At least 12 people, including children, have been killed in twin bomb blasts that hit two camps for displaced people in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, according to government officials, the United Nations and an aid group.
Friday’s explosions targeted the camps in Lac Vert and Mugunga, near the city of Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, the UN said in a statement.
The attacks, in which at least 20 people were injured, were a “flagrant violation of human rights and international humanitarian law and may constitute a war crime”, it said.
A resident of one of the camps told Al Jazeera that many of the victims were sleeping in their tents when the area was attacked.
“We started running as the bombs were fired at the camp,” the resident said.
The Congolese military and the United States accused the military in neighbouring Rwanda and the M23 rebel group of being behind the attacks.
On Saturday, Rwanda denied the US accusations as “ridiculous”.
Government spokesperson Yolande Makolo said the Rwanda Defence Force (RDF) is a “professional army” that would never attack displaced people. In a post on X, Makolo instead blamed the assault on militias supported by the Congolese military.
Lieutenant-Colonel Guillaume Njike Kaiko, a spokesperson for the DRC’s army in the region, said the attacks were retaliation for earlier DRC strikes on Rwandan army positions in which arms and ammunition were destroyed.
In a social media post, government spokesperson Patrick Muyaya also blamed the M23, which has taken over swaths of North Kivu in the last two years.
The DRC, the UN and Western countries have said Rwanda is supporting the group in a bid to control mines and mineral resources. Rwanda has denied the allegations.
Al Jazeera’s Fintan Monaghan reported that the shells were fired from an area controlled by M23.
The group denied any role in the attacks and instead blamed DRC forces, in a statement posted on X.
The intensifying fighting in eastern DRC has forced hundreds of thousands of civilians to flee neighbouring towns towards Goma, which is located between Lake Kivu and the Rwandan border and is largely cut off from the country’s interior.
International charity Save The Children said it was present at one of the camps when shells struck close to a busy marketplace. It said dozens were injured, mostly women and children, and the final death toll remained unclear.
“A tent does not offer much protection from shelling,” said Greg Ramm, the aid group’s country director in the DRC.
“Protection of civilians, especially children and families living in displacement camps, must be prioritised,” he said, and called for “all parties to the conflict to end the use of explosive weapons in the proximity of populated areas”.
President Felix Tshisekedi, who was travelling in Europe, decided to return home on Friday following the bombings, a statement from his office said.
Tshisekedi has long alleged that Rwanda is destabilising DRC by backing the M23 rebels.
The bombings follow the group’s capture of the strategic mining town of Rubaya this week. The town holds deposits of tantalum, which is extracted from coltan, a key component in the production of smartphones.
Condemning the attack, US Department of State spokesperson Matthew Miller said it was “essential that all states respect each other’s sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
The U.S. strongly condemns the attack today from Rwanda Defense Forces and M23 positions on the Mugunga camp for Internally Displaced Persons in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is essential that all states respect each other’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
The DRC branch of the medical charity Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres, or MSF) said its teams had to stop distributing essential items and halt medical consultations on Friday because of the rising insecurity.
Earlier today in Goma, DR Congo:
As our teams were conducting medical activities & distributing shelter kits, intense fighting erupted in the immediate vicinity of IDP camps.
We heard heavy artillery which landed in densely populated areas. Several people were reportedly… pic.twitter.com/zaEWn3prvX
In a post on X, the group condemned the “increasingly regular use of heavy artillery” close to sites for internally displaced people around Goma.
French President Emmanuel Macron said Rwanda must halt its support for M23, during a joint news conference with Tshisekedi in Paris this week.
About six million people have been killed since violence erupted in 1996. It has also displaced about seven million people, many beyond the reach of aid.
Abu Abbas knew more about the Iraqi Marshes than most, having lived there his entire life.
So when the Iraqi government of former dictator Saddam Hussein drained the wetlands of southern Iraq in the early 1990s, Abu Abbas witnessed the devastation.
Then a decade later, as young men with picks and small water pumps began knocking down the embankments that kept water out of the former wetlands after Hussein’s fall, he was among those who watched water re-enter the marshes.
