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UN DAILY NEWS from the
UNITED NATIONS NEWS SERVICE
12 February, 2008 =========================================================================
TIMOR-LESTE: UN ENVOY DECRIES POLITICAL ATTACKS, HAILS GOVERNMENT RESPONSE
A senior United Nations envoy today decried attempts on the life of the President of Timor-Leste, who was wounded yesterday in a shooting, and the Prime Minister, who escaped a separate attack on his motorcade, while praising the maintenance of calm in the country.
“I left New York within hours of hearing the terrible news that President José Ramos-Horta had been injured in a shooting incident early yesterday morning and that Prime Minister [Xanana] Gusmao had also been attacked,” said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's Special Representative, Atul Khare, who had been headed to UN Headquarters to brief the Security Council before reversing course and returning to the country, which the UN helped shepherd to independence in 2002.
Mr. Ramos-Horta is in a serious condition in hospital in Australia after earlier undergoing surgery following the shooting at his home. The Prime Minister was not injured in a separate attack on his motorcade, but the fugitive leader Alfredo Reinado was killed in fighting, according to the UN Mission in Timor-Leste (UNMIT).
“I am deeply disturbed by yesterday's violence,” said Mr. Khare, “but I am also very impressed by the calm manner in which the country has reacted to these events,” he added, noting that investigations are underway.
He praised the conduct of the Government, Parliament and the opposition, while welcoming the fact that State institutions have continued to perform their functions, and leaders have adhered to the Constitution in this time of crisis. “It is a positive sign and a point that I will be conveying to Dr. Ramos-Horta at the earliest available opportunity.”
Mr. Khare said the President “plays a crucial role in leading this country on its path to development, and in enhancing its culture of democratic governance” and voiced hope for his recovery.
Mr. Reinado had been the target of investigations by the UN Independent Special Commission of Inquiry for Timor-Leste, set up to examine the deadly violence that erupted in the tiny nation in April-May 2006. It found the Major and his group were reasonably suspected of committing crimes during the fighting.
The 2006 crisis, attributed in part to differences between Timor-Leste's eastern and western regions, began in April with the firing of 600 striking soldiers, a third of the overall armed forces. Ensuing violence claimed at least 37 lives and drive 155,000 people, or about 15 per cent of the total population, from their homes. The Security Council created UNMIT in August that year to help restore stability.
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CLEAR GLOBAL STRATEGY CRUCIAL IN FIGHTING CLIMATE CHANGE – ASSEMBLY PRESIDENT
To build on the momentum generated by last December’s historic United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bali, Indonesia, it is now critical to formulate a plan of action for the world body to tackle climate change comprehensively, the General Assembly’s President said today.
In Bali, 187 countries agreed to launch a two-year process of formal negotiations on a successor pact to the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.
At the start of today’s General Assembly thematic debate on combating global warming, President Srgjan Kerim underscored the urgency of taking effective action.
“We can’t wait for tomorrow,” he said. “We need to act today.”
Under the so-called Bali Roadmap, key issues during the upcoming negotiations will be adaptation, mitigation, the deployment of climate-friendly technology and financing.
“Many countries cannot wait until the effects of mitigation targets have an impact,” he said. “We need both targets and immediate practical actions that can help the most vulnerable adapt to climate change.”
The UN system seeks to “deliver more than the sum of its parts” and requires clear political support from Member States, the President noted.
He called on the over 100 delegates from Member States and organizations in attendance to consider what the UN’s goals should be following the Kyoto Protocol’s expiration in 2012 as well as how to link the fight against climate change with efforts to bolster development.
The debate is expected to continue in the coming days.
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TIME TO PUNISH PARTIES WHO USE OR ABUSE CHILDREN IN ARMED CONFLICTS – UN ENVOY
The Security Council must “take concrete and targeted measures” against those parties that persistently use or abuse children during armed conflicts around the world, the United Nations envoy on the issue said today, urging that well-meaning words be transformed into effective actions.
Addressing the Council during a day-long open debate, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict Radhika Coomaraswamy noted the ongoing impunity for those persistent violators that use or abuse children during wars.
