Agence France Presse, January 29, 2004
Somali warlords, politicians sign pact on new parliament
Somali warlords and politicians on Thursday signed a landmark accord in Nairobi on the formation of a parliament that will elect a national president for the battle-scarred Horn of Africa country.
The accord was signed by a representative of the Transitional National Government (TNG), which holds little sway outside the capital Mogadishu; Somali warlords and other leaders, including some who had earlier walked out of long-running peace talks in Kenya.
It envisages an assembly of 275 representatives.
Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki, who hosted the signing in State House, urged the signatories to respect the agreement in order to end the suffering endured by the Somali people since dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown in 1991 and the nation plunged into anarchy.
"We want Somalia to be a prosperous nation... You should commit yourself to the agreement made here," Kibaki said.
"Kenya will make available all the resources to pacify Somalia. Please stop the suffering of your people," Kibaki added.
Earlier Thursday Kenyan Foreign Minister Kalonzo Musyoka predicted a swift evolution of the political situation in Somalia.
"We hope there will a functional government in Somalia within one month," Musyoka said.
The deal's signing will herald a new phase in the current peace process. The first phase ended with the 2002 ceasefire, which was repeatedly violated.
Associated Press Online, January 29, 2004
Somalia Leaders Agree on Govt. Structure
BYLINE: CHRIS TOMLINSON
Somalia's feuding leaders signed an agreement Thursday to form a new government based along clan lines, the first deal of its kind to include all armed groups that have torn the country apart for the last 13 years.
The next step for the 42 Somali leaders involved in the yearlong peace process will be to appoint a parliament, which will then choose the country's first national government since the dictatorship of Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown in 1991.
With his departure, Somalia collapsed into fiefdoms of warring factions. Attempts to form a new central government led to dozens of temporary coalitions between warlords whose militias cruised the country's roads in pickup trucks often mounted with anti-aircraft guns, which were used against people.
"We honestly hope that with this positive spirit we will be able to bury the long-standing differences that prevailed among the various sections of our society," Abdiqasim Hassan Salad, the leader of the previous attempt to form a national government, said at the signing ceremony in neighboring Nairobi.
The agreement unites most of central and southern Somalia under one government drawn from a 275-member parliament elected by traditional clan leaders and politicians. The four major clans will each select 61 members of parliament and one coalition of small clans will select 31. The task of further dividing the seats along sub-clans is left to each group.
The Somalis were expected to begin choosing their legislators immediately following the signing, but no timetable had been set and the process will be contentious. Once formed, the parliament will then choose the president, who will nominate a prime minister to form a government.
The new government would unite southern Somalia with Puntland, a region in central Somalia which has practiced autonomy and experienced relative peace over the last 13 years. All of the major militia leaders who control most of the capital, Mogadishu, also signed the agreement.
Ambassador Carlo Ungaro, the European Union representative to the talks, said he would rally world financial and political support for the new government once it takes office.
"The international community will not abandon Somalia to its fate once the conference is over," said Ungaro, an Italian diplomat. "In the next few weeks there will be a conference of donors."
The Somali talks began in November 2002 and were mediated by a Kenyan representative of the Inter-Governmental Authority for Development, a six-nation group of countries in East Africa.
In 1992, a United Nations attempt to intervene in Somalia to feed more than a million people and stop the country's descent into chaos yielded some success, but quickly deteriorated in October 1993 when U.S. troops tried to capture one of the most powerful warlords, Farah Aidid.
That battle, featured in the book and movie "Black Hawk Down," left 18 U.S. soldiers dead and led to a change in U.S. policy so that interventions in foreign countries could only take place where the United States had a clear national interest. In recent years, Washington has expressed concern that Somalia's lawlessness could attract international terrorists.
Associated Press, January 29, 2004
Somalia's factional and traditional leaders agree on structure of new government
BYLINE: CHRIS TOMLINSON
Somalia's feuding factional and traditional leaders signed an agreement Thursday to form a new government based along clan lines, the first deal of its kind to include all the armed groups that have torn the country apart over the last 13 years.
The next step for the 42 Somali leaders involved in the yearlong peace process will be to appoint a new parliament, which will then chose the country's first national government since the dictatorship of Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown in 1991.
With Siad Barre's departure, Somalia collapsed into fiefdoms of warring factions and the country became an analogy for anarchy. Numerous attempts to form a new central government led to dozens of temporary coalitions between warlords whose militias cruised Somalia's roads in pickup trucks often mounted with anti-aircraft guns, which were used against people.
"We honestly hope that with this positive spirit we will be able to bury the long-standing differences that prevailed among the various sections of our society," Abdiqasim Hassan Salad, the leader of the previous attempt to form a national government, said at the signing ceremony in neighboring Nairobi.
The agreement unites most of central and southern Somalia under one government drawn from a 275-member parliament elected by traditional clan leaders and politicians. The four major clans will each select 61 members of parliament and one coalition of small clans will select 31. The task of dividing the seats along sub-clans is left to each group.
