Lynch Distances Herself From Russian Lawyer After Trump Attack

BY JONATHAN EASLEY

THE HILL

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Former attorney general Loretta Lynch on Thursday distanced herself from the Russian lawyer that gained passage into the U.S. before landing a meeting with Donald Trump Jr. during the 2016 campaign.

At a press conference in France earlier Thursday, President Trump blamed the Obama administration and Lynch's Justice Department for allowing Natalia Veselnitskaya into the country.

In a statement, a spokesperson for Lynch said the former attorney general "does not have any personal knowledge of Ms. Veselnitskaya's travel."

In his remarks in France, Trump appeared to cite a report in The Hill that the Justice Department issued Veselnitskaya a special immigration waiver so that she could defend her client, a Russian firm, in an asset forfeiture case in New York.

The U.S. Attorney's office in New York told The Hill that it let Veselnitskaya into the country on a grant of immigration parole from October 2015 to early January 2016 after her initial request for a visa had been denied.

Court records show that when Veselnitskaya sought permission to extend her stay, the U.S. attorney at the hearing told the judge that the special visa the Russian lawyer received was part of a "discretionary act that the statute allows the attorney general to do in extraordinary circumstances."

The U.S. attorney described the grant of parole immigration as extremely rare.

"In October the government bypassed the normal visa process and gave a type of extraordinary permission to enter the country called immigration parole," Assistant U.S. Attorney Paul Monteleoni said to the judge during a hearing on Jan. 6, 2016.

"That's a discretionary act that the statute allows the attorney general to do in extraordinary circumstances," Monteleoni said. "In this case, we did that so that Mr. Katsyv could testify. And we made the further accommodation of allowing his Russian lawyer into the country to assist."

Lynch's spokesperson did not address the specifics of that case, but said: "The State Department issues visas, and the Department of Homeland Security oversees entry to the United States at airports."

Veselnitskaya was granted the special immigration parole for the limited purpose of defending a company owned by a Russian businessman in a Justice Department asset forfeiture case, but later participated in a wide-ranging pro-Russia lobbying campaign.

Over the summer of 2016, Veselnitskaya met with current and former lawmakers from both parties and was spotted in the front row of a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on Russia.

In June of 2016, Donald Trump Jr., White House senior adviser Jared Kushner and former campaign manager Paul Manafort took a meeting with Veselnitskaya. A music promoter told Trump Jr. that Veselnitskaya had dirt on Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. But Trump Jr. said the Russian lawyer instead pushed for changes to the Magnitsky Act, which punished Russians for human rights violations.

Democrats have seized on the meeting, claiming it as evidence that Trump officials sought to collude with the Russians in the campaign.

"She was here because of Lynch," Trump said at a press conference in Paris with French President Emmanuel Macron.

"Nothing happened from the meeting," Trump added. "Zero happened from the meeting, and honestly I think the press made a big deal over something that many people would do."

Peter W. Smith, GOP Operative Who Sought Clinton's Emails From Russian Hackers, Committed Suicide, Records Show

BY KATHERINE SKIBA, DAVID HEINZMANN AND TODD LIGHTY

CHICAGO TRIBUNE JULY 14, 2017

Hillary Clinton Image By Justin Sullivan/Getty

A Republican donor and operative from Chicago's North Shore who said he had tried to obtain Hillary Clinton's missing emails from Russian hackers killed himself in a Minnesota hotel room days after talking to The Wall Street Journal about his efforts, public records show.

In a room at a Rochester hotel used almost exclusively by Mayo Clinic patients and relatives, Peter W. Smith, 81, left a carefully prepared file of documents, which includes a statement police called a suicide note in which he said he was in ill health and a life insurance policy was expiring.

Days earlier, the financier from suburban Lake Forest gave an interview to the Journal about his quest, and it published stories about his efforts beginning in late June. The Journal also reported it had seen emails written by Smith showing his team considered retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, then a top adviser to Republican Donald Trump's campaign, as an ally. Flynn briefly was President Trump's national security adviser and resigned after it was determined he had failed to disclose contacts with Russia.

At the time, the newspaper reported Smith's May 14 death came about 10 days after he granted the interview. Mystery shrouded how and where he had died, but the lead reporter on the stories said on a podcast he had no reason to believe the death was the result of foul play and that Smith likely had died of natural causes.

However, the Chicago Tribune obtained a Minnesota state death record filed in Olmsted County that says Smith committed suicide in a hotel near the Mayo Clinic at 1:17 p.m. on Sunday, May 14. He was found with a bag over his head with a source of helium attached. A medical examiner's report gives the same account, without specifying the time, and a report from Rochester police further details his suicide.

In the note recovered by police, Smith apologized to authorities and said that "NO FOUL PLAY WHATSOEVER" was involved in his death. He wrote that he was taking his own life because of a "RECENT BAD TURN IN HEALTH SINCE JANUARY, 2017" and timing related "TO LIFE INSURANCE OF $5 MILLION EXPIRING."

One of Smith's former employees told the Tribune he thought the elderly man had gone to the famed clinic to be treated for a heart condition. Mayo spokeswoman Ginger Plumbo said Thursday she could not confirm Smith had been a patient, citing medical privacy laws.

The Journal stories said it was on Labor Day weekend in 2016 that Smith had assembled a team to acquire emails the team theorized might have been stolen from the private server Clinton had used while secretary of state. Smith's focus was the more than 30,000 emails Clinton said she deleted because they related to personal matters. A huge cache of other Clinton emails were made public.

Smith told the Journal he believed the missing emails might have had been obtained by Russian hackers. He also said he thought the correspondence related to Clinton's official duties. He told the Journal he worked independently and was not part of the Trump campaign. He also told the Journal he and his team found five groups of hackers - two of them Russian groups - who claimed to have Clinton's missing emails.

Smith had a history of doing opposition research, the formal term for unflattering information that political operatives dig up about rival candidates.

For years, Democratic President Bill Clinton was Smith's target. The wealthy businessman had a hand in exposing the "Troopergate" allegations about Bill Clinton's sex life. And he discussed financing a probe of a 1969 trip Bill Clinton had taken while in college to the Soviet Union, according to Salon magazine.

Investigations into any possible links between the Russian government and people associated with Trump's presidential campaign now are underway in Congress and by former FBI chief Robert Mueller. He is acting as a special counsel for the Department of Justice. Mueller spokesman Peter Carr declined to comment on the Journal's stories on Smith or his death. Washington attorney Robert Kelner, who represents Flynn, had no comment on Thursday.

Smith's death occurred at the Aspen Suites in Rochester, records show. They list the cause of death as "asphyxiation due to displacement of oxygen in confined space with helium."

Rochester Police Chief Roger Peterson on Wednesday called his manner of death "unusual," but a funeral home worker said he'd seen it before.

