An armed gang abducted students from an Islamic school in the north-central Nigerian state of Niger on Sunday, police and state government officials said.Armed groups carrying out kidnapping for ransom are blamed for a series of raids on schools and universities in northern Nigeria in recent months, abducting more than 700 students for ransom since December.A spokesman for Niger’s state police said in a statement that gunmen on motorcycles attacked the town of Tegina, in the Rafi local government area of the state, around 3 p.m. (1400 GMT) Sunday.He said the attackers were “shooting indiscriminately and abducted a yet to be ascertained number of children at Salihu Tanko Islamic school.”The school’s owner, Abubakar Tegina, told Reuters in a phone interview that he witnessed the attack.”I personally saw between 20 and 25 motorcycles with heavily armed people. They entered the school and went away with about 150 or more of the students,” said Tegina, who lives about 150 meters from the school.Tegina said there are around 300 pupils between the ages of 7 and 15. He said pupils live at home and only attend classes at the site.Most students kidnapped in recent months have been taken from boarding schools.One person was shot dead during the attack and a second person was seriously injured, the state governor’s spokeswoman said.She said 11 of the children taken were released by the gunmen because they were “too small and couldn’t walk.” A group of bus passengers were also abducted, she said.Sunday’s attack in Niger state took place the day after the release of the remaining 14 students of a group abducted last month from a university in neighboring Kaduna state.
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Month: May 2021
Hundreds Evacuated in New Zealand as Canterbury Region Floods
Hundreds of people were evacuated overnight and many more face the risk of abandoning their homes in New Zealand’s Canterbury region as heavy rains raised water levels and caused widespread flooding.At least 300 homes in Canterbury were evacuated overnight as water levels rose in rivers across the region in a “one-in-100-year deluge,” local media reports said Monday.Several highways, schools and offices were closed, and New Zealand’s Defense Forces deployed helicopters to rescue some people stranded in floods in the Ashburton area.Ashburton’s Mayor Neil Brown said “half of Ashburton” would need to be evacuated if the river’s levees broke but there was “still quite a bit of capacity” in the river.”We need it to stop raining to let those rivers drop,” said Brown, according to the New Zealand Herald.New Zealand’s MetService had issued a red warning Sunday for heavy rain for Canterbury and multiple warnings elsewhere.The government announced NZ$100,000 ($72,500) toward a Mayoral Relief Fund to support Canterbury communities impacted by the flooding, Kris Faafoi, the acting minister for emergency management said in a statement.”While it is still very early to know the full cost of the damage, we expect it to be significant and this initial contribution will help those communities to start to get back on their feet,” Faafoi said.
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North Korea Slams End to US Guidelines Limiting South Korea Missile Range
North Korea’s state media on Monday criticized the recent termination of a pact between the United States and South Korea that capped the development of South Korea’s ballistic missiles, calling it a sign of Washington’s “shameful double-dealing.”South Korean President Moon Jae-in announced the abolishment of the joint missile guidelines that had limited the country’s development of ballistic missiles to a range of 800 kilometers (500 miles) after his first summit with U.S. President Joe Biden earlier this month.North Korea’s official KCNA news agency carried an article by Kim Myong Chol, who it described as an “international affairs critic,” to accuse the United States of applying a double standard as it sought to ban Pyongyang from developing ballistic missiles.The United States is “engrossed in confrontation despite its lip-service to dialog,” Kim said. “The termination step is a stark reminder of the U.S. hostile policy toward the DPRK and its shameful double-dealing.”The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) is North Korea’s official name.North Korea’s target is the United States, not South Korea’s military, and it will counter the states on “the principle of strength for strength,” Kim said.Kim also criticized Moon for welcoming the termination of the guidelines, calling it “disgusting, indecent.””Now that the U.S. and the South Korean authorities made clear their ambition of aggression, they are left with no reasons whatsoever to fault the DPRK bolstering its capabilities for self-defense,” Kim added.
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Far-Right Party, Centrist Group Gain Big in Cyprus Poll
The far-right ELAM party and a centrist splinter group made big gains in Cyprus’ parliamentary election on Sunday as a sizeable chunk of supporters appeared to have turned their back on the top three parties amid voter disenchantment with traditional power centers.With 100% of votes counted, ELAM garnered 6.78% of the vote — a 3% increase from the previous election in 2016 — to edge out the socialist EDEK party by the razor-thin margin of around 200 votes.The centrist DIPA — made up of key figures from the center-right DIKO party which has traditionally been the third biggest party — gained 6.1% of the vote.The center-right DISY emerged in first place with 27.77% of the vote, 5.4% more than second-place, communist-rooted AKEL. But the parties respectively lost 2.9% and 3.3% of their support from the previous election.“The result isn’t what we expected,” AKEL General-Secretary Andros Kyprianou told a party rally. “We respect it and we’ll examine it carefully to draw conclusions, but we can now say that we failed to convince (our supporters).”Analyst Christoforos Christoforou said the results indicate a “very big failure” on the part of both DISY and AKEL to rally more supporters by convincing them of the benefits of their policies. A last-ditch appeal by the DISY leadership limited a projected 5% voter loss to 3%.Christoforou said the real winners were ELAM with its strident anti-migration platform and hardline nationalist policies and DIPA whose top echelons still have connections to the centers of political power as former ministers and lawmakers.He said that the high electoral threshold of 3.6% means that 15,000 voters who cast ballots for smaller parties who didn’t win any seats are left without a voice in parliament.Opinion polls in the weeks preceding the vote indicated that both DISY and AKEL would hemorrhage support as disappointed voters seek out alternatives among smaller parties.The election won’t affect the running of the government on the divided Mediterranean island nation, as executive power rests in the hands of the president, who is elected separately.About 65.73% of nearly 558,000 eligible voters cast ballots for the 56 Greek Cypriot seats in parliament. Voter turnout was 1% less than the previous poll.Among the key campaign issues were the country’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and the hoped-for economic reboot as the country ramps up vaccinations. Migration has also been an issue as the Cypriot government insists it has exceeded its limits and can no longer receive more migrants.Smaller parties have appealed to voters to turn their backs on DISY, which they said is burdened by a legacy of corruption.An independent investigation into Cyprus’ now-defunct investment-for-citizenship program found that the government unlawfully granted passports to thousands of relatives of wealthy investors, some with shady pasts. DISY bore the brunt of the criticism because it backs the policies of Anastasiades, the party’s former leader.Christoforou said there are questions as to whether the government has breached rules by using state funds to campaign for DISY.
