Americans need to pay more attention to Nigeria, for the simple reason that events happening in Africa's most populous country and largest oil producer (unless instability snatches that status away) have global significance.

Yesterday, a blast near Lagos, the largest city in the country, occurred when a bulldozer punctured a pipeline. Here's the context:

The disaster was the latest in a series of pipeline explosions or blazes caused by damage or theft which have killed more than 1,200 people since 2000 in Nigeria, the world's eighth largest oil exporter and Africa's top producer.

[snip]

A network of oil and fuel pipelines criss-crosses parts of Nigeria and explosions and fires that kill many are frequent.

In the creeks of the Niger Delta, the country's main oil producing zone, the pipelines are also the target of sabotage attacks by local militants seeking greater control over oil revenues and more development for their impoverished region.

Previous accidental pipeline blasts in Nigeria have been caused by vandals who drilled holes in the feeder lines, used to distribute mainly imported fuel, in order to steal petrol for sale on the black market.

Despite the country's oil wealth, most Nigerians live on less than $2 per day and many are prepared to take huge risks to obtain free fuel.

Reuters has a timeline of similar disasters.

From what I can see, the US doesn't even have the rudimentary elements of a coherent policy for dealing with these problems. Why should we, some would say. Well, aside from the glaringly obvious strategic and energy interests Nigeria represents, we should consider that our neglect of the world's problem spots has come back to haunt us again and again. A sane administration would have a more nuanced understanding of economic and political issues in Nigeria, beyond platitudes about democracy and freedom.

After all the hoopla about Obama and/or Carter sponsoring negotiations with MEND, maybe we should be thinking more along those lines. Clearly Nigeria's status quo results in death and suffering for many of its people, and disrupted oil supplies for much of the rest of the world. Let's be proactive, whether that means new programs of development that reach more of these disenfranchised populations, sterner rhetoric regarding Nigeria's flawed elections, or direct involvement of US representatives in helping to broker solutions to political conflicts (if we're invited).

Food riots erupted in Somalia earlier this week, as disputes between customers and shopkeepers over whether shops would accept small bills (Somalia's currency is weakening because of inflation and counterfeiting) escalated into clashes between rioters and the government. Aid agencies are screaming at anyone who will listen that as many as 3.5 million Somalis may need aid by the end of the year.

Today, at least 12 people died in two separate incidents of fighting between Ethiopian occupiers and Somali Muslim insurgents.

And Amnesty International has accused Ethiopia of committing war crimes inside Somala, saying that armed groups are "out of control."

It says the situation is "dire" in the centre and the south with government troops, their Ethiopian allies and Islamist insurgents "out of control". They carry out killings, torture, rape, beatings, arbitrary detention and forced disappearances, a report says.

[snip]

People who have visited the capital, Mogadishu, recently say parts of it are a ghost town, but Amnesty says residents fleeing the city are prey for armed bandits on the road who rape women and girls and steal whatever they have taken with them. A young child's throat was slit by Ethiopian soldiers in front of the child's mother.

Even in refugee camps, Somalis face attack, Amnesty says. It says no-one is offering them any protection. The group says more than 6,000 civilians have been killed in Somalia in the past year.

[snip]

In another incident, the report quotes Haboon, 56, saying Ethiopian troops raped a neighbour's 17-year-old daughter in 2007.

When the girl's two brothers tried to help her, Ethiopian soldiers gouged out their eyes with a bayonet, she said.

The Ethiopian and Somali governments say they are fighting al-Qaeda-backed militants.

Ethiopia denies all the allegations, of course, but it's telling that even so, they draw on our rhetoric - the rhetoric of the War on Terror - as though the urgency of the hunt for terrorists excuses human rights abuses. It's not a leap to see where they found that idea.

As I argued the other day at The Agonist, the United States bears substantial responsibility for these tragedies.

I try not to sound shrill about foreign affairs. I try to present facts and context so that people can understand what goes on abroad, and I try to keep my tone calm so as not to get in the way of understanding.

But as a friend said the other night, concerning Somalia, "It's wrong. It's just wrong."

Mugabe's tyranny is well known, but a report in today's New York Times pulls back the curtain in a particularly revealing manner. Opposition supporters, even professionals like teachers, have faced major repression by the government.

Aid workers say they have been warned by government officials to suspend their operations, lest they be seen as meddling in the nation’s affairs. Teachers, who served as nonpartisan supervisors at polling stations, have been systematically singled out, with 496 questioned by the police, 133 assaulted by thugs and 123 charged with election fraud, according to the Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe. Teachers who worked for the opposition also said they had been attacked.

