Latest news with #Mauritanians
Express Tribune
28-05-2025
- Express Tribune
Fact-check: Claims of Mauritania Hajj flight crash are false
A viral post circulating on social media platforms claims that a Mauritania Airlines flight carrying 210 Hajj pilgrims crashed into the Red Sea while en route to Saudi Arabia. However, The Express Tribune has verified that this claim is false. Breaking Bad News! Mauritanian Hajj flight crashes en route to Saudi Arabia, all 210 passengers confirmed dead. May Allah grant dem Aljanatu firdausi.#Pocolee #Childrenday #Trump #Hajj #ジークアクス — Inozemhe Jacob Azemobor (@GovernorDonJay) May 27, 2025 Some social media users shared videos and unverified images, falsely claiming they showed the crash site of a Mauritania Hajj flight bound for Saudi Arabia. May Allah have mercy on all 210 #Mauritanians who were among the pilgrims who were supposed to perform the Hajj pilgrimage this year have died. The plane they were on crashed while they were on their way to the shrine of Allah while reportedly over the Red Sea coast. This… — Mohamed Gahnug (@Gahnug18Mohamed) May 28, 2025 Upon investigation, The Express Tribune found out that Mauritania's Director of Hajj at the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, El Waly Taha, categorically denied the reports. Speaking to local media, he confirmed that all Mauritanian pilgrims are safe and have successfully arrived in Saudi Arabia for Hajj. Mauritania Denies Rumor of Pilgrims' Plane Crash off the Red Sea Coast The rumor circulating about a Mauritanian pilgrims' plane crashing off the Red Sea coast is false. Mauritania's Director of Hajj at the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, El Waly Taha, denied the claim, confirming… — khaled mahmoued (@khaledmahmoued1) May 27, 2025 Further clarification was provided by Mauritania Airlines, which issued an official statement confirming that three scheduled flights that operated on May 23, 24, and 25 reached their destinations in Saudi Arabia without any issues. 'Mauritania Airlines operated three flights for this year's Hajj season and all three reached their destination safely,' the statement read. The claim appears to be entirely baseless, with no credible media outlet or aviation authority reporting any such incident. Both Mauritanian officials and the airline have urged the public to disregard the rumour and refrain from spreading unverified information, particularly during the sensitive Hajj period.
Ya Biladi
19-03-2025
- Politics
- Ya Biladi
AU : Morocco moves to label Polisario as terrorist group
Morocco received a boost during the 38th Ordinary Summit of the African Union, recently held in Addis Ababa. While Rabat ceded the position of first vice-president of the African Commission to Algiers, it made significant progress toward getting the Polisario listed among the continent's terrorist organizations—or at least securing its condemnation for human rights violations. The current international context could further support this objective. Indeed, in its final declaration, consulted by Yabiladi, the summit «requested the Department of Political Affairs, Peace, and Security to compile a comprehensive list of leaders of armed and terrorist groups in Africa responsible for crimes against refugees and internally displaced persons, and to prosecute those who commit, encourage, finance, or facilitate such crimes». No participant expressed opposition or reservations on this matter. The implementation of this resolution could encourage refugees to testify about the abuses suffered in the prisons of armed groups. In the case of the Polisario, it is not only Sahrawis and Royal Armed Forces (FAR) soldiers who have endured violations, but also Mauritanians —whose cases have largely been overlooked by human rights organizations. AU Calls for Refugee Census The summit also urged member states to «strengthen the protection of refugee camps and internally displaced persons, and to take additional measures to shield them from exploitation by armed and terrorist groups». Additionally, it called on the AU Commission to develop systems for collecting, analyzing, and managing data on refugees, returnees, and internally displaced persons to improve decision-making and ensure effective humanitarian action. Algeria has long refused UN requests to conduct a census of the population in the Tindouf camps. The latest request was included in UN Security Council Resolution 2756 on Western Sahara, adopted on October 31, 2024. Algeria, however, has consistently pushed back, arguing in September 2022 at the UN General Assembly that «a census only makes sense if it is part of a fair and free referendum allowing the people of Western Sahara to exercise their inalienable right to self-determination». By securing the African Union's support for its longstanding demand for a census in Tindouf, Morocco has achieved progress within the continental organization, complementing its gains in UN bodies.
