KANO: Gunmen known in northwest Nigeria as “bandits” killed at least 140 people in multiple raids this week, four residents told AFP on Saturday, but there was no official confirmation. Clashes between herders and farmers over access to land has plagued northwest and central Nigeria for years, with some groups evolving into criminal gangs who now terrorise local communities. “We buried a total of 143 people killed by the bandits in the attacks,” said Balarabe Alhaji, a community leader in one of the affected villages in Zamfara state. Hundreds of motorcycle-riding gunmen rampaged through ten villages in Anka and Bukkuyum…
Author: Hasnain Abid Khanzada
PARIS: Egyptian-Palestinian activist Ramy Shaath arrived in France on Saturday following almost two-and-a-half years of detention in Egypt, after his family said he had to renounce his Egyptian nationality. The 48-year-old was a figure of the 2011 uprising in Egypt and the coordinator of the Egyptian chapter of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. A correspondent saw the activist walk out of Charles De Gaulle Airport outside Paris with his French wife, Celine Lebrun. Shaath said finally being free was “a bit overwhelming”. “I spent the last two-and-a-half years in between a few prisons, a few forced disappearance…
TIRANA: Albanian police intervened on Saturday to move away protesters who broke into the headquarters of the country’s main opposition party in an internal squabble over the party’s leadership. Police used a water cannon truck and tear gas, and scores of officers pushed away hundreds of protesters who had stormed the ground floor of the centre-right Democratic Party’s headquarters. They detained and removed some protesters. A group led by former party leader Sali Berisha used iron bars and hammers to break open the main doors of the building. Party staff used tear gas to try to prevent them breaking in…
RIYADH: Saudi authorities have released a princess and her daughter who had been held without charge for nearly three years in the capital, a human rights group said on Saturday. Basma bint Saud, 57, a royal family member long seen as a proponent of women’s rights and a constitutional monarchy, has been detained since March 2019, and in April 2020 implored King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to release her on health grounds. “Basma bint Saud Al Saud and her daughter Suhoud… have been released,” the ALQST for Human Rights said on Twitter. “She was denied the medical…
KABUL: The Taliban’s foreign minister visited Iran on Saturday to discuss Afghan refugees and a growing economic crisis, in the first such trip to the neighbouring country since the Islamists seized power. Iran, like other nations, has so far not recognised the new government formed by the Taliban after it took power amid a hasty withdrawal by US-led foreign forces in August. “The visit aims at discussions on political, economic, transit and refugee issues between Afghanistan and Iran,” the Taliban foreign ministry spokesman Abdul Qahar Balkhi said on Twitter. Already host to millions of Afghans and fearing a new influx,…
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi was in Sri Lanka on Sunday seeking to advance China’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative, as the island nation looked to Beijing for help as it tries to rescue itself from a foreign currency and debt crisis. Wang arrived in Sri Lanka on Saturday from the Maldives on the last leg of a multi-city trip that also took him to Eritrea, Kenya and Comoros in Africa. In Sri Lanka, Wang was scheduled to meet President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa. Later, Wang and Prime Minister Rajapaksa were to speak at Colombo’s Port City,…
A prominent Afghan university professor who openly criticised the Taliban’s hardline regime has been arrested in Kabul, a spokesman for the government said. Professor Faizullah Jalal has made several appearances on television talk shows since the previous US-backed government was ousted in August, blaming the Taliban for the worsening financial crisis and criticising them for ruling by force. Since returning to power, the Taliban have cracked down on dissent, forcefully dispersing women’s rights protests and briefly detaining several Afghan journalists. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid tweeted that Jalal had been detained on Saturday over statements he made on social media in which…
LAHORE: The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has welcomed the nomination of Justice Ayesha A Malik of the Lahore High Court to the Supreme Court. In a statement, the commission termed the appointment of first woman judge to the apex court in the country’s judicial history an important step towards improving gender diversity in the judiciary, where women reportedly account for only 17 percent of judges overall and just under 4.4pc in the high courts. Nonetheless, addressing Pakistan’s gender disparity — and indeed other forms of disparity on the grounds of class, ethnicity or religion — on the bench and in…
KARACHI: The Sindh police are going to induct more than 10,000 men and women with major chunk of recruitment from Karachi youth having city domicile in one of its massive recruitment drives announced after years, an official says. The law-enforcement agency has allocated certain number of seats for every category ranging from disabled persons to people belonging from the transgender community and members of minorities. They added that the Sindh police had announced 10,490 vacancies with 6,655 alone for Karachi Range. The Sindh police were receiving applications from new recruits under different categories, who would be enrolled under the basic…
LAHORE: The civil society activists have hailed the Supreme Court decision of granting bail to a man who had been in jail in an alleged blasphemy case for the last four years. A blasphemy accused, Nadeem Samson, was recently granted bail by the Supreme Court of Pakistan. The civil society activists held a meeting at a local hotel to discuss the development. Advocate Saiful Malook, the counsel for the accused, said the Supreme Court judgement would act as a precedent to help other people arrested under blasphemy charges because most of the time, the courts would dismiss their bail. He…
