Well, 2011 was a hell of a year and a lot of countries made a play for their place in the list of the worst of 2011 with unexpected and out of character descents into dangerous territory everywhere from Greece to Norway and the UK. The Middle East saw massive changes and Mother Nature really showed off her power in other parts of the world. This however, is the top 10 list where things really went downhill for the year – and here’s where that happened in a big way.

Tunisia – From a young man setting himself on fire in protest at being strong-armed out of making an honest living by the police to the fall of the first of many governments in the Middle East. Tunisia set off a chain of events that will go down in history (and that really made a mark on this year’s list). Hopefully that will lead to a better life for a lot of people, but for a while there it looked like things were not going according to plan for anybody.

Egypt – While the danger in Egypt went in fits and starts, you probably didn’t want to be a regular protester or even (in some cases) a journalist reporting on them. Mubarak fell, the army took over and then folks started getting pissed at that too.  Enter round two of the protests. Many of the maimed have even taken to wearing their injuries as a source of pride.

Libya – 18 months ago, if somebody had predicted that Ghaddafi would be gone by now, they would have been laughed at. One of the big casualties of the Arab Spring was the Colonel and he didn’t die pretty. Things drew out for a little while, but the rebel forces backed by Western air support finally ousted him. While the country was a very ordinary place for much of the year, hopefully it will be off next year’s list.

Syria – While 2011 has ended, the fun in Syria is only just getting started. The security forces are killing people daily and the demonstrations against the Assad regime continue to grow in momentum. Hopefully 2012 sees the people of Syria reclaim their country.

Sudan – South Sudan – welcome to the world! While things are going downhill slowly here, they’re definitely going downhill. The right call was made with the formation of this new country, but now we get to see what that means in reality. For the time being, it means fighting.

Japan – From arguably the safest country in the world, Japan shot up the charts to see a place in the 10 worst due to the huge tsunami and associated nuclear meltdown. Not a good place to be with thousands of people confirmed dead and the great unknown of nuclear pollution now hanging over a huge population of people.

Afghanistan – It’s difficult to see when this place will ever get off the list. Same country. Same crap. Different year.

Iraq – 2011 finally saw the removal of the US army. Now things can really get down to business with the Sunni and Shias starting to go for each other’s throats. It’s been a difficult 10 years for them and now we get to see if they can finally bring it together. We’re not taking bets.

Pakistan – This was the year they got Bin Laden. Unfortunately, the whole fiasco proved to the world once and for all how messed up the internal workings of the country really are. With the military and intelligence services playing both sides and the slew of tribalism and independence movements, not to mention the strong hold of Islamism, it’s difficult to see Pakistan turning into Sweden any time soon.

Somalia – With piracy, Islamism and foreign machinations in the country, this one deserves a spot in our hall of fame. You’ve heard the story before, and not much has changed in 2011. Though, with US banks now refusing to transfer money to the country (mainly from the large group of Somali expats living in the US who send money to their families) it’s difficult to see this one getting better, let alone a little less sucky for the people living there.

And while we haven’t forgotten our friends in Mexico, Djbouti, Nigeria, Honduras or even even Yemen, Middle Eastern history stole a march on them in 2011. And so onto 2012 – the year that the Mayans predict the end of the world. For some, that may not come soon enough. So remember your luck. Remember what makes life worth living and be good to your fellow humans. Some day, you might need them.

Sure, you’ve probably heard of a few big cases of bloggers being sued or held up to professional standards of journalism that they spectacularly failed to meet, but did you also know that around the world there are over 60 bloggers currently behind bars for writing a lousy blog? The sad truth is that this state of affairs is getting worse rather than better.

Here are the main places where blogging can make you a criminal.

Thailand – 0. Ok, so things aren’t too out of hand yet for bloggers in Thailand. Last year Praya Pichai was detained under the Computer Crime Act of the country and detained for 12 days facing up to 10 years in prison. The charges were subsequently dropped after international pressure. Things aren’t too bad for bloggers in Thailand compared to the other countries below, but it is definitely getting worse. And let’s face it, there is plenty of fodder for government criticism in the land of smiles.

Saudi Arabia – 0. Although there are currently no bloggers in jail as far as we know in the kingdom, Fouad al-Frahan was detained without charge for 137 days earlier in the year “because he violated the customs of the kingdom.” Calling for democratic reforms and sounding off against corruption isn’t going to get you too many friends among the authorities over there. He also blogged about some guys that the Saudis had jailed for terrorism, claiming the charges were fabricated. Fouad reported that he was well treated while in custody, but he hasn’t started blogging again. No surprise there really. Here’s the Free Fouad website.

Egypt – 1. Abdel Kareem Soliman enjoyed the distinction of being the first Egyptian prosecuted under his country’s laws against insulting Islam, sedition and insulting President Muburak – the country’s despotic leader. All of this for referring on his blog to al-Azhar University, at which he was a student, as a “university of terrorism.” He also referred to Muburak as a dictator which doesn’t go down so well in the land of the Pharoahs. There is now a movement to campaign on behalf of Abdel who blogged under the pseudonym, Kareem Amer, which can be found at the Free Kareem website.

Burma – 2. In Burma, things are worse. The government has the country locked down so hard that barely anyone can get on the internet due to government restrictions or just plain poverty, but they have still managed to do what most other authoritarian countries have not – actually imprison a blogger. Nay Phone Latt, an internet cafe owner and blogger, committed the grievous crime of having messages in his inbox that were disrespectful of the government.

Syria – 5. When he started criticising the Syrian secret service, blogger Tariq Biassi may not have thought it would end in a three year jail term. The 24 year old was found guilty of weakening the state and undermining national morale. We guess that the irony of that second charge hasn’t quite caught up with the Syrian secret police. The problem for Syrian bloggers is that the state has decreed that all website owners are to keep records of the authors of stories even though the country’s constitution theoretically grants freedom of speech for writers.

That wasn’t much of a protection for Habib Saleh either. According to Amnesty, there is no information on his whereabouts after his arrest and they fear for him being tortured. You can find some of his best work at Elaph.

Then there’s Firas Saad, a poet who was bringing down the Syrian state machine sonet by sonet. You know things are getting tough when a country is afraid of haiku. He went to the
clink for four years in April of this year for the same charges as Tariq. You can read more about Firas at Free Syria.

Vietnam – 9. The great thing about the Vietnamese is that they won’t even try to hide their contempt of bloggers behind laws that are even remotely related to blogging. For example, Nguyen Hoang Hai who blogs under the pseudonym Dieu Cay was last month jailed for tax fraud. Reporter Without Borders condemned the trial and conviction as “trumped up” and “completely unfounded.”

Not to worry – Nguyen will have 8 other blogging buddies to keep him company in jail. In fact vietnam is a clear second in terms of incarcerated bloggers in the world.

China – 50. It’s concerning that the fastest growing internet population in the world comes from the country that is most likely to put its internet users in jail. Perhaps more worrying is the issue of western companies’ complicity in at least a few of those jailings in order to court favour with the authorities who control access to such a huge market. In fact general censorship of the internet relies on censorship technology developed by western companies and western search engines companies have been known to hand over information that has led to the arrest of those critical of the government in their online writings.

And it doesn’t seem like a lot of Chinese cyber-dissidents report the same good treatment in jail that those in Saudi Arabia have – in fact one blogger named Liu Di (who wrote as “Stainless Steel Mouse”) was held in solitary confinement for a year after she was arrested back in 2002. She was eventually released, but but almost 50 other bloggers remain in Chinese jails. Group punishment is also not out of the question as human rights activist, Hu Jia found out when his family was placed under house arrest. RSF keeps a reasonable list of current inmates in China.

So with that, China is the clear winner of the most dangerous place for bloggers, but special mention should also be made of Malaysia, Jordan and Libya who weren’t mentioned on this list, but have all put bloggers in jail.

