If you've ever spent an entire day trying, and failing, to make one important phone call, as I just did here in sunny Chad, you might understand how tenuous communications are in a place like Central
Africa.
So it's no wonder that Thuraya satellite phones are among the hottest items in the whole region ... and why these handy little phones are at the top of bandits' and rebels' wish lists.
Thefts of cars and phones are among the most frequent security incidents in eastern Chad. The U.N., which oversees scores of aid groups here, has reported more than a hundred in the past couple years.
What's funny is that some of Chad's largest rebel groups -- those targeting President Idriss Deby's corrupt regime -- are sometimes quite polite about their crimes.
My friend Alfy Burger, who works for aid group CARE in Chad, describes how rebels often will steal a group's SUV, with a Thuraya inside, then call the group on the Thuraya to confirm whom they just robbed. If the respondent says they're with an aid group, the rebels often will apologize and promise to return the vehicle as soon as they're done with it. "But they always say, 'Sorry -- I'm keeping the
Thuraya,'" Alfy says.
Not all of Chad's armed parties are so nice. There are dozens of rebel groups, each with their own aims. Some target Deby. Others are based here in Chad, sometimes in refugee camps, but cross the border into Sudan to attack Khartoum and its forces in Darfur. Plus, there are bandits with no particular political grievance. And then there are marauding Chadian army soldiers, who are perhaps most dangerous in some places because they can move around in the open and justify anything they do as state prerogative.
So when you're an E.U. peacekeeping force (French soldier pictured)
whose job it is to protect aid workers and refugees from all threats, how do you decide who's a threat? Carefully, according to one Irish soldier I spoke to. Sometimes you have to wait until they open fire.
Which is exactly what happened two weeks ago in Goz Beida, in eastern Chad. Someone opened fire on an Irish patrol. Exactly who they were, is hard to say. The Irish fired a few rounds into the air ... and the bad guys scampered.
(Photo: me)
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