An employee with Rochester Cremation Services, the funeral home that responded to the hotel, said he helped remove Smith's body from his room and recalled seeing a tank.

The employee, who spoke on the condition he not be identified because of the sensitive nature of Smith's death, described the tank as being similar in size to a propane tank on a gas grill. He did not recall seeing a bag that Smith would have placed over his head. He said the coroner and police were there and that he "didn't do a lot of looking around."

"When I got there and saw the tank, I thought, 'I've seen this before,' and was able to put two and two together," the employee said.

An autopsy was conducted, according to the death record. The Southern Minnesota Regional Medical Examiner's Office declined a Tribune request for the autopsy report and released limited information about Smith's death.

The Final Exit Network, a Florida-based nonprofit, provides information and support to people who suffer from a terminal illness and want to kill themselves.

Fran Schindler, a volunteer with the group, noted that the best-selling book Final Exit, written by Derek Humphry in 1991 and revised several times since, explains in detail the helium gas method.

"Many people obtain that information from his book," Schindler said. "It's a method that has been around for many years and is well known."

Smith's remains were cremated in Minnesota, the records said. He was married to Janet L. Smith and had three children and three grandchildren, according to his obituary. Tribune calls to family members were not returned.

His obituary said Smith was involved in public affairs for more than 60 years and it heralded him as a "quietly generous champion of efforts to ensure a more economically and politically secure world." Smith led private equity firms in corporate acquisitions and venture investments for more than 40 years. Earlier, he worked with DigaComm, LLC, from 1997 to 2014 and as the president of Peter W. Smith & Company, Inc. from 1975 to 1997. Prior to that, he was a senior officer of Field Enterprises, Inc., a firm that owned the Chicago Sun-Times then and was held by the Marshall Field family, his obituary said.

A private family memorial was planned, the obituary said. Friends posted online tributes to Smith after his death. One was from his former employee, Jonathan Safron, 26, who lives in Chicago's Loop and worked for Smith for about two years.

Safron, in an interview, said he was working for a tutoring firm when Smith became his client. His job entailed teaching Smith how to use a MacBook, Safron said. At the time Smith was living in a condominium atop the Four Seasons Hotel Chicago. Safron said Smith later employed him at Corporate Venture Alliances, a private investment firm that Smith ran, first out of the same condo and later from an office in the Hancock Building.

Safron, who said he had a low-level job with the Illinois Republican Party in 2014, said he had no knowledge of Smith's bid to find hackers who could locate emails missing from Clinton's service as secretary of state. In his online tribute to his former employer, he called Smith the "best boss I could ever ask for ... a mentor, friend and model human being."

Safron said he worked part-time for Smith, putting in about 15 hours a week. But the two grew close, often having lunch together at a favorite Smith spot: the Oak Tree Restaurant & Bakery Chicago on North Michigan Ave. He called Smith a serious man who was "upbeat," "cosmopolitan" and "larger than life." He was aware Smith was in declining health, saying the older man sometimes had difficulty breathing and told work colleagues he had heart problems. Weeks before he took his life, he had become fatigued walking down about four or five flights of stairs during a Hancock Building fire drill and later emailed Safron saying he was "dizzy," he said.

Smith's last will and testament, signed last Feb. 21, is seven pages long and on file in Probate Court in Lake County. The will gives his wife his interest in their residential property and his tangible personal property and says remaining assets should be placed into two trusts.

He was born Feb. 23, 1936, in Portland, Maine, according to the death record.

His late father, Waldo Sterling Smith, was a manufacturer's representative for women's apparel firms, representing them in department stores in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, according to the father's 2002 obituary. The elder Smith died at age 92 in St. Augustine, Fla., and his obit noted that he had been active in St. Johns County, Fla. Republican affairs and with a local Methodist church

Peter Smith wrote two blog posts dated the day before he was found dead. One challenged U.S. intelligence agency findings that Russia interfered with the 2016 election. Another post predicted: "As attention turns to international affairs, as it will shortly, the Russian interference story will die of its own weight."

Skiba reported from Washington, Heinzmann reported from Rochester and Lighty from Chicago. Lauren Rosenblatt of the Tribune Washington Bureau and Dan Moran of the Lake County News-Sun contributed to this story.

kskiba@chicagotribune.com

dheinzmann@chicagotribune.com

tlighty@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @Katherine Skiba

Twitter @DavidHeinzmann

Twitter @TLighty

N’Delta Leaders Meet, Call For Implementation Of 2014 Confab Report

Maintain region not part of Biafra
 Abdulsalami, Kukah caution political elite against divisive statements
Iyobosa Uwugiaren in Abuja and Emmanuel Addeh in Yenagoa

THIS DAY, JULY 12, 2017

YENAGOA, BAYELSA, NIGERIA (THIS DAY) -- Leaders and elders of the Niger Delta under the Pan-Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF) have reiterated their demand for the implementation of the 2014 National Conference report and the relocation of the headquarters of oil multinationals to the region.

The national leader of PANDEF, Chief Edwin Clark, who presided over a meeting of the group Tuesday in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, also called on the federal government to urgently revisit the 16-point agenda of the forum, as the patience of the youths of the region had started running out.

The nonagenarian spoke at the third general assembly of PANDEF with the theme, “Appraisal of the 16-Point Agenda: State of the Nation and the Way Forward for Sustainable Peace and Development in the Niger Delta region.”
The elder statesman, in the course of the meeting attended by several other Niger Delta leaders, including Governor Seriake Dickson and the King of Twon-Brass, Alfred Diette-Spiff, said the over 600 recommendations in the report would tackle the challenges facing the country.

He also asked the federal government to raise a team to commence dialogue with PANDEF to ensure the sustainability of peace in the Niger Delta region, where he maintained that crude oil production had increased significantly.

PANDEF also accused the federal government of failing to prevail on the oil companies to relocate to their operational bases, as well as not being forthright in declaring its position on the setting up of modular refineries in the region.
On the current Biafra agitation, the leaders reaffirmed their position that the six states of the South-south zone were not part of Biafra as claimed by some Biafran agitators.
They equally condemned the quit notice issued by the Arewa youths to the Igbos, describing the action as a flagrant violation of the Nigerian Constitution.

In his comments, Dickson assured the elders and leaders that the South-south governors were committed to working with them to promote and protect the interests of the region.
Dickson maintained that peace and stability were paramount in the development of the Niger Delta, stressing that the leaders in the region would work collectively to change the long perceived notion of insecurity in the region and promote its socio-economic and political viability.

He reminded the federal government that the militarisation of the Niger Delta was not a solution to resolving the issues, noting that the only battle to be fought was lack of economic inclusion and environmental terrorism in the region.
“There are parts of this country that are very happy to promote crises and spread propaganda about insecurity in our region as a deliberate strategy of weakening this region economically.