The Independent
01-03-2025
- General
- The Independent
‘Desertification is our destiny': How this ancient African city is being buried under Sahara sand
The ancient Saharan city of Chinguetti, a historical hub for poets, scholars, and theologians and home to thousands of manuscripts, is facing an existential threat from the encroaching desert. Shifting sands, a constant presence, have already buried the city's 8th-century heart and are now steadily advancing on its current borders. Residents, seemingly resigned to their fate, speak of the desert as an inevitable destiny. As global temperatures rise and the climate becomes increasingly arid, sandstorms are growing in frequency and intensity. These storms deposit layers of sand, sometimes reaching several feet, onto Chinguetti's streets and into homes, in some cases burying them completely. Efforts to combat the encroaching dunes through tree planting initiatives are underway, but they have yet to alleviate the deep-seated anxieties about the city's future. Chinguetti is one of four UNESCO World Heritage sites in Mauritania, a West African nation where only 0.5 per cent of land is considered farmable. In Africa – the continent that contributes the least to fossil fuel emissions – only Somalia and Eswatini have experienced more climate change impacts, according to World Bank data. Mauritanians believe Chinguetti is among Islam 's holiest cities. Its dry stone and mud mortar homes, mosques and libraries store some of West Africa 's oldest Quranic texts and manuscripts, covering topics ranging from law to mathematics. Community leader Melainine Med El Wely feels agonised over the stakes for residents and the history contained within Chinguetti's walls. It's like watching a natural disaster in slow motion, he said. 'It's a city surrounded by an ocean of sand that's advancing every minute,' El Wely, the president of the local Association for Participatory Oasis Management, said. 'There are places that I walk now that I remember being the roofs of houses when I was a kid.' He remembers that once when enough sand blew into his neighbourhood to cover the palms used to make roofs, an unknowing camel walking through the neighborhood plunged into what was once someone's living room. Chinguetti mapped: Research suggests sand migration plays a significant role in desertification. Deserts, including the Sahara, are expanding at unprecedented rates and 'sand seas' are being reactivated, with blowing dunes transforming landscapes where vegetation once stood. 'What we used to think of as the worst case scenario five to 10 years ago is now actually looking like a more likely scenario than we had in mind,' said Andreas Baas, an earth scientist from King's College London who researches how winds and the way they blow sand are changing. More than three-quarters of the earth's land has become drier in recent decades, according to a 2024 United Nations report on desertification. The aridity has imperilled the ability of plants, humans and animals to survive. It robs lands of the moisture needed to sustain life, kills crops and can cause sandstorms and wildfires. 'Human-caused climate change is the culprit; known for making the planet warmer, it is also making more and more land drier,' the UN report said. 'Aridity-related water scarcity is causing illness and death and spurring large-scale forced migration around the world.' Scientists and policymakers are mostly concerned about soils degrading in once-fertile regions that are gradually becoming wastelands, rather than areas deep in the Sahara Desert. Still, in Chinguetti, a changing climate is ushering in many of the consequences that officials have warned about. Trees are withering, wells are running dry and livelihoods are vanishing. Date farmers like 50-year-old Salima Ould Salem have found it increasingly difficult to nourish their palm trees, and now have to pipe in water from tanks and prune more thoroughly to make sure it's used efficiently. Salem's neighbourhood used to be full of families, but they've gradually moved away. Sand now blocks the doorway to his home. It's buried those where some of his neighbours once lived. And a nearby guesthouse built by a Belgian investor decades ago is now half-submerged in a rippling copper-hued dune. Though many have departed, Salem remains, aware that each time a member of the community leaves, their home can no longer serve as a bulwark and the rest of the community therefore becomes more likely to be swallowed by the desert. 'We prefer to stay here. If I leave, my place will disappear,' the 50-year-old date farmer said. Acacia, gum and palm trees once shielded the neighbourhood from encroaching dunes, but they've gradually disappeared. The trees have either died of thirst or have been cut down by residents needing firewood or foliage for their herds to feed on. Sandstorms are not new but have become increasingly intrusive, each leaving inches or feet in the neighbourhoods on the edge of the city, retired teacher Mohamed Lemine Bahane said. Residents use mules and carts to remove the sand because the old city's streets are too narrow to accommodate cars or bulldozers. When sand piles high enough, some build new walls atop existing structures. 