CULTURE AT RISK - ICC at The Hague, Prosecutes Cultural Vandalism

"International Criminal Court brings a cultural vandal to justice" PBS NewsHour 8/22/2016

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SUMMARY:  Four years ago, 16 holy tombs in Timbuktu, dating back to the 14th century, were demolished in an attack by Islamic militants.  In the first-ever war crimes trial for cultural destruction, one of the men involved admitted his guilt and voiced regret at the International Criminal Court.  Jeffrey Brown talks with DePaul University's Patty Gerstenblith for more on the challenges of prosecuting these crimes.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  It's a first for the International Criminal Court at The Hague, a trial dealing with the destruction of cultural heritage.

It's over the deliberate wrecking in 2012 of historic earthen buildings and religious shrines in the West African nation of Mali.

Jeffrey Brown has the story.  It's part of our ongoing series Culture at Risk.

JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour):  Sixty holy tombs dating back to the 14th century, all reduced to rubble in a wave of violence unleashed on Timbuktu by Islamist militants four years ago.

Today, one of those responsible stood in front of the International Criminal Court and admitted his guilt.

AHMAD AL-FAQI AL-MAHDI, Former Islamist militant (through translator):  I regret all the damage that my actions have caused.  I regret what I have caused to my family, my community in Timbuktu, what I have caused my home nation, Mali.

JEFFREY BROWN:  Prosecutors say Ahmad Al Faqi Al Mahdi directed the destruction of nine mausoleums and damage to a mosque.  He'd been recruited to lead a vice squad by a group of Islamist rebels, affiliated with al-Qaida, who seized control of Northern Mali in 2012.

AHMAD AL-FAQI AL-MAHDI (through translator):  I was influenced by a group of deviant people from al-Qaida, and they were able to influence me, to carry me in their evil wave, through actions that affected the whole population.

JEFFREY BROWN:  The rebels were eventually driven out by French troops in 2013.  The heaps of rubble they left behind have since mostly been rebuilt with help from UNESCO.

In recent years, cultural relics across Northern Africa and the Mideast have been targeted by militant groups, most dramatically by the Islamic State at sites including the ancient cities of Palmyra, Syria, and Nimrud in Iraq.  Unlike Mali, those countries are not subject to the jurisdiction of the ICC.

Mahdi, who, in the plea bargain faces 11 years in prison, today called for an end to such acts.

AHMAD AL-FAQI AL-MAHDI (through translator):  I would like to give a piece of advice to Muslims all over the world, not to get involved in the same acts I got involved in, because they are not going to lead to any good to humanity.

WEST AFRICA - Freeing Hostages

"Cameroon, Nigeria join forces to free Boko Haram hostages" PBS NewsHour 2/29/2016

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SUMMARY:  Hundreds of hostages held by the Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram were freed over the weekend after a joint raid by Cameroonian and Nigerian forces.  The raid followed increased U.S. military efforts to cooperate with regional governments against the jihadist group, which has killed more than 20,000 people over the last six years.  Gwen Ifill talks to special correspondent Nick Schifrin for more.

GWEN IFILL (NewsHour):  Over the weekend, several hundred hostages of the Nigerian Islamist group Boko Haram were freed.  It happened during a raid by Nigerian and Cameroonian forces along the border between the two African nations.

The raid comes as the U.S. military has moved to increase cooperation with regional governments to fight the jihadist group.  Boko Haram pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, or ISIS, last year.  According to Amnesty International, the six-year uprising has killed more than 20,000 people.  Another 2.8 million have been forced from their homes in Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger, and Chad.

Boko Haram gained worldwide infamy in 2014 after kidnapping more than 200 schoolgirls from the town of Chibok in Northeastern Nigeria.  That sparked a global campaign to free the girls, with the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls as a social media rallying cry.  The girls’ plight was a contributing factor to then-President Goodluck Jonathan’s election loss last year.

