Moroccan king to investigate Spanish paedophile pardon

Moroccans outraged by the king's pardon protested outside parliament on Friday

The Moroccan king has promised an investigation into the royal pardoning of a Spanish man convicted of raping 11 children aged between four and 15.

The paedophile was among 48 jailed Spaniards freed by King Mohammed VI, sparking angry protests and violent clashes with police in Rabat on Friday.

A royal statement said the king had been unaware of the gravity of the Spaniard's crimes.

Fresh protests are expected in Casablanca and Rabat next week.

Daniel Galvan Vina, believed to be in his sixties, was sentenced to 30 years in prison in September 2011.

However, last week he was freed by royal decree from a jail in Kenitra, north of the capital. He is reported to have left the country.

Dozens of people were injured in violent confrontations between hundreds of protesters and police outside parliament in the Moroccan capital on Friday.

Demonstrations were also reported in the cities of Kenitra, Tangier and Tetouan, as well as outside the Moroccan embassy in Paris.

"The king was never informed - in any way or at any time - of the seriousness of the abject crimes of which the person concerned was convicted," a statement released by the royal palace said on Sunday.

"It is clear that the sovereign would never have consented" to his release, given the "monstrous crimes" committed, the statement concluded.

It is normal procedure for the king to pardon prisoners on special occasions, such as Throne Day, last Tuesday.

Morocco's Justice Ministry said on Friday the pardons were based on national interests and "friendly relations" with Spain.

A number of foreign nationals have recently been detained in Morocco under suspicion of paedophilia.

In June, a British man was arrested in the port town of Tetouan over allegations of raping a six-year-old girl. In May, a Casablanca court sentenced a French man to 12 years in jail on paedophilia charges.

Thousands of Moroccans marched in Casablanca earlier this year to condemn paedophilia and violence against children in the north African country.

Evidence Suggests Torture Practiced By Mursi Supporters - Amnesty International

Supporters of deposed Islamist President Mohamed Mursi have tortured individuals from their rival political camp, said an Amnesty International report issued Friday on account of testimonies from survivors and evidence it collected.

"Allegations that torture is being carried out by individuals are extremely serious and must be investigated as a matter of urgency," urged Amnesty International's Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa, Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui.

The international organization's report recounted details of anti-Mursi protesters being "captured, beaten, subjected to electric shocks and stabbed by loyalists to the deposed president."

"Since mass rival rallies began in late June, as of 28 July, eight bodies have arrived at the morgue in Cairo bearing signs of torture. At least five of these were found near areas where pro-Mursi sit-ins were being held," said the report.

On July 30, the Ministry of Interior said that 11 bodies bearing signs of torture have been found near the protest camps of Mursi loyalists, in addition to 10 complaints of torture reported by survivors.

In support of official accounts, the "I am Against Torture" campaign group told Amnesty International that it had independently verified that 11 people have died following torture at the hands of Mursi supporters since the beginning the crisis.

"The apparent use of torture for reprisal attacks is unacceptable. People should not take the law into their own hands. Political leaders have a responsibility to condemn these criminal acts and call on their supporters to renounce such human rights abuses."

Concurrently, Amnesty urged the Egyptian government not to use these crimes, which it stressed they were carried out by few, as a pretext to collectively punish all pro-Mursi supporters or use excessive force to disperse their sit-ins.

Loyalists to deposed Islamist President Mohamed Mursi have been holding sit-ins for more than a month in Rabaa al-Adawiya and Nahda Square, demanding his reinstatement following his overthrow by the army that came in response to mass protests across Egypt. They also started a new sit-in near the capital's international airport.

Queens Back From Luxury Holiday

A group of King Mswati's 13 wives are heading back to Swaziland after a vacation that was said to cost millions of dollars.

The wives and an entourage of about 100 people have been on a tour of Japan, Australia, the Pacific and the Indian Ocean for the past two weeks. They are due back at Matsapha this weekend (4 August 2013).

Swazi Media Commentary tracked the progress of King Mswati's private jet as it made its way across half the globe.

In the past week it has been in Papua New Guinea, Australia (Canberra and Sydney), the paradise holiday isle of Bali, the Maldives and Ethiopia before heading back to Swaziland.

The holiday trip was made in great secrecy and media in Swaziland, where the king rules as sub-Saharan Africa's last absolute monarch, have been silent about it.

King Mswati's wives take expensive holidays each year and in the past have travelled to the United States, Europe and the Middle East.

King Mswati is said to have a personal fortune, estimated by Forbes to be about US$200 million. He has 13 palaces in Swaziland, fleets of Mercedes and BMW cars and at least one Rolls Royce. Meanwhile, seven in ten of his subjects live in abject poverty earning less than US$2 a day.

