Why medicine sans frontieres pulling out of Somalia

[LeJusticier]

Two Doctors Without Borders staff members were killed in Mogadishu in December 2011. Their killer was subsequently granted an early release, according to the group.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/15/world ... .html?_r=0

[CushiticReflections]

That was in 2011 and they're pulling out now? Considering that the US is closing a lot of its embassies in the Middle East and Africa, I think it's going to be even more ruthless in its senseless murders and bombings in certain countries and doesn't want Western witnesses. Because when a Westerner shares their account of such atrocities, it becomes more legitimate in the eyes of those outside of Africa and the Middle East. Yet if a person from Africa or the Middle East shares their story, it's dismissed or deemed questionable (much like the reaction of discussions of racism depending on who is talking about it - whites or blacks). Considering what the US has already been behind in recent events, I shudder to think that there might be worse atrocities it wants to commit.

[LeJusticier]

That was in 2011 and they're pulling out now? Considering that the US is closing a lot of its embassies in the Middle East and Africa, I think it's going to be even more ruthless in its senseless murders and bombings in certain countries and doesn't want Western witnesses. Because when a Westerner shares their account of such atrocities, it becomes more legitimate in the eyes of those outside of Africa and the Middle East. Yet if a person from Africa or the Middle East shares their story, it's dismissed or deemed questionable (much like the reaction of discussions of racism depending on who is talking about it - whites or blacks). Considering what the US has already been behind in recent events, I shudder to think that there might be worse atrocities it wants to commit.

Good analyse...they're pulling out now. Why?

[Gabre]

People really need to do some basic research before jumping to conspiracy theories.

LeJusticier,

MSF has made a very difficult decision to end operations after 22 years in Somalia because of all the attacks on their staff. The reason why they made this decision now is because 2 of their volunteer aid workers (Montserrat Serra and Blanca Thiebaut) who were abducted from Dadaab in 2011 just got released from their Somali kidnappers.

It would have been one thing if this was just the work of mooryaan and militias, but this type of behavior is tolerated by the civilian authorities in the government who let these criminals get away with it.

"In choosing to kill, attack, and abduct humanitarian aid workers, these armed groups, and the civilian authorities who tolerate their actions, have sealed the fate of countless lives in Somalia," said Dr Unni Karunakara, MSF's international president.

"We are ending our programmes in Somalia because the situation in the country has created an untenable imbalance between the risks and compromises our staff must make, and our ability to provide assistance to the Somali people."

MSF will be closing medical programmes across the country. More than 1,500 staff provided services including free primary healthcare, malnutrition treatment, maternal health, surgery, epidemic response, immunisation campaigns, water and relief supplies. MSF said last year its teams gave more than 624,000 medical consultations, admitted 41,100 patients to hospitals, cared for 30,090 malnourished children, vaccinated 58,620 people and delivered 7,300 babies.

Karunakara warned: "Ultimately, civilians in Somalia will pay the highest cost. Much of the Somali population has never known the country without war or famine. Already receiving far less assistance than is needed, the armed groups' targeting of humanitarian aid and civilians leaders' tolerance of these abuses has effectively taken away what little access to medical care is available to the Somali people."

Source

Oh btw for the Somaliland crew who might argue Somaliland is peaceful enough for MSF to operate in, "perpetrators of violence against staff are able to move freely in #Somaliland." :

Waa dhibaato runtii. Somalis tear each other apart and highly trained doctors, nurses and engineers come from their own countries to volunteer & help the most needy who are caught in the middle. Then Somalis go on to kill, rape and kidnap these good samaritans who are doing this all free of charge and on a volunteer basis. The authorities ("government", police and tribal leaders) are complicit in all this, freeing the perpetrators of crimes. Sickening wallaahi



Waa sidii odeygii Grant sheegey "Somalis treat their enemies badly and their friends worse." viewtopic.php?p=4046996#p4046996

[LeJusticier]

People really need to do some basic research before jumping to conspiracy theories.

LeJusticier,

MSF has made a very difficult decision to end operations after 22 years in Somalia because of all the attacks on their staff. The reason why they made this decision now is because 2 of their volunteer aid workers (Montserrat Serra and Blanca Thiebaut) who were abducted from Dadaab in 2011 just got released from their Somali kidnappers.

It would have been one thing if this was just the work of mooryaan and militias, but this type of behavior is tolerated by the civilian authorities in the government who let these criminals get away with it.

