Libya opens up to tourists
Libya is opening up to tourists. For the first time in a decade, a group of around one hundred mostly European tourists have visited the historic oasis town of Ghadames, deep …
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Libya is opening up to tourists. For the first time in a decade, a group of around one hundred mostly European tourists have visited the historic oasis town of Ghadames, deep …
Libya is opening up to tourists.
For the first time in a decade, a group of around one hundred mostly European tourists have visited the historic oasis town of Ghadames, deep in the desert.
The convoy of vehicles was accompanied by the police, there to guarantee security.
“They are breaking the barrier of fear among the many admirers of the Libyan desert, thanks to the supporters and the good people, as well as the state, which deployed all its resources from the tourism and interior ministries. As you can see the from the escorts that we have, there is high protection”, said tour guide, Ali al-Kouba.
The visitors arrived via a border crossing with Tunisia which had opened in September after months of closure due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The tour was paid for by the Libyan state in a bid to attract more tourists.
Many, such as this Italian tour operator, are delighted to return to the country.
“Here we are in Ghadames at last, it’s been ten years and we hope to come back to work with clients again in the field of tourism. It went very well, in any case, we were certain that we would be welcomed in this wonderful country”, said Giovanni Paolo, a tour operator and long time admirer of Libya.
Tripoli sees tourism as a key sector for the economy.
Despite a year of relative calm, the country still sees localised outbursts of fighting and most countries still advise their citizens against visiting.
The family of a Kenyan woman who was allegedly killed by a British soldier in 2012, is crying foul as they are yet to receive justice almost 10 years after the …
The family of a Kenyan woman who was allegedly killed by a British soldier in 2012, is crying foul as they are yet to receive justice almost 10 years after the death of the death of Agnes Wanjru.
Wanjiru was a 21-year-old mother of a 5-month old daughter when she was reported missing in March 2012.
Her body was retrieved almost 3 months later from a hotel’s septic tank in central Kenya.
According to witness accounts, she had been last seen partying in the company of British soldiers.
In 2019, an inquest by a Kenyan judge concluded that Wanjiru had been murdered by one or 2 British soldiers.
An order by the judge for two further inquiries hit a snag after the British military took no action.
According to a report done by the Sunday Times, the killer confessed to a fellow soldier.
When the soldier reported the confession, no action was taken by the army.
According to UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, the Ministry of Defense is expected to continue offering support to the Kenyan investigation as far as the case is concerned.
However, this was dismissed by social activists who have called for the extradition of the alleged killer.
A proposed law in Ghana to toughen curbs on the LGBT community has triggered a rift between the Archbishop of Canterbury and the local Anglican church, which strongly supports the bill. …
A proposed law in Ghana to toughen curbs on the LGBT community has triggered a rift between the Archbishop of Canterbury and the local Anglican church, which strongly supports the bill.
Gay sex is illegal in highly religious and conservative Ghana, but the proposed law will criminalise even LGBTQ advocacy while imposing longer jail terms for same-sex relations.
The so-called “Promotion of proper human sexual rights and Ghanaian family values” bill has been widely condemned by the international community and rights activists.
But the bill, currently being debated in parliament, is widely supported in Ghana, where President Nana Akufo-Addo has said gay marriage will never be allowed while he is in power.
Ghana’s Anglican bishops endorsed the bill in a statement earlier this month, saying LGBT beliefs were “unbiblical and ungodly” and also against Ghanaian tradition and culture.
“This is about morality today and of the future generation,” they said in a statement.
But that stance has put the bishops at odds with Britain’s Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, the leader of the global Anglican communion.
Welby said he was “gravely concerned” about the draft law and the Ghanaian church position on the bill.
“I will be speaking with the Archbishop of Ghana in the coming days to discuss the Anglican Church of Ghana’s response to the Bill,” he said in a communique on Tuesday.
He said he reminded the Anglican Church of Ghana of its commitments.
“We are a global family of churches, but the mission of the church is the same in every culture and country: to demonstrate, through its actions and words, God’s offer of unconditional love to every human being through Jesus Christ.”
Asked about the archbishop’s comments, Ghana’s bishops stood by their position.
“We have seen and read about the statement by the bishops in the UK but what we have stated and stood for still stands,” George Dawson-Amoah, director to Metropolitan Archbishop of Ghana, said.
“We see LGBTQI as unrighteousness in the sight of God and therefore we will do anything within our powers and mandate to ensure that the bill comes into fruition.”
LGBTQI means lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and intersex.https://www.facebook.com/plugins/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fafricanews.channel%2Fposts%2F4625632967500514&show_text=true&width=500
More than half the countries in sub-Saharan African have anti-homosexuality laws, with some punishing it with death penalty under sharia law, although there have been no known modern-day executions, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni in 2014 signed a bill that increased the penalty for same-sex relations, but it was annulled by the courts six months later.
