Botswana has hanged a 29-year old man for murdering his employer, prison services announced, despite mounting calls by rights groups to abolish the death penalty.
Mmika Michael Mpe is the second convict to be executed since President Mokgweetsi Masisi took office in October.
He was sentenced to death in 2018 for the 2014 murder of his employer and his appeal was dismissed last year.
The Botswana Prison Service confirmed the execution in a statement on Friday.
It follows the December hanging of 44-year old bricklayer Mooketsi Kgosibodiba, who was also handed capital punishment for murdering his employer.
Amnesty International called on Masisi to abolish the practice after two other people were hanged in 2018.
It described Botswana as the only southern African country that "consistently executes people" and said the sentence was often carried out without prior notice.
The death penalty has been enforced in Botswana since its independence from Britain in 1966.
Masisi's predecessor Ian ...

Botswana continues to execute convicts despite outcry

PTI Automatic

With a partial truce under way Saturday and a deal between the US and the Taliban likely on the horizon, Afghans are daring to dream of the war ending and their country finally opening up.
The "reduction in violence" agreed by the Taliban, the US and the Afghan security forces comes ahead of a possible deal between the insurgents and Washington which would see the US pull thousands of troops out of Afghanistan.
While the move is fraught with uncertainty, it marks a potentially historic step in the country's more than 18-year-old war.
Afghans have been sharing their hopes for peace on social media, tagging posts with hashtags in Dari and Pashto -- Afghanistan's two main languages -- that translate to #ifPeaceComes and #whenThereIsCeasefire.
"In the past 15 years, people have not been able to travel on highways safely. The Taliban stop them, kill them or kidnap them," Ramin Mazhar, a popular poet who helped spread the hashtags, told AFP.
If the reduction in violence holds, Mazhar said ..

'If peace comes': Afghans dream of life after war

The death toll from a flash flood which hit a large group of students trekking along a river in Indonesia rose to eight Saturday, officials said as rescuers searched for two still missing.
Two dozen students from the group of 249 scouts were injured and taken to hospital after being hit by the flood while trekking along the Sempor river near Indonesia's cultural capital Yogyakarta on Friday. Rescuers found six bodies on Friday afternoon.
"Today's search will take place until 17:30, but it all depends on the weather conditions," Yogyakarta search and rescue agency spokesman Pipit Eriyanto told AFP on Saturday.
The students were from local school scout clubs. The dead were all female students aged between 12 and 15.
River trekking is banned for children and teenagers during the rainy season, National Disaster Agency spokesman Agus Wibowo said.
The police have launched an investigation for possible negligence in the deadly incident. At least six teachers were questioned on ...

Indonesian scouts trek flood death toll rises to eight

Opening batsman Shai Hope hit his first one-day international century against Sri Lanka as the West Indies posted 289 for seven in the opening match on Saturday.
Hope lost his opening partner early and was involved in the run out of Darren Bravo but laid the foundation for West Indies' competitive total after being put into bat first at Colombo's Singhalese Sports Club.
Hope, a wicketkeeper-batsman who successfully reviewed an lbw call on the second ball of the innings, completed his ninth ODI hundred and made 115 with the help of 10 fours at the start of the three-match series.
Left-arm pace bowler Isuru Udana claimed three wickets including Hope's prized scalp but gave away 82 runs from his 10 overs.
Paceman Thisara Perera struck first to clean up Sunil Ambris for three on a delivery that nipped back into the right-hand batsman and crashed onto the middle stump.
The innings witnessed a 77-run second-wicket stand before a mix up between the two batsman cut short Bravo's aggressive ...

Hope ton guides West Indies to 289-7 in Sri Lanka ODI

London police on Saturday charged a 29-year-old homeless man with causing grievous bodily harm and possessing an illegal knife he used to stab a mosque leader during prayers.
Suspect Daniel Horton stabbed London Central Mosque's muazzin Raafat Maglad during daily prayers on Thursday.
London police quickly ruled out a terror motive.
Maglad was treated at a London hospital and returned to the mosque for Friday's evening service with his arm wrapped in a sling, "I forgive him. I feel very sorry for him," Maglad told reporters on Friday.
"To me, as a Muslim, I don't need to put any hatred in my heart." Several regulars at the Regent's Park area mosque in northwest London said they had seen Horton attend a few services in the past year.
Horton will appear at Westminster Magistrates' Court for a preliminary hearing later Saturday.