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Biden Pays Tribute to Nation’s War Dead on Memorial Day Weekend
U.S. President Joe Biden paid tribute Sunday to the nation’s war dead on the eve of his first Memorial Day as the country’s commander-in-chief.“We must remember the price that was paid for our liberties,” Biden said at the War Memorial Plaza near the Delaware Memorial Bridge. “We must remember the debt we owe those who have paid it, and the families left behind. My heart is torn in half by the grief.” Biden delivered remarks on the sixth anniversary of the death of his son Beau, who served as a major in the Delaware Army National Guard, including a tour of duty with U.S. forces in Iraq before dying of cancer in 2015. “I know how much the loss hurts,” Biden said. “I know the black hole it leaves in the middle of your chest; it feels like you may get sucked into it and not come out.” “If [Beau] were here, he would be here as well, paying his respects to all those who gave so much for our country,” Biden said. “And I promise you the day will come when the mention of the name of your son or daughter, husband, wife — they will, in fact, bring not a tear to your eye, but a smile to your lips,” Biden said. “And I hope that day comes sooner than later.”Ahead of Memorial Day, members of the U.S. armed forces place flags in front of more than 260,000 headstones at Arlington National Cemetery, in Arlington, Virginia, May 27, 2021.“Folks, you know, despite all the pain, I know the pride you feel in the loved one and — that you lost and those who are still serving — the pride and the bravery in the service to our great American experiment.” he said. “The American creed is the connective tissue that binds us,” Biden said. “It’s a long chain of patriots that come before us and those who will follow us in turn. That creed holds that the ideals that inspire people to service and that us — fill us with pride when we see our loved ones put on that uniform.”“And our progress toward that creed together, as one nation united and preserved through their sacrifices, is the best and strongest memorial to their lives,” he said.“And so, I hope — I hope that the nation comes together,” he concluded. “We’re not Democrats or Republicans today. We’re Americans. We’re Americans who have given their lives.”The United States has commemorated Memorial Day to honor its war dead at the end of May since 1868 after the Civil War. The national holiday is now held on the last Monday in May of each year. Outside Washington, to coincide with the holiday, flags are placed by the headstones at Arlington National Cemetery and at many of the other national cemeteries across the country, where many who served in the U.S. military are buried.The holiday also marks the unofficial start of summer and what traditionally has been a busy travel season in the United States.
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From Uzbekistan to Inspecting American Bridges: An Engineer’s Story
About 40% of the more than 617,000 bridges in the U.S. are at least 50 years old, and of that number more than 46,000 are in dangerously poor condition. The job of bridge inspectors is to locate and identify their structural deficiencies. Svitlana Prestynska met with one such inspector and filed this report from Denver, Colorado, narrated by Anna Rice.
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Bomb Kills 2 CAR Police Officers, 3 Russian Paramilitaries
A military convoy struck a roadside bomb in the northwest of the conflict-wracked Central African Republic, leaving two police officers and three Russian paramilitaries dead, the government said Sunday.Tensions have been high in the country of 4.7 million since a December presidential election, although a recent surge in violence is just the latest in a civil war that has lasted since the ouster of President Francois Bozize in 2013.”Three Russian allies and two Central African police officers were killed,” government spokesman Ange Maxime Kazagui told AFP, while U.N. sources said the attack Thursday also wounded five members of the Central African security forces.They said the convoy was blown up on the road between Berberati and Bouar, more than 400 kilometers (250 miles) from the capital Bangui.A Russian helicopter was sent to the scene to recover the victims’ bodies and the wounded, the sources said.Moscow, which wields significant influence in the poor African nation, has since 2018 maintained a large contingent of “instructors” to train the Central African army.They were joined in December by hundreds more Russian paramilitaries, along with Rwandan troops, who were key in helping President Faustin Archange Touadera’s army to thwart a rebellion.Bangui referred to the Russian “military” in a bilateral defense accord, before Moscow corrected it by referring to them as “instructors.”Numerous witnesses and NGOs say the instructors are in fact paramilitaries from the Wagner Group, a shadowy private military company that is actively participating in the fight against CAR rebels, alongside Rwandan special forces and U.N. peacekeepers.On Friday, the U.N. said 11 people were killed in less than a month by mines in the country, mainly in the northwest where some of the last bastions of rebel groups are located.The presence of roadside bombs and mines is a rather new phenomenon in the country, despite years of conflict. Most of the territory of the perennially unstable former French colony is divided among numerous armed bands.
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Georgia Opposition Ends Parliamentary Boycott
Georgia’s main opposition party on Sunday announced the end of a months-long parliamentary boycott that has plunged the Caucasus nation into a spiraling political crisis, following disputed elections last year.Georgia’s opposition parties have denounced massive fraud in the October 31 parliamentary elections, which were won narrowly by the ruling Georgian Dream party.In the months since, they have staged numerous mass protests, demanding snap polls and refused to assume their seats in the newly elected parliament.The boycott that has left around 40 seats vacant in the 150-seat legislature weighed heavily on Georgian Dream’s political legitimacy.On Sunday, Georgia’s main opposition force — the United National Movement (UNM) founded by exiled ex-President Mikheil Saakashvili — said it had taken the decision to end the boycott.”We will enter parliament to liberate the Georgian state captured by oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili,” UNM chairman Nika Melia told journalists.He was referring to the billionaire founder of the ruling party, who is widely believed to be the man in charge in Georgia, despite having no official political role.The post-electoral stalemate worsened in February after police arrested Melia in a violent raid on his party headquarters, leading to the prime minister’s resignation and prompting swift condemnation from the West.Melia was released from pre-trial detention in May, on bail posted by the European Union.The move was part of an agreement Georgian Dream and the opposition signed in April under the European Council President Charles Michel’s mediation.The deal commits opposition parties to enter parliament, while Georgian Dream has promised sweeping political, electoral and judicial reforms.In power since 2012, Georgian Dream and its founder Ivanishvili — Georgia’s richest man — have faced mounting criticism from the West over the country’s worsening democratic record.Critics accuse Ivanishvili of persecuting political opponents and creating a corrupt system where private interests permeate politics.
