THE United States and Iran engaged in some of the most intense fighting overnight since all-out hostilities in the ongoing US‑Israeli war on Iran were halted with a Pakistan‑mediated temporary ceasefire on April 8. A comprehensive peace agreement remains elusive as Iran and the US have exchanged a series of proposals and counterproposals in the weeks since that pause. After a string of smaller escalations, however, the US struck targets in Iran following the downing of a US Apache helicopter close to the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, and Iran retaliated by hitting US military bases in the Gulf. The…
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AT least 16 people have been killed in Israeli air strikes on Tyre and its surrounding areas in southern Lebanon, according to Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency (NNA). Nine people were killed in an Israeli air strike on the village of Tayr Debba, while three were killed in a strike on the municipality of Deir Qanoun en-Nahr, the agency reported on Wednesday. At least one person was killed in an air strike on the city of Tyre, the NNA report said. On Wednesday evening, an Israeli warplane raided the village of Deir ez-Zahrani, targeting a mosque and a clinic. The…
POLICE in South Africa have launched a manhunt after 12 people were killed in a mass shooting at an informal settlement in Johannesburg. At least 10 suspects, heavily armed with rifles, entered the Jumpers Informal Settlement in the suburb of Cleveland late on Tuesday night and opened fire before fleeing in a white vehicle, police said. The motive for what police called a “heartless” and “barbaric” attack, in which another nine people were injured, is still being investigated. Members of the Jumper’s community believe the shooting may be linked to a turf war between groups of illegal miners living in…
IN the midst of the Ebola epidemic, doctors in the Democratic Republic of Congo said they will go on strike from 11 June. They have denounced what they said was government’s failure to respond concretely to their demands for better pay and working conditions. Doctors’ union said they had also called for increased budget allocations to the health sector to address systemic underfunding. The social movement comes at a time when the Congolese health system remains under severe pressure in the face of several public health challenges, including Ebola. Unions said that while their strike will affect facilities across the…
DESPITE failing to qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, Nigeria’s footballing influence will still be highly visible at the tournament kicking off on June 11 in the United States, Mexico, and Canada. The Super Eagles missed out after a painful playoff defeat to DR Congo on penalties, marking back-to-back absences from football’s biggest stage following their failure to qualify for Qatar 2022. Yet, as the expanded 48-team tournament gets underway, approximately 15 to 16 players with Nigerian roots, by birth, parentage, or ancestry, are expected to feature across multiple national teams. This diaspora presence highlights the depth of Nigerian…
PRESIDENT Donald Trump vowed on Tuesday to respond after he accused Iran of shooting down a US military helicopter the previous night, hours after he said negotiations to end the Middle East war were in their final stages. Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliament speaker and its chief negotiator in talks with Washington, meanwhile warned the United States on Tuesday against breaking its “commitments”. The comments came a day after Iran and Israel halted attacks that threatened to reignite the regional war, which was sparked by US and Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28. In a statement, Trump said he…
GAZA’s Health Ministry has accused Israel of preventing more than 16,500 Palestinians in need of medical treatment abroad from leaving the besieged, wartorn enclave despite a nominal “ceasefire” being in place since October last year. The ministry warned in a statement on Tuesday that Israel was killing patients with delays, after its genocidal war on the enclave killed nearly 73,000 Palestinians since October 2023. The dire situation highlights the plight of the enclave’s healthcare system, which United Nations experts and aid groups have accused Israel of systematically destroying in an attempt to make Gaza uninhabitable. According to authorities in Gaza,…
A DEMONSTRATOR has been shot during a protest in the Kenyan town of Nanyuki against the construction of an Ebola quarantine centre for US citizens, witnesses have told journalists. A protest leader told the Reuters news agency that police shot dead the demonstrator. The police have not yet commented. Groups of protesters, who were waving Kenyan flags, carrying placards and holding a coffin with the word “Ebola” written on the side, had been demanding that the US plan to build the health facility at a nearby military base be reversed. The police had fired tear gas to break up the…
MARITIUS Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam has secured a significant legal victory after a court dismissed charges linked to millions of euros found in safes at his homes in 2015. Prosecutors have vowed to appeal the ruling in the long-running case. The Intermediate Court of Mauritius has dismissed the case against Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam in the so-called safe deposit box affair, bringing a dramatic twist to a legal battle that has lasted more than a decade. The ruling, delivered on June 8, found that key issues raised by the defence had not been adequately investigated, making it impossible for the…
AWARD-Winning Somali referee Omar Artan, set to be the first from his country to officiate at the World Cup finals, was denied entry to the United States, a sports ministry official told AFP on Monday. It was not immediately clear why Artan was barred from entering the US at Miami International Airport, but Somalia is one of several countries on a travel ban list introduced by President Donald Trump’s administration. “Omar Artan is among Africa’s most respected referees and deserves the support of the entire football community,” Ciise Aden Abshir, a senior advisor to Somalia’s Ministry of Youth and Sports…
