Robert Mugabe
Lobbyist says Myanmar junta wants to improve relations with the West, spurn China
An Israeli-Canadian lobbyist hired by Myanmar’s junta said on Saturday that the generals are keen to leave politics after their coup and seek to improve relations with the United States and distance themselves from China. Ari Ben-Menashe, a former Israeli military intelligence official who has previously represented Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe and Sudan’s military rulers, said Myanmar’s generals also want to repatriate Rohingya Muslims who fled to neighboring Bangladesh. The United Nations says more than 50 demonstrators have been killed since the Feb. 1 coup when the military overthrew and detained elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose National League for Democracy party won polls in November by a landslide. On Friday, a U.N. special envoy urged the Security Council to take action against t...
Zimbabwe loses two more ministers to coronavirus
Two ministers serving in the Zimbabwean government died of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) within a matter of days, prompting the country to announce on Saturday plans to further tighten lockdown measures. Late on Friday, the government announced that Transport Minister Joel Matiza had died after falling ill with COVID-19, less than two days after the country lost Foreign minister Sibusiso Moyo to the same disease. Four government ministers have succumbed to the coronavirus in Zimbabwe so far. According to unconfirmed media reports, several other cabinet ministers are fighting for their lives in a private hospital. “We are in a dark cloud that we have to clear very soon,” deputy health minister John Mangwiro told dpa. Mangwiro revealed plans to intensify the current lockdown, which has been in ...
Security forces head off anti-government protests in Zimbabwe
Streets were deserted and businesses shut in Zimbabwe’s two main cities on Friday after security forces were deployed to prevent anti-government marches called by activists over corruption and economic hardship. Protesters stayed away. Job Sikhala, an opposition lawmaker and one of the protest organisers, said the heavy security presence showed a state afraid of its citizens. He added: “Protracted demonstrations will be the way forward.” He is among more than a dozen activists who are in hiding and who police say they are seeking for promoting Friday’s protests. In Bulawayo and central Harare, the capital, businesses were shut as police and soldiers patrolled the streets. Shops also stayed shut in some Harare townships, including Mbare – a hotbed of past protests. President Emmerson Mnanga...
Zimbabwe journalist arrested amid storm over $60m Covid-19 supplies scandal
Zimbabwean police on Monday arrested an investigative journalist who exposed alleged corruption in the procurement of Covid-19 medical supplies, a matter that involves the first family. Hopewell Chin’ono’s lawyers said he was “abducted” by eight state security agents who did not produce a search warrant. One of the lawyers, Beatrice Mtetwa, said she went to Mr Chin’ono’s residence after getting an “SOS that his home was surrounded by state security agents”. Ms Mtetwa described the arrest as an abduction, saying the state agents broke into the house. Via Twitter, the Committee to Protect Journalists called Mr Chin’ono’s immediate release, saying he was “abducted from his home by police”. It added, “Authorities must stop harassing Hopewell Chin’ono and focus on the real criminals. Do the the...
