Month: October 2022

Cypriot police fired tear gas Friday after a fire broke out in an overcrowded migrant reception centre amid clashes sparked by an argument between different nationalities, officers said.

One person needed hospital treatment after being injured at the Pournara camp for migrants, on the edge of the capital Nicosia.

People hurled rocks and objects at each other, forcing many to flee in panic, and firefighters rushed to extinguish a blaze that sent billowing smoke into the sky. Tensions later “calmed”, a police said.

Chief of police Stelios Papatheodorou blamed the violence on overcrowding at centre, which holds more than double its original 800 capacity.

“Police are doing everything possible to protect the area and those residing in the camp,” said Papatheodorou.

Cypriot news outlet Philenews said clashes broke between asylum seekers from Democratic Republic of Congo and Nigeria, two of the largest migrant groups in Cyprus.

European Union member Cyprus says it is on the frontline of the bloc’s irregular migration flows, and last year reported the highest number of asylum applicants per population.

The small EU state has lobbied Brussels to take action over the “disproportionate” numbers of asylum seekers it receives.

New asylum applications multiplied to over 13,000 last year in Greek Cypriot-administered southern Cyprus, with its population of 850,000.

In March, a report by the Cypriot children’s rights commissioner described chronic overcrowding, woeful bathroom facilities and reports of meagre food rations in the Pournara camp, prompting officials to vow to work to improve conditions.

The State Department has ordered the families of U.S. embassy staffers in the Nigerian capital to leave due to heightened fears of a terrorist attack as it repeated a warning for all Americans to reconsider travelling to any part of the country and not to visit Abuja at all.

The announcement came just two days after the department said it would allow nonessential personnel at the embassy in Abuja to depart voluntarily due to elevated security concerns.

It did not provide details but the change suggested the U.S. has indications that an attack may be imminent.

“The department (has) ordered the departure of family members of U.S. government employees from Abuja due to the heightened risk of terrorist attacks there,” it said in a revised travel advisory for Nigeria.

Nigeria has battled an Islamic insurgency in its northeast for more than a decade, but attacks have been rare in Abuja.

In 2011, Islamic extremists linked to the Boko Haram group targeted the United Nations building there with a car bomb, killing 21 people.

The U.S. embassy in Abuja has been warning since Sunday about an “elevated risk of terror attacks” in the city, saying that possible targets include government buildings, places of worship and other public places. It has urged Americans there to avoid all nonessential movements and crowds.

The British mission in Nigeria has issued similar alerts.

Nigeria’s secret and intelligence police, the Department of State Services, has called for calm and has advised that “necessary precautions” are being taken to prevent such attacks.

Burkina Faso this week launched a drive to recruit 50,000 civilian defense volunteers to help the army fight jihadists, the authorities said.

“A recruitment is launched of 35,000 communal VDP, that is to say, 100 VDP per commune,” said a statement by the commander of the Brigade of Vigilance and Patriotic Defense (BVDP), Colonel Boukaré Zoungrana, Minister of Territorial Administration, Decentralization and Security on Tuesday.

“The mission of these communal VDPs is to protect, alongside the defense and security forces, the people and property of their communes of origin”, in the face of jihadist attacks, he said.

This local recruitment is in addition to the one on Monday when the BVDP announced its intention to build a force of 15,000 VDPs “that can be deployed throughout the national territory.

The status of the VDP is defined by law since January 21, 2020. It is defined as “a person of Burkinabe nationality, auxiliary to the Defense and Security Forces (FDS), voluntarily serving the security interests of his village or sector of residence.

VDPs receive 14 days of civic and military training before being armed and provided with means of communication.

They pay a heavy price in the jihadist attacks that regularly strike Burkina Faso, particularly in the north and east.

To date, no data is available on their exact number, even though the initial objective was to recruit 13,000 people.

These massive recruitments are in addition to a one-time recruitment campaign of 3,000 soldiers to bolster the ranks of the army in the fight against jihadists.

These campaigns come after a September 30 coup led by Captain Ibrahim Traore, whose stated aim is to strengthen the anti-jihadist fight.

At least ten soldiers were killed and about 50 wounded Monday in a “terrorist attack” in Djibo, a town under jihadist blockade for three months in northern Burkina.