South Sudan rebels kidnap eight local aid workers: military

South Sudanese rebels have kidnapped eight locals working for a U.S. charity and are demanding aid deliveries as ransom, a military spokesman said on Monday, as food in the famine-hit nation looks increasingly likely to become a weapon of war.

The aid workers were taken from a village near Mayendit, about 420 miles (680 km) northeast of the capital of Juba, Brigadier General Lul Ruai Koang told Reuters.

"The rebels attacked and abducted eight local staff from Samaritan's Purse and they are being held to ransom. They have demanded that the organisation takes aid to them," he said.

No one at the charity was available for comment.

Clashes between the army and rebels killed at least 23 people and injured 56 in the same area on Sunday, Koang said, with the insurgents attacking government positions, looting and setting fire to houses in the oil-rich Bieh state.

"They attacked our position on Sunday. Our forces fought back in self defence and managed to repulse the attackers," he said.

A rebel spokesman was not immediately available for comment.

South Sudan, the world's youngest nation, has been mired in civil war since President Salva Kiir, an ethnic Dinka, sacked his deputy Riek Machar, a Nuer, in 2013.

The fighting has split much of the country along ethnic lines and paralysed agriculture, prompting the U.N. to declare last month that parts of the country are suffering from famine.

-Reuters

At least 50 people killed in garbage dump landslide in Ethiopia

 Desperate parents scrabbled through a towering pile of fetid garbage in the Ethiopian capital on Monday, screaming the names of missing children buried in a landslide after a mound of trash collapsed on an informal settlement killing at least 50.

"My babies, my babies, my little daughter," cried one man wandering through the site, tears streaming down his face. Neighbours said he had lost four children.

The landslide late on Saturday also destroyed 49 dwellings and left 28 people injured, city spokesman Amare Mekonen said.

Hundreds of people live on the 50-year-old Reppi dump, the city's only landfill site, scavenging for food and items they can sell such as recyclable metal.

The tragedy highlights the desperate poverty that drags down many Ethiopian families despite the country's rapid economic growth and government moves to position the East African nation as a regional power.

On Monday, rescuers used bulldozers to move piles of trash as hundreds of people gathered at the scene, weeping and praying. Some dug through the garbage with their hands.

A ripple of dread ran through the crowd as a body was unearthed and taken away, wrapped in a sheet. Earlier, residents angrily turned on journalists filming the scene, driving them away with stones.

Meselu Damte, the neighbour of the weeping man, said he lost his wife and four children.

"Their bodies were found in the morning," she said. "There are still houses that are to be found and many of my neighbours are inside."

Ethiopia is one of Africa's fastest growing economies, largely fuelled by government-driven investment, but the drive to industrialise has also stoked discontent among those who feel left behind.

In October, the government imposed a national state of emergency after more than 500 people were killed in protests in Oromiya region as anger over a development scheme for the capital sparked broader anti-government demonstrations.

-Reuters

Mubarak to be released from detention

Hosni Mubarak, who was overthrown as president of Egypt in an uprising in 2011, will be released from detention in a military hospital, the public prosecutor ruled on Monday, his lawyers and judicial sources said.

"He will go to his home in Heliopolis," Mubarak's lawyer Farid El Deeb said, adding the ageing former president would likely be released Tuesday or soon after.

Mubarak was cleared of murder charges this month in his final trial, having faced various charges ranging from corruption to ordering the killing of protesters who ended his 30-year-rule.

He had one more jail sentence to serve but was cleared after serving time for the murder charges, judicial sources and the state news agency said.

The prosecution subtracted the time served in the murder case from the time he was meant to serve for a separate case in which he was found guilty of appropriating funds reserved for maintaining presidential palaces.

Mubarak was originally sentenced to life in prison in 2012 for conspiring to murder 239 demonstrators during the 18-day revolt - an uprising that sowed chaos and created a security vacuum but also inspired hope for democracy and social justice.