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Belarus News Site Editor Arrested Over Extremism Suspicions
The chief editor of a popular internet news site in one of Belarus’ largest cities was detained Sunday on suspicion of extremism. The arrest Sunday of Hrodna.life editor Aliaksei Shota comes amid a crackdown on independent journalists and opponents of authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko. The publication focuses on Belarus’ fifth-largest city, Grodno. City police said the website “posted information products that were duly recognized as extremist,” but didn’t give details. It wasn’t immediately clear if Shota had been formally charged with extremism, which can carry a prison sentence of up to 10 years. Shota had collaborated with the country’s most popular internet portal Tut.by, which authorities closed this month after arresting 15 employees. Belarusian journalist Raman Pratasevich stands in an airport bus in the international airport outside Minsk, Belarus, May 23, 2021, in this photo released by Telegram Chanel t.me/motolkohelp. He was arrested shortly thereafter.Belarus’ crackdown escalated a week ago with the arrest of dissident journalist Raman Pratasevich and his girlfriend who were aboard a commercial flight that was diverted to the Minsk airport because of an alleged bomb threat. The flight was flying over Belarus en route from Athens, Greece, to Vilnius, Lithuania. The move sparked wide denunciation in the West as an act of hijacking and demands for Pratasevich’s release. The European Union banned flights from Belarus. Pratasevich is charged with organizing riots, a charge that carries a potential sentence of 15 years. The day after his arrest, authorities released a brief video in which Pratasevich said he was confessing, but observers said the statement appeared to be forced. The Belarusian human rights group Viasna said Sunday that Pratasevich had received a package from his sister but that an unspecified book had been taken from it. Large protests broke out last August after a presidential election that officials said overwhelmingly gave a sixth term in office to Lukashenko, who has consistently repressed opposition since coming to power in 1994. Police detained more than 30,000 people in the course of the protests, which persisted for months. Although protests died down during the winter, authorities have continued strong actions against opposition supporters and independent journalists.
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ICC Prosecutor Urges Sudan to Hand Over Darfur Suspects
The International Criminal Court’s prosecutor on Sunday urged Sudan’s transitional government to hand over suspects wanted for war crimes and genocide in the Darfur conflict, the Sudanese official news agency reported. ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda arrived in Sudan’s western Darfur region on Saturday to meet with authorities and affected communities in the region, the court said. Bensouda said she was inspired by “the resilience and courage” of the Darfur people. FILE – The International Criminal Court’s prosecutor Fatou Bensouda gives a press conference in Sudan’s capital Khartoum on October 20, 2020, at the conclusion of her five-day visit to the country.Among those wanted by the international court is former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, who has been in jail in Khartoum since his ouster in April 2019 and is facing several trials in Sudanese courts related to his three decades of authoritarian rule. The conflict in Sudan’s Darfur region broke out when rebels from the territory’s ethnic central and sub-Saharan African community launched an insurgency in 2003, complaining of oppression by the Arab-dominated government in Khartoum. Al-Bashir’s government responded with a campaign of aerial bombings and raids by militias known as Janjaweed, who stand accused of mass killings and rapes. Up to 300,000 people were killed and 2.7 million were driven from their homes. The ICC charged al-Bashir with war crimes and genocide for allegedly masterminding the campaign of attacks in Darfur. Sudanese prosecutors started last year their own investigation into the Darfur conflict. Also indicted by the court are two other senior figures from al-Bashir’s rule: Abdel-Rahim Muhammad Hussein, interior and defense minister during much of the conflict, and Ahmed Haroun, a senior security chief at the time and later the leader of al-Bashir’s ruling party. Both Hussein and Haroun have been under arrest in Khartoum since the Sudanese military, under pressure from protesters, ousted al-Bashir in April 2019. The court also indicted rebel leader Abdulla Banda, whose whereabouts is unknown, and Janjaweed leader Ali Kushayb, who was charged last week with crimes against humanity and war crimes. Bensouda and her team met Saturday with Darfur’s Gov. Mini Arko Minawi, who said the prosecutor’s main concern is to hand over those wanted by the court as soon as possible, and speed up the transfer of Haroun since his case is related to that of Kushayb. In a Sunday meeting with officials in North Darfur province, the ICC prosecutor said they would continue demanding the government hand over all those wanted by the court, SUNA reported. Sudan’s transitional government, which has promised democratic reforms and is led by a mix of civilian and military leaders, has previously said that war crime suspects including al-Bashir would be tried before the ICC, but the trial venue is a matter for negotiations with The Hague-based court.
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WHO Calls for 20 Million Vaccine Doses for Africa
The World Health Organization is asking for 20 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine for African countries to administer second doses to those who have received their first shot. After three weeks of declining rates of COVID-19 infections in Africa, the World Health Organization is reporting an increase in cases. It says its latest figures of more than 4.7 million cases, including 128,000 deaths indicate a 17% rise over the previous week. WHO regional director for Africa Matshidiso Moeti says she is concerned, but that it is too soon to tell whether Africa is on the cusp of a third wave. “While it is too soon to say if Africa is seeing a resurgence, however, we are seeing increases in a number of countries, we are monitoring the situation very closely. And we see that we are balancing on a knife’s edge,” she said. “So this makes the rapid rollout of COVID-19 vaccines all the more important.” Moeti says South Africa accounts for nearly one-third of the 65,000 new cases reported by WHO. She says she fears new variants of the virus circulating in South Africa may be spreading into neighboring countries. She notes Namibia and Zambia are among 11 African countries experiencing more cases. So far, 28 million COVID-19 doses of different vaccines have been administered in Africa, a continent of 1.4 billion people. Moeti says Africa needs at least 20 million second doses of the Oxford-Astra Zeneca vaccine by mid-July to give everyone who has received the first dose full immunity. “Africa needs vaccines now. Any pause in our vaccination campaigns will lead to lost lives and lost hope,” she said. “Another 200 million doses are needed so that the continent can vaccinate 10% of its population by September this year.” Moeti appeals to countries that have vaccinated their high-risk groups to share their excess doses with Africa. She notes France is the first country to donate tens of thousands of doses to Africa from its domestic supply. WHO says the European Union has pledged more than 100 million doses for low-income countries and the United States has promised to share 80 million doses with lower-income countries. Other wealthy countries have said they will follow suit.
