Sportswashing: Rwandan President Kagame uses Arsenal, PSG sponsorships to paint a glossy picture of his country
With international condemnation Rwanda President Paul Kagame via governments and human rights organisations, jailed Paul Rusesabagina’s daughter Carine Kanimba, a US-Belgian dual citizen, believes that her family will be reunited with their father, who has experienced adversity before. Kanimba says, “He truly is a strong person who follows his principles...
Arsenal and PSG told to get their hands off President Paul Kagame’s ‘blood money’ or risk their proud histories and reputation
Arsenal and Paris Saint-Germain both have multi-million sponsorship agreements with the Rwandan government but the actions of authoritarian President Paul Kagame and the arrest of Paul Rusesabagina have led to allegations of human rights abuses Watch any match involving Arsenal or Paris Saint-Germain and the message is impossible to miss....
China sets out space agenda with emphasis on missions with science at their heart, rather than technology development
China has had a bumper few years in space exploration, and its ambitions are about to get bolder. The China National Space Administration has released an overview of its plans for the next five years, which include launching a robotic craft to an asteroid, building a space telescope to rival...
Smartphone is your enemy No.1: How stepping back from connectivity restored Adam Weiss’s focus in the lab
In early 2021, I hit a rut in my studies. As a doctoral candidate at the University of Chicago in Illinois, I work at the interface of polymer chemistry and immunology, using synthetic strategies to design safer, more effective materials for vaccine and gene delivery. Although I had been productive...
How President Aristide was hoisted to and ousted from power by criminal gangs that call the shots in Haiti
The rise – and fall – of former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who saw himself as a champion of Haiti’s poor, represented a turning point for gangs in the island nation, particularly those in areas such as Cité Soleil where the grinding poverty contrasts sharply to that of the wealth...
Haiti, once a prosperous Black nation, is now a playground for criminal gangs patronised by power elites
Haiti was once one of the wealthiest colonies in the Americas, but centuries of colonial exploitation, foreign interventions, government mismanagement and natural disasters have contributed to more than half of today’s 11.4 million population living below the poverty line. The poverty, power imbalances and a lack of education have left...
Haiti criminal gangs: Gun violence is part of the island nation’s political culture – often deployed to support or quell opposition
the outskirts of Haiti’s capital, gunfire crackles in the seaside shantytown of Cité Soleil. Children playing soccer freeze for a moment. Down the street, a teenager bandages the hand he injured during a gunfight with a rival gang. The number of gangs in Port-au-Prince has grown from roughly three dozen...
South Sudan’s war horrors in Equatoria: Unborn babies were ripped out of women’s womb, bodies being dumped in wells
Politicians from South Sudan capital, Juba, have accused of supporting the formation of an Avungura-led militia in Western Equatoria reportedly backed by troops loyal to President Salva Kiir’s party, while a mostly Balanda militia was created with alleged support from opposition forces. Both sides want to manage the state ahead...
How South Sudan’s peace deal between President Kiir and his deputy Machar sparked conflict in town spared by civil war
The remote county of Tambura, in the breadbasket state of Western Equatoria, went largely unscathed during five years of devastating conflict in South Sudan that killed almost 400,000 people. But the county that survived a civil war has fared less well in a time of peace, as a fragile 2018...
Coming to America II: Tales of broken dreams, despair and attempted suicide in US refugee centres
Between 2017 and 2020, however, the Trump administration slashed refugee admissions to historic lows and starved resettlement agencies of funding. Around 130 resettlement agency offices – or nearly 40 per cent of the total in communities across the US – closed their doors, and many others had to lay off...