The regime's rhetoric is getting more menacing as well:

A member of ZANU-PF’s Politburo, speaking anonymously about its secret deliberations, said in an interview that the party had no intention of giving up power through the ballot box.

“We’re giving the people of Zimbabwe another opportunity to mend their ways, to vote properly,” the Politburo member said. “This is their last chance.”

If voters fail to return Mr. Mugabe to office, the Politburo member told a Zimbabwean journalist working with The New York Times, “Prepare to be a war correspondent.”

The political impasse seems likely to persist for months. ZANU-PF and the opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change, have challenged the election results in more than 50 parliamentary districts, the state-owned newspaper, The Herald, reported Wednesday. Those challenges, which are supposed to be resolved in six months, could overturn the opposition’s newly won control of the lower house of Parliament.

The ruling party, the military and their irregular forces — youth militias and veterans of the liberation struggle against white rule — have for weeks been threatening, arresting and beating those they see as threats, including journalists, election monitors and even people who had simply voted for the opposition.

Clearly we're starting a slide into real chaos, potentially even worse than what happened in Kenya.

There are also some universal lessons here about how people react to crises, I think. "Things getting bad" doesn't necessarily mean that people suddenly embrace formulas for social change. Rather, often societies fragment and some very scary people come out of the woodwork. Read the article, and you'll notice that Mugabe's "youth militias" loom in the background throughout, jumping into focus for brief moments as we hear about them beating the shit out of people for their boss. But why would Zimbabwean youth - any Zimbabwean youth - remain loyal to Mugabe? My guess is that it's because a special space for opportunism gets created in situations of social chaos. With the government's legitimacy slipping, and the economy spiralling into a black hole, certain skills suddenly become valuable, in particular the ability to beat people up and not ask questions. And when that kind of behavior becomes widespread, a massive brutalization of society can soon follow.

This doesn't look good at all.

The BBC catches up, but not quite.

Me in December of 2007:

The war in Somalia is not some obscure "African tribal conflict" - it is a direct result of international political maneuvering, just like Afghanistan. The similarities between the two countries, in fact, are striking. Both fell apart during the Cold War endgame. Afghanistan, invaded by the Soviets in 1979, has seen near-continuous warfare ever since, with some participants funded by the US. Somalia, after switching its allegiance from one superpower to another in the 80s, found itself abandoned by both in the early 90s. A coup brought down the president in 1991, and the chaos that began then has lasted until now.

In conditions of chaos and instability, Somalia and Afghanistan have both provided havens for terrorists at times (surprise surprise). They also both have powerful neighbors who meddle in their affairs (Ethiopia and Pakistan, respectively) and just happen to be US allies.

The BBC, last Friday:

So is Somalia in danger of becoming the new Afghanistan of East Africa?

Certainly western security sources are worried that the country's large ungoverned spaces are very inviting for would-be jihadists, as are its virtually non-existent border controls. Indeed it is thought there are already terrorist training camps in Somalia, though on nothing like the scale of pre-9/11 Afghanistan.

But there are vital differences.

The fall of the Islamic Courts has limited the freedom would-be jihadists have to operate in the country and has even led some to leave to surrounding areas.

Added to that, Somalia's intricate clan structure and high levels of violence make it a tough and dangerous place for outsiders, in comparison to the more permissive atmosphere created in much of Afghanistan by the Taleban before their fall from power.

Always talking about the clans, never talking about the Cold War history.

But wait, what they're saying is that without the Courts, Somalia doesn't look like Afghanistan did with the Taliban? That would seem to make sense. But they're comparing the wrong periods: Somalia's present with Afghanistan's recent past. The real question concerns the present situation in both countries: does Somalia without the Courts looks like Afghanistan without the Taliban? The answer is, with a few qualifications, yes. And the corollary is that these conflicts will drag on, and on, and on, and the Courts (or ash-Shabab, if you prefer) and the Taliban are not going anywhere. Not until we change our approach (hint: try talking).

First there were rumors (unconfirmed, mind you) that Obama would help negotiate a cease-fire in the Niger Delta, where the rebel group MEND's activities have crippled oil export capacity. Now MEND is calling on former President Jimmy Carter to mediate:

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) said on Tuesday that Carter had expressed willingness to help mediate. The acceptance is "on condition that the Nigerian government and any other relevant stake-holder invites him", MEND said in an emailed statement.