The Somalis were expected to begin choosing their legislators immediately following the signing, but no timeline had been set and the process will be contentious. Once formed, the parliament will then chose the president, who will nominate a prime
minister to form a government.
The new government would unite southern Somalia with Puntland, a region in central Somalia which has practiced autonomy and experienced relative peace over the last 13 years. All of the major militia leaders who control most of the capital, Mogadishu, also signed the agreement.
Ambassador Carlo Ungaro, the European Union representative to the talks, said he would rally world financial and political support for the new government once it takes office.
"The international community will not abandon Somalia to its fate once the conference is over," said Ungaro, an Italian diplomat. "In the next few weeks there will be a conference of donors."
The Somali talks began in November 2002 and were mediated by a Kenyan representative of the Inter-Governmental Authority for Development, a six-nation group of countries in East Africa.
In 1992, the United Nations' attempt to intervene in Somalia to feed more than a million people and stop the country's descent into chaos yielded some success, but quickly deteriorated in October 1993 when U.S. troops attempted to capture one of the most powerful warlords, Farah Aidid.
That battle, featured in the book and movie "Black Hawk Down," left 18 U.S. soldiers dead and led to a change in U.S. policy so that interventions in foreign countries could only take place where the United States had a clear national interest. In recent years, the U.S. government has expressed concern that Somalia's lawlessness could attract international terrorists.
BBC Monitoring International Reports, January 29, 2004
SOMALIA: MOGADISHU ORPHANAGES CLOSE AFTER SAUDI CHARITY CUTS AID
It was a deep shock for orphans (staying at Al-Haramayn sponsored camps in Mogadishu) after they were sent home in Mogadishu and other regions in the country. The orphans were told Al-Haramayn (Saudi-based aid organization) has stopped funding the
centres.
The USA and the Saudi government have already agreed to stop humanitarian activities run by Al-Haramayn in some countries including Somalia after it was accused of having links with the Al-Qa'idah network. This has affected the orphans who had been living in those camps.
Source: Radio Shabeelle, Mogadishu in Somali 0500 gmt 29 Jan 04
BBC Monitoring International Reports, January 29, 2004
SOMALI FACTION LEADERS SIGN AGREEMENT ON NATIONAL CHARTER
Factional leaders in Somali conflict today signed the declaration on amendments to the transitional federal charter of the Somali Republic.
The signing of the agreement will pave way for the adoption of the transitional federal charter and commencement of phase three of the negotiations on selection of members of the transitional federal assembly.
The signing, done at State House, Nairobi, was witnessed by President Mwai Kibaki who is the chairman of the IGAD (Inter-Governmental Authority on Development) facilitation committee on the Somali peace process.
It is a culmination of a consultative meeting launched at Safari Park, Hotel on the 9 January by President Kibaki and his Ugandan counterpart President Yoweri Museveni, chairman of the IGAD assembly of the heads of state and government.
Addressing the Somali leaders, President Kibaki challenged them to implement the requirements of the declaration noting that a lot of resources and time had been devoted to the Somali peace process.
President Kibaki asked the protagonists in the Somali conflict to forget their past animosities and aim at realizing peace, noting that looking in the past will erode the gains so far made in achieving peace in the war-torn country.
President Kibaki reminded Somali leaders that with the signing of the declaration they now had the opportunity to make a difference for their country.
He said in this competitive world, it would be tragic for Somali to be left behind due to the conflict that has bedevilled it for close to 14 years.
(Kibaki) How many people amongst yourselves and amongst your friends and others in Somalia, would have over the last so many years committed themselves from time to time to help Somalia to come back to where it was.
Which is what all of us have wished. All of us have always wished and yet it's been 14 years and we have been wishing. Can we now do something, take action rather than wishing so that we can now achieve what we have always wanted to achieve - which is what will help the country Somalia (end of recording).
President Kibaki observed that the genesis of the Somali conflict was ignorable considering that all people of that country shared a common ancestry, spoke the same language, religion and were in all respect the same people.
He reiterated Kenya's commitment to peace in Somali, saying Kenya would like to have a stable and prosperous neighbour.
Noting that conflicts have been the bane of most African countries, President Kibaki said it was high time Africa disabused itself of this dubious distinction once and for all.
Among the salient issues in the declaration are, that while the constitution is being drafted, a national census shall be simultaneously undertaken and that internationally supervised national referendum shall be undertaken to approve the new constitution.
Other issues agreed on are that the number of members of parliament be reduced from 275 to 351 (as heard) of which 21 per cent shall be women and that the term of the transitional federal parliament be increased from four years to five.
Somali leaders who signed the declaration were: Abdiqasim Salad Hasan, Col Abdullahi Yusuf, Muse Sudi Yalahow, Muhammad Qanyare Afrah, Shariff Salah Muhammad, Adan Madobe, and Aisha Haji.
They all expressed confidence and pledged commitment to peace in Somalia. The leaders paid tribute to presidents Kibaki and Yoweri Museveni and the international community for facilitating the Somali peace process and ably steering it to today's
signing ceremony.
