Investigate Bolsonaro for genocide says Brazil's Marina Silva

Former president Jair Bolsonaro should be investigated for genocide, Brazil’s environment minister, Marina Silva, has said, as she prepares an operation to drive illegal goldminers from the site of a humanitarian disaster on Indigenous land. The president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, recently declared an emergency after photos emerged of emaciated children and elderly people in the region and the Sumaúma news platform revealed 570 Yanomami infants died from preventable diseases during Bolsonaro’s term, an increase of 29% on the previous four years. In the coming days, armed police and...

Descendants of Namibia's genocide victims call on Germany to discuss reparations

Descendants of victims of the genocide in Namibia have called on Germany to “stop hiding” and discuss reparations with them directly, as they take their own government to court for making a deal without their approval. The Herero and Nama people have gone to Namibia’s high court, rejecting an apology made in 2021 after years of talks between Namibia and Germany, which they say falls short of atoning for the 1904 to 1908 genocide, the first of the 20th century. “We were not involved at any stage. The government set the agenda, it discussed what it discussed and never disclosed it until we saw...

India invokes emergency laws to ban BBC Modi documentary

The Indian government has invoked emergency laws to block a BBC documentary examining the role of the prime minister, Narendra Modi , during riots in the western state of Gujarat in 2002. An adviser in India’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting on Saturday said that Twitter and YouTube have been asked to block links sharing the BBC documentary, India: The Modi Question, which the government earlier labelled as a “propaganda piece“. On Monday, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said that ordering social media platforms to block the documentary constitutes “an attack on the free...

1,500 arrested following Bolsonarists storming of congress

Officials say about 1,500 people have been arrested following the storming of the National Congress in Brasília. Supporters of the former president, Jair Bolsonaro, stormed Congress and other official buildings including the presidential palace and the Supreme Court on Sunday. Newly inaugurated President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was not there when the invasion happened, but he has since flown back from visiting flood victims in Sao Paulo state to inspect the damage Invaders left a trail of destruction leaving windows broken, furniture overturned and flooded parts of the National Congress...

ELN rebel group denies ceasefire with Colombian government

The National Liberation Army (ELN), says it is not part of a ceasefire with the goverment that had been announced by the Presidient last week. On New Year’s Eve, President Gustavo Petro made a bold pronouncement on Twitter: Five of the country’s illegal armed groups had agreed to a six-month ceasefire . “Total peace will be a reality,” Petro wrote, echoing his promises to bring the country’s decades-long armed conflict to an end. But on Tuesday, the ELN issued a statement refuting claims that it had agreed to the ceasefire. “The ELN Dialogue Delegation has not discussed any proposal for a...

Lula to be sworn in as Brazil's new president

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will be sworn in as president of Brazil for a historic third term on Sunday. The inauguration in Brasília, exactly two decades after the veteran politician first assumed office, is expected to attract hundreds of thousands of people for a festival-style celebration with live music. Lula, as he is universally known, won the most tightly fought election since democracy was restored to the South American nation in the 1980s, in a remarkable political comeback just three years after being released from prison. But the 77-year-old former metalworker faces a host of...

Justice vigil held in Paris for Kurdish activists

A Vigil was held at Ahmet Kaya Cultural Centre where hundreds continue to pay their respects to the three Kurdish activists killed in Paris last week. Three Kurdish activists were killed and three others injured in the armed attack on 23 December on the Ahmet Kaya Cultural Centre, a Kurdish restaurant and a Kurdish-run barbershop on Rue d'Enghien in the tenth arrondissement of Paris. The victims of the targeted attack are Evîn Goyî (Emine Kara), a member of the KCK (Kurdistan Communities Union) Executive Council, YPJ (Women’s Defense Units) veteran in the fight against ISIS and leading...

Nazi typist guilty of complicity in 10,500 murders

Irmgard Furchner 97, a former secretary who worked for the commander of a Nazi concentration camp has been convicted of complicity in the murders of more than 10,500 people. Irmgard Furchner, 97, was taken on as a teenaged shorthand typist at Stutthof and worked there from 1943 to 1945. Furchner, the first woman to be tried for Nazi crimes in decades, was given a two-year suspended jail term. Although she was a civilian worker, the judge agreed she was fully aware of what was going on at the camp. Some 65,000 people are thought to have died in horrendous conditions at Stutthof, including...

Japan doubles military budget in response to building tensions

Friday, 16th December 2022, Japan's cabinet approved a new national security strategy for the first time in nine years, which includes doubling the country's military budget. The move has been commented on as the 'biggest military build-up since World War 2'. The new plan stands at odds with the country's pacifist constitution, which renounces the use of force to settle international discord. However, changes made in 2015 allow the use of force when Japan's security is threatened by attacks on other countries. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute , in 2021, Japan...

Aleksandar Vučić meets with national security council amidst rising tensions in Northern Kosovo

Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić met with his national security council amidst rising tensions between authorities in Kosovo and ethnic Serbs. Unknown attackers in Northern Kosovo exchanged gunfire with local police and threw a stun grenade at European Union officers. Ethnic Serbs set up roadblocks in response to Kosovan police being deployed in a dispute over car license plates. On Sunday, hundreds of ethnic Serbs gathered at the roadblocks in an outrage over the arrest of a Serbian former police officer. Kosovo, which broke away from Serbia after a war in 1998-99, consists of a primarily...

Pages