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page 19 Niger 34 migrants found dead in Sahara Desert Niger says the bodies of 34 migrants, including 20 children, have been found in the Sahara Desert near the border with Algeria. A government statement said they were found near the small desert town of Assamakka. Interior Minister Bazoum Mohammed said it appeared they had […]

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Niger

34 migrants found dead in Sahara Desert

Niger says the bodies of 34 migrants, including 20 children, have been found in the Sahara Desert near the border with Algeria.

A government statement said they were found near the small desert town of Assamakka.

Interior Minister Bazoum Mohammed said it appeared they had died of thirst after being abandoned by their smuggler.

Niger lies on a major migrant route between sub-Saharan Africa and Europe.

Mr Mohammed said nine of the adults were women and five were men. He said members of the group had died between 6 and 12 June.

Two victims have been identified as Nigerian but the nationalities of the others are not yet clear.

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) says about 120,000 people crossed through Niger’s arid northern Agadez region last year.

ETHIOPIA

Forces killed over 400 in protest crackdown – HRW

A human rights group says Ethiopian security forces have killed more than 400 people since November in a crackdown on protests in the country’s Oromia region.

In a newly-released report, Human Rights Watch said soldiers have repeatedly fired live ammunition at Oromia protesters with little or no warning, or attempts to use non-lethal crowd-control measures. It says many of those killed have been students, including children under the age of 18 years.

The rights group also said police have arrested tens of thousands of people since the protests began, and that many remain in detention without charge and without access to lawyers or family members.

The protests were triggered by concerns about the government’s proposed expansion of Addis Ababa’s boundaries. Demonstrators feared the plan would displace Oromia farmers.

There was no immediate response to the report from the Ethiopian government.

UGANDA

Soldier shoots seven dead in Kampala barracks

A Ugandan soldier has killed seven people, including three children, in a shooting spree at a military police barracks in the capital, Kampala.

The soldier, Sgt Isaac Obua, was then shot dead himself.

Military police spokesman Maj Edward Birungi said Sgt Obua had had a dispute with his wife.

He is reported to have got drunk and then started shooting while searching for his wife, who managed to escape.

As well as the three children, Sgt Obua killed a female soldier and three soldiers’ wives. Two others are said to be injured.

Army spokesperson Lt Col Paddy Ankunda tweeted “Sgt Obua… has just gone bonkers killed seven people”.

SYRIA

Russia wants long-term Aleppo ceasefire

Russia has called for a long-term ceasefire in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, hours after declaring a two-day pause in the fighting there.

The Russian defence ministry said the “regime of calm”, which went into effect at midnight, was an effort to stabilise the situation in Aleppo.

Hundreds of people have been killed in the divided city in recent months.

Russian air strikes have supported an attempt by Syrian government forces to encircle rebel-held western areas.

On Wednesday, the US said the government’s offensive was violating a nationwide cessation of hostilities brokered by the US and Russia in February.

The Russian defence ministry statement issued late on Wednesday said the regime of calm had been introduced in Aleppo “with the goal of lowering the level of armed violence and stabilising the situation”.

The ministry did not say if any other parties to the conflict had been consulted

UNITED STATES

Orlando shootings: Democrats in 14-hour gun control filibuster

Democrats in the US Senate have held the floor for nearly 15 hours through the night to demand a vote on gun control after the killing of 49 people at a gay nightclub in Florida.

The marathon session ended after Republicans agreed to hold votes on measures to expand background checks and prevent people on US terrorism watch lists from buying guns, Democratic Senator Chris Murphy said early on Thursday.

The move could break a years-long deadlock on gun control and follows demands for action after the worst mass shooting in US history.

Murphy took to the floor of the Republican-controlled senate on Wednesday morning to launch a procedural obstruction, known as a filibuster, to press colleagues to accept so-called “no-fly no-buy” legislation.

The move comes as US President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden set out for Orlando, the scene of last weekend’s deadly attack.

IRAQ/SYRIA

UN: ISIL committing genocide against Yazidis

Fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) are committing genocide against the Yazidi community in Iraq and Syria, UN human rights investigators have said.

More than 3,200 Yazidi women and children are held mostly in Syria by the fighters who keep them as sexual slaves, the UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria said in a report on Thursday.

“Genocide has occurred and is ongoing,” commission chairman Paulo Pinheiro said in Geneva.

“ISIS has subjected every Yazidi woman, child or man that it has captured to the most horrific of atrocities,” he added.

According to the UN report, ISIL fighters exterminated Yazidis in mass killings when fighters based in Iraq and Syria attacked the Iraqi region of Sinjar in August 2014.

KENYA

Court upholds forced anal testing in homosexuality cases

Two men being prosecuted for having gay sex in Kenya lost their legal bid on Thursday to challenge the authorities’ right to force suspects to have anal examinations.

The two unnamed men who deny the gay sex charges, said in their petition they had been coerced into undergoing anal examinations by security personnel and a public hospital in Mombasa in February 2015.

They wanted the court to declare that the forced examinations – which are used to try to prove gay sex has taken place – amounted to “degrading treatment” and a violation of human rights.

But high court judge Matthew Emukule said on Thursday there was sufficient justification under Kenyan law to allow the intrusion into the human body for the purpose of gathering evidence to prove a sexually related crime.

“The petition has no merit and is dismissed,” he said in his ruling in the Kenyan port of Mombasa.

UAE

War is over for Emirati troops in Yemen

The United Arab Emirates says the “war is over” for its troops in Yemen, though it may continue to keep them there for “counterterrorism operations”.

Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Abu Dhabi’s crown prince and supreme commander of the UAE armed forces, carried the announcement on his official Twitter account late on Wednesday.

He was quoting Anwar Gargash, UAE’s junior minister for foreign affairs, who had given a speech saying the “war is over for our troops”.

The statement left open the likelihood that Emirati troops would remain in the Arabian Peninsula country, where they operate in the southern province of Hadramawt and the port city of Aden.

EGYPT

EgyptAir plane voice recorder recovered

The cockpit voice recorder from the EgyptAir plane that crashed last month has been found in the Mediterranean, Egyptian investigators say.

The “black box” was damaged and had to be pulled out in several stages but its memory unit was intact, they said.

A search vessel with an underwater robot has been scouring the crash site and has sent back images of wreckage.

Flight MS804 from Paris to Cairo crashed on 19 May, killing all 66 people on board.

It is not clear yet what caused the aircraft to go down.

The recorder will now be taken to the Egyptian city of Alexandria to be studied.

UK

MP dies in ‘horrific’ shooting attack

An MP has died after she was shot and stabbed during an attack in her constituency, police have said.

Jo Cox, 41, Labour MP for Batley and Spen, was left bleeding on the ground by her attacker. A 77-year-old man also suffered slight injuries.

A 52-year-old man was arrested near Market Street, Birstall. The MP held a weekly advice surgery nearby.

Her husband Brendan Cox said she would want people “to unite to fight against the hatred that killed her”.

Vote Leave and Remain have both suspended campaigning in the EU referendum in light of the attack