Source: KBC radio, Nairobi, in English 1600 gmt 29 Jan 04
Panafrican News Agency, January 29, 2004
KIBAKI NUDGES SOMALI LEADER TO UPHOLD PEACE ACCORD
Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki has urged Somali factional leaders to fully implement the declaration on amendments to the Transitional Federal Charter of the Somali Republic, paving the way for peace in the country.
He reminded the Somali leaders that "a lot resources and time have been invested" in the peace process and that they now had the "opportunity to make a difference" for their country.
President Kibaki, who is the chairman of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) facilitation committee, was speaking Thursday when the Somali leaders signed a peace declaration at the State House in Nairobi.
It was a culmination of an all-inclusive consultative meeting kicked off 9 January by President Kibaki and Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, who is chairman of the IGAD assembly of heads of state.
The agreement paves the way for the adoption of the Transitional Federal Charter and commencement of Phase III of the negotiations on selection of the members of the Transitional Federal Assembly.
It was agreed that the number of parliamentarians be reduced to 275 from 351 and that 12 percent shall be women, while the term of the transitional Federal Parliament would be extended from four to five years.
The Somali leaders further agreed that while a new constitution was being drafted, a national census would be simultaneously undertaken and that internationally supervised national referendum would be required to approve the new constitution.
President Kibaki asked protagonists in the Somali conflict to forget their past animosities as looking back would only serve to erode the gains made in achieving peace in the war torn country.
He observed that the genesis of the Somali conflict was ignorable, considering that the people shared a common ancestry, religion, and language, and were "in all respects the same people."
He reiterated Kenya's commitment to peace in Somalia, saying Kenya would like to have a stable and prosperous neighbour.
Somali leaders who signed the declaration were Abdikassim Salat Hassan, Col. Abdullahi Yusuf, Muse Sudi Yalahow, Mohammed Quanyare Afrah, Sharif Salah Mohamed, Adan Madobe and Aisha Haji.
They expressed confidence in the peace process and pledged their commitment to ending the 14-year carnage in Somalia.
President Abdikassim Salad Hassan of the Somalia Transitional Government attributed the strides made so far towards restoring peace in Somalia to the dedication of the Kenyan and Ugandan leaders through the support of IGAD.
He noted that for the first time in 14 years Somali leaders were able to sit together and discuss issues affecting them during the all-inclusive consultative meeting in Nairobi.
Hassan said signing the declaration marked the beginning of renewed hope for the Somali people both at home and in the Diaspora.
Africa News, January 28, 2004,BYLINE: Cameroon Tribune
Somalia;Hope In The horizon
There are times when we are all tired of war, and want to emulate the good example from our neighbors. This is what the warlords of Somalia are currently doing as they meet in Nairobi (Kenya) to create a single parliament of 351 members. The different ethnic groups are represented in Nairobi in this laudable initiative which will pave the way towards creating a
government of national unity.
This initiative, from the Somalis themselves, and from the African continent, is a clear example that things are changing for the better. In virtually all hotbeds of tension on the African continent, there's only one message: that of peace, dialogue and mutual understanding. With the cold war over, and with no East and West tension, few developed countries are now willing to fan the flames of hatred and mayhem.
The people of Somalia have now taken the future on their own hands and seem to bury the hatchet for good. Though its too early to sing victory songs, no reasonable person should pray that this initiative should fail.
Somalia has been without an effective central government since the overthrown of late President Said Barre in 1991. Various attempts by the international community and even within African to bring peace to Africa, have ended in dismal failure. Even the intervention of United States did not succeed in bringing normalcy to the war-torn country. We all remember too well the uncomfortable images of US marines being dragged on the streets of Mogadishu by late General Aidid's men. Humanitarian
agencies are not left unscatched in the mayhem. Their staff have been targeted, abducted and even killed. All this is as a result of the absence of a central government.
The people of Somalia are yearning for the day when peace will become a reality. That's why all eyes are now turned towards Nairobi for the tete-a-tete between the warlords. And this will add more pride on peace initiatives on the African continent.
Africa News, January 28, 2004
Somalia;Traditional Leader Arrested in Somaliland
BYLINE: UN Integrated Regional Information Networks
The authorities in the self-declared republic of Somaliland have arrested Boqor (meaning king) Usman Mahmud, a prominent traditional elder, according to a senior government official.
Local sources in the capital Hargeysa said the Boqor was picked up by a contingent of police officers led by the Somaliland Police Muhammad Ige on Tuesday, from the Hargaysa Club hotel where he was staying.
Somaliland Interior Minister Isma'il Adan Usman told IRIN on Wednesday that the elder had been arrested for breaking Somaliland laws and "committing crimes against the existence of the state".
Boqor Usman is also being accused of "having contacts with Puntland [the neighbouring self-declared autonomous region]".
Tension has been high between Somaliland and Puntland over the Sool and Sanaag regions, which are claimed by both.
