Kenya, Mombasa.
(Bus attack)
"I am not a hero," said softly spoken Raymond Juma.
The bus driver was speaking after his actions saved his 47 passengers from a militant attack in the east of Kenya.
...View MoreKenya, Mombasa.
(Bus attack)
"I am not a hero," said softly spoken Raymond Juma.
The bus driver was speaking after his actions saved his 47 passengers from a militant attack in the east of Kenya.
"My passengers are like my mothers, my brothers and sisters.
"I just did what anyone else would have done to save myself and those I love," he told the BBC.
Mr Juma was driving one of the two buses, owned by the Mobasa Raha company, which were attacked by heavily armed men on 2 January on the road between the coastal towns of Mombasa and Lamu.
He said the men, who were wearing military fatigue jackets, appeared without warning from behind a minivan that was parked at the side of the road and fired in the air, ordering him to stop.
"It was like a scene from a horror movie," he said. But he drove on.
"When I didn't stop, they fired directly at the bus. I knew if I stopped, that would be the end of me and my passengers.
"People were screaming and crying when the shots were fired. From my rear-view mirror, I saw some duck on the floor of the bus as I sped off."
'Scariest moment of my life'
The bullets grazed the side of the bus and punctured the front tyres, which meant it finally ground to a halt 100m (330 feet) up the road.
"When I stopped... people started jumping out of the bus windows trying to get to safety. People were just running everywhere, including into the forest."
Mr Juma's bus travelled on for 100m after being shot at
The 46-year-old father of four said he didn't stop running for an hour before he was spotted by the driver of another bus, who gave him a lift.
"This was the scariest moment of my entire life," he said, his voice still shaking.
"It's just by the grace of God, as we are lucky the bus didn't roll over and we are all alive."
But the driver of the second bus, Aboubakar Hemed, was not so lucky.
'My conductor was killed'
Unaware of what had happened ahead of him, he complied with the gunmen when he was ordered to stop, thinking they were security officers.
All 41 passengers were asked to get off.
"They asked passengers to recite the Muslim Shahada [declaration of faith]. Those who couldn't were shot," Mr Hemed told the BBC.
He said that he was so afraid that he trembled as he recited the Shahada himself.
Three men in the bus were killed by the militants, believed to be members of the Somalia-based al-Shabab group. Several others were injured in the attack and are recovering in hospital.
"How do you ever get over something like this?" Mr Hemed asked.
"My conductor was killed by the attackers. It's traumatic. I can't explain it."
He said people were trembling and crying as they alighted from the bus while the gunmen waited for them. Some got out and immediately ran for their lives while they were being shot at, but luckily none was hit as they escaped.
"As a driver, you keep hearing these stories of al-Shabab attacks on this road but nothing can ever prepare you for something like this," says Mr Hemed, who has been plying the route for more than five years.
The bullets grazed the side of Mr Juma's bus
Al-Shabab has not said it was behind last week's bus attack, but the jihadist group has carried out similar attacks on this road over the last few years.
Kenya has troops in Somalia as part of the African Union force supporting the UN-backed government in its fight against al-Shabab.
The militant group has lost territory but has carried out guerrilla attacks across the border, including an assault on a Kenya-US military base on 5 January in which three Americans died.
Overall, hundreds of civilians have been killed or injured during the raids.
Since 2015, in an effort to combat the militants, the security force have been conducting an operation in the Boni Forest, believed to be a hideout and training ground for al-Shabab fighters.
For several years, teachers, and also nurses, who aren't from the area have refused to be deployed there, meaning some schools are struggling to function.
Schools were due to reopen this week after the holidays but once again, many were deserted.
Dozens of families have left their farmlands, saying they are too afraid to work in the fields.
One Chinese company working at the planned Lamu Port has announced it would be temporarily shutting down and sending home nearly 2,000 casual workers due to security concerns.
Lamu is a popular tourist destination but Western holidaymakers are shying away from the picturesque island.
As for the drivers, Mr Juma says he wants to continue working but will be scared if security doesn't improve.