“So I want to use this opportunity to charge all our people, political, opinion and community leaders, to continue to work for a stable and prosperous Niger Delta because in the end, whether we are able to bring prosperity and development to our people depends on the presence of security and stability.
“I want to also use this opportunity to make the point again that militarisation of any community within any state in our region is not a solution.

“And in this Niger Delta, the battles to be fought are not the ones that tanks and soldiers should be deployed; the battles all of us should unite to confront and defeat in the Niger Delta, are the issues of environmental terrorism as I have always called it and the issue of gross neglect, under-development and lack of economic inclusion,” Dickson said.
He also aligned with the position of PANDEF, pledging to support the forum to ensure that its secretariat in Yenagoa functions optimally.

In a related development, a former military Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar, and the convener of the National Peace Committee, Bishop Hassan Matthew Kukah, have strongly condemned the political elite who they said were promoting hate speeches and calling for the dissolution of the country.
They also commended Acting President Yemi Osinbajo for taking proactive steps to stem the growing divisive rhetoric and separatist sentiments in the country.

The National Peace Committee played a crucial role in the run up to the 2015 general election and used its influence to ensure that the key contestants in the polls and their supporters did not resort to violence during and after the elections.
The two eminent personalities who said this in a statement they jointly signed Tuesday in Abuja, noted that the developments were of serious concern to the peace committee.

They commended Osinbajo for engaging with leaders of influence across the North and South-east, in a bid to stop the rise of mutual hostility and tension that had been stoked by elements from some parts of the country.
Abdulsalami and Kukah called for more voices of leadership from all communities in the country to reinforce the message of the acting president.

“We’ve recently come to the end of the holy month of Ramadan, for millions of Nigerians, a time of spirituality, introspection and the request for God’s forgiveness,” they added.
“Therefore, there could be no better time than now as a nation for us all to be thoughtful, deliberate and make ourselves worthy of divine mercy, especially in the atmosphere of a steep rise in divisive and hateful rhetoric in our country.
“It is indeed, the appropriate time to underscore the imperatives of peaceful co-existence of all communities and all Nigerians,” they said.

They observed that Nigerians could not afford at this time or any other time to stoke the fires of hate and divisiveness in the body politic, especially when ordinary Nigerians are engaged in difficult struggles to secure their livelihood, amidst rising insecurity and increasing fear.
They added that the nation had lost too many of its citizens to random and diverse acts of violence, while many more had been maimed for life or living in displacement.

They further stated: “Tens of thousands of children have been orphaned by conflict and millions of our fellow citizens now face threats of starvation in the face of rising food insecurity.”
In many parts of the country, the committee noted that mass killings had gone unpunished and unresolved, inter-communal clashes had become chronic, adding that economic deprivation and growing social exclusion and feelings of alienation, particularly among the youths were being exploited by segments of the elite with potentially dangerous and painful consequences for all Nigerians.

The statement acknowledged that the drums of rising division also reflects the perception by citizens that there is poor governance in Nigeria today, blaming politicians who had failed in delivering on the mandate of the electorate for better livelihoods and neighbourhoods for teaming up with advocates of division and hate.

The group stated that in many parts of the country, young people who had been left without means of livelihood or hope in their future had become converts to radicalisation preached by those it described as demagogues who resorted to various guises including ethnicity and religion.
According to Abubakar and Kukah, “At this time in Nigeria, more than ever before, we need government at all levels, which works for the people, with commitment and respect for the rule of law and for the security and well wellbeing of persons and communities in the country.

“We also need credible institutions, an economy that guarantees a fair deal and outcome for hardworking people, better physical infrastructure and an enabling environment in which citizens can thrive.”
They further urged the state governments to be more committed to developing their people and relying less on Abuja to fund their consumption through monthly allocations.
They encouraged Osinbajo and the federal government to remain steadfast in the steps they had taken to reassure all communities and citizens of an equal stake in the Nigerian project, insisting that Nigerians need an effective state they call their own.

To reinforce the unity of the country, they appealed that on-going efforts to reach out to leaders from various parts of the country should be broadened into honest dialogue with all segments of the Nigerian population to ensure that ordinary citizens get the opportunity to convey their views to government at the highest levels and get carried along in the formulation and implementation of government policies.

The committee further advised the government to hold consultations on the possibility of examining the reports of the Political Reforms Conference of 2005 and other National Conferences as a basis for further and continuing dialogue on the co-existence among communities in Nigeria.
Pledging their support for the government to ensure effective enforcement of laws that prohibit divisive speeches, they called on politicians to deny support to or endorse groups that harbour or express disdain for peaceful coexistence among Nigerians.

Eze Does It: Calvary Big On Rise Year After Brain Cancer Scare

BY DAVID FURONES

SUN SENTINEL, JULY 11, 2017

A little over one year after undergoing brain surgery for a fist-sized cancer tumor, Elochukwu Eze is getting his groove back. The 6-foot-10 center, currently playing summer travel basketball for Florida Elite, will be a key returner this year for defending Florida high school state champion Calvary Christian. Image: Carline Jean/Sun Sentinel


Geoff Still picked up the phone in late May 2016 for what should have been a proud “father”-to-father update on the headway Elochukwu Eze had made in the U.S. as a sophomore at Calvary Christian.

The 6-foot-10 Nigerian teen, who Still and his family hosted as part of the small Fort Lauderdale private school’s international mission, was excelling in his studies and on the basketball court, where he was gaining national notice.

But instead of sharing all of Eze’s good news with Casmir Eze, Still was calling Nigeria with an altogether more tragic report: a plum-sized cancerous tumor – one doctors weren’t sure Eze would survive – had been found in his brain.

In response, instead of the dismay he expected, Still heard only gratitude and hope.

“Thank God he’s in America,” he said. “If he was in Nigeria today, he would be dead.”

For Eze himself, having recently passed the one-year anniversary of the emergency surgery he underwent on May 5, 2016, to remove the tumor, survival is about more than having the sort of advantages many Americans take for granted. As he explains it, his recovery from brain cancer sounds more like testament to personal improvement.

Instead of “lying there, feeling depressed,” he said. “I decided to get better.”

And “get better” is exactly what Eze has done.

The big move

Eze arrived in South Florida as an eighth-grader, even then more mature than his gangly adolescent body suggested.

Attending a sports camp in Nigeria hosted by former Cleveland Cavalier draft pick Ejike Ugboaja, “Big E” made a big impression on Geoff Still. Still, 48, of Coral Springs, an active Christian educator who’d previously taught at Coral Springs Christian, was speaking to the Ejike Foundation campers, giving encouragement and wishing them luck. Among them, only Eze remained engaged throughout the conversation.

Eze later contacted Still on Facebook and the friendship they struck up ultimately led to Still sponsoring the teen’s move to the U.S. as part of Calvary’s International Student Program.

