By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – Instability is growing in the East African nations of Sudan and South Sudan while the U.S. pursues a military solution to a decades-long civil war in Somalia. Recent U.S. bombing raids are claiming 35 al-Shabab victims in the Hiraan region of central Somalia, the U.S. […]
Eulogies Flow for A Golden Voice That Challenged Apartheid
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – A baobab tree has fallen with the passing of a one-of-a-kind musician. Those were the words spoken of the legendary Mama Dorothy Masuka by South African Arts and Culture Minister Nathi Mthethwa. She was hailed alongside her friend, the late veteran star Miriam Makeba, for […]
IAEA Keen to Enhance Nuclear Security in Africa
By Reinhard Jacobsen VIENNA (IDN) – Enhancing regulatory framework for nuclear security in Africa has been on the agenda of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), nuclear watchdog of the United Nations, for nearly two years. Against this backdrop, lawyers and nuclear scientists from 10 African countries reviewed the status of their countries’ regulatory frameworks […]
African WWII Vets Seek Formal Apology, Compensation From UK
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK | LONDON (IDN) – The UK government is coming under pressure to compensate and apologize to the last surviving African veterans who fought alongside white British soldiers in the Second World War that began 80 years ago and lasted six years. More than half a million black […]
African Villagers Tortured For ‘Blood Rubies’ Worn by Stars
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – A British mining company has agreed to pay over $7 million to settle claims including allegations of torture and murder at ruby mines in the northeast of Mozambique. The brilliant red stones, worth millions, have been worn by international actresses Mila Kunas, Bel Powley, and […]
Africa’s First Ladies Launch Strategy to Promote Health
By Ronald Joshua ADDIS ABABA (IDN) – The Organization of African First Ladies for Development (OAFLAD) has launched a New Strategic Plan (2019-2023) which envisions “a developed Africa with healthy and empowered children, youth and women”. The plan will make a significant contribution to the health and well-being of children, youth and women in Africa. […]
Egypt’s El-Sisi Takes Over African Union Chairmanship from Rwanda’s Kagame
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK | ADDIS ABABA (IDN) – Rwandan President Paul Kagame has turned over the leadership of the 55-member African Union (AU) to Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, President of Egypt, at the 32nd ordinary session of the Assembly of the African Union in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. El-Sisi has pledged to […]
Buhari, If Re-elected, Could Put Nigeria Back on Track
Viewpoint by Jonathan Power LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – Nigeria is a veritable factory of sophisticated novelists. It was no surprise that Ben Okri won the British Booker Prize that goes annually to the best novelist of the year. Considering that high-class novel writing in English only began in Nigeria in 1958 with Chinua Achebe’s famous […]
African Leaders Put Rich Nations on Notice That Days of Cheap Resources Are Ending
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK | CAPE TOWN (IDN) – African leaders had a new message for foreign companies seeking the diamonds, gold, rubies and emeralds so plentiful in desperate dirt-poor countries and so pricey when polished and sold in New York, Paris and Switzerland. We’re no longer a cheap date. That […]
Emeralds, Rubies Could Make Zambia Rich
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – Foreign mining companies extract more than a quarter of the world’s production of rare emeralds in Zambia yet, in some quarters, are alleged to declare losses to make themselves tax exempt. So far, charges of tax evasion filed against Kagem mine, a subsidiary of the […]