"In choosing to kill, attack, and abduct humanitarian aid workers, these armed groups, and the civilian authorities who tolerate their actions, have sealed the fate of countless lives in Somalia," said Dr Unni Karunakara, MSF's international president.

"We are ending our programmes in Somalia because the situation in the country has created an untenable imbalance between the risks and compromises our staff must make, and our ability to provide assistance to the Somali people."

MSF will be closing medical programmes across the country. More than 1,500 staff provided services including free primary healthcare, malnutrition treatment, maternal health, surgery, epidemic response, immunisation campaigns, water and relief supplies. MSF said last year its teams gave more than 624,000 medical consultations, admitted 41,100 patients to hospitals, cared for 30,090 malnourished children, vaccinated 58,620 people and delivered 7,300 babies.

Karunakara warned: "Ultimately, civilians in Somalia will pay the highest cost. Much of the Somali population has never known the country without war or famine. Already receiving far less assistance than is needed, the armed groups' targeting of humanitarian aid and civilians leaders' tolerance of these abuses has effectively taken away what little access to medical care is available to the Somali people."

Source

Oh btw for the Somaliland crew who might argue Somaliland is peaceful enough for MSF to operate in, "perpetrators of violence against staff are able to move freely in #Somaliland." :

Waa dhibaato runtii. Somalis tear each other apart and highly trained doctors, nurses and engineers come from their own countries to volunteer & help the most needy who are caught in the middle. Then Somalis go on to kill, rape and kidnap these good samaritans who are doing this all free of charge and on a volunteer basis. The authorities ("government", police and tribal leaders) are complicit in all this, freeing the perpetrators of crimes. Sickening wallaahi



Waa sidii odeygii Grant sheegey "Somalis treat their enemies badly and their friends worse." viewtopic.php?p=4046996#p4046996

Thanks mate

[CushiticReflections]

People really need to do some basic research before jumping to conspiracy theories.

LeJusticier,

MSF has made a very difficult decision to end operations after 22 years in Somalia because of all the attacks on their staff. The reason why they made this decision now is because 2 of their volunteer aid workers (Montserrat Serra and Blanca Thiebaut) who were abducted from Dadaab in 2011 just got released from their Somali kidnappers.

That's very poor reasoning. So because two individuals who were kidnapped two years ago were released recently, suddenly there's this "danger" that never existed before? How completely illogical. The time to act to protect the other workers would have been ttwo years ago when they were first kidnapped. Has there been a recent, relevant threat since then - if so, where's your research on that?

It seems to me that you think that a kidnapping that occurred two years ago constitutes a current danger or an article about their release (again, how is release a bigger threat than kidnapping?) is "research". It would serve you well to become familiar with logic - that is, basic reasoning. It might aid you in understanding the relevance of an article to an event - or lack of relevance, as your post exemplifies.

[Hawdian]

The main reason is because they no longer making profit since Somalis now have access to increased number of new hospitals. The bastds were fueling the Somali conflict and now that Turkey medical teams are here, no one is going to them. They wanna tell us Somalia is more dangerous now than in the last 22 years. What a lying bstds!!

If they wanted to withdraw they would have during the bloodiest eras such as Aideed, 2006, the height of the suicide bombing...

Never return you French bstards.

[Insomniac]

They are a front for the CIA and French intelligence.

[AbdiJohnson]

Quite frankly, I think there are other reasons unknown to us at the moment of why they pulled out

They said they even had to pull out from Somaliland and Puntland because of violent attacks against them in those regions. What did they experience there to pull out entirely? Why not just pull out from the south?

Sounds very fishy. Why now? Why not at the height of these problems? Surely things like law and justice was getting better

I was of the opinion that MSF was correct but now I'm thinking something fishy is going on

[CushiticReflections]

Quite frankly, I think there are other reasons unknown to us at the moment of why they pulled out

They said they even had to pull out from Somaliland and Puntland because of violent attacks against them in those regions. What did they experience there to pull out entirely? Why not just pull out from the south?

