Videos of a young African man who jumped into the waters of Venice’s Grand Canal in front of hundreds of people and drowned are currently trending on the Internet. The man, who has been identified as a Gambian, is suspected by the Italian authorities of throwing himself into the icy canal on Sunday, 22 January probably in a bid to …

A British court has rejected the pollution claims against Anglo-Dutch energy giant Shell by residents of Nigeria’s Niger Delta region demanding compensation for decades of oil spills there. Members of the Ogale and Bille communities, who say thousands of lives have been devastated by environmental disasters from the global company, had applied for the case to be heard in Britain, …

US President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Friday, 27 January suspending refugee arrivals and imposing tough new controls on travellers from seven Muslim-majority countries. The order imposed a 120-day suspension of the entire US Refugee Admissions Program and a 90-day ban on all entry to the United States from countries with “terrorism concerns”. The State Department said the …

Jubilant Gambians on Thursday, 26 January welcomed home their new president, who was elected almost two months ago but forced to flee to Senegal when his predecessor, Yahya Jammeh, refused to step aside. Dressed in flowing white robes and cap, Adama Barrow stepped off the plane at the Banjul International Airport with heavily-armed troops from Senegal and Nigeria standing by …

Following the revelations of his active role in the repressive regime of ousted president, Yahya Jammeh, former Gambian interior minister, Ousman Sonko, has been arrested by the Swiss authorities. Sonko was arrested yesterday, 26 January in an asylum centre in Berlin following a case of crimes against humanity filed against him by the human rights organisation TRIAL International. The Geneva-based …

Germany’s ‘Marshall Plan’, which calls for an equal partnership to industrialize Africa, has received positive feedback among African business leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos, which took place from 17-20 January. But some are a bit wary, reports Martina Schwikowski. Germany’s Marshall Plan with Africa has received a lot of praise but also criticism. Some call the economic plan too …

Ousman Sonko, a top member of the repressive Gambian regime of ousted president, Yahya Jammeh, has applied for refugee protection in Switzerland, Bern’s police chief confirmed on Wednesday, 25 January. Sonko, a former long-serving interior minister, has been staying in an asylum centre in Bern since November 2016, police chief Hans-Juerg Kaeser said. The ex-minister, who fled Gambia after Jammeh …

The Federal Government of Nigeria and General Electric (GE) are in talks over the planned concession of railway projects in the country on the basis of Public Private Partnership. “We are negotiating with GE to take over the narrow gauge from Lagos to Kano-Funtua-Yobe, and from Port Harcourt to Borno,” Nigeria’s Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, has said. He …

UK Prime Minister Theresa May will have to obtain the consent of parliament before triggering Article 50, the exit procedure from the European Union, the Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday (24 January). The panel of judges rejected by eight to three the government’s argument that it had the power to start the exit procedure based on the result of last …

The former European Parliament president, Martin Schulz, is to be the candidate of the Germany’s Social Democratic Party (SPD) in its bid to unseat Chancellor Angela Merkel in this year’s election. Schulz should be officially confirmed at a meeting on Sunday, after the party’s leader, Sigmar Gabriel decided to stand aside. The SPD has been in government with Merkel’s Christian …