The United States has imposed sanctions against former and current senior Burundi government officials, which it says have contributed to the ongoing crisis in the country. In a statement issued by the White House on Monday, National Security Council spokesperson Ned Price said President Barack Obama has signed an executive order authorising the US to freeze the assets and impose visa restrictions on four Burundians and any others identified going forward. At least 240 people have been killed and more than 200,000 have fled Burundi since violence erupted in April after President Pierre Nkurunziza’s decision to seek a third term…
Author: AMA
All signs are that Pope Francis will receive a rock-star welcome as he prepares for his first visit to Africa. Millions of people across Central and East Africa are already talking about the “historic visit” to the continent, and hundreds of thousands more are expected to turn out to catch a glimpse of the pontiff when he arrives in Kenya, the first stop in his three-country tour. Francis is scheduled to travel to Kenya, Uganda and the Central African Republic (CAR) – a travel itinerary that has raised eyebrows but also endeared him to the region. Religious tolerance Father Anthony…
Nairobi – Used plastic is being given a new lease on life in Kenya. It is melted and then used to make poles for construction and road signs. The concept is still new in Kenya – and expensive given the manufacturing costs – but the poles are slowly changing the landscape. http://bc05.ajnm.me/665003303001/201511/276/665003303001_4626741965001_20151122-KenRecycle-HMU-nostraps.mp4 By Haru Mutasa via [Al Jazeera]
Mali’s president has questioned claims that al-Mourabitoun, an al-Qaeda linked group, was responsible for last week’s assault on a luxury hotel in the Malian capital, Bamako. In his first interview since Friday’s attack that left 27 people dead, President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita told Al Jazeera that despite early speculation, his intelligence suggested that another group, the Macina Liberation Front, was responsible for it. “Initially it was said that this was the work of al-Marabitoun but tonight all indications are it is the Macina Liberation Front who are behind this,” he said. “They’re acting as if Macina was a country or…
Malian security forces were hunting on Saturday for at least three at-large suspects involved in the brazen attack on a five-star hotel that killed 21 people in the heart of the capital, Bamako. A breakaway al-Qaeda faction from the country’s troubled north, al-Morabitoun, claimed responsibility for the nine-hour siege that ended after special forces stormed the hotel, killing two attackers. But Friday’s assault on the Radisson Blu was just the latest in a series of attacks this year on high-profile targets in a country that has battled various rebel groups for years. The situation is complex. Here, I answer some…
Mali’s President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita has declared a 10-day state of emergency after the attack on a luxury hotel in the capital Bamako. Gunmen stormed the Radisson Blu hotel early in the morning and took at least 170 people hostage. After a nine-hour standoff with Malian and UN soldiers, most of the hostages were released – but 19 were killed. Two attackers were also killed. The armed group that’s taken responsibility for the attack is known as Al-Mourabitoun; which is linked to Al-Qaeda. Since the start of Mali’s political crisis in 2012, the government has been unable to stop the…
New border control measures imposed by some Balkan countries risk people’s lives by leaving hundreds stranded outside amid plunging winter temperatures, aid agencies have warned. Macedonia, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia are now profiling refugees according to their nationality, allowing passage to those fleeing Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, while turning back those from Africa and Asia. The measures are creating tension at border crossings and leaving some families stranded without adequate shelter, the UN refugee and children’s agencies and the International Organization for Migration said in a joint statement on Friday. “When you have numbers of people backing up at any…
A new case of Ebola has been identified in Liberia, a country declared free of the deadly disease in September, health officials have said. The patient, a 10-year-old boy in Paynesville, a suburb east of the capital Monrovia, felt sick on November 14 and was hospitalised three days later, Bruce Aylward, the head of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Ebola response, told journalists in Geneva on Friday. Heath officials are still investigating the origins of the new case. “The child has no known history of contact with a survivor or having been at a funeral [where an Ebola victim was…
Burundi’s government has accused its former colonial ruler Belgium of instigating an attempted coup against President Pierre Nkurunziza in May – a charge Belgium called absurd. Army officers unhappy with Nkurunziza’s bid to seek a third term as leader tried to seize power while he was on an official visit to neighbouring Tanzania. “We blame Belgium because all the plotters of the coup are in Belgium. The Belgians have given them accommodation and are looking after them. We blame them for the coup,” Willy Nyamitwe, spokesman for President Nkurunziza, told Al Jazeera. “We blame them for the 1972 genocide that…
Senegal is considering banning the full-body veil worn by some females in the Muslim-majority country. The proposal by the government in the West African nation comes as Senegalese security services questioned at least six religious leaders over alleged links to armed groups. “The full veil is not a religious affair and it does not represent our culture,” Interior Minister Abdoulaye Diallo said on Tuesday, adding the need to prevent attacks was behind the proposed veil ban. “For security reasons, all Senegalese people must support the president in this sense,” he said. RELATED: Congo-Brazzaville bans women from wearing full veil The…
