HUNGARY’S economy entered recession in 2022 according to official data published Tuesday, as soaring energy prices drove inflation higher. Hungarian GDP shrank by 0.4 per cent in the last three months of 2022, after a fall of 0.7 per cent during the third quarter, said the national statistics office KSH. Hungary’s last technical recession — defined as at least two successive quarters of contraction — occurred in 2020 as the Covid-19 pandemic hit the economy. The latest recession comes as Hungary reels from soaring inflation which reached an EU-high of almost 26 percent in January, the highest in the central…
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MIKEL Arteta will “only be satisfied” if his Arsenal side are given two points back for the VAR error that allowed Brentford’s equaliser to stand in Saturday’s Premier League match. Referees’ body PGMOL has apologised to Arsenal after “human error” was to blame for the incorrect VAR decision. VAR operator Lee Mason did not draw the guidelines to check for offside on Ivan Toney’s equaliser. “It wasn’t human error, it was not understanding your job,” said Arteta. “That’s not acceptable, I’m sorry. “It cost Arsenal two points that are not going to be restored so we are going to have…
PSG 0 vs Bayern Munich 1 KINGSLEY Coman repeated his 2020 Champions League final heroics as Bayern Munich beat Paris St-Germain in their last-16 first-leg tie. The Frenchman volleyed home the winner early in the second half in Paris. Coman also scored the only goal when Bayern overcame his former club PSG to win the trophy three years ago. Substitute Kylian Mbappe, back after injury, looked to have rescued a draw for the hosts, but his late effort was ruled out for offside in the build-up. Ligue 1 champions PSG have now lost their last three matches in all competitions.…
MANCHESTER City manager Pep Guardiola has apologised to Steven Gerrard for comments he made about the ex-Liverpool captain’s slip against Chelsea. Defending City over alleged financial rule breaches, Guardiola referenced Gerrard’s mishap when the Reds lost 2-0 to Chelsea late in the 2013-14 season. Liverpool went on to narrowly miss out on the Premier League title to City. “I apologise to Steven Gerrard for my unnecessary and stupid comments,” said Guardiola. “He knows how I admire him and his career and what he has done for this country I am living and training in.” The infamous slip by Gerrard, who…
SAUDI Arabia has been chosen to host the Fifa Club World Cup for the first time, from 12-22 December. The announcement comes three days after Real Madrid lifted the trophy in Morocco, following a thrilling 5-3 win over Al-Hilal, the first Saudi club to reach the final of the tournament. Saudi will be only the sixth host since the competition’s inception in 2000. The country’s sports minister said hosting the tournament signalled “our desire to be a force for good”. Saudi Arabia has invested heavily in sporting events in recent years, but has been accused of using events to ‘sportswash’…
FORMER US ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley announced Tuesday she is running for president in 2024, challenging fellow Republican candidate Donald Trump by proposing a “new generation” of leadership in Washington. “I’m Nikki Haley and I’m running for president,” the 51-year-old former governor of South Carolina and the child of Indian immigrants said in a video statement. “It’s time for a new generation of leadership — to rediscover fiscal responsibility, secure our border, and strengthen our country, our pride and our purpose,” she said in the video shot in Bamberg, the South Carolina town of her birth. Casting…
THE United Nations launched an appeal for $397 million on Tuesday to help earthquake victims in Syria, where the disaster has killed thousands of people and left millions more in desperate need of aid. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, announcing the appeal at the UN headquarters in New York, said the funds would bring “life-saving relief” for nearly five million Syrians and would cover a period of three months. He added that the world body was in the “final stages” of a similar appeal for Turkey. “One week after the devastating earthquakes, millions of people across the region are struggling for survival,…
A CRASH between an armoured truck and a bus has killed 20 people and injured another 60 in South Africa’s northern province of Limpopo, the reginal transport department said on Tuesday. “Twenty people were tragically killed in an accident, where a cash-in-transit truck lost control and collided head-on with an oncoming bus” on a highway on Monday, the department said in a statement. Ten of the injured were in serious condition and have been transported to hospital. Police divers were searching a river that runs along the highway “for people who might have been swept away.” The cause of the…
EIGHT people were killed after a ferry and a motorised canoe collided on Lake Kivu in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), local officials said Tuesday. Four men and four women aboard the canoe died in the accident, which occurred on Saturday in the port of Bukavu, the transport minister of South Kivu province, Mathieu Alimasi Malumni, told AFP. The canoe was leaving for Idjwi, an island in the middle of the large volcanic lake, when it collided with the Emmanuel 3, a ferry that shuttles between Bukavu and Goma, the capital of the neighbouring North Kivu province. Alimasi said…
THE Katsina State Government on Monday withdrew the misappropriation of the N11bn case against former Governor Ibrahim Shema. The Director of Public Prosecution of the State Ministry of Justice Malam Abdulrahman Umar disclosed this in a press briefing on Monday. This is coming seven years after the state government under the leadership of Governor Aminu Masari and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) dragged Shema and three others to court over the alleged misappropriation of the state Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON) fund. The anti-graft agency had hitherto filed 24-count charges bordering on the criminal breach of…