Last month a report on hunger in Swaziland revealed that 40 percent of children in Swaziland were so malnourished it stunted their growth.

Shekau Shot, Deposed - Boko Haram Spiritual Leader

Boko Haram

Borno — Sheikh Abubakar Shekau, leader of the violent Islamic sect, Boko Haram, has reportedly been shot and deposed by members of his own sect, Boko Haram.

A new leader, Abu Zamira Mohammed, who is the sect's leader negotiating with the federal government has been appointed new leader by the group's Shura Council.

The group also said that its ceasefire declaration is working, pointing out that there has not been any suicide bombing since the declaration. It noted its condemnation of the Yobe massacre where 40 students were killed, adding that some politicians now commit murder and ascribe it to Boko Haram

On the Kano blasts last Monday, which led to the death of about 45 people, the group blamed it on federal government's tardiness in responding to the ceasefire agreement.

A joint report published yesterday, by Dr. Stephen Davis, a conflict resolution expert and an adviser to the last three Nigerian Presidents and Phillip van Niekerk, President of Calabar Africa, a strategic advisory company focusing on Africa, and former Editor of South Africa's Mail & Guardian newspaper, in the US based online newspaper, huffingtonpost.com, quoted one Imam Liman Ibrahim, spiritual leader of Boko Haram, as saying that the change in leadership was prelude to peace negotiations with the federal government.

A faction of Boko Haram has entered into a back-channel dialogue with the government in the search for an elusive peace to a conflict that has seen multiple suicide bombings, attacks on government buildings and churches, and has claimed thousands of lives since 2011.

The Chairman of the Presidential Committee on Dialogue and Restoration of Peace in the North-East, Tanimu Turaki, last month announced that his committee had reached an "understanding for ceasefire" with members of the Jama'atu Ahlul Sunnah Lih Da'awa Wal Jihad, JAS, more commonly known as Boko Haram. JAS leadership also nominated five people to enter peace discussions with the Federal Government: Abu Liman Ibrahim, Abu Zamira Mohammed, Abu Adam Maisandari, Kassim Imam Biu and Mallam Modu Damaturu. In its press statement, JAS said the ceasefire would be in effect for 60 days, and that during the period, any attacks in its name or in the name of its leader, Imam Shekau, would be bogus attacks.

Boko Haram has been in preliminary discussions with government emissaries since the organisation declared a ceasefire on June 26. Abu Zamira Mohammed told the paper that his group was still waiting for the Federal Government's response to the ceasefire declaration. The contacts are still at an early, fragile stage, and there is no guarantee that the talks will achieve a breakthrough.

The writers said: "It has now come to light that Boko Haram's leadership sent representatives to the capital Abuja on June 25, 2013 where they revealed to the government that Shekau was no longer their leader."

Imam Liman Ibrahim, the spiritual leader of Boko Haram, explained that the teaching of Shekau was becoming increasingly harsh and began to depart from the Holy Qu'ran.

"It was harsh, harsh, harsh," Imam Liman said when explaining the reasons for the change of leadership.

"The beheadings, the killings, the recent death of students ... this is not the way of the Holy Qu'ran. We could tolerate it no longer.

"Imam Liman explained that Shekau was given a choice of joining the peace dialogue with the Nigerian government, forming his own sect or being killed. Several senior Boko Haram commanders including Shekau's Chief of Security and personal bodyguard, Abdullahi Hassan, have claimed that Shekau has since been shot in the lower leg, thigh and shoulder," the paper went on.

The report said," Shekau's exact fate is not known. A video clip recovered from a Boko Haram camp in the Sambisa Forest Reserve in the northeast Nigeria, raided by the military on May 16, shows Shekau limping, providing confirmation of reports he had been shot.

"However, Shekau has been noticeably absent from recent public statements and is not one of the leaders who have engaged with government emissaries. It had been presumed that Shekau chose to voluntarily leave peace discussions in the hands of Boko Haram's leadership group," the duo wrote.

The JAS leadership were quoted as citing the Qu'ran as their inspiration for seeking peace. "In the Holy Qu'ran, Sura At Tauba: Wa-injanahuu-Lisalmi Faji Nahlahaa, we are encouraged to seek peace. The Holy Qu'ran also tells us it is good to negotiate. Sura At Nisa Ayih: Wa-sulhu Haira."

In June, the Boko Haram leadership demanded that women held by the military under the state of the emergency in the north be released. President Jonathan authorised the release, which opened the door to the ceasefire and the peace dialogue.