Chad and Burundi have all toughened their laws while Angola scrapped anti-gay laws from its penal code two years ago.
Botswana’s High Court, also in 2019, decriminalised same-sex relationships, a ruling that is currently being appealed by the government.
South Africa is the only African nation to allow gay marriage and has become a haven for African homosexuals who flee persecution at home.
Discrimination against LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) people is common in Ghana, but no one has ever been prosecuted under the colonial-era law.
Activist groups say the new bill is a setback for human rights and have called on Akufo-Addo’s government to reject it.
“This is a grave attack to human rights, including the right to freedom of expression,” Article 19 international rights group said in a statement.
But nearly 90 percent of Ghanaians said they would approve of a decision by the government to criminalise same-sex relationships, according to research group Afrobarometer based on 2014 data.
Local churches are a powerful social force in Ghana. When activists tried to open a LGBT rights advocacy centre on the outskirts of Accra this year, the outcry was immediate.
The Catholic Church of Ghana publicly demanded the centre be shut down.
Following a huge media campaign, security forces closed it less than a month after it opened. Ghana’s gender minister called homosexual practises “non-negotiable.”
The proposed anti-LBGT law is currently in the initial parliament committee stage.
If approved, it would criminalise LGBT advocacy, require people to denounce “suspects”, advocates for controversial conversion therapy and imposes jail terms of up to five years for same-sex relations.
“I’m convinced that the law that will come out of this, we’ll protect the culture and values of our people and the Ghanaian identity,” parliament speaker Alban Bagbin said this week.
“It’s not only Africa but the whole world is looking for the outcome of this bill.”
A new air strike has hit Ethiopia’s capital Tigray following several days of such strikes last week. Ethiopian government’s spokesperson confirmed this, with a Tigray spokesperson confirming the death of six …
A new air strike has hit Ethiopia’s capital Tigray following several days of such strikes last week. Ethiopian government’s spokesperson confirmed this, with a Tigray spokesperson confirming the death of six people as the yearlong war intensifies.
Government representative Legesse Tulu told The associated press that Thursday’s airstrike targeted a site in Mekele city used by rival Tigray forces to make and repair weapons.
He said the site forms part of a compound belonging to Mefsin Industrial Engineering, which was also hit last week.
Tigray spokesperson denied that, the airstrike hit a military target and said it struck a “civilian residence,” killing six people and wounding more than 20.
He added, three children were among the dead.
Photos from the scene appear to show rescuers pulling bodies from debris.
Ethiopia’s government has asserted that its latest airstrikes have been confined to military targets, but Tigray forces have asserted that civilian facilities including factories and a clinic have been targeted instead.
Meanwhile, fighting continues in Ethiopia’s neighbouring Amhara region after the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed launched a ground offensive there earlier this month, despite international calls for a cease-fire.
Some of the DR Congo’s former child soldiers have become traders, hairdressers and tailors, but many struggle to recover a normal life. Dreams of becoming a farmer or teacher run up …
Some of the DR Congo’s former child soldiers have become traders, hairdressers and tailors, but many struggle to recover a normal life.
Dreams of becoming a farmer or teacher run up against tough conditions in a society deeply afflicted by unemployment and poverty.
Clement Kahindo, supervisor of a temporary shelter in Goma, capital of North Kivu province, goes through the list of problems.
His facility is managed by an NGO called Cajed, which works for underprivileged young people and currently accommodates around 40 children aged 10 to 17 recently extracted from armed groups.
“They are taught how to behave properly, to read and write. They do drawing, basket-making, gardening, the washing up,” he told AFP.
What about teaching them a trade? “We do that sometimes, but not so much,” Kahindo said. “We lack the funds.”
But he proudly pointed to the success of a young man who had been given a sewing machine and has since regularly visited with reports of his progress. Another runs a hairdressing salon.
Kahindo said many former child combatants were overwhelmed by the horrors they had witnessed in a part of the country that has been ravaged by violence for more than 25 years.
“They have seen killings, some of them have carried out killings themselves, like the teenager who was forced to tie people up and bury them alive,” Kahindo said.
The youngest children are “used for spying, cooking, water and firewood,” said Faustin Busimba, Cajed’s programme officer.
“A child who stays for two or three years in an armed group goes to the front.”
But in eastern DRC’s North and South Kivu, as well as Ituri province, the front line and the conflict itself can be volatile.
The causes of violence in this troubled region are often complex and overlapping, rooted sometimes in ancient grievances but also overlain with the activities of foreign rebel groups and ethnic militias.
