Saturday, July 18, 2015
Sunday, June 28, 2015
Greek exit from euro appears imminent
Greek citizens rush to banks trying to withdraw cash.
NEW YORK – Greece is on the verge of default having failed to reach a refinancing agreement with the EU in a series of EuroSummit negotiations last week that broke off Saturday without conclusion.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras announced banks and the stock exchange in Greece will be closed on Monday in a “bank holiday” that the governing council of ministers has recommended be extended through next week to calm down a panicked run of citizens who withdrew €1.3 billion in cash from ATMs over the weekend.
The European Central Bank decided over the weekend not to increase the €89 billion ($ 100 billion) in Emergency Liquidity Assistance the European Central Bank has reserved to provide Eurozone central banks, including the central bank in Greece, with the liquidity needed to keep ATMs and banks open during a financial crisis like that currently experienced in Greece.
Tsipras is pushing a national referendum on Friday, July 5, calling for a “yes” or “no” vote regarding whether to accept the new austerity measures demanded by the international creditors including the International Monetary Fund, but the vote could turn out to be moot with the European Union threatening to withdraw the current refinancing deal and cut off emergency funds on Tuesday, June 30, if Greece defaults, as appears likely, on a €1.3 billion payment to the IMF scheduled due that day.
“I’m making an appeal for calm,” Tsipras said in an appeal to the nation on Sunday. “Your bank deposits are safe.”
Meanwhile, financial markets around the world are preparing for the likelihood of what in Europe is being called a “Grexit,” the exit of Greece from the euro, given that without a refinancing agreement from the international creditors including the European Union Central Bank and the IMF, Greece has no prospect of meeting the interest and principal payments scheduled on the nation’s huge €300 billion euro debt.
Solutions to Greek debt crisis have stalemated as EU bankers have grown tired of lending Greece the money needed to make scheduled interest payments on the outstanding debt, realizing that promises by Greek politicians to raise additional government funds by raising taxes and cutting pensions are unlikely to work in a nation where additional austerity measures are likely only to depress further an already depressed Greek economy.
The “elephant in the room” turns out to be Deutsche Bank with a $ 75 trillion exposure in derivatives, an amount 20 times the gross domestic product, GDP, of Germany, that could go south should the bank’s complex bets on the Greek debt crisis collapse, causing a failure reminiscent of the derivatives collapse that caused Lehman Brothers to collapse in bankruptcy in 2008, as the bank’s highly leveraged derivative position in the collateralized mortgage market.
On Sunday, Citigroup economist Ebrahim Rahbari, the economist who coined the term “Grexit” in February 2012, advised clients in a research note that he expects the Greek referendum July 5 will result in a comfortable majority for the “yes” camp, eliminating the chance Greece will withdraw from the euro this ear and reducing the likelihood of a Grexit in subsequent years.
Bloomberg reported Sunday that a majority of Greeks support retaining the euro, although in a country with a 25 percent unemployment rate and an economy that has contracted by a quarter since 2010, there is not a majority to support the further tax increases and government spending cuts EU creditors may demand
A decision by Greece to exit the euro would not necessarily mean a decision by Greece to exit the European Union.
Still, the financial disruption a Greek exit from the euro would cause throughout the EU is likely to be sufficient to cause European stock markets to decline precipitously after opening on Monday morning, with the prospect of an EU stock-market collapse causing jitters worldwide.
WND » World
Greek exit from euro appears imminent
Thursday, June 25, 2015
Sunday, June 14, 2015
Sudan president barred from leaving S. Africa dares world
In an unprecedented development, Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir, who is on a diplomatic visit to South Africa, has been barred from leaving the country by a court order for “crimes against humanity”, but dared the world by attending the 25th African Union (AU) Summit here on Sunday.
The Pretoria High Court on Sunday issued an order that bars al-Bashir from leaving South Africa, the Independent Online reported.
Justice Hans Fabricious issued an interim order preventing the Sudanese president from leaving South Africa, pending a decision of the court, to be made after an urgent application that he be arrested is made.
The judge’s order came after granting the state a three-hour period in which to prepare arguments in response to the South African Litigation Centre’s (SALC) application that President Jacob Zuma and the National Prosecuting Authority arrest al-Bashir on the 2009 order of the International Crimes Court (ICC).
