I took the liberty of culling the following piece from the Observer Newspaper. The British ought to be ashamed of themselves for resuming military cooperation with the callous government we have back home and helping Yaya sharpen his instrument of oppression. What has changed in the past seven years to warrant this insensitivity from the British government? Things have gone from bad to worse. Five months ago Yaya's armed forces massacred innocent Gambian children in broad daylight The British are in effect arming Yaya to massacre more children and defenseless Gambians. What has Peter Singhateh and Baboucarr Jatta contributed to the Gambian society, with their Sandhurst training? I would not be surprised if this Mendy chap also come back as an alcoholic murderer. If the British Embassy in Gambia wants to keep itself busy and in the limelight giving out press conferences, they should be engineering aid that is more meaningful to the Gambian poor. Use the money that is going to be used to send this potential murderer to Britain and give some poor kid a British Council scholarship to go to some university to study engineering or medicine. We urge the Gambian community in Britain to lobby the British government and convince them to stop arming Yaya. They are helping to perpetuate a despot that is worst than Foday Sankoh. If the British do not want their soldiers to take up another expedition in The Gambia, they should desist from this shameful exercise of arming murderers. The instrument Yaya uses to brutalize defenseless Gambians, i.e. his army, should not be beefed up by any decent government. Britain should not sit at a table where Yaya sits with the likes of Gadaffi and Charles Taylor. What is all this focus on the regional peace-keeping activities? We have ordinary Gambians being brutalized by our own armed forces every single day and all these diplomats talk about is keeping the peace in the sub-region. Our army has a more urgent job back home. They need to get rid of the tyranny being visited on the defenseless Gambians daily. I respectfully urge our compatriots in Britain to mount a more appropriate response to this latest monstrosity. KB ___________________________________________________________________ After 7 years UK RESUMES MILITARY COOPERATION The British government has resumed its military cooperation with The Gambia, seven years after it was frozen. The British High Commission, Saturday, September 9, held a press briefing on the resumption of the military cooperation, a few hours before cadet officer, Sainey Mendy, of the Gambia National Army left for UK to participate in the Sandhurst Commissioning Course, September 2000 to June 2001. Speaking at the press briefing, British high commissioner, John Perrott, recalled that the last Gambian cadets who attended the Sandhurst commission course were Chief of Staff Baboucarr Jatta and Major Peter Singhatey in 1993. Mr Perrott said two more cadets could be sent to Sandhurst by next September. "Sandhurst is not the only area in which we are trying to help. I have been working closely with Chief of Staff Jatta and Army Commander Badjie to arrange good Gambian participation in a regional peacekeeping in a Regional Map Exercise on regional peacekeeping in Nigeria next month jointly sponsored by the United Kingdom and France. The prospects look good. I can assure you that we will continue to assist you whenever possible in regional and international peacekeeping, both publicly and behind the scenes," High Commissioner Perrott added. Armed Forces Chief of Staff, Colonel Baboucarr Jatta, thanked the British government for the support they have been giving to The Gambia, especially the army. He also urged Lt Mendy to maintain a good conduct through his course. In response, Lt Mendy expressed gratitude and assured both the British and Gambian governments that he would live up to expectation. The ceremony, which was attended by serving and retired military officials, was chaired by the deputy British high commissioner, Bharat Joshi. Observer _________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com. Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at http://profiles.msn.com. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html You may also send subscription requests to [log in to unmask] if you have problems accessing the web interface and remember to write your full name and e-mail address. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------