It has not been plain sailing since. The marshes are struggling as a result of climate change and mismanagement. And yet, Abu Abbas’s optimism has remained.
Early last year, lying in bed with his health failing, he received a visit from his nephew, Jassim Al-Asadi.
“What is the status of the marshes?” Abu Abbas asked.
“Things are miserable,” Jassim replied.
Before Jassim could continue, Abu Abbas cut him off.
“Do not be afraid for the marshes,” he said. “They will survive, even if the water is salty, as long as there are people like you who will defend them.”
The marshes were once among the largest wetlands in the world, covering 10,500sq km (4,050sq miles) in 1973, an area roughly the size of Lebanon.
They were home to a diverse range of flora and fauna and by the middle of the 20th century supported a human population estimated at 500,000.
The great cities of Ur, where most biblical scholars believe Abraham was born, and Uruk, the largest city in the world in 3200 BCE, lay adjacent to the marshes.
While most of the wetlands lie within Iraq, a smaller section known as Hawr al-Azim is in Iran.
During his lifetime, Abu Abbas observed the natural cycles of creation and destruction of the wetlands as floods and drought affected traditional livelihoods based on fishing, hunting, reed production and farming.
At the same time, he experienced the increasing impact of human activities on the marshes: war, upstream dams, oil development and agricultural pollution.
Lingneifel Vaiphei collapsed to the ground in agony after she saw the lifeless body of her infant child laid out on a cold steel stretcher in a mortuary in Chennai, the capital of India’s southern Tamil Nadu state.
Steven’s body was tightly wrapped in a striped woollen shawl, traditionally worn by the Kuki-Zo tribe in the northeastern Manipur state. His face had turned blue. He was only six months old.
Crying profusely, the 20-year-old mother kept kissing her child’s face as she carried his body towards an ambulance, her husband Kennedy Vaiphei walking beside her. Amid sobs and muted rage, the family made their way to a burial ground, about 7km (4 miles) away, and laid their only child to rest. Nine months after Lingneifel and Kennedy had moved to Chennai in search of a fresh start away from violence, a nightmare they had never imagined had visited them.
Lingneifel burying her infant son at a burial ground in Chennai, Tamil Nadu [Greeshma Kuthar/Al Jazeera]
Less than 24 hours earlier, on the night of April 25, the couple had rushed Steven to Chennai’s Kilpauk Medical Hospital after his week-long fever refused to subside and kept getting worse.
But the infant died on the way in his mother’s arms – before the family could even reach the hospital.
A year of deadly violence
Steven was born last winter in Chennai, nearly 3,200km (1,988 miles) away from the place his parents call home in Manipur, which has been in the grip of deadly ethnic clashes between the predominantly Hindu Meitei and the mainly Christian Kuki-Zo tribes for a year now.
The Meiteis – about 60 percent of Manipur’s 2.9 million people – are concentrated in the more prosperous valley areas around the state capital, Imphal. The Kuki-Zo and the Nagas, another prominent tribal group, mostly live in scattered settlements in the hills around the valley. The tribes constitute about 40 percent of the Himalayan state’s population.
The Meiteis are politically dominant. The state government is led by Chief Minister N Biren Singh, a Meitei and member of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). In the 60-member Manipur legislative assembly, 40 are Meitei.
The Kuki-Zo and the Nagas are protected through Scheduled Tribe (ST) status given by the Indian constitution, making them eligible for various state-run affirmative action programmes. The status provides them quotas in state-run educational institutions and government jobs – a provision which, for decades, has caused tensions between the tribes and the Meities.
Those tensions came to a boil in March last year when a local court recommended that the ST quotas should also be extended to the Meiteis. The court order angered Kuki-Zo and Naga groups, who, fearing a takeover of their entitlements by the majority Meiteis, held protest marches mainly in the hill districts, demanding the withdrawal of the court order. The protests led to threats of a Meitei backlash.
During a Kuki-Zo rally on May 3, 2023, in the hill district of Churachandpur, a centenary gate built to commemorate the tribe’s 1917-1919 rebellion against the colonial British was set on fire, allegedly by a Meitei mob. The incident immediately triggered deadly clashes between the two communities across the state.