'When you remove the vegetation, it gives the dunes a chance to become more active, because it's ultimately the vegetation that can hold down the sand so it doesn't blow too much,' Bahane said. Bahane has for years taken measurements of the sand deposits and rains and says that Chinguetti has received an annual average of 2.5cm (one inch) of rainfall over the past decade. As rainfall plummets, trees die, and more sand migrates into town. And with shorter acacia trees submerged in sand, some herders resort to cutting down date palm trees to feed their flocks, further disrupting the ecosystem and date farming economy. The sands also raise public health concerns for the community breathing in the dust, Bahane said. The solution, he believes, has to be planting more trees both in neighbourhoods and along the perimeter of town. Such 'green belts' have been proposed on a continent-wide scale as Africa's 'Great Green Wall' as well as locally, in towns like Chinguetti. Mauritania's Ministry of Environment and Ministry of Agriculture as well as European-funded NGOs have floated projects to plant trees to insulate the city's libraries and manuscripts from the incoming desert. Though some have been replanted, there's little sign that it has contributed to stopping the desert in its tracks. It can take years for taproots to grow deep enough into the earth to access groundwater. 'We're convinced that desertification is our destiny. But thankfully, there are still people convinced that it can be resisted,' El Wely, the community leader, said.
Nahar Net
27-02-2025
- Climate
- Nahar Net
Encroaching desert threatens to swallow Mauritania's homes and history
by Naharnet Newsdesk 26 February 2025, 15:22 For centuries, poets, scholars and theologians have flocked to Chinguetti, a trans-Saharan trading post home to more than a dozen libraries containing thousands of manuscripts. But it now stands on the brink of oblivion. Shifting sands have long covered the ancient city's 8th-century core and are encroaching on neighborhoods at its current edge. Residents say the desert is their destiny. As the world's climate gets hotter and drier, sandstorms are more frequently depositing inches and feet of dunes onto Chinguetti's streets and in people's homes, submerging some entirely. Tree-planting projects are trying to keep the invading sands at bay, but so far, they haven't eased the deep-rooted worries about the future. Chinguetti is one of four UNESCO World Heritage sites in Mauritania, a West African nation where only 0.5% of land is considered farmable. In Africa — the continent that contributes the least to fossil fuel emissions — only Somalia and Eswatini have experienced more climate change impacts, according to World Bank data. Mauritanians believe Chinguetti is among Islam's holiest cities. Its dry stone and mud mortar homes, mosques and libraries store some of West Africa's oldest quranic texts and manuscripts, covering topics ranging from law to mathematics. Community leader Melainine Med El Wely feels agonized over the stakes for residents and the history contained within Chinguetti's walls. It's like watching a natural disaster in slow motion, he said. "It's a city surrounded by an ocean of sand that's advancing every minute," El Wely, the president of the local Association for Participatory Oasis Management, said. "There are places that I walk now that I remember being the roofs of houses when I was a kid." He remembers that once when enough sand blew into his neighborhood to cover the palms used to make roofs, an unknowing camel walking through the neighborhood plunged into what was once someone's living room. Research suggests sand migration plays a significant role in desertification. Deserts, including the Sahara, are expanding at unprecedented rates and "sand seas" are being reactivated, with blowing dunes transforming landscapes where vegetation once stood. "What we used to think of as the worst case scenario five to 10 years ago is now actually looking like a more likely scenario than we had in mind," said Andreas Baas, an earth scientist from King's College London who researches how winds and the way they blow sand are changing. More than three-quarters of the earth's land has become drier in recent decades, according to a 2024 United Nations report on desertification. The aridity has imperiled ability of plants, humans and animals to survive. It robs lands of the moisture needed to sustain life, kills crops and can cause sandstorms and wildfires. "Human-caused climate change is the culprit; known for making the planet warmer, it is also making more and more land drier," the U.N. report said. "Aridity-related water scarcity is causing illness and death and spurring large-scale forced migration around the world." Scientists and policymakers are mostly concerned about soils degrading in once-fertile regions that are gradually