US assistant secretary of state, Satterfield to visit Nigeria Sunday
The United States Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs, Lee Satterfield, will visit Nigeria from Sunday.
According to a press statement released by the US Mission on its website on Friday, Satterfield’s trip will commence from March 17-22, 2024.
During the visit, the Assistant Secretary will reinforce the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to Africa by focusing on people-to-people connections between Americans and Nigerians.
Satterfield will also build on a recent visit by Secretary of State Antony Blinken to Nigeria.
Blinken’s visit to Nigeria in January, according to the US State Department was part of a bid to forge a united front with key African democracies as crisis engulfed the world.
According to the statement on the US Mission website, Satterfield will visit Abuja and Lagos State during her visit.
The statement read, “From March 17-22, Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs Lee Satterfield will travel to Abuja and Lagos, Nigeria.
“While in Nigeria, Assistant Secretary Satterfield will advance key bilateral priorities, including expanding access to education and bolstering economic opportunities through the creative arts.
“Assistant Secretary Satterfield’s trip to Nigeria builds on a recent visit by Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken and reinforces the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to Africa by focusing on people-to-people connections between Americans and Nigerians.”
Russia claims large numbers of Ukrainian soldiers killed in a single airstrike
The deputy chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces told Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu during a meeting that up to 300 soldiers were killed “as a result of an accurate strike by an aerial munition,” Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Saturday.
Newsmen cannot independently verify the numbers and there has been no immediate comment from Ukraine.
Colonel General Alexei Kim did not indicate where the strike took place but described the location of the strike as the “deployment point of the ‘Kraken’ nationalist formation,” according to the ministry, referring to a special unit of the Ukrainian Defense Intelligence.
The details emerged during a meeting at the headquarters of the Joint Group of Forces, where Shoigu heard reports from commanders on the current situation in the “zone of the special military operation,” the ministry said, Russia’s phrase for its war in Ukraine.
Kim also did not mention when the strike was carried out but noted that “over the past week alone, as a result of effective work of reconnaissance and strike systems, three American Patriot complexes, a Vampire multiple rocket launcher, more than 10 foreign-made artillery systems and fuel and ammunition depots were destroyed,” according to the ministry.
Kim also told Shoigu during the meeting that Ukraine is “suffering significant losses in both equipment and manpower as a result of the use of high-precision weapons and strike drones,” the ministry said.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
Hong Kong jails 12 for storming legislature in 2019
A Hong Kong court has sentenced 12 people to jail terms ranging from more than four years to nearly seven years after they stormed the city’s legislature during the 2019 pro-democracy protests.
Hundreds of protesters broke into the Legislative Council building on July 1 that year, daubing graffiti in the chamber and defacing a government emblem amid rising public anger over a proposed extradition bill that many feared would allow authorities to send people to mainland China for trial.
On Saturday District Court Judge Li Chi-ho sentenced the defendants including actor Gregory Wong after they were previously found guilty of rioting. Wong, who is 45, was jailed for six years and two months after pleading not guilty.
Political activists Ventus Lau and Owen Chow, who had pleaded guilty, were given terms of 54 months and 20 days, and 61 months and 15 days, respectively.
Althea Suen, the 27-year-old former president of the University of Hong Kong’s student union, who had also pleaded guilty, was sentenced to four years and nine months.
Two former reporters who were charged alongside the 12, but not convicted of rioting, were fined for “entering or staying in the Legislative Council chamber”.
Li described the incident as a “serious” blow to the city’s rule of law.
The activists defended their actions ahead of sentencing.
“The actual crime committed by the protesters … is the pursuit of democracy, freedom of thought and free will,” Suen told the court.
Chow, meanwhile, said the riot was “the language of the unheard”, citing civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
He said the government’s refusal to withdraw the extradition bill after a march opposing it drew one million people was the immediate cause of the incident.
“How a political regime handles dissent and whether it can rectify its mistakes will decide whether a society can maintain sustainable growth,” said Chow, who is charged with conspiracy to commit subversion in a separate ongoing national security trial.
Relatives and supporters cried and shouted “Take care!” and “Hang in there!” as the defendants were led away from the dock.
Rioting carries a maximum sentence of seven years in Hong Kong’s District Court.