Amid the killings, mutilations and lynchings, there were also multiple allegations of sexual assault on Kuki-Zo women and burning of dozens of their villages and churches. The internet remained suspended for months across the state and the army was called in to contain the bloodshed.
A year later, however, the violence has not abated – making it one of India’s longest-running civil wars that has already claimed more than 200 lives and displaced tens of thousands of mainly Kuki-Zo people.
Among the displaced were Lingneifel and Kennedy, who moved to Tamil Nadu in July last year after their villages were burned down in the first week of the clashes. As they rebuilt their lives in a new city despite barriers of language and culture, the struggle for a livelihood trumped their worries over the violence back home.
Lingneifel, who works in a Chennai restaurant that serves the local cuisine, had to return to work within days of Steven’s death, fearing she could be fired over absence. Kennedy is yet to find work.
“When we first came to Tamil Nadu, we didn’t know anybody here. We weren’t even sure what to do when our baby fell sick,” she told Al Jazeera, lamenting that she could barely make time for her son due to her long working hours at the restaurant.
However, a larger support network for the displaced Kuki-Zo is slowly emerging. Comprising professionals from the community, the network is now in place in Chennai, New Delhi and Bengaluru cities, helping them find accommodation and work.
Haoneithang Kipgen, 26, is a member of the network. He reached Chennai last June.
Days before the violence broke out, Haoneithang had borrowed 300,00 rupees ($3,600) from a local moneylender to set up a customer support business in his K Phaizawl village in Manipur’s Kangpokpi district. But his shop was burned down, along with the rest of the village.
The debt, however, had to be paid, forcing Haoneithang to migrate to Chennai, where his small, rented apartment also operates as a transit home for other Kuki-Zo displaced by the violence.
Haoneithang’s apartment in Chennai is a transit home for those displaced from Manipur seeking work in the city [Greeshma Kuthar/Al Jazeera]
Haoneithang said many from his tribe also send a part of their salaries towards a fund to support volunteers back home, who guard the Kuki-Zo villages after the government forces withdrew from many areas of a buffer zone between the hills and the valley. These areas have been the most vulnerable in the conflict.
But Haoneithang also stressed that he cannot look at all Meitei people as his enemies.
“During my first job at a restaurant, my roommate was a Meitei. We were away from our state, our communities at war, but we weren’t,” he told Al Jazeera. “So many of them are my friends, how can I? My problem is with [Chief Minister] Biren Singh and the government of Manipur.”
Singh’s government has been accused of enabling the violence for political gains – a charge the chief minister and the BJP have denied.
Most of the displaced Kuki-Zo across India share a similar sentiment. “We don’t want to go back now, the violence is only increasing and the government is doing nothing,” said Kennedy.
Thanggoulen Kipgen, professor of sociology at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras in Chennai, said the violence has set Manipur back by decades.
Referring to both the collapse of the economy and the distrust between the communities, Thanggoulen saw migration as the only option for those affected by the war and seeking survival.
“The Meitei are also fleeing the state to protect their families from being sucked into violence. The Kuki-Zo have no choice but to migrate and work to support their families back home,” Thanggoulen told Al Jazeera.
Ruling BJP’s ‘denial’
The scale of death and displacement faced by Manipuris on both sides of the ethnic divide has, critics of the BJP say, largely been missing from the prime minister’s narrative.
In an interview on April 8 with a newspaper based in the neighbouring Assam state, Modi said a “timely intervention” of the federal and state governments resulted in a “marked improvement in the situation”.
“We have dedicated our best resources and administrative machinery to resolve the conflict,” the prime minister said. “Remedial measures undertaken include a financial package for the relief and rehabilitation of people living in shelter camps in the state.”
However, less than a week after Modi’s statement, videos showing the mutilated bodies of two Kuki-Zo men went viral on social media. And on April 27, an army post in Bishnupur district was bombed by unidentified men, killing two paramilitary personnel and wounding two others.
