International News
Senegal Suspends Mobile Internet, Bans Protest March Over Vote Delay
Senegalese authorities on Tuesday (today) suspended mobile internet and banned a march against the delay of this month’s presidential poll, as the UN voiced concern about tensions in the country.
Protesters shout slogans and collect barrels and tables to burn during clashes with police on the sidelines of a protest against a last-minute delay of presidential elections in Dakar on February 9, 2024. On February 8, 2024, the parliament backed the president’s sudden decision to postpone the February 25 election by 10 months, sparking a fierce opposition backlash and international concern. (Photo by GUY PETERSON / AFP)
Three people have been killed during violent protests after President Macky Sall’s decision to push back the February 25 vote plunged traditionally stable Senegal into one of its worst crises in decades.
“We are deeply concerned about the tense situation in Senegal,” Liz Throssell, spokeswoman for the United Nations rights office, told reporters in Geneva.
“Following reports of unnecessary and disproportionate use of force against protesters and restrictions on civic space, we call on the authorities to ensure that they uphold Senegal’s long-held tradition of democracy and respect for human rights,” she added.
Demonstrations are subject to authorisation in Senegal, with authorities refusing to give the green light for many opposition rallies in recent years.
Unauthorised protests often descend into violent clashes. Security forces repressed demonstrations which took place on Friday.
Throssell said at least three young men were killed and 266 people, including journalists, were reportedly arrested across the country.
The Aar Sunu Election (Let’s protect our election) collective, which includes some 40 civil, religious and professional groups, had called for a peaceful rally in the capital Dakar on Tuesday at 1500 GMT.
But one of the organisers, Elymane Haby Kane, told AFP he had received an official letter from local authorities in Dakar saying the march was banned as it could seriously disrupt traffic.
“We will postpone the march because we want to remain within the law,” said Malick Diop, coordinator of the Aar Sunu Election collective.
– ‘Subversive hate messages’ –
Authorities on Tuesday also suspended mobile internet access for the second time this month, with the communications ministry citing “the dissemination on social networks of several subversive hate messages that have already provoked violent demonstrations”.
Access to mobile data had already been restricted eight days earlier when parliament backed Sall’s decision to postpone the election. It was later restored on Wednesday.
The decision to cut access was a repeat of a move last June when Senegal’s government restricted mobile internet amid high tensions.
The measure has become a common response to curb mobilisation and communication via social networks and is strongly condemned by rights activists.
Sall said he postponed the election because of disputes over the disqualification of potential candidates and over fears of a return to unrest seen in 2021 and 2023.
Parliament backed Sall’s suspension of the election until December 15, but only after security forces stormed parliament and removed some opposition lawmakers who opposed the bill.
The vote paved the way for Sall — whose second term was due to expire in April — to remain in office until his successor is installed, probably in 2025.
Senegal’s opposition has decried the move as a “constitutional coup” and suspects it is part of a plan by the presidential camp who feared defeat at the ballot box.
It has denounced the delay as a move to extend Sall’s term in office, despite him reiterating that he would not stand again.
The United States and the European Union have called on the government to restore the original election timetable.
– Possible amnesty –
Sall, who has been in power since 2012, is now seeking a way out of the turmoil.
Media reports have raised the possibility of dialogue with the opposition, including anti-establishment firebrand Ousmane Sonko, who fought the state for more than two years before being imprisoned last year.
Some have suggested the possibility of an amnesty for Sonko, his imprisoned second-in-command Bassirou Diomaye Faye and for people detained during unrest in 2021 and 2023.
The government has not commented on the reports.
Sall has said he wants to begin a process of “appeasement and reconciliation”.
But the rhetorical olive branch raises a host of questions, including whether it will be accepted by the likes of Sonko and Faye and what it means for their fate.
Defence Minister Israel Katz announced on Thursday that an Israeli airstrike had killed Alireza Tangsiri, commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ navy.
“Last night, in a precise and lethal operation, the IDF eliminated the commander of the Revolutionary Guards’ navy, Tangsiri, along with senior officers of the naval command,” Katz said in a video statement.
“The man who was directly responsible for the terrorist operation of mining and blocking the Strait of Hormuz to shipping was blown up and eliminated.”
Since the start of the joint US-Israeli attacks on Iran on February 28, Israel has announced the killing of several top Iranian officials, including supreme leader Ali Khamenei and the Islamic republic’s powerful security chief, Ali Larijani.
In recent days, Israeli forces have carried out several strikes targeting the naval assets of Iran.
Last week, Israeli airstrikes hit several Iranian naval ships in the Caspian Sea, including ones equipped with missile systems, support vessels and patrol craft.
AFP
US President Donald Trump insisted Wednesday that Iran was taking part in peace talks, suggesting Tehran’s denials were because Iranian negotiators fear being killed by their own side.
“They are negotiating, by the way, and they want to make a deal so badly. But they’re afraid to say it, because they figure they’ll be killed by their own people,” Trump told a dinner for Republican members of Congress.