Astonishingly, he was back at work the following day - driving another bus along the same route, under heavy military guard.
He said that as he approached the scene of the attack, he felt a chill down his spine.
Mr Hemed also had to work the next day. He said he was seriously thinking about quitting for the sake of his family and children.
Courtesy of BBC
Cameroon, Fotokol.
(Explosion)
At least nine people have died and 30 others have been wounded in an explosion in the Cameroonian town of Fotokol on the northern border with Nigeria, a local official...View MoreCameroon, Fotokol.
(Explosion)
At least nine people have died and 30 others have been wounded in an explosion in the Cameroonian town of Fotokol on the northern border with Nigeria, a local official said.
“A young man picked up an explosive device thinking that it was a piece of iron and it exploded, killing him and eight others” said Midjiyawa Bakari, the governor of Cameroon’s Far North region.
Bakari said officials are investigating the origins of the explosive device, but it is certainly either from the military fighting Boko Haram extremists in the region or from the Islamic extremist group itself.
Full-scale battles have not been reported recently between the military and Boko Haram in the area, but officials have warned of the presence of landmines and abandoned or missing weapons.
Boko Haram’s decade-long insurgency began in northeastern Nigeria and has spilled across borders into Cameroon, as well as Niger and Chad. The group has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced millions and created one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises.
United States
(US Hacked)
A US government website has been targeted by hackers claiming to be from Iran, according to a report by Metro UK.
The website for the Federal Depository Library Program...View MoreUnited States
(US Hacked)
A US government website has been targeted by hackers claiming to be from Iran, according to a report by Metro UK.
The website for the Federal Depository Library Program, fdlp.gov, showed a picture of Donald Trump being punched in the face, along with a message from ‘the Islamic Republic of Iran’.
Below the President’s bleeding face were the words ‘Hacked by Iran Cyber Security Group Hackers’ and ‘this is only a small part of Iran’s cyber ability’.
The chilling warning said ‘martyrdom was (Suleimani’s)… reward for years of implacable efforts’.
‘With his departure and with God’s power, his work and path will not cease and severe revenge awaits those criminals who have tainted their filthy hands with his blood and blood of the other martyrs,’ it said.
However, a US government spokesperson said ‘there is no confirmation’ this attack came from Iran, the Mirror reports.
It comes after the President warned the US will target 52 Iranian sites if Tehran attacks Americans over the killing of their top general, Qassem Soleimani.
He said the number 52 was symbolic of the number of American hostages taken by Iran ‘many years ago’.
In a series of sinister tweets Trump warned that some of those targets were ‘high level’ and important to Iranian culture.
He said: ‘Iran itself will be hit very fast and very hard. The USA wants no more threats!’
Iran has vowed harsh vengeance over a US airstrike in Baghdad that killed leader of the Quds force general Qassem Soleimani.
Courtesy: Metro UK
Somalia, Mogadishu.
(Bomb kills 76 people)
A massive car bomb exploded in a busy area of the Somali capital Mogadishu on Saturday, leaving at least 76 people dead and scores injured, an ambulance off...View MoreSomalia, Mogadishu.
(Bomb kills 76 people)
A massive car bomb exploded in a busy area of the Somali capital Mogadishu on Saturday, leaving at least 76 people dead and scores injured, an ambulance official said.
The blast occurred in a busy area of the city where traffic is heavy because of a security checkpoint and a tax office.The wounded were carried on stretchers from the site, where the force of the explosion left charred and twisted remains of vehicles.
Mogadishu is regularly hit by car bombings and attacks waged by Al-Shabaab Islamist militants allied to Al-Qaeda.
“The number of casualties we have confirmed is 76 dead and 70 wounded, it could still be higher,” the director of the private Aamin Ambulance service, Abdukadir Abdirahman Haji, told AFP.
Police officer Ibrahim Mohamed described the explosion as “devastating”.
Mogadishu’s mayor Omar Mohamud Mohamed told a press conference that the exact number of dead was not yet known, but that around 90 peoploe were wounded.
“We will confirm the exact number of the number of the dead later but it is not going to be small, most of the dead were innocent university students and other civilians,” he said.