The U.S. has military personnel operating a new drone base in Cameroon to provide intelligence. And there is now discussion of sending American special forces near the front lines of Nigeria’s fight against Boko Haram.  They would advise the military in its operations.

I’m joined now by special correspondent Nick Schifrin.  He’s currently on assignment for us in Nairobi, Kenya, and he reported in-depth from Nigeria for the “NewsHour” last year.

Nick, it’s good to talk to you again.

So, tell us what you know about this new U.S. engagement in Nigeria.

NICK SCHIFRIN (NewsHour):  Yes, Gwen, good evening.

There’s a new recommendation by the U.S. military’s top Africa Command that one to three dozen special operations forces troops be deployed to Northeastern Nigeria.  This is what the military calls an advise-and-assist mission.

They are towards the front lines, but not really on the front lines, advising the Nigerian military in their fight, assisting that fight, things like intelligence and training those troops.  Now, this is just a recommendation right now.  This will have to go through the State Department and the Pentagon and the White House.

But this is what the military in Africa wants.  And it’s what one military official describes as a national progression to a real escalation in what the U.S. has been doing against Boko Haram and helping the Nigerians.  The first step in that is intelligence.  There’s a new drone base in nearby Northern Cameroon.  Predator drones have been supplying the Nigerian and the countries all along the Lake Chad Basin with imagery, with intelligence, so they can go after Boko Haram.

That’s new in the last few months.  And just in the last few years, the U.S. has resumed a training mission in Northwestern Nigeria.  That is for Nigerian special forces far from the front line.  That’s a mission the U.S. has really been trying to resume after it ended about a year ago.

And, Gwen this is in addition to real concerted effort diplomatically to try and help the Nigerians improve things like the police. So, this is a real escalation in the U.S. helping Nigeria and all the countries fighting Boko Haram.

BOOK - Called for Life

"Missionary recounts Ebola fight as both doctor and patient" PBS NewsHour 8/10/2015

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SUMMARY:  Dr. Kent Brantly contracted Ebola while treating patients during last year's epidemic in West Africa.  He was airlifted from Liberia back to the U.S. and received an experimental drug and other treatment at Emory University Hospital.  Brantly joins Hari Sreenivasan to discuss his experience, faith and new book, "Called for Life.”

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Next, the medical doctor who was airlifted from Liberia to the U.S. one year ago this month after he contracted Ebola while treating patients in West Africa.

Kent Brantly and a medical missionary colleague, Nancy Writebol, who was also infected, were treated with the experimental drug ZMapp at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.  Both eventually recovered.

Now Dr. Brantly and his wife, Amber, have written a book about the experience.  He recently sat down with Hari Sreenivasan in our New York studio.

HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour):  So, it’s almost exactly a year ago, after you quarantined yourself.  You have got all the symptoms.  You have got the vomiting, the diarrhea, the bloodshot eyes, things that you have been seeing in patients and treating.  And, for the most part, those patients have been dying.  What’s going through your head?

DR. KENT BRANTLY, Author, “Called for Life”:  Before I received my diagnosis, the main symptoms I had were fever, fatigue, body aches and diarrhea.

When the diarrhea started, that was more mounting evidence that this really is probably Ebola.  But I held on to that hope that it was something else until we had the definitive test result.

HARI SREENIVASAN:  You were the first human to get ZMapp.  Before that, I think it’s been a dozen, maybe 18 monkeys had got it.  What went through your mind in making that decision to say either yourself or your colleague at the time Nancy should take this?

DR. KENT BRANTLY:  Nancy and I actually talked on the phone.  I remember she called me and said, after we had the kind of informed consent discussion with the doctor that was in charge of our care, she said, “Kent, what are you going to do?  Because I’ll probably do whatever you do.”

And I said, “I think I would be willing to receive it.”

But it was — you know, I thought, otherwise, I’m probably going to otherwise, and this may or may not help, but at least I could be a guinea pig and let the world know whether there is any benefit to it or not.

