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  • US, UK, France oppose review of ICJ judgement on Bakassi

    US, UK, France oppose review of ICJ judgement on Bakassi

    • Send solidarity messages to Cameroun

    • Pro-review groups yet to submit fresh documents

     

    Three world powers- the United States of America (USA), United Kingdom (UK) and France are in solidarity with Cameroun on the Bakasi issue amidst pressure on the Federal Government by some interest groups to appeal against the ceding of the Bakasi Peninsula to Yaounde.

    The three countries, according to diplomatic sources, have assured Cameroun of their continued support on the decision of the International Court of Justice (IJC) on the peninsula and their commitment to the Green Tree Agreement.

    The US, UK and France ambassadors in Cameroun, it was gathered, met that country’s Minister of External Affairs at the weekend to express their strong opposition to any attempt by Nigeria to initiate a review of the ICJ ruling.

    The Western nations are all members of the influential Security Council of the United Nations.

    One source said: “We have got diplomatic report of the closed-door session between the ambassadors of the three countries and the Minister of External Affairs of Cameroun.

    “We are aware that they insisted on the Green Tree Agreement at the meeting. This has justified our decision to weigh all options on the latest demand for a review of the judgment.

    “Beyond sentiments, we are looking at the diplomatic implications especially the likelihood of sanctions on Nigeria by the UN Security Council if we seek a review of the judgment.

    “We have a challenge of not being trusted as a nation that respects agreements or treaties. These are all the sides to the matter.”

    There were indications last night that the government has finally foreclosed filing an application for a review of the IJC ruling because there are no fresh facts or documents to support such.

    Nigeria has up till October 10 to file an appeal based on fresh facts.

    Although President Goodluck Jonathan had said government would not appeal the decision of the IJC, scores of groups and individuals have been piling pressure on government to reconsider its position.

    The President, apparently bowing to the pressure, last Wednesday constituted an eight man committee to strategise on the possibility of an appeal by Nigeria.

    But none of the pro-appeal groups or individuals including the Cross River State government has so far volunteered fresh information or document to the office of the Attorney General of the Federation/Justice Minister as directed by the committee.

    At a session on Thursday night at the residence of the Senate Leader, Mr. Victor Ndoma-Egba (SAN), the Federal Government committee mandated Cross River State and others canvassing for review to make new facts or documents available to it.

    Members of the committee are the AGF, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Chief Anyim Pius Anyim, the DG of the National Boundary Commission, Senator Ndoma-Egba, a representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, two members of the House (Ahmed Ali and Nnenna Ukeje) and another Senator.

    Sources close to the meeting said: “Contrary to reports, the meeting was held at Ndoma-Egba’s residence and not at the Office of the Attorney-General as being insinuated. Only the representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was absent at the session.

    “When we asked for documents to support new argument for a review of the ICJ judgment, the counsel hired by the Cross River State Government, Mrs. Nella Andem-Rabana (SAN) and the AGF of the state came to make verbal submissions.

    “Mrs. Andem-Rabana even told the committee that the review is being sought based on four factors. But she could only discuss three factors with her argument based mainly on the Anglo-German Treaty Agreement of 1913. It was the same Treaty she had canvassed as a member of the Federal Government Team at ICJ in The Hague in 2002.

    “When asked if the ceding of Bakassi was not caused by negligence, they had nothing to say.

    “We asked them to get all relevant documents and submit these particulars for evaluation by the AGF in line with Article 61 of the ICJ statute.

    “We have been waiting all day for new pleadings and documents without anything from pro-review side.”

    Asked what would become of the agitation, the source said: “It is apparent that the Federal Government will not seek a review of the ICJ judgment because we formally handed over the territory in 2008.

    “It is laughable that nine years, 11 months and 26 days after the ICJ judgment, we are seeking a review. And those agitating for it have not been able to come up with documents to meet the conditions stated in Article 61 of the ICJ statute.

    “What we have is a situation where they are running helter-skelter at the last minute looking for documents.

