Philippines President Duterte ordered mass murders, claims former militiaman
Spokesman for Rodrigo Duterte rejects accusations of extrajudicial killings – including feeding a man to a crocodile – when he was mayor of Davao
A Filipino former militiaman testified before the country’s Senate on Thursday that President Rodrigo Duterte, when he was still a city mayor, ordered him and other members of a liquidation squad to kill criminals and opponents in gangland-style assaults that left about 1,000 dead.
Edgar Matobato told the nationally televised Senate committee hearing that he heard Duterte order some of the killings. Matobato acknowledged he himself carried out about 50 of the abductions and deadly assaults, including a man who was fed to a crocodile in 2007 in southern Davao city.
The committee inquiry is being led by Senator Leila de Lima, a staunch critic of Duterte’s anti-drug campaign that has left more than 3,000 suspected drug users and dealers dead since he assumed the presidency in June. Duterte has accused de Lima of involvement in illegal drugs, alleging that she used to have a driver who took money from detained drug lords. She has denied the allegations.
Flatscreens for trash: Recycling for prizes in Nigeria
OBSERVERS
For four years, employees of Wecyclers have been rolling through the streets of Lagos on bikes, collecting rubbish to be recycled from households in the Nigerian company's programme. The originality of this approach resides in its incentive structure: households earn points for their garbage, and those points can be exchanged for prizes.
Wecyclers was founded in 2012 by Bilikiss Adebiyi, a Nigerian who studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), in the United States. It was during her time at the university that she came up with the idea for the business, hoping both to help reduce the rubbish problem in Lagos – her home city and Nigeria's economic capital – and to help the poor.
"Households can win food, little appliances, telephone credit, money..."
Growing number of colleges offer food pantries to help students
SEARCH FOR SOLUTIONS
College officials cite several reasons the pantries are needed, including more low-income students and a higher cost of living. 'We want our students to be successful ...,' explains one official.
HOUSTON — Dwyanya Earnhardt refers to herself as an ex-con and recovering drug addict, but now the 40-year-old has a new title: college student.
The Houston Chronicle reports she studies Human Services at Lone Star College in Conroe, Texas, balancing school with waitressing on the weekends. Her husband works as a commercial electrician.
"We make literally $20 an hour between us," Earnhardt said.
During her first semester, Earnhardt confided to her English teacher that she and her husband were struggling financially. Her English teacher told her about Karen Buckman, a psychology professor, who helped start a food pantry on campus in September 2015. The food pantry located inside Lone Star's student services building is filled with beans, soups, vegetables, baby food and other items.China’s gay rights charade
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On Monday, Qiu Bai, a 22-year-old student from the city of Guangzhou, China, took the Chinese Ministry of Education to court in Beijing to demand that it change the way college textbooks talk about homosexuality. Right now, most of them call it a disease.
The trial went mostly as Qiu had expected. A government official said the language in the textbooks did not infringe on her rights as a gay student, and refused to respond directly to her complaints that the textbooks were spreading false— and potentially dangerous — information. The judge announced that she would make a decision “another day” (which generally means in about three months). Then the hearing adjourned.
Civilians In Rebel-Held Aleppo Breathe Sigh Of Relief: ‘Now, We Can Go Outside’
A shaky ceasefire has brought some calm to the besieged city, but promised aid deliveries have yet to show up.
ISTANBUL ― For months, 5-year-old Hala and 8-month-old Oula were confined to the walls of their house in rebel-held Aleppo. Their family dared not venture outside, terrified of the deadly bombs dropped by Syrian government and Russian forces on civilians and fighters alike.
But this week, family members brought Hala and Oula outside for the first time since July, thanks to a Russian and U.S.-brokered ceasefire. As the girls played in the sunshine, the sky above was void of barrel bombs and menacing warplanes. It was an Eid al-Adha miracle.
“They’re happy now,” the girls’ uncle, Gheyyath, said by phone from Aleppo, as children shrieked with joy in the background. Even he couldn’t help but giggle. “Prior to the truce, there was fierce bombing. Now, we can go outside.”
The strange story of a seized Hanjin ship and its lonely crew
Sprinkled across the oceans around the globe, some 60 of Hanjin Shipping's cargo vessels are stranded at sea after the company filed for bankruptcy two weeks ago.
Here's the story of one of those ships, its captain and its crew.
The Hanjin Rome is nestled between countless other ships off the coast of Singapore, a towering container vessel. As with any of these ships, if you approach in a small boat, it seems there's no sign of life up there.
That's what the BBC did, hoping to get on board to see what the situation was. Well, our team didn't get permission - but they did manage to speak to the crew via radio and get some contact details.
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