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BRITISH Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, a former banker, paid more than 500,000 pounds ($630,000) in taxes in 2023, his office revealed on Friday. The 43-year-old, who has been prime minister since October 2022, had revenues of 2.2 million pounds in the 2022-23 tax year, a 13-percent increase on the previous year, according to documents released by Downing Street. About 140,000 pounds was earned as prime minister and a member of parliament. Another 2.1 million pounds came from capital gains, share dividends and interest. The figures indicate that Sunak paid an overall rate of 23 percent in tax, with capital gains…

MADAGASCAR’s justice minister defended a new bill Friday to castrate child rapists, with the measure deemed “cruel, inhuman and degrading” by Amnesty International. The upper house Senate approved the measure permitting chemical and surgical castration Wednesday after it had been voted through by the National Assembly earlier this month. Amnesty International urged Antananarivo to drop the proposed law, saying it would not resolve the problem of paedophilia. But Justice Minister Landy Mbolatiana Randriamanantenasoa told AFP that the large Indian ocean island “is a sovereign country that has every right to amend its laws”. “Faced with the resurgence of rape, we…

SENEGALESE security forces on Friday used tear gas to disperse people attempting to gather in the capital after being urged to mobilise against a last-minute delay of presidential elections. Anti-riot police kept back groups of people trying to get to the large Place de la Nation in central Dakar, where a rally had been planned. Some demonstrators responded by throwing stones and all access points to the square were closed off, AFP journalists saw. “The situation is deplorable. We came to pray and we got gassed. It’s intolerable,” Thierno Alassane Sall, one of the 20 candidates who had been due…

US PRESIDENT Biden late Thursday offered one of his sharpest rebukes to date of Israel’s military conduct in Gaza, saying the operation to go after Hamas had been “over the top.” He also voiced optimism that a deal currently being brokered pairing the release of hostages with a prolonged pause in the fighting could eventually lead to a more sustained change in the war. And he painted a stark portrait of the suffering in Gaza, insisting more must be done to stem the humanitarian crisis there. Delivered at the very end of a fiery evening news conference, Biden’s remarks offered…

QUEEN Camilla, wife of Britain’s King Charles III, said Thursday that her husband who has been diagnosed with cancer is “doing extremely well” under the circumstances. King Charles has been “very touched by all the letters and the messages the public have been sending from everywhere”, she said during a trip in southern England. “Well he’s doing extremely well under the circumstances,” Camilla said, adding that all the kind messages the king had received were “very cheering”. The Queen left King Charles at the royal country residence of Sandringham, in the East of England, where the couple moved on Tuesday.…

WEST African foreign ministers held emergency talks on Thursday on the political crisis in Senegal and the withdrawal by three coup-hit countries from the regional bloc. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) extraordinary session addressed President Macky Sall’s decision to delay elections in Senegal, just a week after Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger declared their departure. ECOWAS Commission president Omar Alieu Touray said it was “the time we have been most challenged,” calling the crisis in Senegal a “worrying development”. He urged the bloc to remain united as he spoke before the ECOWAS Mediation and Security Council in…

SOUTH Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa will on Thursday give his most important state of the nation address in an election year when his ruling party risks losing its parliamentary majority for the first time. Ramaphosa, 71, must rally support behind the scandal-tainted African National Congress in the speech to lawmakers at Cape Town City Hall at 1700 GMT, according to analysts. It will be the third time he has had to give the address at City Hall after the nation’s parliament was ravaged by arson in 2022. But this will be the most closely watched of his seven annual speeches…

CHELSEA’s fans mirrored the mood of dysfunction and crisis hanging over the club by opening this dramatic FA Cup night at Villa Park with a loud lament for lost owner Roman Abramovich. It did not last long, cut off in full cry as Conor Gallagher’s crisp finish at The Holte End instantly brought songs of a different kind, setting the tone for Chelsea’s finest moment of this mess of a season under manager Mauricio Pochettino. Chelsea’s form has been so dismal that any talk of victory in this fourth-round replay at Aston Villa was placed into the bracket of an…

AFTER Israel’s Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant claimed Israeli forces have dismantled 18 of 24 Hamas battalions, war monitors have questioned the minister’s definition of “dismantle” noting that on January 6 Israel claimed to have dismantled all of Hamas’s battalions in northern Gaza. In their latest battlefield assessment, US-based think tanks Institute for the Study of War (ISW) and the Critical Threats Project (CTP) said ongoing operations by Palestinian fighters in the west of Gaza City had spurred Israel to mobilise a division-sized force to re-clear the city over the past week. “Gallant and the [Israeli military] have not identified…

AT least 24 people were killed Wednesday by two separate bomb blasts outside the offices of election candidates in southwestern Pakistan, on the eve of a national vote marred by violence and allegations of poll rigging. More than half a million security officers were deploying ahead of Thursday’s election, with authorities distributing ballot papers to more than 90,000 polling stations. There have been multiple security incidents in the run-up to the vote, with at least two candidates shot dead and dozens more targeted in attacks across the country. “The aim of today’s blasts was to sabotage the election,” said Jan…

