Articles
China: Africans trapped in lockdown
30 Jan 2020
With rich countries like the US evacuating their students, Doctor Bakari, a Tanzanian PhD student, has become a leader for hundreds of students from poorer African countries stranded in Wuhan with little chance of escape. Beijing’s…
Israel: peace plan protests
30 Jan 2020
Palestinian terror groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad have rejected Donald Trump’s peace plan which was unveiled on 28 January. Many Palestinians protested in the West Bank, and the US embassy warned of potential terror attacks. The…
Nigeria: the 'leopard unit'
30 Jan 2020
Insecurity in some parts of the country has led people to form their own vigilante units. A reporter writes, ‘Last week, I helped pay a ransom to free the kidnapped wife and two daughters of a…
South Africa: demobilising ‘child soldier’ gangs
30 Jan 2020
Hanover Park is a violent gangland neighbourhood of unemployed young men where even army deployment failed to stop shootings. Gangsters as young as 12 operate within a contested jigsaw of fiefdoms in the historically ‘coloured’ township…
Algeria: churches shut down by authorities
30 Jan 2020
Thirteen churches in Algeria have been closed since 2018. Hope Evangelical Church is the latest to be ordered to shut down as the government’s crackdown on houses of worship continues. A 2006 law is being used…
US / Mexico: drug-smuggling tunnels
30 Jan 2020
Since 2015 tunnels have run under the border from Mexico to America. Donald Trump has made building a border wall one of his key priorities to tackle illegal immigration and drug trafficking. On 30 January, US…