NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg asked South Korea on Monday to “step up” military support for Ukraine, suggesting it reconsider its policy of not exporting weapons to countries in conflict. Stoltenberg is in Seoul on the first leg of his Asia trip, which will also take in Japan, as part of a drive to boost ties with the region’s democratic allies in the face of the Ukraine conflict and growing competition from China. He met top South Korean officials Sunday, and on Monday urged Seoul to do more to help Kyiv, saying there was an “urgent need for more ammunition”.…
Author: Osas Monday
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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived Sunday in Egypt at the start of a Middle East trip on which he will look to notch down Israeli-Palestinian tensions after an eruption of violence. Blinken, who will travel Monday and Tuesday to Jerusalem and Ramallah after his stop in Cairo, had long planned the visit to see Israel’s new right-wing government, but the trip takes on a new urgency after some of the worst violence in years. A Palestinian gunman on Friday killed seven people outside a synagogue in a settler neighbourhood of east Jerusalem, and another attack followed on Saturday.…
Gunmen opened fire on a group of people celebrating a birthday at the weekend in a township in South Africa, killing eight and wounding three others, police said Monday. The birthday celebrant was among those gunned down in the mass shooting in the southern port city of Gqeberha, formerly Port Elizabeth. “The owner of the house was celebrating his birthday when two unknown gunmen entered the yard” on Sunday evening “and started shooting at the guests,” police said in a statement. The gunmen “randomly shot at guests,” police said, adding “eight people died while three others are still fighting for…
As Sudan’s economic crisis drags on, grocer Hassan Omar keeps busy cleaning packaged food items that have been gathering dust for months as his dwindling customer base make fewer purchases. “People can no longer afford to buy all their needs,” Omar, 43, told AFP at his grocery store in the capital Khartoum. “Purchasing power has significantly declined over the past six months,” he said, noting that his sales had plummeted from 500,000 Sudanese pounds ($877) to 200,000 pounds ($350) per day over that period. His plight reflects Sudan’s spiralling economic crisis which has forced many households to tighten their belts…
The World Health Organization called on Monday for greater investment in combating neglected tropical diseases, which left more than 1.6 billion people, often in least-developed countries, requiring treatment in 2021. NTDs are a diverse group of conditions found mainly in tropical regions that include dengue, leprosy and rabies. The WHO said NTDs disproportionately affect the poorest people, primarily in areas where water safety, sanitation and access to health care are inadequate. They are deemed neglected because they are largely overlooked and benefit from only limited funding. Soce Fall, director of the WHO’s NTDs department, said they had been neglected because…
An armed group in Mali that signed a major peace deal in 2015 said this week it was pulling out of efforts to draft a new constitution. The new constitution is a key part of a peace and reconciliation process designed to return the country from military to civilian rule by March 2024. The Coordination of Azawad Movements (CMA) — a predominantly Tuareg alliance that fought the state for years before signing the peace deal in Algiers in 2015 — blamed the ruling military junta for foot-dragging. In a statement seen by AFP on Saturday, the CMA pointed out that…
Peruvian President Dina Boluarte made a renewed appeal Sunday for Congress to hold early elections as a way to end weeks of deadly protests, warning that otherwise, she will seek constitutional reform to make a vote happen. The South American country has been embroiled in a political crisis with near-daily street protests since December 7, when then-president Pedro Castillo was arrested after attempting to dissolve Congress and rule by decree. In seven weeks of demonstrations, 48 people — including one police officer — have been killed in clashes between security forces and protesters, according to the Ombudsman’s Office of Peru.…
17 Oct Download logoTurkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TİKA) provided technical equipment and consumable materials to Chad, where the mortality rate for malaria is high. The equipment and materials were presented at a ceremony held at N’Djamena Municipality. Türkiye’s Ambassador to Chad, Kemal Kaygısız, the Mayor of N’Djamene, Ali Harun and TİKA’s Coordinator in N’Djamena, Vedat Baş… 18 Oct Ahead of this year’s harmattan season and attendant disruption often experienced in local air travel, the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) has commenced a general overhaul of navigational facilities at airports nationwide. 18 Oct Nomadic herder Fatime Tchari fended off a…
A wave of attacks on villages in eastern DR Congo attributed to Islamic State-affiliated ADF rebels killed at least 15 people Sunday, local officials said. These latest killings come a week after a similar attack left more than 20 dead. “There were simultaneous attacks this Sunday between 4:00 and 5:00 am on three villages…,” said local official Dieudonne Malangai. “In Manyala village we found seven bodies… at Ofay, there were eight dead, including seven women,” Malangai told AFP, and indicated that the final toll might be higher. A humanitarian source confirmed seven fatalities in Manyala and “at least eight” in…
In an abandoned print works in a scruffy but bohemian Lagos neighbourhood, an improvised cinema has opened, gigantic black drapes blocking out the light. Dozens of young people crowd round the screen on plastic chairs, ready to discover the new wave of Nigerian cinema. The second edition of the S16 film festival, which took place late last year, brought together Nigerian filmmakers looking to do things differently. They are determined to break away from Nollywood, the powerful and influential film industry that has inundated Africa’s market with blockbusters that generate millions of dollars. Nollywood is driven by two things —…