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Texas Legislature Advances Voting Restrictions
Majority Republicans in the Texas Senate on Sunday approved one of the most restrictive new voting laws in the U.S. after rushing the bill to the floor in the middle of the night.The sweeping measure, known as Senate Bill 7, passed along party lines around 6 a.m. after eight hours of questioning by Democrats, who have virtually no path to stop it from becoming law. But the bill must still clear a final vote in the Texas House in order to reach Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, who is expected to sign it.“I have grave concerns about a bill that was crafted in the shadows and passed late at night,” said Democratic state Sen. Beverly Powell.Under revisions during closed-door negotiations, Republicans added language that could make it easier for a judge to overturn an election and pushed back the start of Sunday voting, when many Black churchgoers head to the polls. The 67-page measure would also eliminate drive-thru voting and 24-hour polling centers, both of which Harris County, the state’s largest Democratic stronghold, introduced last year.Texas is a key battleground in the GOP’s nationwide efforts to tighten voting laws, driven by former President Donald Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him. Georgia and Florida have also passed new voting restrictions. President Joe Biden on Saturday condemned the measures as “an assault on democracy.”The vote in the Texas Senate came after a final version of the bill had been made public Saturday. Around midnight, Republicans wielded their majority to suspend rules that would normally prohibit taking a vote on a bill that had not been posted for 24 hours, which Democrats protested as a breach of protocol that denied them and the public time to review the language first. The bill would newly empower partisan poll watchers by allowing them more access inside polling places and threatening criminal penalties against election officials who restrict their movement. Republicans originally proposed giving poll watchers the right to take photos, but that language was removed from the final bill that lawmakers were set to vote on this weekend. Another provision could also make it easier to overturn an election in Texas, allowing for a judge to void an outcome if the number of fraudulent votes cast could have changed the result, regardless of whether it was actually proven that fraud affected the outcome.Election officials would also face new criminal penalties, including felony charges for sending mail voting applications to people who did not request one. The Texas District and County Attorneys Association tweeted that it had counted in the bill at least 16 new, expanded or enhanced crimes related to elections.GOP legislators are also moving to prohibit Sunday voting before 1 p.m., which critics called an attack on what is commonly known as “souls to the polls” — a get-out-the-vote campaign used by Black church congregations nationwide. The idea traces back to the civil rights movement. Democratic state Rep. Nicole Collier, chairwoman of the Texas Legislative Black Caucus, said the change is “going to disengage, disenfranchise those who use the souls to the polls opportunity.”Pressed on the Senate floor over why Sunday voting couldn’t begin sooner, Republican Sen. Bryan Hughes said, “Election workers want to go to church, too.”Collier was one of three Democrats picked to negotiate the final version, none of whom signed their name to it. She said she saw a draft of the bill around 11 p.m. Friday — which was different than one she had received earlier that day — and was asked for her signature the next morning.Major corporations, including Texas-based American Airlines and Dell, have warned that the measures could harm democracy and the economic climate. But Republicans shrugged off their objections, and in some cases, ripped business leaders for speaking out.Texas already has some of the country’s tightest voting restrictions and is regularly cited by nonpartisan groups as a state where it is especially hard to vote. It was one of the few states that did not make it easier to vote by mail during the pandemic.The top Republican negotiators, Hughes and state Rep. Briscoe Cain, called the bill “one of the most comprehensive and sensible election reform bills” in Texas’ history.“Even as the national media minimizes the importance of election integrity, the Texas Legislature has not bent to headlines or corporate virtue signaling,” they said in a joint statement.Since Trump’s defeat, at least 14 states have enacted more restrictive voting laws, according to the New York-based Brennan Center for Justice. It has also counted nearly 400 bills filed this year nationwide that would restrict voting.Republican lawmakers in Texas have insisted that the changes are not a response to Trump’s false claims of widespread fraud but are needed to restore confidence in the voting process. But doubts about the election’s outcome have been fanned by some of the state’s top GOP leaders, including Attorney General Ken Paxton, who led a failed lawsuit at the U.S. Supreme Court to try to overturn the election.Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who chaired Trump’s presidential campaign in Texas, offered a $1 million reward to anyone who could produce evidence of voter fraud. Nonpartisan investigations of previous elections have found that voter fraud is exceedingly rare. State officials from both parties, including in Texas, as well as international observers have also said the 2020 election went well.
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Ethiopians Protest US Sanctions Over Brutal Tigray War
Thousands of Ethiopians gathered in the nation’s capital Sunday to protest outside pressure on the government over its brutal war in Tigray. Protesters at the rally in Addis Ababa carried banners that criticized the United States and others in the international community who are voicing concern over atrocities in Tigray, where Ethiopian forces are hunting down the region’s ousted and now-fugitive leaders. Troops from neighboring Eritrea are fighting in Tigray on the side of Ethiopian government forces, in defiance of international calls for their withdrawal. But the protesters in Addis Ababa carried placards that read: “Ethiopian young people denounce the western intervention.” Others said Ethiopia’s sovereignty was at stake. The U.S. said last week it has started restricting visas for government and military officials of Ethiopia and Eritrea, who are seen as undermining efforts to resolve the fighting in Tigray, home to an estimated 6 million of Ethiopia’s 110 million people. Besides the visa restrictions, Washington is imposing wide-ranging restrictions on economic and security assistance to Ethiopia.
Testifying on Capitol Hill last week, Robert Godec, the U.S. acting assistant secretary for the Bureau of African Affairs, said Ethiopia is now at a turning point and, unless it reverses course, could face further measures such as Magnitsky Act sanctions that can include asset freezes. Atrocities including brutal gang-rapes, extrajudicial killings and forced evictions have been part of the violence in Tigray, according to victims, witnesses, local authorities and aid groups. Thousands of people are estimated to have died. The Ethiopian government called U.S. actions “misguided” and “regrettable.” “The Ethiopian government will not be deterred by this unfortunate decision of the U.S. administration,” said the statement tweeted by the ministry of foreign affairs. “If such a resolve to meddle in our internal affairs and undermining the century-old bilateral ties continues unabated, the government of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia will be forced to reassess its relations with the United States, which might have implications beyond our bilateral relationship,” said the statement. The crisis began in November after Ethiopia accused former leaders of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, or TPLF, of ordering an attack on an Ethiopian army base in the region. Troops sent by Ethiopia’s leader, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, quickly ousted the TPLF from major cities and towns, but guerrilla fighting is still reported across Tigray. More than 2 million people have been displaced by the war.
