Do No Harm

The airplane's engines hum as you circle the airport, waiting to land. You've been preparing for months, but as a matter of habit you kept your briefing notes on hand and open on your lap. You glance over them one more time.

/=The Jumhuriyyah Wahiriya, the state previously known as the "Free and Glorious Democratic Republic of Wahiriya," is a small nation in northern Africa undergoing a violent and incomplete transition to democracy. The previous regime, led by the enigmatic - some say utterly deranged - Field Marshal Samir, was deposed in a revolution two years ago. Since then, the country's deep ethnic and ideological divisions have threatened to tear it apart. Samir during his tenure deliberately undermined any kind of political institutionalization that did not in some way rely on him, personally. His private militias took on the role of army and police and since his death at the hands of the revolutionaries, neither institution has conclusively reestablished itself.=/

/=Wahiriya is divided broadly into three ethnic groups. The majority, present throughout the country but particularly in and around the capital of Kobrat, are ethnically Wahiriyan. The next largest group, about a third of the population, are ethnically Ghazini, residing almost exclusively in Wahiriya's second-largest city, Ghazine and its environs. Finally, around a tenth of the population, predominantly in the south, is ethnically Berber and treats the other two groups with varying degrees of suspicion and hostility. =/

/=After Wahiriyan-dominated parties won predictably if disproportionately large representation in the country's first elections, Ghazini parties declared the elections invalid, citing voter fraud and intimidation meant to keep Ghazini voters out of the ballot box. Rising tensions and growing protests against what was seen as a continuation of the Wahiriyan domination under the Samir era escalated into open violence, culminating in the assassination of a prominent Ghazini politician. =/

/=Wahiriya has since collapsed into civil war, with pro- and anti-government militias forming along largely ethnic lines. The fighting has been particularly intense in Ghazine, where a three-way battle between secularist and Islamist Ghazinis and government forces resulted in the government's retreat in the opening weeks of the war. In recent days, the tide has turned in favor of the government, bolstered by Berber support. Peace talks are currently underway during a provisional ceasefire, with government troops mere miles away from Ghazine.=/*--*

/=The humanitarian situation in Wahiriya is critical. The conflict has caused significant loss of life and infrastructure, and Wahiriyans have been internally displaced and driven into neighboring Egypt and Tunisia by the millions. =/