U.S. authorities are expressing concern over Turkey’s sales of armed drones to Ethiopia, where two sources familiar with the matter said there was mounting evidence the government had used the weapons against rebel fighters.
A senior Western official said Washington has “profound humanitarian concerns” over the sales, which could contravene U.S. restrictions on arms to Addis Ababa.
The year-long war between Ethiopia’s government and the leadership of the northern Tigray region, among Africa’s bloodiest conflicts, has killed thousands of civilians and displaced millions.
A State Department spokesman said U.S. Horn of Africa envoy Jeffrey Feltman “raised reports of armed drone use in Ethiopia and the attendant risk of civilian harm” during a visit to Turkey last week.
Elsewhere, a senior Turkish official said Washington conveyed its discomfort at a few meetings, while Ethiopia’s military and government did not respond to detailed requests for comment.
Turkey, which is selling drones to several countries in Europe, Africa and Asia, has dismissed criticism that it plays a destabilising role in Africa and saying it is in touch with all sides in Ethiopia to urge negotiations.
Last week though, the United Nations agreed to set up an independent investigation into rights abuses in Ethiopia, a move strongly opposed by its government.
A government minister in Madagascar Serge Gelle has said he swam for 12 hours to safety after his helicopter crashed at sea during a rescue mission.
Speaking to a camera as he recovered on a stretcher, the exhausted Police Minister said it was not his time to die yet.
Gelle, aged 57, said his helicopter came down after it caught a gust of wind, and he swam from “7:30 last night , until 7:30 this morning,” to Mahambo. He said he had no injuries but added that he was feeling cold.
He said, “I would just like you to broadcast this video for my family to see, my colleagues to see, the government members to see. [I am] alive and well,” Mr Gelle told locals at Mahambo.
Another security official travelling with him in the helicopter also survived the crash. The team had been flying to inspect the site of a shipwreck in the north-east of the country on Monday night.
In the meantime, the maritime agency has said the number of people killed in that accident has risen to 64 with at least 20 others still missing,
The vessel was a cargo ship that was not authorised to carry passengers, and was overloaded and water flooded its engine, according to an agency official.
At least 45 survivors have so far been rescued, the agency said.
On Twitter President Andry Rajoelina mourned those who died and also paid tribute to Mr Gelle and the other officer, who arrived in the seaside town of Mahambo separately.
Police chief Zafisambatra Ravoavy told Newsmen that Gelle had used one of the helicopter’s seats as a flotation device, adding that he has always had great stamina in sport, and he’s kept up this rhythm as minister.
The EU’s training mission in Mali (EUTM) has handed over command to a new general.
The ceremony took place in the Malian capital, Bamako, and was attended by a number of European ambassadors as well as Malian military brass.
The move follows the announcement that Mali has accepted one thousand UN peacekeepers from nearby Chad and comes as France announced a reduction in the deployment of troops in the country.
Christian Riener, the new EUTM commander said the mission is very critical and that it was a great honour for him to serve in this mission, adding that he had great respect for the Malian people and the Malian soldiers.
Hervé Bléjean, director general of the European Union Military Staff added they are working for the benefit of the G5 joint force, doing training, and also providing them with equipment.
Paris has already closed down three army bases in Northern Mali and by next year its presence in the country will be reduced to about 3,000 soldiers from 5,100.
Mali is the epicentre of a jihadist insurgency that began in the north of the country in 2012 and spread three years later to neighbouring Niger and Burkina Faso.
Former South African President Jacob Zuma will be allowed to appeal a court ruling that ordered him back to jail to serve the remainder of his sentence, according to a court ruling on Wednesday.
The eighty-year old former President had been released on medical parole earlier this year, but the Gauteng High Court in the capital, Pretoria, ruled last week that his parole had been illegal.
However, On Tuesday, Judge Elias Matojane said that Zuma can now appeal that finding, adding that due to his illness and advanced age, he needs compassion, empathy and humaneness.