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Oldest American, Fastest Woman on Everest Return Safely
A retired attorney from Chicago who became the oldest American to scale Mount Everest, and a Hong Kong teacher who is now the fastest female climber of the world’s highest peak, on Sunday returned safely from the mountain where climbing teams have struggled with bad weather and a coronavirus outbreak.Arthur Muir, 75, scaled the peak earlier this month, beating the record set by another American, Bill Burke, at age 67.Tsang Yin-hung, 45, of Hong Kong scaled the summit from the base camp in 25 hours and 50 minutes, and became the fastest female climber. The record of 10 hours and 56 minutes is held by a Sherpa guide, Lakpa Gelu.Tsang Yin-hung, 45, of Hong Kong who scaled Mount Everest from the base camp in 25 hours and 50 minutes, and became the fastest female climber gestures to media as she arrives in Kathmandu, Nepal, May 30, 2021.A climbing accident on Everest in 2019, when Muir hurt his ankle falling off a ladder, did not deter him from attempting to scale the peak again. He began mountaineering late in life, and said he was scared and anxious during his latest adventure.“You realize how big a mountain it is, how dangerous it is, how many things that could go wrong. Yeah, it makes you nervous, it makes you know some anxiety there and maybe little bit of scared,” Muir told reporters in Kathmandu.“I was just surprised when I actually got to there (the summit) but I was too tired to stand up, and in my summit pictures I am sitting down,” he said.Muir began mountaineering at age 68 with trips to South America and Alaska before attempting Everest in 2019, when he fell off the ladder.Climbing was closed last year due to the pandemic.Married and a father of three, Muir has six grandchildren. The last one — a boy — was born while he was still in the mountains during his current expedition.Tsang made only two stops between the base camp, located at 5,300 meters, to the 8,849-meter summit to change, and covered the near vertical distance in 25 hours and 50 minutes.She was lucky because there were barely any climbers on the way to the highest camp at South Col. After that, on her way to the summit, she met only climbers making their descent, which did not slow her speed climb.There are only a few days of good weather left on the mountain this year, when hundreds of climbers line up to the summit, many having to wait for a long time in the traffic jam on the highest trail.“I just feel kind of relief and happy because I am not looking for breaking a record,” she said. “I feel relieved because I can prove my work to my friends, to my students.”She made a previous attempt on May 11, but bad weather forced her to turn back from a point very close to the summit. She then returned last Sunday. “For the summit, it is not just your ability, team work, I think luck is very important,” she said.An outbreak of the coronavirus among climbers and their guides at the Everest base camp has forced at least three teams to cancel their expeditions. But hundreds of others have pushed through attempting to scale the summit, at a time Nepal is in lockdown battling its worst surge in COVID-19.
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Ukrainian Ambassador in Thailand Dies on Resort Island
The Ukrainian ambassador to Thailand collapsed and died on Sunday while on a resort island with his family, authorities said.Andrii Beshta, 44, was declared dead on Lipe Island in southern Satun province, Gov. Ekkarat Leesen told The Associated Press.Police quoted his teenage son, who was staying in the same hotel room, as saying his father vomited and fainted early Sunday. He said he was feeling fine before. Police said they suspect he may have suffered a heart failure.Leesen said the body was sent to the police hospital for an autopsy.Beshta had assumed the post of ambassador in January 2016. He is survived by his wife, daughter and two sons, according to a bio on the embassy’s website.
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Australians Rush for Vaccines as COVID Lockdown Continues in Victoria
Record numbers of COVID-19 vaccinations have been completed in Australia as a snap seven-day lockdown continues in the nation’s second most-populous state.Seven million people in Victoria are subject to strict stay-at-home orders after a growing cluster of infections was detected in recent days. Australia has managed to mostly contain the coronavirus through lockdowns, the closure of its international borders and strict quarantine measures for returning citizens, but the national vaccination program has been beset by supply issues and hesitancy among many Australians.There are estimated to be 100 active coronavirus cases in Australia, according to the Health Department. About half are in Victoria, which is under a seven-day lockdown. It is the state’s fourth shutdown since the pandemic began.The number of infections in Australia is small compared to other countries, including Japan, Brazil and the United States.However, community transmission of the virus has been rare in recent months and the outbreak in Victoria is significant.There has been complacency in the community and mounting hesitancy about vaccines and possible side effects, which have delayed the national inoculation plan.Health authorities in Victoria, though, have said the lockdown has sent residents flocking to injection centers across the country in record numbers.However, some experts believe that it might be too late to prevent another wave of infections in Australia’s second most populous state.“We have been here before,” said Dr. Michelle Ananda-Rajah, an infectious diseases expert at Melbourne’s Alfred Hospital. “I think, though, that the stakes are higher this time because we have all the factors for what is essentially a perfect storm. We have a largely unvaccinated population; we have winter approaching, and we have an unforgiving variant on the loose at the moment. You know, Victoria is primed at the moment for a third wave, and we need to do everything possible to prevent that from happening.”Melbourne, the Victoria state capital, endured Australia’s longest COVID-19 lockdown last year. Once again, the nation’s second-biggest city finds itself under tight restrictions.Masks are now mandatory. Places of worship and schools are closed. Victorians can only leave home for essential work, shopping, exercise, caregiving or to get a coronavirus vaccine.Businesses are facing heavy losses.A man infected with a highly contagious COVID-19 variant who stayed at a quarantine hotel for returning travelers is thought to be the source of the outbreak.Australia has recorded more than 30,000 coronavirus cases and 910 deaths since the pandemic began, according to government statistics.
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Tanzanian Muslims Fear Missing Hajj Due to Vaccination Delay
Saudi Arabia is requiring all pilgrims for the scaled-back, annual Hajj in July to be vaccinated against COVID-19. In Tanzania, where vaccinations have still not begun, Muslims hoping to go to Mecca are urging authorities to start jabbing. Charles Kombe reports from Dar es Salaam.
