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FILE PHOTO: Members of Burundi's National Defence Force (FDN), part of the troops of the East African Community Regional Force (EACRF), arrive to their deployment as part of a regional military operation targeting rebels, at the airport in Goma, North Kivu province of the Democratic Republic of Congo March 5, 2023.
Burundi detains troops who refused to fight in Congo
The Burundian government has been detaining troops for refusing orders to deploy to the neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo, where Burundi is trying to stop the advances of a rebel group backed by Rwanda. The focus now is on the key border city of Goma.
The background: The area around Goma is rich in minerals, which armed groups and their backers have vied to control for years. The Rwanda-backed M23 rebel group began taking territory two years ago and funneling the spoils back to their patrons. UN peacekeepers have been largely unable to stop violence that has pushed hundreds of thousands of people into dangerous refugee camps.
A Kenyan-led intervention force managed to hold Goma last year, but withdrew in November, opening the way for M23. In December, Burundi intervened, but troops say they are fighting blind, hence the desertions. That leaves a South African-led coalition as Goma’s best bet.
What’s next? The fighting will be brutal, with 2 million residents of Goma in the crossfire. M23 is angling to cut the city off from the rest of the DRC. If they succeed, the rebels – and their Rwandan supporters – will be in a commanding position to extract concessions from Kinshasa.What We're Watching: Mexico dismisses US report on drugs, UN warns Burundi, Biden's limits on US-UK trade
Mexico rejects top drug hub claim: In response to a new US report on the countries that are major transit points and producers of illicit drugs, Mexico's populist president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, known as AMLO, rejected the report's findings — which called out Mexico as one of the world's most prolific drug production hotspots — as merely a matter of "opinion." AMLO said that the accusation is an example of things that come up in its relations with the US that "we [Mexico] don't accept," but made clear that he would not seek confrontation with Washington over the disagreement. Indeed, AMLO's dismissal is remarkable considering he came to power in 2018 in part on his promise to root out crime linked to the country's powerful drug cartels. But to date, crime in Mexico has only exploded under AMLO's watch, while more recently, the country's powerful cartels have exploited the pandemic to expand their operations (evidence suggests that lockdowns have exacerbated the addictions of their US clientele, who account for over $20 billion of Mexican drug sales each year).
Grave concern about Burundi: A new UN report released Thursday said it is "extremely concerned" about the domestic situation under Burundi's new president, Evariste Ndayishimiye. The report called out Ndayishimiye's seeming disregard for human rights, particularly because he has appointed several senior officials to his cabinet who have been the subject of international sanctions over their role in the political chaos of 2015, when the government cracked down on Burundians protesting an election widely deemed to be fraudulent. Ndayishimiye came to power after longtime former President Pierre Nkurunziza — who oversaw a tumultuous tenure, including a failed coup attempt and ongoing civic unrest that forced thousands of Burundians to flee the country in recent years — died suddenly in June. The UN called on the government to release political prisoners and human rights activists, and implored Ndayishimiye to renew consultations with the World Health Organization, whose representatives were expelled from the country after raising concerns about the risks of large political rallies amid a pandemic.
Biden sets Brexit limits on US-UK trade: US presidential candidate Joe Biden has warned that if he wins the White House in November, a future US-UK trade deal is off the table if London returns to a "hard" Irish border after Brexit. Biden was referring to a new law recently proposed by Prime Minister Boris Johnson that authorizes the UK to temporarily suspend parts of its withdrawal agreement with the EU, including rules about the border, if Brussels and London fail to sign a trade deal. Biden says he will not allow the 1998 Good Friday Agreement — which put an end to decades of political violence in Northern Ireland and virtually erased the border between Ireland, an EU member state, and Northern Ireland, which is part of Great Britain — to "become a casualty of Brexit." This forces British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to make a tough choice: continue with his latest gamble on a no-deal Brexit to appease hardliners within his party, or back down to improve his odds of getting a trade deal with the US — which the UK desperately needs — if Biden becomes president. Or he can bet it all on the reelection of President Trump, who is both pro-Brexit and keen on a trade agreement with London.
What We’re Watching: Libya’s kaleidoscopic war, Spain’s royal scandal, Burundi’s sudden death
A new phase in Libya: The intractable conflict in Libya, now in its sixth year, appears to have reached a new phase in recent days. After a series of military gains by the Government of National Accord (GNA) – the internationally recognized government which is backed by Turkish troops – its rivals in the Libyan National Army (LNA), led by General Khalifa Haftar with support from Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt and Russia, proposed a unilateral ceasefire and the formation of a new nationwide leadership council. The idea, presented by President el-Sisi of Egypt, was promptly rejected by the GNA, which hopes to capitalize on recent military gains – including its takeover of the oil-rich city of Sirte – to solidify its control over Libya's eastern provinces. In response to the LNA's setbacks, Russia appeared to intensify its operations Tuesday, sending a host of new aircraft conveys to help General Haftar push back against the GNA offensive. Turkey's President Erdogan, meanwhile, lobbied President Trump to further support his cause in Libya.
