Headline

Botswana’s New President Sworn In As Voters Kick Out Ruling Party Of Nearly Six Decades

Published

9 months ago

November 1, 2024

Botswana’s new president took office Friday in a whirlwind transfer of power following elections that saw a historic defeat handed to the party that had governed the diamond-rich country for nearly 60 years.

Human rights lawyer Duma Boko, 54, was sworn in during a closed session at the office of the chief justice three days after elections which booted the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) out of office.

Boko later delivered an acceptance speech and press briefing that was broadcast live on state television and touched on some of his campaign pledges, such as more than doubling the minimum wage to 4,000 pula ($300) and introducing universal health insurance.

The president said he wanted to secure investor confidence as well as ties with mining companies active in Botswana while exploring ways to diversify the diamond-dependent economy, a measure seen as critical to stabilising the country’s finances.

A public inauguration ceremony would be held in due course, he said. The presidency is “a responsibility one approaches and accepts with humility, with some trepidation and feeling. I dare not fail. I dare not disappoint.”

Outgoing president Mokgweetsi Masisi conceded defeat earlier in the day after overnight results from Wednesday’s general election showed that his party — in power since independence from Britain in 1966 — would not win enough seats in parliament to be able to form a government.

– ‘Higher democracy’ –

Boko, who has spent three decades in opposition politics fighting to dislodge the BDP, praised the peaceful handover as an example of democracy in action.

“What has happened today takes our democracy to a higher level,” he told the independent Mmegi newspaper.

“It now means we have seen a successful, peaceful, orderly democratic transition from one regime to the next and this happened in full view of every citizen of this country with their full participation and endorsement.”

The BDP’s defeat was a major blow for Masisi, 63, who was elected in 2018 and had been confident of securing a second term.

“We got it wrong big time in the eyes of the people,” Masisi conceded.

“We were really convinced of our message. But every indication, by any measure, is that there’s no way that I can pretend that we’re going to form a government.”

“I will respectfully step aside and participate in a smooth and transparent transition process ahead of inauguration,” he said.

A key concern for voters was unemployment which has risen to 27 percent this year and a slump in the economy due in part to weakened diamond sales, Botswana’s single biggest revenue earner.

Headline

Three Ghanaian Nationals Extradited To US In $100m Online Fraud Case

Published

1 hour ago

August 9, 2025

Editor

Three Ghanaian nationals accused of orchestrating a $100 million online fraud scheme targeting U.S. businesses and vulnerable Americans have been extradited to New York, federal prosecutors announced Friday.

Isaac Oduro Boateng, a/k/a “Kofi Boat,” Inusah Ahmed, a/k/a “Pascal,” and Derrick Van Yeboah, a/k/a “Van,” arrived in New York on August 7 after being extradited from Ghana.

They are scheduled to appear before U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert W. Lehrburger. A fourth defendant, Patrick Kwame Asare, a/k/a “Borgar,” remains at large.

According a post on the FBI website on Friday

“As alleged, Isaac Oduro Boateng, Inusah Ahmed, Derrick van Yeboah, and Patrick Kwame Asare led and participated in an international fraud ring that engaged in a massive conspiracy to defraud vulnerable people and steal from businesses,” said U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton.

“Offshore scammers should know that we, the FBI, and our law enforcement partners will work around the world to combat online fraud and bring perpetrators to justice.”

All these are detailed in a press release dated August 8, 2025, on the United States Attorney’s Office, Southern District of New York.

FBI Assistant Director in Charge Christopher G. Raia said, “Deceiving businesses using email compromise campaigns and tricking innocent elderly victims through fraudulent companionship in order to exploit their trust and finances is not merely appalling but illegal.

“The FBI will continue to ensure anyone who preys on companies and vulnerable Americans online is made to face the criminal justice system.”

Prosecutors say the defendants held senior positions in a Ghana-based network that posed as romantic partners to older victims and used fraudulent emails to trick companies into wiring funds.

After securing the money, the proceeds were allegedly laundered through West Africa, often directed by “chairmen” such as Boateng and Ahmed.

All four defendants face multiple federal charges, including wire fraud, money laundering, and receiving stolen funds, with each wire fraud count carrying a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.

The case is being handled by the Southern District of New York’s Complex Frauds and Cybercrime Unit.

Headline

Israeli Fire Kills 34 In Gaza

Published

2 hours ago

August 9, 2025

Editor

Gaza’s civil defence agency said at least 34 people were killed by Israeli fire on Saturday, including more than a dozen civilians who were waiting to collect aid.

Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP nine people were killed and 181 wounded when Israeli forces opened fire on them as they gathered near a border crossing in northern Gaza that has been used for aid deliveries.

Six more people were killed and 30 wounded after Israeli troops targeted civilians assembling near an aid point in central Gaza, he said.

Strikes in central Gaza also resulted in multiple casualties, according to Bassal, while a drone attack near the southern city of Khan Yunis killed at least three people and wounded several others.

Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties accessing swathes of the territory mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence and the Israeli military.

Thousands of Palestinians congregate daily near food distribution points in Gaza, including four managed by the US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.

Since launching in late May, its operations have been marred by almost-daily reports of Israeli forces firing on those waiting to collect aid.