By spreading the word about the plight of bloggers, it seems some pressure can be applied to the authorities responsible for these abuses of power so consider blogging, writing, emailing or bringing these issues to the attention of others on the internet.

‘Tis the season to be jolly, for some at least. Elsewhere, ‘tis the season to rampage through the streets, rubbing out your adversaries and making life a misery for anyone that contests your anti-social behaviour.

And so as we enter the final week of 2007, the staff at Polo’s Bastards, tucking into roast goose, washed down with hot mulled wine, present you with their collective assessment of the year’s top ten worst destinations. Always the source of much contention and vehement disagreement from various corners, we expect this year’s compilation to be no different. But whatever you may think of us and our take on the world’s more “colourful” destinations, we think you’ll have to agree that getting upset about a teddy bear’s name is just plain stupid, and murdering monks is dismally short of tactful.

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Iraq

What, wait, aren’t things supposed to be getting better there? Yeah sure they are, for those who may have already survived umpteen hundred suicide car bombs and bombers, extra judicial killings and kidnappings perhaps, but for you Mr. And Mrs. Samsonite, even the best and safest parts of the country may put you on the wrong end of a Turkish JDAM, or stuck at the wrong checkpoint, or tossed unceremoniously into the trunk of a car that you most certainly did not hail.

Your hide is still worth money here or it simply might just be good for a point making beheading on YouTube by all the wrong independent filmmakers, whom have absolutely no axe to grind with you personally, except the one that happens at that moment to be against your neck. Face it does anyone even know how many people are actually still being held hostage in Iraq? Arab hospitality notwithstanding, there are more armaments circulating this country in all sorts of hands and at all levels of technology that while it may be possible to get a cold drink and a tan the potential for so much more than you bargained for, or were willing to pay, is still very much in the realm of possibility.

While the violence and unabated killing seems to be enjoying a temporary lull it really is one of those rare countries where everyone seems to have a beef with someone else, whether it be brand new or a hundred years old. Let there be no doubt here, it’s whether or not the country is even in possession of a future that is still very much in doubt.

Afghanistan

There may be only one place more wary of strangers as a whole than Afghanistan’s hinterlands (that’s pretty much the majority of the country outside Kabul) and that spot too would be inside Afghanistan somewhere. For centuries the tribes and people that populate this country have taken great pride in tossing out occupiers, and now for the past six years the country has been loaded with occupiers from all over Europe and the rest of the developed world. This would be courtesy of an organization called NATO and, all things considered, those locals that are so predisposed to the longstanding tradition of ejecting outsiders certainly have plenty of motivation to get their game on.

Unfortunately for everybody involved – the citizens, NATO and yes you the world traveler of exotic locations, the extreme dichotomy that exists within this physically and culturally stunning country range from “We want our MTV!” to “Sharia dictates that you must be punished for watching it”. Indeed you’ll be punished for any number of apparent ludicrous crimes against Allah by any number of barbaric forms of punishment; all of which for the average citizen and especially for the traveler tends to create a behavioral minefield. Speaking of minefields; this lovely country has more than its fair share of those too, sixth in the world, in fact, not to mention when talking of world rankings it happens to be number one in opium poppy cultivation. So while there may be a myriad of ways to find yourself in a great deal pain, whether through ever increasing rates of suicide bombing via human bombers or vehicle borne devices, kidnapping or random shootings, car or bus crashes on dangerous mountain roads, rampant disease, conflagrations initiated between NATO and the Taliban or the current villainous warlord of the moment, you’ll at least be able to derive some comfort that there will be enough morphine or heroin around to take the edge off.

While Chicken Street and much of Kabul and its populace will invariably be sure to invite you inside their rug shop or café for a hospitable cup of chai and to chat you up and practice your particular language, this will not be the case in the south of the country or in the northwest frontier provinces where tribal law and ‘who has the most guns’ tends to sort out even the most minor of issues. Unless, of course, NATO, the Taliban, Narcotics funded warlords or the Pakistani military decide to put in their two cents’ worth, which more often than not tends to be the case. Expect things to heat up in the upcoming year.

Somalia

How much worse can it get for this poor impoverished, fractured, chaotic pseudo nation? It could always be stated that for a country that has had no viable government since the early 1990’s, it’s not doing too bad. Some folks even felt the leadership takeover this past year by the Islamic council was a step in the right direction, despite the fact that edicts governing basic human behaviors and Sharia-based laws were being declared on a weekly basis. The banning of public showing of movies, and Khat chewing, not to mention simply playing a radio, were punishable offences.

Say what you will about Sharia law but this was enough to prompt Somalia’s powerful neighbor, Ethiopia, to invade to toss these Islamists and their supporters out of power. This took cities like Baidoa and Mogadishu that already had enough violence and chaos and misery, and turned them into full on battlefields, where of course it was the civilians who suffered the most. Like so many forces before them, Ethiopia is now bogged down there following an initial withdrawal and then a quick return to support an outgunned interim government that within weeks of being “returned to power” was once again under attack. If this sounds complicated it hasn’t even begun to bring into play the role the warlords and their affiliate clans play, and the resulting constant, ongoing havoc. When it comes to the deaths of journalists that cover the anarchy, this country is second only to Iraq and it’s not clear where that leaves your camera-yielding white tourist other than dead.

Chronic Khat chewing leaves young, bored, gunmen with very twitchy trigger fingers and enough stimulation to jump into the back of a heavily armed Toyota Hi-Lux, ready to settle some perceived score with some begrudged party. If you plan a visit it is a very good idea to hire this type of crew as a preemptive measure to protect you from the very real threat of kidnapping by the very same people you’re hiring.

And it’s not just on land that you stand a chance of an early demise either: Rampant piracy has led to attacks, kidnapping and hostage taking on the high seas, and any ship or vessel entering Somali waters runs this terrifying gauntlet. The increase in the past year has been dramatic and worrisome for all involved. Relief agencies, the UN and Somalia’s citizens all depend on the goods and services that the maritime trade provides. Without safe, open shipping routes, a large segment of the population faces the prospect of starvation.

Without question the south of the country is vastly worse than the northern end, which has for the past several years been trying to divorce itself from its misbehaving brethren to the south by declaring itself the independent de facto states of Puntland and Somaliland. This is done to attempt on an international level to separate the north from the anarchy and violence in the south, and thus engender stability and a better way of life for the northern citizens. So yes it could be worse for Somalia – it could break off the continent and fall into the sea. Expect the grind to continue at its usual steady pace.

Lebanon

For a place with such a perfect Mediterranean location; wonderful historical context; exceeding geological beauty and refined social culture, it sure does have a load of worries. It’s really difficult to choose just where to start with this small plot of land with big problems, but betting people have been talking for some time now about the “if’s” and “when’s” of the next dust up between Hizbollah and Israel. This valid concern might be the top reason any vacation you plan here might most be affected. The last conflict in 2006 left no less than 3 billion US dollars in damage to Beirut alone, and a similar action could be your fastest ticket to ride along with the US marines or the French navy during the next mandatory evacuation, thus placing a sizable kink in your holiday plans of sunbathing, drinking fine wine and café dining. Couple this with an ongoing and seemingly systematic eradication via car bombs of higher echelon Lebanese politicians and civil leaders, and those who tend to be in the same area with them. Syria usually takes the blame here, so it’s easy to see that Lebanon has some serious neighbor issues.

No matter where you go in Lebanon, you will find the potential for trouble for a variety of different reasons. In the south, Hizbollah’s strong hold, you’ll find minefields, some old some new; you’ll find the remnants of cluster bombs that Israel dropped in the area during 2006; and you’ll need to contend with the potential for Israeli artillery to occasionally drop in, or over-flights from their jets that like to buzz Damascus and the disputed Golan, occasionally dropping explosives. But even in the north, on the outskirts of Tripoli, the Lebanese army has spent a great deal of time this past year fighting Palestinian Islamic militants (Fatah-al-Islam), who had entrenched themselves in some refugee camps. Outside of the potential for Pakistan to explode into an orgy of election inspired violence, to many this small country might perhaps have the greatest chance in 2008 to become, once again for all but the most fool hardy of travelers, a “No go” destination.