An appeals court ordered a retrial that culminated in 2014 in the case against Mubarak and his senior officials being dropped. An appeal by the public prosecution led to a final retrial by the Court of Cassation, the highest in the country, which acquitted him on March 2.

-Reuters

NVBF to organise national league

The Nigeria Volleyball Federation (NVBF) has said it had adopted modalities to commence a national league soon.

Habu Gumel, President of NVBF told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that the national league was of importance to federations.

“The league is very important to any national federation.

“We have agreed on how we can do the league through the zones so that we come up to the national, and the league is going to start very soon.

“We have adopted the system we are going to use and now we have written to sponsors and we believe most likely that we are going to get sponsors that will sponsor the league.’’

Gumel said that the federation had already written letters to some states and companies seeking to sponsor the federation’s 2017 championship in both the indoor and beach games.

He said that Nigeria would host the zones championship of volleyball to which no fewer than nine countries would attend in Lagos.

The NVBF president said a date had yet to be fixed for the championship which would feature over 150 participants.

“So many programmes are lined up for this year which we have discussed but the most important thing is to ensure that we get good sponsors that can help us so that we can finish all these programmes without any problem.

“I want to seize this opportunity to appeal to the private sector to please support sports because government cannot do it alone.

“Government has so many sectors to take care of; so, naturally, the private sector will have to compliment the effort of government.’’

-NAN

Nigerian govt. earmarks N701bn for electricity

The Federal Government says it is committed to providing N701 billion as guaranty to electricity to ensure market liquidity in the country’s power sector.

Alhaji Mustapha Baba-Shehuri, the Minister of State for Power, Works and Housing, disclosed this on Monday in Keffi, Nasarawa State.

Baba-Shehuri spoke on “Power Generation, Distribution and Transmission in Nigeria’’ at the 58th annual conference of the Association of Nigerian Geographers (ANG).

The theme of the conference is: “Geography, Nation-Building and Environmental Change’’.

The minister identified lack of political will, policy direction in the past, current fluctuation, poor management and inadequate power supply, among others, as some of the challenges facing the power sector.

Baba-Shehuri said that the present government was committed to addressing the problem of power sector so as to improve electricity supply for the benefit of Nigerians and the overall development of the country.

“We are all aware that the importance of power supply to the socio-economic development of the country cannot be over-emphasised as the federal government is doing its best in addressing the challenges facing the sector.

“The federal government is making serious commitment in ensuring that the problem of vandalism of infrastructure is completely addressed for the overall development of the country.

“His Excellency, the Vice President was recently in the Niger Delta region as part of efforts to address the problem of gas/pipeline vandalisation as its affect the power generation in the country.

“As a result of the government efforts, we could notice sufficient and significant power improvement with power generation hovering around 4,000MW and above compared to what is obtained as 2,000MW power generation a month ago,” he said.

The Minister of Water Resources and Rural Development, Mr Suleiman Adamu, urged the association to continue to provide solutions to the nation’s environmental problems.

On his part, the Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Mr Usani Usani Uguru, who presented a paper titled “Appreciating Change in the context of Globalisation: Geographic Paradigm”, said that President Muhammadu Buhari came to rescue Nigeria from decaying.

Also speaking, the Minister of State for Environment, Alhaji Ibrahim Jibrin, who presented a paper on “Environmental Issues in Nigeria: the Change Agenda’’, said that the federal government was genuinely committed to addressing environmental challenges for the benefit of the people.

Earlier, in a welcome address, the National President of the association, Prof. Kayode Oyesiku, said that one of the key goals of geography was to help citizens realise their responsibilities for the future of the plant earth.

He said that the association would continue to embark on research in order to proffer solutions to the nation’s environmental challenges.

-NAN

TO THE UNKNOWN HUSBAND (1)

Dear future husband, please answer these questions:

When are you coming for me?
When are you bringing the band with the beautiful rock?
When do you intend to stop deceiving yourself and find me already?
When do I drop daddy's name for yours?
When do I begin to make you breakfast each morning and knot your tie, (if you ever wear one) bidding you the best day at work? Just whennnn?