From the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to Myanmar and from Sri Lanka to Uganda, parties to armed conflicts kill, maim, abduct or sexually assault children; deny humanitarian access to children in need; and recruit and use child soldiers. In total, at least 58 parties are known to be offenders.
Ms. Coomaraswamy called for the establishment of a mechanism by the 15-member Council to review and oversee targeted measures against violators to end their impunity.
“It is most important that the Council make good on its promise in order to ensure the credibility of this exercise,” she said. “The targeted measures could include the imposition of travel restrictions on leaders and their exclusion from any governance structures and amnesty provisions, the imposition of arms embargoes, a ban on military assistance, and restriction on the flow of financial resources to the parties concerned.”
While acknowledging that some parties have made important commitments in peace accords and action plans to stop recruiting child soldiers, the Special Representative warned that in some regional conflicts – such as those in the Great Lakes and Horn regions of Africa – cross-border recruitment from refugee camps is surging.
The detention of children for alleged association with armed groups is also worrying and a violation of international standards, she said, noting that many detained children face ill-treatment, torture, interrogations and food deprivation.
In addition, systematic and deliberate attacks against schoolchildren are escalating in numerous conflicts, particularly Afghanistan, while in the DRC and Burundi “appalling levels of sexual and gender-based violence” are occurring.
UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Executive Director Ann M. Veneman told the Council debate that it was possible to reintegrate children used by armed forces and groups, especially once they are given the necessary skills and assistance to become productive members of their communities.
“Yet reintegration is a difficult and long-term process requiring patience and long-term commitment,” Ms. Veneman said, adding that UNICEF is already working in several countries – notably the Central African Republic (CAR), Côte d’Ivoire and Sudan – to reintegrate children.
She also highlighted the particular vulnerability of girls and women during armed conflicts because of sexual violence.
“Allow me to share with you one story as told by a 14-year-old girl in Liberia. She said: ‘The attackers tied me up and raped me because I was fighting. About five of them did the same thing to me until one of their commanders who knew my father came and stopped them, but also took me to make me his wife. I just accepted him because of fear.’ We need to put an end to the abuse, the rapes and the sexual violence.”
Representatives of dozens of countries then addressed the Council during today’s debate, which follows the recent release of a UN report stating that children are still recruited and used in armed conflicts in at least 13 nations worldwide. They are Afghanistan, Burundi, Chad, the CAR, Colombia, the DRC, Myanmar, Nepal, the Philippines, Somalia, Sudan, Sri Lanka and Uganda.
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LATEST DARFUR REFUGEES FACE RISK ALONG BORDER, UN AGENCY WARNS
Some 12,000 Sudanese who fled into Chad following Friday’s deadly attacks against three West Darfur towns remain in a precarious situation along the volatile border region as they await transfer into formal campsites, the United Nations refugee agency said today.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) may start relocating the Sudanese to camps later today, spokesperson Jennifer Pagonis told journalists in Geneva, with daily convoys eventually planned.
The first batch of 200 refugees, currently based in Figuera in the Birak area, will be relocated towards Kounoungou camp near Guereda, and UNHCR is also holding talks with Chadian authorities about extending Mile camp to house some of the refugees.
The new arrivals are expected to place severe strains on UNHCR’s 12 camps in eastern Chad, with many of the camps – and their limited water supplies – already at or close to capacity.
Ms. Pagonis said most of the refugees are destitute, having escaped by night across the border without any possessions and lacking nourishment. Families have been separated in the turmoil and the refugees include unaccompanied minors; most of the refugees are living in the open and sheltering under trees at night.
An assessment team that visited the area on Sunday provided basic supplies to the refugees and local Chadians have offered water and food that they can spare.
But unidentified armed groups are roaming around the area, Ms. Pagonis said, and the security situation is particularly tense near Guereda, where the market and school have been looted by unknown men.
UNHCR is reinforcing its numbers in eastern Chad to cope with the latest influx of Sudanese refugees, which followed deadly attacks on the towns of Abu Suruj, Sirba and Seleia on Friday, reportedly by Janjaweed militia backed by Sudanese Government forces.
The three towns are located about 50 to 70 kilometres north of El Geneina, the provincial capital of West Darfur, and that area is known to be a stronghold of the Darfurian opposition group known as the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM).