HARI SREENIVASAN:  Once you get this special air ambulance that is arranged, the State Department, lots of people working to try to make this happen, it’s a bit cloak and dagger.  You’re literally taken to the airport at night.  There’s — before this, there are countries that don’t even want you flying over their airspace.

DR. KENT BRANTLY:  It did seem like something from a movie.

ANGOLA - Deadly Corruption

Gee....sounds like a government run Republican style.  For the rich and ONLY the rich.

"In Angola, corruption has deadly consequences for children" PBS NewsHour 6/30/2015

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SUMMARY:  Angola is a country of extreme wealth, thanks to oil and diamonds.  Yet, it has the highest child-mortality rate in the world.  Rampant corruption accounts for a large part of this contradiction.  Nicholas Kristof, an op-ed columnist for The New York Times, joins Gwen Ifill to discuss the country’s disheartening situation.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  The city of Luanda, the capital of Angola, was recently named the most expensive city in the world to live in for expatriates, beating out Tokyo, Hong Kong and Moscow.

But Angola also bears the distinction of being the country with the highest child mortality rate in the world.

The ties that bind the two?  Corruption.

Gwen Ifill picks up the story from there.

GWEN IFILL (NewsHour):  The West African nation of Angola is a land of contrasts, where the gap between the very rich and the desperately poor is so great, that its most vulnerable population, children, are dying every day.

Nicholas Kristof, the op-ed columnist for The New York Times, spent five years trying to get a visa into Angola to see for himself, and he recently returned with stunning video.  He traveled there with video journalist Adam Ellick.

NICHOLAS KRISTOF, Columnist, The New York Times:  This is the deadliest country in the world for kids, and yet the government has just cut the health budget by 30 percent.

At a sunset dance party in the capital, Luanda, you would never know there’s a health crisis here.  That’s the crazy part.  This country is actually filthy rich, flush with oil and diamonds.  There’s so much money here that a one-bedroom apartment downtown can cost $12,000 a month.

The real problem is it’s just spectacularly corrupt.  Officials here spend $50 million a year on luxury cars alone.  Judges here get Jaguars to drive, as kids perish at the highest rate in the world.

EBOLA - Testing Ain't Easy

"Why testing an Ebola vaccine isn’t so easy" PBS NewsHour 6/12/2015

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SUMMARY:  In Sierra Leone and Liberia, where the Ebola epidemic has been a nightmare, the promise of a vaccine offers hope.  Science correspondent Miles O’Brien reports on the challenges of conducting experimental drug trials there and the desperate need to find a fix.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Now the last in our series on Ebola in West Africa — tonight, a look at new research to help stop or slow the next outbreak.  The best hope may ultimately come from a new vaccine.

Science correspondent Miles O’Brien reports, part of his series on Cracking Ebola’s Code.

MILES O’BRIEN (NewsHour):  It’s dark and early in Freetown, Sierra Leone.  A team of pharmacists is in a nondescript government building preparing the day’s supply of an experimental vaccine against Ebola.

The clock starts running when they take the vaccine out of a very deep freeze.  This is likely the coldest spot in the whole country.  The vaccine can only be thawed out right before it is injected, or it will lose its potency, and all of this will be a waste of time, money and hope.

So, right now, timing and temperature are absolutely critical.  And then it happens.

WOMAN:  The power went out.

MILES O’BRIEN:  Another reminder of how hard it is to conduct a high-tech vaccine trial in one of the poorest countries on the planet.  But they are ready.  They have got two backup generators for the building, solar-charged batteries, and, if all else fails, a special container that maintains about 100 degrees below zero Fahrenheit for five days without power.

Pharmacist Morrison Jusu is delivering the vaccine three-and-a-half miles across Freetown.  After a seemingly endless national nightmare, he carries a cooler full of expectations.  He knows much is riding with him.

MORRISON JUSU, STRIVE Trial Research Team:  Some people lost family members.  And some families were essentially wiped out as a result of this thing.  And if this vaccine proves out to be something that prevents such in the future, then it’s — it’s — words cannot describe how much relief that would be to this community.

