How Costa Rica drafted Latin America’s first-ever anti-hate strategy
For Faustina Torres, from the Bribri indigenous community in Costa Rica, feeling invisible to others is a stinging form of discrimination she has fought against since childhood. “Costa Rican society does not teach us that there are indigenous people in this country,” she said. “It is a form of discrimination, making the existence of indigenous peoples invisible.” Amid an alarming trend...
Kenya’s high court extends a block on sending police to Haiti even as parliament approves deployment
NAIROBI, Kenya—Kenya’s high court on Nov. 16 extended orders blocking the deployment of police officers to Haiti, even as parliament approved a government request to send 1,000 officers to the Caribbean nation to help deal with gang violence. High Court Judge Chacha Mwita said he would issue a ruling on Jan. 26, effectively delaying the sending of security officers to...
Guterres strongly condemns attack in Iran; over 100 reportedly killed
The UN Secretary-General António Guterres on Jan. 3 strongly condemned an attack in Iran which has reportedly killed more than 100 people taking part in a commemoration for a former top military general in the eastern city of Kerman. More than 170 people have also been wounded according to Iranian officials at the scene. News reports citing local officials said that there were two explosions as...
China raises defense budget by 7.2 percent as it pushes for global heft and regional tensions continue
BEIJING—China on March 5 announced a 7.2 percent increase in its defense budget, which is already the world’s second-highest behind the United States at 1.6 trillion yuan ($222 billion), roughly mirroring last year’s rise. Tensions with the U.S., Taiwan, Japan and neighbors with competing claims to the crucial South China Sea are seen as furthering growth in high-tech military technologies from...
Kenyan author accepts writing prize in his Gikuyu language
(GIN)—Ngaahika Ndeenda, a theatrical piece about a wealthy farmer, a peasant and his marriageable young daughter, was a commercial success when it appeared in 1977 in Kenya. But because it appeared in Gikuyu, the author’s mother tongue, it angered the government which slapped the authors—Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o and Ngũgĩ wa Mirii— in jail. Set in post-independence Kenya, the play looks...
Strong earthquake hits East Africa
Kampala, Uganda (PANA) - A strong earthquake measuring 6.8 on the Richter scale shook Uganda's capital, Kampala, on Monday (1225 GMT). Hundreds of people evacuated office buildings and shopping malls in mainly medium rising buildings in the city center, and were largely seen assembled in open spaces waiting for further information. Meteorological reports said a magnitude of 6.8 also hit...
Is scholar linked to Sudanese rebel group?
(FinalCall.com) - Looking into the reasons for Dr. Hassan Al-Turabi's most recent arrest, his fifth since his falling out with President Omar Al-Bashir, analysis as always comes from different quarters: Political science professor at Al Neilein University Hassan Al-Sa'ori believes the detention is somehow connected to Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) leader Khalil Ibrahim's “failure to distort the...
Politics and the U.S. food aid program
President Dwight Eisenhower created the Food for Peace program in 1954 to send massive amounts of surplus food, produced in the U.S., to the developing world and to countries still recovering from World War II. The program has been politically popular among farmers in the Midwest, shipping companies, dock workers' unions and food processing plants, as well as...
Nigeria’s president battles chief judge over millions in unexplained funds
GINNEWS (GIN)–Efforts to clean up government–difficult in the best of times–were hamstrung by none other than Nigeria's top judge accused of failing to declare hundreds of thousands of dollars that “suspiciously” appear in his accounts but were never declared as required by law. President Muhammadu Buhari, who has often accused the judiciary of frustrating his anti-corruption fight, defended his announced suspension...
W. Africa’s legendary Dahomey female warriors
No story about Africa’s kingdom of Dahomey, now the Republic of Benin, would be complete without chronicling the history of their fearless female warriors. In fact, in the history of the world these fearless women warriors called “Agojie” or Dahomey Amazons by the French literally left European colonialists “shaking in theirs boots.” The Agojie warriors are called the only documented frontline...