Occupied East Jerusalem – The city of Jerusalem is still tense in the aftermath of overnight raids by Israeli forces on Palestinian Muslim worshippers who were in the Al-Aqsa Mosque after nighttime tarawih prayers. International efforts are being made to mediate between Palestinian groups and the Israeli government to reduce tensions after the latter received a barrage of condemnations for the actions of its forces. The raids went on into the morning, with images circulating of Israeli soldiers dragging and beating worshippers to get them out of the mosque, shortly before the compound, known as al-Haram al-Sharif to Muslims, was…
Author: National Tone
President Cyril Ramaphosa declared the ‘state of disaster’ in February in a bid to assuage South Africa’s power crisis.South Africa has revoked a national “state of disaster” declared in February to manage a crippling electricity crisis, the government said on Wednesday. On February 9, President Cyril Ramaphosa invoked disaster regulations to fight the crisis that included daily rolling power cuts by state utility Eskom due to frequent breakdowns at its ageing coal-fired power stations and years of corruption. The state of disaster gave the government additional powers to respond to the crisis, including by permitting emergency procurement procedures with fewer…
Lahore, Pakistan – Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan has won a major political victory after the country’s Supreme Court ordered the government to hold snap polls in the politically crucial Punjab province on May 14. Khan, who was removed from power in April last year after losing a confidence vote in parliament, says he is confident of victory for his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party in forthcoming provincial as well as national elections, due by October this year. In an interview with Al Jazeera at his Zaman Park home in Punjab’s capital, Lahore, Khan discusses his plans in an election…
Kim Cotton has made history in becoming the first female umpire to stand in a men’s international match between two ICC full-member countries.Auckland-born Cotton umpired New Zealand’s nine-wicket win over Sri Lanka in the second T20I of their three-match series in Dunedin. The 45-year-old has previously umpired in 16 women’s one-day international matches and 44 women’s T20Is. She was one of the on-field umpires for both the 2022 Women’s World Cup final (50-over) and the 2023 Women’s T20 World Cup final in February.Claire Polosak was the first female umpire in a men’s international in 2019 when she stood in a…
Lisbon, Portugal – On the banks of the River Tagus, to the south of Lisbon, a wide clearing in the neighbourhood of Segundo Torrao is littered with piles of rubble. Until six months ago, this empty plot was filled with houses and families. Now, it is the backdrop of a struggle between the people who live here, and the local council trying to remove them and their houses. More than 60 families from this self-built neighbourhood learned in June last year that their houses were earmarked for demolition by the Almada local council – which cited the risk of flooding…
An indictment against former United States President Donald Trump has been unsealed, revealing that the Republican leader faces 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in New York. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges, which stem from a grand jury investigation into hush money allegedly paid to porn star Stormy Daniels in the lead-up to the 2016 election. But the charging documents released on Tuesday reveal that prosecutors plan to pursue Trump for other payments beyond the $130,000 allegedly paid to Daniels for her silence. The indictment accuses Trump of using a “catch and kill scheme” to subvert…
A family of four found dead trying to reach the United States by boat from Canada last week had been told they would be deported to their native Romania, Canadian media outlets have reported. Florin and Cristina lordache and their two young children – aged two and one – were among eight people found dead in the St Lawrence River near the US-Canada border on Thursday and Friday. Police in the Akwesasne Mohawk community, whose lands stretch into the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Ontario and the US state of New York, said Florin had two Canadian passports belonging to…
Election of Janet Protasiewicz gives liberals a majority on the court ahead of upcoming ruling on state abortion ban.Wisconsin voters have elected judge Janet Protasiewicz to the state Supreme Court on Tuesday, creating a liberal majority on the bench in a key swing state ahead of the 2024 United States presidential election. Protasiewicz defeated conservative candidate Daniel Kelly in what New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice called the most expensive judicial election in US history. More than $42.3m had been spent as of Monday, according to a review by the website WisPolitics.com, far outstripping the previous record of $15.2m.…
A longtime dispute between two sides has been temporarily resolved, and oil exports via Turkey will resume, officials say.The central government of Iraq has reached a deal with the country’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region to resume oil exports from northern Iraq through a pipeline to Turkey. Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani and Masrour Barzani, prime minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government, announced the deal at a press conference in Baghdad on Tuesday. “Halting the export of the region’s oil harms Iraq’s revenues,” Sudani said, adding that the governments would work towards passing a federal law detailing the sharing of funds…
Donald Trump has made his first appearance in front of a New York judge since becoming the only former president of the United States to face criminal prosecution. Trump on Tuesday pleaded not guilty in Manhattan criminal court to 34 felony charges of falsifying business records connected to three alleged hush-money payments, including one to adult film star Stormy Daniels during his 2016 presidential campaign. Trump, who waved to the public before entering the courthouse, was released following an hour-long arraignment. Here’s what to know about the legal process and what comes next. What is the next legal step? Tuesday’s…