MILES O’BRIEN:  While Jusu and the vaccine are wending their way, a line is growing outside their destination, Freetown’s Connaught Hospital.

The volunteers start showing up before dawn.  They are health care workers.  This trial is limited to them because they are, by far, the most at risk of contracting Ebola virus disease.  Even though there is no evidence the vaccine poses any real danger, they must weigh the rumors and the uncertainties.

HEALTH - Life After Ebola

"How Ebola can hide in the bodies of survivors" PBS NewsHour 5/11/2015

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SUMMARY:  Liberia was declared Ebola-free this weekend, marking a major milestone in the fight against the epidemic in West Africa, where it killed more than 10,000.  But for survivors, the disease can still wreak serious after-effects.  Judy Woodruff learns more about those health complications from Ebola patient Dr. Ian Crozier, who nearly went blind from the virus after making a narrow escape from death.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  This weekend marked a major milestone in the fight to end the Ebola outbreak.  Liberia was declared Ebola-free after 42 days without a new case.  Many took to the streets to celebrate.

And efforts are under way to rebuild schools, hospitals and other clinics.  The disease has killed more than 10,000 people in West Africa, including 500-plus health care workers.  While the outbreak has slowed considerably, there are new health complications for survivors.

Dr. Ian Crozier is one American health care worker who nearly lost his life while volunteering in Sierra Leone with the World Health Organization.  After contracting the virus, he was evacuated to Atlanta’s Emory University Hospital and he eventually recovered.  Months later, the virus was found in his eye and it nearly blinded him before a series of procedures and treatments.  He is still experiencing a number of other symptoms.

And he joins me now.

And, Dr. Crozier, welcome.  And we’re so glad to see you doing much better.

DR. IAN CROZIER, Ebola Patient/Survivor:  Good afternoon. It’s a pleasure to be here. It’s a pleasure to be anywhere.

(LAUGHTER)

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Tell us, first of all, how are you doing?  It’s, what, been eight months since you were first diagnosed.

DR. IAN CROZIER:  So, I’m doing remarkably well, given what I have been through.

First of all, I’m fortunate to be here and to be alive, and, secondly, to be looking at you through two fairly clear eyes is quite remarkable.  So still struggling with a few symptoms that have been part of my sort of post-Ebola syndrome, but I’m doing much better than I was a few months ago.  Thank you.

WEST AFRICA - Ebola Update

"Getting ‘to zero’ in the fight against Ebola" PBS NewsHour 12/16/2014

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JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Now an update on the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

As of yesterday, the World Health Organization reported nearly 18,500 confirmed cases in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea, with more than 6,800 deaths.  And while a newly published study finds that the number of unreported, and therefore undercounted, cases may not be as high as once feared, health officials say that, to halt the outbreak, every infection must be traced to its source.

Here to talk about that and more is the president of the World Bank Group, Dr. Jim Yong Kim.  He is a medical doctor, and he has just returned from West Africa.

Dr. Kim, thank you for being here.

DR. JIM YONG KIM, President, World Bank Group:  Thank you, Judy.  Thanks for having me.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  So you wrote while you were there that this is the worst epidemic you have ever seen.  Of course, I guess, to many, that wouldn’t be surprising, considering the numbers, but what did you see in West Africa?

DR. JIM YONG KIM:  Well, when I say it’s the worst, I spent a lot of my life fighting AIDS in Africa.  And that was pretty bad, and drug-resistant tuberculosis.

The reason this is so bad is because it is so deadly, and we have to get to zero.  There’s no getting almost to zero.  Each one of the epidemics in the three countries started with a single case.  And what we now know is — especially in this epidemic, is that if you leave a single case untreated and then if you let that transmission continue, it could explode again.

I’m very, very worried about this, because we still don’t have in place plans to get to zero in each of the three countries.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  So what is it going to take?  You wrote — in the column that you wrote the other day, you said it’s not just money, it’s more local control over what’s happening there.