Zuma was convicted and sentenced for defying a court order ordering that he appear before a government-backed commission probing allegations of corruption during his tenure as president from 2009 to 2018.
His release on medical parole had been granted by former correctional services commissioner Arthur Fraser against the recommendation of the parole board.
He served nearly two months of his 15-month sentence, but this was mainly in the hospital wing of the Estcourt Correctional Center and a hospital in Pretoria, where he underwent surgery in August this year.
Zuma’s lawyer, Dali Mpofu, had argued that returning him to jail “is equivalent to a death sentence.”
Zuma’s imprisonment in July also sparked protests by supporters who demanded his immediate pardon and release from jail.
The protests quickly descended into chaotic violence in which trucks were burned, shops and warehouses looted and burned. More than 300 people died in the country’s worst violence since the end of apartheid in 1994.
The Nigerian government has launched a free e-learning website called “inspire.education.gov.ng” for all levels of education to allow for easy learning access.
Represented by the Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Education, the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, said in Abuja that the website would accommodate 2 million Nigerians at a time.
Adamu said that the decision was initiated by COVID-19 which disrupted learning for two years.
He said the website was a brainchild of the ministry and it has two features namely, inspire for students and ignite for teachers, saying it would allow both learners and teachers to have full access to the website.
He added that the ministry was collaborating with the Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN) to allow only registered teachers to have access to the website.
The minister said that the content of the e-learning would cover all levels of education saying that currently, the ministry is focused on primary and secondary education.
He added that the current e-learning website being used by polytechnics and universities would not be stopped but rather linked to the new website.
According to the minister, as of today, the ministry has provided over 4,000 video lessons for basic levels, 7,000 video lessons for secondary levels and 4,000 audio lessons for secondary levels.
“We have been developing content in such we can broadcast in every media. We have the content on the radio which covers the entire country and also television.
“ We have exceeded 30 per cent in terms of broadband. We are working with Galaxy Backbone to lay fibres across the country and lay it across schools in the country.
“The content is for all levels but the focus presently is at the level of primary and secondary. This is because there is hardly any of our Polytechnic or University that does not have their own.
“We don’t have the intention to close down the website for polytechnics and universities but want to create a link for them to access the platform,” he said.
He added that the ministry is also working to reserve a proportion of Galaxy Backbone cyber base dedicated for the e-content.
whether the website would accommodate teaching in the various local languages, the minister said that a committee had been set up to link up with regulatory agencies to harness local languages.
He commended the partners and local content providers for their role in bringing the project to the limelight.
Adamu further urge users to take advantage of the website saying that the ministry was working to make it seamless and economical for users.
Also, the Director of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in the ministry, Abubakar Isah said the website would offer both teachers and learners more beneficiary teaching and learning resources to teach and understand lessons respectively.
He added that the e-learning website had also enabled states to adopt a strategy for teaching.
In response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOI) request, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (“CDC”) admitted that there are no documented cases of unvaccinated individuals who have been re-infected or transmitted Covid to another person after acquiring so-called “natural immunity.”
Attorney Brehm, whose firm Siri & Glimstad lists vaccine injury and exemptions among its specialties, had requested “documents reflecting any documented case of an individual who: (1) never received a COVID-19 vaccine; (2) became infected with COVID-19 once, recovered, and then became re-infected; and (3) transmitted SARS-CoV-2 to another person when re-infected.”
The CDC responded in a letter dated Nov. 5. “A search of our records did not reveal any documents related to your request,” a CDC spokesperson responded. “CDC’s Emergency Operations Center (EOC) relayed that this information is not collected.”
While the response alone does not establish that no such cases exist, it could be taken as an indicator of health officials’ disinterest in the information that could undermine elected policies.
“Studies have found that vaccine-induced protection against Covid wanes at around six months (or potentially sooner),” Life Site News reported, “by contrast, a recent Yale study projected that natural immunity lasts three times longer.”
