Various new or tweaked Swiss laws, governing a range of issues from foreigners to online shopping, entered into force on 1 January. One of them affects the Foreigner’s law. Foreigners living in Switzerland now have to meet certain criteria of good behaviour, for example respect for public security and order and constitutional values, before their residence permits are granted or …

Gabon’s government has announced that a group of soldiers who seized the national radio station in an apparent coup attempt early on Monday have been arrested. The “situation is under control”, government spokesman Guy-Bertrand Mapangou told Radio France Internationale (RFI), just hours after the soldiers announced they were “restoring democracy” in a message on state radio. Four of the five …

The newly inaugurated international terminal at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, has officially been opened for operations as Asky Airlines began operations at the terminal on Sunday (6 January). Asky Airlines’ B737-700 aircraft with flight number ET-AVP, which landed at the airport at 3:30 pm from Lomé in Togo, had 91 persons on board comprising 85 passengers and six …

As I write this article, 49 migrants, mostly Africans, are stranded at sea. They had been rescued in the Mediterranean by the humanitarian organisation Sea Watch about two weeks ago but no European country is ready to allow the migrants to disembark at its port. Last year, about 112,000 migrants found their way irregularly through the Mediterranean to Europe while …

The Israeli government has issued a notice for thousands of African migrants to leave the country or face imprisonment. Rights group kick against controversial plan. Israel will force tens of thousands of African migrants to leave over the next three months, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Wednesday. Speaking at a cabinet meeting, Netanyahu said that the Israeli government will …

German prosecutors have charged a man arrested on New Year’s day with attempted murder after he rammed his car into crowds of revellers in two separate attacks, police said on Wednesday. The 50-year-old German was detained after he drove his Mercedes into people celebrating the New Year in the western cities of Bottrop and Essen in a suspected hate crime …

The year 2018 saw a new record in Spain for migrant arrivals by sea, at more than 57,000 – representing around half of all undocumented migrants making the Mediterranean crossing last year. According to the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), 113,145 migrants and refugees entered Europe by sea last year. According to UNHCR, a total of 119,575 refugees and migrants …

German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer is calling for harsher deportation laws after asylum-seekers attacked pedestrians in Bavaria. So far, who gets deported – and who makes that call –  is a complex matter. Carla Bleiker reports. Federal Interior Minister Horst Seehofer has said he would send proposals to the government aimed at changing German deportation laws in an effort to …

Distribution of Nigerian movies on Netflix started around 2015. Alessandro Jedlowski, a scholar at the Free University of Brussels, Belgium, takes a look at the global streaming giant’s intervention in the Nigerian film industry and predicts what long-term impact this could have on the worldwide marketing of Nollywood. Global streaming service Netflix set its eyes a few years ago on …

Germany, Indonesia, South Africa, the Dominican Republic and Belgium, took up their seats on the UN Security Council as non-permanent members on 1 January 2019. They were elected last June to serve two-year terms on the 15-member Security Council. The other five non-permanent members on the Council are Côte d’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, Kuwait, Peru and Poland. Five countries have permanent …