WEST AFRICA - Some Progress on Ebola Fight

"Liberia and Guinea meet key targets in Ebola fight as Sierra Leone lags" PBS NewsHour 12/1/2014

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JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  .....the battle to contain Ebola in West Africa.

The World Health Organization reported today that Liberia and Guinea have met two key targets.  They’re now isolating 70 percent of those infected, and ensuring safe burials for 70 percent of those who have died.  More than 6,900 people have been killed by the virus during this outbreak.

Laurie Garrett of the Council on Foreign Relations is back from a recent trip to Liberia and Sierra Leone.  She has a new e-book called “Ebola:  Story of an Outbreak.”  She is symptom-free, but since she is still being monitored, we spoke with her by Skype from New York.

Laurie Garrett, welcome.

So there is some good news today from the WHO about Guinea and Liberia.  How do you size up the situation there, having just come back?

LAURIE GARRETT, Council on Foreign Relations:  Well, certainly, in Liberia, the American presence has made a difference.  The staggering capacity of the Liberians themselves, the way they have organized, has made a difference.

And, indeed, that epidemic, which was doom and gloom in September, has plummeted.  Now, the danger is to get cocky and think, OK, so, it’s all over, we can all go back to behaving exactly as we did before Ebola emerged.

And, of course, Liberia made that mistake before, back in April, thinking that it had this small intrusion from Guinea, but it was over and everybody could go back to business as usual.  And, of course, we know what happened after that.

Guinea, I have not been in Guinea, but I can say that the data we have so far looks promising.  That’s a country where the president himself has deeply engaged in fighting the epidemic. Sierra Leone is another story.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Well, what about the challenges in Sierra Leone, based on what you saw?

LAURIE GARRETT:  It’s a really tough situation.

Physically, it’s a very tough country, mountainous, hilly, lots of mud, very difficult just to simply get around from place to place.  And in Freetown, in the capital, you have a really massive level of denial.

The kind of social distancing, where everybody in Liberia stays a certain distance away from the next person and washes their hands in bleach, you don’t really see that in Freetown.  You don’t really see that in Sierra Leone.  You don’t have a sense that people are really appropriately fearful.

And then, on top of everything else, they have very complicated burial and funeral rituals that are quite dangerous.  And people are not reporting loved ones that are sick or dead, because they don’t want to be forbidden to practice traditional funereal services.

NIGERIA - Deal With the Devil

Aha... History repeats, 'Peace for our time.'

"Future of abducted Nigerian girls unclear under Boko Haram cease-fire – Part 1" PBS NewsHour 10/17/2014

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  In Nigeria, surprising news came today that a cease-fire has been reached between the government and militant group Boko Haram.

Jeffrey Brown has more.

JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour):  Word of the unexpected truce came from Nigeria’s official news agency.

WOMAN:  The federal government and the Boko Haram sect have agreed to a cease-fire deal.

JEFFREY BROWN:  Similar announcements in the past failed to bear fruit.  But this time, Nigeria’s defense chief ordered government troops to halt all action against the militants.  There was no immediate statement from Boko Haram.

It was also unclear whether a truce would mean the release of 219 schoolgirls abducted in April.  They were among about 300 girls taken from this boarding school in the northeast town of Chibok and declared slaves.  Dozens managed to escape. The fate of the others remains unknown.

Chika Oduah is a journalist reporting from Nigeria.

CHIKA ODUAH, Journalist:  What we know is that Boko Haram has promised not to attack civilians and Nigerian troops are not supposed to shoot at Boko Haram strongholds.  So, that’s what we have for now.  As far as the Chibok girls, there are no details, but we do know that talks are ongoing until at least next week.

JEFFREY BROWN:  Boko Haram has carried out a wave of bombings and suicide attacks over the past five years in a campaign to create an Islamic caliphate in northeastern Nigeria.  Tens of thousands of people have died.