Pakistan

The nemesis of India just seems to go from bad to worse and this year was a particularly exciting one for them. With tribal problems, Islamist problems, territorial problems, sovereignty problems, election problems, foreign relation problems and the imposition of martial law, it’s a wonder they’re not getting a complex. Of course, the big bang this year (or at least the one that the media bothered reporting) was the public and very messy attempted assassination of opposition leader and former Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto. With a few hundred casualties, it gave us a good reason to stay away from political rallies in this volatile country. The incumbent PM also had at least one attempt on his life, too. Of course, with the amount of weapons floating around the country (largely thanks to the manufacturing production lines in the North West Frontier Province) combined with a peculiar predisposition to settling differences with said weaponry, it’s little wonder that the politicians of the country are constantly dodging the pointy end of them. Speaking of NWFP, the state continues to stew in a molasses of violent tribal retribution and anti-government sentiment with continued rumors that this is the current hiding place of the big kahuna himself – Osama Bin Laden. The other big problem, of course, is there are the twenty or so proxy Islamist groups that keep popping up in Kashmir to fight the evil secularists in India, though how much control the central government has over them is up for argument.

The lid is beginning to loosen on this powder keg which gives Pakistan a firm spot in our top 10 and a very likely position in next year’s too unless something drastic happens and it changes for the better. With the sheer scope of problems in the country, that is pretty unlikely.

Sudan

The hilarity just continues in Africa, with Sudan getting another well deserved place on the list. Notwithstanding the fact that it appears to be a country with a sizeable population of idiots that believe a teddy bear’s name is reason enough to execute an old lady, Sudan is also mired in as complex tribal and political hostilities as you’ll find anywhere on the continent.

As one of the world’s longest running conflicts and the resistance of the central government to any meaningful actions that could lead to a lull in the hostilities, it’s difficult to see an end to it. With 200k Darfurians already dead and another four million displaced or relying on aid, the counter just keeps ticking. The 2006 Eastern Sudan Peace Agreement didn’t have a lot of support on the ground and resistance of the central government to the deployment of a UN peace keeping force means any real muscle that could help stop the slaughter remains impotent. Clashes between the Government and the SPLM also leaves the Comprehensive Peace Agreement on the verge of collapse with the rebels withdrawn from the Government of National Unity.

African Union troops currently deployed seem to be remarkably ineffectual and are coming under direct attack. Seven aid workers were killed in October alone and major aid organisations (which supply millions of people with their only access to food and water) starting to contemplate withdrawing. Cross border incursions by the government armed militias are also destabilising neighbouring Chad and having an effect on CAR.

As if all this isn’t enough, Sudan Arab militias have struck up a lucrative deal with those humanitarian angels, the Chinese, in which oil is traded for weapons and military training. Nations with a shred of decency walked away from an oil deal with Sudan, but Chinese oil companies saw an opportunity and now two billion US Dollars’ worth of oil each year is shipped out and fundamentalist Arabs draw a handsome salary. With untapped oil fields in the north/south borderlands, it seems only a matter of time before the shaky peace deal falls apart and if the north goes to war against the south again, Darfur will pale in comparison.

Even with all of this going on, Sudanese President Omer al-Bashir had the temerity to term 2007 “the year of peace” proving once again that politicians always have their hand firmly on the pulse of reality. The only question remaining now is whether the international community will have the strength of purpose to pursue a peace operation that guarantees security to civilians now that it is glaringly obvious to everyone that a short or even medium term political solution is a pipe-dream. We’re not holding our breath.

Myanmar

You know things aren’t going great for you as a government when you need to start killing and torturing monks. Now that’s some bad karma. But that’s what happened this year in our favourite South East Asian golden land when the monks started backing up a fairly sizable portion of the general population in anti-government rallies and found themselves on the wrong side of the ruling junta. Now, Myanmar has had its own fairly constant and intense teething problems with pesky things like elections and opposition parties, but beating up on monks was a new low and there were even reports that the soldiers were targeting anyone with a camera in order to stop the story getting to the outside world. Needless to say, the opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi remains under house arrest (the only Nobel Peace Prize winner with such a distinction) and journalists have been warned about reporting on the problems with internet access being cut off completely for a time and then restored intermittently.

Of course, we can’t really forget the ongoing insurgency in the country or the massive amount of heroin that comes out of the place, or the 300,000 odd refugees along Myanmar’s various borders. Really, Myanmar has it all!

Now, entering as a tourist, it might seem like a pretty nice place. This is largely due to the fact that the government forced thousands of citizens into forced labour to pretty up the main tourist destinations and thus encourage tourism, which is responsible for a fair amount of the country’s hard currency. The International Labour Organisation stated that it would be seeking to prosecute the leaders of the government for crimes against humanity as a result. With the likelihood of such great national management continuing there is a fair chance that we can expect to see more fun in Myanmar in the coming months and years.

Democratic Republic of Congo

Welcome to the darkest heart…. well one of them anyway. DRC is one of those nightmare places that usually ends up as the background of a flippant Hollywood attempt at depth and insight. Unfortunately for the locals it is all too real.

This year, DRC’s main claim to fame is their love of the child soldier. According to several charities, who still operate in the country, the eastern DRC has seen some of the worst situations for children in recent times (not to mention the displacement of up to 800,000 people). Kids as young as 10 years old are being draughted by both sides of the conflict as front line soldiers, not to mention porters and sex slaves. One exceptionally troubling element of this is that the government (and UN) backed soldiers have also been accused of recruiting children to their cause during an offensive against rebel general, Laurent Nkunda. Spotting the good guy is getting increasingly difficult.

Of course, to add to the lovely ambiance of DRC was a UN report in July by the United Nations Human Rights Council on violence against women that characterised the problem as “extreme” and “pervasive” with local authorities doing little to stem the problem. According to the report, “In numerous cases, male relatives are forced at gun point to rape their own daughters, mothers or sisters.” As for who to blame for the brutality, according to the report, it is “committed by non-state armed groups, the Armed Forces of the DRC, the National Congolese Police, and increasingly also by civilians”. That basically means there’s nowhere to hide. How nice!

Chad

When the UNHCR warns that genocide may well occur in your country, it’s probably best to sit up and take notice. Well, that is unless you live in Chad where it’s just another day at the slaughter house. The country seems to have more problems than Paris Hilton and Pete Doherty’s love child and things certainly ain’t getting any better.

With several hundred thousand Darfurian refugees on the border with Sudan, Chad is now forced to endure constant cross border incursions by the Sudanese armed Janjaweed militia, leading to pretty tense relations between the governments, not to mention the people at the coal face. Combined with another 50,000 or so refugees along the border with CAR, who have fled the fighting there, and 140,000 internally displaced persons of their own, it’s fair to say room is getting a little tight at the inn.

Things couldn’t possibly be complete without a homegrown insurgency, too, and Chad does not disappoint. The Chadian Movement for Justice and Democracy keeps the government on their toes from the north of the country and at least a couple of other groups keep things tense. Banditry is also pretty rife so be sure to keep your iPod at an extended distance from your person so that the thieves don’t take your arm or head too when they steal it.

Sri Lanka

The country seemed to be united at the time of the cricket world cup with a multi-ethnic team making the finals of the event. Unfortunately, the Tamil rebels put a slight damper on that unity when they started dropping bombs at the exact time the rest of the country, including the army, was watching the Sri Lankan team play in the finals. But that’s how things roll in Colombo, where the bombs just keep coming. Sri Lanka lost the cricket and the peace but won a spot on our most coveted of lists.