In an article, Dr. Sebastian Rushworth, a Stockholm physician, discussed a recent Swedish study to determine how effective Covid injections are in protecting against Covid after more than a few months.
In total, 1,684,958 people were included in the study. The study authors identified who was “vaccinated” at the end of May 2021. The vaccinated people were then compared individually with people of the same age and sex and living in the same municipality who had not been “vaccinated.” They followed them until October to see if they developed Covid-19.
After the first two months from “vaccination,” there was a rapid decline in efficacy. At four to six months, the injections, across all types, only reduced the relative risk of infection by 48%.
“Governments had initially set the bar for approving vaccines with a 50% relative risk reduction. Therefore, if the trials had been required to run for six months before presenting results instead of only running for two months, then the vaccines would have been considered too ineffective to be worth bothering with and would never have been approved,” said Dr. Rushworth.
Rushworth added that “four to six months after injection, AstraZeneca was no longer doing anything to reduce risk … [and] at nine months, the Pfizer vaccine no longer offers any protection.”
And yet – Federal employees around the world continue to be subjected to the shaming, bullying, coercion, harassment, and discrimination as a result of their vaccine status.
The world has witnessed ant-vaccine protests from civil scoiety organisations and workers more than ever before in resistance to the “vaccinate or we terminate” business plan which they say promotes discrimination, resentment, and inequity within the workplace.
Meanwhile analyst say they are yet to understand government rational behind forced vaccination for a virus which shares the overall mortality rate of season influenza among low risk individuals.
A Norwegian Cruise Line ship docked in New Orleans over the weekend with at least 17 passengers and crew members infected with the coronavirus, according to local health officials, including one probable case of the omicron variant among the crew.
WpGet the full experience.Choose your planArrowRightThe Norwegian Breakaway departed from New Orleans on Nov. 28 with more than 3,200 people aboard and stopped in Belize, Honduras and Mexico on its voyage, the Louisiana Department of Health said in a statement Saturday.
The statement did not say whether the passengers were tested for the coronavirus before the trip, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advises cruise-goers to get tested one to three days in advance.
The cruise company said that it requires all passengers and crew members to have been vaccinated before departure, and that the cases represent only a “handful” of the thousands of people on the ship. It described their infections as “asymptomatic.”
Even so, the outbreak highlights that despite cruise lines’ efforts to impose strict public health rules, the virus is still finding a way on board. And public health rules that dictate how cruise ships can operate in U.S. waters during the pandemic are due to become only recommendations in mid-January.
Cruise ships were an early source of outbreaks last year, prompting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to issue a no-sail order in March 2020. As the government allowed cruises to resume with some restrictions, ships added vaccine requirements, testing rules, capacity limits and mask mandates.
A report by the CDC last month showed that more than a thousand cases had been discovered on cruises in the United States since sailing resumed following the industry-wide shutdown.
Many of those involved breakthrough infections of people who were fully vaccinated.
In the villages of Polar Inuits, families like to visit each other and have parties.
They drink coffee and eat cakes and exchange brightly wrapped parcels.
Traditional presents are model sledges, a pairs of polished walrus tusks, or sealskin mitts. Everyone in the village gets a gift and children go from house to house, singing songs.
On Christmas Eve, Church Services are held and most people go to them, many in national costume. Some men wear the white anoraks which are worn on special occasions.
Christmas Trees have to be imported, because no trees grow as far north as Greenland.
The trees are often imported from Denmark – Greenland has had a long historical connection with Denmark.
The trees are decorated with candles, bright ornaments and sometimes small versions of sealskin breeches known as kamiks.
Trees are traditionally decorated on the evening of 23rd December. People who don’t use an imported tree, might have a traditional driftwood tree decorated with heather.
Another traditional and popular decoration is to put an illuminated star in windows.
There are stars in most homes and in all public buildings.
Because Greenland is so far north, and within the Arctic Circle, during the winter the sun never rises! (You might get a brief glimpse over the southern mountains, but that’s it!)
