PRETORIA: Mayor of Uthukela district in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, has defended her decision to reserve 16 university scholarships for girls who can prove their 'virginity'. Dudu Mazibuko said she was empowering students who had “decided to stay pure”, by offering scholarships to girls who can prove they are virgins. The province has the highest rate of HIV and Aids in South Africa, at 16 per cent, according to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “We are just encouraging them to abstain until they are ready to face the world,” she said.
Korea executes army chief for graft'
PYONGYANG: General Ri Young-gil, chief of North Korea's military has been executed on charges of “corruption”, as per a South Korean news agency. General Ri was purged this month and also faced accusations of “pursuing personal gains”. While it is almost impossible to verify the report, rumours of General Ri falling out of favour with Kim has been doing the rounds since early 2014. Ri often accompanied Kim on inspection tours, but his name was conspicuously missing from state media reports of a recent major party meeting and celebrations over the recent rocket launch. If the reports hold to be true, it would be one of the most high-profile purges in North Korea since Kim ordered the execution of his own uncle, Jang Song Thaek, following a special military tribunal.
New IS video shows 4-year-old blowing up a car, killing 3
LONDON: Terrorist organisation, the Islamic State, has released a new graphic video showing a four-year-old Briton blowing up a car and killing three people. Believed to be the son of Muslim convert Grace 'Khadija' Dare from South-east London, who had fled to Syria in 2012 and married Swedish extremist Abu Bakr, had appeared in another propaganda video a month ago. The latest video shows the kid dressed in the terror outfit's trademark camouflage clothing and a black headband, with his hand on the detonator. The three people killed were prisoners dressed in orange, tied up in the car before it blows up. A masked man with a British accent also threatens PM David Cameron in the video.
Help desk for jihadi to evade tracking
WASHINGTON: ISIS has reportedly opened a technical 'help desk' that instructs terrorists on how to put off electronic surveillance and prevent them from committing security blunders. They opened the Electronic Horizon Foundation on January 30, as a joint effort of several top ISIS cyber security experts, as per a media report. “Jihadis have long sought technical information, which has been confined in the past to various password-protected jihadi forums. However, the freedom and ease by which they can now obtain that information is alarming, especially when such information is shared over private and secure channels,” the report said. The EHF operates on the encrypted messaging platform Telegram but also maintains a Twitter account that disseminates information and directs followers to its secure Telegram channel.
Jain temple demolished in Lahore
LAHORE: Punjab government in Pakistan has demolished centuries-old Jain temple in Lahore, provoking intense uproar from the opposition. Leader Mian Mehmood-ur-Rashid has demanded an inquiry into the incident. The Jain community in India has urged the Centre to raise the issue with the neighbour, demanding steps be taken to find out and bring the idols back from the demolished building. “We have sent an e-mail to External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, requesting her to find out through Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi that whether idols of the demolished temple at Lahore's Anarkali Market are safe or not as they hold immense religious and historical importance for us,” Anurodh Lalit Jain, coordinator of the Jain Yuva Sangthan said.
Family of boy shot by police given $500 ambulance bill
NEW YORK: City of Cleveland has filed a lawsuit against the family of 12 year old Tamir Rice, demanding they pay $500 for the boy's “last dying expense”. The family still owes money for the work done by paramedics who had tried to save the boy's life after he was shot in November 2014. Cleveland.com reports that assistant law director Carl Meyers filed a claim in Cuyahoga County Probate Court, informing the family that they need to pay the bill for “advance life support” and also the cost of the ambulance ride to MetroHealth Medical Center. Subodh Chandra, a lawyer for the Rice family, said the bill “adds insult to homicide”. Earl Ward, another family lawyer, branded the bill “cold and callous,” adding it is “disrespectful to a family who is still grieving, especially on the heels of the grand jury decision”.
EU set to restrict passport-free trips
BRUSSELS: Countries of the European Union is prepared to invoke an emergency rule to impose controls at several borders for two more years because of the ongoing migration crisis. The move will restrict passport-free travel, reversing a decades-old trend. Each of the 26 countries in the Schengen Area is allowed to unilaterally put up border controls for a maximum of six months, but that time limit can be extended for up to two years if a member is found to be failing to protect its borders. Documents show that EU policy makers are preparing to make unprecedented use of an emergency provision by declaring that Greece is failing to protect its border sufficiently. With a sense of compromise, EU statement acknowledged the vast challenge facing Greece, saying “the very large number of arrivals is such that the external border controls of any member state would be placed under severe pressure.”
