Wavel Ramkalawan wins presidency ousting incumbent United Seychelles party leader
An Anglican priest won the Seychelles presidential election on Sunday, marking the first opposition victory since the Indian Ocean archipelago’s independence from Britain more than four decades ago.
Wavel Ramkalawan won enough votes in the first round to clinch the presidency on his sixth attempt and called for unity after his victory.
Continue reading...Sanctions punished the Sudanese people, not their rulers. The US extracting compensation is one more hypocritical act
Few countries in the world have been subjected to as many punitive sanctions as Sudan. After the deposed president Omar al-Bashir came to power in a military coup in 1989, the country was gradually cut off from the rest of the world, with the upholding of human rights the rationale. Economic sanctions were followed by a spot on the state sponsors of terrorism list, and then by the indictment of Bashir by the international criminal court. At some point it became hard to keep up with all the legislation, punishment for the reckless harbouring of terrorists in the 1990s, and the brutal slaughter of marginalised ethnic groups in areas such as Darfur. There were sanctions on individuals, a US travel ban on all Sudanese-born people, acts of Congress and lawsuits by members 9/11 victims’ families.
The country became a sort of human rights cause celebre, attracting Hollywood stars and a vast network of lobbyists in Washington who, whenever it seemed like there might be a relaxation of sanctions, campaigned fiercely to keep them going. Bashir was a president over whom it was easy to reach consensus. Here was an African brute in the classic mould, a military man who turned on his own people, and a sharia-wielding terror sponsor to boot.
Continue reading...Attackers fired indiscriminately at schoolchildren in area where separatist insurgents are active
Gunmen stormed a school in Cameroon on Saturday and opened fire indiscriminately, killing at least six children and wounding about eight more in a region where separatist insurgents operate, officials and parents said.
Arriving on motorbikes and in civilian clothes, the attackers hit the school around midday in the city of Kumba in the Southwest Region, according to the accounts, including from one parent outside the school at the time.
Continue reading...Stephanie Williams, the acting head of the United Nations mission in Libya, announced that rival forces in Libya had agreed a permanent nationwide ceasefire, including the departure of all foreign fighters and mercenaries from the country for a minimum of three months.
'This is a good day for the Libyan people,' she said as UN chief António Guterres asked nations to respect the 'fundamental step towards peace and stability in Libya'
Continue reading...Donald Trump seeks to score points from deal; Palestinians call it ‘a new stab in the back’
Israel and Sudan have agreed to work towards normalising relations in a deal brokered by the US that would make Sudan the third Arab country to set aside hostilities with Israel in the past two months.
Donald Trump sealed the agreement in a phone call on Friday with the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, his Sudanese counterpart, Abdalla Hamdok, and Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the head of Sudan’s transitional military council.
Continue reading...Deal includes departure of all foreign fighters for at least three months and prisoner exchange
Rival forces in Libya have agreed a permanent nationwide ceasefire including the departure of all foreign fighters and mercenaries from the country for a minimum of three months.
“This is a good day for the Libyan people,” said Stephanie Williams, the acting head of the United Nations mission in Libya. She added that she saluted the courage and patriotism of the negotiators who made the deal at UN-sponsored talks in Geneva between military officers representing forces in the east and west of the country.
Continue reading...Violent enforcement of lockdown has led to legal action aiming to force police reform and accountability
A nervous energy filled downtown Mombasa on the afternoon of 27 March. It was the first day of Kenya’s dusk-to-dawn curfew to curb the spread of Covid-19, and baton-wielding police were patrolling the streets of the coastal city as people rushed to get home. Confrontation was expected. Kenya’s police have a reputation for being heavy-handed even without the excuse of enforcing a nationwide curfew. But no one anticipated the brutality that was about to take place.
The centre of the violence was the Likoni ferry terminal. Huge crowds had built up as commuters tried to get on ferries which were running at lower capacity due to new social distancing rules. Suddenly, hordes of police officers in riot gear appeared. They threw teargas into the crowds, lashing out at innocent men, women and children and forcing them to the ground. Dozens were made to lie on top of one another while others sat choking, vomiting and rubbing their burning eyes.
Continue reading...Muhammadu Buhari addresses nation but fails to mention shootings by security forces on Tuesday
Nigeria’s president, Muhammadu Buhari, has called for an end to nationwide demonstrations against police brutality, but failed to directly mention the fatal shooting of peaceful protesters.
In a televised address on Thursday night – his first public appearance since security forces were accused of killing at least 12 people in Lagos on Tuesday – Buhari called on protesters to “resist the temptation of being used by some subversive elements to cause chaos”.
Continue reading...UN and World Bank call for structural changes to tackle the effects of the pandemic on children, who make up half the world’s poor
The world’s limited progress in tackling child poverty over recent years could be destroyed by the coronavirus pandemic, the UN and World Bank have warned.
“Slow-paced, unequally distributed” progress meant one in six children were living in poverty even before the pandemic, according to a joint study.
Continue reading...Cameroonians say officers choked, beat and threatened to kill them, as lawyers tell of pre-election removal drive
US immigration officers allegedly tortured Cameroonian asylum seekers to force them to sign their own deportation orders, in what lawyers and activists describe as a brutal scramble to fly African migrants out of the country in the run-up to the elections.
Many of the Cameroonian migrants in a Mississippi detention centre refused to sign, fearing death at the hands of Cameroonian government forces responsible for widespread civilian killings, and because they had asylum hearings pending.
Continue reading...Demonstrators were braced for a confrontation but hail of bullets still left them – and the world – reeling
In the minutes before the shooting began, hundreds of mostly young protesters at a toll gate in Lagos, were sitting on the hot ground on a Tuesday evening, waving Nigerian flags, singing the national anthem and defying the government.