A signboard at the airport in Imphal, the capital of Manipur [Greeshma Kuthar/Al Jazeera]
The violence forced the authorities to hold the ongoing general election in Manipur’s two seats over two phases – April 19 and April 26. Yet, despite massive security, several incidents of violence and alleged vote rigging were reported from there, forcing authorities to carry out re-polling in several of about a dozen election booths.
Many in Manipur accuse Arambai Tenggol, an armed militia allegedly backed by the ruling BJP, of the violence and election rigging. The opposition Indian National Congress, in a news conference on April 19, complained of “unprecedented mass violence and booth capturing in the valley region by armed groups”.
At least three witnesses Al Jazeera spoke to claimed they saw Arambai Tenggol members forcing voters to vote for the BJP in the valley districts. The group and the BJP have denied the allegations. The BJP’s state vice president Chidananda Singh told Al Jazeera the party “always stands for free and fair elections”.
But Congress politician in Manipur, Kh Debabrata, said the crisis has only worsened under the BJP.
“There is total breakdown of the economy and a complete militarisation of society, with armed groups in power everywhere. This is well out of the control of the BJP government,” he said, demanding the sacking of the state chief minister and the imposition of the president’s rule – an administrative provision that brings a state under New Delhi’s direct control during a political or security crisis.
“If we have to address this divide between the hill and the valley, the CM [chief minister] has to go. There is no other option,” said the Congress politician.
The BJP’s Chidananda Singh rejected the charge, blaming the Congress for being unaware of the ground reality of Manipur. “It is part of their politics to only blame us,” he told Al Jazeera.
However, many in Manipur, including among Meiteis, accuse the BJP of militarising their community through groups such as the Arambai Tenggol.
Disillusioned with the violence, Amar L* left his home in Imphal and settled in New Delhi to pursue a degree in history as “staying in Imphal would have come in the way of my education”.
“The way in which the Arambai Tenggol are taking so many young men into their fold is scary. Our aspirations for Manipur were and are different,” the 20-year-old told Al Jazeera.
Patricia Mukhim, editor of The Shillong Times newspaper, said continuing political incompetence had failed to check the violence in Manipur.
“The nature of politics is to thrive on division and fear-mongering,” she said, calling on the warring communities to discuss their issues “without placing too much reliance on either the government or armed groups”.
“There is no alternative to peace,” she said.
*Name changed to protect the individual’s identity because of fears of a backlash.
Austin, Texas – “It didn’t feel real.” That’s how Alishba Javaid, a student at the University of Texas at Austin, describes the moment when she saw roughly 30 state troopers walk onto the campus lawn.
Javaid and hundreds of her classmates had gathered on the grass, in the shadow of the campus’s 94-metre limestone tower, as part of a walkout against Israel’s war in Gaza.
They were hoping that their school would divest from manufacturers supplying weapons to Israel. Instead, law enforcement started to appear in increasing numbers.
By Javaid’s count, the state troopers joined at least 50 fellow officers already in place, all dressed in riot gear. The protest had been peaceful, but nerves were at a high. The troopers continued their advance.
“That was the first moment I was genuinely scared,” said Javaid, 22.
Dozens of students were ultimately arrested on April 24, as the officers attempted to disperse the protesters. Footage of the clashes between police and demonstrators quickly spread online, echoing images from other campus protests across the United States.
Yet, Texans face a unique challenge, as they contend with a far-right state government that has sought to limit protests against Israel.
In 2017, Governor Greg Abbott signed a law that prohibits government entities from working with businesses that boycott Israel, and the state has since taken steps to tighten that law further.
Abbott has also cast the current protests as “hate-filled” and “anti-Semitic”, amplifying misconceptions about demonstrators and their goals.
In addition, a state law went into effect earlier this year that forced public universities to shutter their diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) offices.
Multiple students and employees told Al Jazeera that campuses have become less safe for people of colour as a result of the law, which forced the departure of staff DEI advocates.
Barricades sit in front of the tower on the University of Texas campus in Austin on April 30 [Nuri Vallbona/Reuters]
‘Using violence to subvert minorities’
The violence has continued at University of Texas campuses as students press forward with their protests.
On the final day of class, April 29, police used pepper spray and flash-bang devices to clear a crowd at the Austin campus, while dozens more were encircled by troopers and dragged away screaming.