Unfortunately, 2007 was another less than stellar year for peace on the island, with the Tamil Tigers finding a way to launch their own air raids against various facilities controlled by the central government, and the government finding ways to marginalise human rights groups, who questions their tactics against the rebels. In reality, both sides attracted condemnation for their human rights abuses, but who’s keeping count anyway? Extra judicial killings, “disappearances” and arbitrary arrests under terrorism laws are all part of the local festivities. With a quarter million people displaced and thousands dead, it can only get better… or not.

The Tamil Tigers have taken up a fine tradition from other parts of the world in kidnap for profit, and some pro-government militias have started to take up the fine tradition of child recruitment for military adventures. Fun!

With no viable political solution being discussed, we can only look forward to the party going on. Luckily, the cricket world cup only rocks around every four years.

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And so as the new year unfolds before us, keep a mental note of this list of unsavoury spots and book yourself a nice skiing holiday in Austria instead; or a beach holiday in the Bahamas; or a barbeque at Ayers Rock. And if you simply can’t ignore that irresistible urge that’s drawing you to a night’s partying at the Hard Rock Café, Mogadishu, then don’t say we didn’t warn you.

From all at Polo’s Bastards – Go well.

Authors – Rob Wood, Steve Strommer and Lee Ridley.
Photography – Michael Cordoni, Lee Ridley, Sean Rorison, Vince Gainey.

A summary of the world’s worst travel dstinations of 2005, as chosen by Polo’s Bastards.

2005 has been another bumper year for finding adventurous places to travel. There was certainly no shortage of natural disasters and the seemingly never-ending supply of wars and conflict has made certain parts of the world a miserable place for many unfortunate souls. It comes as little surprise that the top ten worst destinations fall into just two continents – Asia and Africa. In truth, we could easily find ten countries in Africa alone that could warrant being on this list, but in the interest of fairness, we’ve nominated just four. Also, it would be true to say that the Americas escaped by the skin of its teeth, with Colombia being the most probable “number 11”. Whether you agree with us or not, this is Polo’s Bastards’ top ten list of 2005’s worst destinations:

Iraqi National Guard. Photo by Lee Ridley

Iraq
– was there ever really any doubt that Iraq was going to take out the number one spot? Anyone who ventures into the Sunni Triangle seems to be taking their life in their own hands, and other areas of the country still don’t seem to be a picnic. The Kurdish autonomous north of the country is, perhaps, a little less dicey for the adventure traveler, and is a place where your guard can be dropped a bit as you walk the dusty streets talking to the locals about their hope for a better future. Nevertheless, the sad thing about this country is overall it’s a pretty nasty place to be caught with your pants down and we can’t see it leaving the number one spot any time soon. It will almost certainly be years, if not decades, before Iraq even leaves the top ten.

Somalia – This ugly conflict became mainstream viewing when the Ridley Scott film Black Hawk Down hit the shelves in Blockbuster Videos. Without a central government since 1991, the ongoing power struggle between the country’s warlords has turned the horn of Africa into a lawless wasteland, where the only rule is the rule of the gun. Journalists and travelers can fly into Mogadishu easily enough, but if they want to set foot outside the airport they are strongly advised to hire their own private, heavily armed guards. Failure to do so could seriously jeopardize the already slim chance of surviving the day intact. Daily rates for an armed escort range from a couple of hundred bucks if staying within the Mog, and several hundred bucks if going up-country, making Somalia an expensive as well as dangerous place to spend time.

Afghanistan – Following the promise of good times to come, the country once again seems to be receding back into the contentious ranks of the world’s most dangerous places. It culminated this year in the deaths of two Japanese school teachers who ventured into the wild southern regions of the country around Kandahar. By all accounts, many areas of Afghanistan are falling back under the sway of extremists, and Kabul itself is even experiencing its own fair share of terror attacks – enough to make all but the hardiest of travelers a little wary. Whether you’re in search of the fabled Minaret of Jam, the pastoralist Kuchi shepherds, or your latest bulk opium order, Afghanistan has a wealth of travel experiences just waiting for the foreign visitor. So long as they’re aware that Taliban-sponsored suicide bombs, IEDs and unexploded ordnance all list among the country’s attractions.

Warning Unexploded Ordnance. Afghanistan. Photo by Dan Quinton

Thailand – OK, so Thailand is a great tourist Mecca and it’s not exactly what we would normally call
‘dangerous,’ but this year it gets a spot on the list because of the Tsunami. The Tsunami was on Boxing Day, 2004 but the effects were mainly felt in 2005, with the extent of the damage coming to light up to several months after the event in some areas. The cleanup is still going on and bodies are still being found a year later. This, along with the ongoing hostilities between the government and the restive Islamic militants in the southern provinces, is putting a lot of doubt into prospective tourists’ minds, causing them to look towards alternative shores for their annual hols. Until these concerns disappear, this wonderful country will continue to struggle as a result of the depleted supply of tourist dollars.

Sudan – This one is also gearing up to be a permanent resident on any top 10 list of worst destinations. With the ongoing tensions between the government and rebel groups, as well as the government backed (or at least not stopped) genocide, any areas outside the capital are looking shaky for travelers. In the beleaguered western region of Darfur, murder and rape is commonplace as people cower in the IDP camps, fearful of setting foot outside in search of wood to make cooking fires, lest they encounter the murderous Janjaweed militia. In the northeast of the country, the marginalized Beja people are also dissatisfied with their lot and, led by the Beja Congress, are uprising against the central government. Travel permits are required to head into this region, and Khartoum simply isn’t issuing them. Peace has allegedly finally come to the south of the country, thanks to the tireless efforts of recently deceased John Garang. However, the cross-border activities of the Ugandan Lords Resistance Army in the far south, close to the town of Juba, means that the shit could hit the fan at anytime, with little or no warning.

Janjaweed. Darfur. Photo by Vicent Gainey

Chechnya
– It doesn’t get too many travelers at the best of times but even journalists fear to go to this former Soviet state. The insurgency is in full swing and the school hostage drama at Beslan shows just how far they are willing to go. Even if you did manage to reach the capital, Grozny, with your life intact, it’s unlikely that you’d find a hotel to stay in, as the city lies mostly in ruins, following the Russians’ capture of the city in 2001. We don’t imagine that Club Med has too many plans in the near future for this place.

Indonesia – Now this country isn’t dangerous per se, but there are so many elements of danger that it gets a spot on the list for the worst destinations of 2005, from the second Bali Bombing incident to the Tsunami. Indonesia is also home to the insurgent movements in Aceh and West Irian, neither of which are getting enough coverage in the press and both of which are extremely difficult for travelers (especially journalists) to get to. Killings and suppression of the media are an almost daily occurrence.

The Palestinian Territories – Despite the ongoing efforts of the international community, the Palestinian territories seem to sway only between bad and terrible as a place to travel. Just last week two foreign nationals, there to help educate children, were kidnapped by insurgents and later released. Foreign aid workers report being beaten by settlers. The military controls population movement and curfews are often enforced. It’s probably not on Paris Hilton’s list of places to visit.

Uganda – For some eighteen years now, the Lords Resistance Army, fighting the Ugandan government in the far north of the country, have made the region a no-go area for all but the most determined of travelers. With a reputation of being among the most evil, murderous gang of cold-blooded killers on the planet, the LRA’s practice of child abduction for the purpose of turning children into soldiers is deplorable enough. Forcing those same children to kill and mutilate their own family members as part of the indoctrination transcends most people’s idea of unspeakable horror. To journey into this area along the border with southern Sudan, truly is to journey into the heart of darkness.

Aftermath of the Tsunami. Sri Lanka. Photo by Richard Everingham.

Niger
– Last, but by no means least, Niger, rated as the world’s second poorest country, takes number ten in Polo’s Bastards’ worst destinations of 2005. The famine stricken south of the country has already claimed countless lives through malnutrition, and as the year draws to a close, official figures put some 30,000 children at risk of an unsavory demise unless food aid arrives very soon. For the aid-workers, journalists and casual travelers, the horrors of seeing starving children is just a fly-drive away, as the worst affected areas of Niger are easily accessible along the length of the country’s southern highway that runs between the capital, Niamey, and Lake Chad to the east.