The Boqor had reportedly contacted Puntland authorities in an effort to ease the tension and avert armed confrontation, sources said. Isma'il, however, said that the Boqor "supports the reunification of Somaliland with Somalia and has therefore called into question the existence of the country [Somaliland]".
It is a crime under Somaliland law to advocate the reunification of Somaliland with the rest of Somalia.
Somaliland unilaterally declared independence from the rest of Somalia in 1991 after the fall of former President Muhammad Siyad Barre. It has remained relatively free from the chaos and war still ravaging other parts of Somalia, but has failed to gain recognition as an independent country.
Isma'il said Boqor Usman "is like any other person who breaks the law. He will not be treated differently. The law will take its course."
The Boqor is also accused of trying to damage Somaliland's relationship with Djibouti and Ethiopia. "We haveary evidence against him," said the minister, adding that he would be brought to court "as soon as police complete their investigations".
Boqor Usman is a senior traditional leader of the Habar Ja'lo sub-clan, numerically one of the three largest subclans of the Isaq, the dominant clan in northwestern Somalia.
Agence France Presse, January 28, 2004
Eleventh-hour row blocks signing of deal on Somali parliament
An eleventh-hour row among Somali delegates blocked Wednesday's planned signing in Nairobi of a landmark deal on a new parliament for the battle-scarred Horn of Africa state, mediators told AFP.
"The Somalis failed to agree on issues regarding who should sign the agreement," said an official from the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), the regional body mediating talks aimed at restoring a recogised central government to Somalia for the first time since the 1991 fall of dictator Mohammed Siad Barre.
On Monday, diplomatic sources and a leading Somali warlord said that faction leaders, politicians and prominent civil society leaders had agreed on a new formula for the parliament and would put their names to the deal on Wednesday.
In September, Somali President Abdulkassim Salat Hassan, who enjoys very limited recognition, walked out of talks in Nairobi after rejecting an earlier version of a blueprint for Somalia's governance.
He was enticed back on board when the size of the envisaged assembly was reduced from 350 MPs to 275 and when elders, rather than just warlords, were brought into the selection process.
Wednesday's row focussed on exactly who should be allowed to sign the accord, with one group saying only the 24 signatories of an October 2002 ceasefire and Salat should be permitted do so, and another, the newly formed National Salvation Council, insisting that its members also have a the right to put their names to the deal.
Top mediator Kenyan Foreign Minister Kalonzo Musyoka spent most of Wednesday trying in vain to end the impasse.
The IGAD source told AFP that since the disagreement did not focus on the actual contents of the deal, a compromise might well be reached by the end of the week.
The future parliamentarians in Somalia will appoint a new national president who will in turn appoint a prime minister responsible for forming a government.
The deal's signing will herald a new phase of the current peace process. The first phase ended with the 2002 ceasefire, which was repeatedly violated.
The third phase of the talks will concentrate on how to share power among groups who, for more than a decade, have used weapons to settle their disputes and helped to keep their Horn of Africa country one of the world's poorest.
BBC Monitoring International Reports, January 22, 2004
SOMALI INTERIM GOVERNMENT PLANING TO TRAIN 9,000 SOLDIERS
Commander-In-Chief (of the armed forces) of the Transitional National Government (TNG) of Somalia Gen Muhammad Nur Galal, is working on a plan to reorganize and rebuild the TNG (National) force, which had in the past dispersed soon after its formation.
The plan targets to recruit and train up to 9,000 soldiers with a complete military attire. It is not clear who was going to provide the equipment.
According to the plan, several vehicles would be purchased for the troops which would be used for security operations as soon as they were acquired.
Source: Xog-Ogaal, Mogadishu, in Somali 22 Jan 04/Frank Bruni NYT Monday, February 2, 2004
Copyright © 2004 the International Herald Tribune,
In Italy, clash over an African rite; To protect immigrant girls, doctor suggests gentler circumcision
FLORENCE Week after week, scarred women came to Dr. Omar Abdulcadir's gynecology clinic here for help, and while the ways in which they suffered differed, the reason was always the same.
They were immigrants to Italy who had been subjected back in Africa to a brutal girlhood ritual, common throughout much of the continent, in which part or all of their external genitalia had been sliced off.
Abdulcadir treated their infections or inflammation and then, earlier this month, took an unusual step - intended, he said, to protect their daughters from the same fate. He publicly proposed that the hospital where he works let him perform a much less severe version of - or alternative to - female genital cutting.
His goal, he said, was to ease the physical toll of a tradition that was not going away.
"My proposal isn't ideal," he said. "But is there a better answer for how to save the children?"
Health officials in the region of Tuscany are seriously considering that question and have yet to reject his proposal, which he says may prevent immigrants from bringing girls under 10 years old to Africa or to illicit places here for more extreme operations. Opponents have denounced the doctor's proposal, calling it an implicit endorsement of an unacceptable practice.