Nato to patrol Aegean Sea to combat migrant-smuggling
BRUSSELS: NATO will send military aid to the Aegean Sea to help EU countries Turkey and Greece crack down on criminal networks smuggling migrants and refugees into the continent. The move is to help the continent tackle its worst migration crisis since World War II. While the plan is yet to be discussed by NATO generals, member states are likely to deploy at least three warships and work with Turkish and Greek coastguards, and the European Union border agency Frontex. “There is now a criminal syndicate that is exploiting these poor people and this is an organised smuggling operation,” said US secretary of defence Ash Carter. “Targeting that is the way that the greatest effect can be had... That is the principal intent of this.”
2 men on trial over Aylan Kurdi's death
SYRIA: Two alleged people-smugglers have been put on trial in Turkey for causing the death of three-year-old Syrian Alan Kurdi and four other people. Kurdi's washed up body has become the icon of the migrant crisis, after it brought to notice the dangers faced by tens of thousands of refugees who risk their lives to seek safety in Europe. Syrian nationals Muwafaka Alabash and Asem Alfrhad have denied any responsibility in the refugees' deaths in their opening hearing, blaming the child's father instead and accusing him of organising the trip and sailing the boat. The defendants have been charged with human smuggling and causing the deaths of five people “through deliberate negligence”. They face up to 35 years in prison each if proven guilty.
US hosp to perform 1st HIV+ organ transplants
NEW YORK: Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine is set to perform the first kidney and liver transplants between HIV donors HIV positive patients, in a development that advocates said could create a lifesaving pipeline for HIV patients and shorten organ donor waiting lists for all. Dr Dorry Segev, associate professor of surgery estimated that organs from 500 to 600 HIV positive potential donors have gone to waste each year and that allowing those donations could save more than 1000 people. “That's be the greatest increase in organ transplantation that we've seen in the past decade,” he said. Medical facilities were forbidden from such transplants until November 2013, when President Obama signed the HIV Organ Policy Equity Act into law.
US plans to name street outside Chinese embassy after dissident
WASHINGTON/BEIJING: The US Senate has unanimously approved a bill to rename the street in front of the Chinese embassy after Liu Xiaobio, who was jailed for 11 years in 2009 for subversion. The bill, proposed by Senator Ted Cruz, also a contender for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination, has triggered an angry reaction from a state-run Chinese newspaper that called it “petty” and “rash”. The address for China's embassy in Washington will be changed from 3505 International Place to 1Liu Xiaobo Plaza, an embarrassment to Beijing as all their letters would bear the name of the incarcerated Chinese dissident. “The apparently provocative move intends to outrage and unsettle China. But this is no big deal. In addition to anger, it will enable us to learn more about the US from another perspective: the US has big problems in abiding by the rules and keeping self-respect and its Congress acts so rashly,” read the editorial.
Brazil deploys 2L soldiers to fight Zika before Oly
BRASILIA: Brazil government has launched a nationwide campaign to fight the Zika virus, with President Dilma Rousseff and several cabinet members personally visiting homes and handing out leaflets along with 220,000 troops. Rousseff said everyone needed to take part in the battle against the mosquito carrying Zika, suspected of causing the birth defect microcephaly. While there are no vaccines or treatment available for the virus, research institutes and pharmaceutical firms are working on possibilities. “Brazil and the world have lost the battle against dengue, but we won the war against yellow fever, which is carried by the same mosquito. We will win the war against Zika,” Rousseff said.
Balochis hold anti-Pakistan stir outside White House
WASHINGTON: Baloch-Americans and leaders from Balochistan held a peaceful protest in front of the White House to seek United States' intervention in Pakistan's “forceful” occupation of the region. “At least 35,000 Baloch are missing. There is a grave violation of human rights on the people of Balochistan and all this is being perpetrated by the Pakistan Army and the ISI,” said Mama Abdul Qadir Baloch. The protest was organised by the Baloch National Movement to condemn the alleged “coldblooded murder of its secretary general Dr Mannan Baloch” by the Pakistani army. The protestors called for an independent Balochistan that can guarantee peace and stability in the region which currently suffers from religious extremism and terrorism.