Protesters had braced themselves, prepared for when security forces would surely arrive, said 21-year-old Shola Abdul, a kitchen assistant, to enforce a 24-hour curfew across the state that effectively banned mass protests against police brutality.
Continue reading... Police violence prompted latest protests but anger at the government is growing
The signs held up by protesters have been clear. “We have no leaders,” said one. “The power of the youth is stronger than you that is in power,” ran another. A third read: “Nigeria bleeds.”
This last statement has been all too true over the last 24 hours. At least seven people are thought to have been killed when soldiers opened fire on a protest site in an upscale part of Lagos, the commercial and cultural centre of Africa’s most populous nation.
Continue reading...Almost 3,000 girls from the Kuria community have undergone female genital mutilation in recent weeks, despite crackdown
Kenya has seen a setback in its progress to eradicate female genital mutilation (FGM) after an open parade in defiance of the government clampdown on the practice took place this week.
Almost 2,800 girls from the Kuria community in south-western Kenya have undergone FGM, which involves the removal of the outer layers of female genitalia and sometimes the clitoris, in the past three weeks, say local activists.
Continue reading...Nigerian security forces have opened fire on hundreds of protesters in Lagos, as rallies against police brutality continued in defiance of a 24-hour curfew. Footage shared on social media shows shots being fired in the Lekki district of Africa's largest city. Demonstrators continued their protest against the notorious Sars police unit, now dissolved but long-accused of extra-judicial killings, torture and extortion. The government has adopted measures including judicial panels to investigate abuses and compensation for victims, and officials have called for protesters to suspend the demonstrations to give the government time to make good on its pledges
Crackdown as rallies against police brutality continue in defiance of government curfew
Nigerian security forces have opened fire on hundreds of protesters in Lagos, as rallies against police brutality continued in defiance of a 24-hour curfew imposed by the government earlier in the day.
Graphic scenes posted on social media showed protesters fleeing as security forces, including soldiers, shot live rounds towards the crowds.
Continue reading...Children as young as five still exposed to hazardous work in countries including Ghana and Ivory Coast, report reveals
Nearly 20 years after the world’s major chocolate manufacturers pledged to abolish employment abuses, hazardous child labour remains rife in their supply chains, a new study finds.
Research from the University of Chicago finds that more than two-fifths (43%) of all children aged between five and 17 in cocoa-growing regions of Ghana and Ivory Coast – the world’s largest cocoa producers – are engaged in hazardous work.
In total, an estimated 1.5 million children work in cocoa production around the world, half of whom are found in these two west African nations alone. Hazardous work includes the use of sharp tools, working at night and exposure to agrochemical products, among other harmful activities.
The report, commissioned by the US Department of Labor, notes that the overall proportion of children working has gone up by 14 percentage points in the past decade. The increase is accompanied by a 62% rise in production over the same period.
The findings raise difficult questions for industry in particular. Back in 2001, big brands such as Nestlé, Mars and Hershey signed a cross-sector accord aimed at eliminating egregious child labour. Despite missing deadlines to deliver on their pledge in 2005, 2008 and 2010, they continue to insist that ending the illegal practice remains their top concern.
In response to the scathing report, US chocolate giant Mars reiterated that child labour has no place in cocoa production and said it had committed $1bn to help “fix a broken supply chain”.
Campaign groups dismiss such comments as a duplicitous smokescreen. Indeed, a lawsuit stating that international chocolate manufacturers knowingly profit from abuses against children is currently being heard in the US supreme court.
Compensation payment pledged for alleged role in bombing of two US embassies
Washington has removed Sudan from a terrorism blacklist after the country agreed to pay $335m in compensation for its alleged role in the bombing of two US embassies in east Africa by al-Qaida in 1998.
Donald Trump tweeted the news of the deal on Monday. “GREAT news! New government of Sudan, which is making great progress, agreed to pay $335 MILLION to U.S. terror victims and families. Once deposited, I will lift Sudan from the State Sponsors of Terrorism list. At long last, JUSTICE for the American people and BIG step for Sudan!” he wrote.
Continue reading...Two-year BBC News Arabic investigation uncovers horrific conditions, with boys as young as five facing violence and sexual abuse
An April evening in the suburbs of Khartoum. After months of undercover work, I had learned to time my visits to khalwas, Sudan’s Islamic schools, to coincide with evening prayers. I entered while the sheikhs (teachers) and 50-odd boys dressed in their white djellabas were busy praying. As they knelt, I heard the clanking of chains on the boys’ shackled legs. I sat down behind them and started filming, secretly.
I began investigating after allegations emerged of abuse inside some of these schools: children kept in chains, beaten and sexually abused. Khalwas have existed in Sudan for centuries. There are more than 30,000 of them across the country where children are taught to memorise the Qur’an. They are run by sheikhs who usually provide food, drink and shelter, free of charge. As a result, poor families often send their children to khalwas instead of public schools.
Continue reading...Islamic State West Africa Province fighters fired machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, sources say
Jihadists linked to the Islamic State group have killed 14 Nigerian soldiers in an attack on an army base, military sources have said.
Two sources told Agence France-Presse on condition of anonymity that fighters from the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) group had attacked the base in Jakana on Friday evening, firing machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades.
Continue reading...Case expected to open door for others wanting to drop ‘atig’ or ‘liberated by’ from their name
A court in Tunisia has allowed an 81-year-old man to remove a word from his name that marked him out as descended from slaves, in the country’s first ruling of its kind, his lawyer has said.
Tunisia abolished slavery in 1846, but critics say it has not done enough to address racism against black Tunisians, who make up 10-15% of the population and are mostly descended from slaves.
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