The director of finance at Calvary Christian, Still said his wife, Stacy, and their three children – Geoffrey, who’s 19, Emilie (15) and David (11) – “absolutely adore” Eze.

He thrived in school and, by his sophomore season, started for the basketball team, averaging 10 points, 12 rebounds and three blocks at center under coach Cilk McSweeney.
The big sick

The way Eze remembers it, the trouble started after a day at the pool, when he couldn't seem to get the water out of his ears. Later that night, he struggled to make it through a church service because of the bright lights and loud music, which left him with a terrible headache.

But as his American brother, Geoffrey Still Jr., related in a story for GoodNewsFl.org at the time, Eze for weeks had complained about having headaches and being sensitive to light. One of his teachers, later visiting Eze in the hospital, had said the boy hadn't been his usual "happy and excited" self for several months.

Then along with the increasingly painful headaches, Eze began to have trouble walking and, on May 4, started vomiting.
Eze does it

More than one year has passed since the tumor was removed during three hours of emergency surgery on May 5, 2016. The MRIs he has had every three months since have come back clean. His doctors believe with the cancer fully removed from his brain, Eze need not undergo chemotherapy.

Eze seemingly has no obstacles as he looks forward to his senior year at Calvary Christian.

Still, he expects to make a huge return playing hoops too. After spending last year coming off the bench behind 7-footer and fellow Nigeria native Victor Uyaelunmo, now at Southern Cal, he’ll return to his starting role as Calvary looks to defend its state title.

McSweeney said Eze is working this summer on giving his guards a lane for drop passes and finishing strong at the basket. The fifth-year Eagles coach says Eze has a big part to play on the team and with his teammates.

“I always rely on him to be another coach in the locker room,” said McSweeney, who had him as a captain on the title-winning team last year. “He’s always a spiritual influence on the guys.”

Maintaining a 3.5 grade-point average, Eze already has scholarship offers from North Florida and Stetson and has drawn interest from FAU, FIU, Furman, East Carolina, Navy and USF.

For right now, Eze is more concerned about recovering from a high ankle sprain he sustained earlier this summer. Then it's back to work -- as part of the Florida Elite travel team, he has tournaments in Orlando, Atlanta and Las Vegas this summer before coming back to prepare for his senior season at Calvary.

“I know most people would have quit or suffer from depression,” Eze said about what seemed to him to be a long road back from brain surgery. “I don’t because I know what I came here to do.

“I have to embrace it and get working.”

5 Things To Know About Iraq's Mosul

U.S. soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division fire artillery in support of Iraqi forces fighting Islamic State militants from their base east of Mosul. U.S.-led coalition support for Iraqi ground forces in Mosul repeatedly proved to be the critical factor in the Mosul fight. Iraq’s prime minister declared victory over the Islamic State group in Mosul after more than eight months of some of the toughest fighting Iraqi forces have faced in the more than 3-year-old war against the extremists.

MOSUL, IRAQ (AP JULY 10, 2017) — Iraq's prime minister declared victory over the Islamic State group in Mosul after more than eight months of some of the toughest fighting Iraqi forces have faced in the more than 3-year-old war against the extremists.

Iraqi and coalition forces acknowledged from the start that Mosul would be a challenge, but the Iraqi leadership's initial vows that it would be over by the end of 2016 underestimated the capacity and the resolve of the IS fighters left to fight to the death.

Here are five things to know now that the fight for Mosul is officially over. THE IMPORTANCE OF MOSUL Mosul held deep symbolic importance for IS. It was after the Islamic State group overran Mosul in June of 2014 that they declared a caliphate stretching from territory in northern Syria deep into Iraq's north and west. And it was from Mosul's al-Nuri mosque that the group's leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, made his only public appearance when he gave a Friday sermon calling on all Muslims to follow him as "caliph." He vowed that IS would conquer "Rome," and the entire world.

Mosul was also the bureaucratic and financial backbone of IS. In the early days of IS growth in Iraq and Syria, former Saddam-era military officers from Mosul made up some of the group's highest-ranking members and helped garner supporters in Iraq.

Raiding Mosul's central bank, and taxing and extorting the city's wealthy inhabitants, made IS the richest terrorist organization in the world in the summer of 2014. Mosul's vast industrial zones were converted into factories for weapons and explosives.
HOW U.S.-BACKED IRAQI FORCES WON

Iraq spent more than two years rebuilding its armed forces and preparing for the Mosul offensive. Some 70,000 forces drawn from Iraq's army, special forces, the federal police, and tribal and militia fighters were mobilized for the fight, according to Iraq's joint operations command.

Initially, Iraqi forces planned to attack the city simultaneously from multiple fronts — north, east and south. But forces without urban combat experience and limited training quickly proved incapable of leading pushes and instead were moved to act largely as holding forces. Iraq's special forces and the federal police led most combat operations to retake Mosul, first clearing the city's east and then the west.

U.S.-led coalition support for Iraqi ground forces in Mosul repeatedly proved to be the critical factor. Iraqi forces repeatedly called in airstrikes to kill just one or two IS fighters armed with light weapons. Iraqi commanders said this approach was adopted to keep military casualties to a minimum.

The final battles for Mosul played out in the Old City, dense terrain measuring just a few square kilometers (miles) where the United Nations estimated IS held more than 100,000 people as human shields.
THE COST OF VICTORY

The extent of the cost in civilian life is not yet known as many bodies are still believed to be trapped under rubble and Iraq lacks a centralized system for documenting civilian casualties.

But at a minimum hundreds of people are believed to have been killed and thousands more wounded, according to interviews conducted with doctors at field clinics and humanitarian organizations.

Iraq's military has also suffered high casualty rates. The government does not disclose official death tolls, but many of the units leading assaults in Mosul faced attrition rates of upward of 25 percent when engaged in urban combat. The high casualty rates will likely undermine the forces' ability to continue the fight against IS in the pockets of territory they still hold in Iraq.
DESTRUCTION

The levels of destruction are dramatically different between Mosul's east and west. Complexes in the east used by IS fighters, like the city's university, were heavily bombed. But many of the east's residential neighborhoods suffered relatively little damage.

In the west, however, entire city blocks are damaged or destroyed by months of airstrikes and artillery. It was also in western Mosul that a single U.S. airstrike killed more than a hundred civilians sheltering in basement of a single home.

Human rights and aid groups warn that such widespread destruction could undermine the military victory and make it more difficult for the hundreds of thousands of civilians who fled the west to return to their homes.
THE FIGHT CONTINUES

The operation in Syria to retake the IS group's de-facto capital, Raqqa, is in full swing, with U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led forces having retaken a handful of neighborhoods. But the battle for Raqqa is expected to be extended and bloody, and IS still controls a number of other towns in eastern Syria.