The report also said "the Boko Haram leadership has appointed Abubakar Babasani Ibn Yusuf as spokesman to replace Zamirah. Babasani says the leadership has been consulting all senior commanders to assure compliance with the ceasefire. He said commanders as far afield as Niger, Chad, Sudan and Cameroon have agreed to the ceasefire and discussions with the Nigerian government on the subject of a peace deal."

The June 26 ceasefire announcement has been accompanied by an absence of suicide bombings, giving credibility to the new leadership and their intention of signing a peace accord. However, the administration's tardiness in responding to the group's ceasefire announcement is believed to have precipitated three car bomb attacks in the northern city of Kano this week that left at least 15 people dead.

Other attacks have persisted including the recent horrific killings of students in Yobe where about 40 students were incinerated in their school building. The latest Boko Haram statement is highly critical of the Yobe deaths and denies responsibility for the attacks.

The leadership blames such atrocities on politicians in the northeast whom they accuse of arming gangs and committing crimes in the name of Boko Haram.

Shekau was deputy leader under Boko Haram founder Imam Mohammed Yusuf who was captured in July 2009 in fighting in the northeast of Nigeria and executed by Nigeria's Police force in what appears to have been an extrajudicial killing. The interrogation and Yusuf's bullet-riddled body were filmed on video.

Yusuf's death radicalized the Boko Haram leaders and led them to move underground and identify more closely with Al Qaeda. Following the founder's killing, Shekau emerged as the new leader of a revitalised Boko Haram in 2010 and he and other commanders refocused the group towards global jihad.

Shekau launched a series of well-planned assassinations and suicide bombings that targeted Nigerian police headquarters and the UN offices in Abuja among many other locations. Through a series of video appearances on television stations, notably Al Jazeera, Shekau emerged as the face of Boko Haram. Earlier this year, the U.S. placed a $7-million bounty on his head.

The military's Joint Task Force has recently arrested Alhaji Mala Othman, Chairman of the opposition All Nigeria People's Party in Borno state, the epicentre of the insurrection, on terrorism charges.

"Jonathan declared a state of emergency on May 14 and launched a military offensive that has seen some successes. But reprisal attacks by Boko Haram, including the freeing of 105 of their members from prison, indicate that without a peace deal, Boko Haram has the resources to continue the fight," the duo wrote.

A Big Bang and a Bright Idea As Satellite Coverage Strengthened Over Africa

ANALYSIS

We have all seen rocket launches on TV but nothing prepares you for the real thing. From a couple of miles away, the rocket looked like a distant steeple glistening peacefully in the sun. Assembled in an open air viewing platform, we were casually chatting.

Then the countdown began. As it reached "Two ... .One", a vast explosion of smoke roiled out from the base of the rocket. A painfully bright tongue of flame spurted downwards and the silver tube rose, then shot towards the clouds with terrifying acceleration. Then the bang hit like a blow to the stomach. The rocket flashed through the clouds losing its boosters, then arced beautifully eastwards across the sky until silence finally absorbed its roar and its booming echo.

This all took place at the launch of the European Space Agency's (ESA) Ariane 5 rocket from the ESA base at Kourou in French Guiana. Part of Ariane 5's 9.6 tonne payload was Alphasat, a satellite built by Inmarsat - a company that provides 'global voice, data and IP communications solutions' - that could have a revolutionary impact on the availability of satellite communications services to African countries

At 6.7 tonnes, Alphasat is the biggest satellite built by Inmarsat so far. Two and a half times more powerful than any of the previous Inmarsat satellites, it will come to rest 22,500 miles up, somewhere over the middle of Congo. So far the mission has gone well - something that is not taken for granted among its creators.

Inmarsat was founded 1979 by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) so ships could stay in constant touch and summon help in an emergency. It still handles thousands of distress and safety calls a year.

Over 30 years later, Inmarsat continues to be at the heart of maritime and aviation safety systems whilst also growing into a global leader in mobile satellite broadband communications services. The company provides voice and data communications across the world - particularly in areas where terrestrial systems are non-existent or unreliable.

Its communication satellites are now used by organisations ranging from governments to aid agencies and from ship owners to mining companies. Inmarsat is also used by airlines across the world, by journalists reporting from remote regions and anyone outside the range of mobile or fixed line terrestrial telecommunication networks. .

At Inmarsat's headquarters in London, the map of the world is laid out across a vast screen overlaid with a honeycomb pattern. Each segment represents a sector, small at the equator directly beneath the satellite and elongating as the curvature of the earth extends north and south. This new satellite - Alphasat - will cover the whole of Africa, the oceans each side and most of southern Europe, the Middle East and West Asia.

But looking at the back-lit digital wall map, it is clear that while in Afghanistan, Iraq and other stressed places, usage is very high, there are almost no calls or communications in vast swathes of Africa.