London police charge homeless man with mosque stabbing

Streets were deserted and residents warned to keep out of an emergency room on Saturday in an Italian town placed under lockdown as a second death from coronavirus sparked fears throughout the region.
"No entry" read the sign on the emergency room in the small town of Codogno with a population of 15,000 where three people have already tested positive for the virus, including one 38-year old man now on life support.
On Saturday, Italian news agency ANSA reported a second death from the virus in the Lombardy region, where Codogno is located.
It came one day after the death of a 78-year-old retired bricklayer from the Padua area in the nearby Veneto region, who was the first local person in Europe to die from the coronavirus.
ANSA reported that the new victim was a woman. No further information was immediately available.
Italy's health minister said that the man who died on Friday, Adriano Trevisan, had been admitted to hospital 10 days earlier for an unrelated health issue.
He was one ..

Second coronavirus death sparks fears, lockdown in Italian towns

Iran on Saturday reported one more death among 10 new cases of coronavirus, bringing the total number of deaths in the Islamic republic to five and infections to 28.
"We have 10 new confirmed cases of COVID-19," health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said on state television.
"One of the new cases has unfortunately passed away," he added, noting that eight of them had been hospitalised in Qom and two in Tehran, without specifying where the death occurred.
The COVID-19 outbreak first emerged in Iran on Wednesday, when officials said it killed two elderly people in Qom, a Shiite holy city south of the capital.
They were the first confirmed deaths from the disease in the Middle East.
Since then, Iran has carried out tests on 785 suspected cases, Jahanpour said.
"Most of the cases are either Qom residents or have a history of coming and going from Qom to other cities," the health ministry spokesman said.
Qom is a centre for Islamic studies and pilgrims, attracting scholars from Iran 

Iran reports one death among 10 new coronavirus cases

A second person in Italy has died from complications from the new coronavirus, Italian news agency ANSA said on Saturday.
The death of a woman in the northern region of Lombardy follows that of a 78-year-old man who died on Friday. The new wave of cases in Italy's northern regions have triggered shut-downs of shops, offices and community centres.

Second death in Italy from coronavirus - ANSA

Iran on Saturday reported one more death among 10 new cases of coronavirus, bringing the total number of deaths in the Islamic republic to five and infections to 28.
"We have 10 new confirmed cases of COVID-19," health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said on state television. "One of the new cases has unfortunately passed away.

Iran reports one death among 10 new coronavirus infections

Conservatives appeared to be in the lead as the first results of Iran's parliamentary election came in Saturday, amid expectations of a low turnout after the disqualification of many candidates.
Friday's election came after months of steeply escalating tensions between Iran and its decades-old arch foe the United States.
Voters had been widely expected to stay away in droves, disillusioned over unfulfilled promises and struggling to cope in a country whose economy has buckled under harsh US sanctions.
By mid-morning on Saturday, 1,063,860 votes had been counted in 41 constituencies across Iran, according to figures released by the National Elections Committee and reported by semi-official news agency ISNA.
There were still 167 other constituencies to tally, said a spokesman for the committee, including bigger provinces such as Tehran and Fars.
"We will try to publish the final figures tonight, and if that task takes too long, tomorrow," spokesman Esmail Mousavi told state ...

Conservatives ahead as Iran poll results trickle in

Togo went to the polls Saturday in an election widely expected to see President Faure Gnassingbe claim a fourth term in power and extend his family's half-century domination of the West African nation.
The incumbent, 53, has led the country of eight million since 2005 following the death of his father Gnassingbe Eyadema, who ruled with an iron fist for 38 years.
In Lome, some voters were out early to cast their vote in the hope the election may bring much-needed change.
"We suffer too much in Togo, this time it has to change," said Eric, a driver in his 30s, near a voting centre.
"I am not going to tell you who I will vote for, but this time we don't want to be cheated of victory," he said, adding that he would return in the evening to watch over the counting after polls close at 1600 GMT.
Elsewhere, ruling party supporter Balakebawi Agbang urged people "to turn out in force to make the right choice" so the government can continue its work.
The authorities faced major protests in 2017 

