DOCUMENT: TUAREG.TXT Survie Touaregue Temoust 14, passage du Guesclin 75015 Paris T‚l. 0033 72.33.51.87 (Lyon) Fax. 0033 72.12.07.97 (Lyon T U A R E G S, A T H R E A T E N E D P E O P L E The Tuaregs occupied the Central Sahara area which by the process of colonisation has been divided up amongst Algeria, Lybia, Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso. By the absence of reliable statistics, we estimate at the present day the population of the Tuaregs at 3,000,000 individuals out of which 1.5 million in Niger, 1 million in Mali and 500,000 in the 3 other countries and including the diasporas. The partition of the territory provoked the falling apart of families and Tuareg confederations; the limitations of the borders destroyed completely the Tuareg society. Forced to live in countries where they are not accepted, the Tuareg became marginalised on the cultural, social and political level. The present situation of the Tuareg is the direct result of this marginalisation. For the last years, the Tuareg People went through the most dramatic period of its history; it is threatened in its very existence by political factors strengthening the already hard living conditions due to the climate, the dry periods and the progress of the desert. Since the independence, the governments of Mali and Niger marginalised even more the Tuareg culture and population. Already in 1963, this marginalisation incited the Tuareg People to an uprising which ended up in savage blood shedding (several hundreds of deaths), to the total indifference of the international community. Since then, inexorably, the Tuareg regions are deprived from all hope on social and cultural development. Moreover, the two states took advantage of the several periods of dryness to go even more into a real genocide; refusing in informing the international opinion on the gravity of the situation, hi-jacking of the humanitarian aid,... This policy of extermination reached its severest points with the massacres of Tchin-Tabaraden in Niger and Gao, Goundam, L‚r‚, Tombouctou, Kidal, Menaka, in Mali which caused the death of thousands of persons. Very recently, twelve persons have been extrajudicially executed at Gossi, by the authorities of Mali, one month only after signing of a national pact intended to establish peace and in order to put an end to the torture and the massacres perpetrated by the army against the Tuareg population... These massacres continue. The estimated number of victims amounts to several thousands. These cruelties pushed thousands of Tuaregs to seek refuge in Mauritania and Algeria where they have been and still are terribly suffering for months; a lot of them died from starvation, cold, epidemics and their trail of suffering is not yet ending; the conditions for returning to their areas could not be realised properly without a real political solution to guarantee a total security at home. These events with their escort of crimes (rapes, plundering, torture, executions...) are inevitably for the Tuareg the most important traumatism of their history. Tuareg People have the right to claim a final end to these criminal behaviour, so far not punished and wish to share the same rights of all other Peoples as well as handle its own future and destiny. The United Nations and other international institutions have not yet answered to the unceasing appeals of the Tuareg People. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: :: -= THE FOURTH WORLD DOCUMENTATION PROJECT =- :: :: A service provided by :: :: The Center For World Indigenous Studies :: :: www.cwis.org :: ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: Originating at the Center for World Indigenous Studies, Olympia, Washington USA www.cwis.org © 1999 Center for World Indigenous Studies (All Rights Reserved. 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