eSwatini says fake polygamy story 'insult' to king and country

Yahoo – AFP, May 14, 2019

King Mswati III has 14 wives and more than 25 children (AFP Photo/
GIANLUIGI GUERCIA)

Mbabane (eSwatini) (AFP) - The government of eSwatini on Tuesday angrily denied viral online reports that King Mswati III, Africa's last absolute monarch who has 14 wives, had ordered men to have at least two marriages or face jail.

The story, carried by the Zambian Observer and picked up by several other online publications, said that Swazi men would have to marry several wives starting from June.

As well as 14 wives, King Mswati has more than 25 children and a reputation for lavish spending while 63 percent of his 1.3 million subjects in the kingdom formerly known as Swaziland live in poverty.

The story, first published on Monday, said the government would sponsor marriage ceremonies and offer houses to men who entered into polygamous marriages.

Three of King Mswati III's wives look at their husband as he delivers a speech 

calling on men to get circumcised (AFP Photo/Jinty Jackson)

It said the king "has declared in... Swaziland that men will from June 2019 be required to marry at least two or more wives or be jailed if they fail to do so".

Government spokesman Percy Simelane called the story "malicious" and "poisonous".

"His Majesty has not made any pronouncement to that effect as it has never been an issue raised," by the people, Simelane said.

He said the story was "not only an insult to the monarchy and the culture of eSwatini but a disgrace to journalism".

The government has demanded that the newspaper retract its story.

Foreign domestic workers in Lebanon protest abuses

Yahoo – AFP, May 5, 2019

Foreign domestic workers in Lebanon protest against the 'kefala' sponsorship system
that they say leaves them open to abuse (AFP Photo/ANWAR AMRO)

Beirut (AFP) - Hundreds of foreign domestic workers demonstrated in the Lebanese capital Sunday to demand the scrapping of a sponsorship system that they complain leaves them open to abuse from employers.

Lebanon hosts more than 250,000 registered domestic workers, the vast majority of them women, from countries including Ethiopia, the Philippines and Sri Lanka.

They are excluded from the labour law, and instead obtain legal residency though their employers' sponsorship under the so-called "kafala" system.

The protesters marching in Beirut held up placards reading "No to slavery and yes to justice" and "Stop kafala".

"We want the cancellation of this system. There are employees imprisoned in houses and they need to have days off," Dozossissane, a 29-year-old Ethiopian, told AFP.

Lebanon's labour ministry introduced a standard contract for domestic workers in 2009, but the forms are often written in Arabic, a language many cannot read.

Activists regularly accuse the authorities of failing to take claims of abuse seriously, with maids, nannies and carers left at the mercy of employers.

Amnesty International last month urged Lebanon to end what it called the "inherently abusive" migration sponsorship system and change the labour law to offer domestic workers more protection.

A report from the rights group that surveyed 32 domestic workers revealed "alarming patterns of abuse", including physical punishments, humiliating treatment and food deprivation.

Brother of Algeria's Bouteflika, 2 ex-spy bosses arrested: security source

Yahoo – AFP, May 4, 2019

Said Bouteflika (centre), brother of Algeria's ex-president Abdelaziz Bouteflika,
pictured in 2012 (AFP Photo/FAROUK BATICHE)

Algiers (AFP) - Said Bouteflika, the powerful brother of deposed Algerian president Abdelaziz Bouteflika, was arrested Saturday along with two former intelligence chiefs, a security source told AFP.

General Mohamed Mediene, known as Toufik, who headed the secret service for 25 years and former intelligence coordinator Athmane Tartag were the two spy chiefs arrested, the source said, asking not to be named.

The security source did not provide a reason for the arrests.

There was no immediate comment from Algeria's police or army, despite efforts by AFP to reach them.

Said Bouteflika was seen as the guiding hand behind the rule of his ailing brother Abdelaziz, who resigned on April 2 following pressure from the military in the face of huge street protests.

The president's brother was frequently cited in the past as a likely successor as head of state.

He had exerted increasing influence behind the scenes, as the former president was rarely seen in public after a stroke in 2013.

Mediene headed the all-powerful DRS intelligence agency, until Bouteflika fired him and then dismantled the institution in 2016.

Algeria's army chief Ahmed Gaid Salah has in recent weeks accused Mediene of being involved in a plot against Algeria.

In mid-April he gave what he called "a final warning" to the former DRS chief whom he accused of conspiring to "hinder solutions to ending the crisis" in the protest-hit country.

