Banaadirland was established in Nai-robi, Kenya, in December 2011. Itwants to run the Lower Shabelle, Mid-dle Shabelle and Banaadir regions.Engineer Abdulle Hasan Nurrow is thepresident. Mogadishu will be headquar-ters for the administration.

Xamar iyo Xamar daye state wants torun Mogadishu’s Banaadir region andmiddle Shabelle. This administrationwas established in Nairobi in May,2011. Jibril Haji Mahmud is the presi-dent of this administration.

Wargaadhi State was formed May 2011in Nairobi. It seeks to run the MiddleShabelle region. Yusuf Hundubay isthe president.

Hir iyo Maanyo was established in2011. It wants to administrate theLower and Middle Shabelle regions ofSomalia. Engineer Ahmed Bajuu is thepresident.

Abweyn State was formed in September2011. Its goal is to rule the Banaadir,Lower and Middle Shabelle regions of

Somalia. Abdullahi Abdi Muhammadis the president.

Further mini-states exist in Somalilandand Puntland. (SomaliaReport.com 12 ⁄ 5)

NATO Airstrikes

A statement by NATO said the alli-ance’s forces will carry out aerialattacks targeted at terrorist groups inYemen, Somalia and Afghanistan.

The statement said drones will be usedto operate in terrorist-held areas, add-ing that Al-Qaeda forces opposed tothe government and the world are inSomalia.

NATO said it will incorporate USplanes in the Horn of Africa to launchjoint attacks against terrorist groupsthat have in the last few years increasedtheir presence in Somalia, Yemen andAfghanistan.

The statement said NATO has severaltimes launched joint aerial attacks withAmerican planes in Somalia in which

several senior fighters were killed.(Shabeelle Media Network website, Mogadi-shu 23 ⁄ 5)

UGANDAKony Commander Captured

Acellam could provide a treasuretrove of information.

Major General Caesar Acellam Otto,third-in-command of the Lord’s Resis-tance Army (LRA) Ugandan rebelgroup, after its leader Joseph Kony andOkot Odhiambo, was captured alongthe banks of the Mobou River in theCentral African Republic. Top Ugandanarmy officers, announcing the arrest,defined it as ‘‘big progress’’ towards thecapture of Kony.

The Lord’s Resistance Army com-mander was curiously trekkingunguarded. He would later tell journal-ists that he had left his escorts, about30 in number, behind in the DemocraticRepublic of Congo. They planned tocross to CAR later.

Based on reconstructions in the Ugan-dan media, Acellam was armed onlywith an AK-47 rifle and 8 chargers atthe moment of his capture. He was inthe bush with his wife, one of his youn-gest daughters and an aide, on returnfrom the DRC, when he fell into aUgandan army ambush. The troops hadbeen on his tracks for about a month.

Many consider Acellam one of the‘minds’ of the LRA, attributing to himthe strategy behind the redeployment ofthe rebel group in the Central AfricanRepublic, South Sudan and DRC, afterleaving north Uganda around sevenyears ago. He is the highest rankingLRA figure in captivity, but is notamong the group leaders wanted by theInternational Criminal Court (ICC).(Misna news agency website, Rome 14 ⁄ 5)

The arrest has boosted the morale offorces hunting Kony and his fighters, asenior army commander said. MajorGeneral Katumba Wamala said Acel-lam’s arrest will accelerate the arrest ofKony and his commanders.

Ugandan officials suspect that the elu-sive rebel leader, Kony who has tradi-tionally lived in bush campssignificantly far from where his topcommanders hide as a security precau-tion, is holed up somewhere in Sudan.

The Ugandan army is being assisted inits hunt for Kony by soldiers fromother African nations (the AfricanUnion, AU, is currently setting up a5,000-strong force made up of soldiersfrom affected countries to help bettercoordinate the cross-border hunt forthe LRA), as well as 100 US Special

South Sudan

Jonglei Peace Conference

The Special Representative of the UN Sec-retary-General to South Sudan, Ms. HildeJohnson, said the state of Jonglei had theopportunity to start ‘‘a new chapter ofpeace’’.

Ms. Johnson made the remarks at the clos-ing ceremony of the Jonglei All Commu-nity Peace Conference in Bor, Jonglei’scapital, which witnessed the signing of res-olutions to end violence among the state’ssix main communities.

She stressed that lasting peace can onlyhappen when comprehensive solutions tothe challenges of Jonglei have been found,when security institutions are being estab-lished, and protection for the people is inplace.

A statement from the UN Mission inSouth Sudan (UNMISS) said that thechiefs of the six communities involved,Dinka, Kachipo, Jie, Nuer, Anyuak andMurle, expressed their commitment tocomplete the ongoing civilian disarma-ment.

Some 3,000 people attended the signingceremony, which took place in Bor’s Free-dom Square and was attended by PresidentSalva Kiir Mayardit and other state offi-cials.

PANA recalled that clashes between vari-ous communities in the Jonglei state,which have a history of inter-communalfeuds resulting from cattle rustling, haveaffected some 120,000 people since Decem-ber. (PANA, New York 7 ⁄ 5)Warning Against Child Recruitment: TheSudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA)

has warned of tough measures againstrecruiting children into the national army.The warning comes a few weeks after theSPLA issued an order directing all armyunits to screen and register all children intheir ranks.

Addressing the press in Juba, the SPLAspokesperson Col Philip Aguer saidrecruitment of child soldiers is a crime.Aguer’s warning comes after UN agenciesfor child protection raised concerns thatchildren along the volatile borders withSudan may be recruited into the nationalarmy.

An action plan on child demobilizationpolicy was signed between SPLA and UNagencies in 2002. (Miraya FM, Juba 5 ⁄ 5)Japanese Peacekeepers: The Japanesedefence minister, Naoki Tanaka, on May11th ordered the Ground Self-DefenceForces (GSDF) to send a second contin-gent of engineers to South Sudan as partof the UN peacekeeping mission in thecountry.

According to the Japan Times, the ordercame a day after a government assessmentconcluded that the current military ten-sions between South Sudan and Sudanwould not affect them. The assessment wasbased on a report by a fact-finding teamsent to South Sudan earlier in May. Thesecond batch of around 330 service mem-bers will be dispatched to South Sudan inJune.

The Japanese engineering contingent willsupport South Sudan in building infra-structures, including road construction.(Miraya FM website, Juba 14 ⁄ 5)

May 1st–31st 2012 Africa Research Bulletin – 19283

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� Blackwell Publishing Ltd. 2012.