australian and an
Indian...
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Crises in Somalia and the Middle East need to be resolved to prevent further extremism and terrorist attacks, Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga said Thursday on the 10th anniversary of deadly bomb attacks in East Africa.
Over 200 people died and more than 4,000 were injured in Kenyan capital Nairobi and Tanzanian capital Dar es...
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 An Islamist commander who was one of al Qaeda’s top members in Somalia was killed in an overnight American air strike; Aden Hashi Ayro was killed Thursday morning, according to American and Somali officials. The spokesman for the Islamic al-Shabab militia, Sheik Muqtar Robow, said the strike killed Aden Hashi Ayro, another commander and...
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 France will not pursue discussions with Damascus unless it is given
"proof" of Syria's readiness to let Lebanon choose a president by
consensus, French President Nicolas Sarkozy told the press on Sunday.
"We will have no more contact with the Syrians so long as we do not
have a proof of Syria's willingness to let...
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the 157th day of 2008 with 209 to follow. The moon is waxing. The morning stars are Venus, Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus. The evening stars are Mercury, Mars and Saturn.Those born on this date are under the sign of Gemini. They include economist Adam Smith in 1723; Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa in 1878; English economist John Maynard...
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 The Global Peace Index brought up a report which ranks each nation in terms of “peacefullness”. It took in consideration factors as a nation's
relations with its neighbors, arm sales, troop organization, respect for human
rights and number of homicides per 100,000 people. It is the second year when
the index was conducted and it rates...
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 According to witnesses and journalists in Mogadishu, neighborhoods in the Somali
capital were deserted on Sunday, a day after 17 civilians were brutally killed
in the wake of intense fighting between Ethiopian-backed Somali troops and
Islamic insurgents.
Witnesses in Mogadishu's
al-Baraka neighborhood said the dead included women...
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 A report released by the US-based
group Human Rights Watch holds responsible Ethiopian, Somali, and insurgent
forces for severe violations of the laws of war that have resulted in
heavy civilian casualties.
The 113-page report called "Shell-Shocked:
Civilians under siege in Mogadishu" refers to the fights...
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176.918 |
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