Hero Rats learn sociability at a young age (photo: ©2009 Apopo)
Hero Rat (photo: ©2009 Apopo)
Ed. note: GenevaLunch was on the ground this week in Cartagena, Colombia where the Geneva International Center for Humanitarian Demining joined the Colombian Government in welcoming heads of state for the Summit on a Mine-Free World
GenevaLunch background stories
by Jared Bloch
Cartagena, Colombia (GenevaLunch) - The Apopo organization was among the myriad governments and NGOs on hand to review progress made in the past four years in implementing the Ottawa Convention to ban use and stockpiling of anti-personnel mines. Apopo is notable for its innovative use of rats in the field of mine detection.
Bart Weetjens, Apopo founder and conference delegate, told GenevaLunch that rats are playing an increasingly important role in the effort to rid the world of the risks posed by anti-personnel land mines. Weetjens is a product design engineer by training, and a Buddhist monk. He founded Apopo 12 years ago in response to the need for accessible, low technology innovations for humanitarian demining.
A military raid on a car carrying suspected Islamist militants in southern Somalia has likely killed Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, a Kenyan-born man officials say was a senior member of al-Qaeda in Eastern Africa. Nabhan is believed to be responsible for a bomb attack on an Israeli-owned hotel in Mombasa, Kenya in 2002 which killed 15 people, and an attempt to shoot down an Israeli passenger plane flying out of Mombasa later that year. He may also have been involved in the US embassy bombings in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania in 1998.
Witnesses say six helicopters flew into the Barawe district in southern Somalia, 250km south of the capital Mogadishu, which is controlled by Al-Shabaab rebels fighting for supremacy in Somalia. Two fired missiles on the car. At least four bodies were removed and two wounded people were taken away by the helicopters’ crew. Al-Jazeera, AllAfrica, BBC, GaroweOnline
Thirteen bodies have washed up on the Tanzanian island of Mafia (map), along with debris, and they are thought to be those of victims of the Comoros archipelago crash of a Yemeni airliner in 1 July. Officials say DNA tests will be needed to identify them. The island is south of Dar es Salaam, not far from the mainland. BBC
The trial has begun in Tanzania of 12 people accused of murdering albinos and selling their body parts for witchcraft purposes. More than 40 people have been killed in the last 18 months. BBC In a similar trial in Burundi that began in May, 11 people are on trial. Human rights groups have accused authorities of acting too slowly to stop the series of murders. Voxafrica
The Guantanamo Bay prison on the island of Cuba has been centre-stage this week in the US, with President Barack Obama and former Vice-President Dick Cheney appearing in what NPR describes as “dramatic, back-to-back televised speeches” on the future of Guantanamo and the release earlier in 2009 of classified documents on the use of torture.
Obama announced in January he wanted to close the prison facility on the island of Cuba, but Senate Democrats voted Tuesday 19 May to withold funding for the closure, asking the White House to provide a more detailed plan. Republicans have criticized Obama’s announcement to close the prison by January 2010, saying they want to know what will be done with the remaining 240 inmates at the facility. Twelve US states to date have passed laws banning inmates on their soil. CNN, Reuters and a series of commentaries on Obama’s plan for closing the prison, from the New York Times
In another development, Ahmed Ghailani, a Tanzanian held at Guantanamo since 2004 in connection with the US embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, will be tried in a US federal court in New York. He becomes the first detainee from the prison camp to be accorded a civilian trial. BBC, The Standard (Kenya)