…So here’s to whatever lies ahead in 2006. No doubt continuous headlines will tell of conflict, disaster and despair. And we will just strap on our desert boots, sling a small pack on our back and camera on our shoulder, and go and see for ourselves. I suspect that the list above will be largely unaltered this time next year, with perhaps just a couple of changes. The sabre rattling between Ethiopia and Eritrea is reaching fever pitch, so don’t be surprised if both countries are adorning our pages sometime soon. Also, as Ahmedinejad furthers his plans for nuclear development in Iran, the US are gonna get real itchy, meaning the Middle East will remain just about the tensest place anyone could wish to be. On top of that, earthquakes, wild-fires, tsunamis and El Niño are sure to make life a misery for countless many. Happy new year.

Author – Rob Wood and Lee Ridley

Strabo at the time of Jesus mentions 26, already ancient, Albani tribes in the Caucasus that, by linguistic argument, included the Chechens (and Ingush). Most of the 55 ethnic groups in the Caucasus mountainous region between the Black and Caspian seas speak unique Caucasian languages. Chechen is a Northeast Caucasian language called Veinakh, meaning ‘our people’. Language, people, culture and religion are absolutely different from Russian.

Russia, since well before the 16th century’s Tsar Ivan Grozny (same name as the city, meaning ‘Terrible’) regarded Caucasus as a buffer between the then Ottoman Turkey, and Persia. As part of the long-advancing Russian fortified line, Grozny was founded as a fortress in 1818. During the 1800 – 1864 Russian subjugation of the Caucasus, Daghestani and Chechen Mountaineers resisted though outnumbered 100 to 1, notably under Daghestani – Avar Imam Shamil, from 1831 to his honourable surrender in 1859. That period was followed by many seeking exile in Ottoman lands.

Stories of the war were famously recorded by Tolstoy and Lermontov, who were stationed in Grozny.

In 1823 oil was found in Grozny but not exploited industrially until 1893 when the train line was built.

The Chechen Soviet Autonomous Republic was imposed in 1922 and then changed to Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Republic (ASSR) in 1934. In 1937 14,000 Chechens were purged, and in 1944 Beria and Stalin liquidated the ASSR and deported 390,000 Chechens and 90,000 Ingush, on the pretext of collaboration with Nazis, in spite of 40,000 Chechens fighting with distinction in the Red Army. 20% of those deportees died in frozen cattle trucks on the journey to Siberia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. In total, 200,000 Chechens and 30,000 Ingush had died in harsh exile by 1957, when Krushchev restored the Chechen-Ingush ASSR. In 1952 316,000 Chechens were registered in Central Asia.

Grozny had become the 2nd oil refinery centre in the USSR by 1989, when its population was 400,000, of whom only 1/3 was Chechen. There were 294,000 Russians in Chechen-Ingush ASSR. In the 1989 census there were near 1 million Chechens counted in the USSR, of which 3/4s were in Chechen-Ingush ASSR.

The break-up of Soviet power saw Djokar Dudayev democratically elected president in 1991 for Chechen independence, which was blocked by Russia. Russians left Chechnya and by 1993 the population of Grozny was 118,000.
Between December 1994 and August 1996, the 1st Russian war was waged on Chechnya, which resulted in extensive destruction. Dudayev was killed in April 1996 and Maskhadov made a peace agreement with Lebed-Yeltsin in September of the same year, which the Russians, incidentally, never implemented. For example, they failed to rebuild Grozny, which had suffered worse bombardment than Berlin, and an estimated 24 times bombardment of Sarajevo.

Maskhadov was democratically elected president in January 1997.

Though the true numbers of Chechen casualties was not known, Ahmed Zakhaev gave estimates of 200,000 with hundreds of thousands of refugees in Ingushetia, Daghestan and Southern Russia. There were also 15,000 elderly Russians killed in Grozny, leaving only some 30,000 survivors.

The Sept 1999 apartment bombs that former Col. Litvinenko has exposed as agent-provocateur, Stalin-style actions, in addition to warlord Shmail Basayev’s (more below) ill-judged incursion into Daghestan in August, condemned by Maskhadov, were Putin’s pretext for election victory, linked to 2nd war that effectively continues today. June 2000 saw Chechen, Akhmad Kadyrov, appointed by Moscow as administrator of Chechnya – the population of destroyed Grozny varied between 90,000 – 190,000 (rising to 223,000 in 2002).

The nature of war changed in June 2000 with the first suicide bombers in Chechnya, and in July 2002 in Moscow. Always condemned by Maskhadov, responsibility was claimed by Basayev. In Oct 2003 Kadyrov was ‘elected’ president in deeply flawed elections. Putin took the war outside of the Russian Federation, when Yanderbayev, Dudayev’s brief successor before Maskhadov, was murdered in Qatar by two, since convicted, Russian SVR agents in February 2004. In May 2004 Kadyrov was murdered in the Stadium bomb on Victory Day, leaving his savage son in charge of Chechen self-policing. On 8 March 2005 Maskhadov’s corpse was exhibited as a Russian casualty, and the best peace negotiator, who Putin repeatedly refused to talk to, was lost. On 10 March Basayev promptly announced a successor – Abd al-Khalim Saidullayeva, who Zakhaev had said was an an anti-Wahhabi cleric, who had been close to Maskhadov.

Among many other NGOs, Amnesty I, Memorial, Helsinki, HRW, IWPR, US State Department and the UK Home Office CIPU have all reported massive Human Rights abuses, but Europe and US have virtually remained silent. Russia has leadership of G8 this summer with a large conference planned in summer 2006. Will anyone mention what’s going on in Chechnya? More importantly, will they discuss that what’s happening can technically be defined as genocide?

Chechen social history
Chechnya occupies a small diamond-shaped area less than 150km across. The top is plains and the lower part the heartland in the northern Great Caucasian Mountain chain. From antiquity there were volnaya obchestva, similar to & smaller than ancient Greek city-states – polis, ruled by a local council of elders. Similar to the Highlands of Scotland, over 130 clans or teips were recorded in late 19th century with combined clans or tukkhum. In spite of Shamil’s attempts to impose Sharia Islamic law, and in later years moves to impose Tsarist Russian law, the traditional Customary Law system called adat continued – and does today. The worst aspect was blood feud vendettas that were stopped in 1923, but reappeared after the Soviet period.

Sunni Islam spread during the 18th and 19th centuries in a predominantly animist society. Membership of Naqshbandi and Kadyriye Sufi tariqats were inherited within families and clans. Fierce Soviet suppression of Islam from 1928 to 1938 was only eased during Glasnost when c1988 people were permitted to go on Hajj to Mecca. Young men were targeted by well-financed Saudi Wahhabis and converted, which split families because Wahhabis ban sheikhs, shrines and the act of revering ancestors, an essential part of Caucasian Sunni Islam. The independent warlords, such as Basayev, have converted to Wahhabism and claim responsibility for suicide attacks in Russia and Chechnya. My Daghestan academic colleague Dr Magomedkhanov estimated that by 2002, some 25% of young men in Chechnya were Wahhabis, compared to 5% in neighbouring Daghestan.

Parties involved in the Chechen war
It is usually confusing to work out who is responsible for what, in Chechnya, so here are the ‘participants’. On one side, there is the Russian Army, which is making a living by extortion following cleansing operations, black market in arms, drugs & trafficking of people. The Russian FSB, put in by Putin to balance the Army and according to ex-Lt. Col. FSB Litvinenko, likely as corrupt; And the pro-Russian Chechen administration and security personnel.
In the middle are Chechen, Russian and multi-national organised criminal groups.