More than 200,000 people have been killed and at least 2.2 million others forced to flee their homes across Darfur since rebel groups began fighting Government forces and allied militia in 2003.
The hybrid UN-African Union peacekeeping mission (UNAMID) was deployed at the start of the year to try to quell the violence and restore stability to the war-wracked and impoverished region on Sudan’s western flank.
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UN READIES TO PROVIDE MORE LASTING HELP FOR CHADIAN REFUGEES IN CAMEROON
United Nations aid officials in Cameroon are preparing plans to deliver protection and assistance for some months to as many as 20,000 Chadian refugees who fled their homeland last week because of deadly fighting between Government forces and armed opposition groups.
An estimated 30,000 refugees are currently in Kousséri, in north-eastern Cameroon, and UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) local representative Jacques Franquin said that after handling the group’s immediate life-saving needs, the agency expects about two thirds will not return to Chad in the coming weeks.
“We expect such number to remain in Chad in the medium term,” Mr. Franquin said. “We are now working with our donors to ensure funding so that we can provide the protection and assistance required.”
This weekend UNHCR and its aid partners will start officially registering the new refugees and offering some of them transport to a camp near the town of Maltam, about 32 kilometres from Kousséri.
Silvia Luciani, the acting representative in Cameroon of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), said vaccinations against measles and polio will start tomorrow for up to 44,000 children among the refugees and the local host communities.
UNICEF has also been providing 48,000 litres of drinking water to the refugees each day since Saturday, when the World Food Programme (WFP) began systematic distributions of food. The Chadians will also receive blankets, soaps, buckets and jerry cans.
Sophie de Caen, the UN Resident Coordinator for Cameroon, said that while the living and hygienic conditions for the refugees were harsh, UN agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) operating in the area were getting the situation under control. A cargo p*** chartered by UNHCR landed in Garoua, Cameroon, on Sunday, carrying another 45 tons of relief items.
Although people are still crossing back and forth over the bridge between Kousséri and the Chadian capital, N’Djamena, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said the refugee inflow has almost stopped.
Meanwhile, UNHCR reported that some 6,000 to 7,000 Central Africans have fled their homeland for southern Chad since late January because of the increasing risk of bandit attacks in the Central African Republic (CAR).
UNHCR spokesperson Jennifer Pagonis said the agency is sending a team today to assess the recent arrivals, who are largely located in several villages near Gore, the main town in southern Chad.
Mostly women and children, the refugees are in poor condition, arriving with no possessions and relying on the generosity of locals. There are now an estimated 50,000 Central African refugees living in Chad.
Both Chad and the CAR have been plagued by violence, instability and impoverishment and last year the Security Council authorized the establishment of a multi-dimensional UN presence – including a peacekeeping mission known as MINURCAT – to try to remedy the situation.
Victor Angelo, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative in Chad and the CAR, said today that he would work to persuade armed groups in the region to lay down their weapons and join a political process.
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MANY DISPLACED ARE ON THE MOVE AGAIN IN KENYA, SAYS UN
With the security situation easing after a wave of violence tore through Kenya following last December’s contested elections, the United Nations reported that large numbers of displaced are returning to their “ancestral homes,” potentially straining resources in the nation’s western region.
The movement of internally displaced persons (IDPs) is mainly occurring from central to western areas of the country, and its impact is already being felt in Western and Nyanza provinces where educational and health systems are overextended, according to the UN Country Team.
Additionally, the large influx of IDPs could threaten food security, the team noted.
Currently, there are 12,000 people in over two dozen displacement camps in the capital Nairobi, and plans are afoot to create a site to shelter 15,000 IDPs in Kasarani, on the outskirts of the city.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that 47 tons of food have been distributed to 19 displaced settlements in the Kipelion and Nakuru districts, the first such delivery in the South Rift Valley.
Some 1,000 people have lost their lives and more than 310,000 others displaced since the December 2007 elections in which President Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner over opposition leader Raila Odinga. In addition, some 12,000 Kenyans have fled to neighbouring Uganda.
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WORLD-FAMOUS ACTORS, HUMANITARIANS JOIN UN CALL TO END VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
Award-winning actresses Catherine Deneuve and Hillary Swank and humanitarian Sir Bob Geldof have added their names to an ever-growing list of names on a United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) online petition which aims to eliminate violence against women.
