WORLD - The African Mirror

Dec

18

2022

Erdogan says courts will fix any mistakes after Istanbul mayor’s sentencing

WORLD

TURKISH President Tayyip Erdogan said that the courts would correct any mistakes in an appeal process after the jailing of Istanbul's opposition mayor. In the meantime, Turks had no right to ignore legal rulings. In his first direct comments on Wednesday's conviction of Ekrem Imamoglu - a potential challenger to Erdogan who was sentenced to two years and seven months in prison and handed a political ban - Erdogan said he did not care who is the opposition candidate in next year's elections. Imamoglu was prosecuted for insulting public officials in 2019 when he criticised a decision to cancel the first…

Dec

17

2022

By The African Mirror

Residential fire near French city Lyon kills 10, including children

WORLD

YIMING WOO AND SARAH MEYSSONNIER TEN people including five children aged three to 15 were killed in a fire that engulfed a residential building in an impoverished town near the southeastern French city of Lyon. Another four people were seriously injured in the blaze in Vaulx-en-Velin, which started around 3 a.m. (0200 GMT) on the ground floor before spreading up the seven-storey building, rescue authorities said. Witnesses in nearby buildings said they had been woken up by screams and felt helpless as they stood at the foot of the building on fire, the smoke too thick for them to get…

Dec

17

2022

By The African Mirror

Louisiana officers charged in 2019 death of unarmed Black motorist

WORLD

TIM REID A grand jury indicted five Louisiana law enforcement officers on Thursday on charges ranging from negligent homicide to malfeasance for their role in the death of unarmed Black motorist Ronald Greene while making an arrest in 2019. Greene, 49, died in May 2019 on a roadside in rural northern Louisiana after a violent confrontation with officers that followed a high-speed car chase. Officials initially said Greene had died driving his car but body-camera footage that was eventually made public revealed the white officers dragging and beating Greene who was screaming in fear. The most serious charges were leveled…

Dec

17

2022

By The African Mirror

Twitter suspends several journalists, Musk cites ‘doxxing’ of his jet

WORLD

TWITTER suspended the accounts of several prominent journalists who recently wrote about its new owner Elon Musk, with the billionaire tweeting that rules banning the publishing of personal information applied to all, including journalists. Responding to a Tweet on the account suspensions, Musk, who has described himself as a free speech absolutist, tweeted: "Same doxxing rules apply to 'journalists' as to everyone else," a reference to Twitter rules banning the sharing of personal information, called doxxing. Musk's tweet referred to Twitter's Wednesday suspension of @elonjet, an account tracking his private jet in real time using data available in the public domain.…

Dec

16

2022

By The African Mirror

Harry accuses Prince William of screaming at him, his aides of leaking stories

WORLD

MICHAEL HOLDEN PRINCE Harry and his wife Meghan piled fresh criticism on the British royals in new episodes of their documentary series released on Thursday, accusing his elder brother Prince William of screaming at him during a summit to discuss his future. In the final three episodes of the Netflix series, Harry also said aides for William, now heir to the throne, had been complicit in negative stories appearing about the couple in the media and blamed the press for Meghan having a miscarriage. "It is a dirty game. There's leaking but there's also planting of stories," said Harry. "So if the…

Dec

16

2022

By The African Mirror

Ex-Twitter worker gets 3-1/2-year U.S. prison term for spying for Saudi Arabia

WORLD

PARESH DAVE A former Twitter Inc manager convicted of spying for Saudi Arabia by sharing user data several years ago and potentially exposing users to persecution was sentenced to 3-1/2 years in prison, U.S. prosecutors said. Ahmad Abouammo had been found guilty by a jury in August following a trial in a federal court in San Francisco. Prosecutors had sought a prison term of just over seven years, saying they wanted a "sentence strong enough to deter others in the technology and social media industry from selling out the data of vulnerable users." Abouammo faced a maximum penalty of decades in prison.…

Dec

16

2022

By The African Mirror

China’s COVID spike not due to lifting of restrictions, WHO director says

WORLD

EMMA FARGE COVID-19 infections were exploding in China well before the government's decision to abandon its strict "zero-COVID" policy, a World Health Organization director said, quashing suggestions that the sudden reversal caused a spike in cases. The comments by the WHO's emergencies director Mike Ryan came as he warned of the need to ramp up vaccinations in the world's No. 2 economy. Speaking at a briefing with media, he said the virus was spreading "intensively" in the nation long before the lifting of restrictions. "There's a narrative at the moment that China lifted the restrictions and all of a sudden the disease…

Dec

14

2022

By The African Mirror

Journalist imprisonments reach 30-year high

WORLD

THE number of journalists imprisoned worldwide is the highest ever recorded in the 30 years that the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has produced its prison census, the organization said Wednesday. A record 363 journalists were behind bars as of December 1, 2022, a 20% increase over 2021, CPJ’s annual prison census showed. Iran has soared to become the world’s worst jailer of journalists, with 62 imprisoned on December 1, rising from tenth place in 2021, a reflection of authorities’ ruthless crackdown on the women-led uprisings that erupted in September. The regime has imprisoned a record number of female journalists—22 out of…

Dec

15

2022

By The African Mirror

In a small Russian town, a pensioner’s street art denounces Ukraine conflict

WORLD

OVER 20 years, Russian pensioner Vladimir Ovchinnikov gained a following for his street murals in the small town of Borovsk, some 70 miles (115 km) southwest of Moscow, many of which depicted the plight of victims of Stalinist-era repressions. But on March 25, just over a month after Russia sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine, Ovchinnikov created a new work, one that would place him in serious legal jeopardy. He painted a girl, in a blue and yellow dress, the colours of the Ukrainian flag, with a bomb falling onto her from above. Beneath her, in block capitals,…

Dec

15

2022

By The African Mirror

U.S. lawmakers unveil bipartisan bid to ban China’s TikTok

WORLD

REPUBLICAN Senator Marco Rubio announced bipartisan legislation to ban China's popular social media app TikTok, ratcheting up pressure on owner ByteDance Ltd amid U.S. fears the app could be used to spy on Americans and censor content. The legislation would block all transactions from any social media company in or under the influence of China and Russia, Rubio's office said in a news release, adding that a companion bill in the U.S. House of Representatives was sponsored by Republican congressman Mike Gallagher and Democrat Raja Krishnamoorthi. "It is troubling that rather than encouraging the administration to conclude its national security…