“They’re also afraid they’ll be killed by us.”
The US leader’s comments came after Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said that “we do not intend to negotiate”.
Trump repeated his assertion that Iran was being “decimated” in the conflict now in its fourth week, even though Tehran still maintains an effective stranglehold over the crucial Strait of Hormuz oil route.
Lashing out at his domestic opponents, Trump also claimed Democrats were trying to “deflect from all of the tremendous success that we’re having in this military operation.”
In a mocking reference to calls from Democrats for him to seek the approval of Congress for the conflict, Trump added: “They don’t like the word ‘war,’ because you’re supposed to get approval, so I’ll use the word military operation.”
The White House said earlier that Trump was ready to “unleash hell” if Iran did not admit defeat, while also insisting that Tehran is still taking part in talks.
Iranian state media had earlier cited an unidentified official as saying that the Islamic republic had responded “negatively” to a reported 15-point plan from Washington.
‘Talks continue’
“If Iran fails to accept the reality of the current moment, if they fail to understand that they have been defeated militarily and will continue to be, President Trump will ensure they are hit harder than they have ever been hit before,” Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters.
“President Trump does not bluff and he is prepared to unleash hell. Iran should not miscalculate again.”
Asked if negotiations with Iran had stalled, Leavitt replied: “Talks continue. They are productive.”
Leavitt declined to say whom the US was dealing with in Tehran following the assassination of supreme leader Ali Khamenei, whose son and successor Mojtaba Khamenei has not been seen in public.
Reports have suggested the Trump administration’s interlocutor is Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s speaker of parliament and one of its most prominent non-clerical figures.
The spokeswoman also declined to confirm reports that top US officials including Vice President JD Vance were set to hold talks with the Iranians in Pakistan, which has emerged as a key mediator.
Trump is moving thousands of airborne troops and extra marines to the Gulf amid speculation that he might order a ground invasion to either seize Iranian oil assets in the Gulf or secure the Strait of Hormuz.
The White House meanwhile appeared to stick to the four to six-week timeline it has previously given for the war.
Trump announced Wednesday that his visit to China to meet Xi Jinping had now been rescheduled for mid-May, having postponed it by six weeks to deal with the conflict.
“We’ve always estimated approximately four to six weeks (for the length of military operations against Iran), so you could do the math on that,” Leavitt added.
AFP
Ousted Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro will appear in a New York court on Thursday for the second time since his capture by US forces in an extraordinary nighttime raid.
Maduro, 63, and his wife, Cilia Flores, have been held in a Brooklyn jail for almost three months after American commandos snatched the pair from their compound in Caracas in early January.
The stunning operation deposed the strongman who had led Venezuela since 2013 and has since forced the oil-rich country to largely bend to the will of US President Donald Trump.
Maduro has declared himself a “prisoner of war” and pleaded not guilty to the four counts of “narco-terrorism” conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy, possession of machine guns and destructive devices, and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices.
Thursday’s hearing at 11 a.m. (1500 GMT) will likely see Maduro push for the dismissal of his case as lawyers tussle over who will pay the former leader’s legal fees.
Venezuela’s government is seeking to cover the costs, but because of Washington’s sanctions, his lawyer, Barry Pollack, must obtain a US license that has not been issued.
Pollack argued in a court submission that the license requirement violated Maduro’s constitutional right to legal representation and demanded the case be thrown out on procedural grounds.
Deadly Raid
Detained in Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Centre, a federal prison known for unsanitary conditions, Maduro is reportedly alone in a cell with no access to the internet or newspapers.
A source close to the Venezuelan government said the incarcerated Maduro reads the Bible and is referred to as “president” by some of his fellow detainees
He is only allowed to communicate by phone with his family and lawyers for a maximum of 15 minutes per call, the source added.
“The lawyers told us he is strong. He said we must not be sad,” said his son, Nicolas Maduro Guerra, adding his father told him: “We are fine, we are fighters.”
Maduro and his wife were forcibly taken by US commandos in the early hours of January 3 in airstrikes on the Venezuelan capital backed by warplanes and a heavy naval deployment.
At least 83 people died, and more than 112 people were injured in the assault, according to Venezuelan officials.
No US service members were killed.
US Pressure
At his first US court appearance in January, Maduro struck a defiant tone as he identified himself as the president of Venezuela despite being captured.
The South American country is now led by Delcy Rodriguez, who has been Maduro’s vice president since 2018.
Under US pressure, she is grappling with leading a country saddled with the world’s largest proven oil reserves but an economy in shambles.
Rodriguez has since enacted a historic amnesty law to free political prisoners jailed under Maduro and reformed oil and mining regulations in line with US demands for access to her country’s vast natural wealth.
This month, the State Department said it was restoring diplomatic ties with Venezuela in a sign of thawing relations.
Security is expected to be heightened around the New York courthouse for Thursday’s hearing.
Presiding over the case is Alvin Hellerstein, a 92-year-old judge credited with overseeing several high-profile trials during his decades on the bench.
AFP
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