WORLD - The African Mirror

Jan

11

2021

Man who sat at Pelosi aide’s desk faces charges; FBI probes officer’s death

WORLD

SARAH N LYNCH and MAKINI BRICE A West Virginia state lawmaker and a man pictured sitting at an aide's desk in U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office are among those facing federal charges stemming from the siege on the U.S. Capitol by President Donald Trump's supporters, federal prosecutors have announced. In a related development, Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen announced the FBI would team up with Washington's police department to jointly investigate the death of Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick, who was injured while defending the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday. "Just because you've left the D.C. region, you…

Jan

11

2021

By The African Mirror

Olympics-80% want Tokyo Games cancelled or delayed – Japanese survey

WORLD

ABOUT 80% of people in Japan say this year's Tokyo Olympics should be cancelled or delayed as worries mount about a record surge in coronavirus cases across the country, according to a Kyodo News poll. The survey found 35.3% want the Games to be cancelled and 44.8% favoured another delay. The world's biggest multi-sports event, postponed last year due to the pandemic, is scheduled to be held from July 23 - August 8 in the Japanese capital. Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga. Photo: Flickr Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga declared a state of emergency for the greater Tokyo region on Thursday and…

Jan

10

2021

By The African Mirror

An isolated Trump, cut off from Twitter, faces 2nd impeachment

WORLD

RICHARD COWAN AN increasingly isolated and angry President Donald Trump, cut off by Twitter in the waning days of his term, faces a renewed drive by Democrats to remove him from office after he incited his supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol. Twitter has permanently cut off Trump's personal account and access to his nearly 90 million followers late, citing the risk of further incitement of violence, three days after Trump exhorted thousands of supporters to march on the Capitol as Congress met to certify his defeat to Democrat Joe Biden. The resulting chaos, viewed with shock around the world,…

Jul

20

2022

By The African Mirror

Putin meets Iran’s Khamenei on first trip outside ex-Soviet Union since Ukraine war

WORLD

GUY FAULCONBRIDGE and PARISA HAFEZI RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin had talks with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Iran on Tuesday, the Kremlin leader's first trip outside the former Soviet Union since Moscow's February 24 invasion of Ukraine. In Tehran, Putin also held his first face-to-face meeting since the invasion with a NATO leader, Turkey's Tayyip Erdogan, to discuss a deal that would resume Ukraine's Black Sea grain exports as well as the conflict in northern Syria. Putin's trip, coming just days after U.S. President Joe Biden visited Israel and Saudi Arabia, sends a strong message to the West about…

Jan

10

2021

By The African Mirror

Haunted by forced sterilizations, Peruvian women pin hopes on court hearing

WORLD

ANASTASIA MOLONEY A 25-year legal battle by thousands of indigenous Peruvian women who say they were forcibly sterilized during a 1990s birth control drive will go before a judge on Monday, raising hopes they could finally see justice, their lawyers said. About 350,000 women were sterilized under a program launched in 1996 by former strongman President Alberto Fujimori, who has said the procedures were carried out with patients' consent and aimed to tackle poverty by cutting birth rates. But more than 2,000 women have told rights groups and prosecutors they were sterilized without their consent, sometimes threatened or duped by…

Jul

20

2022

By The African Mirror

Analysis: The 2.5 seconds of security lapses that sealed Shinzo Abe’s fate

WORLD

SATOSHI SUGIYAMA, SAM NUSSEY and JU-MIN PARK BODYGUARDS could have saved Shinzo Abe if they shielded him or removed him from the line of fire in the 2.5 seconds between a missed first shot and a second round of gunfire that fatally wounded him, according to eight security experts who reviewed footage of the former Japanese leader's assassination. The failure to protect Abe from the second shot followed what appeared to be a series of security lapses in the lead-up to the assassination of Japan's longest-serving prime minister on July 8, the Japanese and international experts said. Abe's killing in…

Jan

10

2021

By The African Mirror

Indonesian plane feared to have crashed with 62 aboard

WORLD

STANLEY WIDIANTO and TABITA DIELA A Sriwijaya Air plane with 62 people on board lost contact after taking off from Indonesia's capital Jakarta on a domestic flight and rescuers said suspected debris had been found in the sea off the city. The Boeing 737-500, en route to Pontianak in West Kalimantan, disappeared from radar screens after taking off just after 2.30 p.m. (0730 GMT). Indonesian Transport Minister Budi Karya told a news conference that 62 people had been aboard, including 12 crew. Another official had said earlier there were 56 passengers and six crew. Bagus Puruhito, head of the country's…

Jul

20

2022

By The African Mirror

Twitter gets fast-tracked Elon Musk trial over $44 billion deal

WORLD

TOM HALS and SHEILA DANG TWITTER Inc will get an October trial in its legal fight to hold Elon Musk to his $44 billion takeover after a Delaware judge said on Tuesday the social media company deserved a quick resolution of the deal's uncertainty. The ruling is a blow to Musk, who pushed for a trial in February to allow for an extensive investigation into his claims that Twitter has misrepresented the number of fake or spam accounts. The question of whether Twitter's user numbers are inflated is core to his contention that he can walk away from the deal. The…

Jan

09

2021

By The African Mirror

‘We live in two Americas’, says LeBron James

WORLD

LOS Angeles Lakers forward LeBron James said the violent mob of President Donald Trump's supporters forcing their way into the U.S. Capitol showed that there were "two Americas". Hundreds of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday in a bid to overturn his election defeat, forcing Congress to postpone a session that would have certified President-elect Joe Biden's victory. James watched on television as the events took place, and on Thursday wondered what would have happened if the intruders had been mostly Black. "We live in two Americas," James said, following the Lakers' 118-109 loss to the San Antonio…

Jan

09

2021

By The African Mirror

Pelosi spoke to top U.S. general about restraining Trump

WORLD

HOUSE Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on Friday she spoke to the top U.S. military commander about taking precautions to ensure that Republican President Donald Trump cannot initiate hostilities or order a nuclear strike in his remaining two weeks in office. "The situation of this unhinged president could not be more dangerous, and we must do everything that we can to protect the American people from his unbalanced assault on our country and our democracy," Pelosi said in a letter to colleagues. The development as at least one Senate Republican said they would consider supporting a possible effort by congressional Democrats…