“This was a devastating incident because there were many people including students in buses who were passing by the area when the blast occurred,” said another witness Muhibo Ahmed.
Sakariye Abdukadir, who was near the area when the car bomb detonated, said the blast “destroyed several of my car windows”.
“All I could see was scattered dead bodies… amid the blast and some of them burned beyond recognition.”
No group has yet claimed the attack.
Al-Shabaab was forced out of the Somali capital in 2011 but still controls parts of the countryside and has also staged attacks in neighbouring Kenya.
Two weeks ago, five people were killed when Shabaab militants attacked a Mogadishu hotel popular with politicians, army officers and diplomats in an hours-long siege.
Since 2015, there have been 13 attacks in Somalia with 20 or more killed, 11 of which have been in Mogadishu, according to a tally of AFP figures.
All of them involved car bombs.The deadliest attack in the country’s history was a truck bombing in October 2017 in Mogadishu which left 512 people dead and around 295 injured.
Courtesy: AFP
view less
Sudan, Darfur.
(Al-Bashir on trial)
"Fifty-one members of the former regime, including Omar al-Bashir and Ahmed Haroun (a former cabinet minister and governor), will be investigated. They will face...View MoreSudan, Darfur.
(Al-Bashir on trial)
"Fifty-one members of the former regime, including Omar al-Bashir and Ahmed Haroun (a former cabinet minister and governor), will be investigated. They will face justice," as announced by the Attorney General of Sudan.
The investigation will be the first to be launched since Bashir was ousted by the army in April following massive protests against his 30-year dictatorial leadership.
Bashir, who is behind bars for corruption and awaiting trial on other charges, is wanted by the International Criminal Court in The Hague for his role in the bloody Darfur conflict.
The ICC issued warrants for Bashir's arrest in 2009 and 2010 on charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in the conflict that left around 300,000 people dead and 2.5 million displaced, according to the United Nations.
Haroun, who was governor of Sudan's warn-torn South Kordofan state, is also wanted by the ICC on war crimes charges.
The Darfur fighting broke out in 2003 when ethnic minority rebels took up arms against Bashir's Arab-dominated government, which they accused of marginalising the region.
Human rights groups say Khartoum targeted suspected pro-rebel ethnic groups with a scorched earth policy, raping, killing, looting and burning villages.
Despite numerous calls for his extradition, the ex-dictator has not been sent to The Hague.
- 'Thanks but it's too late' -
Yacoub Mohammed, an official at the sprawling Camp Kalma facility where tens of thousands of people displaced by the conflict in Darfur have been living for years, said the initiative came "too late".
"Thanks to the prosecutor general, but it's too late because... almost 17 years (have passed) and the investigation cannot find any evidence," he told AFP.
"The evidence has disappeared. And there is no mention of these crimes (crimes against humanity), it is not written in Sudanese law. For this we want these criminals to be taken to the ICC," he added.
Swept to power in a coup backed by Islamists in 1989, Bashir was deposed on April 11 by the army, after months of protest against his regime that left dozens dead.
Following a deal reached in August between the military and protesters, Sudan is now led by a transitional government tasked with paving the way for civilian rule.
The investigation was announced on Sunday as the new government has vowed to establish peace in the country's conflict-hit regions, including Darfur.
On December 14, Bashir was sentenced by a court in Khartoum to two years' detention in a correctional centre for corruption in the first of several cases against him.
He is also under investigation for his role in the 1989 coup, which he led against the democratically elected government.
On Sunday, Heber said that proceedings had also been launched against Salah Gosh, former intelligence chief under Bashir.
"There are four cases against Salah Gosh and we started a procedure to bring him (back to Sudan) by Interpol."
Gosh, head of the feared National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS), resigned in April two days after the ouster of Bashir, and is now outside of Sudan.
On Wednesday, human rights groups led by the International Federation for Human Rights called on Sudan's transitional government to end the "reign of impunity" for war crimes committed in Darfur.