becoming wastelands, rather than areas deep in the Sahara Desert. Still, in Chinguetti, a changing climate is ushering in many of the consequences that officials have warned about. Trees are withering, wells are running dry and livelihoods are vanishing. Date farmers like 50-year-old Salima Ould Salem have found it increasingly difficult to nourish their palm trees, and now have to pipe in water from tanks and prune more thoroughly to make sure it's used efficiently. Salem's neighborhood used to be full of families, but they've gradually moved away. Sand now blocks the doorway to his home. It's buried those where some of his neighbors once lived. And a nearby guesthouse built by a Belgian investor decades ago is now half-submerged in a rippling copper-hued dune. Though many have departed, Salem remains, aware that each time a member of the community leaves, their home can no long serve as a bulwark and the rest of the community therefore becomes more likely to be swallowed by the desert. "We prefer to stay here. If I leave, my place will disappear," the 50-year-old date farmer said. Acacia, gum and palm trees once shielded the neighborhood from encroaching dunes, but they've gradually disappeared. The trees have either died of thirst or have been cut down by residents needing firewood or foliage for their herds to feed on. Sandstorms are not new but have become increasingly intrusive, each leaving inches or feet in the neighborhoods on the edge of the city, retired teacher Mohamed Lemine Bahane said. Residents use mules and carts to remove the sand because the old city's streets are too narrow to accommodate cars or bulldozers. When sand piles high enough, some build new walls atop existing structures. "When you remove the vegetation, it gives the dunes a chance to become more active, because it's ultimately the vegetation that can hold down the sand so it doesn't blow too much," Bahane said. Bahane has for years taken measurements of the sand deposits and rains and says that Chinguetti has received an annual average of 2.5 centimeters (one inch) of rainfall over the past decade. As rainfall plummets, trees die, and more sand migrates into town. And with shorter acacia trees submerged in sand, some herders resort to cutting down date palm trees to feed their flocks, further disrupting the ecosystem and date farming economy. The sands also raise public health concerns for the community breathing in the dust, Bahane said. The solution, he believes, has to be planting more trees both in neighborhoods and along the perimeter of town. Such "green belts" have been proposed on a continent-wide scale as Africa's "Great Green Wall" as well as locally, in towns like Chinguetti. Mauritania's Ministry of Environment and Ministry of Agriculture as well as European-funded NGOs have floated projects to plant trees to insulate the city's libraries and manuscripts from the incoming desert. Though some have been replanted, there's little sign that it has contributed to stopping the desert in its tracks. It can take years for taproots to grow deep enough into the earth to access groundwater. "We're convinced that desertification is our destiny. But thankfully, there are still people convinced that it can be resisted," El Wely, the community leader, said.
Euronews
23-02-2025
- General
- Euronews
'Surrounded by an ocean of sand': Desertification pushes ancient city to the brink of oblivion
For centuries, poets, scholars and theologians have flocked to Chinguetti, a trans-Saharan trading post home to more than a dozen libraries containing thousands of manuscripts. But it now stands on the brink of oblivion. Shifting sands have long covered the ancient city's 8th-century core and are encroaching on neighbourhoods at its current edge. Residents say the desert is their destiny. As the world's climate gets hotter and drier, sandstorms are more frequently depositing metres of dunes onto Chinguetti's streets and in people's homes, submerging some entirely. Tree-planting projects are trying to keep the invading sands at bay, but so far, they haven't eased the deep-rooted worries about the future. Like a natural disaster in slow-motion Chinguetti is one of four UNESCO World Heritage sites in Mauritania, a West African nation where only 0.5 per cent of land is considered farmable. In Africa - the continent that contributes the least to fossil fuel emissions - only Somalia and Eswatini have experienced more climate change impacts, according to World Bank data. Mauritanians believe Chinguetti is among Islam's holiest cities. Its dry stone and mud mortar homes, mosques and libraries store some of West Africa's oldest Quranic texts and manuscripts, covering topics ranging from law to mathematics. Community leader Melainine Med El Wely feels agonised over the stakes for residents and the history contained within Chinguetti's walls. It's like watching a natural disaster in slow motion, he said. 'It's a city surrounded by an ocean of sand that's advancing every minute,' El Wely, the president of the local Association for Participatory Oasis Management, said. 