And these are also the areas that are not economic for mobile phone companies to build transmitters in. Despite the explosion of mobile phone use across the continent in the last decade, these areas are not covered and satellite communications have been far too expensive.

This, says Rupert Pearce, CEO of Inmarsat, could change soon, as the price of sat-phones and satellite communication may be about to fall dramatically. "The cost per bit is coming down enormously as we become more efficient and more effective with investment in new technology. Sat-phones that once cost $2000 dollars now retail at $500."

The huge capacity and efficiency of Alphasat means that in the predictable quiet periods, airtime could be sold at a discount or subsidised for universities, schools and hospitals by the big corporate users.

Massive Online Open Content Courses (Moocs) could be made available to remote villages and schools in Africa. Telemedicine by satellite - already widely used by the shipping and aviation industries - could easily be made available to far flung hospitals and clinics - or even by individuals through mobile phones linked to a wifi hotspot.

Africa has the world's fastest growing numbers of mobile phones per capita. The bank on your phone and other major innovations in mobile telephony also started in Africa.

With a relative lack of infrastructure and very few landlines, Africa has been able to jump a generation faster than most developed countries. Could this new satellite provide even cheaper telephone calls and especially broadband for all in Africa, even in the remotest places?

MDC-T Supporter Jailed for Shouting Bhora Musango

A SUSPECTED MDC-T supporter who shouted "bhora musango" 30 metres from a polling station has been jailed for three months.

John Munyikwa (39) of Domboramwari in Epworth had initially been handed a six-month jail term before Harare magistrate Anita Tshuma set aside three months for five years on condition of good behaviour.

John's accomplice Kingstone Hurudza who had first shouted "bhora mugedhi" was still at large.

John readily pleaded guilty to contravening Electoral Act saying that he was just playing with his friend Kingstone.

When magistrate Tshuma asked John what his statements meant, he said that it showed that he had voted for the MDC-T and he (John) agreed that such conduct was unlawful.

State prosecutor Tungamirai Chakurira submitted that "a short and sharp custodial sentence" would meet the justice of the case because his statements had the potential to cause violence.

"The accused committed an offence that has the potential to cause disaster.

"The timing was unfortunate because it is everyone's desire that peace continues to prevail in the country," submitted prosecutor Chakurira.

Prosecutor Chakurira added that, "such reckless conduct and utterances should be avoided at a time of elections because they have a potential to cause public disorder and violence. The electoral period should expire while the accused is in custody".

It was proved that on Election Day (Wednesday July 31), John went to Shawasha Polling Station to cast his vote.

When he finished, he moved for a distance about 30 metres away from the polling station and met Kingstone.

Kingstone then kicked an empty cardboard box to John shouting "bhora mugedhi" but the latter kicked back the cardbox to his colleague shouting "bhora musango".

The State proved that John's chants meant Vote MDC -T.

Constable Nommater Gombacheka who was nearby heard them and when the cops approached them. Kingstone bolted from the scene leaving John to face arrest.

Election a 'Huge Farce' - Tsvangirai

MDC-T leader Morgan Tsvangirai has dismissed Wednesday's elections as a "huge farce" saying he has since met with the AU Observer mission chair Olesugun Obasanjo to voice his concerns over the manner in which the poll was conducted.

Addressing journalists at his party offices in Harare Thursday, the MDC-T leader Tsvangirai said the election was "illegitimate" adding that the ball now rests squarely with the AU and SADC.

"The election has been a huge farce. Its credibility has been marred by administrative and legal violations which affect the legitimacy of its outcome," he said.

"I have met with the chair of the AU observer mission, former Nigerian President Olesugun Obasanjo, head of the SADC observer mission and I have given a diplomatic briefing. The message we have given is that this is not a credible election. It does not reflect the will of the people of Zimbabwe.

"The election has been heavily manipulated. In our view, the outcome of this election is illegitimate. But more importantly, the shoddy manner in which it has been conducted and the consequent illegitimacy of the result will plunge this country into a serious crisis.

"We therefore call for SADC, and the AU audit teams to look into this process, in particular the voters roll, the ballots and the manner in which the whole process was conducted."

The MDC-T leader said the vote was a sham as it failed to meet the SADC guidelines on elections singling out the issue of the voters roll as well as the disenfranchisement of thousands of potential voters.

He said the voters roll was in a shambles adding that traditional chiefs were also intimidating rural people to vote. He also said some voters were also being bussed rendering the whole exercise a sham.

Visibly downcast, Tsvangirai did not wait for questions from Journalists after presenting his statement choosing, instead, to head straight to his vehicle escorted by his security details and driving off.