Category: Foreign

Agency Reporter

Young people in Greece, who got a coronavirus vaccination will soon, not get only protection against COVID-19, but also payment cards.

A 150-euro ($179) payment card is given, as the country seeks to draw in as many for vaccination as possible.

Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis made the announcement on Monday, when the exercise is opened to approximately 940,000 people aged 18 to 25 in the country.

Up to 141 million euros is being set aside for the drive.

The government hopes to have 60 per cent of Greece’s 11-million strong population vaccinated by the end of July.

READ ALSO: Buhari sends solidarity to Turkey, Greece over earthquake

Dubbed the freedom card, the payment is being couched as a thank you for the young people who have been patient, staying away from crowds during the pandemic in an attempt to stop the virus’ transmission.

The money can be used for hotel bookings, ferry tickets, flight tickets, museum visits and concerts.

Mitsotakis noted that even as people head out to enjoy the money, they should be aware of the risks posed by the virus.

“It might be that younger people think they won’t get the coronavirus or, if they do, they think they won’t get very sick,’’ he said.

“But they are then carriers of the virus and help with its spread.’’ (dpa/NAN)

Agency Reporter

The Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven on Monday announced his resignation a week after a no-confidence vote against him in parliament.

Lofven, a Social Democrat, said at a press conference that he had decided against called fresh elections in the light of the Coronavirus pandemic.

READ ALSO: Swedish-Nigerian jailed for child trafficking 

It was the first time a Swedish premier had such a no-confidence vote.

The vote was called after a left-wing party withdrew its support for Lofven’s minority government, due to a clash about proposed reforms to Sweden’s rental market.

The next scheduled general election is in September 2022. (dpa/NAN)

Agency Reporter

At least two people were injured on Sunday when a makeshift bomb exploded at a Catholic Church in the north-eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), according to the Police.

The explosion occurred at 6.00 am local time (0400 GMT) in Beni city of North Kivu province, the city’s Police Chief, Narcisse Muteba Kashale, said.

Witnesses said the explosion also destroyed several pews and other objects on the spot.

READ ALSO: ‘I am dying slowly with one kidney’, says bomb blast convict Okah

The experts of the United Nations Organisation Stabilisation Mission in the DRC that rushed to the site after the explosion said it was a homemade bomb targeting Christians coming for the Sunday worship.

The authorities have not identified the perpetrators.

But many in the city believed it was an attack by rebels of the Allied Democratic Forces, a militia group that has been active in the area for decades. (Xinhua/NAN)

By Tajudeen Adebanjo

The Platform for African Culture and Development (PACUD) and the Centre for Policy Intervention in Africa (CEPIA) have held a virtual international colloquium on Palestinian–Israeli crisis.

Moderated by former Organisation of African Trade Union Unity (OATUU) Secretary-General Mr Owei Lakemfa, the colloquium was themed: Land, Promise and Quest for Justice.

General Ishola Williams, who retired as Commander of Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC), the think-tank of the Nigerian Army, said the world was built on a philosophy that might is right.

He urged the Hamas and the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) to close ranks.

According to him, some Arab countries are being bought over to the side of the Israelis.

Omar Barghouti, co-founder of the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee (BNC) which drives the global Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, explained that the struggle in the region is not a Palestinian one, but a universal one for humanity.

He said Africa with its rich heritage of struggles against racism and apartheid, was in a  position to fight for the Palestinian rights.

Albie Walls of the All Africa Revolutionary Party in Ghana lamented the killing of Palestinians, occupying their territory and subjugating them to endless siege.

He likened the issue in the Palestine to armed robbers invading a house, killing some members of the family and forcing the rest out of the house.

This, he said, was not a conflict, but genocide.

“It is not a question of making peace between two warring parties, but stopping the genocide against the Palestinian people,” Walls said.

Maren Mantovani, who has been working for Palestinian movements and coalitions since 2002, said Israel runs an apartheid regime in the region.

She pointed out that with Africa’s votes at the United Nations General Assembly, Palestinians should have an overwhelming majority.

Sheikh Abdul Fatah Thanni took participants back to the Balfour Declaration where “Britain sought to give away what it did not own.”

He pointed out that Jews are not Zionists and that the latter is just using them to perpetrate their agenda. He said that those who claim to be driving democracy in the world like the United States (USA) and Europe have a duty to stop Zionism.

