The Gulf of Guinea, where 17 seamen were abducted Thursday when two merchant ships came under attack in Cameroonian waters, has in recent years become the epicentre of world maritime piracy.
The syphoning of oil from hijacked cargo ships, illegal fishing, trafficking of all kinds: the 5,700-kilometre (3,541-mile) coastal zone stretching from Senegal to Angola is a happy hunting ground for pirates.
It has upstaged the Gulf of Aden, where once rampant piracy has considerably diminished faced with the deployment of an international military armada.
In 2018 in the Gulf of Guinea, attacks have more than doubled compared to 2017, according to the International Maritime Bureau (IMB), accounting for all six hijackings worldwide, 13 out of 18 ships fired upon and most kidnappings for ransom.
Pirates are now venturing out farther, often beyond territorial waters, and attacking a wider range of vessels, from fishing boats to larger carriers, according to the IMB.
However, attacks in the region ..

The Gulf of Guinea: hunting ground for pirates

PTI Automatic

Zinedine Zidane has admitted Gareth Bale is back in his plans ahead of Real Madrid's opening La Liga game of the season against Celta Vigo on Saturday.
Eden Hazard sustained a thigh injury in training on Friday, meaning Bale could even start against Celta following a turbulent summer for the Welshman.
Zidane was keen for Bale to be sold but Madrid cancelled a deal with Chinese club Jiangsu Suning while the winger's salary of around 18 million euros a year has proven too high for other interested clubs.
Bale is also eager to stay at Madrid, where he has a contract until 2022, and is not interested in moving to Paris Saint-Germain, despite suggestions he could be included in a bid for Neymar.
"It looked like he was leaving and now he's here with us, that's it," Zidane said.
"The dynamic changes and things change and now I'm going to count on him like everyone else. I said it a short time ago, I'm going to count on all the players that are here."
Zidane left Bale out of his squad for ...

Things change, I'm now counting on Bale - Zidane

Romania's left-wing government confirmed its two candidates for the country's European Commission post Friday, despite criticism from the opposition who say the pair have been tarnished by corruption allegations.
The two candidates, Rovana Plumb and Dan Nica, are both former MEPs and members of the ruling Social Democrats (PSD).
"They have a very good knowledge of European institutions and know what the post of commissioner entails," PSD Prime Minister Viorica Dancila said in a press conference Friday.
However, the opposition has branded the pair unsuitable given their previous legal entanglements and closeness to former PSD chef Liviu Dragnea, who was jailed earlier this year for corruption offences.
"Dan Nica and Rovana Plumb supported the anti-European line taken by Liviu Dragnea and defended his war against the justice system and the rule of law," said Dacian Ciolos on Wednesday, himself a former EU commissioner and now the head of the liberal Renew Europe group of MEPs.
The "war" 

Romania confirms EU commission candidates despite outcry

Greenland is not for sale, the mineral-rich island said Friday, after a newspaper reported that US President Donald Trump was asking advisers whether it's possible for the United States to buy the Arctic island.
Trump has expressed interest in the self-governing part of Denmark -- which is mostly covered in ice, -- asking advisors if it is possible for the US to acquire the territory, The Wall Street Journal said Thursday, citing people familiar with the discussions.
The president, a former real estate magnate, has been curious about the area's natural resources and geopolitical relevance, the paper reported.
Greenland is a self-governing region of Denmark, which colonised the 772,000 square-mile (two-million square kilometre) island in the 18th century, and is home to only about 57,000 people, most of whom belong to the indigenous Inuit community.
There has been no official comment from the White House, and the Danish embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to AFP's request 

Greenland cold-shoulders Trump's reported buyer's wish

The captain of a Spanish charity ship carrying 134 rescued migrants warned Friday of the "explosive" situation on board the vessel anchored within swimming distance of Italy's Lampedusa island but forbidden to approach.
Italy has evacuated a handful of medical cases from the Open Arms but far-right Interior Minister Matteo Salvini has been refusing to allow the vessel to dock despite a European deal to take in those remaining.
The captain of the ship operated by Proactiva Open Arms, Marc Reig, said that those on board, rescued after leaving chaos-stricken Libya, were "broken psychologically".
"Every second that passes, the bomb ticks a second closer. Either someone cuts the red cable and defuses this bomb now, or the Open Arms will explode," he told Spain's TVE television.
"This is inhuman. We're close to land and people could swim there. They want to throw themselves in the water. It's untenable. They can't take it anymore."
This is the umpteenth standoff between a charity vessel ...