Hiba Faruqi, a 21-year-old student, said her knee “just kept bleeding” after she was knocked over during a pushing-and-shoving match between students and police.
Yet she counts herself lucky for not sustaining worse injuries. It was surreal, she said, to think that her own university called in state troopers — and then had to deploy medical personnel to assist students who were hurt.
“There’s a racist element people don’t want to talk about here,” she said. “There’s a xenophobic element people don’t want to acknowledge. There are more brown protesters, which maybe emboldens the police to do things a certain way.”
As calls for divestment continue, students, lawyers and advocates told Al Jazeera they have been forced to navigate scepticism and outright hostility from the Texas government.
“Texas is known for using violence to subvert minorities,” Faruqi said. “The reason this is shaking people this time is because it’s not working.”
Protesters gather at Texas universities to call for divestment from firms linked to Israeli weapons [Tyler Hicks/Al Jazeera]
Scrutiny over university endowments
Many of the protests have zeroed in on the University of Texas’s endowment, a bank of funds designed to support its nine campuses over the long term.
The University of Texas system has the largest public education endowment in the country, worth more than $40bn.
Some of that money comes from investments in weapons and defence contractors, as well as aerospace, energy and defence technology companies with deep ties to Israel.
ExxonMobil, for example, is one of the biggest beneficiaries of the system’s investments, and the company has supplied Israel with fuel for its fighter jets.
Those ties have fuelled the protests across the state’s public university campuses, including a May 1 demonstration at the University of Texas at Dallas.
Fatima — who only shared her first name with Al Jazeera, out of fear for her safety — was among the demonstrators. She wiped sweat from her brow as a young child led the crowd of about 100 in a series of chants: “Free, free, free Palestine!”
The divestment protests have largely been peaceful, Fatima explained, raising her voice to be heard above the noise.
“Over 30,000 people have been murdered,” she said, referring to the death toll in Gaza, where Israel’s military campaign is entering its eighth month.
“And our university is investing in weapons manufacturing companies that are providing Israel with these weapons. We’re going to stay here until our demands are met.”
Twenty-one students and staff members were arrested that day in Dallas. Members of the group Students for Justice in Palestine, of which Fatima is a member, spent the night outside the county jail, waiting for their friends to be released.
One protester wryly noted outside the jail that they had been arrested for trespassing on their own campus, a seemingly nonsensical offence.
In the background, a thunderstorm was beginning to rear its head, so the protesters huddled closer together under the awning.
Student protesters applaud one another as they are released from the Travis County Jail in Austin, Texas, on April 30 [Nuri Vallbona/Reuters]
Texas officials and university administrators have justified the police crackdowns, in part, by citing the presence of outsiders with no present affiliation with the campuses involved.
But 30-year-old activist Anissa Jaqaman is among those visiting the university protests, in an effort to lend supplies and support.
Everyone has a role to play, Jaqaman explained: Her role is sometimes that of the communicator, but more often that of the healer.
She has brought water to the student demonstrators at the University of Texas at Dallas and hopes to provide a space for people to “come over and talk about how we heal”.
“This is a healing movement,” she said time and again as she spoke to Al Jazeera. “We have to carry each other.”
Jaqaman is Texas through and through: She was raised in the Dallas suburbs and is a strong advocate for her state.
“I’m a proud Texan,” she said. “I actually think that Texans are some of the nicest people in the country.”
But back when she was in college, from 2012 to 2016, Jaqaman started to use her voice to bring awareness to the plight of Palestinians.
Rights groups have long warned that Israel has imposed a system of apartheid against the ethnic group, subjecting its members to discrimination and displacement.
In college, Jaqaman’s friends often laughed at her passion. She often smiles, exuding optimism, but her voice grows serious as she talks about Palestine, as well as other issues like the scourge of single-use plastics.
“They just thought I was a tree-hugger, but for human rights,” she explained, speaking in a soft yet confident voice.
But the current war has amplified her concerns. The United Nations has signalled famine is “imminent” in parts of Gaza, and rights experts have pointed to a “risk of genocide” in the Palestinian enclave.