That and what’s been perceived as the Nigerian government’s ineffective response has fed a deep public skepticism, as “NewsHour” special correspondent Fred de Sam Lazaro found on a recent trip.

Sheik Abdur Rahman is the imam of a prominent Islamic charity.

SHEIK ABDUR RAHMAN:  How can you move 300 girls, almost 300 girls, you know, in a state or in a region where you have declared a state of emergency, and nobody challenged the movement of the vehicles?

JEFFREY BROWN:  Dozens of other girls, boys and adults have also been carried away, as Yemisi Ransome-Kuti points out.  She’s a longtime activist from a prominent Nigerian family.

YEMISI RANSOME-KUTI, Nigerian Activist:  Kidnapping is going on almost on a daily basis in the north, not just girls, but boys being recruited into the Boko Haram militia system.

"What’s motivating the Boko Haram cease-fire? – Part 2" PBS NewsHour 10/17/2014

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SUMMARY:  What’s behind the timing of the cease-fire between Nigeria and Boko Haram?  Jeffrey Brown speaks with J. Peter Pham of the Atlantic Council about the motivation for both sides, why the abducted schoolgirls may have become a burden to their captors and what to expect from future talks.

EBOLA OUTBREAK - United State Offers Support

"U.S. offers support to fragile, West African health systems to combat Ebola" PBS NewsHour 9/9/2014

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JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  In West Africa, doctors are fighting the world’s most deadly Ebola outbreak with makeshift hospitals, a handful of vehicles and a few brave volunteer health workers.  Meanwhile, terrified villagers and city-dwellers alike can only watch helplessly as their loved ones succumb to the disease.

Tonight’s episode of “Frontline” on PBS takes an intimate and harrowing look at all this on the ground in Sierra Leone. In the following scene, “Frontline” cameras travel with a group of health workers who go to remote villages, searching for Ebola’s victims.

NARRATOR:  They’re heading to a village where Ebola has already killed an old man.  Everyone they encounter, even those who look healthy, could be infectious.

The team used to wear protective clothing, but the suits terrified the villagers, who ran, hid and sometimes even attacked them.  Manjo now relies on keeping his distance from everyone he meets.

MANJO:  My name is Manjo, and this is Ishata (ph) from the World Health Organization.

NARRATOR:  A young woman is clearly unwell.

MANJO:  What’s wrong with you?

NARRATOR:  Kadiatu Jusu (ph) is 25 years old, the mother of four children.

WOMAN:  Do you have a fever?

WOMAN:  Yes, I have temperature, diarrhea and I’m vomiting.

NARRATOR:  Her husband, Fallah (ph), is a farmer.  He’s 35.0  It was his father who died two weeks ago.  Ishata Conteh (ph) can see Kadiatu is almost certainly infected.

WEST AFRICA - Ebola Crisis Update

"Ebola’s spread hastens preparations for vaccine testing" PBS NewsHour 8/28/2014

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GWEN IFILL (NewsHour):  Adding to the difficulty, a different strain of Ebola has appeared in the Democratic Republic of Congo, causing 13 deaths so far.

Here at home, the National Institutes of Health announced today it will start testing an experimental Ebola vaccine next week.

For more on that development, I’m joined by Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at NIH.  He will oversee those trials.

Dr. Fauci, thanks for joining us again.

What would trials like this look like?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, Director, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases:  Well, first of all, it’s an early phase one trial.

And by phase one, we mean this is the first time this vaccine has been put in humans.  So safety is paramount, so you take a very small number of people, 20 in total, three at a time, and you use the vaccine to determine if there are untoward effects, any inflammation, any idiosyncratic or hypersensitivity reactions, pain or anything that might be a red flag about safety.

And also you learn whether it induces the kind of response in a person that you would hope would be protective against Ebola infection.  The reason why we chose this vaccine is that it showed very favorable results in an animal model, a monkey model, in which it protected monkeys very well against a challenge with lethal Ebola.

