(AFP) – Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi yesterday accused Rohingya fighters of burning down homes and using child soldiers during a recent surge in violence in troubled Rakhine state, allegations denied by the militants themselves. The impoverished western state neighbouring Bangladesh has become a crucible of religious hatred focused on the stateless Rohingya Muslim minority, who […]
(International Justice Monitor) – Following a one-month break, Bosco Ntaganda has resumed testimony in his own defense at the International Criminal Court (ICC), denying knowledge of the existence of child soldiers among the Congolese militia forces trained by the Uganda government. Under cross-examination by prosecution lawyer Nicole Samson, Ntaganda stated that Ugandan authorities were in charge […]
(The New York Times) – Let’s be blunt: With U.S. and U.K. complicity, the Saudi government is committing war crimes in Yemen. “The country is on the brink of famine, with over 60 percent of the population not knowing where their next meal will come from,” the leaders of the U.N. World Food Program, Unicef and […]
(Reuters) – A four-year-old boy photographed in a Kabul mosque last week as police desperately tried to call him to safety during an attack by Islamic State gunmen is back with his family but still suffering nightmares, his father said. Ali Ahmad was with his grandfather in the Shi’ite Imam Zaman mosque on Friday when at […]
(The New York Times) – Saudi Arabian diplomats have devoted enormous time and effort in recent days to emphasizing how much aid their kingdom has given to the war-ravaged civilians of Yemen. In at least three events last week at the United Nations, the Saudis stressed that they are, by far, the top donors of food, medicine and […]
(UN News Centre) – The weekly number of reported new cholera cases in Yemen has declined by one third since late June, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) today said, praising Yemenis for leading a “heroic daily fight” against the outbreak, which remains the worst in the world. “Health, water and sanitation personnel – who have […]
(The Guardian) – Aung San Suu Kyi’s office has accused international aid workers of helping “terrorists”, a claim that has prompted fears for their safety and been condemned as dangerously irresponsible. The state counsellor office said it had learned that international aid staff had “participated while extremist terrorists besieged” a village in Rakhine state, adding it would investigate […]
(Al Jazeera) – The vast majority of Yemen’s cholera deaths have occurred in areas controlled by Houthi rebels, largely the result of a blockade and air raids by the Saudi Arabia-led coalition they are fighting, an Al Jazeera investigation reveals. An analysis of World Health Organization data shows that 1,794 of Yemen’s 2,003 cholera deaths – 90 percent – have occurred […]
(The Washington Post) – By last December, the main hospital in the city of Hajjah in northern Yemen had already received 200 suspected cases of cholera. The patients were being treated at a month-old cholera center supported by the World Health Organization. Across the country, U.N. workers had recorded 122 confirmed cases by then, including 10 […]
(NPR) – Salamatu Umar was abducted by Boko Haram in 2014, when she was just 15. She and five other girls were herded in the bush. She was forced to marry a Boko Haram fighter. She and another girl eventually escaped, running away while they were collecting firewood for cooking. Umar was pregnant at the time. […]