On the other side are the Maskhadov pro-democratic separatist rebels, such as Zakhaev; the independent Chechen warlords, such as Basayev, who are Wahhabi fundamentalist and, according to President Putin, who seeks to link the war to international terrorism, foreign Islamist and Arab forces. However, only Russian-made arms have ever been found in Chechnya.

Of course, rapid changes in local conditions have given rise to a variety of different alliances, and the organised criminals are often part of most of the above groups. The victims of this war are the civilians in Chechnya, a diminishing number of refugees in Russia and an estimated 15,000 dead and 60,000 – 100,000 wounded Russian military, who have returned to their homes throughout Russia; and of course tens of thousands of brutalised FSB officers who have served 3-6 month tours of duty!

Polo’s Bastards’ Contributor, Vince Gainey has recently returned from a 6 week posting in the middle of the Darfur Crisis in West Sudan with a major international aid agency. Previously, Vince has spent time in The Sudan both in the 80’s and the 90’s, accompanying cross-border aid convoys into northern Ethiopia, following the big famine. He also worked in the western provinces of Kordofan, and in Darfur, on longer-term development programmes and, more recently, has spent time in Southern Sudan, managing a major aid and humanitarian programme.

Here, Vince describes how The Sudan has managed to spiral out of control and into the situation it currently finds itself in. – Editor.

Sudan, quite frankly, is a mess. In fact, it has pretty much always been a mess, but the mire is getting deeper by the day. Having just been on the verge of clambering out of 20 years of conflict in the south, and with a peace agreement within spitting distance, Darfur then erupted. The two issues are not of course unconnected: The SPLA (Sudan People’s Liberation Army) rebels of south Sudan have been fighting the Islamist Government in Khartoum for 20 years in order to achieve greater regional autonomy in the south and a greater share in the wealth of the Sudan as a whole. The oft-vaunted public message about this being a Muslim-Christian conflict, is a gross and inaccurate over simplification of a far more complex conflict.

In October 2002 a cessation of hostilities between Government and SPLA forces was declared and since then the two sides have been edging closer to a comprehensive peace agreement that will give the south a high degree of political autonomy (including exemption from Sharia laws) and, after a proposed 6 year interim period, allow a referendum to give the south the opportunity to opt for total separation from the north.

With peace close in the south, other marginalised peoples of Sudan saw their chance: The peoples of Darfur in the far west have long been isolated from political and economic power in Sudan. This isolation has cost them dear in terms of development and the region shows few signs of having benefited from the oil revenue that has purchased new warplanes, and tanks, and rebuilt the government ministries in Khartoum. Darfur has always been bandit country out on the fringes of society and the law. Much of North Darfur is open desert where Arab nomads have always been the only inhabitants tough enough to survive and, through that toughness, have exercised their own laws and codes far divorced from central government.

West Darfur is the mountain fastness of Jebel Marra, rising to over 10,000 feet above the desert, high and cool, and inhabited by the Fur people (“Dar Fur” means Land of the Fur). South Darfur is savannah country inhabited by farmers of more African extraction, and seasonally by nomads, using the green lands to feed their cattle and camels in the dry season from October to June.

Darfurians have had little opportunity to benefit from the political process to date or from the income flow from Sudan’s increasing oil exports (over 300,000 barrels a day now, and rising). Scattered armed resistance throughout the state crystallised in 2003 into a full armed rebellion against the central government, led by two military factions; the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), the latter having a strong Islamic agenda, being closely aligned to the Islamic Ideologue, Hassan El Turabi, former Eminence Grise of the current government and since 2001, their Bete Noire.

Picture: The relative normality of life in Khartoum; The Friday afternoon ‘Dervish’ dances by the Sufi followers of the Saint Hamed en Nil in Omdurman.

The SLA launched a surprise attack on El Fasher, the state capital of North Darfur in April 2003, and this attack acted as the catalyst for a major government offensive against both rebel movements. The Government, on the verge of ceding much power in the south, were determined that this pattern would not be repeated elsewhere in Sudan, and so cracked down hard on the Darfur rebellion. This crackdown included a full conventional military offensive but also the arming and mobilisation of Arab militias to terrorise the ‘African’ population of Darfur, seen as the backbone of support for the rebellion. This technique has been used extensively in south Sudan in recent years where similar Arab militias known as ‘Murahaleen’ have massacred and driven Nuer and Dinka nomads from their homes in the southern oilfields to clear them for major oil exploitation.

The Government has cynically exploited the rivalries between farmers and herders (familiar across the world where these lifestyles clash) to arm the Arab herders and use them as a proxy army against the farmers, seen as the main supporters of the rebel movements. The Arab militias have come to be known to the world as ‘Janjaweed’, a word that means bandit or outlaw. This is a serious misnomer though, as all Arabs seen on horses or camels have been tagged Janjaweed when they are simply the traditional nomads of this region. All the peoples of Darfur are Sahelian or Saharan people where African and Arab have become mixed, blended and confused. At face value there is little to distinguish a so-called “Arab” or “African”. Such distinction is more a state of mind than anything overtly physical. All the peoples of Darfur are Muslim; there is no religious element to this conflict.

Such has been the success of this tactic that whole regions of Darfur are now effectively emptied. The villages are burnt, the fields abandoned and the people driven into vast camps for the internally [eternally? - Editor.] displaced. Many have died, perhaps 50,000, though figures are unreliable and up to a million are in the camps, either inside Darfur or across the border in Chad. Food production in Darfur has hence, ground to a halt. It is now the middle of this year’s rainy season, and with the farmers off the land, there is no prospect for resuming production for at least another year into the 2005 rainy season, if security permits. The crisis is therefore actually only just beginning, as the international community must now commit itself to feeding these one million plus displaced people for at least the next year

Despite the rhetoric of the UN, the US Government, the European Union and others, the Government of Sudan has not made significant progress in the last month on bringing the militias under control and protecting their civilian population. Attacks still happen, militias still terrorise the population outside the camps and women are still being raped in large numbers when they step out of the relative safety of the camps to collect fuelwood and water. The militias now are a law unto themselves. Darfur is wild country where there was always little government control. Now that the tiger has been given its teeth there is little anyone can do to bring it back under control, even if the Government seriously wanted to.

Author: Vincent Gainey

Route six, Iraq – AKA “MSR Topeka” (Main Supply Route Topeka), as named by the UK coalition forces, is a long, worn, and neglected jugular through the heart of Shia Iraq, running roughly south and east from Baghdad to Basrah – the second city. It winds its way through 260 miles in a slow dance, mirroring the route of the Tigris River, and sometimes too close for comfort to the political and physical border of the foothills of Iran.

I’m in Qurnah, the supposed site of the Garden of Eden, a smallish market town, nestling at the great confluence of the two mighty rivers that make up the boundaries of ancient Mesopotamia – the Tigris from the north and the Euphrates from the west. Here they form the Shatt-al-Arab, which sleepily washes down through the balmy port of Basrah, over the sunken wrecks of warships, and eventually eddies into the Persian Gulf.

Route six runs through the legendary marshlands of the Madan, the lost tribes of Iraq -The tragic “Marsh Arabs”. Saddam Hussein’s legacy for most people in Iraq is the ongoing war of attrition, between Iraqi and westerner and foreign fighter; between Shia and Sunni; His legacy here, in places like Qurnah, is the absolute destruction of a whole system of living.

When he drained the marshes because he could not tame the Madan; ancient tribes such as The Fartus, The Feraigat and The Shagambeh, Saddam turned a once bustling and fertile ecosystem into a dustbowl. And when he fought a futile war against Iran for eight years, the area suffered even more. Today, the ‘Marshland’ that used to stretch for ninety miles, from Amarah down to just north of Basrah, is a barren desert for the most part. Hulks of tanks and other military hardware lie rusting in the disintegrating wadis and dry canal beds.

Why am I here? Well, parallel to route six and accessed by it, is a brand spanking new 400kV power line that carries electricity from the Al Hartha power station in Basrah, north 260 miles to where it’s desperately needed in Baghdad.

