British embassy personnel withdrawn from
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva voted 38-3 to condemn Syria in a resolution that refers to “widespread and systematic violations of human rights”. China, Cuba and Russia voted against the motion, continuing to argue that intervening in Syria’s affairs will worsen the situation.
The vote came as Syrian forces bombarded the Baba Amro district of Homs, where the plight of rebels and civilians is worsened by the heaviest snow the area has seen in years, according to rebels quoted by Reuters.
The Swiss government Thursday confirmed that it closed its Syrian embassy Wednesday, after weeks of encouraging its citizens there to leave the country. The embassy says that 150 who are registered remain in the country, all but three of them with dual citizenship. Two-thirds of them live in Damascus, with another group in Aleppo.
The UK announced it has withdrawn staff from its embassy in Damascus and it is stopping all diplomatic services.
The Voice of America cites Hillary Clinton at a press conference as saying “There is little doubt that Iran is strongly supporting Assad and his regime,” adding: “The details about what they are or are not doing, we could provide what we know in a classified session, but you are absolutely right that Iran has a lot invested in Assad and will do whatever it can to keep him in power.”
Thousands of migrants are waiting at Ras Djir in Tunisia after fleeing the violence in Libya. The UNHCR is working with authorities to prepare a transit camp for 12,000 people to house those waiting to move on (photo, ©2011 UNHCR/A Duclos)
Update 19:05 Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Governments are responding to the urgent appeal from the joint IOM/UNHCR project to evacuate thousands of refugees who have made it out of Libya or are trying to leave, the Geneva migration and refugee organizations said Wednesday 2 March.
New arrivals in the transit camp of Choucha Ras Djir, situated eight kilometers from the Tunisian border with Libya. More than 55,000 new arrivals have been registered over the past ten days. Most are foreign nationals working in Libya and so the majority will travel on to their home country (photo, ©2011 UNHCR/A Duclos)
In the past 36 hours the US has pledged $2 million in emergency funding, Great Britain has supplied charter planes and half a million pounds to help pay for staffing and processing costs related to the operation, and the Swiss government has donated an initial emergency fund of CHF500,000.
The British government’s Department for International Development (DFID) and UNHCR have provided chartered planes that will allow the IOM to evacuate up to 8,800 Egyptian migrants from Djerba in Tunisia to the Egyptian capital, Cairo, the IOM says.
New arrivals in the transit camp of Choucha Ras Djir, 8km from the Tunisian-Libyan border (photo, ©2011 UNHCR/A Duclos)
The first flights were scheduled to leave Wednesday.
UNHCR is providing IOM 16 charter flights.
“The in-kind assistance will help to ease some of the enormous pressure at the Tunisian-Libyan border where in nine days more than 75,000 migrants had fled across the border from Libya and many tens of thousands more are stranded on the Libyan side,” the IOM said in a statement.
The US ambassador to the UN and international organizations in Geneva, Betty King, told the joint IOM/UNHCR funding appeal meeting Tuesday that “We particularly appreciate the cooperation and commitment demonstrated by both Tunisia and Egypt in maintaining open borders and providing safe haven to refugees, returning nationals, and third-country nationals. In this 60th anniversary of the UN Convention on the Status of Refugees, Egypt and Tunisia have reminded us all of the importance of providing protection and asylum to those in need.”
Photos, 27-28 February (click on images to view larger)
Indonesian civil protection officials are encouraging thousands of residents from the slopes of Mount Merapi in central Java to evacuate their villages, fearing an imminent eruption of Merapi, Indonesia’s most active volcano. The area has been put on top alert by the country’s Volcanology and Geological Disaster Mitigation Center whose scientists say the number of earthquakes has doubled since 21 October and plumes of ash up to 50m high are venting from the crater. Their greatest concern is the pressure building up behind a massive lava dome near the top of the crater.
Merapi last erupted in 2006 when a sheet of super-hot gases and rock raced down the mountain-side, killing two people. An estimated 14m cubic metres of material was thrown up in that eruption. In 1994, 60 people were killed in an eruption.
Links to other sites: Al-Jazeera, Jakarta Post
Heavy rains in Czech Republic, Germany, and Poland caused flash floods that have thus far killed 11 people.
Hundreds of people had to evacuate the state of Saxony in Germany after several roads and villages were flooded by the Neisse river.
In Poland, the rains destroyed a bridge near Bogatynia and left residents without electricity or running water.
In The Czech Republic two dams threatened thousands of residents which had to be evacuated to protect them from raising waters. Flooding in other parts of the country was such that many had to be rescued from the roofs of their homes by helicopters.
Additional sources: BBC
Police in New York City have issued video footage showing a white male in his 40s who could be a suspect in what was apparently a bomb attack on Times Square Saturday. A t-shirt vendor alerted a police officer when he spotted smoke coming from a Nissan Pathfinder. It was found to have three propane tanks weighing 15 -17 pounds, of a kind often used for home barbecues. “One of the tanks had more M-88 firecrackers attached to the side,” reports CNN, “some of which detonated inside the vehicle.”
The rigged vehicle, discovered Saturday night in one of the city’s busiest areas, prompted a large-scale evacuation.
Links to other sites: CNN, New York Times
The UN has announced it will redeploy 600 “non-front-line” workers in Afghanistan, pulling workers from the provinces to the capital, Kabul. Some will temporarily leave the country, said Kai Ende, the UN’s chief in Afghanistan. “We are not talking about pulling out. We are not talking about evacuation,” Ende said. Five UN employees and their three Afghans assailants were killed a week ago in an attack on a residence housing UN workers.
But, he said, “there is a belief among some, that the international community (presence) will continue whatever happens because of the strategic importance of Afghanistan,” he told a press conference this morning. “I would like to emphasise that that’s not true”. He urged the Afghan government to combat the corruption that many say is playing into the hands of the Taliban insurgency.
The UN has 1,300 international workers in Afghanistan.
Forest fires fanned by very strong and unpredictable winds are threatening the northern suburbs of Athens, Greece. Up to 90 blazes have started since Friday 21 August, and 2000 firefighters on the ground are overwhelmed attempting to contain them. In one suburb, Agios Stefanos, north of Athens, police helped almost 20,000 residents to flee the fire Sunday 23 August. France, Italy and Cyprus have sent water-dropping aircraft to add to the two Greek planes. The fires started in Grammatiko, northeast of Agios Stefanos and rapidly sprang out of control. BBC, CNN