But as an intense debate plays out in Italy, it encompasses more than a medical issue and touches on the same quandary that France confronts in regard to Muslim head scarves and that other European countries face in other ways.
How far can, and should, Europeans bend to accommodate so many new immigrants with such a wide variety of cultural traditions? Cristiana Scoppa, a spokeswoman for the Italian Association for Women in Development, an education and advocacy group, adamantly opposes Abdulcadir's proposal. "It would undermine the fight of hundreds of thousands of women throughout Africa who have said that no form of genital manipulation can be permitted and that it symbolizes a culture that submits women to the control of men," she said. But she also said she opposed a bill in the Italian Parliament that would explicitly criminalize genital cutting. She said that more general laws against violence covered the situation and that a law against genital cutting would represent "a specific attack against a culture."
Marzia Monciatti, a Florence city official, said certain cultural traditions were at such odds with Italian values that accepting them in any form was impossible.
Genital cutting was one example, she said. The marriage of Romanian Gypsy immigrants in their early teens, which also happens here, was another. But she said she sympathized with efforts by some Muslim immigrants to have crucifixes removed from classroom walls. That, too, has been the recent subject of fervent debate in Italy, where an estimated 85 percent of the population is at least nominally Roman Catholic.
Public buildings, Monciatti asserted, "are places where people with diverse origins, cultures and traditions gather." That diversity warranted respect, she said.
Female genital cutting is practiced in more than two dozen African countries, as well as in countries with immigrants from those places.
It has become enough of a concern in Europe that Denmark, Britain and Sweden, for example, have enacted laws that expressly criminalize it. Broader laws in other countries also serve to ban the procedure. Immigrants who want their daughters to submit to it either return briefly to Africa or have the operation done illegally, outside of a licensed medical setting, said Abdulcadir and other health officials who have studied the issue.
Abdulcadir said he did not know how frequently that was happening in Italy because most of the 500 new patients he saw yearly were grown women whose genitals had been cut in Africa at least a decade ago. He treats them for menstrual problems, swelling and chronic infections, among other problems.
But he said, "Whether they live in Italy or Britain or France or America, they don't want to let go of their traditions," and added, "So I'm trying to give them a way to save that tradition."
He developed his proposed alternative in consultation with immigrants from Somalia, which is also where he was born and reared. Female genital cutting there is widespread, and he said his seven sisters, who now live outside Somalia, were all subjected to it. That alternative, as he described it, would be a piercing of the tip of the clitoris that would draw just a
drop or two of blood and would be largely symbolic. He said he would use a topical anesthetic.
But whether immigrant women would actually use the procedure, which would probably not violate any law, remains unclear.
"This is all difficult, very difficult," said Marisa Nicchi, a regional official in Tuscany, in an interview in Florence on Monday. "It condenses many problems, the biggest of which is how two cultures coexist together." The New York Times
FLORENCE Week after week, scarred women came to Dr. Omar Abdulcadir's gynecology clinic here for help, and while the ways in which they suffered differed, the reason was always the same.
They were immigrants to Italy who had been subjected back in Africa to a brutal girlhood ritual, common throughout much of the continent, in which part or all of their external genitalia had been sliced off.
Abdulcadir treated their infections or inflammation and then, earlier this month, took an unusual step - intended, he said, to protect their daughters from the same fate. He publicly proposed that the hospital where he works let him perform a much less severe version of - or alternative to - female genital cutting.
His goal, he said, was to ease the physical toll of a tradition that was not going away.
"My proposal isn't ideal," he said. "But is there a better answer for how to save the children?"
Health officials in the region of Tuscany are seriously considering that question and have yet to reject his proposal, which he says may prevent immigrants from bringing girls under 10 years old to Africa or to illicit places here for more extreme operations. Opponents have denounced the doctor's proposal, calling it an implicit endorsement of an unacceptable practice.
But as an intense debate plays out in Italy, it encompasses more than a medical issue and touches on the same quandary that France confronts in regard to Muslim head scarves and that other European countries face in other ways.
How far can, and should, Europeans bend to accommodate so many new immigrants with such a wide variety of cultural traditions? Cristiana Scoppa, a spokeswoman for the Italian Association for Women in Development, an education and advocacy group, adamantly opposes Abdulcadir's proposal. "It would undermine the fight of hundreds of thousands of women throughout Africa who have said that no form of genital manipulation can be permitted and that it symbolizes a culture that submits women to the control of men," she said. But she also said she opposed a bill in the Italian Parliament that would explicitly criminalize genital cutting. She said that more general laws against violence covered the situation and that a law against genital cutting would represent "a specific attack against a culture."
Marzia Monciatti, a Florence city official, said certain cultural traditions were at such odds with Italian values that accepting them in any form was impossible.
Genital cutting was one example, she said. The marriage of Romanian Gypsy immigrants in their early teens, which also happens here, was another. But she said she sympathized with efforts by some Muslim immigrants to have crucifixes removed from classroom walls. That, too, has been the recent subject of fervent debate in Italy, where an estimated 85 percent of the population is at least nominally Roman Catholic.