Kunle Adegoke, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) posited that the issue in Palestine was “about genocide; a war of annexation to wipe out  a part of humanity.” He said since the America is the backbone of Israel, boycotting Israeli products without boycotting American products, will not be effective as the latter would always sabotage such efforts.

Adegoke argued that America has a history of subverting democratic cultures and democracy as it did On September 11, 1973 against the Salvador Allende government in Chile in favour of the butcher, General Augusto Pinochet.

The international community, he argued, must force the American establishment to accept the needed transformation in the Palestine..

Ramzi Abu Ibrahim, member of the Palestinian Community in Lagos, said the Palestinians have been suffering for 72 years.

Many of them, he said, have been forced to be refugees roaming the world.

Benjamin Ladraa from Solidarity Arising, Sweden narrated how the Israeli state stopped him from entering the Palestine for his solidarity work.

He suggested that activists in all countries should focus on raising awareness on the Palestinian struggles.

He condemned the occupation of the Palestine and the denial of the people their rights to self-determination.

 

 

Agency Reporter

Authorities in Mauritania on Wednesday arrested former president Mohammed Ould Abdel Aziz, amid an ongoing investigation into alleged high-level corruption during his time in office.

Abdel Aziz, who stepped down in 2019 after serving two five-year terms, was indicted in March and placed under house arrest in May following a parliamentary investigation into suspected graft during his administration.

Mohameden Ichidou, coordinator of the lawyers for his defence said the ex-president was taken into custody on Tuesday for failing to appear before a judge last week, as he was required to do regularly under the terms of his judicial supervision.

“The cause raised in the report relates to the absence of the former president in front of the judge on Friday and Sunday,’’ said Ichidou.

He said Abdel Aziz had stopped going to see the judge because each time he went he was followed by police and civilians along the road who hassled and threatened him.

READ ALSO: Referee collapses as Mauritania, Ethiopia qualify

The former president could not be reached for comment. He had previously denied the corruption allegations.

A family member confirmed that police appeared at the former president’s home in Nouakchott on Tuesday with a summon from the courthouse.

Abdel Aziz followed them, and the family was later informed he had been arrested, he said.

Abdel Aziz, 64, came to power in Mauritania, a vast desert country of fewer than five million people, in a 2008 coup and was an important ally of Western powers fighting Islamist militants in the Sahel region.

He was replaced by a political ally, current president Mohamed Ould Ghazouani, but quickly found that his government’s actions, including deals on offshore oil projects, came under scrutiny by parliament.

Former Prime Minister Ismail Ould Cheikh Sidiya and his entire government resigned amid the parliamentary investigation in 2020. (Reuters/NAN)

Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called the new government that succeeded his administration a threat to the country’s national security because it has promised to inform the United States before acting against Iran.

Last Thursday, Israeli Alternate Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Yair Lapid held his second phone call with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in just four days, and the two agreed on a “no surprises” policy, according to an Israeli Foreign Ministry statement.

Yesterday, Netanyahu issued a response to the arrangement via video remarks in which he assailed the new government’s apparent break with his own strategy of acting unilaterally. He called it an “astonishing commitment.”

“Lapid promised Blinken that Israel would not surprise the United States on matters relating to Iran’s nuclear programme. That’s the programme designed to produce nuclear weapons to annihilate the state of Israel,” Netanyahu said.

He said if such a deal had been reached by former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin decades ago, “we would not have destroyed Saddam Hussein’s nuclear reactor.”

“I have been asked by the United States many times to give such a commitment,” Netanyahu added. “Now, mind you, there is no greater ally and no greater friend than Israel has like the United States, but when it comes to matters of our security, our very survival, I’ve always reserved the right to act on our own without informing our American friends.”

The former prime minister revealed that there were times where he acted without first consulting the U.S. and that the commitment by the new ruling coalition headed by Lapid and Bennett would only accelerate its collapse.

“There were times that I did tell them of impending actions, there are many other times where I didn’t, and yet it took the Lapid-Bennett government three days to undermine this important and critical tenet of our national security,” Netanyahu said. “That’s why this government is so dangerous to our future. That’s also why we’ll bring them down a lot faster than you think.”

Ahead of Netanyahu’s comments, Lapid trashed the previous administration in comments delivered to a meeting of his Yesh Atid faction, which came in second only to Netanyahu’s Likud party but managed to coalesce with Bennett’s Yamina and other parties to score a parliamentary majority necessary to win the election.

