Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Mahmoud Dicko has emerged as a key player in a country in crisis. But is he a zealot or a pragmatist?
A fragile calm has returned to Bamako. The debris has been cleared from the streets and the barricades around the Salam mosque in the neighbourhood of Badalabougou are gone. For the moment, a bloody confrontation between security forces and demonstrators in the capital of Mali appears to have been averted.
But the pause is likely to be temporary. Leaders of the landlocked west African nation’s protest movement have promised to go “right to the bitter end” to force through dramatic political change, after six weeks of rising unrest. “We will wage this battle until we bring in a new democratic era in Mali. We have lost too many killed to retreat now,” Mohamed Salia Touré, a prominent protest leader and young politician, told the Observer.
People detained far from property agents were sent to protect
Trump looking for a confrontation, says governor
Militarized federal agents deployed by Donald Trump to Portland, Oregon, fired tear gas at protesters again late on Friday night, even as the city’s mayor demanded the agents be removed and the state’s attorney general vowed to seek a restraining order against them.
The civil rights leader John Lewis, known at the ‘conscience of America’, has died. Born the son of sharecroppers in Alabama on 21 February 1940, he attended segregated public schools and, inspired by the words of Martin Luther King Jr, became active in the civil rights movement. From university onwards he organised sit-ins at segregated lunch counters, took part in the Freedom Rides, was chair of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee and was a key speaker at the historic March on Washington in 1963. He led one of the pivotal moments in the civil rights movement, a march over the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama that was brutally attacked by state troopers.
A police raid on a gay bar in New York led to the birth of the Pride movement half a century ago – but the fight for LGBTQ+ rights goes back much further than that. By Huw Lemmey
New analysis finds economic shock of pandemic coupled with existing grievances makes widespread public uprisings ‘inevitable’
The economic impact of coronavirus is a “tinderbox” that will drive civil unrest and instability in developing countries in the second half of 2020, according to new analysis.
Highest risk countries facing a “perfect storm”, where protests driven by the pandemic’s economic fallout are likely to inflame existing grievances, include Nigeria, Iran, Bangladesh, Algeria and Ethiopia, the analysis said.
It happened one day during my first year of college at Rutgers University, in my home state of New Jersey. The anti-apartheid movement was raging on my college campus, there was still a massive buzz about Jesse Jackson’s first run for president and I had instantly become woke, as we say, because of names such as Winnie and Nelson Mandela, because of the Aids and crack epidemics, and because of my adopted big sister on campus, an older student named Lisa Williamson, who would later become the famed activist and bestselling author Sister Souljah.
For sure, Lisa was one of the most incredible speakers I had ever heard. She was a fearless leader, and I became so instantly fond of her, I even called her “Ma” just like I did my own mother. And she adored me, taught me and shared with me everything that she knew and was learning, in real time.
Call for increased security as French president tells demonstrators ‘be cool’
Anti-government gilets jaunes (yellow vests) hurled abuse at Emmanuel Macron as he walked with his wife, Brigitte, on Bastille Day in a public garden in Paris, prompting calls from opposition leaders for increased security.
Demonstrators confronted the French president and his wife, Brigitte, as they walked with bodyguards in the Tuileries Gardens in Paris on Tuesday.
A Black Lives Matter protester, Jen Reid, says she 'shed a tear' when she saw a sculpture of her replace that of the slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol on Wednesday.
The artist Marc Quinn had the new statue installed without council permission. It replicates a photograph of Reid with her fist raised taken after the statue of Colston, a 17th-century merchant, was toppled by Black Lives Matter demonstrators in June.
Arriving in two lorries before 5am, a team of 10 people worked quickly to install the figure of Reid, who said she had been secretly working with Quinn on the idea for weeks
Muralists are covering the Afghan capital’s blast walls with agitprop imagery and calling out corruption
From the killing of George Floyd in the US and the drowning of Afghan refugees in Iran, to the signing of the US-Taliban agreement towards peace and brutal murder of a Japanese aid worker, a group of Afghan artists have taken paintbrushes to adorn Kabul’s grey blast walls with vivid imagery.
The barriers have been transformed into politically inspired murals, which the artists hope will create “visual dialogue” and raise awareness of corruption and injustices.
Harper’s letter asserts way to ‘defeat bad ideas is by exposure, argument, and persuasion’, but critics accuse authors of censorious mentality
JK Rowling, Salman Rushdie and Margaret Atwood are among the signatories to a controversial open letter warning that the spread of “censoriousness” is leading to “an intolerance of opposing views” and “a vogue for public shaming and ostracism”.
Rowling, whose beliefs on transgender rights have recently seen scores of Harry Potter fans distance themselves from her, said she was “proud to sign this letter in defence of a foundational principle of a liberal society: open debate and freedom of thought and speech”.
The tell-all book due out shortly from Mary Trump, the niece of the president, tells of a family divided by trauma.