Camera: Rajabu Hassan Producer: Robert Raffaele
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Mali’s New President Heads to ECOWAS After Double Coup
West African leaders will meet in Ghana on Sunday to discuss a response to Mali’s second coup in nine months, with the new president Colonel Assimi Goita attending.The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) invited Goita to come to Ghana’s capital Accra for “consultations” ahead of an extraordinary summit on Sunday devoted to Mali, according to a letter from the 15-nation bloc seen by AFP.He flew to Accra on Saturday, military and airport sources said.In a statement on Facebook, the office of the Mali presidency said Goita would “take part alongside his counterparts in the sub-region.”He had served as vice president since leading a coup last August that ousted the democratically elected president, with the roles of president and prime minister held by civilians after pressure from ECOWAS, which has served as a mediator.However, on Monday, soldiers detained transitional president Bah Ndaw and prime minister Moctar Ouane, releasing them on Thursday while saying that they had resigned.The twin arrests triggered a diplomatic uproar and marked the second apparent coup within a year in the Sahel country.Mali’s constitutional court completed Goita’s rise to full power on Friday by naming him transitional president.With the junta going back on its previous commitment to civilian political leaders, doubts have been raised about its other pledges, including holding elections in early 2020.The junta said this week it would continue to respect that timetable but added that it could be subject to change.The constitutional court said Goita would “exercise the functions of transitional president to lead the transition process to its conclusion.”Sanctions threatECOWAS, which issued sanctions against Mali after the August coup before lifting them when the transitional government was put in place, will meet from 2:00 pm (1400 GMT) in Accra on Sunday.The 15-nation bloc has warned of reimposing sanctions on the country, as has the United States and former colonial power France.French leader Emmanuel Macron, during a visit to Rwanda and South Africa, said Saturday that he told West African leaders they could not back a country “where there is no longer democratic legitimacy or transition.”Ndaw and Ouane’s detention came hours after a government reshuffle that would have replaced the defense and security ministers, both of whom were army officers involved in the August putsch.On Friday, Goita said the army had had little choice but to intervene.”We had to choose between disorder and cohesion within the defense and security forces and we chose cohesion,” he said.Goita added that he wants to name a prime minister from the opposition M5 movement within days.M5 spearheaded protests against former president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita in 2020 that built up pressure ahead of his ouster, but it was excluded from key posts in the army-dominated post-coup administration.A rapprochement with the group might serve to soften domestic and foreign criticism of the military.Mali is regularly ranked among the world’s poorest countries. The previous ECOWAS sanctions were felt hard by the country, which is reeling from numerous crises including a grinding jihadist insurgency.
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Immigrant Advocates in US Push New Efforts to Bring Back Some Deportees
Jesus Lopez says he feels like a stranger in the place he was born.He’s from Guadalajara, Mexico, but his life was in Chicago. After 15 years in the city, he was deported a year ago during the COVID-19 pandemic.”I want to go back because I belong there. That’s where I have my friends, my family,” said the 25-year-old, who was once a recipient of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program that gives protections to immigrants brought to the U.S. as children.Lopez, who said he didn’t renew his spot in the program because he couldn’t afford it, hopes to benefit from new efforts by advocates, groups and attorneys to bring back immigrants they believe were unfairly deported from the United States.Jesus Lopez, who was deported from the U.S. last year, holds up his Illinois driver’s license and a family snapshot, at his home in Zapopan, Jalisco state, Mexico, May 13, 2021. “I belong there,” the DACA recipient says of Chicago.With President Joe Biden in office, one of the new proposals from advocates urges creating a centralized Department of Homeland Security office to consider requests from deported immigrants trying to reunite with their families in the U.S.”We have deported hundreds of thousands of individuals, and to do that and not even have an effective safety valve to review bad decisions violates due process,” said Nayna Gupta, associate director of policy for the National Immigrant Justice Center, the Washington-based nonprofit that proposed the idea.It’s a long shot: White House officials have never publicly mentioned the idea, and it doesn’t yet have a supporter in Congress. The campaign, however, shows how immigrant advocacy has become emboldened after four years of hardline immigration policies under former President Donald Trump.It also shows how varied ambitions are among pro-immigrant advocates.Bills in CongressMany are focused instead on immigration bills that have passed the House but appear stalled in the Senate as large numbers of unaccompanied children crossing the border have weakened the White House’s position. The measures would give legal status to DACA recipients like Lopez, more farmworkers and others with special protections.Another bill Biden proposed to offer a path to citizenship for immigrants in the country illegally includes some chance for deportees to come back to the U.S. But the Biden administration has not spoken publicly or answered questions about the possibility of regularly considering those requests.More than 700,000 immigrants have been deported from the U.S. in the last three fiscal years, according to federal data. U.S. law includes ways for deportees to return, but they rarely succeed.Claudio Rojas, a 55-year-old handyman who was deported from the U.S. in 2019, is pictured in his home in Moreno, Argentina, May 8, 2021. His wife, two sons and two grandsons remained in Florida.For some deportees, the change of administration offers hope.Claudio Rojas says he feels better since Trump left office, but he still lives with anxiety and can’t sleep some nights in his Buenos Aires home.”I am not in a detention center, but I feel like I am in jail in my own apartment. I am in Argentina, but I feel I am a foreigner. I can’t adapt,” said Rojas, 55, a handyman deported in 2019. His wife, two sons and two grandsons are in Florida.Rojas and his family overstayed a tourist visa. After a decade, he ended up in federal custody after he was stopped by police and received a deportation order. Rojas did not leave, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement detained him again for seven months. He held a widely publicized hunger strike, and two filmmakers made a documentary based on his experience and that of others.Awaiting a rulingDays before Rojas was to speak at the 2019 Miami Film Festival, he was detained again and deported. The Argentinian has sued and is waiting for a decision from a federal appeals court.”I want back the life I lost, all this time that I lost,” Rojas said.The National Immigrant Justice Center says Congress doesn’t need to act on its proposal and that creation of a centralized process to review applications could be done through executive action because it is based on existing laws.Jesus Lopez works in his family’s carpentry workshop in Zapopan, Jalisco state, Mexico, May 13, 2021. Lopez arrived in the U.S. when he was 9 on a tourist visa that later expired. He became a Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipient in 2012.The plan asks the government to take into account factors such as people who were eligible for legal status and had applied before being deported or those who have compelling circumstances.The proposal has been shared with White House staff, the group said. It plans to invite Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to discuss the proposal and include a letter signed by 75 immigrant rights organizations supporting the plan.A White House spokesperson referred questions about the proposal to the Department of Homeland Security, which did not immediately respond.Reunification of familiesAdvocates point to how the government has started reunifying families that the Trump administration separated at the border under its “zero tolerance” policy.”In the process of doing that, hopefully the various agencies involved recognize that this is something that can be done, that we have processes in place, such as humanitarian parole, to bring people back,” said Alina Das, co-director of the Immigrant Rights Clinic at New York University School of Law.And while efforts to bring back deported veterans have persisted for years, advocates have started a new campaign with that goal, which during his campaign Biden promised to carry out.In February, three California lawmakers reintroduced a bill to allow certain deported veterans to return.”If someone deserves a second chance, those are our veterans,” Democratic state Representative Mark Takano said recently.Besides that effort, DACA might have the most chance of success in Congress.Arrested, detained, deportedLopez, the Mexican immigrant, was 9 when he was brought to the U.S., and he became a DACA recipient in 2012. He didn’t renew those protections a few years later because he couldn’t afford it.He was arrested in 2019 when Iowa police stopped the car he was riding in with friends and found a small amount of marijuana. He ended up in ICE custody and was released nine months later.Last year, Lopez traveled from Chicago with his two brothers to what he thought was a routine ICE check-in in Iowa. Instead, he was detained and deported.He said he dreams of going back to Chicago to work at construction, live with his family and help his grandmother with errands.”This new administration gives me the hope of thinking that they see things in a more human way,” Lopez said.