    “We have also mandated the aggrieved state and groups to come up with a compilation of alleged violations of human rights of Nigerians resident in Bakassi Peninsula.

    “If these violations are established by the committee, we can forward the list to the UN Committee on Human Rights to consider. Yet, they have not given the committee any example.

    “Most members of the committee felt disappointed that there have been noise all over without documents to back up the agitation. We cannot make ourselves a laughing stock before the international community.”

    Article 61 says: “An application for revision of a judgment may be made only when it is based upon the discovery of some fact of such a nature as to be a decisive factor, which fact was, when the judgment was given, unknown to the Court and also to the party claiming revision, always provided that such ignorance was not due to negligence.

    “The proceedings for revision shall be opened by a judgment of the Court expressly recording the existence of the new fact, recognizing that it has such a character as to lay the case open to revision, and declaring the application admissible on this ground.

    “The Court may require previous compliance with the terms of the judgment before it admits proceedings in revision. The application for revision must be made within six months of the discovery of the new fact.

    “No application for revision may be made after the lapse of ten years from the date of the judgment.”

    Meanwhile, the Federal Government was shocked that barely 72 hours after inaugurating the eight-man committee some highly-placed people have personalized the Bakassi issue by sponsoring attacks on the AGF, who is the chairman of the committee.

    A source said: “The President made the AGF the chairman of the committee because the matter involved is directly under his portfolio.

    “Government is surprised to read about personal attacks on the AGF on a matter being looked into with transparency. Members of the National Assembly are in the committee and the AGF has not imposed his views on any person or group so far.

    “We hope that those behind these attacks will allow the committee to do its work without distraction.”

  • US hails Oshiomhole on re-election

    The United States (US) Government has congratulated Edo State Governor Adams Oshiomhole on his re-election.

    The US Consul-General in Nigeria, Mr. Jeffrey Hawkins, expressed his government’s felicitations to Oshiomhole during a visit to the governor yesterday.

    Hawkins said: “I have come to congratulate you on your re-election.”

    He and Oshiomhole had a closed-door meeting for almost two hours.