FLORENTINO Perez has been re-elected president of Real Madrid after defeating challenger Enrique Riquelme in the club’s presidential election. The election, held on Sunday, extended late into the night before Perez was declared the winner shortly before midnight. Riquelme subsequently conceded defeat and congratulated the incumbent president. Perez faced the election amid growing scrutiny over the club’s recent performances, including two consecutive seasons without a major football trophy and the absence of Real Madrid players from the Spanish national team. Debate also surrounded proposals to sell part of the club to external investors despite Real Madrid’s long-standing 100 per cent…
IRAN threatened to retaliate against the United States and Israel for fresh strikes in Beirut on Sunday, further dampening hopes for a lasting peace as the Middle East war reached its 100th day. Efforts to turn a ceasefire into a settlement have repeatedly stalled, while the war has rattled global markets and increased domestic pressure on US President Donald Trump ahead of midterm elections. Tehran has repeatedly insisted any deal to permanently end the war must also halt the parallel conflict in Lebanon, where Israel is pursuing a campaign against the Iran-backed movement Hezbollah. Iran had warned in recent days…
A POWERFUL earthquake has struck the Philippines, killing at least 32 people, destroying buildings and triggering tsunami alerts across Asia. More than 100 people were also injured when the magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck off the island of Mindanao shortly before 7:40am local time on Monday (23:40 GMT, Sunday), according to the United States Geological Survey. The initial earthquake was followed by more than an hour of aftershocks, according to the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS). General Santos, a city of 722,000 people in southern Mindanao, sustained some of the most serious damage. PHIVOLCS said the city, located in…
A GROUP of 150 Malawians repatriated from South Africa amid growing worries about xenophobia are due to arrive by road in their home country on Monday, the Malawian authorities have said. The repatriation follows violence in South Africa’s Western Cape Province where there were reports just over a week ago of door-to-door intimidation, as well as the deaths of two Mozambicans in Mossel Bay. The Malawians were “among a number of foreign nationals” who had “sought refuge in temporary camps” in Mossel Bay, according to a statement from Lilongwe. Ghana, Nigeria and Zimbabwe have also organised repatriation flights and transport…
KENYA’s former Chief Justice David Maraga has been arrested while protesting against, among other things, what activists are alleging is a plan to build a car park on protected land belonging to a wildlife sanctuary in the capital, Nairobi. He was among a group of demonstrators who were marching along a road running close to the Nairobi National Park. The 117-sq-km (45-sq-mile) site is a popular conservation area and tourist spot within Nairobi. The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), which runs the park, is accused of giving a portion of the land to a neighbouring convention centre as well as planning…
IRAN’s Fifa World Cup 2026 football team have landed in Mexico amid an ongoing row over visas and access to the stadiums in the US where they are to play. All three of Iran’s group games are in the US, but the players and support staff have been told they have to fly in and out of the country on match day. Iran says 15 other officials and support staff have been denied visas altogether, which an official has described as political interference in sport in its worst form. The World Cup, jointly hosted by the US, Canada and Mexico,…
THE Israeli army has killed at least nine people and injured dozens of others across the Gaza Strip since dawn, according to information gathered by Al Jazeera, as Egypt began hosting a new round of talks with leaders from Hamas and other Palestinian factions to salvage a “ceasefire”. Five people were killed on Sunday in a strike on a police post in the al-Mawasi area near the southern city of Khan Younis, three were killed in the Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City, and one person was killed on a beach in Deir el-Balah in central Gaza. Major fighting has been…
BERNADETTE Chirac, widow of former French president Jacques Chirac and known as the loyal companion of one of France’s key postwar politicians, died at the age of 93, their daughter told AFP Saturday. She “passed away peacefully surrounded by her family in the evening,” on Friday, said Claude Chirac. Bernadette Chirac had just turned 93 on May 18, she added. She was seen as being in the shadow of her charismatic husband, who served as president from 1995-2007, a term during which he famously opposed the US-led invasion of Iraq. Jacques Chirac died in 2019. She also stood by her…
THE speaker of Senegal’s parliament, Ousmane Sonko, a powerful mentor-turned-rival to President Bassirou Diomaye Faye, won re-election Saturday as head of their party amid a political crisis sparked by their falling-out. Sonko, who was sacked as Faye’s prime minister last month, easily won a leadership vote at a congress of their Pan-Africanist Pastef party in Diamniadio, outside the capital Dakar, according to a text read out at the gathering. Pastef said Sonko had unanimously won a vote of 583 party delegates. Faye won the presidency after widely popular Sonko was barred from standing in Senegal’s 2024 election. Sonko anointed Faye…
PROTEESTERS gathered on Saturday at midday outside the headquarters of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in the Lac district of Tunis, demanding the deportation of undocumented sub-Saharan African migrants and calling on the organization to leave Tunisia. Among the participants were activists who were seen organizing demonstrators before joining the protest. The demonstration took place under a heavy security presence, with numerous security vehicles surrounding the UNHCR headquarters and protesters kept at a distance from the building. As the protest drew to a close, some activists were seen standing opposite the heavily secured headquarters before leaving the…