Jaqaman has sported her keffiyeh scarf ever since the war began on October 7, despite feeling anxious that it could attract violence against her.
“I wear it because I feel like it protects my heart, honestly,” she said. “I feel like I’m doing the Palestinian people injustice by not wearing it.”
But she has struggled to get public officials to engage with her concerns about the war and divestment from industries tied to Israel’s military. For months, she attempted to persuade her local city council that “this is a human issue, an everyone issue”, to little avail.
“Everything that we’re seeing right now is about shutting down the discussion,” she said. “If you say anything about Palestine, you’re labelled anti-Semitic. That’s a conversation-ender.”
A boy leads a crowd in pro-Palestinian chants at a demonstration in Dallas, Texas [Tyler Hicks/Al Jazeera]
Youth protesters look to the future
Students like Javaid, a journalism major in her final semester, told Al Jazeera that they are still trying to figure out what healing looks like — and what their futures might hold. In many ways, she and her friends feel stuck.
They recognise they need to take a break from scouring social media for information about the war, and yet it is all they can think about.
The usual college rites of passage — final exams, graduation and job hunting — just don’t seem as important any more.
“How are we supposed to go back to work now?” Javaid asked after the protests.
While she has treasured her time at the university, she is also highly critical of its actions to stamp out the protests. Part of the blame, she added, lies with the government, though.
“The root issue in Texas is that the state government doesn’t care,” she said.
Born and raised in the Dallas area, Javaid plans to stay in Texas for at least a little while after she graduates this month. She has mixed feelings about staying long term, though.
She would like to work in social justice, particularly in higher education, but she worries such a job would be tenuous in her home state.
Still, she feels a sense of responsibility tying her to the state. The political climate in Texas may be challenging, she said, but she has a duty — to her fellow protesters and to Palestine — to keep playing a role.
“I don’t want to jump ship and just say, ‘Texas is crazy’,” Javaid said. “I want to be a part of the people trying to make it better. Because if not us, who?”
With tears and an open admission of nerves, Hope Hicks, a former advisor to Donald Trump, has taken to the witness stand in New York City, where she has been called to testify in the former United States president’s criminal hush money trial.
Friday marked day 11 in the trial, and Hicks was arguably the highest profile witness to testify so far.
A former model turned communications director, Hicks was one of Trump’s longest serving aides, helping his 2016 presidential campaign navigate the scandals at the heart of the New York criminal case.
Trump stands accused of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records at the time of the 2016 race, related to hush money payments made to the adult film star Stormy Daniels.
Daniels had claimed she and Trump had an affair, and prosecutors have argued Trump tried to buy her silence as a means of influencing the election. He was already under scrutiny at the time for statements made on tape about his interactions with women.
Trump has denied the extramarital affair, and he has insisted he committed no wrongdoing. His defence team has argued that Trump simply hoped to spare his family embarrassment — not interfere with the election.
The New York trial is one of four criminal cases Trump faces as he runs for reelection this November. Here are five takeaways from Friday’s hearings:
Former US President Donald Trump poses with his White House Communications Director Hope Hicks in 2018 [File: Andrew Harnik/AP Photo]
Yes, Trump is allowed to testify
The day’s legal drama began even before Trump entered the courtroom, as the former president sought to backtrack on comments he had made the evening before.
On Thursday, Trump had falsely told reporters, “I’m not allowed to testify.”
“This judge is totally conflicted, has me under an unconstitutional gag order,” Trump continued. “Nobody’s ever had that before. And we don’t like it.”
But as he returned to court on Friday, Trump attempted to clarify his earlier statement: “The gag order is not to testify. The gag order stops me from talking about people and responding when they say things about me.”
Thursday’s comments, however, remained Judge Juan Merchan’s first order of business as he took the bench.
“The order restricting extrajudicial statements does not prevent you from testifying in any way,” Merchan said on Friday.
Couy Griffin, a supporter of former President Donald Trump, rode his horse outside the courthouse on the 11th day of the trial [Ted Shaffrey/AP Photo]
Witnesses testify from district attorney’s office
As testimony continued, the first two witnesses of the day spoke to the technical aspects of the case.