John Stremlau, the Carter Centre's vice-president for Peace Programs, said the former president would take such a request for all parties seriously. However, he said it was "woefully premature to suggest [Carter] will plunge himself into mediating this conflict".

[snip]

The group publicly approached Carter earlier this year to act as a negotiator.

"We are ready to call off all hostilities and hold a temporary ceasefire in honour of president Carter should the Nigerian government accept president Carter's initiative," MEND said in the statement.

"However, if as expected, the government fails to seize on this new opportunity for peace, our actions will continue to speak volumes beyond the Nigerian shores."

Carter failed in a previous attempt to mediate in the restive Delta in 1999, but he is familiar to many senior members of the different armed factions.

The Carter Centre informed MEND on Monday that it would consider mediating in the long-running conflict only if all sides made the request.

"The absolute first condition (for mediation) is that the Nigerian government has to approach us," Stremlau told Reuters news agency.

I draw a few conclusions from this. First, MEND really wants someone to mediate, and they really want it to be a credible figure from the outside.

Second, their calling on Obama and Carter indicates that there are American leaders who are positively perceived by hardline groups abroad, even in conflicts that could be seen as stemming partly from American energy/foreign policy. With Carter's image as an elder statesman on the rise, I think it's a good thing that Obama's credibility on the world stage is rising too. If Obama seizes the opportunity, 2009 could be a transformative year for America's relations with the world.

Third, MEND wants American attention either way. To paraphrase their statement, It's either negotiation or escalation.

If one were really crazy, one might speculate that Carter's recent high-profile activism could even represent a deliberate attempt by the former president to open a window for Obama, one that would allow him to embrace a more progressive foreign policy. Or maybe that's reading too much into it. 

UN Dispatch has more.

Nigeria's deadly conflicts over oil don't just play a part in driving the price of oil over $120 a barrel. They also leave scores of dead and tear the country apart.

Oil-related violence continued this weekend:

Militants in Nigeria have blown up an oil flow station belonging to the Shell company in the Niger Delta, causing it to cut some of its production.

It is the fifth attack on the oil industry in recent weeks, reducing output and pressuring global prices.

[snip]

Shell accounts for around half of Nigeria's 2.1 million barrels per day of oil output, and has already been forced to cut production because of a pipeline bombing last month.

Will resolution come from an unlikely source?

Rebels who have stepped up attacks on Nigeria's oil industry in the last month said on Sunday they were considering a ceasefire appeal by U.S. presidential hopeful Barack Obama.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) has launched five attacks on oil facilities in the Niger Delta since it resumed a campaign of violence in April, forcing Royal Dutch Shell to shut more than 164,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd).

"The MEND command is seriously considering a temporary ceasefire appeal by Senator Barack Obama. Obama is someone we respect and hold in high esteem," the militant group said in an e-mailed statement.

MEND did not say when or where Obama, the leading candidate for the Democratic ticket for November's U.S. presidential election, made the appeal. It said it hoped the government would use any ceasefire to improve conditions for its detained leader, Henry Okah.

Now, without confirmation from Obama this sounds like just another rumor. And maybe the praise of yet another militant group is the last thing Obama needs right now. But part of me wishes that the rumor were true. Despite the fact that I support Obama, the painful thing about his candidacy has been that he hasn't taken advantage of the platform he has right now and used it to impact crises in America or the world. While I take him at his word that his presidency will bring change, it sure would help his credibility if he was out negotiating cease-fires (which would lower the price of gas more than any "holiday").

Or maybe American voters could give a fuck less. Silly me for thinking Nigeria could be important. After all, there are flag pins and pastors to discuss.
 

Conservative Party candidate Boris Johnson was elected mayor of London by a margin of around 140,000 votes. While this news was expected earlier today, its confirmation adds to Labour's woes.

The BBC has more.

Zimbabwe's Election Commission coughed up the results of March's presidential polls today, showing MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai won nearly 48% of the vote, beating Mugabe. However, not winning a majority forces a runoff, and the MDC is not happy.

Tsvangirai has raised doubts over whether he would take part in a run-off and has been out of the country since shortly after the vote, trying to keep up international pressure on Mugabe.

But if he refused to take part, then Mugabe would keep his hold on power.

Tsvangirai has suggested he could only contest a second round if it was monitored by United Nations-led foreign observers. The main international observer group during the first round was from Zimbabwe's neighbors.