“Can you believe that one in three women will be a victim of violence?” asked Ms. Deneuve, the French film star, encouraging others to sign the “Say NO to violence against women” petition.
Hundreds of names – including British actor Christopher Lee and German Development Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul – were added to the petition last night in Berlin at the Cinema for Peace event that seeks to promote understanding through film. Additionally, $100,000 was raised for UNIFEM’s UN Trust Fund to End Violence Against Women.
“Glittering evenings are generally not the place to dwell on hard truths,” UNIFEM Goodwill Ambassador Nicole Kidman, who also serves as the campaign’s spokesperson, said in a video message to the Berlin event.
“But we cannot be together without our conscience being deeply troubled by the situation in Darfur, in Eastern Congo and in so many under-reported conflicts where women’s bodies have become part of the battlefield, where rape is being used intentionally as a weapon of war,” she added.
To date, the campaign, which will run until the end of this November, has garnered nearly 35,000 signatures. Last month, the UN Foundation (UNF) announced that it will donate $1 dollar for each of the first 100,000 signatures.
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UNICEF SEEKS $856 MILLION TO AID CHILDREN AND WOMEN CAUGHT IN CRISIS
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) today asked donors for $856 million to assist children and women who are victims of emergencies, ranging from the conflicts in Chad and Kenya to flood-hit areas such as Mozambique.
Launching its Humanitarian Action Report 2008 in Geneva today, the agency said the funds will be used to provide urgent assistance in health, education and nutrition.
In Kenya, some 150,000 children are among the 300,000 people who were forced from their homes, while in Chad, an estimated 30,000 of the 52,000 who have been driven from the country are vulnerable and urgently need help.
“In both these conflicts, and in the 37 other crises described in this report, children and women continue to bear the brunt of conflict and displacement,” UNICEF Deputy Executive Director Hilde Johnson told a press briefing in Geneva.
Funding is also being sought for humanitarian activities in Sudan, especially the strife-torn Darfur region, home to 2.1 million internally displaced persons (IDPs). UNICEF-supported programmes in Sudan, totalling over $150 million, aim to boost health, nutrition and education, increase access to safe water and sanitation, and promote child protection and mine action.
In West Africa, nearly 1 million people are currently displaced by conflict and young children face the risk of under-nutrition. In the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), more than half of the deaths of young children are attributed to malnutrition. UNICEF is requesting $106 million to help Congolese children.
“We must make sure that children and women are protected as much as possible from these atrocities, and that those responsible for these crimes are eventually brought to justice,” Ms. Johnson stressed.
Last year, thanks to an increase in the contributions received from new funding mechanisms such as the Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF), 52 per cent of UNICEF’s requested emergency funds were received. The agency today said it hopes donors and other partners will help increase the efficiency of disaster preparedness and response.
Steve Adkisson, who represented UNICEF in Chad from 2004 to 2007, said financing up front can save costs in the long run. “If the funding does not come in a consistent and timely manner, goods need to be delivered by air rather than by road,” he noted. And each time that happens, “more funding goes to the delivery of the goods.”
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UN TO LAUNCH DRIVE AGAINST HUMAN TRAFFICKING AT UPCOMING GLOBAL FORUM
The United Nations this week will convene the first global forum against human trafficking in Vienna, where some 1,200 experts, legislators, law enforcement teams, business leaders, non-governmental organization (NGO) representatives and trafficking victims are expected to launch an international campaign to combat the crime.
“The blood, sweat and tears of trafficking victims are on the hands of consumers all over the world,” said the Executive Director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Antonio Maria Costa, ahead of the 13-15 February forum, explaining that the problem is so widespread within the global economic system that all share complicity.
Because of the lack of information about human trafficking, Mr. Costa called it “a monster whose shape, size and ferocity we can only guess.”
But experts agree that the scourge accompanies other unlawful activities, like illegal migration, forced labour, paedophilia, child exploitation, civil conflicts and organized prostitution.
“It’s time for the world to open its eyes to this form of modern slavery,” the UNODC chief declared.
However, he cautioned against empty platitudes. “Moral outrage is not going to stop the traffickers; we need high impact law enforcement measures to make human trafficking a riskier business.”