More than 10,200 people were arrested in connection with the 2019 protests, of whom 2,937 have been charged with offences including rioting, unlawful assembly and criminal damage, according to police figures.
Beijing imposed a sweeping national security law on Hong Kong in the middle of 2020 that critics say has criminalised dissent. The Chinese and Hong Kong governments say they have restored calm and stability. Hong Kong’s own national security law is expected to be passed as early as next month.
‘We want Sonko’: Senegal opposition boosted after leaders freed before vote
Celebrations broke out among Senegal’s opposition supporters after two of their top leaders were freed from jail 10 days before the country’s delayed presidential election.
Firebrand politician Ousmane Sonko and his close aide Bassirou Diomaye Faye were released late on Thursday in a move that could boost the opposition’s chance to win in the March 24 election and replace outgoing President Macky Sall.
Sonko, the charismatic anti-establishment politician who has won over crowds of youngsters by promising to fight corruption, had been behind bars since July, serving a two-year sentence for corrupting the youth. He was barred from running for the presidential race due to a separate case involving defamation charges.
His supporters maintain Sonko’s legal woes were an outcome of efforts to keep him away from competing in the elections. Excluded from the presidential race, Sonko urged his supporters to vote for Faye, a lesser-known politician and deputy of his now-dissolved PASTEF party. “Ousmane is Diomaye,” was the message his supporters spread from prison. Faye was also in jail but on administrative detention — a state of arrest that does not bar him from contesting in the election.
“Sonko represents hope for the entire nation,” said Cheick Diara, a young Senegalese man cheering in the streets of Dakar on his release. “Look what is happening around the youth, they want change – we want Sonko in power,” he said.
Faye’s mission is now to bank on Sonko’s popularity to win the country’s top job. Dressed in a sky-blue tunic and a white cap, he was welcomed as a hero by a crowd gathered in front of Cap-Manuel prison in the capital Dakar as the news of his release started circulating.
“The way from prison to the presidential palace is now paved,” said Alioune Tine, founder of think tank AfrikaJom Center and former Amnesty International Regional Director for West and Central Africa. “President Sall thought he could neutralise their popularity by putting them in prison, but he understood that it wasn’t working – he was forced to release them,” said Tine, noting that their release will re-energise the opposition front.
Faye’s programme includes the establishment of a new national currency and the renegotiation of the country’s mining and energy contracts between the government and private conglomerates. Central to his campaign is also a review of the relations with former colonial power France whose economic interests in the country are perceived by some in the opposition as a form of neo-colonialism.
He has also promised to tackle youth unemployment: Three out of 10 Senegalese aged 18 to 35 are jobless. The crisis is further exacerbated by the speed at which the population is growing – it doubles every 25 years, according to Afro Barometer data.
“This is a radical youth for a radical change who wants to see a new way of doing politics,” said Hawa Bo, associate director of the Open Society Foundation. “They want to break with clientelism, endemic corruption and lack of accountability,” she added.
The anti-establishment presidential hopeful’s election could have significant implications for the region’s economy and the country’s plan to become an oil producer by the end of 2024. Senegal is the region’s number one recipient of foreign aid, including a $1.8bn loan from the International Monetary Fund.
Meanwhile, Sall’s governing Alliance of the Republic party has bet on Amadou Ba, a former prime minister. He ran the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning from 2013 to 2019 and was the country’s top diplomat between 2019 and 2020. His victory would mean policy continuity with the previous government, something that would likely reassure foreign investors.
Western allies are also closely monitoring developments in Senegal after months of protests have rocked Senegal’s image as a rare bastion of stability in a region plagued by military coups.
The latest round of demonstrations took place after Sall postponed the elections originally planned for February. The decision plunged Senegal into uncertainty with critics saying the move amounted to a constitutional coup for Sall to get a third mandate. Presidents in Senegal have a two-term limit. The Constitutional Court overruled the delay and elections were finally set for March 24.
In an attempt to quell tensions, Sall passed a controversial amnesty law – under which Sonko and Faye were released on Thursday – that critics have said is an attempt to make a clean exit from power and avoid being targeted once he is out of office.
Sall’s second term was marked by restrictions on civil liberties, a ban on demonstrations and internet shutdowns. At least 40 people were killed and more than a thousand political opponents ended in jail since 2021, according to Human Rights Watch.
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