So the stars help to bring some light. The tradition of hanging stars came with Christian missionaries from the Moravian church. The stars are sometimes called ‘poinsettia stars’ as they look a bit like poinsettia flowers.
Villages also put a large Christmas Tree on a nearby hill, so everyone can see it. These trees are put up and decorated ready for the start of Advent.
There are some rather unusual foods eaten at Christmas time in Greenland.
‘Mattak’ is whale skin with a strip of blubber inside. It is supposed to taste like fresh coconut, but is often too tough to chew and is usually swallowed.
Other popular foods in Greenland include ‘suaasat’ which is a soup/stew, barbecued caribou/reindeer, lamb, razorbill, ptarmigan and fish either as raw sushi or cooked.
Popular desserts are berries and apples with a crisp Topping and special Christmas porridge that’s served with butter and topped with sugar and cinnamon. Lots of Danish pastries and Christmas cookies are also eaten!
It is traditional on Christmas night that the men look after the women, serving their food and coffee and stirring the meal for them. Games follow the Christmas meal, including one in which an object is passed from hand to hand round a long table under the cloth. It is supposed to be repulsive: round, clammy and rough in texture; such as a frozen egg, wrapped in strips of wet fox fur!
Like in Finland and other nordic countries, lighting candles in cemeteries is sometimes done on Christmas Eve to remember family and friends.
In Greenland there are two main languages spoken, Inuit/Greenlandic and Danish. In Greenlandic, Happy/Merry Christmas is ‘Juullimi Pilluarit’; in Danish it is ‘Glædelig Jul’.
People in Ghana celebrate Christmas from the 20th of December to the first week in January with lots of different activities.
Many people travel to visit their relatives and friends in other parts of the country.
Over 66 languages are spoken in Ghana and all these language groups have their own traditions and customs!
December is also the start of the cocoa harvest (the bean that makes chocolate) in Ghana.
Ghana is the world’s second biggest cocoa producer.
Christmas Eve night is the time when the celebrations really start with Church services that have drumming and dancing.
Children often put on a Nativity Play or other drama.
Then choirs come out to sing and people come out in front of the priests to dance. Songs are mostly sung in the languages that the people understand best.
Sometimes these services and dancing go on all night long!
Other people celebrate Christmas Eve with fireworks and parties.
On Christmas Day the Churches are very full. People come out dressed in their colorful traditional clothes. After the Church service on Christmas morning, people quickly go back to their houses to start giving and receiving gifts.
Traditional food includes stew or okra soup, porridge and meats, rice and a yam paste called ‘fufu’.
During the Christmas period, children’s parties, employees’ end of year parties, etc. are mostly celebrated in the hotels, at the beaches, school parks and community centers with good wishes for all people on earth.
Some Ghanaians also go to Church on the 31st December to thank God for sending Jesus and to pray for a good and safe New Year.
1790 Supposedly impenetrable Turkish fortress of Izmail stormed and captured by Suvorov and his Russian armies during the Russo-Turkish War (1787–92).
1877 Thomas Edison’s Phonograph is announced by Scientific American.
1885 Itō Hirobumi, a samurai, becomes the first Prime Minister of Japan.
1989 After 23 years of dictatorial rule, Romania ousts Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu.
1990 Lech Wałęsa sworn in as Poland’s 1st popularly elected president.
Historical Events Today Today in Film & TV 1932 “The Mummy” directed by Karl Freund and starring Boris Karloff is released in the US – 1st Mummy horror film.
Today in Music 1894 Claude Debussy’s first orchestral masterpiece “Prélude à l’apres-midi d’un faune” premieres in Paris.
Today in Sport 1894 United States Golf Association forms in New York.
Do you know this fact about today? Did You Know? 1956 Colo is born, the first gorilla to be bred in captivity at Columbus Zoo and Aquarium, Columbus, Ohio.
Would you believe this fact about today? Would You Believe? 1849 The execution of Russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky by firing squad is called off at the last second
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