When do we begin to make love (oh yeah! And don't you start thinking am such a rotten pretty thing!) and make cute babies together? (Now that got my eyes teary)
When do I get to fight and argue with you in endless chatter, till we run round the house like kids, throwing sofa pillows around?
When do I get to experience those beautiful morning devotions with you while you hold my hands in prayers? Just when baby?

And just when do I get to slip those tiny sweet notes into your pocket for you to find, read, at those few times we'd ever be apart?
When do I get to have a mother-in-law, papa-in-law, brother/sister-in-laws, niece/nephew-in-laws? (if there's anything like that)
Just when do we get to christen our tiny little cuties those beautiful names I have been saving up all the years?

When do you get to comb my hair and try making your bad braids of them, and when do I get to nag you to drop both pair of your stockings at the same spot?
Darling, when do you get to hold my shoulders, kiss my fore head, pray with me and reassure me all would be fine in Christ???

Your lady is waiting.

UN warns Burundi’s Nkurunziza

Any attempt by President Pierre Nkurunziza to seek a fourth term in office risks undermining collective efforts to find a sustainable solution to the political crisis in Burundi, says the Special Adviser to the UN Secretary-General for Conflict Prevention, Jamal Benomar.

Benomar spoke while presenting the Secretary-General’s Report on Burundi to the Security Council just as he expressed concern about the worsening human rights situation in the country.

The senior UN official, warned that political crisis in Burundi has continued to deepen amid serious human rights violations, mass displacements of people and economic degradation.

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) had documented allegations of extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests and forced disappearances, as well as cases of torture and ill-treatm0ent, he said.

Benomar added that there had been more than 210 cases of enforced disappearances between October 2016 and January 2017.

According to him, many live in fear of the Imbonerakure, the ruling party’s youth militia.

“On the humanitarian front, the number of people needing assistance in 2016 had reached three million – or 26 per cent of the population – and there had been a four-fold increase in the number of those who were food insecure.

“Some 8.2 million people – or 75 per cent of the population – were affected by malaria, he said, adding that almost 390,000 Burundians had fled the country since the start of the crisis.”

He said the interim report of the internal dialogue led by the Government-established National Commission for Inter-Burundian Dialogue was close to completion had reached a number of conclusions that could undermine the Arusha Agreement.

According to Benomar, the interim report states that the majority of citizens demanded an end to presidential term limits and favoured amendment of the Constitution, which opposition and civil society groups rejected.

Benjamin Mkapa, East African Community Facilitator of the Inter-Burundi Dialogue and former President of the United Republic of Tanzania, said he had worked to bring the parties together to resume “the spirit and dictates” of the Arusha Agreement and the Constitution.

While both sides agreed that those instruments must form the basis for progress, the opposition believed the Government had narrowed the political space, Mkapa said.

However, Albert Shingiro, Permanent Representative of Burundi to the UN, rejected some aspects of the report, notably that Nkurunziza would seek a fourth mandate, saying the President was currently exercising his second mandate.

Shingiro alleged “unwise” use of the term “militia” to describe young people affiliated with the ruling party, which was not in line with the language of past UN resolutions.

“The Council had never used that loaded word having previously used the more balanced term ‘youth affiliated with political parties,” he said.

Shingiro had earlier accused the UN of being concerned about Nkurunziza’s fourth term citing presidents in Africa seeking fifth, sixth and seventh terms.

-NAN

White House intruder troubled, says Trump

U.S. President Donald Trump has said that Jonathan Tran, 26, who scaled an outer-perimeter fence on the White House complex on Friday night was a troubled person.

Trump, who made the remarks on Saturday, said he appreciated the Secret Service efforts and that the accused is disturbed.

“The secret service did a fantastic job last night,”Trump said.

On the intruder, the president added that  “he was a troubled person. It was very sad”.