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Pro-Palestinian Rally in Washington Seeks End to US Aid to Israel
More than 1,000 people rallied Saturday in Washington in support of Palestinians and called for an end to U.S. aid to Israel.The demonstration on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial came as a cease-fire that ended 11 days of intense fighting between Israel and the Islamist movement Hamas in the Gaza Strip has held.”We are hoping to send a clear message to the United States government that the days of supporting the Israeli state without repercussions are over,” one of the demonstrators, 39-year-old Washington lawyer Sharif Silmi, said as he stood in the crowd where many protesters held red, white, green and black Palestinian flags.”We will stand against any politician that continues to fund weapons to Israel. We will oppose them, we will vote against them, we will fund their opponents, until we vote them out of office,” Silmi said.Lama Alahmad, a resident of neighboring Virginia who is of Palestinian origin, said that U.S. public opinion is turning in favor of the Palestinian cause.”There is a huge change” going on in the U.S. with regard to the Palestinian cause to secure a sovereign homeland, Alahmad said.”We just want the world to recognize that we are human beings. We are not terrorists,” said Alahmad, a 43-year-old stay-at-home mother who grew up in the United Arab Emirates before moving to the U.S. about 20 years ago.Silmi insisted there was growing opposition in the U.S. to how Israel treats the Palestinians, which he likened to apartheid in South Africa.”People have now woken up, and we’re resisting. Whether young Jews, young Muslims, young Blacks, young whites, there is a generational shift. And people are working across ethnic groups, racial groups, to work for change and freedom and liberation for Palestinian people,” Silmi said.
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Myanmar COVID-19 Outbreak Hits Health System Shattered After Coup
Breathless, fevered and without the extra oxygen that could help keep them alive, the new coronavirus patients at a hospital near Myanmar’s border with India highlight the threat to a health system near collapse since February’s coup.To help her tend the seven COVID-19 patients at Cikha hospital, day and night, chief nurse Lun Za En has a lab technician and a pharmacist’s assistant.Mostly, they offer kind words and acetaminophen.”We don’t have enough oxygen, enough medical equipment, enough electricity, enough doctors or enough ambulances,” Lun Za En, 45, told Reuters from the town of just more than 10,000. “We are operating with three staff instead of 11.”Myanmar’s anti-COVID campaign foundered along with the rest of the health system after the military seized power on Feb. 1 and overthrew elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose government had stepped up testing, quarantine and treatment.Services at public hospitals collapsed after many doctors and nurses joined strikes in a Civil Disobedience Movement at the forefront of the opposition to military rule — and sometimes on the front line of the protests that have been bloodily suppressed.Thirteen medics have been killed, according to World Health Organization data that shows 179 attacks on health workers, facilities and transportation, nearly half of all such attacks recorded worldwide this year, said WHO Myanmar representative Stephan Paul Jost.About 150 health workers have been arrested. Hundreds more doctors and nurses are wanted on incitement charges.Neither a junta spokesman nor the health ministry responded to requests for comment. The junta, which initially made fighting the pandemic one of its priorities, has repeatedly urged medics to return to work. Few have responded.Testing collapsedA worker at one COVID-19 quarantine center in Myanmar’s commercial capital, Yangon, said all the specialist health workers there had joined the Civil Disobedience Movement.”Then again, we don’t receive new patients any more as COVID test centers don’t have staff to test,” said the worker, who declined to give his name for fear of retribution.In the week before the coup, COVID-19 tests nationally averaged more than 17,000 a day. That had fallen below 1,200 a day in the seven days through Wednesday.Myanmar has reported more than 3,200 COVID-19 deaths from more than 140,000 cases, although the slump in testing has raised doubts over data that shows new cases and deaths have largely plateaued since the coup.Now, a health system in crisis is raising concerns about the likely impact of the variants that are sweeping through India, Thailand and other neighbors.Patients with COVID-19 symptoms started showing up at Cikha hospital in mid-May. It is only 6 kilometers from India, and health workers fear the illness could be the highly infectious B.1.617.2 strain, though they lack the means to test for it.”It’s very concerning that COVID-19 testing, treatment and vaccinations are extremely limited in Myanmar as more lives are at risk with new, more dangerous variants spreading,” said Luis Sfeir-Younis, Myanmar COVID-19 operations manager for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.Surge of casesTwenty-four cases have been identified in Cikha, said Za En, the nurse. Seven were so serious they needed hospitalization.Stay-at-home orders have now been declared in parts of Chin state, where Cikha is located, and neighboring Sagaing region.The WHO said it was trying to reach authorities and other groups in the area who could provide help, while recognizing the difficulties in a health system that was precipitously reversing years of impressive gains.”It is not clear how this will be resolved, unless there is a resolution at the political level addressing the political conflict,” Jost said.Za En said her hospital was doing the best it could with nebulizers — machines that turn liquid to mist — to relieve breathlessness. Some patients have oxygen concentrators, but they only work for the two hours a day that the town gets electricity.Refusing to abandon the sick, Za En said she decided not to join the strikes.”The junta will not take care of our patients,” she said.Across Myanmar, some striking doctors have set up underground clinics to help patients. When Myanmar Red Cross volunteers established three clinics in Yangon neighborhoods, they quickly had dozens of patients.At best, such options can provide basic care.”Eighty percent of the hospitals are public health hospitals,” said Marjan Besuijen, head of mission for the Medicins Sans Frontieres (MSF) aid group. “As MSF or others we can’t step in, it’s too big.”Although military hospitals have been opened to the public, many people fear them or refuse to go on principle, including for coronavirus vaccinations in a campaign the ousted government had launched days before the coup.”I am very worried that these new infections will spread all over the country,” Za En said. “If the infection spreads to the crowded cities, it could be uncontrollable.”
