WORLD - The African Mirror

Jan

12

2024

By MOHAMMED SALEM, NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI and ANTHONY DEUTSCH

Netanyahu condemns ICJ genocide case; Gazans return to wasteland in north

WORLD

BENJAMIN Netanyahu condemned South Africa's genocide case against Israel in Gaza as "hypocrisy and lies", as some Gazans returned to scenes of total devastation in the north of the enclave where Israeli forces have begun withdrawing. Three months of Israeli bombardment have laid much of the coastal enclave to waste, killing more than 23,000 people and driving nearly the entire population of 2.3 million Palestinians from their homes. An Israeli blockade has sharply restricted supplies of food, fuel and medicine, creating what the United Nations describes as a humanitarian catastrophe. Israel says its only means to defend itself is by eradicating…

Jan

12

2024

By The African Mirror

Polish priest arrested, charged with sex crimes after alleged orgy

WORLD

A Polish priest was arrested and charged with sex and drug crimes as well as failure to assist a person at medical risk after media reports that a man collapsed at a sex party at his home, state news agency PAP said. The diocese in southwest Poland has been engulfed in scandal since reports emerged last September of an orgy at the home of a priest in the town of Dabrowa Gornicza. The priest, referred to as Tomasz Z due to Polish privacy laws, was placed in pre-trial detention after his arrest on Monday. He could face up to 10…

Jan

12

2024

By The African Mirror

Belgian police arrest three after witness overheard possible attack plot

WORLD

BELGIAN authorities morning stopped a bus travelling to Brussels from northern France and arrested three people after a passenger overheard them discussing a possible 'terrorist' plot, the local public prosecution office said. "Every time we get a notification like that we take it very seriously and we don't want to take any risk," a spokesperson at the Ghent prosecution office told Reuters, adding that police were currently checking the bus, its 46 passengers and their luggage. She declined to disclose any details on the suspects as well as on the content of their conversation. Belgium is on heightened alert after…

Jan

11

2024

By AMIR COHEN and MAAYAN LUBELL

In shelter where Hamas killed trapped Israelis: smell of blood and a mother’s grief

WORLD

THREE months on, the scent of blood still hung in the air in the cramped concrete bomb shelter where rampaging Hamas fighters tossed grenades and opened fire to kill dozens of Israelis trapped inside. Tali Kizhner knelt down, caressing the foot of a bullet-and-shrapnel-scarred wall, now painted white to cover the bloodstains and scorch marks. One of the victims here was her 22-year-old son Segev, who had sought safety after fleeing a music festival on the morning of October 7. "I wanted to know where his last moments were, whether there was anywhere to hide. What happened there. To feel…

Jan

10

2024

By ELIZABETH PINEAU and YIMING WOO

Gabriel Attal becomes France’s youngest prime minister as Macron seeks reset

WORLD

GABRIEL Attal promised to be bold and act fast to help the middle class weather the rising cost of living, after President Emmanuel Macron, seeking to breathe new life into his second term, on Tuesday made him France's youngest-ever prime minister. The appointment of Attal, 34, a popular and media-savvy rising star of French politics, signals a desire by Macron to move beyond divisive reforms and improve his centrist party's chances in the European Parliament elections in June. "Dear @GabrielAttal, I know I can count on your energy and your commitment to implement the project of revitalisation and regeneration that I announced,"…

Jan

10

2024

By The African Mirror

Indian AI startup CEO arrested after body of 4-year-old son found in luggage

WORLD

THE CEO of an Indian AI startup has been arrested on suspicion that she murdered her four-year-old son after his body was found in her luggage, police said. Suchana Seth, who heads The Mindful AI Lab in India’s tech hub of Bengaluru, was detained in the Chitradurga district of Karnataka state when she was returning from the neighbouring state of Goa by taxi and arrested after the body was found in her luggage, they said. Seth could not be reached for comment as she was in custody and police said they did not know if she has a lawyer as…

Jan

10

2024

By The African Mirror

Detention of Russian theatre director and playwright accused of ‘justifying terrorism’ extended till March

WORLD

A Moscow court said that it had extended the detention of a prominent Russian theatre director and a playwright who had been held since last May on charges of "justifying terrorism" until March 10. Director Yevgenia (Zhenya) Berkovich and playwright Svetlana Petriychuk are accused of vindicating terrorism in the award-winning play, "Finist, the Brave Falcon", which is about Russian women who married Islamic State fighters. Investigators opened the case against the two women last May over Petriychuk's play, which premiered in 2020 under Berkovich's direction. Since Russia sent its armed forces into Ukraine in 2022, Moscow has intensified a clampdown…

Jan

09

2024

By PHILIP PULLELLA

‘Indiscriminately striking’ civilians is war crime, pope says in major speech

WORLD

POPE Francis, tackling conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine in his yearly address to diplomats, said that "indiscriminately striking" civilians is a war crime because it violates international humanitarian law. Francis, 87, made his comments in a 45-minute address to Vatican-accredited envoys from 184 countries that is sometimes called his "state of the world" speech. In it, he also talked about conflicts in Africa and Asia, migration crises in the United States and Latin America, climate change and the persecution of Christians. Expressing concern that the war between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas in the Gaza Strip could spread…

Jan

09

2024

By SAKSHI DAYAL

India’s top court quashes release of men in Muslim woman’s gang-rape

WORLD

INDIA'S top court quashed the release of 11 Hindu men who had been jailed for life for gang-raping a pregnant Muslim woman and murdering her relatives during Hindu-Muslim riots in Gujarat state in 2002, a lawyer in the case said. The court directed the men to surrender to prison authorities within two weeks, the lawyer added. The victim, Bilkis Bano, was three months pregnant when she was gang-raped and seven of her relatives, including her three-year-old daughter, were murdered during the riots that killed more than 1,000 people, most of them Muslims. Prime Minister Narendra Modi was Gujarat's chief minister…

Jan

09

2024

By The African Mirror

Trump says he will attend federal appeals court arguments on presidential immunity

WORLD

DONALD Trump said he will be attending an appeals court hearing regarding the scope of his presidential immunity in Washington D.C. on Tuesday, in comments in a Truth Social post. "Of course I was entitled, as President of the United States and Commander in Chief, to Immunity," Trump said in the post. Prosecutors have accused Trump, the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, of attempting to obstruct Congress and defraud the U.S. government through schemes to reverse Democratic President Joe Biden's 2020 election win. Trump has argued that the case should be dismissed on the grounds that former presidents…