Sudan's new leaders must "seize this momentum to bring to justice those responsible for the crimes committed in Darfur", they said in a report titled "Will there be Justice for Darfur?".
Courtesy:AFP
Nigeria, Abuja.
(Former Nigerian Attorney General arrested for fraud.)
Nigeria’s former attorney general was detained by the country’s financial crimes agency upon his return home on Thursday, the c...View MoreNigeria, Abuja.
(Former Nigerian Attorney General arrested for fraud.)
Nigeria’s former attorney general was detained by the country’s financial crimes agency upon his return home on Thursday, the commission said in a statement, as part of an investigation into one of the oil industry’s biggest suspected corruption scandals.
Mohammed Adoke was arrested by Interpol in November after travelling to Dubai for a medical appointment. He voluntarily flew back to the West African country on Thursday, his lawyer said.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) investigation relates to the $1.3 billion sale of a Nigerian offshore oilfield known as OPL 245 by Malabu Oil and Gas in 2011.
Eni SpA and Royal Dutch Shell Plc jointly acquired the field from Malabu, which was owned by former petroleum minister Dan Etete.
The sale of the oil field has spawned legal cases across several countries, involving Nigerian government officials and senior executives from Eni and Royal Dutch Shell.
Shell and Eni, and their executives, have denied any wrongdoing. Etete has also denied wrongdoing.
“His return to Nigeria clears the way for him to answer to the charges against him,” the EFCC said in a statement, following Adoke’s return to Nigeria.
Adoke’s lawyer, Mike Ozekhome, said the former attorney general was released by Interpol and Dubai authorities after “finding nothing criminal against him.”
“Our client remains very confident that he will be vindicated in the court of law and justice at the end of the day, after a free and fair trial,” Ozekhome said in a written statement.
Courtesy: Reuters
United Kingdom, London.
(Boris Johnson wins)
Boris Johnson has clinched a historic Conservative general election victory, winning a string of seats from Jeremy Corbyn's Labour party in its tradition...View MoreUnited Kingdom, London.
(Boris Johnson wins)
Boris Johnson has clinched a historic Conservative general election victory, winning a string of seats from Jeremy Corbyn's Labour party in its traditional heartlands.
It's done in Boris Johnson. In leading his Conservative Party to achieve one of the country's most spectacular electoral victories in decades, the UK Prime Minister has shocked political pundits.
The result is a vindication of Johnson's strategy to campaign on a single promise to "get Brexit done."
For the opposition Labor Party, whose leader, Jeremy Corbyn, said he would step down after a "reflection process," it was a crushing defeat. And the leader of the pro-Remain Liberal Democrat party, Jo Swinson, lost his seat as the Scottish National Party swept the board in Scotland.
The Conservatives won 363 of the 650 seats in Parliament's House by early Friday morning, just ahead of Labor's 203 seats.
Nigeria,
U.S. President Donald J. Trump re-tweeted on Monday a portrait of himself by a Nigerian artist named Creative Doks on Twitter.
The artist said it was his second American leader portrait add...View MoreNigeria,
U.S. President Donald J. Trump re-tweeted on Monday a portrait of himself by a Nigerian artist named Creative Doks on Twitter.
The artist said it was his second American leader portrait adding that he had spent 70 hours using a ball pen to get the portrait at 24221 inches.
"This is my second portrait of President Trump, I really want him to see it this time ... Please RT (retweet) until the president sees this," read part of the message that accompanies his tweet.
He tagged the accounts of the president, that of his son, Donald Trump Junior and his official POTUS (President of the United States) account.
But the president known for his prolific tweeting seems to have notice and responded same. “Not only did I see it Doks_Art, I think it is fantastic. You are a wonderful artist, never give up your dream!” Trump tweeted.
Trump’s post has generated over 27,500 retweets and over 97,100 “likes” with the artist’s tweet beating Trumps retweets with 37,900 retweets and “likes” of 78,400.
This is the second time that Trump is actively engaging an Africa-related tweet. Months back, he retweeted a video of a female football juggler.
The exploits of the Tanzanian lady further went viral following which she was interviewed by a number of international news outlets.
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