The Trump family failed to block the book after court efforts failed to stop publisher Simon & Schuster printing and distributing it, even though a restraining order was ongoing against Mary Trump herself, the daughter of Donald Trump’s late oldest brother.
In response to the news that New York state has sanctioned Deutsche Bank, the bank put out a statement by a spokesperson.
We acknowledge our error in onboarding Epstein in 2013 and the weakness in our processes, and have learnt from our mistakes and shortcomings. Immediately following Epstein’s arrest, we contacted law enforcement and offered our full assistance with their investigation.
The Department of Financial Services factual findings on Danske Estonia and FBME, like our own internal investigation, identified various deficiencies in our oversight and monitoring of the banks that used our clearing services. There was no intentional effort by anyone within the bank to facilitate unlawful activity...while the settlement reflects our upmost [sic] cooperation and transparent engagement with our regulator, it also shows how important it is to continue investing in our controls and enhancing our anti-financial crime capabilities.
Trump is still tweeting away, now insisting schools must reopen in the fall, despite concerns about the spread of coronavirus once in-person classes resume.
“SCHOOLS MUST OPEN IN THE FALL!!!” the president tweeted moments ago.
SCHOOLS MUST OPEN IN THE FALL!!!
Nascar driver Bubba Wallace has responded to Trump’s tweet suggesting he should apologize after a noose was found in his garage.
Wallace, the only top black driver in Nascar, addressed his response “to the next generation and little ones following my foot steps.”
Protesters have held up blank pieces of white paper to avoid using slogans banned under a new national security law in Hong Kong on Monday.
The law, which was imposed by China after anti-government protests last year, has made it illegal to shout slogans or hold up banners and flags calling for the city's independence. Hong Kong police cleared the group of demonstrators who gathered in a shopping centre in the central business district
Calls follow Mark Zuckerberg’s dismissal of anti-hate-speech campaign in meeting with staff
Campaigners are calling for an advertising boycott of Facebook in the US to be extended to Europe, after its chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, dismissed the effects of the campaign in a meeting with staff.
A growing number of companies have halted advertising on Facebook after criticism that the platform was not doing enough to counter hate speech on its sites.
Houston mayor Sylvester Turner has appeared on CBS’s Face The Nation to discuss the Covid-19 outbreak in his city. He says staffing at the city’s hospital is a particular problem.
“If we don’t get our hands around this virus quickly, in about two weeks our hospital system could be in serious, serious trouble,” he says. “... We can always provide additional beds, but we need the people, the nurses and everybody else, the medical professionals to staff those beds. That’s the critical point right now.”
New Jersey’s Democratic governor, Phil Murphy, has appeared on NBC’s Meet The Press. New Jersey has been one of the worst-hit states in the US during the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic, and he says a national strategy is needed to combat Covid-19.
“This thing is lethal,” he says. “New Jersey’s paid an enormous price. We’ve [had] 13,000 confirmed fatalities from Covid-19. We’re starting to see small spikes in reinfection from folks coming back from places like Myrtle Beach and as well as in Florida, other hotspots.
The White House is set to host its largest event since the start of the coronavirus pandemic with tonight’s Salute to America. Hundreds of chairs and tables have been set up on the South Lawn, where Trump will deliver a speech he says will celebrate American heritage. An administration spokesperson says social distancing “will be observed” and face masks will be offered but not mandatory.
Trump was first inspired to stage a mass display of pop and power on America’s birthday when attended the Bastille Day military parade as the guest of French president Emmanuel Macron back in 2017. An initial 2018 push to stage a parade that would have seen soldiers marching and tanks rolling down the streets of Washington was scuttled amid accusations that he was politicizing an important holiday, emulating displays in authoritarian countries and wasting taxpayers’ money.
President Donald J. Trump and First Lady Melania Trump, along with the Department of Interior, will host the 2020 Salute to America on the South Lawn of the White House and Ellipse on Saturday, July 4. In addition to music, military demonstrations, and flyovers to honor our Nation’s service members and veterans, the President will deliver remarks that celebrate our independence and salute our amazing heritage. The evening will culminate with a spectacular fireworks display over the National Mall.
For 4 July, in the summer of protests over the killing of George Floyd, a picture gallery from Jameelah Nuriddin and Erin Hammond.
The eight images capture a giant 200-year-old flag, a young black woman with a giant afro, and various postures combining the pledge of allegiance and black power poses. They are accompanied by a manifesto that mirrors the preamble to the US constitution, written by Nuriddin, who is also the model in the series:
Haacaaluu Hundeessaa was shot dead in Addis Ababa on Monday night, fuelling ethnic tensions
At least 166 people have died during violent demonstrations that roiled Ethiopia in the days following the murder of popular singer Haacaaluu Hundeessaa, police said Saturday.
Pop star Haacaaluu Hundeessaa, a member of the Oromo ethnic group, Ethiopia’s largest, was shot dead by unknown attackers in Addis Ababa on Monday night, fuelling ethnic tensions threatening the country’s democratic transition.