Aung San Suu Kyi's party takes seats in historic session of Myanmar parliament
Hundreds of National League for Democracy MPs, including party leader, sit as a majority for the first time in parliament
After half a century of military-dominated rule, Aung San Suu Kyi has led her National League for Democracy (NLD) party into Myanmar’s parliament, taking a majority of seats and starting the process of installing a democratically elected government.
Aung San Suu Kyi has waited more than 25 years for this moment, having won a parliamentary majority in 1990 that was annulled by the military leadership. In November last year, she led the NLD to another landslide victory that has been accepted by the outgoing army-aligned government.
Hundreds of NLD parliamentarians, many of them former political prisoners during successive military regimes, took their seats in the lower house on Monday morning. The party won 80% of all electable positions during a general election in November, with the military reserving a quarter of total seats.Alternative for Germany: Party behind Germany's 'shoot at migrants' politician is attracting unprecedented support
A German politician has called for police to be allowed to shoot at migrants. While her demand was widely condemned, Tony Paterson reports from Berlin that the right-wing, xenophobic party she leads is attracting unprecedented support
The leader of Germany’s main right-wing anti-migrant party has caused political uproar by insisting that the country’s border police should be authorised to shoot at refugees trying to enter the country illegally.
Frauke Petry, the 40-year-old leader of Germany’s once merely Eurosceptic but now increasingly xenophobic Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, made her controversial demands after addressing a political meeting in Hanover at the weekend.
“Police must stop migrants crossing illegally from Austria,” Ms Petry told the Mannheimer Morgen newspaper. “And, if necessary, use firearms. That is what the law says.” She added: “I don’t want this either, but the use of armed force is there as a last resort.”
THE MARIANA MINING DISASTER
burst dam in Brazil released millions of tonnes of toxic mud and has caused destruction across 500kms, from the mountains of Minas Gerais to the Atlantic Ocean.
Wallison Henrique de Souza always dreamed of owning his own home. As a bricklayer, he decided to build it himself while living in rented accommodation.
It took three years and more than $10,000 in materials to build a small, one-storey house next to his mother in Bento Rodrigues, a village in the Mariana district of Brazil’s mineral-rich state of Minas Gerais.
The area’s economy is mostly based on mining. Samarco – a joint venture between Brazil’s Vale and Anglo-Australian company BHP Billiton – is one of the region’s biggest employers, mining iron ore and depositing the resultant waste in the nearby Fundao dam.
For Palestinian citizens of Israel, no place is quite home
AMID PROGRESS, CONFLICTED IDENTITY
Even as Arabs in Israel are more successfully integrating into Israeli society, they are identifying more as Palestinians.
KAFR QASSEM, ISRAEL — Huda Abo Zaeid is an Arab woman who wears the hijab of a devout Muslim. She also oversees Hebrew curriculum at the local elementary school.
It’s indicative of the dual identities for people in this Arab village in central Israel.
At the local community center, the entryway displays portraits of Palestinian intellectuals alongside prints by a famous Israeli artist. Downstairs, a government-funded museum commemorates the 1956 massacre of Kafr Qassem villagers by Israeli soldiers, an event still seared into the collective memory of Arab citizens of Israel. A sign in Hebrew reads: "We won't forget, we won't forgive."
Boko Haram attack: Children burnt alive in Nigeria
At least 86 people, including children, killed in a series of attacks on a village in northern Nigeria.
| Politics, War & Conflict, Africa, Nigeria
At least 86 people, including a number children, have been killed in a series of attacks on a village in north-eastern Nigeria, according to officials.
Witnesses said suspected Boko Haram fighters firebombed huts, and opened fire on civilians on Saturday evening in the village of Dalori, leaving bullet-ridden and charred bodies strewn across the streets. Gunmen also tried to storm a camp close to Dalori, home to some 25,000 refugees, but were repelled by troops.
Witnesses said they heard the screams of children burning to death as huts and homes were razed to the ground.
Mohammed Kanar, area coordinator of the National Emergency Management Agency, told the Associated Press news agency that 86 bodies had been collected by Sunday afternoon.
Making money out of the migrant crisis
Last year a record 1.1 million people sought asylum in Germany - and while politicians have been busy arguing over how best to deal with the influx of migrants, others have been making money out of it.
Raphael Hock is one of life's optimists.
He has reason to be. At 22, he is fit, highly qualified, bilingual, drives a smart car, is fresh back from a skiing holiday in the Alps and is heir to a multi-million euro family business.
Hock is driving me past whitewashed mansions among the birch trees of Gruenwald, on the southern outskirts of Munich. We're in the most prosperous part of one of the most prosperous cities on Earth. These houses - with their pools and barbecue decks - belong to bosses of famous manufacturing firms and to football players of Bayern Munich.
No comments:
Post a Comment