Sounds very fishy. Why now? Why not at the height of these problems? Surely things like law and justice was getting better

I was of the opinion that MSF was correct but now I'm thinking something fishy is going on

Exactly, especially when there is so much controversy about the widespread surveillance. It's strange how just when politicians are attempting to convince us that this surveillance is justified in order to quell any outrage, they are now trying to show us that it has helped them detect a threat to Americans by shutting down embassies in so many nations. Perhaps they are trying to illustrate the scale of this "threat" through the number of embassies they've closed in many nations. It's funny when you think about, especially after reading this:

"You know, it’s so ludicrous. For eight straight years, literally, Democrats, every time there was a terrorist alert or a terrorist advisory issued by the United States government in the middle of a debate over one of the Bush-Cheney civil liberties abuses, would accuse the United States government and the national security state of exaggerating terrorism threats, of manipulating advisories, of hyping the dangers of al-Qaeda, in order to distract attention away from their abuses and to scare the population into submitting to whatever it is they wanted to do. And so, here we are in the midst of, you know, one of the most intense debates and sustained debates that we’ve had in a very long time in this country over the dangers of excess surveillance, and suddenly an administration that has spent two years claiming that it has decimated al-Qaeda decides that there is this massive threat that involves the closing of embassies and consulates throughout the world. And within literally an amount of hours, the likes of Saxby Chambliss and Lindsey Graham join with the White House and Democrats in Congress—who, remember, are the leading defenders of the NSA at this point—to exploit that terrorist threat and to insist that it shows that the NSA and these programs are necessary."

Source:

[CushiticReflections]

They are a front for the CIA and French intelligence.

That's curious, especially considering how many CIA agents pretend to be missionaries or working for non-profits when in the Horn.

[Gabre]

CushiticReflections,

There weren't just 2 people kidnapped, this was the straw that broke the camel's back. Since 1991, more than 16 MSF workers have been killed and there had been dozens of attacks on its staff, ambulances and medical facilities.

Humanitarian action requires a minimum level of recognition of the value of medical humanitarian work, and therefore the acceptance by all warring parties and communities to allow the provision of medical assistance, as well as the operational principles of independence and impartiality. Furthermore, these actors must demonstrate the capacity and willingness to uphold negotiated minimum security guarantees for patients and staff. This acceptance, always fragile in conflict zones, no longer exists in Somalia today.

MSF press release in English | Somali

MSF couldn't just shutdown shop 2 years ago while they had missing foreign aid workers in the middle of god-knows-where.

With the two kidnapped aid workers recently released, MSF had to make this difficult decision to end all operations seeing as no one was respecting the safety of their staff, patients and operations. This culture of targetting aid workers and the vulnerable is incusable.

How is the article I linked irrelevant when it's talking about the topic at hand: MSF ending their operations in Somalia after 22 years?

Hawdian,

MSF is a non-profit organization that works in the most dangerous environments with all staff working as of volunteers. They were one of the few NGOs who actually made a difference and weren't out for themselves, unlike so many of the suits in Mogadishu.

AfroBro,

Somalida waxee ku maah maahan "Maroodi takarta saaran ma arkee, ta kale saaran buu arkaa."

Saqajama,

Someone asked the International President of MSF the same question on Twitter, I linked it in my above post. Here's it again:

The "safety" of the north is a facade because criminals get away with crimes in their clan enclaves anywhere in Somalia, including Puntland and Somaliland.

[LeJusticier]

The main reason is because they no longer making profit since Somalis now have access to increased number of new hospitals. The bastds were fueling the Somali conflict and now that Turkey medical teams are here, no one is going to them. They wanna tell us Somalia is more dangerous now than in the last 22 years. What a lying bstds!!

If they wanted to withdraw they would have during the bloodiest eras such as Aideed, 2006, the height of the suicide bombing...

Never return you French bstards.

the worst analysis ever

Quite frankly, I think there are other reasons unknown to us at the moment of why they pulled out

They said they even had to pull out from Somaliland and Puntland because of violent attacks against them in those regions. What did they experience there to pull out entirely? Why not just pull out from the south?

Sounds very fishy. Why now? Why not at the height of these problems? Surely things like law and justice was getting better

I was of the opinion that MSF was correct but now I'm thinking something fishy is going on

Of course something fishy is going on there!!

[Cherine]

The main reason is because they no longer making profit since Somalis now have access to increased number of new hospitals. The bastds were fueling the Somali conflict and now that Turkey medical teams are here, no one is going to them. They wanna tell us Somalia is more dangerous now than in the last 22 years. What a lying bstds!!

If they wanted to withdraw they would have during the bloodiest eras such as Aideed, 2006, the height of the suicide bombing...

Never return you French bstards.

[Grant]

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wir ... t-19988937

MSF pulls out, and the Somali Government makes it's first stab at punishing the guilty. Up to this point the perpetrators have had total immunity, in all parts of the country, including SL and PL. Both for the murders of journalists and aid workers.

The execution is a good move, but it has missed the boat. It's Government inaction that has caused the MSF to leave.