Javad Zarif, negotiator of Iran nuclear deal, backs reformist presidential candidate
Fiery former foreign minister enters campaign to elect consensual reformist Masoud Pezeshkian
Javad Zarif, the former foreign minister and probably the Iranian politician best known to the west, has thrown himself into the campaign to elect the reformist Masoud Pezeshkian as the country’s president.
Zarif emerged from academia back to frontline politics to face heckling at public rallies, outright bans from one university and allegations that he is seeking to settle scores with those who thwarted his foreign policy when in office between 2013 and 2021.
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Migration of 6m antelope in South Sudan dwarfs previous records for world’s biggest, aerial study reveals
The movement is more than double that of east Africa’s renowned ‘great migration’ and has continued despite decades of war and instability
An extensive aerial survey in South Sudan has revealed an enormous migration of 6 million antelope – the largest migration of land mammals anywhere on Earth. It is more than double the size of the celebrated annual “great migration” between Tanzania and Kenya, which involves about 2 million wildebeest, zebra and gazelle.
“The migration in South Sudan blows any other migration we know of out the water,” said David Simpson, wildlife NGO African Parks’ park manager for Boma and Badingilo national parks, which the migration moves between and around. “The estimates indicate the vast herds of antelope species … are almost three times larger than east Africa’s great migration. The scale is truly awe-inspiring.”
Continue reading...‘It was a very tough period’: Italian antifascist MEP Ilaria Salis on her 15-month detention in Hungary
Activist says threat of up to 11 years in prison ‘still scares me a lot’ and she intends to speak up for prisoners’ rights
An Italian activist who was released from house arrest in Hungary after she was elected as an MEP has spoken of her gratitude to the voters who gave her back her freedom and vowed to continue to fight for the rights of prisoners and against the rise of neofascist groups in Europe.
The case of Ilaria Salis, a teacher from Monza, near Milan, sparked anger and diplomatic protests in Italy when she brought to court in Hungary in chains in January. She had been arrested nearly a year earlier at a counter-demonstration to a neo-Nazi rally in Budapest and charged with three counts of attempted assault and membership of an extreme leftwing organisation – charges that carry a potential prison sentence of 11 years.
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Ultra-Orthodox students must be drafted, Israel court rules
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Israeli court rules ultra-Orthodox men must be drafted for military service
Decision threatens Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition government with collapse as Gaza conflict drags on
Israel’s supreme court has ruled that ultra-Orthodox Jewish men must be drafted into military service, a politically explosive decision that threatens the stability of Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition government.
The unanimous ruling on Tuesday, from an expanded panel of nine judges, upheld an interim decision last month that the state had no authority to offer the current exemption for ultra-Orthodox, or Haredi, men. It found that yeshivas – Orthodox seminaries for Torah study – should be ineligible for state subsidies unless students enlisted in the military.
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