Togo goes to polls as president seeks likely fourth term

French state-owned energy giant EDF on Saturday began shutting down the country's oldest nuclear power plant after 43 years in operation.
EDF said it had disconnected one of two reactors at Fessenheim, along the Rhine near France's eastern border with Germany and Switzerland, at 2:00 am (0100 GMT) in the first stage of the complete closure of the plant.
The second reactor is to be taken off line on June 30 but it will be several months before the two have cooled enough and the used fuel can start to be removed.
The removal of the fuel is expected to be completed by the summer of 2023 but the plant will only be fully decommissioned by 2040 at the earliest.
Shutting down Fessenheim became a key goal of anti-nuclear campaigners after the catastrophic meltdown at Fukushima in Japan in 2011.
Experts have noted that construction and safety standards at Fessenheim, brought online in 1977, fall far short of those at Fukushima, with some warning that seismic and flooding risks in the Alsace ...

France begins shutting down oldest nuclear plant

A week-long, partial truce came into effect across Afghanistan on Saturday, with jubilant civilians celebrating in the streets to mark a potentially historic turning point in the war, even as isolated attacks threatened to undermine the process.
The Taliban, US and Afghan forces have all agreed to a so-called "reduction in violence" which, if it holds, will be only the second lull in fighting since 2001.
"It is the first morning that I go out without the fear of being killed by a bomb or suicide bomber. I hope it continues forever," Kabul taxi driver Habib Ullah said, while in other parts of the country people danced in the streets.
However in Balkh province in the north, Taliban fighters attacked a district headquarters near the provincial capital of Mazar-i-Sharif, killing two Afghan soldiers, a local official told AFP.
The attack came after midnight, when the partial truce had already kicked in. There were also reports of a separate incident in central Uruzgan province.
General ...

Afghans mark start of week-long partial truce amid isolated attacks

Some 100 passengers who were in close contact with infected people on board began disembarking from the coronavirus-stricken Diamond Princess cruise ship on Saturday, local media said.
They included the last batch of Japanese passengers to leave the ship while some foreign passengers were still waiting on board for chartered aircraft to be sent by their governments.
Around 970 passengers disembarked earlier this week.
Television footage showed a driver in a white protective suit at the wheel of a bus with the curtains drawn so that passengers could not be identified.
They will be quarantined for two weeks near Tokyo, officials said.
With the disembarkation, a 14-day quarantine is expected to start for more than 1,000 crew still on board as many of them did not undergo quarantine because they were needed to keep the ship running.
They were preparing food and delivering meals to cabins, leading some critics to charge they were inadvertently spreading the virus throughout the ship, which 

100 passengers in close contact with infected leave Japan ship

Media groups Fox Corp and NBC Universal are looking to buy ad-supported streaming platforms meant to lure customers who don't want to spend money on subscriptions, the Wall Street Journal reported Friday.
Fox, the Murdoch-family controlled media group which owns the Fox News Channel, has said it would be willing to shell out some USD 500 million for Tubi, a streaming platform which airs mostly older movies and TV shows, the report said.
A tie-up could help expand the footprint of Fox, which last year sold much of its film and television assets to Disney but retained its broadcast television network in the deal.
Tubi, sometimes called the "free Netflix," claims to have some 25 million users and recently announced an expansion into Europe.
It already operates in the United States, Canada and Australia.
NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast, is meanwhile engaged in what the WSJ called advanced talks with Vudu, a Walmart-owned, ad-supported service that allows users to rent and buy movies 

Fox and NBCUniversal in talks to acquire streaming platforms: report

Police in Kazakhstan detained dozens of activists Saturday after two opposition groups announced plans to hold anti-government protests in the oil-rich Central Asian country.
An AFP correspondent saw police detain at least ten activists from the unregistered Democratic Party who were attempting to hold a protest in the largest city Almaty.
Eyewitnesses said that police had detained up to 70 people, who were en route to the site where the group said it would hold a protest.
Authoritarian Kazakhstan has long faced criticism from local and international rights groups for its restrictive laws regulating demonstrations.
Zhanbolat Mamay, a filmmaker and prominent figure in the Democratic Party was arrested and sentenced to three days in administrative detention on Friday.
Mamay told AFP by telephone Friday that "at least ten" members of his group had received sentences of up to five days in detention earlier this week -- a measure he said was intended to prevent the Democratic Party holding 