Royal wrongdoing in Spain? Spain's top court is investigating whether the country's former king received millions of dollars in illegal kickbacks from Saudi Arabia in connection with a Spanish consortium's construction of a high-speed rail link between the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. Swiss prosecutors are also reportedly probing financial links between then-King Juan Carlos and the late Saudi King Abdullah. Juan Carlos, who abdicated the throne in 2014 in favor of his son Felipe, now has no immunity from prosecution. Spain's current king has renounced any inheritance from his father, but this is just the latest in a series of financial scandals hanging over Spain's increasingly controversial royal family.
Burundi's outgoing president is dead: Just weeks after Burundi expelled World Health Organization representatives who criticized the government's handling of the coronavirus crisis, the country's outgoing head of state, President Pierre Nkurunziza, has died, reportedly of a heart attack. The 55-year old Nkurunziza was to be replaced in August by a political ally after a tumultuous 15 years in power that have included a failed coup attempt, a harsh crackdown on political opponents and ongoing civic unrest that forced thousands of Burundians to flee the country in recent years. Reports are abuzz that Nkurunziz, who denied the severity of the coronavirus pandemic in recent months and pushed back against calls for social distancing guidelines, died from COVID-19. He and his wife had sought medical treatment in Kenya in recent weeks.
Coronavirus Politics Daily: Burundi boots the WHO, vaccine squabbles, Haiti braces for an outbreak
Burundi expels the WHO: Just days before Burundians head to the polls to elect a new president and parliament, the government has expelled officials from the World Health Organization (WHO) who are in that country to help steer the government's pandemic response. Burundi's government did not give a reason for the dismissal, but critics say it was a reprisal against WHO personnel who had criticized the ruling party, currently led by President Pierre Nkurunziza, for holding large political rallies in recent weeks that have been banned in most parts of Africa, and for threatening citizens who called out the government's poor response to the outbreak. This isn't the first time that Burundi's ruling party, which won the vote in 2015 in an election that many say was illegitimate, has booted out UN representatives who raise human rights concerns. Burundi's officials, for their part, point to the country's low infection rate (there are currently around 30 confirmed cases of COVID-19) as proof of their success in handling the crisis, but critics say that's only because of the country's limited testing capacity. The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, meanwhile, says that the health infrastructure in Burundi – where half the population of 11 million is food insecure – is so weak that the WHO's support and expertise are needed now more than ever.
Vaccines: who gets them? As labs around the world race to develop a coronavirus vaccine, a thorny question looms: who gets them first? It's a moral, medical, and monetary dilemma that spilled into the open this week when the head of French Pharma giant Sanofi suggested the US would get first dibs on vaccines from the company. His reasoning? Washington put up big money to fund the vaccine development, which isn't cheap. But his remarks provoked an angry response in France, with President Emmanuel Macron summoning the Sanofi boss for a meeting to ask him why les Americains should get the vaccine before, say, the French. Sanofi, the world's third largest vaccine-maker, has since walked back the idea, saying Friday that any vaccine would be available in all regions of the world at the same time. Still, the problem remains: with supplies of any vaccine sure to be extremely limited at first, what's the right criterion for whether you can get one – your passport or your wallet? Is a global rationing system possible? Tough questions with a silver lining: merely asking them will mean that a vaccine is finally close.
Haiti's border problem: Haiti and the Dominican Republic share an island and a border, but so far, their experiences of the coronavirus pandemic have been markedly different. The DR, a popular tourist destination, has suffered the worst outbreak anywhere in the Caribbean, with about 12,000 cases, while Haiti, which has grown increasingly isolated after a year of political unrest, has registered just 230. But now as 150,000 Haitian migrants working in the Dominican Republic lose their jobs (and their legal status) and are forced to return home, they risk bringing the virus with them.At the moment, around 22,000 homeward-bound Haitians are crossing the border every week. Public health experts warn that Haiti, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, could not handle a serious outbreak of disease. The country's decrepit health care system would reportedly need an additional 8,000 hospital beds in order to accommodate a surge in cases. Even before the coronavirus outbreak, Haiti had been rocked by a series of crises including perennial political corruption scandals, a catastrophic earthquake, and violent political protests. As coronavirus crosses the border, the challenges for the country will be immense.