About 52,000 people are eligible under the scheme, but a government spokesperson said Kigali would accept ‘thousands’
Rwanda has admitted it cannot guarantee how many people it will take from the UK under Rishi Sunak’s deportation scheme.
The east African country did not give assurances that the estimated 52,000 asylum seekers in the UK who are eligible to be sent to Kigali would be accepted, instead saying it would be “thousands”.
Continue reading...The UN says two camps for displaced people were hit near the city of Goma where thousands are seeking refuge from fighting in surrounding areas
Bomb attacks on two camps for displaced people in eastern Congo have killed at least 12 people, including children, according to the UN.
The bombs hit the camps in Lac Vert and Mugunga, near the city of Goma, the UN said in a statement, calling the attacks a “flagrant violation of human rights and international humanitarian law and may constitute a war crime”.
Continue reading...Glossy promotional leaflet handed out to asylum seekers detained under Rishi Sunak’s deportation policy
Asylum seekers who have been detained under Rishi Sunak’s deportation policy are being handed a colourful promotional document entitled: “I’m being relocated to Rwanda. What does it mean to me?”
The news came as the government faced a second legal challenge over the prime minister’s £500m policy and it emerged that dozens of asylum seekers were being forcibly taken to detention centres.
Continue reading...Russians in separate compound and do not have access to US forces or equipment, says defence secretary
The US secretary of defence, Lloyd Austin, has confirmed Russian security forces have been deployed to the same airbase as American troops in the Nigerien capital, Niamey.
It remains unclear when the Russian troops, who have been in Niger for weeks, were deployed to Airbase 101, which is next to Diori Hamani international airport in Niamey. It is also unclear how many troops are on the ground.
Continue reading...Philip Morris International has supported non-smoking programmes around the world ‘to advance its own interests’, say health professionals
The tobacco company Philip Morris has sponsored courses for doctors in multiple countries, in what critics have called a “grotesque” strategy.
Medical education programmes on quitting smoking and harm reduction in South Africa, the Middle East and the US have been supported by Philip Morris International (PMI) or its regional subsidiaries, according to advertising material seen by the Guardian.
Continue reading...Move comes after west African country’s military government had told US to withdraw its troops
Russian military personnel have entered an airbase in Niger that is hosting American troops, after a decision by Niger’s junta to expel US forces from the country.
The military officers ruling the west African country have told the US to withdraw its nearly 1,000 military personnel, which until a coup last year had been a key partner for Washington’s fight against insurgents who have killed thousands of people and displaced millions more.
Continue reading...The population of El Fasher, which includes thousands of displaced people, is in ‘dire need of food, medicine and water’
Water, food and fuel supplies for people in the largest city in the Darfur region of Sudan are being choked off as fighting intensifies, according to reports.
El Fasher has been encircled by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group over recent weeks, besieging the population as well as the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and allied militias.
Continue reading...Birthplace and parents’ names are being removed from passports and birth certificates as Mauritius stakes claim to the island
Exiled islanders from the disputed British-owned Chagos Islands are finding their heritage has been removed from new identity documents in an apparent move by Mauritius to stake its claim to the territory.
British ownership of the Chagos Islands has long been challenged by Mauritius, where most islanders were shipped in the 1960s after being evicted from their Indian Ocean homeland to make way for a US military base on Diego Garcia, the largest island.
Continue reading...Kenya Red Cross rescues more than 90 people from hotels and lodges as heavy rainfall continues
Scores of tourists have been evacuated by air from Kenya’s Maasai Mara national reserve after more than a dozen hotels, lodges and camps were flooded as heavy rains battered the country.
Tourist accommodation facilities were submerged after a river in the Maasai Mara broke its banks on Wednesday morning. The reserve, in south-west Kenya, is a popular tourist destination because it features the annual wildebeest migration from the Serengeti in Tanzania.
Continue reading...Refugee Council sounds warning after children wrongly issued with notices of intent by Home Office
Lone child asylum seekers are at risk of being sent to Rwanda because the Home Office has wrongly classified some as adults, it has been claimed.
The Refugee Council, which works with these children, has warned of the risk after more than a dozen of the children it works with were wrongly issued with notices of intent for Rwanda.
Continue reading...MP says trade in remains is ‘gross violation of human dignity’, as skulls from Pitt Rivers collection removed
An auction house has withdrawn 18 ancient Egyptian human skulls from sale after an MP said selling them would perpetuate the atrocities of colonialism.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy, the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Afrikan reparations, believes the sale of human remains for any purposes should be outlawed, adding that the trade was “a gross violation of human dignity”.