So this is a first, because it’s the first time this has been in a human, in now what will be a series of steps to ultimately develop it to determine if, in fact, it is effective.

"Ebola outbreak started with funeral in Guinea, report finds" PBS NewsHour 8/29/2014

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SUMMARY:  The Ebola virus has now reached a fifth country.  Officials announced a Guinean student in Senegal was confirmed to have the disease.  Meanwhile, a new report traces the deadly outbreak to a funeral in Guinea near the Sierra Leone border.  Hari Sreenivasan talks to Stephen Gire of Harvard University about his on-the-ground experience in Sierra Leone and the latest on how the virus has spread.

WEST AFRICA - Air Algerie Crash

"Bad weather seen as probable cause of fatal Air Algerie crash" Reuters 7/25/2014

Poor weather was the most likely cause of the crash of an Air Algerie flight in the West African state of Mali that killed 118 people on board, French officials said on Friday.

Investigators at the scene of the crash in northern Mali concluded the airliner broke apart when it hit the ground, the officials said, suggesting this meant it was unlikely to have been the victim of an attack.

"French soldiers who are on the ground have started the first investigations.  Sadly, there are no survivors," French President Francois Hollande told reporters.

A column of 100 soldiers and 30 vehicles from the French force stationed in the region arrived early on Friday morning to secure the crash site near the northern Mali town of Gossi and to recover bodies, a Defense Ministry official said.

Hollande said one of the black box flight recorders had already been recovered and would be analyzed quickly.

"The plane's debris is concentrated in a small area, but it is too early to draw conclusions," Hollande said of the wreckage of the plane carrying at least 51 French nationals that crashed near the border with Burkina Faso, from where it had taken off.

"There are theories, especially the weather, but I'm not excluding any theory."

The death toll was revised to 118 from 116 after a final passenger manifest was issued.

"They have to do everything to reassemble the bodies and bring them home so that we can mourn properly," said Alidou Ouedraogo, whose daughter was among the 27 citizens of Burkina Faso killed in the crash.

WORLD HEALTH - West Africa Ebola Outbreak

"Health workers race to halt Ebola in West Africa" (Part-1) PBS NewsHour 7/4/2014

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Now a spreading health crisis in Africa.

International and regional officials met in Ghana yesterday to coordinate a strategy to contain an outbreak of Ebola and keep it from spilling over new borders.

Jeff is back with our report.

JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour):  With more than 750 cases of infection identified and at least 467 individuals killed, the latest Ebola outbreak in West Africa is the now the largest and deadliest ever of the disease.

Since February, Ebola cases have been reported in both rural and urban areas of Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, leaving health workers in a race against time to halt the deadly virus from spreading.

Ebola is highly lethal, killing 90 percent of those who become infected, and is transmitted by direct contact with the bodily fluids of infected animals or people.  Despite precautions, health workers can still be at risk.

This nurse contracted the virus after interacting with an Ebola patient who later died.

WOMAN:  How are you feeling?  Do you feel sick?

WOMAN:  I feel weak.

JEFFREY BROWN:  And there are further dangers for health workers.  In April, a Doctors Without Borders facility in Guinea was attacked amid accusations that the staff brought the disease into the country.  And this week, the Red Cross temporarily suspended operations in the southeastern part of the country after armed men surrounded and threatened workers.

BERNICE DAHN, Deputy Health Minister, Liberia:  Our biggest challenge is denial, fear and panic.  Our people are very much afraid of the disease.

JEFFREY BROWN:  Ending their meeting in Ghana yesterday, health officials spoke of meeting that and other challenges.  World Health Organization Assistant Director-General Keiji Fukuda:

KEIJI FUKUDA, Assistant Director-General for World Health Security, World Health Organization:  That combination of having multiple mini-outbreaks going on within the larger outbreak, having them take place in different countries, with difficult communities, different cultures, makes it very complex.

JEFFREY BROWN:  Among the summit’s resolutions, stepped-up surveillance to better detect virus cases, enhanced cross-border collaboration, and increased engagement with local communities and global health partners.