Main roads in at least ten provinces of Ecuador remained blocked on Wednesday on the second day of a national strike against fuel price hikes and President Guillermo Lasso’s economic policies. …
Main roads in at least ten provinces of Ecuador remained blocked on Wednesday on the second day of a national strike against fuel price hikes and President Guillermo Lasso’s economic policies. In some cases, police officers tried to clear the roads, but demonstrators kept returning to the barricades that they had set up. During a military ceremony, Lasso called for dialogue and “to think about the country’s benefit and not about personal, partisan or trade union interests.” The demonstrations have been called by trade unionists, Indigenous people, farmers and other social sectors outraged by the increase in fuel prices. Regular gasoline has gone up more than 70% over the course of little more than a year.
slamic religious police in northern Nigeria arrested a man who put himself up for sale to escape biting poverty, a local official said Wednesday. Aliyu Idris, 26, was arrested on Tuesday …
slamic religious police in northern Nigeria arrested a man who put himself up for sale to escape biting poverty, a local official said Wednesday.
Aliyu Idris, 26, was arrested on Tuesday by the morality police in Kano after pictures emerged on social media showing him holding a placard indicating he was up for auction at 20 million naira ($49,000).
Kano is one of a dozen predominantly Muslim northern Nigerian states where sharia law is enforced alongside common law.
“We arrested him for putting himself up for sale, which is illegal under Islamic law,” said Lawal Ibrahim Fagge, a spokesman for the religious police called Hisbah.
“He is in our custody,” said Fagge, blaming the young man’s “abhorrent action” on poverty and ignorance.
Last week Idris, a tailor from neighbouring Kaduna, went around the city last week with the placard inscribed with the sale offer.
Residents posted pictures of him online, turning him into a sensation.
The young man told reporters he was “selling” himself out of “excruciating poverty” and that he intended to give half the money to his parents and two million naira to anyone who could facilitate the auction.
He had also promised to be a “loyal servant” to his buyer.
“We all know there is grinding poverty in the society, but that does not give anyone the right to put himself up for sale,” Fagge said. “The era of slavery is over.”
Hisbah subjected Idris to a mental evaluation and found him to be sane, Fagge said.
Nigeria has been grappling with a tottering economy because of the weakening of the local currency and dwindling oil revenues, which account for 90 percent of its foreign exchange earnings.
Slipping into its second recession in five years after the start of the pandemic, Nigeria’s economy has bounced back to growth in recent months.
But inflation, especially food prices, remains stubbornly high, plunging Nigerians, most of whom live on less than two US dollars a day, further into poverty.
According to Fagge, Idris left his village and moved to Kano to look for work but was not successful.
“He told us he couldn’t get any job, including menial work, and decided to sell himself,” the spokesman said.
No charges were filed against Idris, but Hisbah said he was given counselling sessions.
Ugandan police said Sunday that a deadly explosion that killed one person and injured three others at a roadside eatery in the capital Kampala was an “act of domestic terror”. Police …
Ugandan police said Sunday that a deadly explosion that killed one person and injured three others at a roadside eatery in the capital Kampala was an “act of domestic terror”.
Police spokesman Fred Enanga said the attackers arrived at the popular grilled pork joint in northern Kampala at around 8:30 pm (1730 GMT) on Saturday carrying a plastic shopping bag that they placed under a table.
Shortly after leaving thirty minutes later, an explosion ripped through the eatery.
“The suspects detonated the device after they left the scene,” Enanga told reporters, describing the explosive as “crude” and containing nails and metal fragments.
“All indications suggest an act of domestic terror.”
President Yoweri Museveni earlier said the blast “seems to be a terrorist act” and vowed to hunt down those responsible.
“The public should not fear, we shall defeat this criminality like we have defeated all the other criminality committed by the pigs who don’t respect life,” he said.
Enanga said the group appeared unsophisticated and investigators believed they could track their whereabouts using evidence found at the scene.
They did not elaborate on the identity or motivation of the suspected attackers.
– Victim identified –
Police said the blast killed 20-year-old Emily Nyi/naneza, a waitress. Three others were in hospital, including two in a critical condition.
Masked anti-terrorism police attended the scene on Sunday as forensic officers in white overalls combed for evidence.
The explosion occurred about two hours after the start of a nationwide dusk-to-dawn coronavirus curfew.
Security forces rushed to the scene in Komamboga, a fast-growing suburb about eight kilometres (five miles) north of Kampala city centre.
Local mayor Emmanuel Sserunjogi said the bombing took place in an area popular with young revellers looking for roasted meat and drinks on a night out.
“The community are frightened. It was such a terrible act. People were woken up by the sound of the bomb,” he told AFP.
– Terror warnings –
It is the first such deadly attack in many years in Kampala, a bustling city of two million on the shores of Lake Victoria.
But it followed an uptick in recent weeks of signs and warnings that a strike could be imminent.
On October 8, the Islamic State group claimed its first attack in Uganda, an alleged bombing of a police post in the Kawempe area, near where Saturday’s explosion occurred.