  • US sends spies, drones to Libya

    US sends spies, drones to Libya

    The U.S. is sending more spies, marines and drones to Libya, trying to speed the search for those who killed the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans. But the investigation is complicated by a chaotic security picture in the post-revolutionary country, and limited American and Libyan intelligence resources.
    The CIA has fewer people available to send, stretched thin from tracking conflicts across the Middle East, Africa and Asia.
    And the Libyans have barely re-established full control of their country, much less rebuilt their intelligence service, less than a year after the overthrow of dictator Moammar Gadhafi.
    The U.S. has already deployed an FBI investigation team, trying to track al-Qaida sympathisers thought to be responsible for turning a demonstration over an anti-Islamic video into a violent, coordinated militant attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi.
    Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other embassy employees were killed after a barrage of small arms, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars tore into the consulate buildings in Benghazi on Tuesday, the 11th anniversary of 9/11, setting the buildings on fire.
    President Barack Obama said in a Rose Garden statement the morning after the attack that those responsible would be brought to justice. That may not be swift. Building a clearer picture of what happened will take more time, and possibly more people, U.S. officials said Friday.
    Intelligence officials are reviewing telephone intercepts, computer traffic and other clues gathered in the days before the attacks, and Libyan law enforcement has made some arrests. But investigators have found no evidence pointing conclusively to a particular group or to indicate the attack was planned, White House spokesman Jay Carney said, adding, “This is obviously under investigation.”
    Early indications suggest the attack was carried out not by the main al-Qaida terror group but “al-Qaida sympathisers,” said a U.S. intelligence official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to discuss the investigation publicly.
    One of the leading suspects is the Libyan-based Islamic militant group Ansar al-Shariah, led by former Guantanamo detainee Sufyan bin Qumu. The group denied responsibility in a video Friday but did acknowledge its fighters were in the area during what it called a “popular protest” at the consulate, according to Ben Venzke of the IntelCenter, a private analysis firm that monitors Jihadist media for the U.S. intelligence community.
    The U.S. had been watching threat assessments from Libya for months but none offered warnings of the Benghazi attack, according to another intelligence official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak publicly about U.S. intelligence matters.
    Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, questioned whether the consulate had taken sufficient security measures, given an attempt to attack the consulate in Benghazi a few months ago.
    Carney said that given the 9/11 anniversary, security had been heightened.
    “It was, unfortunately, not enough,” he said.
    That paucity of resources also applies to the intelligence officers available to monitor Libya on the ground.
    With ongoing counterterrorism operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen, as well as the civil war in Syria, the CIA’s clandestine and paramilitary officer corps is simply running out of trained officers to send, U.S. officials say, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss the deployment of intelligence personnel publicly. The clandestine service is roughly 5,000 officers strong, and the paramilitary corps sent to war zones is only in the hundreds, the officials said.
    Most of the CIA’s paramilitary team dispatched to Libya during the revolution had been sent onward to the Syrian border, the officials said.
    The CIA normally hires extra people to make up for such shortfalls, often retired special operators with the requisite security clearance, military training and language ability. But the government mandate to slash contractor use has meant cutting contracts, according to two former officials familiar with the agency’s current hiring practices.
    To fill in the gaps in spies on the ground, the U.S. intelligence community has kept up surveillance over Libya with unmanned and largely unarmed Predator and Reaper drones, increasing the area they cover, and the frequency of their flights since the attack on the consulate, as well as sending more surveillance equipment to the region, one official said.
    But intelligence gathered from the air still needs corroboration from sources on the ground, as well as someone to act on the intelligence to go after the targets.
    The Libyan government, though it claims it is eager to help, has limited tools at its disposal. The post-revolution government has been slow to rebuild both its intelligence capability and its security services, fearful of empowering the very institutions they had to fight to overthrow Gadhafi. They have made a start, but they lack a sophisticated cadre of trained spies and a large network of informants.
    “The Libyans in just about every endeavour are just learning to walk, let alone run,” said Paul Pillar, a former senior CIA official and author of the book “Intelligence and U.S. Foreign Policy”.
    “There is confusion and competing elements within the new provisional government which complicates the task of creating new institutions, including the intelligence service,” he said.
    “There are still some aspects of the intelligence services that still work,” says Barak Barfi of the New America Foundation think tank, including eavesdropping on cellphone calls and spying on computer traffic using equipment from the Gadhafi era. Barfi spent months with members of Libya’s transitional government as they tried to rebuild the nation’s services and infrastructure.
    But the Libyans have not yet even taken full command of their own security services almost a year after Gadhafi’s fall, Barfi said. That’s given the tens of thousands of militiamen who helped overthrow Gadhafi the time they needed to organise and seek new targets, especially Western ones, he said.
  • Al-Qaida says US consulate attack ‘revenge’

    Al-Qaida says US consulate attack ‘revenge’