Continue reading...François Bozizé is wanted by special criminal court over alleged crimes including murder and torture
A UN-backed court has issued an arrest warrant for the Central African Republic’s former president François Bozizé over possible crimes against humanity committed by the nation’s military between 2009 and 2013.
The alleged crimes include murder, enforced disappearance, torture, rape and other inhumane acts, according to the special criminal court (CPS), a hybrid jurisdiction located in the capital Bangui with Central African and foreign magistrates.
Continue reading...Malian state forces confirm death of Abu Huzeifa, who was believed to have helped carry out 2017 attack
A senior Islamic State group commander, wanted in connection with the deaths of US forces in Niger, has been killed in an operation by Malian state forces, the country’s army said.
Abu Huzeifa, known by the alias Higgo, was a commander in the group known as the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara. The state department had announced a reward of up to $5m for information about him.
Continue reading...Nine people rescued from boat sailing perilous Atlantic route that reportedly left Senegal with 60 people onboard nine days ago
At least 50 people are feared to have drowned after a boat sailing the perilous Atlantic route from west Africa to Europe began to sink 60 miles south of the Canary island of El Hierro.
Nine people were rescued from the craft early on Monday after a passing bulk carrier alerted Spain’s Salvamento Marítimo rescue service, which dispatched a fast boat and a helicopter from its base in Tenerife.
Continue reading...Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza says her banning shows Rwandan government does not adhere to international law
A Rwandan opposition leader who has been banned from standing for election has cast doubt on whether her government will stick to the terms of the deportation deal agreed with Rishi Sunak.
Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza told the Guardian that the Rwandan government’s refusal to allow her to stand or leave the country to see her ill husband showed that the government under Paul Kagame did not adhere to international law.
Continue reading...Minister says ‘officers are used to this’, as figures suggest Home Office is in contact with only 38% of people it wants to remove
The Home Office is “used to” losing contact with asylum seekers, a UK government minister has said, after official figures suggested thousands of people it hoped to deport to Rwanda had stopped reporting.
The impact assessment on the Home Office’s website on Monday suggests the department is in contact with 38% of those it intends to remove to Rwanda. Only 2,145 “continue to report to the Home Office and can be located for detention”, the impact assessment says, of the 5,700 it has identified to put on the first flights.
Continue reading...The Guardian and Le Monde among latest outlets blocked, following on from BBC and VOA last week
Authorities in Burkina Faso have suspended further foreign media over their reporting of an alleged massacre of hundreds of civilians by the Burkinabe army.
The decision was announced in a statement over the weekend, days after the military government suspended the BBC, Voice of America and the international watchdog Human Rights Watch (HRW), halting broadcasts and blocking websites, after the latter’s scathing report on Thursday.
Continue reading...Houses washed away and road cut off as dam collapses amid heavy rains and floods across country
At least 45 people died when a makeshift dam burst its banks near a southern town in Kenya’s Rift valley in the early hours of Monday, police said, as torrential rains and floods hit the country.
The disaster raises the total death toll over the March-May wet season in Kenya to more than 100, as heavier-than-usual rainfall pounds east Africa, compounded by El Niño weather pattern.
Continue reading...Tim Loughton had sanctions imposed on him in 2021 by Beijing, which has close ties to east African country
A former government minister who has had sanctions imposed on him by China has said he was detained and deported by Djibouti as a “direct consequence” of the east African country’s close ties with Beijing.
Tim Loughton, the Conservative MP for East Worthing and Shoreham since 1997, said he was held for more than seven hours at the airport earlier this month, barred entry to Djibouti, and told he was being removed on the next available flight.
Continue reading...The De Beers owner is a longstanding jewel in the African' state’s economic crown – it would be a ‘big blow’ to see it sold off
The world’s largest mining company has a problem. Australia’s BHP has set out its intention to snap up the rival miner Anglo American in a multibillion-pound deal that would reshape the global industry. Its proposed £31bn takeover plan has already been rebuffed as a lowball offer that undervalues the company. But Anglo’s deep roots in South Africa could be a far more sensitive issue to address.
Africa’s most advanced economy was built on mining. For more than 150 years since the first discovery of diamonds, gold and coal, the industry has remained South Africa’s economic lifeblood. Today it is the world’s fifth largest producer of coal and diamonds and the 10th largest producer of gold.
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