'Explosive' situation on migrant rescue boat in limbo off Italy

A Kenyan court on Friday sentenced two rugby players to 15 years in prison for the gang rape of a female singer at a birthday party last year.
The international rugby sevens players Frank Wanyama, 24, and Alex Olaba, 23, were earlier this month found guilty of the rape in a case which highlighted what some activists refer to as a tradition of "rape culture" in rugby.
Milimani High Court Martha Mutuku handed down the sentences of 15 years imprisonment saying "a deterrent sentence is necessary."
The trial was held in-camera, so details of the evidence provided were not made public.
Mutuku declined a request from the defence lawyers that their clients be allowed to avoid jail time due to their youth and the fact that they had shown remorse.
Wanyama and Olaba, who were both university students when the rape took place, play for the Nairobi Harlequins club and have played for the national sevens team in global tournaments.
Wanyama captained Kenya's second sevens team to win the Victoria ...

Kenyan rugby players jailed 15 years for gang rape

The alleged Israeli-American head of a major online drug-dealing network gave his captors the slip as he was being extradited from Ukraine to the Jewish state, Israeli police said Friday.
"The Ukrainian police informed us last night that while in the process of extradition, Amos Dov Silver, escaped his Ukrainian escorts," they said in a statement.
Silver was arrested in March accused of running a network, with connections in the United States, Ukraine, Israel and Germany, using the popular encrypted messaging app Telegram.
Israeli police said at the time that the ring had a turnover of "hundreds of millions" of Israeli shekels (tens of millions of dollars/euros).
Silver founded the Israeli online drug marketplace Telegrass.
Friday's Israeli police statement said that the Ukrainian supreme court had on Thursday turned down Silver's appeal against extradition.
The Kiev prosecutor's office said that he was at the city's Boryspil airport bound for Israel on Thursday when he escaped his ...

Suspected Israeli online dope dealer nabbed in Ukraine escapes

Nine Chinese and eight Ukrainian seamen were abducted on Thursday when two merchant vessels came under attack in Cameroonian waters, sources said Friday.
"Seventeen Chinese and Ukrainians were kidnapped... (of whom) nine (are) Chinese who were abducted on one of the ships," an official in the port of Douala told AFP.
A Cameroonian security official, likewise speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed the account.
The abduction was reported on Thursday by sources in the Cameroonian navy and the country's port service, but their number and nationality were not then known.
The navy source had said the kidnappers "are probably Nigerian pirates," adding that Cameroon's security forces had launched a search for them.
The Gulf of Guinea, whose coastline stretches in a huge arc from Liberia to Gabon, is notorious for piracy as well as oil theft, illegal fishing and human and drugs trafficking.
In Malaysia, Noel Choong, who heads the International Maritime Bureau (IMB), a watchdog agency, ..

17 Chinese, Ukrainian seamen kidnapped off Cameroon

At first glance, it looks like hard candy laced with flecks of fake fruit, or a third grader's art project confected from recycled debris.
In reality, it's a sliver of Arctic Ocean sea ice riddled with microplastics, extracted by scientists from deep inside an ice block that likely drifted southward past Greenland into Canada's increasingly navigable Northwest Passage between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
"We didn't expect this amount of plastic, we were shocked," said University of Rhode Island ice expert Alessandra D'Angelo, one of a dozen scientists collecting and analysing data during an 18-day expedition aboard the Swedish icebreaker Oden.
"There is so much of it, and of every kind -- beads, filaments, nylons," she told AFP from Greenland, days after completing the voyage.
Plastic pollution was not a primary focus of the Northwest Passage Project, funded by the US National Science Foundation and Heising-Simons Foundation.
Led by oceanographer Brice Loose, the multi-year ...

Arctic sea ice loaded with microplastics

Two Israelis were injured Friday in what the Israeli army called a "terrorist" car-ramming attack near the Jewish settlement of Elazar south of Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank.
"A terrorist ran over two civilians," an English-language army statement said.
"The civilians were injured and evacuated to hospital for medical treatment. The terrorist was neutralised," it said.
A police statement said an off-duty policeman passing by the scene near Elazar settlement saw the alleged attacker trying to exit his vehicle, and fired at him.
An army spokeswoman contacted by AFP could not immediately say if the suspect was alive or dead.
A 17-year old Israeli was taken to Jerusalem's Hadassah hospital in grave condition and put on a respirator, a hospital spokeswoman said.
A young woman less seriously injured was taken to the city's Shaare Zedek hospital.
Last week, an off-duty Israeli soldier was stabbed to death in the same area. Two Palestinian suspects were later arrested.