Mali was under a state of emergency on Saturday after a brazen siege by gunmen at a five-star hotel killed 21 people in the heart of the capital, Bamako. A breakaway al-Qaeda faction from the country’s restive north claimed responsibility for the attack. Three days of mourning were announced by President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who also clarified the death toll after Malian state televison reported late Friday it was 27 victims dead along with three attackers. “This evening the death toll is heavy and terrible: 21 dead, two [assailants] amongst them and seven wounded,” Keita said. The president cut short…
South Africa’s military said it dismissed 47 peacekeepers serving in the United Nations mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo for violating curfew. South African National Defence Force spokesman Brigadier General Xolani Mabanga said the soldiers were fired for breaking a “curfew in the eastern Congo where they were based” in September. The soldiers’ actions “compromised the security” of other South African troops deployed in the area, he said on Wednesday. “We don’t know where they were, who they were with and what could have happened thereafter,” he said. South African media speculated the soldiers visited a pub frequented by…
Rwanda’s upper house of parliament has unanimously approved a constitutional amendment to allow President Paul Kagame to seek a third term. The vote by the Senate on Tuesday clears the path for a referendum that is not expected to face much opposition. Earlier this year, more than 60 percent of voters signed a petition calling for constitutional changes to be drafted that would allow Kagame to stand again. Senate head Bernard Makuza said that Kagame, whose current term ends in 2017, could run for another seven-year term and then two five-year terms, possibly keeping him in power until 2034. “But…
Utrecht, The Netherlands – When actor Bright O Richards came to Holland as a refugee of the Liberian civil war, he bought himself a pair of brightly coloured wooden shoes. He wore them everywhere he went. As an African in clogs, he attracted a lot of attention. Everywhere he went, people would strike up a conversation with him. “In a way, with those clogs, I secured myself a public again,” he says. “In Liberia, I was a celebrity. But as a refugee, I totally lost my identity. I was a nobody. But thanks to those clogs people couldn’t help noticing…
At least four people have been killed in shooting attacks and explosions in the capital of Burundi, according to witnesses and local officials. The overnight attacks on Sunday in Bujumbura came despite a UN plea for both sides to end the violence and attend talks. Attackers targeted a police post in the south of Bujumbura, killing one police officer and injuring another, a policeman, who witnessed the incident and did not wish to be named, said. Dieudonne Nduwayo, administrative secretary of Bujumbura’s Bwiza zone, said three other people had been killed in different places within Bujumbura’s Mukaza district. Freddy Mbonimpa,…
At least 15 Sudanese refugees have been shot dead and eight more injured in Egypt’s Sinai region as they reportedly attempted to enter Israel. Speaking on the condition of anonymity, Egyptian security officials told the Associated Press that the refugees were killed while caught in the crossfire between security forces and people smugglers on Sunday. Earlier in the day, however, officials said that security forces had shot the Sudanese as they approached the border fence separating the Sinai and southern Israel. Most of the people being smuggled through the Sinai are fleeing political violence in Eritrea, Sudan and Ethiopia, among…
Mondika, Congo – Over the past 60 years, illegal hunting and logging have been the main causes of an estimated 80 percent reduction in the numbers of chimpanzees and gorillas in Congo’s Mondika wildlife reserve. Since 1988, the apes have gone from vulnerable, to endangered, to critically endangered – and conservationists say the forests of central Africa’s Goualougo Triangle are being lost at an alarming rate. They have helped turn a number of animal hunters into wildlife trackers, who now protect their former prey. http://bc05.ajnm.me/665003303001/201511/3951/665003303001_4613918080001_20151115-CongoApes-JHE-Nostraps.mp4 By John Hendren via [Al Jazeera]
The Congo Basin in Africa, the world’s second-largest tropical forest, is facing a growing threat of deforestation carried out to clear the way for palm oil plantations. Environmentalists fear that increasing forest fires and illegal logging are putting endangered species and the ecosystem at greater peril. The destruction could also affect millions of people who depend on the Congo Basin for their livelihood. Al Jazeera’s John Hendren reports from the Republic of Congo. http://bc05.ajnm.me/665003303001/201511/841/665003303001_4612924249001_20151114-cong-nostraps.mp4 By John Hendren via [Al Jazeera]
Marikana will haunt South Africa’s Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa for the rest of his career. Ramaphosa revealed on Thursday in parliament that he’s been summoned by lawyers representing the victims of Marikana – they insist he’s to blame for the police shooting 34 striking platinum miners in 2012. Ramaphosa was a director and shareholder at the Lonmin platinum mine at the time of the massacre. He was involved in an email exchange with the ministers of mineral resources and police in which it’s alleged he pressured them to take action. This was all before Ramaphosa became deputy president. But he…
The families of South African striking miners shot dead by police at Lonmin’s Marikana mine in 2012 have issued a court summons for Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa over complicity in their deaths, the presidency said. The violence around the Marikana mine during a strike in August, 2012, culminated in the police shooting 34 striking miners dead. “A summons has indeed been served on lawyers of Deputy President Ramaphosa arising from the Marikana tragedy. Ramaphosa has instructed his lawyers to defend the action,” a statement released on Thursday by the presidency said. Ramaphosa was a director and shareholder at Lonmin at…