Young people found to be ‘overwhelmingly keen’ to tackle Africa’s challenges head on, challenging negative stereotypes
Young people across Africa are confident that the continent is heading for an era of success fuelled by technology and entrepreneurship, according to a new survey.
The Africa Youth survey, which claims to be the largest of its kind, said there is growing belief in the concept of “Afro-optimism”, fighting persistently negative stereotypes of the continent.
Continue reading...UN warns 25 million people could be affected as wartorn country is beset by fresh wave of insects
Swarms of desert locusts, which have been ravaging crops and grazing land across east Africa, have now crossed the border into South Sudan, a country already struggling from widespread hunger and years of civil war.
The UN has warned that an imminent second hatch of the insects could threaten the food security of 25 million people across the region.
Continue reading...Hotel bookings plummet by 40,000 in recent weeks as ban on incoming flights from China bites local businesses
The idyllic holiday island of Bali has been hit by the ripple effect of the coronavirus crisis, with tourism plummeting and suggestions it “does not have the capacity” to treat patients if they become sick.
Indonesia, the largest country in south-east Asia, claims to have no cases of coronavirus, but according to the Bali’s tourism board, there have been around 40,000 cancellations of hotel bookings in recent weeks nonetheless. In the first half of February about 740,000 people visited the island – 16.25% fewer than the same period last year – Bali’s airport spokesman told state news agency Antara this week.
Continue reading...Injuries and fatalities are common among thousands of debt-bonded men and children toiling in one of the world’s harshest work environments
All photographs by Mashal Baloch
The spectre of death hovers over the coal mines of Balochistan. Under scorching skies, this turbulent south-west region of Pakistan is home to one of the world’s harshest work environments, where tens of thousands of men and children descend below the surface each day to dig up thousands of tonnes of coal.
The threats of underground explosions, methane gas poisoning, suffocation, or mine walls collapsing are omnipresent and there is barely a single worker across the state’s five massive commercial coal mines who has not been touched by the fatalities that are common here.
Continue reading...Raised to hide her low caste, Yashica Dutt’s new book traces her realisation that her history is one of oppression, not shame
Pretending not to be a Dalit took a heavy toll on the young Yashica Dutt.
Her mother, Shashi, was so determined to protect her three children from the discrimination of the Hindu caste system that relegates Dalits to the periphery of society that she pretended the family were Brahmin.
Continue reading...Children in biggest carbon-emitting nations are healthiest, while those with tiny environmental footprints suffer twofold from poor health and living at the sharp end of the climate crisis
Every country in the world is failing to shield children’s health and their futures from intensifying ecological degradation, climate change and exploitative marketing practices, says a new report.
The report says that despite dramatic improvements in survival, nutrition, and education over the past 20 years, “today’s children face an uncertain future”, with every child facing “existential threats”.
Continue reading...The Atacama in northern Chile is the driest desert in the world, and may be the oldest. It also holds 40% of the world's lithium – an essential ingredient in the rechargeable batteries used in green technology. Indigenous leaders and scientists say Chile's plans to feed a global green energy boom with Atacama lithium will kill the desert. As violent protests rock the country, they are fighting for the mining to stop
Acid attacks have been on the rise in Uganda. Organisations such as End Acid Violence Uganda are pushing for a law that would see harsher punishments for perpetrators such as a ‘no bail policy’, satisfactory compensation for victims, and implementation of a medical care policy paid for by the government. End Acid Violence Uganda officers make regular home visits to survivors to offer support and guidance.
Continue reading...Once lauded as one of Sudan’s finest musicians, Abu Obaida Hassan faded into obscurity under the Bashir regime and was even pronounced dead. Now he is back – to global acclaim
The unpaved outskirts of Omdurman, Sudan’s second city, seem like an unusual place to find a musical superstar, but Abu Obaida Hassan is far from ordinary. The frail man in his 60s who holds court in the shaded yard of a squat brick house represents a musical revolution, one that electrified traditional Sudanese music. Stranger still, in the eyes of the Sudanese public he is back from the dead.
In his 70s heyday, Abu Obaida travelled from Merowe, the home of the Shaigiya people and a centre of Nubian culture, to Khartoum, finding fame as a renegade player of a local stringed instrument known as the tambour.
Continue reading...Rights groups and UN warn of rapidly accelerating danger as banned cluster weapons are deployed
The threat posed by unexploded bombs is rising exponentially in wartorn Libya, experts have warned, with the use of banned cluster weapons a source of particular concern.
The UN’s Mine Action Service (Unmas) said that even parts of the country previously cleared of explosive material had been recontaminated following a surge in fighting since April last year, when the warlord Khalifa Haftar launched a campaign to seize the capital, Tripoli.
Continue reading...Campaign groups unite in condemnation of ‘grossly inhumane and incompassionate’ verdict
Human rights groups in Malaysia are calling for the repeal of a law that criminalises attempted suicide after a man with a physical disability was sentenced to six months in prison for trying to take his own life.