Salah had helped Abdelaziz Bouteflika to neuter the DRS, which was long considered a "state within a state".

Tartag -- described by Algerian media as close to the former president's brother -- was fired just after Bouteflika's resignation.

Salah has spoken of a meeting attended by "known individuals, the identity of whom will be revealed at the right time, that sought to lead a virulent media campaign across various media and on social networks against the army."

According to Algerian media, this meeting was attended by Mediene, Tartag and Said Bouteflika.

Mediene said "I have never met, whether it be a single time, this person from the security forces who was cited as taking part in this pseudo-meeting, since I left my position" heading the DRS.

Algeria's former defence minister Khaled Nezzar meanwhile has recently claimed that Said Bouteflika wanted to declare a state of emergency and had considered firing Salah, ahead of the president's resignation.

Demonstrations are ongoing in the North African country, with people pouring onto the streets for the 11th consecutive week on Friday, to demand the resignation of regime insiders and the establishment of transitional institutions.

Remains of nearly 85,000 genocide victims buried in Rwanda

Yahoo – AFP, Arafat Mugabo, May 4, 2019

A woman carries flowers to offer before the mass funeral to bury 81 coffins
containing newly discoverd remains of 84,437 victims of the 1994 genocide in
the mass grave at the Nyanza Genocide Memorial, suburb of the capital Kigali, on
May 4, 2019. The remains of nearly 85,000 people murdered in Rwanda's genocide
 were laid to rest on May 4 in a sombre ceremony in Kigali, a quarter of a century
after the slaughter (AFP Photo/Yasuyoshi CHIBA)

Kigali (AFP) - The remains of nearly 85,000 people murdered in Rwanda's genocide were laid to rest Saturday in a sombre ceremony in Kigali, a quarter of a century after the slaughter.

Mourners sobbed as 81 white coffins containing the remains of 84,437 victims of the 1994 mass killings were buried at the Nyanza Genocide Memorial in the capital.

They were among more than 800,000 people, mostly Tutsis, massacred over 100 days by Hutu extremists and militia forces determined to eradicate the Tutsi minority in Rwanda.

Rwanda begins 100 days of mourning every April 7 -- the day the genocide began. But this year has witnessed particular commemorations to mark the 25th anniversary.

"Commemorating the genocide against the Tutsi is every Rwandan’s responsibility -- and so is giving them a decent burial," said Justice Minister Johnston Busingye at the mass burial.

Some mourners broke down wailing as survivors spoke of the pain of losing their loved ones so brutally. A number were escorted from the funeral by ushers.

Emanuel Nduwayezu said the discovery meant he finally had somewhere to come each April 7 and lay a wreath in memory of his murdered family.

"Right now I am very happy because I have buried my dad, my sister and her children, and my in-law. Twenty-five years have passed and I had not known where they were," he told AFP.

"Everyday I was thinking and getting confused (about) where my dad was but now I found him and I have a buried him.”

The remains of those interred on Saturday were only found early last year, when 143 pits containing thousands of bone and clothing fragments were discovered beneath homes on the outskirts of Kigali.

Those exhumed for burial on Saturday came from just 43 such pits -- leaving 100 more to go.

A painstaking effort was undertaken so that family members could identify their loved ones by their teeth, clothing and other markings.

They join 11,000 other victims already laid to rest at the Nyanza Genocide Memorial.

Grim discovery

Jean-Pierre Dusingizemungu, who heads Ibuka, an umbrella organisation for genocide survivors, said a landlord from the area revealed the location of the graves only after he was threatened with arrest.

More pits were later found when a man, tasked in 1994 with dumping corpses, came forward with new information.

Dusingizemungu said it was likely those living on the graves knew what lay beneath their homes.

"It is unfortunate that... these perpetrators, now free, never bothered to reveal to bereaved families the location of these grave sites, so they could get closure," he said.

Clementine Ingabire was the sole survivor from her extended family of 23 who were massacred in the frenzy.

Seven of her relatives were identified from the pits, their remains scattered among the coffins. But at least they were granted a dignified burial, she said.

Just seven at the time, Ingabire remains incredulous she made it out alive.

"Despite the fact that most people were very cruel, there were those who took risks to save others," the 32-year-old said.

"I was saved by a Hutu woman who was a good friend to my mother. She saw me running and grabbed me... that's how I survived."

The ethnic bloodshed ended on July 4 when mainly Tutsi rebels entered Kigali, chasing the genocidal killers out of Rwanda. The rebel general was Paul Kagame, who became Rwanda's president and has remained in power ever since.)