Public buildings, Monciatti asserted, "are places where people with diverse origins, cultures and traditions gather." That diversity warranted respect, she said.
Female genital cutting is practiced in more than two dozen African countries, as well as in countries with immigrants from those places.
It has become enough of a concern in Europe that Denmark, Britain and Sweden, for example, have enacted laws that expressly criminalize it. Broader laws in other countries also serve to ban the procedure. Immigrants who want their daughters to submit to it either return briefly to Africa or have the operation done illegally, outside of a licensed medical setting, said Abdulcadir and other health officials who have studied the issue.
Abdulcadir said he did not know how frequently that was happening in Italy because most of the 500 new patients he saw yearly were grown women whose genitals had been cut in Africa at least a decade ago. He treats them for menstrual problems, swelling and chronic infections, among other problems.
But he said, "Whether they live in Italy or Britain or France or America, they don't want to let go of their traditions," and added, "So I'm trying to give them a way to save that tradition."
He developed his proposed alternative in consultation with immigrants from Somalia, which is also where he was born and reared. Female genital cutting there is widespread, and he said his seven sisters, who now live outside Somalia, were all subjected to it. That alternative, as he described it, would be a piercing of the tip of the clitoris that would draw just a drop or two of blood and would be largely symbolic. He said he would use a topical anesthetic.
But whether immigrant women would actually use the procedure, which would probably not violate any law, remains unclear.
"This is all difficult, very difficult," said Marisa Nicchi, a regional official in Tuscany, in an interview in Florence on Monday. "It condenses many problems, the biggest of which is how two cultures coexist together." The New York Times To protect immigrant girls, doctor suggests gentler circumcision
FLORENCE Week after week, scarred women came to Dr. Omar Abdulcadir's gynecology clinic here for help, and while the ways in which they suffered differed, the reason was always the same.
They were immigrants to Italy who had been subjected back in Africa to a brutal girlhood ritual, common throughout much of the continent, in which part or all of their external genitalia had been sliced off.
Abdulcadir treated their infections or inflammation and then, earlier this month, took an unusual step - intended, he said, to protect their daughters from the same fate. He publicly proposed that the hospital where he works let him perform a much less severe version of - or alternative to - female genital cutting.
His goal, he said, was to ease the physical toll of a tradition that was not going away.
"My proposal isn't ideal," he said. "But is there a better answer for how to save the children?"
.
Health officials in the region of Tuscany are seriously considering that question and have yet to reject his proposal, which he says may prevent immigrants from bringing girls under 10 years old to Africa or to illicit places here for more extreme
operations. Opponents have denounced the doctor's proposal, calling it an implicit endorsement of an unacceptable practice.
But as an intense debate plays out in Italy, it encompasses more than a medical issue and touches on the same quandary that France confronts in regard to Muslim head scarves and that other European countries face in other ways.
How far can, and should, Europeans bend to accommodate so many new immigrants with such a wide variety of cultural traditions? Cristiana Scoppa, a spokeswoman for the Italian Association for Women in Development, an education and advocacy group, adamantly opposes Abdulcadir's proposal. "It would undermine the fight of hundreds of thousands of women throughout Africa who have said that no form of genital manipulation can be permitted and that it symbolizes a culture that submits women to the control of men," she said. But she also said she opposed a bill in the Italian Parliament that would explicitly criminalize genital cutting. She said that more general laws against violence covered the situation and that a law against genital cutting would represent "a specific attack against a culture."
Marzia Monciatti, a Florence city official, said certain cultural traditions were at such odds with Italian values that accepting them in any form was impossible.
Genital cutting was one example, she said. The marriage of Romanian Gypsy immigrants in their early teens, which also happens here, was another. But she said she sympathized with efforts by some Muslim immigrants to have crucifixes removed from classroom walls. That, too, has been the recent subject of fervent debate in Italy, where an estimated 85 percent of the population is at least nominally Roman Catholic.
Public buildings, Monciatti asserted, "are places where people with diverse origins, cultures and traditions gather." That diversity warranted respect, she said.
Female genital cutting is practiced in more than two dozen African countries, as well as in countries with immigrants from those places.
It has become enough of a concern in Europe that Denmark, Britain and Sweden, for example, have enacted laws that expressly criminalize it. Broader laws in other countries also serve to ban the procedure. Immigrants who want their daughters to submit to it either return briefly to Africa or have the operation done illegally, outside of a licensed medical setting, said Abdulcadir and other health officials who have studied the issue.
Abdulcadir said he did not know how frequently that was happening in Italy because most of the 500 new patients he saw yearly were grown women whose genitals had been cut in Africa at least a decade ago. He treats them for menstrual problems, swelling and chronic infections, among other problems.
But he said, "Whether they live in Italy or Britain or France or America, they don't want to let go of their traditions," and added, "So I'm trying to give them a way to save that tradition."