Malaysia is one of the few countries where attempting suicide is illegal. Under existing legislation, people found guilty can be punished by up to a year in prison, a fine, or both. But the Malaysian government is now considering a change to the law, which advocates say cannot come soon enough.
Continue reading...High court judge intervenes to prevent victim of county lines sex exploitation being made street homeless after refusal to find her safe housing
A young and highly vulnerable British sex trafficking victim was re-trafficked by county lines drug gangs on multiple occasions after the Home Office repeatedly refused to fulfil its legal obligation to provide her with safe accommodation.
A high court judge was forced to intervene to compel the Home Office to house the woman, who was about to become street homeless.
Continue reading...Schools across the country in dire straits as teachers abandon the profession or skip the country amid one of the worst economic downturns in modern history
There are 723 pupils at the José Eduardo Sánchez Afanador school but no electricity, no computers, no tables and no chairs.
The windows lack glass, the toilets have lost their sinks and its metal classroom doors have been plundered by thieves, allowing pigeons to colonize several of the filthy spaces.
Continue reading...The ruthless quest for gold in eastern Cameroon has left the landscape peppered with deadly open pits
It was the last day of the summer holidays when, on his way to meet friends in his hometown of Batouri, eastern Cameroon, 12-year-old Saustem Brandon Samba slipped on reddish mud and fell into what at first looked like a large puddle.
The puddle turned out to be an abandoned gold mine, with a steep drop, 18 metres deep. Samba tried to get out, his arms and legs scrambling frantically in search of something to grip on to as muddy water choked him.
His father, Sah, still carries a photo of his son’s lifeless body after it was recovered from the mining pit in September 2017.
Between 2017 and 2019, at least 115 children and adults drowned or were buried alive by landfalls in the mostly abandoned pits in the East and Adamawa regions of Cameroon, according to Forests and Rural Development (Foder), a local watchdog that is alone in tracking the accidents and deaths.
“The whole area was not at all secure,” says Sah, whose fury is clear as he describes how gold mining pits in the region – which locals call “tombs” – have been left open and abandoned by Chinese companies, among others.
Rules intended to protect domestic workers have only made them more vulnerable to exploitation and abuse, say activists
Amita* knew she had to escape. After five months of being assaulted, starved and being forced to work for 20 hours a day as a domestic maid in a suburban house in Kuwait, the 45-year old from Nepal seized her chance. While the household slept, she climbed out of a downstairs bathroom window and fled.
Amita managed to find the Nepali embassy, hoping that staff there would assure her safety and help send her home to Kathmandu.
Continue reading...Shootings, beatings and arbitrary arrests condemned as election candidates urged to protect freedom of expression
The increasingly hostile environment in Somalia has left journalists living in fear of both the government and militant groups, according to Amnesty International.
At least eight journalists have been killed since President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed came to power in 2017, while others have survived assassination attempts or been targeted for arrests and censorship, the rights group has said.
Continue reading...Government has ignored laws intended to prevent stigma, discrimination and bullying, Human Rights Watch claims
Young people in Vietnam continue to be taught at home and at school that same-sex attraction is a “disease” and a “mental illness” that can be cured and treated, despite legislation designed to support and protect LGBTQ+ rights.
Stigma and discrimination about sexual orientation and gender identity contribute to the verbal harassment and bullying of LGBTQ+ young people, which in some cases leads to physical violence, according to a report published on Thursday by Human Rights Watch (HRW).
Continue reading...Prof Massimo Del Bene aids African migrants whose captors inflicted horrific injuries to extort ransom payments
The first patient was a young Ghanaian man who had been tortured every day for more than a year in Libya by traffickers trying to extort a ransom for his release, says Prof Massimo Del Bene, head of reconstructive surgery at the San Gerardo hospital in Monza, north of Milan.
Since then, the surgeon renowned for performing the first double hand transplant in Italy, has adapted his expertise to what he calls “torture surgery”, helping African migrants who have survived Libyan detention camps, where traffickers and criminal gangs are documented to have tortured captives to extort ransom money.
Continue reading...Health centres step up preparations as World Health Organization raises fears about ability to cope with major outbreak
African health authorities are stepping up preparedness for coronavirus after the head of the World Health Organzation described the outbreak as a “very grave threat for the rest of the world”.
The number of African countries that can test for the virus tripled to 15 this week, with more expected to have testing labs up and running in the coming days. The head of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said health centres were on “high alert” for new cases.
Continue reading...Creators of Meray Paas Tum Ho could be facing legal suit amid accusations the hugely popular show was ‘misogynistic’
A court in Pakistan has summoned the creators of a wildly popular television series after a petition was filed demanding they apologise for portraying Pakistani women as “greedy, selfish and non-professional”.
In the petition filed at the Sindh high court last month, lawyer Sana Saleem said the television series Meray Paas Tum Ho (I Have You) was “ridiculing a woman who makes the same decision as every other man in society”.
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