MOZAMBIQUE
Protesters dispute election
The capital, Maputo, on Friday experienced a mobile Internet blackout after protests against the re-election of the ruling Frelimo party descended into violence. Protests erupted on Thursday with hundreds of opposition supporters rejecting what they called a ballot “stolen” by a “corrupt” electoral commission in favor of the party that has ruled since 1975. The commission on Thursday had announced Frelimo candidate Daniel Chapo as the winner of the Oct. 9 election with 71 percent of the vote, sparking a furious reaction from the opposition. Further sporadic demonstrations sprang up on Friday in the capital, where streets were littered with broken glass, burnt tires and other debris. Internet outages across various mobile carriers struck Maputo, although home access was not affected.
UNITED KINGDOM
Hunt on for cheese swindler
British celebrity chef Jamie Oliver on Saturday urged cheese lovers to help police catch scammers who conned a London dairy out of 22 tonnes of English and Welsh cheddar. Oliver described the theft as a “brazen heist of shocking proportions.” He told followers on Instagram to be alert if they heard anything about “lorry loads of very posh cheese” being offered “for cheap,” adding that the cheddar would have originally been worth about ￡300,000 (US$388,830). The appeal comes after Neal’s Yard Dairy said it delivered more than 950 wheels of cheddar to the alleged fraudster posing as a wholesale distributor for a major French retailer before realizing it had been duped. The Metropolitan Police in a statement on Friday said it was investigating a “report of the theft of a large quantity of cheese.”
UNITED STATES
G7 to boost sanction efforts
Finance ministers of the G7 nations on Saturday vowed to step up efforts to prevent Russia from evading sanctions imposed after its invasion of Ukraine. “We remain committed to taking further initiatives in response to oil price cap violations,” the group said in a statement following a meeting in Washington. Those further steps were not spelled out in detail. In December 2022, the G7 together with the EU and Australia agreed to pressure purchasers of Russian oil to not go above a certain price ceiling. However, some countries, notably China, have continued to import Russian crude oil without observing the price ceiling. The G7 finance ministers also said they would take additional measures aimed at “increasing the costs to Russia of using the shadow fleet to evade sanctions.” The group on Friday announced it had reached an agreement to provide a loan of about US$50 billion to Ukraine. The loan would be repaid with the interest — about US$3 billion a year — generated by Russian assets seized and frozen after the war began in February 2022.
BULGARIA
Borisov likely to top poll
Bulgarians began voting yesterday in their seventh election in less than four years, with dim hope of an end to political turmoil that has favoured the country’s far right. The EU’s poorest member state has been at a standstill since 2020, when massive anti-corruption protests brought down the Cabinet of conservative three-time prime minister Boyko Borisov. Six consecutive votes so far have failed to yield a stable government. Borisov’s GERB party once again looks set to top the vote, but chances are high that GERB would struggle to find partners to govern. Voter turnout is also expected to be low, amid fears of electoral fraud.
‘GREAT OPPRTUNITY’: The Paraguayan president made the remarks following Donald Trump’s tapping of several figures with deep Latin America expertise for his Cabinet Paraguay President Santiago Pena called US president-elect Donald Trump’s incoming foreign policy team a “dream come true” as his nation stands to become more relevant in the next US administration. “It’s a great opportunity for us to advance very, very fast in the bilateral agenda on trade, security, rule of law and make Paraguay a much closer ally” to the US, Pena said in an interview in Washington ahead of Trump’s inauguration today. “One of the biggest challenges for Paraguay was that image of an island surrounded by land, a country that was isolated and not many people know about it,”
DIALOGUE: US president-elect Donald Trump on his Truth Social platform confirmed that he had spoken with Xi, saying ‘the call was a very good one’ for the US and China US president-elect Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) discussed Taiwan, trade, fentanyl and TikTok in a phone call on Friday, just days before Trump heads back to the White House with vows to impose tariffs and other measures on the US’ biggest rival. Despite that, Xi congratulated Trump on his second term and pushed for improved ties, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. The call came the same day that the US Supreme Court backed a law banning TikTok unless it is sold by its China-based parent company. “We both attach great importance to interaction, hope for
‘FIGHT TO THE END’: Attacking a court is ‘unprecedented’ in South Korea and those involved would likely face jail time, a South Korean political pundit said Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol yesterday stormed a Seoul court after a judge extended the impeached leader’s detention over his ill-fated attempt to impose martial law. Tens of thousands of people had gathered outside the Seoul Western District Court on Saturday in a show of support for Yoon, who became South Korea’s first sitting head of state to be arrested in a dawn raid last week. After the court extended his detention on Saturday, the president’s supporters smashed windows and doors as they rushed inside the building. Hundreds of police officers charged into the court, arresting dozens and denouncing an
RELEASE: The move follows Washington’s removal of Havana from its list of terrorism sponsors. Most of the inmates were arrested for taking part in anti-government protests Cuba has freed 127 prisoners, including opposition leader Jose Daniel Ferrer, in a landmark deal with departing US President Joe Biden that has led to emotional reunions across the communist island. Ferrer, 54, is the most high-profile of the prisoners that Cuba began freeing on Wednesday after Biden agreed to remove the country from Washington’s list of terrorism sponsors — part of an eleventh-hour bid to cement his legacy before handing power on Monday to US president-elect Donald Trump. “Thank God we have him home,” Nelva Ortega said of her husband, Ferrer, who has been in and out of prison for the
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