“We have a lot of work to do. The destruction and neglect we have found in government ministries are inconceivable,” Lapid said. “We’re not starting working from zero but below zero. Instead of worrying about the state, the previous government cared only for itself and its close associates.”

Ethiopia’s elections chief said complaints by the opposition of irregularities in two regions risked tarnishing polls billed by the government as the country’s first free and fair vote after decades of repression.

Election board chief Birtukan Midekssa said yesterday several opposition parties had complained their agents were beaten and their badges confiscated in two regions.

Opposition leader Berhanu Nega said his Ethiopian Citizens for Social Justice Party (Ezema) had filed 207 complaints. Local officials and militia prevented observers from entering many polling stations in the Amhara region and in the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples’ Region, he said.

“This will jeopardise the credibility of the election process,” Birtukan warned. “Local officials and law enforcement officers should immediately take corrective measures.”

But in most areas, including the capital, voting went peacefully although many polling stations opened late. The election board extended voting nationwide by three hours because many polling stations still had long lines when they were due to close. read more

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has said the elections for national and regional parliaments are proof of his commitment to democracy.

“I hope it will be the best election in history,” he told journalists after voting.

Ethnic violence and printing errors have delayed the polls in a fifth of constituencies, however, including all those in Tigray, where Ethiopia’s military has been fighting the northern region’s former governing party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), since November.

In populous Oromiya, major opposition parties are boycotting the vote over what they say is intimidation by regional security forces. Government officials did not return calls seeking comment about the allegations of intimidation.

Abiy, 45, oversaw sweeping political and economic reforms after his appointment in 2018 by the ruling coalition which, with allies, currently holds all 547 national parliamentary seats.

But some rights activists say those gains are being reversed and he is coming under increasing international pressure over reports of abuses in the war in Tigray. The UN says 350,000 people there face famine – something Abiy denies.

“There is no hunger in Tigray,” he told a journalist for the British Broadcasting Corporation after voting.

Abiy has said the government will hold anyone committing abuses in Tigray to account. The results of a joint investigation by the United Nations and the state-appointed Ethiopian Human Rights Commission into rights violations by “all parties to the conflict” in Tigray are expected in August, U.N. rights chief Michelle Bachelet said yesterday.

Ethiopia is a diplomatic heavyweight in the volatile Horn of Africa, providing peacekeepers to Somalia, Sudan and South Sudan. With Africa’s second-biggest population, over a third aged under 18, it is also a major frontier market.

 

By Bolaji Ogundele, Abuja

President Muhammadu Buhari has said the election of the new Iranian President, Ebrahim Raisi, has again proven that the people determine their democracy, anywhere in the world.

In a statement issued by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Mallam Garba Shehu, President Buhari said: “Raisi deserves his victory in the presidential election.”

The Nigerian leader explained that “democracy affords voters the opportunity to change or re-elect their representatives by peaceful means.”

He described Raisi as “a consummate politician with experience to lead his country to greater heights and a better future.”

President Buhari urged Iranians to “brush political differences aside and support Raisi to succeed in efforts to help the country overcome its challenges, including the impact of COVID-19 pandemic and the crippling sanctions imposed on the country.”

Congratulating Raisi on his victory, President Buhari advised the President-elect “to unite the country for the sake of protecting the common interests of Iranians that transcend party lines.”

May God guide and grant you wisdom in the discharge of the heavy responsibility your election entails,” President Buhari added.

But, Raisi yesterday ruled out future negotiations with the United States over his government’s conventional ballistic missile programme and support for Shiite militias across the Middle East.

Raisi, who was elected to the presidency in Friday’s national elections, called the ballistic missile programme and militia support “non-negotiable” and urged the United States to return to the 2015 nuclear agreement.

The president-elect staked out a hard-line position in his first remarks since his landslide election victory, rejecting the possibility of meeting with President Joe Biden.

The comments by Raisi offered a blunt preview of how Iran might deal with the wider world in the next four years as it enters a new stage in negotiations to resurrect its now-tattered 2015 nuclear deal with global powers.

The news conference in Tehran also marked the first time the judiciary chief found himself confronted on live television about his role in the 1988 mass execution of political prisoners at the end of the Iran-Iraq war. Raisi offered no specific response to that dark chapter in Iranian history, but appeared confident and defiant as he described himself as a “defender of human rights”.