Forum participants will discuss practical measures to increase the effectiveness of preventing human trafficking and bringing the perpetrators to justice. Measures under consideration include tracking and blocking Internet payments for human trafficking transactions; innovative technology to pinpoint frequently used trafficking routes; help-lines to report suspected child prostitution or sex slavery; codes of conduct to curb sex tourism; improved controls on supply chain management; and efforts to stop the forced removal and trade of human organs.
Mr. Costa pointed out that global campaigns have been waged against the trade in blood diamonds, fur, and illegal timber, while efforts to stop the trade in people “lag behind.”
In addition to experts and other officials, the forum has attracted the participation of celebrities and public figures, including Suzanne Mubarak, the First Lady of Egypt; Emma Thompson, the Oscar-winning British actress; and Ricky Martin, the Grammy Award-winning Puerto Rican pop star.
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UN REFUGEE CHIEF IN MIDDLE EAST TO URGE INCREASED ASSISTANCE FOR UPROOTED IRAQIS
António Guterres, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), has traveled to the Middle East in a bid to raise awareness of the millions of Iraqis displaced by violence and host countries that are helping them.
Mr. Guterres is in Amman, Jordan, today to meet with senior Government officials, visit UNHCR's registration centre and confer with a group of Iraqi refugees, before travelling to Damascus, Syria, this evening.
During his week-long mission, the Commissioner hopes to “assure governments in the region of our continued commitment to and engagement in efforts to ease the plight of those displaced in the region and beyond,” UNHCR spokesperson Jennifer Pagonis told reporters in Geneva.
Additionally, Mr. Guterres will emphasize the ongoing need for resources and global support and will thank governments such as Jordan and Syria for the generosity they have shown to Iraqi refugees.
According to UNHCR and its partners, out of Iraq's total population of 26 million, some 4.4 million are displaced, with 2.4 million uprooted within the war-torn nation's borders and 2 million in other countries. Over 40,000 non-Iraqis – including Palestinians, Iranians and Turks – are taking refuge inside Iraq.
This year, the agency hopes to raise $261 million to assist the most vulnerable of displaced Iraqis, both in and out of their home country, through programmes such as counselling, provision of household and shelter items; protection and legal help; and support for camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs). It also wishes to send 200,000 Iraqi refugee children to school in Syria, Jordan and other host countries through the appeal.
For UNHCR – which operates within Iraq with some 30 local and internal staff in collaboration with Iraqi aid agencies – helping the displaced has proven to be difficult given the insecurity plaguing much of the country.
Last year, the agency registered over a quarter of a million Iraqis in nearby countries, provided health services to more than 200,000 people and directly aided vulnerable families through initiatives such as giving cash cards to households headed by females, widows and people with disabilities.
In a joint effort with the UN World Food Programme (WFP), UNHCR will feed up to 360,000 Iraqi refugees in Syria this year.
“We will also continue our resettlement programme for the most vulnerable Iraqis,” Ms. Pagonis noted. Last year, UNHCR submitted over 21,000 Iraqi resettlement cases to more than one dozen governments for consideration.
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UN REFUGEE AGENCY SEEKS $63 MILLION TO HELP SOUTHERN SUDANESE RETURN HOME
The United Nations refugee agency today launched an appeal for $63 million to help it administer the voluntary return and reintegration of 80,000 Sudanese still living in neighbouring countries as a result of the north-south civil war that ended in early 2005.
The appeal by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), unveiled in Geneva, aims to ensure that the agency’s voluntary repatriation scheme would be able to continue.
So far, more than 169,000 refugees and an estimated 1.9 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) have returned to southern Sudan since the Government and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) signed a comprehensive peace agreement in January 2005.
But another 260,000 Sudanese refugees still live outside the borders of the country and UNHCR is hoping that 80,000 will return this year, with more than half expected to return from Uganda and the remainder from Kenya, Ethiopia and Egypt.
Marjon Kamara, Director of UNHCR’s Africa’s bureau, warned that “if the pace of return is not adequately supported, the challenges for sustainable reintegration may become even greater.”
Returning refugees and IDPs receive reintegration assistance in the form of aid packages and community-based projects, especially in those parts of southern Sudan most lacking in basic services and infrastructure.