MALI reaffirmed its exit “without delay” from West African bloc ECOWAS, saying it was not bound by the organisation’s one-year timeframe for withdrawal, according to a foreign ministry document seen by AFP Wednesday. Bamako’s military government announced its withdrawal from ECOWAS on January 28, along with neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger. But article 91 of the bloc’s treaty stipulates that member countries remain bound by their obligations for a period of one year after notifying their withdrawal. “The government of the Republic of Mali is no longer bound (by the) time constraints mentioned in article 91 of the treaty,” the…

ZIMBABWE’s’s cabinet has supported proposed legislation to end the death penalty, marking a pivotal point in abolishing capital punishment in the southern African country. Information Minister Jenfan Muswere on Tuesday said that the cabinet’s decision was made following countrywide consultations. Should parliament approve the bill, life imprisonment will serve as the maximum sentence. President Emmerson Mnangagwa has previously criticised capital punishment. He was sentenced to death in 1965 following accusations that he bombed a train while fighting against white minority rule. Mr Mnangagwa’s death sentence was, however, commuted after his lawyers argued that he was underage. Zimbabwe’s death penalty is…

SEBASTIEN Haller scored the winner as 2023 Africa Cup of Nations hosts Ivory Coast beat DR Congo to set up a final meeting with Nigeria. The only goal of a cagey contest in Abidjan came in the 65th minute when Haller’s volley bounced down into the ground and up over Leopards goalkeeper Lionel Mpasi. The Borussia Dortmund striker should have opened the scoring just before the break with an unmarked header, and Haller also missed a chance to double the lead when he sent a lob narrowly wide. DR Congo did not look like getting a late equaliser, although Meschack…

NIGERIA and South Africa will rekindle rivalry today at the Stade de la Paix in Bouaké as both countries bid to book a place in the semi-finals of the ongoing Africa Cup of Nations in Ivory Coast. Today’s game will be the fourth time that the two countries will be facing each other at the AFCON with Nigeria winning all three previous encounters. South Africa will be desperate to end their losing streak to Nigeria at the AFCON having lost 2-0 in the semis in 2000, which was followed by another 4-0 defeat in 2004 and suffering elimination after a…

MOUSA Tamari scored a brilliant curling strike to stun two-time winners South Korea and send Jordan to their first Asian Cup final. Yazan Al-Naimat put Jordan ahead at the start of the second half with a clever dink, before Tamari doubled their lead with a superb solo effort. Jordan had never gone beyond the quarter-finals before this year’s tournament. They will face hosts Qatar or Iran in Saturday’s final. With Bayern Munich’s Kim Min-jae absent through suspension, South Korea’s defence struggled to cope with a high-pressing Jordan side in the opening half. Son Heung-min found the back of the net…

MEDIATOR Qatar says Hamas has given a “generally positive” response to a proposed truce deal with Israel, as the Palestinian group reiterated its demand for an end to the Israeli assault on Gaza. During a press conference on Tuesday with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani described Hamas’s reaction to the proposal as “generally positive”, without providing more details. Blinken said Hamas’s response to the proposal brokered by Qatar, Egypt and the United States has been shared with Israeli officials. Blinken is on a lightning tour of the Middle…

CHILE’s former president Sebastian Pinera, a billionaire tycoon who twice held the South American nation’s top job, died Tuesday in a helicopter crash, his office said in a statement. “It is with deep regret that we announce the death of the former president of the Republic of Chile,” said the statement, adding the 74-year-old Pinera had died in the popular vacation spot Lago Ranco, some 920 kilometres (570 miles) south of Santiago.

A KENYAN court on Tuesday charged the leader of a starvation cult and dozens of suspected accomplices with murder over the deaths of nearly 200 people in a forest near the Indian Ocean. Self-proclaimed pastor Paul Nthenge Mackenzie, who has already been charged with terrorism, manslaughter as well as child torture and cruelty, is alleged to have incited hundreds of his acolytes to starve to death in order to “meet Jesus”. On Tuesday, Mackenzie and 29 other suspects pleaded not guilty to 191 counts of murder, according to court documents seen by AFP. A 31st suspect was deemed to lack…

ETHIOPIA’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has said that his country “does not wish any harm” on neighbouring Somalia. His comments in parliament came after Somalia accused landlocked Ethiopia of trying to annex part of its territory to gain access to the sea. Last month, Ethiopia struck a controversial deal with the breakaway republic of Somaliland. Somaliland, which Somalia sees as part of its territory, agreed to lease a stretch of coastline to Ethiopia. Somalia described the agreement as an act of aggression and President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud called on youths “to prepare for the defence of our country”. He also…

TOP officers of some intelligence services in the country have uncovered attempts by some “unscrupulous elements” to set up Senators of Northern extraction in the 10th National Assembly, NASS, against the masses. The officers, who plead anonymity told PRNigeria  that the hatchet job of the “mischievous persons” is also aimed at pitching the nation’s security services against one another. They made the assertion while reacting to a newspaper report alleging that an influential Northern Senator is closely being watched by security agencies in the country for reportedly spearheading terrorism, banditry and Kidnapping. According to the report, the powerful lawmaker, who…