I first came to Iraq back in October 2003 as part of the security element for TFRIE (Task Force Restore Iraq Electricity). This is an organisation of multinational companies that make up part of the infrastructure re-building programme, initially under the control of the, now defunct, CPA (Coalition Provisional Authority). TFRIE along with other entities, such as TFRIO (Oil), were tasked with quietly assisting Iraq in getting back off its knees, and bringing amenities to areas which had long done without or with very little; It has been a complete success.

The pylon line was non-existent in large sections: stolen, blown up, or pulled down, so engineering and construction companies from the US, UK, India, Turkey and Iraq were brought together and constructed the line pretty much from scratch.

I was there as part of the team ensuring the safety of the people involved and to create a local Iraqi guard force to ensure it stayed up once the multinationals had finished the task.

Picture Right – ‘Memorial of Bahjat Yusuf’ The memorial to the young Badr martyr in the main street of Qurnah. Bahjat was a militia man who hid out with the Madan when the repression of the southern Shia was in full swing in 1993. One day he entered Qurnah with a friend and attacked the Ba’ath Party offices, heavily defended by government police. He managed to kill eleven Ba’athists before he himself was gunned down.

After many setbacks, many of which stemmed from the culture clashes and varying work ethics among the foreign companies, phase 1 of the task was completed on schedule in February 2004. George W. Bush announced that the line was energised and much backslapping went on between the parties involved.

I left the area for a three-month spell in Nasiriyah and returned to Qurnah in August 2004. The line has stayed intact, apart from one pylon, which was pulled down near Kut as a result of a tribal dispute. The pylon was swiftly reinstated.

I’m out and about most days with our team of Iraqis and multinationals. We spend our time motoring along route six, meeting all kinds of people as we go about our business of safeguarding ‘the line’.

To my knowledge we are unique among foreign contractors: Most live in cabins inside compounds, or inside plush hotels in Baghdad’s Green zone; Their only interaction with Iraqis is on the roads, as the cut them up in their huge, armoured Fords and GMC’s. We, however, employ many locals; over 90% of our company here is made up of local people.

We live among the people in Qurnah, housed in one of our Sheikhs’ properties. We eat local food and enjoy the company of our Iraqi hosts; it is a great way to earn a living; Baghdad and Fallujah may as well be a million miles away.

Picture Above – ‘Mohammed Bahkr al Hakim’ A mural depicting Mohammed Bahkr al Hakim in Qurnah. The leading figure of the Shia uprising against Saddam’s regime in 1993. Bahkr hid out in the remnants of the Marshes with his Badr Militia after the uprising was brutally crushed.He was murdered on 29 August 2003 outside the Imam Ali mosque in Najaf. A massive 750kg car bomb killed him and 200 followers. Moqtada al Sadr is the prime suspect in his murder and the subject of an arrest warrant. Bahkr was closely aligned to Grand Ayatollah al Sistani, the leader of the moderate majority of Shi’ite Iraq. In an odd twist of fate many of these murals are daubed, very artistically, over portraits of Saddam Hussein.

Our local guards on the pylons are paid by their respective Sheikhs, who we pay in bulk for this purpose.

Picture: Right – ‘Pylon Guard, Qurnah’ – The front line against the “Ali Babas” – the ubiquitous Iraqi term for robbers and thieves. There are thousands of armed criminals in post war Iraq.Some of our Shiekhs may have dabbled in this enterprise in the past. But, as the saying goes – set a thief to catch a thief!

Because each section of the line runs through a different tribal area, our company employed a Sheikh Liaison team which went out meeting and greeting the people of the fiercely tribal Madan, and Fallah (non Madan, village Arabs). You want guards on the line…you employ the Sheikhs’ men: The pylons, otherwise would not last 24 hours.

The line will eventually be handed over to the EPSS (Electricity Police), although the Sheikhs have threatened to pull the pylons down if these “outsiders” replace our company. Madan folk have a healthy distrust of official bodies, and with good reason considering the Saddam regime. The EPSS are seen as corrupt and not to be trusted, so we (the company, that is) could be here for a very long time.

The locals are great – warm, friendly and very hardy.

When we first came out onto the line, people were suspicious; very few foreigners have been here lately. For some of the more remote areas the last westerners to trundle by in their strange vehicles could well have been the British Expeditionary Force of WW1, in the presence of the legendary T.E. Lawrence.

But once people became used to our 4×4s, we were waved at and offered tea and such. Kids still run after us shouting “Ar teeny my, Mistah!” – “Give me water, Mister”. The boys are loud and cocky, the girls shy but just as curious.

Islam caused the women of the area to scurry away from us at first, but now they are comfortable that we pose no threat to them or their Muslim rules regarding such contact. A shy smile and a quick wave show us just how welcome we have become here.

By and by it is a happy environment, an area that has seen so much tragedy over the years has retained its dignity and human warmth.

There have been troubles – Amarah remains a dangerous town, out of bounds to civilian contractors and a stronghold of Muqtada-al-Sadr’s Mehdi Army.

Qurnah however, retains its allegiance to the murdered Mohammed Bahkr-al-Hakim, the great upstart to Saddam and the subject of the arrest warrant of Sadr, who it is alleged ordered the death of this moderate Shia cleric.
Hence the relative safety we, the foreigners, enjoy in Qurnah.

Majarr-al-Kabir is the old Madan town where six British Royal Military Policemen were slain by the mob last year. Many of the people we have met expressed shame at this tragedy, although they have now moved on from this.

The future looks decidedly brighter in this forgotten corner of Iraq. It is a place where one feels a great link to the tragedies of the past. The Madan, the British, the Turks have all brushed with sorrow in this desolate area. It has escaped the ravages of the rest of the country during this latest tragic episode of Iraq. I hope it can avoid the strife for a lot longer, but that may not be easy.

I feel privileged to be here now. I have a job that is part of something that is making a difference, even if it is to only understand a bit more about our different cultures. I have a duty to see it out, whatever happens.

Author – Billy Kaye

I’ve never understood to what to attribute the prevalence of gold-capped teeth in Northeastern Nicaragua. For some, it seems like a fashion statement. For others, it seems the last line of defense against the total loss of dental capacity, a life restricted to mashed cassava and gummable beans. The truck driver was somewhere in the middle, blings in the grill, a sweaty unshaven man clad in a dust covered Hawaiian shirt.

Every year when the local roads deteriorate to vast stretches of muddy, cratered waste, the local government wakes up from their bathtub-rum addled haze and pitches a bitch against their treatment by Managua’s elite. I’ve been in Puerto Cabezas, the “urban” center of the Northeastern Atlantic region of Nicaragua for better part of two months, trying to gather together the materials needed to finish the construction of the region’s fourth (to be) operating room. But in response to the absolute dilapidation of the road connecting Puerto to the outlying villages and the Western coast, a blockade has been instituted, shutting off the city from the outside world.

So to pass the time while the supplies sit somewhere between here and Managua, I decide to put on my journo boots and put together a decent piece on the situation. I head toward the blockade on the outskirts of town, a pathetic cluster of punished school busses arranged in a wavy V pattern, with shirtless Miskito Indian men controlling the influx/efflux of all traffic with a piece of rope.
For a blockade, it seems a little on the weak side of things. No guns. Definitely no tanks. Not even coils of concentration camp razor wire or tire spikes. Just a rope and some dirty school buses.
I find the Jeffe of the group and get into the clichéd list of questions. Why the blockade? What is your group called? What are your demands? Don’t you think that you guys would be taken a little more seriously if you wore red bandanas on your face, draped bullets across your chest, and gave yourself an acronym?
He explains that the blockade has been established by a all those affected by the practically impassible conditions of the road. Bus drivers, truck drivers, local merchants, and the regional government. They are shutting down the city until the Central

Government makes a concrete promise to fix the “highway.” He explains that the trip from Managua– a 340 mile expanse of practically nothing– is taking drivers between 8 and 12 days. I calculate 8 to 12 days of driving in the states: N.Y to L.A, back to N.Y. with a comfortable stop off in Vegas.
Our conversation attracts a group of truckers that all want to vent their frustration with the road. I ask if there is a close section where they could take me to snap a few pictures. “One kilometer,” they say, “very close.”
I jump in the stripped-out cab of the gold toothed trucker’s rig and head off into Nicaraguan nothingness. The back is piled with empty soda bottles and 7 men who whistle when boxes fall to the mud. After 30 minutes of bumping down the road, waving around my shiny new mini dv cam and mini disc I wonder if something was lost in the translation of “very close.” I ask the trucker.
“We’re close, right? How much farther?”