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Family of American Killed in Kenya Wants Separate Probe
The family of an American investor of Somali origin whose body was found with torture wounds days after he went missing in Nairobi wants Kenya’s director of public prosecutions to run a separate investigation from one being done by police.In a letter sent through their lawyer, relatives of Bashir Mohamed Mohamud, 36, question the behavior of police after Mohamud disappeared in an apparent abduction.The family questioned the time it took police to ask them to positively identify Mohamud when he had been identified days before they were notified. In the letter delivered to the DPP’s office this week, they asked why the shell of Mohamud’s burned Range Rover was taken away within minutes after the vehicle was linked to him.The family delivered the letter even as local media published stories quoting unnamed sources without evidence insinuating that Mohamud was funding extremism through money transfers made by his construction company, Infinity Development Limited.Human rights defenders in Kenya have previously illustrated how police linked slaying victims to extremism or robberies to explain unsolved killings.Wilfred Ollal, the coordinator of a network of community-based social justice centers in Kenya, said people disappear every week before their bodies are found in the countryside, while others are never found.The killings and forced disappearances are rampant in low-income areas of the capital, but nobody is immune, he said.”Our interventions save some, but the bodies of others are found in rivers,” Ollal said Saturday.Police, without producing any evidence, attempt to explain such killings on social media pages associated with the force by saying the person killed was a criminal who would have bribed his way to freedom, if arrested and prosecuted. Both claims have been proven false by the media and human rights activists. According to rights group Missing Persons, Kenyan police killed 157 people in 2020 and 10 people disappeared without a trace after being arrested.According to Mohamud’s family and police, he was abducted on May 13 by unknown assailants as he drove from a mall in Nairobi’s wealthy Lavington neighborhood. The family reported him missing three days later, and police reported finding his body the same day in Kerugoya, a town 127 kilometers (78.91 miles) north of the city.Relatives question why they were not informed until May 22, when police had identified the body as Mohamud’s by at least May 18.An autopsy carried out by Kenya’s chief government pathologist revealed that Mohamud had been strangled. The autopsy report said the body showed signs of torture that included blunt head trauma and burn marks, suspected to have been caused by a vehicle’s cigarette lighter.
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DR Congo Eruption ‘False Alarm’ as Humanitarian Crisis Mounts
DR Congo’s government mistakenly announced Saturday that another volcano had erupted, later admitting it was a false alarm, with the scare coming a week after Mount Nyiragongo roared back into life, causing devastation and sparking a mass exodus.The blunder comes as the government is increasingly being criticized for a looming humanitarian crisis, with about 400,000 residents having evacuated the eastern city of Goma after a week of rolling aftershocks.More suffering briefly seemed imminent when the government said that Murara volcano, considered to be a crater of Mount Nyamuragira just 25 kilometers (15 miles) north of Goma, had erupted Saturday morning.Goma, DRCAbout 80,000 households — 400,000 inhabitants — have moved out of the city since Thursday, when a “preventative” evacuation order was given.Goma was quiet Saturday, with a handful of vehicles on the semi-deserted streets and only some small shops open, an AFP journalist said.’I have nothing left’Around 3,000 people fleeing Goma sought refuge at a temporary camp in Rugerero, about 10 kilometers (six miles) over the Rwandan border.But Saturday, an estimated 1,200 had left to return to Goma, a Rwanda government official at Rugerero told AFP on condition of anonymity. Military trucks were seen transporting refugees to the border.William Byukusenge, a construction worker, told AFP that “if it erupts again, we will come back to Rwanda”.But another evacuee, Marie Claire Uwineza, said she had nowhere left to go.”My house was burned, and I have nothing left,” said the 39-year-old, who fled with two of her children.People carry their belongings as they evacuate from recurrent earth tremors as aftershocks after homes were covered with lava deposited by the eruption of Mount Nyiragongo near Goma, in the Democratic Republic of Congo May 25, 2021.Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi held a cabinet meeting Friday in which he called on the government to “redouble its efforts to better deal with the humanitarian situation”.Criticism has been growing over the government response after Thursday’s evacuation order was met with fear and traffic jams, many not knowing where to go.”The population had the impression of being abandoned to their sad fate,” said the newspaper EcoNews, calling it “a perfect illustration of the fact that the state does not exist”.”The state has decided to evacuate the population of Goma and Nyiragongo without giving any help,” citizen movement Lucha tweeted.Prime Minister Jean-Michel Sama Lukonde defended the government’s response, saying the event had “no similarity to previous eruptions in that it occurred without warning signs”.The mounting humanitarian crisis comes in a region that has been ravaged by violence for three decades. Access to drinkable water is particularly urgent, according to aid organizations in the area.”Sometimes it’s the war, now it’s the volcano,” a customs officers grumbled Saturday.
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British Prime Minister Weds Fiancee in Secret, Reports Say
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson married his fiancee, Carrie Symonds, in a secret ceremony at Westminster Cathedral on Saturday, The Sun and Mail on Sunday newspapers reported.A spokeswoman for Johnson’s Downing Street office declined to comment on the reports.Both newspapers said that guests were invited at the last minute to the central London ceremony, and that even senior members of Johnson’s office were unaware of the wedding plans.Weddings in England are currently limited to 30 people because of COVID-19 restrictions.The Catholic cathedral was suddenly locked down at 1:30 p.m. (1230 GMT) and Symonds, 33, arrived 30 minutes later in a limo, in a long white dress with no veil, both reports said.Johnson, 56, and Symonds, 33, have been living together in Downing Street since Johnson became prime minister in 2019.Last year they announced they were engaged and that they were expecting a child, and their son, Wilfred Lawrie Nicholas Johnson, was born in April 2020.Earlier this month the Sun had reported that wedding invitations had been sent to friends and family for July 2022.Johnson has a complicated private life. He was once sacked from the Conservative Party’s policy team while in opposition for lying about an extramarital affair. He has been divorced twice and refuses to say how many children he has fathered.Johnson’s last marriage was to Marina Wheeler, a lawyer. They had four children together but announced in September 2018 that they had separated.
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