2 Israelis, Palestinian assailant hurt in West Bank car ramming: army

A top anti-corruption official in Thailand has been accused of concealing millions of dollars in assets including an upscale London apartment, according to the agency tasked with tackling endemic graft in the kingdom.
National Anti-Corruption Commission deputy secretary Prayat Puangjumpa amassed several undeclared assets in his wife's name, among them a USD 6.9 million apartment in the British capital's Kensington neighbourhood, the agency said.
"He intended not to disclose six items belonging to his wife," NACC spokesman Worawit Sukboon said Thursday.
The remaining assets were worth a total of USD 400,000, according to a nine-month investigation by the commission, which said it will ask the attorney general to indict Prayat.
Prayat told local media the charges were a misunderstanding and that his wife was holding the apartment for other people.
The case had raised public concerns and risked further damaging the reputation of anti-corruption investigators in the country, said Sunai ...

Thai anti-corruption official accused of hiding millions in assets

England fast bowler Jofra marked his Test debut with a wicket as Australia suffered a top-order collapse at Lord's on Friday.
Australia lost three wickets for 11 runs on the way to reaching 80-4 when rain forced an early lunch on the third day of the second Test.
That left Australia 178 runs behind England's first-innings 258.
Archer, on the ground where he bowled the Super Over that saw England seal a World Cup final win over New Zealand last month, had fine figures of one wicket for 18 runs in 13 overs.
But Australia star batsman Steve Smith was still there on 13 not out, with Matthew Wade unbeaten on nought.
Australia, 1-0 up in the five-match series after their 251-run win in the first Test at Edgbaston, resumed on 30-1 having seen Stuart Broad dismiss David Warner cheaply for the third time in as many innings this series.
Play resumed under gloomy skies, the floodlights on at full beam, with conditions difficult for batting.
Cameron Bancroft was five not out and Usman Khawaja 18 .

Archer strikes as Australia slump to 80-4 in second Ashes Test

A fighting half-century by wicketkeeper-batsman B.J. Watling helped New Zealand to take a lead of 177 at stumps on day three in the first Test match against Sri Lanka in Galle on Friday.
New Zealand, who trailed Sri Lanka by 18 runs in the first innings, finished on 195 for seven and a target around 200 could prove tricky for the hosts.
Spinners have long ruled the roost at Galle and towards the tail end of the game they tend to become even more threatening.
The highest successful run chase in here is 99 by Sri Lanka against Pakistan in 2014 and armed with a three-pronged spin attack, New Zealand should be already feeling comfortable.
It was a thrilling day's Test match with both teams fighting tooth and nail for the initiative and at stumps on day three New Zealand emerged on top thanks to the efforts of Watling, who finished unbeaten on 63.
New Zealand had slumped to 25 for three losing top batsmen Ross Taylor (3) and Kane Williamson (4) cheaply and at 124 for six with only a lead ..

Watling puts New Zealand in strong position in Galle

Taiwan's Foreign Minister Joseph Wu insisted Friday that ties with the Solomon Islands were "rock solid" as speculation mounted that the Pacific nation could switch recognition to China after it sent a top delegation to Beijing.
Wu stressed that Taiwan "highly cherished" relations with the 17 countries that officially recognise Taipei rather than Beijing, especially the Solomon Islands which is one of its oldest allies.
He described ties with the Solomon Islands as "rock solid" in a tweet after meeting Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare while attending a regional conference in Tuvalu, also a Taiwan ally.
The Solomon Islands is being courted by China which has been investing heavily in the Pacific.
China still sees self-ruling democratic Taiwan as part of its territory awaiting reunification, by force if must.
Relations between Beijing and Taipei have plummeted since President Tsai Ing-wen came to power in 2016 because her party refuses to recognise the idea that Taiwan is part of "one ..

Taiwan FM in Pacific to shore up Solomons ties

The eastern DR Congo province of South Kivu has recorded its first confirmed cases of Ebola in the country's year-old epidemic, one of which was a fatality, the provincial government said Friday.
"Two cases which tested positive for Ebola were confirmed overnight in South Kivu, in Lwindi district in the Mwenga region," it said in a statement.
"A 26-year-old victim died and (one of their) children who tested positive is still alive and being treated," it said.
More than 1,900 people have died from Ebola in Democratic Republic of Congo since August 1, 2018, when the haemorrhagic virus erupted in North Kivu province and spread to neighbouring Ituri province.
South Kivu Governor Theo Ngwabidje told reporters: "Teams from the national anti-Ebola coordination campaign arrived yesterday to provide support."
The Ebola virus causes fever, vomiting and severe diarrhoea, often followed by kidney and liver failure, internal and external bleeding.
The disease is spread by contact with infected ...