THE Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention has confirmed 216 diphtheria cases from Kano, Yobe, Lagos, and Osun states. This is even as the death toll has hit 40 in the country. The NCDC also said the suspected cases in the country are now 523 from five states – Kano, Yobe, Katsina, Lagos, and Osun states. The Lead of the Diphtheria/Pertussis Technical Working Group in the NCDC, Dr Bola Lawal revealed this at a webinar titled ‘Diphtheria Outbreak in Nigeria: A Case of Re-Emergence or Improved Surveillance,’ monitored by our correspondent on Monday. Diphtheria is a serious bacterial infection…
LIVERPOOL boss Jurgen Klopp said “it felt like us, it looked like us,” after the Reds recorded their first Premier League win in 2023 with a comfortable Merseyside derby victory over Everton at Anfield. Sean Dyche’s reign as Everton manager got off to the perfect start with a win over league leaders Arsenal at Goodison Park, but the task he has taken on after succeeding sacked Frank Lampard was laid out before him in graphic detail as they remain rooted in the bottom three. Everton had actually kept Liverpool at arm’s length before they were caught by a devastating counter-attack…
UEFA itself bears “primary responsibility” for failures which “almost led to disaster” at the 2022 Champions League final in Paris between Liverpool and Real Madrid, a report commissioned by the European football body said Monday. The report also claimed the policing model was influenced by a view of Liverpool based on the deadly 1989 Hillsborough disaster on incorrect assumptions that the city’s supporters were a threat to public order. The report said that the panel “has concluded that UEFA, as event owner, bears primary responsibility for failures which almost led to disaster.” The panel also said it was astonished that…
ONE of Africa’s most prestigious universities has banned those attending its graduation ceremony from carrying phones, cameras and video cameras. Uganda’s Makerere University will from Monday hold a five-day graduation ceremony at its Freedom Square. Faculties have been assigned different graduation dates across the week. No reason was given for the banning of cameras at the graduation square, but other items prohibited from the ceremony include alcohol, cigarettes, canned foods and bottled drinks. “A detailed list of prohibited items has been inserted in the graduation invitation package that is presented to the graduands and invited guests,” the head of ceremonies…
SOUTH Africa declared a national disaster on Monday as floods hit seven of its nine provinces, damaging roads and bridges and leaving at least seven people dead. Heavy rains have hit large parts of the country, and the deluge is expected to continue, according to the national weather service. The government has “declared a national state of disaster to enable an intensive, coordinated response to the impact of floods” affecting the seven provinces, mainly on the east coast of the country, the statement said. Disaster management centres report seven deaths so far but no national toll has been announced. Five…
SAUDI Arabia will send its first ever woman astronaut on a space mission later this year, the latest move by the kingdom to revamp its ultra-conservative image. Rayyana Barnawi will join fellow Saudi Ali Al-Qarni on a 10-day mission to the International Space Station (ISS), the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said. Barnawi and Al-Qarni will fly to the ISS aboard a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft as part of a mission this spring by the private space company Axiom Space, SPA and Axiom said. Also on board Ax-2 will be Peggy Whitson, a former NASA astronaut who will be making her…
A BRITISH security guard at the UK’s embassy in Germany who pleaded guilty to spying was snared in an elaborate sting after sending sensitive material to Russia, prosecutors said Monday. David Ballantyne Smith, 58, has admitted to eight charges and London’s Old Bailey criminal court is now considering arguments ahead of his sentencing on Friday. Smith, who worked at the Berlin embassy for five years, pleaded guilty in November to violating the Official Secrets Act. The court was told that he was motivated by an intense hatred for his homeland. Making their case for a strong sentence, prosecutors on Monday…
Bags KADCCIMA Award PAN-AFRCAN conglomerate, the Dangote Group, is not relenting in buoying investment opportunities across Africa through numerous businesses and philanthropic forays. This is the consensus of economists and stakeholders who participated in the just concluded 44th Kaduna International Trade Fair. Dangote Group also bagged the First Runner-Up award at the annual event. Speaking to newsmen on the sideline of the company’s Special Day, Professor of Economics, Umar Dantsoho, said Dangote Industries Limited has been creating investment and job opportunities for Africans through its cement establishments in Nigeria and in Africa. He said the key to developing the African…
A LAGOS High Court sitting in Ikeja has sentenced a teacher, Chukwu Ndubuisi, to life imprisonment for defiling a six-year-old pupil (name withheld) of Mind Builders School, Lagos. Justice Sedoten Ogunsanya handed down the sentence to Ndubuisi aged 41 for his act of forceful penetration of the minor. Ndubuisi was the art teacher of the school as of June 2016 when the offence was committed. He was first arraigned at an Ogudu Magistrate Court on a charge of forceful penetration which he pleaded not guilty. His case was later transferred to High Court before Justice Sedoten Ogunsanya following the advice…
A SOFT deadline of 17 February is approaching for the first round of proposals to buy Manchester United. United’s owners, the Glazer family, are considering selling the club as they “explore strategic alternatives”. There has only been one public declaration so far, from businessman Sir Jim Ratcliffe, and there is uncertainty about interest in the Premier League club from Qatar. Despite suggestions that United have not attracted the interest expected by their owners, insiders have told BBC Sport the process has proceeded positively. As they stated in their announcement on a potential sale in November, the Glazer family are still…