A critical day for Kenya's peace talks hit a snag yesterday when the opposition leader unexpectedly left the country and his party said the government failed to show up on time for the latest negotiations.
Raila Odinga left Kenya on a charter flight to Nigeria, according to an airport employee and two officials of Odinga's Orange Democratic Movement. Odinga was expected back today and was still available for consultations while out of the country, said opposition official Musalia Mudavadi.
He said that government negotiators did not show up on time at a luxury hotel where the two sides were trying to strike a deal to end weeks of violence stemming from President Mwai Kibaki's disputed re-election, which local and foreign observers say was rigged.
"There has been a delay from the other side," Mudavadi said. "So we are waiting to hear their communication."
In Nigeria, Information Minister John Odey said he was unaware of Odinga's visit, indicating that the trip's purpose wasn't likely to have been officially sanctioned by the government. The presidential spokesman wasn't immediately available for comment.
Nigeria, an African military and diplomatic powerhouse, isn't known to be involved in mediation efforts in Kenya.
On Thursday, the two sides appeared to be edging toward a deal as the government tentatively agreed to create a prime minister's post to be filled by the opposition.
SEEING THE LIGHT
Government negotiator Mutula Kilonzo said a political deal was expected yesterday after weeks of international pressure on both sides to share power.
"I am beginning to see light at the end of the tunnel," former UN chief Kofi Annan, who has been mediating in the political negotiations, said in a statement on Thursday.
Odinga missed a scheduled meeting yesterday with Jean Ping, chairman of the African Union Commission, the AU executive body. But negotiators from his party attended instead, according to an AU official who asked that his name not be used because he was not authorized to speak publicly.
The Dec. 27 election returned Kibaki to power for a second five-year term after Odinga's lead in early vote counting evaporated overnight.
BLOODSHED
The ensuing violence has stirred up ethnic grievances over land and poverty that have bedeviled Kenya since independence in 1963. More than 1,000 people have been killed.
Much of the bloodshed has pitted other ethnic groups against Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe, long resented for dominating politics and the economy.
On Thursday, a man was hacked to death in a Nairobi slum, police said. Witnesses said the fight started when a group of young Luos -- from the same ethnic group as Odinga -- began taunting Kikuyus.
"They started hurling insults then throwing stones at the Kikuyus, who are their neighbors," said a woman selling vegetables in the slum.
The Kikuyus then attacked, killing a Luo man, said the woman, who asked that her name not be used for fear of retribution.
MOBILIZING
A think tank said on Thursday that armed groups on opposing sides of the political and ethnic strife are mobilizing for new attacks and serious violence could erupt again if peace talks fail.
"Calm has partly returned but the situation remains highly volatile," the Brussels, Belgium-based International Crisis Group said in a report. "Armed groups are still mobilizing on both sides."
Talks between Kibaki and Odinga have focused on how to create a broader-based government to end the crisis. In particular, Odinga and his backers have demanded that the president share power.
The country remains caught between a desire to move on from waves of ethnic attacks and a fear that any compromise could spark new fighting.
POLITICAL PATRIARCHS: Recent clashes between Thailand and Cambodia are driven by an escalating feud between rival political families, analysts say The dispute over Thailand and Cambodia’s contested border, which dates back more than a century to disagreements over colonial-era maps, has broken into conflict before. However, the most recent clashes, which erupted on Thursday, have been fueled by another factor: a bitter feud between two powerful political patriarchs. Cambodian Senate President and former prime minister Hun Sen, 72, and former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, 76, were once such close friends that they reportedly called one another brothers. Hun Sen has, over the years, supported Thaksin’s family during their long-running power struggle with Thailand’s military. Thaksin and his sister Yingluck stayed
In the sweltering streets of Jakarta, buskers carry towering, hollow puppets and pass around a bucket for donations. Now, they fear becoming outlaws. City authorities said they would crack down on use of the sacred ondel-ondel puppets, which can stand as tall as a truck, and they are drafting legislation to remove what they view as a street nuisance. Performances featuring the puppets — originally used by Jakarta’s Betawi people to ward off evil spirits — would be allowed only at set events. The ban could leave many ondel-ondel buskers in Jakarta jobless. “I am confused and anxious. I fear getting raided or even
Kemal Ozdemir looked up at the bare peaks of Mount Cilo in Turkey’s Kurdish majority southeast. “There were glaciers 10 years ago,” he recalled under a cloudless sky. A mountain guide for 15 years, Ozdemir then turned toward the torrent carrying dozens of blocks of ice below a slope covered with grass and rocks — a sign of glacier loss being exacerbated by global warming. “You can see that there are quite a few pieces of glacier in the water right now ... the reason why the waterfalls flow lushly actually shows us how fast the ice is melting,” he said.
Residents across Japan’s Pacific coast yesterday rushed to higher ground as tsunami warnings following a massive earthquake off Russia’s far east resurfaced painful memories and lessons from the devastating 2011 earthquake and nuclear disaster. Television banners flashed “TSUNAMI! EVACUATE!” and similar warnings as most broadcasters cut regular programming to issue warnings and evacuation orders, as tsunami waves approached Japan’s shores. “Do not be glued to the screen. Evacuate now,” a news presenter at public broadcaster NHK shouted. The warnings resurfaced memories of the March 11, 2011, earthquake, when more than 15,000 people died after a magnitude 9 tremor triggered a massive tsunami that
RSS