Returning from Thursday was forensic analyst Douglas Daus, from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office. He had previously shared evidence that was retrieved from the phone of Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, including secret recordings.
Emil Bove, from Trump’s defence team, attempted to get Daus to admit to “gaps in the handling of this data” by pointing out that the events in question happened in 2016 — and Daus received the phone to examine in 2023.
Then, another witness from the district attorney’s office took the stand: paralegal Georgia Longstreet. She spoke to evidence gathered from Trump’s social media accounts, including a post from 2016 complaining about levels of support from women voters.
Former President Donald Trump, centre, speaks to his lawyers in the courtroom [Mark Peterson/Pool Photo via AP Photo]
Hope Hicks takes the witness stand
The third witness of the day was the most anticipated: Hicks, a former member of Trump’s inner circle.
At age 26, after working for Trump’s daughter Ivanka, Hicks was handpicked to be his press secretary as he launched his 2016 presidential bid.
Prosecutors subpoenaed her to testify about the inner workings of the campaign and the Trump Organization.
Hicks testified she thought Trump “might be joking” by naming her his press secretary. But she explained she was quickly on the road to states like Iowa, on the campaign trail with the then-candidate.
She explained that Trump was very involved in the day-to-day media strategy of his campaign. “I would say that Mr. Trump was responsible,” she said of his authority over press relations. “He knew what he wanted to say and how he wanted to say it, and we were all just following his lead.”
In this courtroom sketch, Hope Hicks dabs her eyes while being questioned by defence lawyer Emil Bove [Jane Rosenberg/Reuters]
Hicks reflects on Access Hollywood tape
Much of her testimony, however, revolved around an audio recording known as the Access Hollywood tape, which captured Trump bragging about “grabbing” women by the genitalia.
Hicks explained she first became aware of the recording when a Washington Post reporter emailed her a transcript.
“I was concerned, very concerned,” she said, testifying that she encouraged the campaign to “deny, deny, deny”.
The tape became public in October 2016, one month before that year’s presidential election. In the aftermath, Hicks said Trump was concerned how his wife Melania would react.
“I don’t think he wanted anyone in his family to be hurt or embarrassed by anything happening in the campaign,” she told the court.
Hicks also spoke about how she became aware of allegations Trump had an affair with Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal.
Daniels, she said, briefly came up in conversation at a celebrity golf tournament.
She also explained that, in November 2016, the Wall Street Journal reached out about claims of Trump’s extramarital affairs — and the alleged “catch-and-kill” scheme orchestrated to suppress the story in the media.
“He was concerned about how it would be viewed by his wife, and he wanted me to make sure the newspapers weren’t delivered to their residence that morning,” Hicks said.
At one point, she excused herself from the courtroom in tears, forcing a brief pause in the proceedings.
Former President Donald Trump reportedly listened intently to his former aide Hope Hicks on the witness stand [Jane Rosenberg/Reuters]
Trump pays gag order fine
Friday was the deadline for Trump to pay a $9,000 fine for nine violations of his gag order, resulting from a ruling earlier in the week.
But the former president discharged his fine on Thursday, with two cashier cheques: one for $2,000 and another for $7,000.
That was not the end of the matter, though. As Friday’s court proceedings wound to a close before the weekend recess, prosecutors petitioned the judge for the ability to question Trump about the gag order violations.
Trump is barred from speaking about jurors, witnesses, court staff and other people involved in the trial in a way that might affect court proceedings.
But Judge Merchan brushed aside the prosecutors’ request, on the basis that it could unfairly bias the jury.
The deaths were recorded out of nearly 200 suspected measles cases in the state of Adamawa, official says.
At least 42 people have died from a measles outbreak in a little more than a week in Nigeria’s northeastern state of Adamawa, the state’s health commissioner says.
Felix Tangwami said on Friday that the measles outbreak had mostly affected two local government areas where nearly 200 suspected cases were identified.
“Measles vaccines have been released to those areas and our field teams are containing the situation,” he said at a media briefing.