“Yes, we’re very close. Just two and a half hours.”

“Um…senior, I cant go two and a half hours.”

“But you must see how bad it gets. Its beautiful.”

I decided that that’s ok, because I have a ride back.

“You are going back, right?”

“No. No. I’m going to Managua.”

Shit.

Its a hot day, soon to be turning to a long evening. With three hours of daylight left before the nighttime swarm of Mosquitoes, something fierce that comes out of the grassy swamps, I decided to make a rapid executive decision.

After thirty minutes of contemplating my situation, seeing the gringo laden with expensive cameras, thinking about the sweaty truckers and thirsty mosquitoes, having that vulnerable “what the crap did I get myself into” feeling, and ultimately hearing the distant twang of dueling banjos as played by mariachis, we come across a particularly bad section of road.
“Here. Perfect, I’ll just snap a few pictures of this and wait for another truck heading back to Puerto.”
“Ok. You can take pictures, but its not safe to wait here. You come with us.”
I take the photos of the truck making its way through knee-deep mud. The truckers insist that I stay with them until another truck comes along. We head off again, all 180 degrees of the wrong way.
It’s thirty more minutes before another truck comes along. It’s the same fashion as the current: shirtless, sweaty trucker chic. My anus shivers.
After ten minutes of drivers haggling, the gold toothed man tells me it’s ok. The passing truck will take me back to Puerto. I jump on the back, nestled between a huge leaking tank of diesel fuel and some bags of strange looking roots. The men stare at me. But I’m happy to be headed in the right direction.

A good twenty minutes pass before the truck makes a horrible noise and comes to a harsh, metal-on-metal stop. The men dismount, and crowd around the undercarriage. I sneak a peek, seeing a mangled, dangling drive train. One of the men asks me if I have any money. I wonder what he’s looking to buy. I tell him no, just cigarettes. He helps himself to all of them.
More waiting, this time relieved by another beaten truck loaded with sand and gravel. I flag them down, and ask them if they’re headed to Puerto. “Yes,” they inform me “after a few more loads of dirt.”
I spend the next hour shoveling sand into the truck, learning about opportunities in the dirt-faming industry of the area. “Its free,” they say. “We just take it and sell it.”
I make it back to Puerto right as the sun dives behind the slash-and-burn clear-cut horizon, knocking a pile of dirt on the highway when I dismount the truck. I push it into a pothole with my foot and smile at the drivers.

Until the central government convinces the people of the Eastern Atlantic region that they really do give a flying fuck at a yucca tree about the laughable road, the city will stay blockaded. Today they closed down the airport, the bank, the pier, and all state government offices that represent the Pacific coast. They want to cease all revenues, including taxes that may reach the government and big business from operations in the area.
With an estimated revenue of $80 million per year leaving this region from fishing, mining, and lumber headed for the pockets of Managua’s few elite, this place defines the word ‘enclave.’ There is no sustainable economy to speak of. The investment in local infrastructure is the bare minimum needed to extract the resources. And with the pipe shut off by the blockade and all of my exits closed, I’m curious how the next few weeks will play out. Right now I’m running out of money. The supplies for the operating room have not arrived, and I don’t think they will. So I’m looking for other ways to pass the time other than playing journalist, and dirt farmer is looking like a much more profitable field.

The spell of Liberation, a narcotic with which the world over dreams of acquiescing their souls, was cast upon Blaine today.

In our convoy we crossed the border under heavy protection and witnessed the Birth of a Society, a City, a Nation; these proud men and women have thrown off the yoke of oppressive imperialistic dictatorships and now see for themselves the glories that the dream of democracy can provide.

There must be special mention for the Women of Blaine. Now that the Women of Blaine are free, they are able to talk amongst one another, buy meat and cheese without fear for worry of retribution. They shall not fear random canings or rape, or be confined to their homes.

They may even wield a weapon if they so choose, the weapons of Glory that can be found all across America, God’s most Blessed country, this great Country.

Its town of Blaine is free.

In my flak jacket and helmet I braved my shaking bones and soiled pants to witness its suddenly Liberated streets. Soldiers across the world, this is what you fight for. This is the gift of Freedom, and a bountiful gift it is indeed.

Twenty one months after my initial meeting with Rugabo, in August 1995, he made international headline news when his body was discovered, shot dead along with an adult female. The motive appeared to be kidnap as the poachers had made off with a baby gorilla, although it was subsequently retrieved a few days later near the Ugandan border and successfully returned to its family. The perpetrators were rounded up and six men were prosecuted and sentenced to between 15 and 20 years in prison. However, the damage had been done and the following years saw what was left of the Rugabo family slowly decline in numbers.

At the end of November, 1996, the national park infrastructure on the Zairean part of the Virunga Volcanoes was destroyed in the civil war and a number of guards killed. The gorillas were not directly affected, but the temporary disappearance of tourism will have seriously impacted any anti-poaching measures that were in place at the time.

Life after Rugabo

At first, following Rugabo’s murder the family scarpered into the surrounding forest and became unapproachable, but after only a few weeks they allowed park rangers close enough for them to be observed again. An ageing female had initially taken on the dominant role and had led the family to safety before submitting leadership to a Blackback male called Lulengo.

Things went well under Lulengo’s leadership until early 1998 when a lone Silverback by the name of Mapua roamed into the fringes of the family’s home range and attacked Lulengo. The confrontation lasted for 15 days and resulted in Mapua successfully splitting off a young adult female and a juvenile. They were followed out of the range a short while later by another female and her baby. In September of the same year, Lulengo’s family were caught in the crossfire of the ongoing military operations that had plagued the region for the previous four years. Two young gorillas were killed, including the one that had been kidnapped as a baby and reintroduced following Rugabo’s death.

By the end of 1998 Lulengo had finally matured into a Silverback but his family numbered only 5 males following the departure of the last remaining female in October of that year. In all of this time, no babies were born.

In February 2002, one of the remaining males, Pilipili had matured into a Silverback and departed the group, taking Karema, an adult Blackback with him. The last report to come from the Virungas, regarding Lulengo’s group says that the two remaining Blackbacks are expected to become solitary animals, thus rendering what remains of the family dysfunctional. In short, Lulengo has fulfilled his duty to ensure the young would grow up.

Group Dynamics

The family history since Rugabo’s death in August 1995 is as follows:

- beginning of September 1995: 23 individuals
- end of September 1995: 17 individuals
- June 1996: 13 individuals
- July 1996: 11 individuals
- December 1998: 5 individuals
- December 2001: 3 individuals
- May 2002: 4 individuals. The fourth gorilla was a solitary animal who joined the family but only stayed for a few weeks before moving on, evidently unimpressed by the shortage in numbers and the total absence of females.

Research shows that against all odds, the population of Mountain Gorillas has grown by 11% since 1989. This was in no small part down to the concerted efforts of the park rangers who continued to carry out their duties even while civil war raged around them.

A war in which over 70 of those rangers lost their lives. In July 2003, the total number of surviving Mountain Gorillas was estimated to be at 672 and some might be optimistic enough to say the future looks bright. But as long as this part of the world is ravaged by corruption, despotism and civil unrest, the future of Gorilla gorilla beringei is likely to be as dark as the continent they live on.