Tran climbed a White House fence on Friday night and gained access to the complex’s south grounds before being arrested, the Secret Service said on Saturday.

The service said the incident occurred at about 11:38 p.m. on Friday while Trump was at the White House.

The Secret Service also said Tran scaled an outer-perimeter fence on the White House complex’s southeast side, near the Treasury Building, and was arrested without further incident by an officer in the agency’s Uniformed Division.

The intruder was carrying a backpack and purportedly got close to the White House’s south portico residence entrance, near the Washington Monument.

No hazardous material was found inside the backpack, and a subsequent search of the complex grounds resulted in “nothing of concern to security operations,” the Secret Service said.

The agency also said that the suspect had no “previous history” with the agency.

Tran, who reportedly had a California driver’s license, told Secret Service officers that he was at the White House to see Trump.

“No, I am a friend of the President. I have an appointment,” the suspect said when approached by an officer, according to a report released on Saturday by the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Police Department.

Asked how he got there, the suspect told officers: “I jumped the fence”.

-NAN

Trump barrels ahead with plan to gut 'Obamacare'

President Donald Trump vowed Saturday to press ahead with a controversial plan, slowed by bickering within his Republican party, to repeal Barack Obama's signature healthcare law.

"We are making great progress with healthcare. ObamaCare is imploding and will only get worse. Republicans coming together to get job done!" Trump wrote on Twitter.

Trump, who spent part of Saturday golfing in Virginia, told reporters that he spent part of the day strategizing with his White House team on the health care overhaul.

The president has thrown his full weight behind a contested plan by House Republicans to replace Obamacare, battling to overcome resistance from the party's right wing in hopes of meeting a key campaign pledge.

On Saturday he dispatched his top lieutenant, Vice President Mike Pence, to the southern state of Kentucky to make a pitch for the beleaguered proposal.

"Here are the heart-breaking facts: today, Americans are paying $3,000 more a year on average for health insurance than the day Obamacare was signed into law," Pence told a crowd in the city of Louisville.

"Last year alone, premiums spiked by 25 percent and millions of Americans have lost their health insurance plans and lost their doctors," Pence said, touting the Republican reform plan, unveiled just this past Monday, as the solution.

"We're going to give Americans more choices. We'll expand health savings accounts," Pence declared.

"Under President Trump's leadership, we're actually also going to finally allow Americans to purchase health insurance across state lines -- the way you buy life insurance, the way you buy car insurance."

Barack Obama's signature health insurance reform bill was the crowning domestic achievement of his presidency.
GETTY IMAGES/AFP/File / WIN MCNAMEEU.S. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-WI) explains the Republican plan to replace the Affordable Care Act during his weekly press conference at the U.S. Capitol March 9, 2017 in Washington, DC


But like much of the rest of his legacy, it has come under attack from Trump, who has made dismantling it one of his top goals.

Republicans' market-driven plan to replace it, however, has been roundly criticized by some members of their own party -- especially in the US Senate -- and also has been met with consternation from conservative pundits.

"The Republican health plan would make America's economic chasm worse. It would cut health subsidies that go to the poor while eliminating the net investment income tax, which benefits only the top one percent," right-of-center political columnist David Brooks wrote in the New York Times this week.

Democrats were no less harsh in their assessment of the Republican health care reform plan.

"They're calling it the American Health Care Act: the AHCA. But they should call it the BBBA: the Big Breaks for Billionaires Act," said Congresswoman Cheri Bustos on Saturday.

In their plan, which "takes coverage away from the people who need it the most, Washington Republicans found a way to give massive tax breaks to the CEOs of health insurance companies, as well as to America's billionaires," Bustos said.

-AFP

UN warns of worst humanitarian crisis since WWII

The United Nations is warning that the world is facing its worst humanitarian crisis since the end of World War II, with more than 20 million people facing starvation and famine in four countries.

The world body's humanitarian chief Stephen O'Brien called Friday for an urgent mobilization of funds -- $4.4 billion by July -- for northeastern Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen to "avert a catastrophe."

