Syria suffering awful but NOT 'unparallled in recent history'

In a rather shocking statement statement from someone in a position to know better, the head of the UN refugee agency described the situation in Syria as involving “suffering and displacement unparalleled in recent history."

Perhaps António Guterres should get off YouTube and speak to his staff in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, home of what is widely acknowledged to be the deadliest war and worst humanitarian catastrophe anywhere on the planet since World War II.

Mauritanian refugees to be repatriated from Senegal

I discovered a very interesting site recently: Telediaspora.net. The site is a regular portal providing the usual news and such, but with an interesting twist. It offers live feed of state television networks from Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Senegal, Mali and Guinea.

Anyway, I was watching the news from Senegal's RTS and they did a story about rapprochement between Senegal and Mauritania. Banjul's Daily Observer did a story as well.

The two countries fought a border in 1988 that left thousands of mostly black Mauritanians stranded in Senegal and Mali. Even though Senegal had a change in leadership in 2000, no progress was made in the refugee issue until the military that overthrew Mauritanian strongman Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya. Senegalo-Mauritanian relations seem to have thawed since newly elected president Ould Cheikh Abdallahi took over in Mauritania.

The new president recently conducted a two-day visit to Dakar to meet with his Senegalese counterpart Abdoulaye Wade. The two countries' foreign ministers met as well.

Mauritania has agreed to repatriate all Mauritanian refugees trapped in Senegal since 1988, reports The Daily Observer

A joint communique also called for expanding trade and common investment between the two countries and expressed their satisfaction over the progress being made in the construction of the Tangiers-Nouakchott-Dakar Trans-Saharan road and the "encouraging evolution" of the plans for the Tangiers-Casablanca-Nouadhibou -Nouakchott-Dakar sea link.