Chad
Nine years on is the UN still failing Darfur?
View event here. Download this episode View in iTunes By Nicky Armstrong Last night’s event at the Frontline Club saw a heated debate between the expert panel and the audience on the UN’s presence in Darfur. Chaired by Patrick Smith, editor of Africa Confidential, the discussion bought up many of the tangled complexities surrounding the […]
Nine years on is the UN still failing Darfur?
Since the start of the 2003 conflict in Darfur, questions have been raised about the role played by the United Nations and the viability of its mandate.
Join us at the Frontline Club to discuss the actions of the UN and whether they are still failing Darfur.
World Politics Review: Disputes Threaten Chad-Sudan Peace Deal
Crashed Chadian helicopter. David Axe photo. by DAVID AXE On April 16, a Chadian helicopter with at least three people aboard crashed in Adre, a town abutting the border with Sudan in the desert region shared by the two countries. One person died in the crash, while two were injured. The incident was an unwelcome […]
No End in Sight to South Sudan’s Violence over Land
By DAVID AXE Tribal fighting in South Sudan killed nearly 200 people on Sunday. Murle tribesmen reportedly attacked an encampment of refugees from the Lou Nuer tribe, killing 185, mostly women and children, but also including soldiers from the Sudan People’s Liberation Army, the U.S.-backed armed force of the breakaway Government of South Sudan. The […]
U.S. Trains South Sudan Air Experts?
by DAVID AXE The U.S. Air Force Special Operations School in Hurlburt, Florida, last week launched its inaugural "Building Partner Aviation Capacity Course." The training course in basic aviation planning "included representatives from the U.S., Costa Rica and Sudan," the Air Force reported. Costa Rica, sure. But Sudan? Since Washington does not have formal military […]
Dodging Antonovs in Darfur
It wasn’t much more than a speck. A tiny, white fleck in the wide blue sky above us. Our 4×4 lurched to a halt as Yahia, the driver, peered through the 10 inches of windscreen scraped clean of the mud that camouflaged the rest of the vehicle. Then we were off again, lurching over the […]
U.S. General: Darfur No-Fly Zone Not “Developed”
Let’s be perfectly clear about this: deploying Western forces to establish a no-fly zone over Darfur is a bad idea, and would only further entangle foreign powers in a war in which they have no clear interest. Not to mention, the logistics and rules-of-engagement would be nightmares. Fortunately, the U.S. Air Force doesn’t seem terribly […]
Stealth Fighters to Darfur?
U.N. officials and aid workers are gathering in eastern Chad to discuss preparations for an alarming contingency. With the recent arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar Bashir and his subsequent ejection of foreign aid groups from Darfur, the U.N. and Chad’s humanitarian community are worried that thousands of Darfuri refugees currently living in camps in […]
Reuters honours conflict photographers
Reuters has announced the winners of its own internal journalism awards for 2008. Notable among the winners were Goran Tomasevic’s image of a US soldier in action against the Taleban in Afghanistan, named as Photograph of the Year. Belgrade-born Tomasevic began working for Reuters during the Bosnian conflict in the 1990s the agency says. Ukrainian […]
Somalia Journos’ Kidnapping: Inside Job?
Two months ago two foreign journalists and their Somali colleagues were abducted while reporting on refugees outside Mogadishu. Aussie Nigel Brennan and Canadian Amanda Lindhout and as many as three Somalis were grabbed on the heavily traveled Afgooye Road, apparently under the noses of Ethiopian troops. My friend Mohamed Omar Hussein, a reporter in Mogadishu, […]
Ethiopians Withdrawing from Somalia?
Thousands of Ethiopian troops reportedly are retreating from Mogadishu after nearly two years of bloody fighting.The withdrawal, which still leaves sizable Ethiopian and A.U. (pictured) forces in the city, coincides with two separate peace talks: one, U.N.-brokered, aiming at reconciling all of Somalia’s armed parties; the other, encouraged by Ethiopia, meant to prevent a split […]
Child Soldier Recruitment Continues in Chad
They usually come at night, to the sprawling refugee camps in eastern Chad along the border with Sudan. Recruiters for Chad-based rebel groups, which are locked in bloody combat with Khartoum and its militia proxies in Sudan’s Darfur region, sometimes simply show up at the camps and new recruits, many of them still boys, come […]
Central African Refugees Clash over Fields, Herds
Clarisse Larlombaye was nearly ruined when a herd of cows got into her rice field one night. The tiny 900-square-meter plot, outside the U.N.-run Gondje refugee camp in lush southern Chad is the sole source of income for Larlombaye and the two other Central African refugees she shares it with. In recent years, Larlombaye and […]
Chad’s Budding Roadblock Entrepreneurs
Corruption is big business in Chad, a country whose teetering economy is propped up by billions of dollars in foreign aid. When Chadians can’t make an honest buck, they’ll make a dishonest one. In Afghanistan and Somalia I paid out maybe a couple hundred bucks in bribes combined. Here in Chad, I’ve had to pay […]
Blocked in Chad
Frontline blogger David Axe writes on the Danger Room blog about the joys of getting around Chad. Roadblocks equal a local road tax. He’s got through $500 in just a month paying off the blockers. At least at one roadblock the ‘guards’ let him hold onto his wallet, I was driving through a U.N.-administered refugee […]
Web 2.0 for warzones… not there yet
Our man in Chad, David Axe, writes a great post summarizing the strengths and the weaknesses of using a Nokia N95 and live video broadcast software Qik to report from a war zone. It’s not rocket science, if the mobile phone networks are flakey and/or you can’t get to a decent wifi connection live reporting […]
Alive and Qiking in Chad
When Web 2.0 startup Qik offered me a free Nokia N95 camera phone plus their new video-streaming software for my trip to Chad, I jumped. Here was a chance to try out the latest technology in one of the world’s most remote war-zones. The Qik-N95 combo promised to condense the basic capabilities of bulky […]
David Axe on Radio 5 Live
Chris Vallance, presenter of BBC Radio 5 Live’s Pods and Blogs show, interviews David Axe in Chad. You can hear the report here and you can follow David’s trip on the border of Sudan on his Frontline blog. To listen direct click here – I think this link is good for one week or so […]
More trouble in Chad
Finbarr O’Reilly, Reuters snapper and World Press photo 2006 winner, is currently in Chad. He found himself in a spot of bother as he haretails it through the desert of the eastern part of the country. Harsh light and shifting shadows in the windblown desert of eastern Chad can conjure strange images, but this was […]
Trouble in Abeche
Frontline blogger David Axe and photographer Anne Holmes think they’re onto a story when they hear gunfire in the Chadian city Abeche. The story appears to have been little more than a misunderstanding that finds David in the wrong place at the wrong time, We’d seen plenty of shooting and lots of soldiers, but no […]
David Axe heading to Chad
Frontline blogger David Axe is heading to Chad and Sudan tomorrow. He’ll be blogging when he can. He’ll also be the second Frontline blogger to experiment with the mobile phone live streaming video tool called Qik. Kyle is already a big fan, but David will see how (and if) the service works in the field. […]