IS also continues to carry out insurgent attacks in Iraq, Syria and beyond. Iraqi and coalition officials have said the fight against IS as an insurgent force will likely be more difficult than the fight against the group as a conventional one and that the extremists will continue to pose a threat for years to come.

Iraqi Declares 'Total Victory' Over Islamic State In Mosul

Iraq's prime minister Haider al-Abadi addresses forces from a small base on the edge of Mosul's Old City, where heavy clashes have been underway for days, Monday, July 10, 2017. Al-Abadi returned to Mosul Monday and declared victory against the Islamic State group in the northern city following nine months of grueling urban combat. (Iraqi Prime Minister's Media Office via AP)

MOSUL, IRAQ (AP JULY 10, 2017) — Iraq on Monday declared "total victory" over the Islamic State in Mosul, retaking full control of the country's second-largest city three years after it was seized by extremists bent on building a global caliphate.

"This great feast day crowned the victories of the fighters and the Iraqis for the past three years," said Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, flanked by his senior military leadership at a small base in western Mosul on the edge of the Old City. Iraqi forces had backed the last pockets of Islamic State militants against the banks of the Tigris River.

Al-Abadi alluded to the brutality of the battle for Mosul — Iraq's longest yet in the fight against IS — saying the triumph had been achieved "by the blood of our martyrs." The nearly nine-month campaign, which was backed by airstrikes from the U.S.-led coalition, left thousands dead, entire neighborhoods in ruins and nearly 900,000 displaced from their homes.

Shortly after al-Abadi's speech, the coalition congratulated him on the victory but noted that parts of the Old City still "must be back-cleared of explosive devices and possible ISIS fighters in hiding." ISIS, ISIL and Daesh are alternative acronyms for the Islamic State group.

Earlier in the day, airstrikes pounded the last IS-held territory on the western edge of the Tigris, Humvees rushed the wounded to field hospitals and soldiers hurriedly filled bags with hand grenades to ferry to the front.

Iraqi troops had slowly pushed through the narrow alleyways of the Old City during the past week, punching holes through walls and demolishing houses to carve supply routes and fighting positions in a district where many of the buildings date back centuries.

For days, the remaining few hundred militants held area measuring less than a square kilometer (less than a mile), and Iraqi commanders described victory as imminent. Al-Abadi also visited Mosul on Sunday, congratulating the troops on recent gains but stopping short of declaring an outright victory as clashes continued.

The drawn-out endgame in Iraq's fight for Mosul highlighted the resilience of the extremists and the continued reliance of Iraqi forces on air support to retake territory. Iraqi commanders said gains slowed to a crawl in recent days as IS fighters used their families — including women and children — as human shields. As the battle space constricted, the coalition began approving airstrikes, dropping bombs of 200 pounds or more on IS targets within 50 meters (yards) of friendly forces.

Plumes of smoke Monday grew larger than the strip of territory under IS control. Over the campaign, the Iraqi special forces who largely led the assault have faced casualty rates of 40 percent, according to a report in May from the office of the U.S. secretary of defense. Iraq's army, federal police and mostly Shiite government-sanctioned militia forces also suffered significant losses.

As the Iraqi army celebrated imminent victory on Sunday, Muhammad Abdul Abbas, a 20-year-old solider, said he lost 15 close friends fighting for Mosul. "Honestly, all this death and all this destruction, I don't believe it was worth it," he said.

Reports of civilian casualties also rose as Iraqi forces punched into Mosul's western half in February. Residents fleeing the fighting reported that entire families sheltering in the basements of their homes were killed by airstrikes targeting small teams of IS fighters.

Thousands of civilians were estimated to have been killed in the fight for Mosul, according to Nineveh's provincial council. That did not include those still believed buried under collapsed buildings.

More than 897,000 people were displaced, and the U.N. said there was no end in sight to the humanitarian crisis in Iraq despite the conclusion of the fighting. The U.N. said thousands of Mosul residents will probably not be able to return to the city because of "extensive damage caused during the conflict."

The infrastructure in western Mosul, where the fighting was fiercest, has been decimated. Iraq's civil defense rescue teams — a branch of the Interior Ministry — said about 65 percent of the buildings in the Old City were severely damaged or destroyed. In western neighborhoods like Zanjili, destruction was estimated to be 70 percent of all houses, buildings and infrastructure.

Mosul fell to IS militants within a matter of days in June 2014, starting a political and security crisis not seen in the country since the 2003 toppling of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. The territorial gains by the extremists led to the ouster of Iraq's top leaders, dramatically shifted the balance of power among its security forces, empowered Iranian-backed fighters who are now sanctioned by the central government, and brought U.S. ground troops back onto Iraqi soil for the first time since 2011.

The road to retake Mosul has taken the government, its security forces and the coalition more than three years of training troops to replace the tens of thousands of Iraqi forces who dissolved in the face of the 2014 IS advance.

That summer, IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, appeared at Mosul's al-Nuri Mosque and declared a caliphate on territory it seized in Iraq and Syria. Last month, as Iraqi troops closed in on the Old City, the militants destroyed the al-Nuri Mosque and its famous leaning minaret to deny the forces a symbolic triumph.

Senior Advocate Of Nigeria Reveals New Meaning Of Biafra

BY CHIJIOKE JANNAH

DAILY POST NIGERIA

JULY 10, 2017

A Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Mike Ahamba, yesterday, said the issue of Biafra has acquired a new meaning which no longer represents only South-easterners who want an independent state.

According to him, the new meaning of Biafra reflects, “protest against imbalance in Nigeria.”

Ahamba made this statement in Owerri, while reacting to the current agitations in the country, especially from the South-East zone.

He said: “the word Biafra is no longer for secessionists or those who want to secede, it is now a word for protest against the imbalance in Nigeria.

“Because we have Biafra in the Middle Belt, South-South, South-West, North-East, among others, they all have their own name. They are those who think that they are not well accommodated in this country. To that extent, I agree with Biafra.”

But he was of the view that the Igbo cannot leave Nigeria for anybody, saying: “To the extent of making me leave Nigeria, I do not agree, I am not leaving this country for anybody because I have invested in it.

“There is nobody who can force me out of this country because I have invested so much. Whatsoever the problem, we shall discuss it, all of us as Nigerians.

“Let me tell you why the sit-at-home order was successful, they put one emotional point in it, honouring the dead, and many stayed at home to honour the dead in the Biafra/Nigeria civil war.


“Let me also say this, it was the Federal Government that created the present impulse by arresting and detaining Kanu against the law. They created sympathy for him.”

