John Bolton calls out Uganda, Rwanda for plunder of Congo

Rwanda, Uganda must help end Congo plunder

By Irwin Arieff Reuters AlertNet

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 15 (Reuters) - U.N. Security Council members pressed Uganda and Rwanda on Wednesday to cooperate with U.N. experts seeking to end the illegal trade in minerals plundered from neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo.

Council members "were disturbed that a number of countries were still not fully cooperating with the experts," U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said following a closed-door council briefing on the four U.N. experts' latest findings.

"We think that cooperation is critical," Bolton, the council president for February, told reporters. "We urge the experts and others to do what they can to get cooperation to acceptable levels."

Bolton named no names, but the experts, in a Jan. 27 report, had accused Uganda and Rwanda of refusing to provide them with straight answers about their role in the exploitation of Congo's mineral resources.

Three years after a peace agreement ended Congo's five-year civil war, which drew in most of the vast central African nation's neighbors, some of those neighbors are still believed to play active roles in the illegal export of its resources including gold, diamonds, medicinal barks, cobalt and copper.
Until Congo's industry, mining and transport networks are brought firmly under state control, "it will be impossible to ensure peace and security" in the country, the report said.

Uganda is suspected of facilitating the illegal export of Congolese gold while Rwanda is believed to be helping smuggle out tin ore, the experts said.

When asked about their activities, both countries provided erroneous and unreliable information, they said.

Their responses were "not only erroneous but lack basic logic that cannot be solely attributed to a lack of capacity," the experts' report said.

"A few hours of work by Ugandan and Rwandan officials, for example through the collection of data from the relevant companies involved, would immediately reveal the inconsistencies in the information supplied thus far to the group," they said.

World Vision Thanks Senate for Northern Uganda Resolution

Senate Unanimously Passes Resolution on Conflict Targeting Children in Uganda


WASHINGTON, Feb. 3 /PRNewswire/Yahoo.com -- The president of Christian relief and development agency World Vision thanked Senate members today for last night's unanimous approval of a resolution calling for increased U.S. engagement to end a 20-year civil war in the northern region of Uganda that viciously and deliberately targets children.

Since 1986, northern Uganda has been plagued by a conflict between the Ugandan government and a rebel group called the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA). The LRA has become internationally reviled for its practice of attacking civilians and abducting children, forcing them to serve as soldiers and sex slaves within its ranks.

"We are gratified to see this kind of bipartisan attention and action focused on helping northern Uganda's children," said World Vision President Richard E. Stearns. "It's a signal to us, and to other organizations advocating on their behalf, that the political will is there to help end this war."

Sponsored by Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) and co-sponsored by a bipartisan group of 43 Senators, the resolution calls for the governments of Sudan, Uganda and the United States, as well as the international community, to better engage in efforts to promote peace in northern Uganda.

"This resolution is long overdue and is only the beginning," said Inhofe. "I urge President Bush to examine every aspect of his executive authority to relieve the suffering in northern Uganda. I also urge far more action from the United Nations. These significant steps can shed light into the darkness that has cloaked this ongoing tragedy in Uganda and can begin to affect change for peace."

Inhofe visited northern Uganda in April 2005 and toured World Vision's Children of War Rehabilitation Program in Gulu, which has helped nearly 14,000 formerly abducted children recover from their traumatic experiences in LRA captivity.

World Vision is a Christian relief and development organization, dedicated to helping children and their families worldwide reach their full potential by tackling the causes of poverty. For more information, visit www.worldvision.org/childrenofwar.

Bono & Bush at National Prayer Breakfast

whitehouse.gov
George and Laura Bush met last summer with Bono and Bob Geldof at the G-8 Summit.

Christianity Today talked-up the appearance today of President Bush at the National Prayer Breakfast - but it was really all about Bono:

"After 9/11, we were told America would have no time for the world's poor. We were told that America would be taken up with its own problems of safety. … But America has not drawn the blinds and double-locked the doors." Bono said. "You have doubled aid to Africa. You have tripled funding for global health. And Mr. President, your emergency plan for AIDS relief and support of the Global Fund, has put 700,000 people onto life-saving antiretroviral drugs and provided 8 million bed nets to protect children from malaria. … But here's the bad news. There is so much more to do. There is a gigantic chasm between the scale of the emergency and the scale of the response."

Bono, clearly, is showing no inclination whatsoever of sounding like a politician.

"While the law is what we say it is, God is not silent on the subject," Bono said. "There are the laws of the land, and then there is a higher standard. We can hire experts to write them so they benefit us, so that they say it's okay to protect our agriculture, but it's not okay for African farmer to protect their agriculture to earn a living. As the laws of man are written, that's what they say. But God will not accept that."

Bush, meanwhile, may well have recalled what getting the Bono "treatment" is like from go-rounds on debt relief and health funding, and perhaps measured his words accordingly:

"Over the past five years, we've been inspired by the ways that millions of Americans have answered that call [to love your neighbor just like you'd like to be loved yourself]," Bush said. "After Katrina, volunteers from churches and mosques and synagogues and other faith-based and community groups opened up their hearts and their homes to the displaced. We saw an outpouring of compassion after the earthquake in Pakistan and the tsunami that devastated entire communities. We live up to God's calling when we provide help for HIV/AIDS victims on the continent of Africa and around the world."

Bush has got credibility when he says this - no matter how his critics try to spin. As reported by Newsmax, Bush was not shy in his praise for Bono:

"The thing about this good citizen of the world is he's used his position to get things done," Bush said. "You're an amazing guy, Bono. God bless you."

There's only one thing to say to that: Amen.