Behind a sea of microphones, mostly from media in Iran and countries home to Tehran-backed militias, Raisi took questions ranging from his views on the nuclear talks to relations with regional rival Saudi Arabia. He appeared nervous at the start of the hourlong session but grew increasingly at ease as he returned to vague campaign themes of promoting Iran’s economic self-sufficiency and combating corruption.

The 60-year-old cleric, a protégé of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, swept nearly 62% of the 28.9 million votes in Friday’s presidential election, which saw the lowest turnout in the Islamic Republic’s history. Millions of Iranians stayed home in defiance of a vote they saw as tipped in Raisi’s favor after a panel under Khamenei disqualified prominent reformist candidates and allies of relatively moderate President Hassan Rouhani. Tehran province had a staggeringly low 34% turnout, roughly half of previous years, with many polling stations noticeably deserted.

Concerning the talks over Iran’s nuclear deal, Raisi promised to salvage the accord to secure relief from U.S. sanctions that have devastated the Iranian economy. But he ruled out any limits to Iran’s missile capabilities and support for regional militias — among other issues viewed by Washington as shortcomings of the landmark deal that the Biden administration wants addressed. “It’s nonnegotiable,” Raisi said of Iran’s ballistic missile program, adding that the U.S. “is obliged to lift all oppressive sanctions against Iran.”

Tehran’s fleet of attack aircraft largely dates back to before the 1979 Islamic Revolution, forcing Iran to instead invest in missiles as a hedge against its regional Arab neighbours, which have bought billions of dollars in American military hardware over the years. Those missiles, with a self-imposed range limit of 2,000 kilometers (1,240 miles), can reach across the Mideast and U.S. military bases in the region.

 

Agency Reporter

A mineworker who had a habit of feeding crocodiles was killed by the reptiles on Indonesia’s Belitung island, an official said on Monday.

Juperi Ahmad, 53, went missing on Friday while manning a sluice gate in a lake at the mining site in Dendang district, said Danu Wahyudi, the head of the local search and rescue agency.

His mutilated body was found the next day, he said.

READ ALSO: A gathering of crocodiles

“Locals told us that he often fed crocodiles there,’’ Danu said.

A co-worker said the victim often scolded him for chasing crocodiles away.

“He will say that we should feed them so they wouldn’t disturb us.

“He often fed them dogs,’’ the colleague was quoted as saying by Tribunnews.com. (dpa/NAN)

No fewer than 18 people have been killed in a series of shootings in Reynosa, Mexico, a border town known for drug cartels and as a gathering point for migrants seeking to cross illegally into the United States (U.S.).

Unidentified gunmen riding in sport-utility vehicles shot people in various neighbourhoods of Reynosa, just a stone’s throw from McAllen, Texas, on Saturday afternoon, Tamaulipas state law enforcement officials said.

Identities of the victims haven’t been released, and police are investigating the motive.

State, National Guard and army security forces were sent to Reynosa in response to the shootings. One person was arrested, and three vehicles involved in the shootings were seized, police said.

“We ask the security forces to clarify the unfortunate events where 12 people lost their lives and three more were injured,” Reynosa Mayor Maki Esther Ortiz Dominguez said on Twitter Saturday evening, before the full death toll was known, “and protect citizens from these violent acts”.

Mexico is plagued by cartel violence, which contributed to a record-high 34,681 murders in 2019 and more than 34,000 homicides again last year. With cartels fighting over control of smuggling routes, Reynosa ranks as one of the country’s most dangerous cities. In fact, it ranks as the 42nd-most dangerous city globally, according to WorldAtlas.com.

With illegal migration traffic into the U.S. surging since President Joe Biden took office in January, the Reynosa-McAllen crossing has emerged as a hotspot in America’s border crisis.

A video leaked to undercover-journalism outfit Project Veritas in March showed dozens of migrants, including small children, fenced off and laying in the dirt under the Anzalduas International Bridge, on the Texas side of the border. US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) officers were reportedly using the area as a makeshift migrant-processing centre.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott last week announced that the state will build its own border wall and begin making mass arrests of illegal aliens to help secure the region. He said under Biden’s policies, unprecedented numbers of migrants are crossing into Texas resulting in increasing home invasions, drug-trafficking, human-trafficking and damage to crops and livestock.