Illinois Has Bills To Pay After 2 years Without Budget Plan

BY JOHN O'CONNOR

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

JULY 09, 2017

Rep. David Harris, R-Mount Prospect, left, explains why he would vote to override Gov. Bruce Rauner's veto of a package of budget bills at the Capitol in Springfield, Ill. Ten Republicans voted with Democrats to overturn the governor's veto approving the first state budget in more than two years. Democratic Comptroller Susana Mendoza's staff estimates she will be able to cover expenses in August. The law allows for borrowing or taking $1.5 billion from other state funds in the interim. (Rich Saal/The State Journal-Register via AP File)

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) — Illinois finally has a budget plan after two years. Now, to start paying bills. The Democratic-controlled Legislature's vote last week to create a $36 billion framework over Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner's vetoes ended the nation's longest fiscal stalemate since at least the Great Depression. At the core of the budget was a $5 billion income tax increase.

The tax hike is retroactive to July 1, and the state could start seeing some additional money within weeks. But after unchecked "autopilot" spending that outstripped incoming revenue by $600 million a month, Illinois has a $14.7 billion jumble of overdue bills.

The tax increase also does nothing to directly address the haunting, $130 billion shortfall in pension obligations to retired and current state workers. The debt-reduction plan also includes more debt, although slightly less costly. It allows Rauner to sell up to $6 billion in bonds, on top of the tens of billions of dollars Illinois owes from past loans. The idea is the interest owed on bonded indebtedness would be less than what is owed on overdue bills. The state must pay 1 percent per month on any bill unpaid for 90 days.

But while less, the state can expect to pay double what a more financially sound state would pay on bond-sale interest — as low as 2 percent. That's because the state's creditworthiness has been downgraded amid the budget crisis. On a $480 million sale last fall, the state is paying 4.2 percent, and that was before major credit-rating agencies knocked down the rating further. One, Moody's Investors Service, said a downgrade to "junk" status could come regardless of a budget deal.

More immediately, Democratic Comptroller Susana Mendoza predicts there will be enough money to cover basic services in August; she had warned that without a deal, she would fall $185 million short. If added income tax revenue isn't sufficient, the law allows for borrowing or otherwise taking $1.5 billion from money accumulated in state funds created for other purposes.

Mendoza said in a YouTube video that she would begin by paying bills that draw matching dollars from the federal government, such as those covered by the Medicaid health care program. Bills with high late payment interest also get priority.

"Our state's schools and universities will receive critical funds, giving them the chance to open on time in the fall," Mendoza said. "State vendors will still have to wait longer than they'd like to be caught up on payments. But there is finally a path forward."

The individual income tax rate is now 4.95 percent, up from 3.75 percent. Corporations will pay 7 percent instead of 5.25 percent. The Illinois Department of Revenue updated its payroll withholding guide to reflect the new tax rate, spokesman Terry Horstman said. Larger employers must make semi-weekly withholding payments, so those should begin this month. Smaller employers and taxpayers not on a payroll are required to file estimated payments by mid-September, at which point money will start coming in at the higher rate.

In the budget year that ended last month, Illinois collected $17.8 billion in personal and corporate income taxes, an increase of just 1 percent from the previous year, according to the Legislature's bipartisan Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability . Legislative sponsors of the tax hike estimated it would bring in $350 million more per month, though that likely depends on economic growth in the state.

Legislative Democrats boast that the $36 billion budget they approved is not only $1 billion less than Rauner himself proposed, but $3 billion less than the "autopilot" government spent annually. But Rauner's administration complains the budget still is $1 billion or more out of balance.

The legislation also provides some relief for nonprofits that have provided services without payment and college students who have had to make do this past school year without access to the state's needs-based Monetary Award Program. They will receive money from the more than $800 million in tax revenue that accumulated in special funds but went unspent because lawmakers hadn't appropriated the money.

Contact Political Writer John O'Connor at https://twitter.com/apoconnor . His work can be found at https://apnews.com/search/john%20o'connor

Goal Of Nation's First Opioid Court: Keep Users Alive

City Court Judge Craig Hannah presides at Opiate Crisis Intervention Court in Buffalo, N.Y. The first such program in the country puts users under faster, stricter supervision than ordinary drug courts, all with the goal of keeping them alive.

BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP, JULY 09, 2017) — After three defendants fatally overdosed in a single week last year, it became clear that Buffalo's ordinary drug treatment court was no match for the heroin and painkiller crisis.

Now the city is experimenting with the nation's first opioid crisis intervention court, which can get users into treatment within hours of their arrest instead of days, requires them to check in with a judge every day for a month instead of once a week, and puts them on strict curfews. Administering justice takes a back seat to the overarching goal of simply keeping defendants alive.




"The idea behind it," said court project director Jeffrey Smith, "is only about how many people are still breathing each day when we're finished." Funded with a three-year $300,000 U.S. Justice Department grant, the program began May 1 with the intent of treating 200 people in a year and providing a model that other heroin-wracked cities can replicate.

Two months in, organizers are optimistic. As of late last week, none of the 80 people who agreed to the program had overdosed, though about 10 warrants had been issued for missed appearances. Buffalo-area health officials blamed 300 deaths on opioid overdoses in 2016, up from 127 two years earlier. That includes a young couple who did not make it to their second drug court appearance last spring. The woman's father arrived instead to tell the judge his daughter and her boyfriend had died the night before.

"We have an epidemic on our hands. ... We've got to start thinking outside the box here," said Erie County District Attorney John Flynn. "And if that means coddling an individual who has a minor offense, who is not a career criminal, who's got a serious drug problem, then I'm guilty of coddling."

Regular drug treatment courts that emerged in response to crack cocaine in the 1980s take people in after they've been arraigned and in some cases released. The toll of opioids and profile of their users, some of them hooked by legitimate prescriptions, called for more drastic measures.

Acceptance into opioid crisis court means detox, inpatient or outpatient care, 8 p.m. curfews, and at least 30 consecutive days of in-person meetings with the judge. A typical drug treatment court might require such appearances once a week or even once a month.

"This 30-day thing is like being beat up and being asked to get in the ring again, and you're required to," 36-year-old Ron Woods said after one of his daily face-to-face meetings with City Court Judge Craig Hannah, who presides over the program.

Woods said his heroin use started with an addiction to painkillers prescribed after cancer treatments that began when he was 21. He was arrested on drug charges in mid-May and agreed to intervention with the dual hope of kicking the opioids that have killed two dozen friends and seeing the felony charges against him reduced or dismissed.

In addition to the Monday-through-Friday court dates, Woods attends daily outpatient counseling, submits to drug testing, works at his family paving business and, although they are not required, attends Narcotics Anonymous meetings.

"This court makes it amazingly easy. Normally I'd be like ... 'This is stupid,'" said Woods, who has been through programs before. "But for the first time I have an optimistic outlook and I wanted to get clean."

Buffalo's get-tough court is part of a nationwide push to come up with ways to use the criminal justice system to address the opioid crisis. In April, the National Governors Association announced that eight states — Alaska, Indiana, Kansas, Minnesota, North Carolina, New Jersey, Virginia and Washington — will together study, among other things, how to expand treatment within the criminal justice system.