"Otherwise, many people will predictably die from hunger, livelihoods will be lost and political gains that have been hardwon over the last few years will be reversed," O'Brien said in his stark warning to the UN Security Council.

"Without collective and coordinated global efforts, people will simply starve to death. Many more will suffer and die from disease. Children stunted and out of school. Livelihoods, futures and hope will be lost."

He called war-wracked Yemen "the largest humanitarian crisis in the world," with two thirds of the population, or 18.8 million people -- three million more than in January -- in need of assistance and more than seven million with no regular access to food.

AFP/File / ASHRAF SHAZLYSouth Sudanese refugees at a "Refugee Waiting Centre" in Al-Eligat area along the border in Sudan's White Nile state

The conflict in Yemen has left more than 7,400 people dead and 40,000 wounded since an Arab-state coalition intervened on the government's side against rebels in March 2015, according to UN figures.

In just the past two months alone, more than 48,000 people have fled fighting in the Arab world's poorest country, according to O'Brien, as it grapples with a proxy war fought by archrivals Iran and Saudi Arabia.

- 'Arbitrarily denying' access -

During recent meetings, O'Brien said senior leaders in both parties agreed to provide continuous humanitarian access and respect international humanitarian law.

He noted that 4.9 million people received food assistance last month alone.

"Yet all parties to the conflict are arbitrarily denying sustained humanitarian access and politicize aid," he added.

AFP/File / Albert Gonzalez FarranA woman collects grains left on the ground after food distribution in Ganyiel

"Already, the humanitarian suffering that we see in Yemen today is caused by the parties and proxies and if they don't change their behavior now, they must be held accountable for the inevitable famine, unnecessary deaths and associated amplification in suffering that will follow."

He noted that despite assurances from all parties that he would obtain safe passage to the flashpoint city of Taiz, he was in fact denied access and came under gunfire after retreating to a short distance away.

A total of $2.1 billion are needed to reach 12 million people with life-saving assistance and protection in Yemen this year, according to O'Brien, who noted that just six percent of those funds have been received so far.

He announced that a ministerial-level pledging event for Yemen will take place in Geneva on April 25, to be chaired by UN chief Antonio Guterres.

- Politics behind 'man-made famine' -

During his visit last week to South Sudan, the world's youngest nation, O'Brien said he found a situation that is "worse than it has ever been."

"The famine in South Sudan is man-made," he added.

"Parties to the conflict are parties to the famine -- as are those not intervening to make the violence stop."

AFP / ASHRAF SHAZLYSouth Sudanese refugees at the "Refugee Waiting Centre" in Al-Eligat

He said more than 7.5 million people need assistance, an increase of 1.4 million fro last year. And some 3.4 million people are displaced, including nearly 200,000 who have fled South Sudan since January alone.

More than half the population of Somalia -- 6.2 million people -- need humanitarian assistance and protection, including 2.9 million at risk of famine.

Nearly one million children under the age of five will be "acutely malnourished" this year, according to the humanitarian chief, who also visited the country.

"What I saw and heard during my visit to Somalia was distressing -- women and children walk for weeks in search of food and water," O'Brien said.

AFP/File / ALBERT GONZALEZ FARRANAgop Manut (11 months), at the clinic run by Doctors without Borders (MSF) in Aweil, Northern Bahr al Ghazal, South Sudan, last October

"They have lost their livestock, water sources have dried up and they have nothing left to survive on. With everything lost, women, boys, girls and men now move to urban centers."

In northeastern Nigeria, O'Brien said 10.7 million people need humanitarian aid, including 7.1 million people who are "severely food insecure."

The humanitarian emergency afflicting the area was triggered by the Boko Haram insurgency, which erupted in Nigeria in 2009. Poor governance and climate change have also been powerful contributors to the crisis.

-AFP

The conflict, which has left around 20,000 people dead and forced more than 2.6 million others to flee their homes, has aggravated an already difficult humanitarian situation in one of the poorest regions of the world.