ZAMBIA
US diplomat angers leader
President Edgar Lungu wants US ambassador to Zambia Daniel Foote to leave the country after the diplomat criticized the African state for sentencing a gay couple to 15 years behind bars for having a consensual relationship. “We have complained officially to the American government, and we are waiting for their response, because we don’t want such people in our midst,” Lungu said on Sunday in comments broadcast on state-owned ZNBC TV. “We want him gone.” Foote said last month that he was “personally horrified” after the high court sentenced the two men and called on the government to reconsider laws that punish minority groups.
ZIMBABWE
VP’s wife charged with fraud
Zimbabwe’s anti-graft commission has arrested 38-year-old Marry Mubaiwa, the wife of vice-president Constantine Guvheya Nyikadzino Chiwenga, on fraud and money-laundering charges involving US$1 million, a document seen on Sunday by reporters revealed. Anti-corruption officers detained Mubaiwa on Saturday, a police report said. The charge sheet showed that Chiwenga himself appears to be challenging the legal basis of their marriage. Former model Mubaiwa was arrested on suspicion of having contravened the Exchange Control Act and fraud. The charges accuse her of having transferred US$1 million from her foreign currency account in Zimbabwe to South Africa under the pretext of paying for goods bought there.
MEXICO
Remains of 50 people found
Human remains discovered last month at a farm outside the city of Guadalajara have been confirmed as belonging to at least 50 people, authorities in the state of Jalisco reported. State prosecutors said recovery work at the farm in Tlajomulco de Zuniga, which began on Nov. 22 after the initial discovery, concluded on Friday as experts determined there was no more evidence to be gathered from the scene. The office said in a Saturday statement that there was a “preliminary” indication that the remains corresponded to 50 individuals. Prosecutors said they had identified 13 people so far — 12 male and one female, all of whom were previously listed as missing.
UNITED STATES
DHL ordered to pay US$9m
A jury has awarded more than US$9 million in damages to a man and woman from Vancouver, British Columbia, who were struck by an 18-wheeler truck while riding their bikes along Interstate 84 in the Columbia River Gorge in Oregon. The eight-member jury found Exel Inc — more commonly known as the shipping company DHL — liable for the Aug. 3, 2016, collision late on Friday after a five-day trial in the US District Court in Portland.
UNITED STATES
Kissing brides’ ads safe
In a change of heart, the Hallmark Channel is to allow TV commercials produced by wedding-planning Web site Zola that show two brides kissing. The cable network had pulled the ads over the weekend after the conservative group One Million Moms complained they promoted “the LGBT agenda,” according to The Associated Press. That decision prompted an immediate backlash from people including Ellen DeGeneres and Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg. The company has apologized and would reach out to Zola to reinstate the commercials, it said in a statement.
Thousands gathered across New Zealand yesterday to celebrate the signing of the country’s founding document and some called for an end to government policies that critics say erode the rights promised to the indigenous Maori population. As the sun rose on the dawn service at Waitangi where the Treaty of Waitangi was first signed between the British Crown and Maori chiefs in 1840, some community leaders called on the government to honor promises made 185 years ago. The call was repeated at peaceful rallies that drew several hundred people later in the day. “This government is attacking tangata whenua [indigenous people] on all
The administration of US President Donald Trump has appointed to serve as the top public diplomacy official a former speech writer for Trump with a history of doubts over US foreign policy toward Taiwan and inflammatory comments on women and minorities, at one point saying that "competent white men must be in charge." Darren Beattie has been named the acting undersecretary for public diplomacy and public affairs, a senior US Department of State official said, a role that determines the tone of the US' public messaging in the world. Beattie requires US Senate confirmation to serve on a permanent basis. "Thanks to
UNDAUNTED: Panama would not renew an agreement to participate in Beijing’s Belt and Road project, its president said, proposing technical-level talks with the US US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Sunday threatened action against Panama without immediate changes to reduce Chinese influence on the canal, but the country’s leader insisted he was not afraid of a US invasion and offered talks. On his first trip overseas as the top US diplomat, Rubio took a guided tour of the canal, accompanied by its Panamanian administrator as a South Korean-affiliated oil tanker and Marshall Islands-flagged cargo ship passed through the vital link between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. However, Rubio was said to have had a firmer message in private, telling Panama that US President Donald Trump
‘IMPOSSIBLE’: The authors of the study, which was published in an environment journal, said that the findings appeared grim, but that honesty is necessary for change Holding long-term global warming to 2°C — the fallback target of the Paris climate accord — is now “impossible,” according to a new analysis published by leading scientists. Led by renowned climatologist James Hansen, the paper appears in the journal Environment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development and concludes that Earth’s climate is more sensitive to rising greenhouse gas emissions than previously thought. Compounding the crisis, Hansen and colleagues argued, is a recent decline in sunlight-blocking aerosol pollution from the shipping industry, which had been mitigating some of the warming. An ambitious climate change scenario outlined by the UN’s climate