The grant pays for the coordinator and case managers from UB Family Medicine, a University at Buffalo medical practice, who enforce curfews, do wellness checks and transport patients. Insurance is billed for treatment.

Judge Hannah hasn't taken a day off since the program started, determined to show participants he is as committed as they are. Although he still carries a full City Court load, he meets unhurriedly and one by one with the people in the opioid program during prolonged sessions on the bench.

These are not interrogations about whether they've used drugs the previous night; they are chats about the weather, the weekend and work. Some have missed check-ins or otherwise slipped and are brought before him in handcuffs after being picked up by law enforcement.

"I don't want to die in the streets, especially with the fentanyl out there," Sammy Delgado, one of the handcuffed defendants, said. After his arrest for drug possession, Delgado left inpatient treatment after six days but wants another chance.

Hannah, as much counselor and cheerleader as judge, told him: "You have a lot of people pulling for you. We need you to pull for yourself." Later, in his office, Hannah described his philosophy as tempering justice with mercy. He said he's willing to overlook defendants' occasional lies and attempts to fool him, "because we've got them now. We're just trying to save their life at this point and to stabilize them, get them back on track."

Somali Refugee Relieved To Get To US Before Travel Ban Rules

Ali Said, of Somalia, center, leaves a center for refugees with his two sons, as refugee caseworker Mohamed Yassin, right, holds open the door Thursday, July 6, 2017, in San Diego. Said, whose leg was blown off by a grenade, says he feels unbelievably lucky to be among the last refugees allowed into the United States before stricter rules kick in as part of the Trump administration's travel ban.

SAN DIEGO (AP, JULY 07, 2017) — Ali Said fled war-torn Somalia two decades ago after his right leg was blown off by a grenade. Last year, the father of seven was shot in his other leg by robbers while living in a Kenyan refugee camp.

Said rolled his wheelchair up to a desk in an office hours after arriving in California from Kenya, saying he felt unbelievably lucky: He and his family are among the last refugees allowed into the United States before the Trump administration's latest travel ban rules kick in.

"Until this moment, in this interview, I still don't believe that I'm in the United States," Said told The Associated Press through a translator Thursday at the International Rescue Committee's office in San Diego, smiling while his two sons hung at the back of his wheelchair.

"So during the flight, we all were saying that we are in a dream and it's not true yet until we finally landed at LAX, and we all said to each other: 'Yeah, we're finally here. We made it,'" he said. The U.S. refugee program will be suspended Wednesday when a cap of 50,000 refugee admissions for the fiscal year — the lowest in a decade — was expected to be reached, according to the U.S. State Department.

Once the cap is hit, only refugees who have a relationship with an immediate family member or ties to a business in the United States will be eligible for admission during the 120-day suspension, State Department guidelines say.

Those guidelines come after the Supreme Court partially reinstated President Donald Trump's executive order banning citizens of six mainly Muslim countries and refugees from coming into the U.S. The high court's ruling allowed for an exemption: Those with a "bona fide" relationship to the United States. Under State Department guidelines, that connection was defined as an immediate family member such as a parent, spouse, child, sibling or a business.

Said is aware of the difference a week could have made. He, his wife and children, ages 2 to 15, have no ties to the U.S. beyond the refugee resettlement agency, which the U.S. government says is not sufficient.

"I was afraid our case would be closed," he said. "It would have been a rough life." He said refugees at the Kakuma refugee camp where he lived have talked every day about the travel ban since it was first issued in January.

It was blocked several times by U.S. courts before the Supreme Court partially reinstated it in June. The Trump administration says the travel ban is necessary to keep Americans safe and to allow the federal government to review the vetting process for refugees and others.

Advocates say the ban will close the doors on many of the most vulnerable. A record 65 million people are displaced by war and persecution worldwide, according to the U.N. refugee agency. It selects the most at-risk refugees to be recommended to governments for resettlement, typically including victims of gender-based violence, LGBT refugees, members of political opposition groups and people with medical issues.

But the new requirements could mean many of those refugees could be passed over for those who have an immediate family member already in the United States. "This is part of the disconnect now," said David Murphy, executive director of the International Rescue Committee's San Diego office. "We identify families based upon need and now they have to have a U.S. tie."

Said, who spent eight years being vetted for refugee resettlement, had feared he would never leave Kakuma, a 25-year-old camp that is home to about 172,000 refugees. About a year ago, robbers broke into his home at the camp and tried to rape his wife, he said.

Said, who was on crutches after losing his right leg to a grenade explosion in 1993, was shot in his good leg while fighting off the men. A neighbor who came to their aid shot one of the robbers to death. Said's children were home at the time.

The shooting left him with a fractured hip, and it still has not healed. He plans to get medical help now that he is in the United States. They will spend the next three months with the refugee group, taking English classes, finding an apartment and getting adjusted culturally.

On his first night in his new country, Said and his family said they slept peacefully in a San Diego motel. But the feelings of happiness and relief are tinged with sadness, too. "I don't like it that others like me won't be able to make it here," he said. "The life there is so hard. No matter how hard you work, you don't have enough to meet your basic needs."

Associated Press writers Alicia A. Caldwell and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed.

WAR IN NIGERIA: VICTORY REMAINS ELUSIVE, 50 YEARS ON

BY WOLE SOYINKA

NEWSWEEK, JULY 07, 2017

Nigerian Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka attends the national inter-denominational funeral rites for Biafran secessionist leader Odumegwu Ojukwu in Enugu, Nigeria, on March 1, 2012. Image: Pius Utomi Ekpei/AFP/Getty

On July 6, 1967, civil war broke out in Nigeria between the country’s military and the forces of Biafra, an independent republic proclaimed by ex-Nigerian military officer Odumegwu Ojukwu on May 30 of that year. The war killed more than 1 million people, many of whom died from starvation. It ended in January 1970 with the reintegration of Biafra into Nigeria.
Malnutrition, Red Cross, kwashiorkor, relief flights, genocide, the Uli airstrip used by Biafran planes to elude the Nigerian blockade, mercenaries, the Aburi accord that broke down and led to war—these are some of the memory triggers of the Nigerian civil war of secession that we would like to re-assign.

Over a million lives perished—a shameful proportion of them children—mostly through starvation and aerial bombardment. The Nigerian federal government, committed to the doctrine of oneness, had boasted that the conflict would last no longer than three weeks of “police action.” We had learnt much from the politics of other nations, but apparently not from history; the war lasted more than two years.

Tormented by the image of a herd of human lemmings rushing to their doom, as a young writer, I made the “treasonable” statement warning that the secessionist state, Biafra, could never be defeated. The simplistic rendition of that conviction in most minds—certainly in the minds of the then-ruling military and its elite support—was that this applied merely to the physical field of combat. Thus it was regarded as a psychological offensive against the federal side, an attempt to demoralize its soldiers while boosting the war spirit of the enemy. That “enemy” had also boasted that no force in black Africa could defeat them.