The opposition accuses the ruling ZANU-PF party, which lost its parliamentary majority in a parallel vote on March 29, of a campaign of violence and intimidation ahead of a possible second round and says 20 of its members have been killed.

The government denies that and accuses the MDC of political attacks.

On Wednesday, the United States cast doubt on the credibility of the election results and said it was hard to see how a run-off could be fair because of state-orchestrated violence.

Now, the results are plausible…to an extent. Dictators, and we here in the US don't often like to admit this, do have support from some sectors of the population. But it's also highly plausible that Tsvangirai won outright, and if we ever find out the truth of the matter I doubt it will be any time in the immediate - or relevant - future.

So I hate to say it, but were I Tsvangirai I would take the run-off. Protest loudly beforehand, but take it. Boycotts, from what I've heard political scientists say, end up hurting opposition parties, and in this case it would give Mugabe an excuse to declare victory. The whole world expects Tsvangirai to win in the second round, and if he does not he will have an extremely strong case that the results were manipulated not once, but twice.

The decision to announce these results is calculated, of course. If we go based on the speculation that there are different voices in Mugabe's inner circle, it seems that middle-of-the-roaders (in the sense of not being completely authoritarian) are winning out. The regime has shied away from the path of complete repression, which is likely a sign that they are at least somewhat attuned to international pressures. Perhaps they count on repression to win the second round, or annul its results if they prove unfavorable, but they are showing a minimal degree of flexibility. I think Tsvangirai should pursue that opening.

And if the US is going to talk tough, let's back it up. Let's lean on Mugabe as hard as we can to allow UN observers in, and let's continue to denounce any acts of violence. If Zimbabwe has a political transition at its fingertips, we should help them achieve it.

In what the British press is calling a "bloodbath" for Gordon Brown's Labour Party, local election results are spelling out some bad news.

Labour — with Brown leading them into elections for the first time since taking office last year — was set to finish third behind opposition Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, according to near-complete results.

The ruling party could face further humiliation in the closely-fought London mayoral race, which pitched the current mayor, Labour's Ken Livingstone, against the Conservatives' maverick Boris Johnson.

"It's clear to me that this has been a disappointing night, indeed a bad night for Labour," Brown told reporters, linking Labour's performance to the effects of the global credit crunch.

"We have lessons to learn from that and then we will move forward."

Conservative leader David Cameron said the results were "a very big moment" for his party. Some commentators suggest the Tories' strong showing could be a springboard to victory in a general election which must be held by mid-2010.

The BBC has more information on seats won and lost, though the results of London's mayoral race have not yet been announced.

While I'm sure the election results have a great deal to do with local politics, it's tempting to view them in a geopolitical context as well. A referendum on Gordon Brown - if that's indeed what the elections are - has indicated that Brits are still unhappy with the centrist and pro-Bush policies laid down by Blair. Practically every world leader with ties to Bush who has competed in free and fair elections has lost…is this the tail end of that trend? Blair did win in the last parliamentary elections in 2005, but Labour lost 57 seats that year (according to Wikipedia). And that was 2005. So I'm wondering whether the votes for Conservatives indicate a general distaste for Labour's politics in the last few years, rather than an embrace of their opposition per se.

Then again, I'm pretty ignorant of British politics, and I tend to see things through a US-centric lens, so I could be totally off base.

Thoughts? UK readers, what's the scoop?

Is this a headline from The Onion?

China to be focus of U.S. attention in Asia: CIA

Gee, what a surprise. Probably warrants a major speech, eh? Glad you guys have figured out that China is important. I'd like to know what country the Asia experts at the CIA were focusing on previously - Thailand? Mongolia? How, oh how, did they ever hit on the idea that US intelligence efforts in Asia should focus on the world's most populous country, which is also a rising superpower?

Let's examine their staggering powers of deductive thinking:

China is likely to achieve great-power status this century and maintain a military buildup but is not an inevitable enemy, CIA Director Michael Hayden said on Wednesday.

China is an economic and strategic competitor with the United States, Hayden said in a Kansas speech on 21st-century trends, adding the country was likely to continue a "troubling" military buildup.

"China, a communist-led, nuclear state that aspires to — and will likely achieve — great power status during this century, will be the focus of U.S. attention (in Asia)," he said.

It all depends on whether China acts from a narrow self-interest or with broader perspective, Hayden said in a speech at Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas.

Wow, I feel safer. Maybe tomorrow you guys can issue a special report on what color the sky is.