First confirmed Ebola cases in DR Congo's South Kivu province

A group of UN human rights experts on Friday called for the immediate release of three Iranian women given long jail terms for protesting laws compelling women to wear veils.
The trio were charged after a video posted online showed them handing out flowers on Tehran's metro on March 8, International Women's Day, according to a statement co-signed by five United Nations special rapporteurs and another expert.
The women -- named in the statement as Mojgan Keshavarz, Yasaman Aryani and Monireh Arabshahi -- were not wearing veils.
They "peacefully protested against Iran's compulsory veiling laws and advocated for a woman's right to choose whether or not to wear the hijab," the statement said.
According to the experts, who are independent and do not speak for the world body, the women were detained in April, "forcibly disappeared" for up to two weeks, and denied access to a lawyer through the initial investigation.
"Their legal representatives were also reportedly prohibited from ...

Iran must free women held over veil protests: UN experts

Andy Murray is to skip the US Open later this month where he was scheduled to play doubles so as to get more singles matches under his belt, the former world number one old the BBC.
The 32-year-old Scotsman lost in straight sets to old foe Richard Gasquet earlier this week in Cincinnati in what was his first competitive singles match since undergoing 'life-changing surgery' on a hip in January.
The three-time Grand Slam champion has been playing plenty of doubles -- he won the Queen's title with Feliciano Lopez on his return to the circuit in June -- but said he had decided to give it a miss at the US Open which gets underway on August 26.
"I'm not going to play doubles at the US Open," Murray told BBC Sport.
"My goal is to get back playing at the level that I want to on the singles court, and I've decided that I need to focus all my energies on that right now.
"The US Open, doubles and mixed, can be another couple of weeks that you are slowing things down.
"Because I want matches, ...

Murray to skip US Open doubles to focus on singles

Spin dominated in classic Galle fashion on day three of the opening Test match between Sri Lanka and New Zealand, as the tourists slumped to 124 for six at tea on Friday.
The Kiwis lost five wickets in the afternoon session, including the big wickets of captain Kane Williamson and Ross Taylor, as Sri Lanka deployed their three spinners throughout the extended session.
Left-arm spinner Lasith Embuldeniya, the man tipped to fill the boots of Sri Lankan legend Rangana Herath, struck a couple of massive blows in the second essay after failing to claim a wicket in the first innings.
Williamson charged down the pitch and attempted to hit one over the head of the bowler but didn't get the timing right and Kusal Perera at mid-on ran backwards for a terrific tumbling catch.
In his next over, Embuldeniya gave Sri Lanka the upper hand with the big wicket of Taylor. The batsman saw the width and stepped out to drive but ended up edging it to de Dhananjaya de Silva at slip.
Akila Dananjaya then ...

Sri Lanka restrict New Zealand lead to 106 in first Test

Cathay Pacific announced the shock resignation on Friday of its CEO Rupert Hogg, days after the Hong Kong carrier was censured by Beijing because some staff had supported pro-democracy protests in the city.
In a statement posted on the Hong Kong stock exchange on Friday, Cathay said Hogg had resigned "to take responsibility as a leader of the Company in view of recent events".
He has been replaced by Augustus Tang, a veteran of the Swire Group conglomerate, Cathay's main shareholder.

Cathay Pacific says CEO Rupert Hogg has resigned

The Turkish military pension fund OYAK said Friday it had signed a provisional deal to buy British Steel after the UK steelmaker was forced into compulsory liquidation in May.
"As part of its regional growth ambitions in steel industry, OYAK, the biggest complimentary pension fund in Turkey, signed an exclusivity agreement to buy the industry symbol British Steel that has operations in UK, France and the Netherlands," OYAK said in a statement.
The Ankara-based fund added that it hoped the takeover by Ataer Holding -- wholly owned by OYAK -- would happen by the end of 2019.
After British Steel entered insolvency, UK authorities put the company up for sale and nearly 80 bidders including steel producers sought to buy it, OYAK said.
The exclusivity deal gives OYAK time to hold talks with customers, suppliers, employees and trade unions, and carry out a detailed inspection, due to be completed by September.
The head of OYAK's mining and metallurgy division, Toker Ozcan, said his priority .

Turkish army pension fund to buy British Steel: statement

Israel is to allow a visit by barred US congresswoman Rashida Tlaib who is of Palestinian origin on "humanitarian" grounds, the interior ministry announced Friday.
It said Interior Minister Aryeh Deri decided to allow Tlaib to make a "humanitarian visit to her grandmother" in the Israeli-occupied West Bank after the lawmaker had sent him a written pledge "to respect conditions imposed by Israel".

AFP

AFP

Page 455 - Afp