He developed his proposed alternative in consultation with immigrants from Somalia, which is also where he was born and reared. Female genital cutting there is widespread, and he said his seven sisters, who now live outside Somalia, were all subjected to it. That alternative, as he described it, would be a piercing of the tip of the clitoris that would draw just a
drop or two of blood and would be largely symbolic. He said he would use a topical anesthetic.
But whether immigrant women would actually use the procedure, which would probably not violate any law, remains unclear.
"This is all difficult, very difficult," said Marisa Nicchi, a regional official in Tuscany, in an interview in Florence on Monday. "It condenses many problems, the biggest of which is how two cultures coexist together." The New York Times To protect immigrant girls, doctor suggests gentler circumcision
FLORENCE Week after week, scarred women came to Dr. Omar Abdulcadir's gynecology clinic here for help, and while the ways in which they suffered differed, the reason was always the same.
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They were immigrants to Italy who had been subjected back in Africa to a brutal girlhood ritual, common throughout much of the continent, in which part or all of their external genitalia had been sliced off.
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Abdulcadir treated their infections or inflammation and then, earlier this month, took an unusual step - intended, he said,
to protect their daughters from the same fate. He publicly proposed that the hospital where he works let him perform a much
less severe version of - or alternative to - female genital cutting.
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His goal, he said, was to ease the physical toll of a tradition that was not going away.
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"My proposal isn't ideal," he said. "But is there a better answer for how to save the children?"
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Health officials in the region of Tuscany are seriously considering that question and have yet to reject his proposal, which
he says may prevent immigrants from bringing girls under 10 years old to Africa or to illicit places here for more extreme
operations. Opponents have denounced the doctor's proposal, calling it an implicit endorsement of an unacceptable practice.
But as an intense debate plays out in Italy, it encompasses more than a medical issue and touches on the same quandary that
France confronts in regard to Muslim head scarves and that other European countries face in other ways.
How far can, and should, Europeans bend to accommodate so many new immigrants with such a wide variety of cultural traditions? Cristiana Scoppa, a spokeswoman for the Italian Association for Women in Development, an education and advocacy group, adamantly opposes Abdulcadir's proposal. "It would undermine the fight of hundreds of thousands of women throughout Africa who have said that no form of genital manipulation can be permitted and that it symbolizes a culture that submits women to the control of men," she said. But she also said she opposed a bill in the Italian Parliament that would explicitly criminalize genital cutting. She said that more general laws against violence covered the situation and that a law against
genital cutting would represent "a specific attack against a culture."
Marzia Monciatti, a Florence city official, said certain cultural traditions were at such odds with Italian values that accepting them in any form was impossible.
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Genital cutting was one example, she said. The marriage of Romanian Gypsy immigrants in their early teens, which also happens here, was another. But she said she sympathized with efforts by some Muslim immigrants to have crucifixes removed from
classroom walls. That, too, has been the recent subject of fervent debate in Italy, where an estimated 85 percent of the population is at least nominally Roman Catholic.
Public buildings, Monciatti asserted, "are places where people with diverse origins, cultures and traditions gather." That diversity warranted respect, she said.
Female genital cutting is practiced in more than two dozen African countries, as well as in countries with immigrants from those places.
It has become enough of a concern in Europe that Denmark, Britain and Sweden, for example, have enacted laws that expressly criminalize it. Broader laws in other countries also serve to ban the procedure. Immigrants who want their daughters to submit to it either return briefly to Africa or have the operation done illegally, outside of a licensed medical setting,
said Abdulcadir and other health officials who have studied the issue.
Abdulcadir said he did not know how frequently that was happening in Italy because most of the 500 new patients he saw yearly were grown women whose genitals had been cut in Africa at least a decade ago. He treats them for menstrual problems, swelling and chronic infections, among other problems.
But he said, "Whether they live in Italy or Britain or France or America, they don't want to let go of their traditions," and added, "So I'm trying to give them a way to save that tradition."
He developed his proposed alternative in consultation with immigrants from Somalia, which is also where he was born and reared. Female genital cutting there is widespread, and he said his seven sisters, who now live outside Somalia, were all subjected to it. That alternative, as he described it, would be a piercing of the tip of the clitoris that would draw just a
drop or two of blood and would be largely symbolic. He said he would use a topical anesthetic.
But whether immigrant women would actually use the procedure, which would probably not violate any law, remains unclear.
"This is all difficult, very difficult," said Marisa Nicchi, a regional official in Tuscany, in an interview in Florence on Monday. "It condenses many problems, the biggest of which is how two cultures coexist together." The New York Times
The Guardian (London) January 26, 2004
Women: Mutilation The facts
* Infibulation is the most common form in Somalia. But the majority (85%) of mutilations in Africa consist of a
clitoridectomy (removal of all or part of the clitoris).
* 135 million women, mostly African, have undergone genital mutilation - about 6,000 a day.
* It can lead to haemorrhage, kidney damage, abscesses, gangrene, tetanus, chronic infections, infertility and death.
* The procedure is most commonly carried out between the ages of four and eight.