The ICC issued warrants for arrest of al-Bashir for committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Darfur conflict.
The conflict claimed the lives of more than 400,000 people, and left more than two million more displaced.
The SALC made the urgent application following the ICC’s order that al-Bashir be arrested immediately after he landed in South Africa to attend the AU summit for which he reportedly reached on Saturday.
As a signatory of the Rome treaty, South Africa is obliged to arrest the president, but the AU has previously refused to heed the ICC call, accusing them of targeting African leaders.
Justice Fabricius said al-Bashir should not leave the country until the urgent application to have him arrested has been heard.
Al-Bashir on Sunday attended the summit, Xinhua news agency reported later in the day.
Dressed in a blue Western suit and looking relaxed, he gave the thumbs-up to photographers as he stood for a group picture with other heads of state and government before the summit kicked off.
The South African government kept silent over the ICC request and calls to several departments for comments went unanswered.
But an unidentified government source was cited by Xinhua as saying that it would be ridiculous to arrest al-Bashir who was invited by South Africa and the AU to attend the summit.
Sudanese Foreign Minister Ali Ahmed Karti told the media that ICC was only targeting African leaders.
The AU summit, which was scheduled to start at 11.30 a.m., was postponed for several hours before the Sudanese president came in the open.
Meanwhile, the Independent Online said in a later report that the South African government has requested for more time to prepare to respond to arguments for the urgent application for the arrest of al-Bashir, asking that it be stood down for Monday morning.
Asking for more time, senior state attorney William Mokhari said: “We are dealing with a very sensitive matter here” concerning the “sitting president of another African country”.
The case was postponed to Sunday afternoon during an appearance on Sunday morning.
Attorneys for SALC said they would agree to coming back on Monday on the assurance that migration officials at all points of entry were ordered not to allow the Sudanese president out of the country pending finalisation of the case.
Christian News latest RSS headlines – Big News Network.com
Sudan president barred from leaving S. Africa dares world
Saturday, June 13, 2015
Freed from Ugandan Rebel Captors Former Child Soldiers Struggle to Find Peace in Their Minds Communities
GULU, UGANDA – Filder Lakot, a cook, wishes she could work more to earn extra money. She’s willing to hawk goods in Gulu, a town in northern Uganda, or wash clothes for students at a nearby university. But a 16-year-old gunshot wound, from her days as a soldier in one of the world’s most brutal militias, hobbles her.
She stretches to display a scar that starts a few inches below her knee and extends across her leg. Her face turns ashen as she recalls taking that shot.
“The fighting was intense,” she says. “I was still learning how to use a gun.”
It has been nearly a decade since Lakot was rescued from the Lord’s Resistance Army, a rebel group that abducted her and thousands of other children and young adults, but that gunshot – and the terrors she experienced as a forced fighter for a militia that routinely sliced off the noses, ears and limbs of children – haunts her every day.
Tears well up in her eyes. At first she lets them flow freely; then she wipes them away with the back of a hand. Silence reigns in the room at the Gulu War Affected Training Center as Lakot regains her composure.
As a child, Lakot dreamed of becoming a nurse, like an aunt who worked at a local hospital. Lakot admired her crisp white uniform.
But one day in 1996, while her parents were away at a funeral, LRA soldiers raided the family’s home. At gunpoint, they ordered Lakot and her two brothers to follow them. She was 22.
Lakot and her brothers underwent two months of military training.
The LRA often required new guerillas to murder relatives, making them less likely to escape and return home. Rebels made Lakot to kill her uncle.
Lakot’s brothers managed to escape and return home safely, but Lakot was forced to fight. After she was shot battling Ugandan forces in 1999, she was taken to Sudan with other casualties.
Old women at the LRA camp in Sudan treated her wound with honey. Lakot stayed there, healing from her wound, until 2006, when Ugandan soldiers raided the camp and rescued her and others.
Lakot was taken in by Gulu Support the Children Organization, where she received post-trauma care for seven months before being reunited with her family.
Now 41, Lakot works as a cook at the Gulu War Affected Training Center. There, she receives counseling to overcome fear, bitterness and suicidal tendencies.
Traumatic experiences in northern Uganda’s battlefields have left countless former guerillas, many of whom were abducted and forced into battle, with serious psychological problems.