Dozens detained as Kazakh opposition calls for protests

Finance ministers and central bank governors from G20 nations meet in the Saudi capital Saturday for a two-day gathering to discuss the global economy and the risks from the coronavirus epidemic.
Aside from an action plan to shield the world economy from the impact of the outbreak, financial leaders from the world's top 20 economies are also expected to discuss ways to achieve a fairer global taxation system for the digital era.
"Finance ministers and central bank governors will discuss global economic outlook and possible policy responses to support growth and safeguard against downside risks," G20 organisers said in a statement.
"In addition, they will discuss the priorities of the Saudi G20 Presidency under the theme 'realising opportunities of the 21st century for all'... including the tax challenges arising from the digitalisation of the economy."
The meeting in Saudi Arabia, the first Arab nation to hold the G20 presidency, will be chaired by the the kingdom's finance minister ..

Saudi hosts G20 financial leaders amid coronavirus alarm

China's armies of racing, swerving motorcycle deliverymen have been hailed as saviours during the coronavirus crisis, keeping shut-in citizens fed and stocked up.
But it's come with major adjustments for couriers like Gao Yuchao.
A Shanghai driver for leading meal take-out service ele.me, Gao's job has changed: his temperature is taken several times daily at restaurants and delivery points, he wears not one but two masks for protection, and frequently disinfects his delivery box.
Gone is the routine hand-off to hungry customers -- ele.me and other platforms have moved to "contactless" delivery to guard against infection, dropping parcels off outside gated communities due to paranoia over the virus.
"We're not safe for them. It's understandable that some people have courier-phobia," said Gao, 30.
"It's more protective and hygienic for everyone." Tens of millions have been effectively quarantined in the virus epicentre in central China, but communities across the country also have ...

China's couriers take hands-off approach amid virus

A week-long partial truce took hold across Afghanistan on Saturday, with some jubilant civilians dancing in the streets as the war-weary country woke up to what is potentially a major turning point in its long conflict.
The Taliban, US and Afghan forces have all agreed to a so-called "reduction in violence" which, if it holds, will be only the second lull in fighting since 2001.
It is expected to set the conditions for Washington and the insurgents to sign a deal that could, ultimately, pull American troops out after more than 18 years and launch war-weary Afghanistan into an uncertain future.
"It is the first morning that I go out without the fear of being killed by a bomb or suicide bomber. I hope it continues forever," taxi driver Habib Ullah told AFP in Kabul early Saturday.
A successful week would show the Taliban can control their forces and demonstrate good faith ahead of any signing, which both the US and the insurgents have said could be done on February 29 in Doha.
It also ..

Dancing Afghans mark start of week-long partial truce

Xiao Yao doesn't know when or where he caught the new coronavirus.
He suspects it happened on his train journey home to celebrate the Lunar New Year in Jingzhou city, in central China's Hubei province.
The 27-year-old, who works in the southwest city of Chengdu, only realised something was amiss as the clock ticked midnight into the year of the rat on January 25.
"I suddenly began to feel that my body was very warm, and I began to panic," he told AFP.
Xiao, who was at a friend's house in Jingzhou at the time, wasn't sure what to do.
He had heard horror stories about the virus spreading through the country from friends at the epicentre of the outbreak in nearby Wuhan.
"The feeling I got was that you shouldn't go to the hospital -- you will fall ill if you aren't already ill," he said.
But he knew he had to get away from his friend's young child and elderly parents, to protect them.
By then, Wuhan and other parts of Hubei had been placed under a quarantine that blocked millions of ...

Coronavirus survivor recounts fear, confusion

China's badminton players have been cleared of the coronavirus and will play three tournaments in Europe during a "critical stage" of Tokyo Olympic qualifying, officials said on Saturday.
The Chinese Badminton Association said "no one is infected" and that the team would compete at next week's German Open, the All England Open and the Swiss Open.
"Since the outbreak of coronavirus, there has been close attention on whether the Chinese team could train and participate in tournaments," the CBA said.
"We would like to explain that members of the Chinese badminton team are healthy and that no one is infected or suspected of being infected."
Most of the team have been training in Britain since last week, and the others are still in Beijing applying for British visas.
Olympic men's singles champion Chen Long and Shi Yuqi, as well as veteran star Lin Dan, are listed as starters in Germany and at the All England, as well as women's world number one Chen Yufei.
China have been the dominant ...

AFP

AFP

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