In a statement issued through its communication channels, the group claimed a unit from its Central Africa operation had detonated an improvised explosive device that resulted in injuries and damage to police infrastructure.
No explosion or any injuries were reported by authorities or local media at the time, though police later confirmed a minor incident had occurred without providing further details.
However in the following days, both the UK and France updated their travel advice for Uganda, urging vigilance in crowded areas and public places like restaurants, bars and hotels.
“Terrorists are very likely to try to carry out attacks in Uganda. Attacks could be indiscriminate, including in places visited by foreigners,” stated the updated advice from the UK.
But police were adamant Saturday’s attack had no foreign agenda.
In 2010, twin bombings in Kampala targeting fans watching the World Cup final left 76 people dead.
Somalia’s Al-Shabaab militant group claimed responsibility for the blasts at a restaurant and at a rugby club.
The attack, the first outside Somalia by the insurgents, was seen as revenge for Uganda sending troops to the war-torn country as part of an African Union mission to confront Al-Shabaab.
Nigeria is officially launching a new digital version of its currency, the eNaira, after postponing the operation initially planned for early October, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari announced Monday. With this launch, …
Nigeria is officially launching a new digital version of its currency, the eNaira, after postponing the operation initially planned for early October, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari announced Monday.
With this launch, Nigeria, Africa’s largest economy in terms of GDP and the continent’s most populous country (over 200 million inhabitants), is a pioneer on the continent, alongside Ghana, which has been testing its e-Cedi as a new means of exchange since September.
“We have become the first country in Africa and one of the first in the world to have introduced a digital currency for our citizens,” said Buhari.
The president said the new digital currency would improve cross-border trade, financial inclusion for people outside the formal economy and increase remittances.
Originally scheduled for October 1, the launch of the eNaira had been delayed by the Central Bank, citing the country’s independence anniversary celebrations.
Crypto-currencies are widely used in Nigeria, ranked in 2020 as the third largest user of virtual currencies in the world after the United States and Russia, by a study from specialist research firm Statista.
With cryptocurrencies, Nigerians are mainly looking to escape the constant depreciation of the naira in recent years. They also make it easier for them to receive money from the diaspora or move their savings out of the country.
Central banks around the world are looking to create digital versions of their currencies, known as CBDCs, in response to the growth of online payments and to compete with cryptocurrencies that are beyond the control of governments and global regulators.
Last year, China became the first major economy to launch a test version of a digital currency. Since then, at least five countries have launched their virtual currencies.
Unidentified gunmen arrested several Sudanese leaders early Monday at their homes, a government source told AFP, after weeks of tension between the military and civilian transitional authorities in the East African …
Unidentified gunmen arrested several Sudanese leaders early Monday at their homes, a government source told AFP, after weeks of tension between the military and civilian transitional authorities in the East African country.
The internet was cut off throughout the country, AFP journalists noted, while demonstrators gathered in the streets to protest against the arrests, setting fire to tires.
The events come just two days after a Sudanese faction calling for a transfer of power to civilian rule warned of a “creeping coup” at a press conference that a crowd of unidentified people sought to prevent.
Sudan has been undergoing a precarious transition marred by political divisions and power struggles since the ouster of President Omar al-Bashir in April 2019. Since August 2019, the country has been ruled by a civilian-military administration charged with overseeing the transition to an all-civilian regime.
The main civilian bloc — the Forces for Freedom and Change (FFC) — which led the anti-Bashir protests in 2019, has split into two opposing factions.
“The current crisis is artificial — and is taking the form of a creeping coup,” FFC leader Yasser Arman said at a press conference in the capital Khartoum on Saturday.
“We renew our confidence in the government, Prime Minister Abdallah Hamdok, and in the reform of the transitional institutions, but without order or imposition,” Arman added.
Tensions between the two sides have long existed, but the divisions were exacerbated after the failed coup on September 21. Last week, tens of thousands of Sudanese marched in several cities to support the full transfer of power to civilians, and to counter a rival multi-day sit-in outside the presidential palace in the capital Khartoum, which demanded a return to “military rule.”
Mr. Hamdok has previously described the divisions within the transitional government as the “most serious and dangerous crisis” facing the transition.
On Saturday, Mr. Hamdok denied rumors that he had agreed to a cabinet reshuffle, calling them “not accurate. The prime minister also “stressed that he did not monopolize the right to decide the fate of the transitional institutions.
Also on Saturday, U.S. Special Envoy for the Horn of Africa Jeffrey Feltman met jointly with Hamdok, the chairman of Sudan’s governing body, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and paramilitary commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo.
“Mr. Feltman emphasized U.S. support for a civilian democratic transition in accordance with the expressed wishes of the Sudanese people,” the U.S. Embassy in Khartoum said.
Analysts say recent mass demonstrations show strong support for a civilian-led democracy, but street protests may have little impact on powerful factions pushing for a return to military rule.