Nonprofit organizations and the local government provide post-trauma care and vocational training, but some local people want former soldiers to be prosecuted for their actions, regardless of whether they were forced to fight.
Meanwhile, at the International Criminal Court in the Netherlands, Dominic Ongwen, the first indicted LRA commander to be brought to justice, is awaiting trial for crimes the group committed in Uganda and neighboring countries.
The Gulu District in northern Uganda was the epicenter of a war that started in the late 1980s. LRA leader Joseph Kony sought to overthrow the government of President Yoweri Museveni and establish a state based on his interpretation of the biblical Ten Commandments.
Ugandan officials and LRA delegates worked out the terms of a cease-fire agreement. However, in 2008, Kony failed to appear to sign the agreement. He went into hiding. Sporadic battles continue today as international forces chase LRA ranks that burrow deep into central Africa.
The LRA raided villages in the region, abducting children and forcing them to fight. Almost 90 percent of LRA soldiers were children, according to “Ten Stories the World Should Hear More About,” a U.N. publication.
From the mid-1990s until its waning years in the mid-2000s, the rebel movement abducted 66,000 young people between the ages of 14 and 30, according to a 2008 UNICEF-sponsored report, “The State of Youth and Youth Protection in Northern Uganda.”
More than 100,000 people died in the conflict, according to the U.N. The fighting displaced more than 1.7 million people in Uganda.
The LRA ultimately retreated from Uganda and seeped across borders into the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Central African Republic, where it continues to commit crimes.
As recently as March, the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugeesreported that 15 Congolese refugees and 1 Congolese national were kidnapped by the LRA while tending their fieldsneara refugee camp in CAR. Thirteen were later released with evidence of rape and beatings. Three are still missing.
LRA rebels have also internally displaced more than 180,000 people in CAR and DRC and forced more than 30,000 people to flee to neighboring countries, according to UNHCR.
Ongwen, a top LRA commander indicted in 2005 by the International Criminal Court for war crimes, was taken into U.S. custody in January 2015 and subsequently flown to the Netherlands. Ongwen, who began fighting for the LRA at age 10, is expected to appear Aug. 24 at a confirmation of charges hearing – a preliminary step to decide whether the case will be referred to trial.
Many former child soldiers and other LRA abductees have serious psychological problems. Twenty-four percent of the people who fought with the LRA as children have suicidal tendencies, according to a 2014 study.
Most former child soldiers suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, according to a 2008 study. Nearly 90 percent struggle with depression.
Starting life over again is painful.
When Lakot emerged from her time with the LRA, she couldn’t find a job. At one point, she considered turning to prostitution to earn a living.
With such a past, finding a spouse can be difficult.
“I had a boyfriend, and when he learned that I was with LRA, he left,” Lakot says.
Being childless, she says, is heartbreaking. Seeing it as a curse for her actions in the LRA, she seeks deliverance at a local church.
Lakot’s recovery has been more difficult than some.
Monica Auma, a former soldier, is now a catering student at Gulu War Affected Training Center. Counseling helped her forgive herself for killing people, she says. And interacting with other former soldiers at the counseling center has helped her to see that she is not alone.
Auma, 24, is often in a jolly mood, says Betty Lalam, the center’s executive director. That wasn’t so when Auma first came to the center last August.
The LRA abducted Auma in 2001 along with her brother and 14 other children from the village of Acet, in the Gulu district. She was forced to undergo three months of military training at age 10.
“We only used to eat in the evening, and we carried heavy guns all day,” she says.
Many of Auma’s friends died fighting Ugandan troops. Those who survived risked being killed by their captors. Auma’s 16-year-old brother was fatally shot when he and two friends tried to escape. The worst moments, she says, were when she was forced to shoot her relatives and neighbors in the neck.
Auma surrendered to Ugandan forces in 2006 as a way to escape. The Uganda office of World Vision, a Christian aid agency, linked her with post-trauma care for eight months. She then returned to her family.
Nancy Lamala, another former child soldier, says she feared being alone after escaping from the LRA. She could only sleep when she was near her mother. She hated people. She cried when she remembered those she killed.
Counseling helped her recover from the psychological effects of the war, she says.
Lamala was kidnapped in 2003, when she was 11 years old. She and six other children were taken from the village of Petek in Gulu District. The rebels forced the children through four months of training. Armed with sticks, the children were ordered to clobber people to death.