Measles is a highly contagious, airborne virus that mostly affects children under the age of five. It can be prevented by two doses of vaccine. Its early symptoms include high fever, cough and runny nose. It also often causes rashes and bumps all over the body of the patient.
More than 50 million measles deaths have been averted through vaccinations since 2000, according to the World Health Organization.
Widespread insecurity in many northern Nigerian states is often blamed for disruptions in vaccination campaigns, leaving children particularly vulnerable.
Since the armed group Boko Haram started launching attacks in Nigeria in 2009, more than two million people have been displaced from their homes, spawning one of the world’s worst ongoing humanitarian crises. Criminal gangs have further deepened security woes in northwestern Nigeria.
The COVID-19 pandemic has also disrupted the health system and vaccination programmes in parts of the country, according to Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF.
MSF said earlier this year that the inability of public health actors in Nigeria “to achieve the 95 percent vaccination rate required to suppress measles” led to an alarming rise in the number of people affected by the virus last year.
MSF said it treated 3,965 patients between October and December.
“This is notably due to the difficulties for health workers in accessing rural communities surrounding Maiduguri,” Jombo Tochukwu-Okoli, MSF medical activity manager at the Gwange Pediatric Hospital in the capital of the northeastern state of Borno, said in a statement in February.
The virus can spread quickly among unvaccinated children. “One infected child can spread the virus to between nine and 12 other unvaccinated children,” Tochukwu-Okoli said.
The decision removes uncertainty over Mulino’s eligibility just two days before the vote in the Central American country.
Panama’s Supreme Court has ruled that frontrunner Jose Raul Mulino is eligible to run in the Central American country’s presidential election.
The ruling on Friday came just two days before the vote and ends uncertainty that has loomed over Mulino’s campaign since he replaced former President Ricardo Martinelli as the candidate for the right-wing Realizando Metas (Realizing Goals) party.
Mulino had been Martinelli’s running mate but went to the top of the ticket after Martinelli lost his appeal to overturn his money-laundering conviction, which carries a sentence of 11 years in prison.
Panama’s Electoral Tribunal in March barred Martinelli from standing in the election, citing a provision in the constitution that prohibits anyone sentenced to five years or more from holding elected office.
The tribunal then allowed Mulino, a lawyer who had previously served in Martinelli’s administration, to stand for election despite not fulfilling a law that requires presidential candidates to participate in a party primary and choose a running mate. That decision was challenged in the country’s top court, which ruled on Friday that Mulino’s candidacy did not violate the constitution.
Magistrate Maria Eugenia Lopez, the president of the Supreme Court, told reporters that the jurists rejected the challenge by a margin of 8 to 1, and were persuaded to do so by the right of Panamanians “to elect and be elected, and political pluralism”.
“What has moved this constitutional tribunal in the historic moment in which we find ourselves is the defence of our country and democracy as well as institutionality, social peace, the right to elect and to be elected, political pluralism and let’s not forget the important role played by the political parties,” she said, reading a statement on behalf of the court.
While voters say he lacks Martinelli’s charisma, Mulino, 64, has hewed close to his former running mate’s policies. According to the most recent polls, he is leading the crowded field of eight candidates with more than 30 percent support.
He has also enjoyed vociferous support from Martinelli, who has remained inside Nicaragua’s embassy in Panama after being granted political asylum by Managua.
The former president posted on his X account that the decision “will set an example for future electoral processes”.
He added: “Truth, law and justice always prevail in the end.”
Mulino has promised to restore the economic prosperity of Martinelli’s 2009-2014 presidency and crack down on migration through the Darien Gap jungle, which reached record numbers last year.
But corruption has also loomed large as a defining issue in public opinion polls with all eight contenders promising to address the issue. Seven of the candidates are considered to be conservative with only long-shot economist Maribel Gordon representing the left.
Polls show former President Martin Torrijos trailing closest behind Mulino heading into Sunday’s election, but he has only 5 percent of the vote.
Mulino has served as foreign minister and justice minister but gained the most notoriety as Martinelli’s security minister.
He was widely condemned for a violent crackdown on Indigenous workers protesting conditions at banana plantations in 2010. The clashes left two people dead and more than 100 injured.
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