WORLD - The African Mirror

Sep

08

2020

Saudi Arabia jails eight over Khashoggi murder, fiancee decries trial

WORLD

MARWA RASHAD and RAYA JALABI A Saudi Arabian court has jailed eight people for between seven and 20 years for the 2018 murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, four months after his family forgave his killers and enabled death sentences to be set aside. The trial was criticised by a United Nations official and human rights campaigners who said the masterminds of the murder remained free. Khashoggi, a critic of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was last seen at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2, 2018, where he had gone to obtain documents for his impending wedding.…

Sep

07

2020

By The African Mirror

Tuk-tuk warriors: the abuse victims who rode to women’s rescue in lockdown India

WORLD

ANNIE BANERJI As the coronavirus kept virtually everyone at home, Talat Jahan was busily crisscrossing the slums in her black-and-yellow rickshaw - on a lockdown mission to help women suffering abuse and hunger in her central Indian city. Jahan, 29, a domestic abuse survivor, and about a dozen other women who recently trained to become Bhopal's first female rickshaw drivers ferried food and other essentials to hard-hit city families during India's months-long lockdown. But often, Jahan said, she and her fellow volunteers from the Gauravi one-stop crisis centre were simply a sympathetic ear for women cooped up with their abusers…

Sep

07

2020

By The African Mirror

Shooting fails to deter Afghan woman on Taliban talks team

WORLD

SHADI KHAN SAIF AFGHAN women's rights advocate Fawzia Koofi had nightmares for days after a volley of bullets was fired at her car as she travelled with her daughter in the restive province of Parwan. Just two weeks later and with her arm still in a cast, Koofi, one of the few female members of the Afghan team negotiating a peace deal with the Taliban, is planning to return to the area, where floods have killed more than 150 people. It is a sign of the determination of a woman who has survived two apparent assassination attempts to keep fighting…

Sep

06

2020

By The African Mirror

Hundreds of Hong Kong protesters march to oppose postponed elections, new law

WORLD

JESSIE PANG HUNDREDS of protesters took to the streets in the Asian financial hub of Hong Kong on Sunday to demonstrate against a new national security law imposed by China and the postponement of legislative elections. Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam postponed the September 6 election for seats in the city's Legislative Council for a year in July because of a spike in coronavirus cases. The move dealt a blow to the pro-democracy opposition who hoped to win a historic majority in the Council, where only half the seats are directly elected and the other half are appointed members who…

Sep

04

2020

By The African Mirror

More than 40 crew missing after ship with 6000 cattle capsizes in storm off Japan

WORLD

JUNKO FUJITA AND PRAVEEN MENON MORE than 40 crew members were missing after a ship carrying cattle from New Zealand to China capsized in stormy weather in the East China Sea, the Japanese coastguard has said. A lone crew member from the Gulf Livestock 1 had been rescued so far. Three vessels, four aeroplanes and two divers were taking part in the search, the coastguard said. The ship, with a cargo of nearly 6,000 cattle, sent a distress call from the west of Amami Oshima island in southwestern Japan on Wednesday as Typhoon Maysak lashed the area with strong winds…

Sep

04

2020

By The African Mirror

Biden speaks with Jacob Blake, hears from Kenosha residents

WORLD

JARRETT RENSHAW and JAMES OLIPHANT DEMOCRATIC presidential nominee Joe Biden put himself squarely in the middle of U.S. tumult over racial injustice and police brutality on Thursday, visiting strife-torn Kenosha, Wisconsin, and speaking by phone with the Black man shot there by police. Biden's made the trip to the city, the site of sometimes violent protests since Jacob Blake was shot in the back several times by a white police officer on Aug. 23, two days after President Donald Trump traveled there. The visits had starkly different tones. Biden met privately with Blake's family on the grounds of the Milwaukee…

Oct

02

2020

By The African Mirror

Prince Harry and Meghan tell Britain: end ‘structural racism’

WORLD

MICHAEL HOLDEN BRITAIN’S Prince Harry and his wife Meghan have called for an end to "structural racism", saying it holds back young people of colour, in their latest foray into politically sensitive issues usually avoided by the British royal family. In an interview for The Evening Standard newspaper, Harry said Britain could be a better place if white people understood more about those "of a different coloured skin" "For as long as structural racism exists, there will be generations of young people of colour who do not start their lives with the same equality of opportunity as their white peers,"…

Oct

02

2020

By The African Mirror

Brazil’s public sector hit with lawsuits for COVID-19 labor abuses

WORLD

FABIO TEIXEIRA and ALFREDO MERGULHAO DOZENS of local authorities and state-owned companies in Brazil are facing lawsuits accused of failing to protect workers including doctors and nurses from COVID-19, data obtained exclusively by the Thomson Reuters Foundation has revealed. Labor prosecutors filed 69 lawsuits against city governments and state-controlled firms such as Banco do Brasil SA in the first half of the year for reported coronavirus labor abuses such as not providing workers with protective equipment. Local governments and other public sector bodies were the target of 30% of the 230 labor lawsuits related to the pandemic - more than…

Oct

02

2020

By The African Mirror

‘Berlin Patient’ Timothy Ray Brown was an HIV hero

WORLD

ASH KOTAK The “Berlin Patient” Timothy Ray Brown, the first person known to have been cured of HIV, has died at the age of 54 from a recurrence of the cancer that prompted his historic treatment. In 1995 Brown, an American, was diagnosed with HIV. Ten years later he was found to separately have acute myeloid leukaemia (AML). Dr Gero Huetter, a blood cancer expert at the University of Berlin, believed that a bone marrow transplant was Brown’s best chance of beating the leukaemia. He also had a theoretical hunch that it may eradicate HIV too. It proved to be…

Oct

01

2020

By The African Mirror

Trump signs stopgap bill to avoid U.S. government shutdown

WORLD

U.S. President Donald Trump has signed a stopgap funding bill that would keep the federal government open through December 11, the White House said in a statement. Trump signed the measure into law shortly after government funding ran out at midnight. The law would maintain current funding levels for most programs, avoiding a government shutdown in the middle of a pandemic just weeks ahead of the November 3 presidential election. It would also give lawmakers more time to work out budget details for the fiscal year that ends on September 30 2021, including for military operations, healthcare, national parks, space…