“They told us to kill our relatives,” she says, cracking her knuckles. “I killed my cousin in Nwoya.”
The Nwoya district neighbors Gulu district to the west.
Lamala and three friends escaped in 2012. They hid in a thicket for 12 hours. In the early morning, they ran through the forest until they found a house. The family there took them in and gave them directions to the office of the resident district commissioner, about 5 kilometers (3 miles) away. Lamala and her friends stayed there and received counseling for two weeks.
Her brother was not as lucky. LRA guerillas killed him when he tried to escape.
Some who escaped physically, like Lakot, find mental escape elusive.
“Lakot and all these formerly abducted children are short-tempered, sometimes,” Lalam says. “They don’t want to talk to anybody. They have mood swings. But Lakot likes me. She likes to be around me.”
That’s unusual for Lakot. The former soldier rarely smiles or laughs. She spends most of her days, which begin in the kitchen at 5 a.m., quietly washing dishes and preparing meals. When she’s not working, she sits alone, staring into space, cupping her chin in her palm. When she is angry, she shouts insults.
Some nights, if she is very tired, she gets a good night’s sleep. But other nights, she is restless. She dreads her future as a single, childless woman.
Most returning soldiers suffer from anxiety and hallucinations, and many are vengeful, says Godfrey Canwat, executive director of Hope and Peace for Humanity, another organization in Gulu district that provides post-trauma care. Drug and alcohol abuse is rampant among former abductees, he says.
Canwat’s organization has rehabilitated about 600 former soldiers, he says. Most of them are now leading productive lives, working in small businesses, as vendors or on farms. Some are in vocational training.
The war has traumatized many people in the region – civilian survivors as well as former soldiers, Canwat says. It’s not uncommon to see people in Gulu talking to themselves, he says.
“Many people have mental problems because of the past traumatic experiences,” he says.
The local government wants to integrate former soldiers back into their communities, says Patrick Otika, a council chairman in Lakwana subcounty, Gulu. At one time, government reception centers provided returning abductees with counseling as well as food, bedding, soap and 200,000 Ugandan shillings ($ 65). Lacking the funds to continue, those centers closed in 2012 and 2013.
Some people ridicule former soldiers, exacerbating their mental health problems, Otika says.
“A former LRA soldier came to me telling he wanted to kill people at home and commit suicide because they were teasing him that he eats a lot,” he says. “I counseled him, and he did not kill anybody.”
While nonprofit organizations and the government see rehabilitation as the solution for former LRA rebels, some members of the community, still embittered by the atrocities LRA committed, call for the prosecution of former conscripts.
Paul Okot, a 52-year-old church elder and member of the Local Council of Lakwana subcounty, says all abductees who became brutal murderers should be charged.
“We can sympathize with a few who were abducted while young, but there are some who became successful at the game and killed people,” he says, contorting his face. “Those people, including Ongwen, should pay for their sins.”
Okot lost three sons and four nephews in the LRA war. He wants justice.
“We have buried so many innocent people as a result of this Kony war,” he says, looking at the far end of his compound. “There are so many graves – the young, the old. Many others have been disabled; they have one ear, no mouth. Those who have served Kony loyally should not go unpunished.”
He says former LRA soldiers should not blame the locals for discriminating against them, as they are also struggling with bitterness over the killings of loved ones.
Full recovery after being a forced soldier is difficult, Canwat says. Memories of brutal murders, torture and other horrific incidents often flash in one’s mind.
“Children who were abducted when young and came back and found their siblings and parents had been killed still feel the loss,” he says. “You hear them say, lsquo;My parents died and I was not there for them,’ or lsquo;The last time I saw my family members was the day I was abducted."”
Children born in captivity suffer stigma and ridicule, he says.
For Lakot, loneliness is a deep struggle. She believes she would recover more quickly if she had a husband and children.
For as long as she remains single, she looks to God for comfort.
“God can do anything,” she says. “Even if I fail to have children or get married, God will comfort me.”
Apophia Agiresaasi, GPJ, translated some interviews from Acholi.
Christian News latest RSS headlines – Big News Network.com
Freed from Ugandan Rebel Captors Former Child Soldiers Struggle to Find Peace in Their Minds Communities