Israeli restrictions on the entry of supplies into Gaza since the start of the war nearly two years ago have led to shortages of food and essential supplies, including medicine and fuel, which hospitals require to power their generators.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces mounting pressure to agree to a ceasefire to bring the territory’s more than two million people back from the brink of famine and free the hostages held by Palestinian militants.

But early Friday, the Israeli security cabinet approved plans for a major operation to seize Gaza City, triggering a wave of outrage across the globe.

Despite the backlash and rumours of dissent from Israeli military top brass, Netanyahu has remained defiant over the decision.

In a post on social media late Friday, he said, “We are not going to occupy Gaza — we are going to free Gaza from Hamas.”

The Palestinian militant group, whose October 7, 2023, attack triggered the war, has slammed the plan to expand the fighting as a “new war crime”.

Israel’s offensive has killed more than 61,000 Palestinians, according to Hamas-run Gaza’s health ministry, figures the United Nations says are reliable.

Hamas’s 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

AFP

Headline

Zelensky Rejects Land-for-peace Deal Ahead Of Trump-Putin Alaska Summit

Published

2 hours ago

August 9, 2025

Editor

Ukraine won’t surrender land to Russia to buy peace, President Volodymyr Zelensky warned, on Saturday, after Washington and Moscow agreed to hold a summit in a bid to end the war.

Presidents Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump will meet in the US state of Alaska next Friday to try to resolve the three-year conflict, despite warnings from Ukraine and Europe that Kyiv must be part of the negotiations.

Announcing the summit on Friday, Trump said that “there’ll be some swapping of territories to the betterment of both” sides, without providing further details.

“Ukrainians will not give their land to the occupier,” Zelensky said on social media hours later.

“Any decisions against us, any decisions without Ukraine, are also decisions against peace. They will achieve nothing,” he said, adding that the war “cannot be ended without us, without Ukraine”.

Zelensky also urged Ukraine’s allies to take “clear steps” towards achieving a sustainable peace during a call with Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

National security advisors from Kyiv’s allies — including the United States, EU nations, and the UK — were gathering in Britain on Saturday to align their views ahead of the Putin-Trump summit.

French President Emmanuel Macron, following phone calls with Zelensky, Starmer, and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, said “the future of Ukraine cannot be decided without Ukrainians” and that Europe also had to be involved in the negotiations.

Later Saturday, in his evening address, Zelensky added: “There must be an honest end to this war, and it is up to Russia to end the war it started.”

– A ‘dignified peace’ –

Three rounds of talks between Russia and Ukraine this year have failed to bear fruit, and it remains unclear whether a summit could bring peace any closer as the warring sides’ positions are still far apart.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, with millions forced to flee their homes.

Putin has resisted multiple calls from the United States, Europe, and Kyiv for a ceasefire.

Putin, a former KGB officer in power in Russia for over 25 years, has ruled out holding talks with Zelensky at this stage.

Ukraine’s leader has been pushing for a three-way summit and has frequently said meeting Putin is the only way to make progress towards peace.

– Far from the war –

The summit in Alaska, the far-north territory which Russia sold to the United States in 1867, would be the first between sitting US and Russian presidents since Joe Biden met Putin in Geneva in June 2021.

Nine months later, Moscow sent troops into Ukraine.

Zelensky said of the location that it was “very far away from this war, which is raging on our land, against our people”.

The Kremlin said the choice was “logical” because the state close to the Arctic is on the border between the two countries, and this is where their “economic interests intersect”.

Moscow has also invited Trump to pay a reciprocal visit to Russia later.

Trump and Putin last sat together in 2019 at a G20 summit meeting in Japan during Trump’s first term. They have spoken by telephone several times since January, with Trump trying to broker peace in Ukraine without making a breakthrough.

On Friday, Putin held a round of calls with allies, including Brazil, China, and India, in a diplomatic flurry ahead of the Alaska summit.

In a 40-minute phone conversation Saturday between Putin and President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the Brazilian leader reiterated his support for dialogue “and the pursuit of a peaceful solution”, his office said.

The US president had earlier imposed an additional tariff on India for buying Russia’s oil in a bid to nudge Moscow into talks. He also threatened to impose a similar tax on China, but so far has refrained from doing so.

– Fighting goes on –

Russia and Ukraine continued pouring dozens of drones onto each other’s positions in an exchange of attacks in the early hours of Saturday.

A bus carrying civilians was hit in Ukraine’s frontline city of Kherson, killing two people and wounding 16.

The Russian army claimed to have taken Yablonovka, another village in the Donetsk region, the site of the most intense fighting in the east and one of the five regions Putin says is part of Russia.

Four people were killed as of Saturday morning in Donetsk after Russian shelling, Ukrainian authorities said.

In 2022, the Kremlin announced the annexation of four Ukrainian regions — Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson — despite not having full control over them.

Russia had previously annexed the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine in 2014.

As a prerequisite to any peace settlement, Moscow demanded Kyiv pull its forces out of the regions and commit to being a neutral state, shun Western military support, and be excluded from joining NATO.

Kyiv said it would never recognise Russian control over its sovereign territory, though it acknowledged that getting land captured by Russia back would have to come through diplomacy, not on the battlefield.