    Al-Qaeda has described  the deadly attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, Libya as a revenge for the killing of the network’s number two Sheikh Abu Yahya al-Libi.
     “The killing of Sheikh Abu Yahya only increased the enthusiasm and determination of the sons of (Libyan independence hero) Omar al-Mokhtar to take revenge upon those who attack our Prophet,” SITE Intelligence Group, a US-based monitoring  organisation quoted  al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula as saying in a statement.
     Al-Qaida’s Yemen-based offshoot did not claim direct responsibility for Tuesday’s attack on the US consulate in Benghazi that killed the US ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens, and three other Americans.
     But it stressed that “the uprising of our people in Libya, Egypt and Yemen against America and its embassies is a sign to notify the United States that its war is not directed against groups and organisations … but against the Islamic nation that has rebelled against injustice.”
     The statement came four days after al-Qaida chief Ayman al-Zawahiri issued a video eulogising Libi, his late deputy and propaganda chief who was killed in a drone strike in June.
     The  Libyan authorities claim to have identified 50 people involved in the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi.
    So far four people have been arrested and are being questioned, officials have said.
     “We know of 50 people who were involved in the attack, we have names and we know who they are, but there could be more,” Abdel-Monem Al-Hurr, spokesman for Libya’s Supreme Security Committee, said.
     “Four have been arrested. Some of the others may have escaped via Benghazi airport, maybe to Egypt, but this not confirmed. We have given their names to all of the Libyan border entry points.”
     Mohammed al-Megaryef, the head of Libya’s national assembly, said the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi was planned and “meticulously executed.”
     Tuesday’s attack by armed men in the eastern city of Benghazi came amid a wave of protests in the Muslim world against a US made amateur Internet film deemed insulting to the Prophet Mohammed.
     Suspected Islamic militants fired on the consulate with rocket-propelled grenades and set it ablaze on the anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on the United States by al-Qaida.
    Libya’s assembly chief  said the attack on the US consulate was planned and “meticulously executed”.
     “I don’t want to talk about what happened in other countries but as for Libya, the operation was meticulously executed,” Mohammed al-Megaryef said of the wave of protests across the world over a US-produced film mocking Islam.
     “There was planning. It was not a peaceful protest which degenerated into an armed attack or aggression. That’s how it was planned.
     “The attack itself and the manner in which the attack occurred… confirms that this was planned and programmed to achieve a purpose,” Megaryef said.
    The attack “was prepared, especially since it coincided with the date of September 11”, he said, referring to the 2011 attacks on the United States claimed by al-Qaeda.
    “I do not exclude discovering things that will link al-Qaeda and the US consulate attack,” Megaryef said, adding however that it was “very early to talk about the investigation”.
    A senior US official said extremists appeared to have used the demonstration against the film as a “pretext” to attack American interests on the anniversary.
     Megaryef also said foreigners may have been involved in the attack.
     “There are non-Libyan actors present in Libya. They aim to carry out their own plans in our territory… [But] we will not allow that Libyan territory be used to implement these plans,” he said.
    Sudan yesterday rejected a U.S. request to send a platoon of Marines to bolster security at the U.S. embassy in Khartoum.
     On Friday, a U.S. official said Washington would send Marines to Sudan to improve security at the embassy after protesters entered the mission in a demonstration against the anti-Islam film.
     “Sudan is able to protect the diplomatic missions in Khartoum and the state is committed to protecting its guests in the diplomatic corps,” Foreign Minister Ali Ahmed Karti  told  the official news agency, SUNA.
    Meanwhile, downtown Cairo, scene of the first protest over an anti-Islam film, appeared calm  last night  hours after security forces pushed protesters away from the U.S. Embassy toward Tahrir Square, where they were further dispersed.
     As the United States strengthened security at diplomatic stations amid the anger, demonstrators clashed with police outside the American Consulate in Sydney.
     Carrying signs that read: “Obama, Obama, we like Osama” and “Behead All Those Who Insult the Prophet,” hundreds of protesters gathered on the steps of the consulate.
     The demonstration turned violent after protesters were pushed back from the building.
     Authorities used tear gas and police dogs to disperse protesters who threw bottles and shoes — considered a grave insult among Muslims. Six police officers were injured and eight people were arrested, Sydney police said. Seventeen people were treated for the effects of pepper spray used by police.
     In his weekly address, U.S. President Barack Obama acknowledged “images on our televisions are disturbing.”
     “But let us never forget that for every angry mob, there are millions who yearn for the freedom and dignity and hope that our flag represents,” Obama said.
     Obama reiterated that those who killed U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens and three other Americans at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi will be brought to justice.
     FBI investigators probing the killings put off a visit until conditions in the volatile region are safer. Agents had hoped to arrive in Libya on Saturday, federal law enforcement officials said.
     Hundreds of Egyptian riot police remained in Tahrir Square as workers cleaned streets and businesses and assessed damage from five days of protests.
     From Morocco to Malaysia, thousands of Muslims have taken to the streets in recent days — with sometimes deadly results — over the release of a 14-minute trailer, privately produced in the United States.