My visit to the Biafran enclave in October 1966 resulted in arrest and detention. During interrogation, I insisted that my statement was meant as a counter to the surge of emotive nationalism and a slavish sanctification of colonial boundaries. Biafra was therefore an expression of that rejection and its replacement with a people's self-constitutive rights. This specific challenge owed its genesis to memory at its rawest, the memory of ethnic cleansing, whose remedy could not be sought rationally in a campaign of subjugation against an already traumatized community.

One question, rhetorical in tone, stuck in my mind for long afterwards. It went thus: “Why should you take it on yourself to make such a statement? Is it because you're a writer? Who are you to take a contrary stance to the government?” I replied to myself that I had learned to listen. The young man countered that he was on the side of history, and Biafra would be crushed. Not quite, as it turned out. The Biafrans were indeed defeated on the battlefield, but crushed?

Today, most Nigerians know better. Biafra has not been defeated. If anyone was left in any doubt about this, the last work of my late colleague, Chinua Achebe's There Was A Country, has left us re-thinking. New generation writers, born long after that brutal war, have inherited and continue to propagate the Biafran doctrine, an article of faith among the Igbo populace, even among those who pay lip-service to a united nation. Millions remain sworn to uphold it. Many have died at the hands of the police and the military as succeeding guardians of that legacy troop out to reclaim it in defiant manifestations. Amnesty International estimated that at least 150 pro-Biafra activists have been killedsince August 2015. Some of their leaders, including the director of their official mouthpiece, Radio Biafra, remain on trial for alleged subversion and treason. Others have gone underground.

The war is not over, only the tactics have changed. One could claim that a project of internal secession is unfolding, one that skirts the peripheries of Nigerian laws, testing what they permit, and daring what they do not. As for the victorious side, analysts continue to cite the lingering consequences of the war of secession among the main causes of the nation's instability, alongside contemporary factors such as mismanagement of petroleum resources, corruption, visionless leadership, etc.

Today, secession simmers openly, and is moving steadily beyond rhetoric. It has already taken on a dangerous complement—ejection. A number of combative youth organizations in the northern part of Nigeria recently called for the expulsion of the Igbo from their lands for daring once again to talk about secession. Mainstream leaders have disowned them, but some support has been voiced by individuals within the same adult cadre, including its intelligentsia. Debate is intense, often acrimonious. Sadly however, one is left with a feeling that most participants in this discourse shy away from a fundamental component of nation being, one that transcends the Biafran will to corporate existence. That principle virtually gasps for air under the wishfully terminal mantra that goes: “The unity of Nigeria is non-negotiable.”

I have never understood how this is supposed to differ from the dogma of certain religious strains that declare conversion from faith to be an act of apostasy, punishable by death. Nationality, like religion, is only another construct into which one is either born, or acquires by accident or indoctrination. Those who insist on the divine right of nation over a people's choice seem unaware that they box themselves into the same doctrinaire mould of mere habit, just like religion. In the Nigerian instance, however, the matter is even more troubling.

Since the absolutists of nation indivisibility are not ignorant of the histories of other nations and are immersed daily under evidence of the assertive factor of negotiation—be it in the language of arms and violence or the conference table—since they know full well that this process straddles pre-colonial, colonial and postcolonial histories, such speakers unconsciously imply that Africans are sub-citizens of the real world and are not entitled to make their own choices, even in this modern age. This smacks of an inferiority complex, if not of a slavish indoctrination, when we additionally consider how today's Africa came to be, a land mass of constitutive units that were largely determined by alien interests, and thus, hold possibilities of fatal flaws.

Also requiring contestation is the implicit equation of supreme sacrifice with supreme entitlement: Those who say, “We have shed our blood for Nigerian unity, and will not stand by and watch it dismantled.”

My observation is that in civil warfare—indeed in most kinds of warfare—civilians pay the higher price in lives, possessions and dignity. We need therefore to eliminate the distracting lament of professionals of violence and confront, in its own right, the issue of the collective volition of any human grouping. This leaves us with the other line of approach, the line of frankly subjective or reasoned, pragmatic preferences. It is a positioning that admits, quite simply, I am a creature of habit and prefer things as they are. Or: I like to be a big frog in a small pond, and allied determinants.

Such individual and collective preferences for nation validation offer sincere basis for negotiation and resolution. Once conceded, we proceed to invoke the positives of cohabitation that render fragmentation mostly adventurist and potentially destructive. Habit is a great motivator, but it should not be permitted to transform itself into categorical controls that make any existing condition “non-negotiable.”

Independence surely means more the severance of ties with an imperial order. It need not go so far as to dictate the dismantling of its bequests but certainly leaves open the option of placing it in question. Propagators of the inflexible “nationalist” line unabashedly attempt to shut down this questioning. They distort even the stance of those whose preference is that the nation remain one, but base their pleading strictly on a pragmatic platform, not as the manifestation of a divine will. The unity of any nation is not only historically subject to negotiation; nation is itself an offspring of negotiation. So what is so exceptional about those who inhabit the Nigerian nation space? Nothing. Except we wish to situate them outside history.

Should Biafra stay in, or opt out of Nigeria? That is the latent question. Even after years of turbulent co-tenancy, it seems unreal to conceive of a Nigeria without Biafra. My preference for “in” goes beyond objective assessment of economic, cultural and social advantages for Biafra and the rest of us.

Today's global realities make multi-textured nations far more compelling, not only for outside investors—tourists included—but equally inspiring to the occupants of any nation space. The West African region is marked by an intersection of horizontally and vertically-formed groupings and identities, the result of colonial intervention in the race for territory. The result has proved often dispiriting but just as often stimulating. It has gone on for long, with developmental structures whose dismantling strikes one as being potentially perilous even for the most resilient and endowed of the resultant pieces.

Among many analogies, I have heard and read Nigeria described as a ticking time-bomb. Ironically, I see in this very fear a strong argument for remaining intact. An explosion in closed space is deadlier than in a wider arena which stands a chance of diffusing the impact and enabling survival. My preference for remaining one is thus reinforced by that very doomsday prediction, not by any presumptive law of human association.

Among the lessons learnt today is that changing the content of geography texts does not obliterate the fundamental attachment to an idea. The Bight of Biafra was renamed during the civil war—to expunge the secessionist consciousness—but that ruse has clearly failed. Orders from a section of Igbo leadership for restoration of the original name is a warning that the Biafran narrative has not ended. When added to the widely spread observance earlier this year of sit-at-home protests to mark Biafra Day on May 30, it would be wise to respond with a fresh understanding to the pulsation of the new Biafran generation.

Wole Soyinka is a Nigerian playwright and poet who was awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize in Literature