* The removal of the clitoris and labia - viewed as "male parts" - is thought by some to enhance femininity. Other justifications include a lowering of the libido and the chance of infidelity, and hygiene.
* In 19th-century England female circumcision was thought to cure hysteria or "excessive masturbation". Clitoridectomy was practised for these reasons in the US until well into 20th century.
Sources: US Department of State; Amnesty.
BBC Monitoring International Reports, January 22, 2004
SOMALIA: THREE CHILDREN DIE OF MEASLES IN SOUTH
Measles has seriously affected children less than five years (in Afgooye in southern Somalia). It is believed that (approximately) three children die every day of the disease and more than that infected.
In an interview, Dr Shombe, who is one of the workers at a clinic sponsored by the Red Crescent in Afgooye District, has blamed the high infection rate on parents not considering cleanness of their children a priority. He said they provide vaccination against the six killer diseases.
Source: Holy Koran Radio, Mogadishu, in Somali 1530 gmt 21 Jan 04
BBC Monitoring International Reports, January 26, 2004
VISITING UK MPS, SOMALILAND OFFICIALS DISCUSS CO-OPERATION
According to reports from Hargeysa, a delegation from the British parliament has held talks with representatives of the Council of Elders and cabinet members of the self-declared administration of Somaliland.
The talks, which took place at the foreign ministry's office in Hargeysa, centred on mutual co-operation between Britain and Somaliland. Also discussed at the meeting was how Britain could make investment in Somaliland.
Holy Koran Radio reporter, Abdiaziz Yusuf Muse said the chairman of Somaliland's Council of Elders representatives, Ahmad Muhammad Qayde, and Foreign Minister Edna Adan Isma'il, exchanged views with the members of the British parliament in the meeting.
The reporter said the British delegates were yesterday accorded a welcoming party at Haraf Hotel in Hargeysa.
Source: Holy Koran Radio, Mogadishu, in Somali 1530 gmt 25 Jan 04
BBC Worldwide Monitoring, January 26, 2004
Visiting UK MPs, Somaliland officials discuss co-operation
SOURCE: Holy Koran Radio, Mogadishu, in Somali 1530 gmt 25 Jan 04
According to reports from Hargeysa, a delegation from the British parliament has held talks with representatives of the Council of Elders and cabinet members of the self-declared administration of Somaliland.
The talks, which took place at the foreign ministry's office in Hargeysa, centred on mutual co-operation between Britain and Somaliland. Also discussed at the meeting was how Britain could make investment in Somaliland.
Holy Koran Radio reporter, Abdiaziz Yusuf Muse said the chairman of Somaliland's Council of Elders representatives, Ahmad Muhammad Qayde, and Foreign Minister Edna Adan Isma'il, exchanged views with the members of the British parliament in the meeting.
The reporter said the British delegates were yesterday accorded a welcoming party at Haraf Hotel in Hargeysa.
Africa News, January 24, 2004/BYLINE: Somali Peace Rally
Somalia;Blaming Djibouti is a Lame-Duck Tactic
After a year and few months of stop-go Somali talks in Kenya, the good intentions of the international community who sponsored these talks seem to be ending up in the wrong foot that they started.
Two dozen warlords, who have no respect for good governance and/or accountability, and their sympathizers, were gathered to take Somali out of its current mess. Instead, they hijacked the goodwill of the international community for their own greed
and self aggrandizement.
The worst civil war in some parts of Somalia erupted before the ink of the so-called "seize-fire agreement" dried up.
Unfortunately, still we read IGAD talking about this worthless agreement, signed by two-dozen warlords who most of them have common denominators. Some have continued to commit crimes against their own people, including broad-day-light assassinations.
Calling these losers the "leaders committee" has been the misnomer of 2003.
These "losers committee" who are mainly in the service of a foreign hand that is apparently against a strong Somalia, made Somalia and the Somalis a laughing stock in the eyes of the world community. This latest cheap ruse of blaming Djbouti in fomenting war between Puntland and Somaliland is obviously a lame excuse to justify the failure of these men on anything more than a goaded handshaking.
Djibouti has shown its interest in forming a national government for Somalia but its efforts failed primarily because of Somalia's enemies, be it "these losers", their godmother and the unfortunate leadership elected at Arte. Somalis will never forget the efforts of Djbouti whatever a power hungry warlords who have no qualms with killing respected traditional leaders.
Blaming Djibouti will not drum up support for a war triggered by brigands holding a large swathes of Somalia hostage. Nor will it be an excuse to withdraw from the ill-fated conference in Kenya. Indeed, the blame of any bloodshed lies with the power hungry warlords and their sponsor who have inundated Somalia with weapons and ammunition in breach of the UN's embargo on Somalia.
The recent threat of taking Somali warlords to court because of "slow genocide" (not to mention their violent actions) should be taken seriously. SPR urges all peace loving Somalis and the international community not to expect anything from the losers' committee, but indeed take them to where they deserve - the UN Court in Arusha.
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