Despite the signing of the peace accord, southern Sudan is plagued by insecurity and a lack of usable roads, especially during the May to November rainy season, makes travel more hazardous.
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RWANDAN INVESTIGATOR ACCUSED OF MANUFACTURING EVIDENCE APPEARS AT UN TRIBUNAL
A Rwandan defence investigator accused of trying to fabricate evidence for the appeal in the genocide trial of the country’s former higher education minister has made his first appearance in his own case before the United Nations tribunal set up to deal with the mass killings that engulfed the small African nation in 1994.
During an initial appearance yesterday before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), in Arusha, Tanzania, Léonidas Nshogoza pleaded not guilty to two charges of contempt of the Tribunal and two counts of attempting to commit acts punishable as contempt.
Mr. Nshogoza voluntarily surrendered to the ICTR on Friday after an international warrant was issued for his arrest late last month.
The indictment accuses him of intending to fabricate evidence and procure false statements for use in the appeal against the conviction and sentencing of Jean de Dieu Kamuhanda. It also accuses him of interfering in the administration of justice.
Mr. Kamuhanda is serving concurrent life sentences after being convicted of genocide and extermination by the ICTR, which found that he had supervised the killings in his native Gikomero commune in the Kigali-Rural prefecture. He distributed firearms, grenades and machetes to the Hutu Interahamwe militia and led attacks at the parish church and adjoining school in Gikomero, where several thousand Tutsi civilians were killed.
Last December the Tribunal convicted a former witness – identified only by the code name GAA – in the Kamuhanda trial to nine months’ jail for giving false testimony.
In less than three months starting in early April 1994, some 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were murdered across Rwanda, often by machete or club.
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UN-BACKED PROJECT TO ASSIST THOUSANDS IN NORTHERN CHINA’S COUNTRYSIDE
About 125,000 households in China’s Inner Mongolia region stand to benefit from better access to financial services, markets, technology and information under a new programme backed by the United Nations agency tasked with trying to reduce rural poverty.
The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) announced today that the $70.9 million programme will target households – particularly those headed solely by women – with per capita incomes of less than $1 a day and limited access to financial services such as microcredit and savings schemes.
The six-year project will promote greenhouse and organic crop production with links to markets and buyers, and it will also establish village development funds to pay for infrastructure and activities selected by local communities.
IFAD said it expects that the project could benefit households in more than 720 villages across nine counties of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, which has not experienced the same economic growth as other parts of the country in recent years.
Thomas Rath, IFAD’s country programme manager for China, said the programme aims to tap into the skills and abilities of the local people.
“So far, Government and donor-funded programmes have used the same poverty reduction strategies in different locations,” he said. “Sometimes this has led to reduced results. This suggests that we needed to try new approaches. We need to target with specific approaches tailored to the local needs of people and their institutions.”
The programme will be funded in part by a $30 million loan from IFAD, as well as loans from the Chinese Government ($31.1 million) and the Rural Credit Cooperatives ($5.7 million). Participants in the scheme will contribute the remaining $4.1 million.
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UNESCO CHIEF CONDEMNS MURDER OF NEPALESE JOURNALIST
The Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) today condemned the murder last month of Nepalese journalist Pushkar Bahadur Shrestha.
The 57-year old publisher of two local weeklies was shot in the back on the evening of 12 January while with his brother in a town near Birgunj on the border with India. A man who said he was the local representative of the Janatantrik Tarai Mukti Morcha militia claimed responsibility for the murder, saying Mr. Shrestha was killed because he was a “pahadi” journalist, meaning from the hill region and not the southern plains population.
“I condemn the murder of Pushkar Bahadur Shrestha,” Koïchiro Matsuura said in a statement. “Through him, the murderers were obviously standing against freedom of expression but also against an ethnic group they are in conflict with.”
The head of the Paris-based agency said the targeting of journalists “must cease in order for Nepal to reach, at long last, democracy and the rule of law.”
According to IFEX, violence against journalists increased drastically in 2007 in areas where armed groups claiming to defend the Madhesi, the people of the south, have launched protest movements. Janatantrik Tarai Mukti Morcha has been involved in dozens of cases of threats and violence since its creation in August 2006.
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