"Resentment and rumor builds against health workers trying to contain Ebola outbreak" (Part-2) PBS NewsHour 7/4/2014

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SUMMARY:  The latest Ebola outbreak in West Africa is now the largest and deadliest outbreak ever.  And unlike outbreaks of the past, it is affecting both rural and urban areas.  Jeffrey Brown talks to Laurie Garrett of the Council on Foreign Relations about a recent summit on the outbreak, distrust building against health workers in infected areas and how porous borders make this outbreak so hard to contain.

AFRICA - Senegal, Boys Forced to Beg

Note "young boys" not girls.  The brand of Islam that excludes girls education.  This practice is tantamount to child slavery.

"In Senegal, thousands of young boys forced into begging system for Koranic study" PBS NewsHour 5/2/2014

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JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  And we travel now to Senegal, considered one of West Africa’s rising nations, home to a stable democracy with plans for universal health care and education, but where a troubling human rights crisis persists.

Kira Kay of the Bureau for International Reporting has the story.

KIRA KAY, Bureau for International Reporting:  In a sandy courtyard in the city of Saint-Louis, a group of young boys begin their evening prayer studies.  They are talibes, meaning students, and they have come 200 miles from their home villages to live with this Koranic master, called a marabout.

But their studies have only come at the end of a long, hard day’s work begging on the streets.  You see Senegal’s talibes weaving in and out of traffic with their little yellow tubs or rusty cans.  It’s dangerous, dirty work, up to 10 hours a day.  Along with morsels of food, they are hoping for money.  They owe their marabout a quota of about a dollar a day.

Begging is used to teach talibes humility and resilience.  But this marabout admits it’s also a matter of simple economics.

ALIOUNE SECK, Koranic Teacher (through interpreter):  You have to buy these books, medicine, water, electricity, everything you need in life.  And the government doesn’t give it to us.  That’s why they beg.

KIRA KAY:  Talibe aid worker Issa Kouyate says what he sees is more sinister.

ISSA KOUYATE, Maison de la Gare:  The society knows that these marabouts treat these boys like slavery.  The government knows these marabouts treat these boys like slavery.  Most of the marabouts abuse these boys.

KIRA KAY:  The talibe system is unique to West Africa, and is rooted in centuries-old tradition, says Imam Mouhamed Cherif Diop.

MOUHAMED CHERIF DIOP, Coordinator, Tostan (through interpreter):  It is assumed that I am not capable of giving my children their necessary education because of my affection, that I will tolerate things that I shouldn’t.  And so we have entrusted our children to the marabouts, who live in another village, to create this distance to permit a good education.

IMHO "good education" in this case means religious brain washing, no alternative ideas allowed, only what the marabout teach.  Which perpetuates the chauvinistic Islamic practice.

EPIDEMIC - West Africa, Deadly Ebola is Back

"Unprecedented Ebola outbreak crosses borders in West Africa" PBS NewsHour 4/8/2014

Excerpt

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Several countries in West Africa are now coping with the worst outbreak of the Ebola virus in years.  The World Health Organization describes it as one of the most challenging episodes of the disease it’s ever faced.  More than 100 people have died so far.

Ebola, which is spread by a virus initially transmitted from wild animals, has a high fatality rate.

Jeffrey Brown has more on the struggle to contain it.

JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour):  One of the concerns is that Ebola has crossed borders.  Guinea is where the outbreak began and was first made public in March.  More than 100 deaths and 150 cases have been reported there.

Another troubling aspect:  The disease has turned up in a wide area, from tropical forests to the capital of Conakry to the Liberian border.   In Liberia, investigators believe there are at least 10 deaths.  Health officials are now investigating possible cases in both in Mali and Ghana.

And more than 60 percent of infected people so far have died.

Laurie Garrett of the Council on Foreign Relations has tracked outbreaks in the past as a journalist and author of several books on global health and disease.  She joins us now.