'There are places that I walk now that I remember being the roofs of houses when I was a kid.' He remembers that once, when enough sand blew into his neighbourhood to cover the palms used to make roofs, an unknowing camel walking through the neighbourhood plunged into what was once someone's living room. Deserts are expanding at an unprecedented rate Research suggests sand migration plays a significant role in desertification. Deserts, including the Sahara, are expanding at unprecedented rates and 'sand seas' are being reactivated, with blowing dunes and transforming landscapes where vegetation once stood. 'What we used to think of as the worst case scenario five to 10 years ago is now actually looking like a more likely scenario than we had in mind,' said Andreas Baas, an earth scientist from King's College London who researches how winds and the way they blow the sand are changing. More than three-quarters of the Earth's land has become drier in recent decades, according to a 2024 United Nations report on desertification. The aridity has imperilled the ability of plants, humans and animals to survive. It robs lands of the moisture needed to sustain life, kills crops and can cause sandstorms and wildfires. 'Human-caused climate change is the culprit; known for making the planet warmer, it is also making more and more land drier,' the UN report said. 'Aridity-related water scarcity is causing illness and death and spurring large-scale forced migration around the world.' Scientists and policymakers are mostly concerned about soils degrading in once-fertile regions which are gradually becoming wastelands, rather than areas deep in the Sahara Desert. Homes are now submerged in the sand In Chinguetti, a changing climate is ushering in many of the consequences that officials have warned about. Trees are withering, wells are running dry and livelihoods are vanishing. Date farmers like 50-year-old Salima Ould Salem have found it increasingly difficult to nourish their palm trees, and now have to pipe in water from tanks and prune more thoroughly to make sure it's used efficiently. Salem's neighbourhood used to be full of families, but they've gradually moved away. Sand now blocks the doorway to his home. It's also buried those where some of his neighbours once lived. And a nearby guesthouse built by a Belgian investor decades ago is now half-submerged in a rippling copper-hued dune. Though many have departed, Salem remains, aware that each time a member of the community leaves, their home can no longer serve as a bulwark. The rest of the community therefore becomes more likely to be swallowed by the desert. 'We prefer to stay here. If I leave, my place will disappear,' the 50-year-old date farmer said. Trees that once shielded the neighbourhood have disappeared Acacia, gum and palm trees once shielded the neighbourhood from encroaching dunes, but they've gradually disappeared. The trees have either died of thirst or have been cut down by residents needing firewood or foliage for their herds to feed on. Sandstorms are not new but have become increasingly intrusive, each leaving mountains of sand in the neighbourhoods on the edge of the city, retired teacher Mohamed Lemine Bahane said. Residents use mules and carts to remove the sand because the old city's streets are too narrow to accommodate cars or bulldozers. When sand piles high enough, some build new walls atop existing structures. 'When you remove the vegetation, it gives the dunes a chance to become more active, because it's ultimately the vegetation that can hold down the sand so it doesn't blow too much,' Bahane said. For years, Bahane has taken measurements of the sand deposits and rains and says that Chinguetti has received an annual average of 2.5 centimetres of rainfall over the past decade. As rainfall plummets, trees die, and more sand migrates into town. And with shorter acacia trees submerged in sand, some herders resort to cutting down date palm trees to feed their flocks, further disrupting the ecosystem and date farming economy. The sands also raise public health concerns for the community breathing in the dust, Bahane said. Could planting more trees stop sand from burying Chinguetti? The solution, Bahane believes, has to be planting more trees both in neighbourhoods and along the perimeter of town. Such 'green belts' have been proposed on a continent-wide scale as Africa's 'Great Green Wall' as well as locally, in towns like Chinguetti. Mauritania's Ministry of Environment and Ministry of Agriculture as well as European-funded NGOs have floated projects to plant trees to insulate the city's libraries and manuscripts from the incoming desert. Though some have been replanted, there's little sign that it has contributed to stopping the desert in its tracks. It can take years for taproots to grow deep enough into the earth to access groundwater. 'We're convinced that desertification is our destiny. But thankfully, there are still people convinced that it can be resisted,' El Wely, the community leader, said.
