Month: July 2022

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British Olympic Champion Farah Reveals He Was Trafficked to UK as a Child

Olympic champion Mo Farah revealed in an article published Monday that he was brought to Britain illegally under the name of another child to work as a domestic servant.

Farah told the BBC that he was given the name Mohamed Farah by a woman who flew him to the UK from the East African country Djibouti when he was 9.

The 39-year-old, whose father was killed in Somalia when he was 4, said his real name is Hussein Abdi Kahin and claimed he was made to look after another family’s children in Britain.

“The truth is I’m not who you think I am,” he said as part of a documentary to be aired Wednesday.

“Most people know me as Mo Farah, but it’s not my name, or it’s not the reality.

“The real story is I was born in Somaliland, north of Somalia, as Hussein Abdi Kahin. Despite what I’ve said in the past, my parents never lived in the UK.

“When I was 4 my dad was killed in the civil war, you know, as a family we were torn apart.

“I was separated from my mother, and I was brought into the UK illegally under the name of another child called Mohamed Farah.”

Farah, who became the first British track and field athlete to win four Olympic gold medals, said his children have motivated him to be truthful about his past.

“I’ve been keeping it for so long, it’s been difficult because you don’t want to face it, and often my kids ask questions, ‘Dad, how come this?’ And you’ve always got an answer for everything, but you haven’t got an answer for that,” he said.

“That’s the main reason in telling my story because I want to feel normal and don’t feel like you’re holding on to something.”

‘Just being honest’

Farah’s wife, Tania, said in the year leading up to their 2010 wedding she realized “there was lots of missing pieces to his story” but she eventually “wore him down with the questioning” and he told the truth.

During the television program, Farah said he thought he was going to Europe to live with relatives and recalled going through a UK passport check under the guise of Mohamed at the age of 9.

“I had all the contact details for my relative and once we got to her house, the lady took it off me and right in front of me ripped them up and put it in the bin and at that moment I knew I was in trouble,” he said.

Farah eventually told his physical education teacher Alan Watkinson the truth and moved to live with his friend’s mother, Kinsi, who “really took great care” of him, and stayed seven years.

It was Watkinson who applied for Farah’s British citizenship, which he described as a “long process” and on July 25, 2000, Farah was recognized as a British citizen.

Farah, who named his son Hussein after his real name, said: “I often think about the other Mohamed Farah, the boy whose place I took on that plane, and I really hope he’s OK.

“Wherever he is, I carry his name and that could cause problems now for me and my family.

“The important thing is for me to just be able to look, this is what’s happened and just being honest, really.”

Source: Voice of America

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President Hassan visited Massawa and its environs

On his third-day official visit to Eritrea, President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud of the Federal Republic of Somalia accompanied by President Isaias Afwerki today, 11 July, visited the port city of Massawa and its environs.

President Hassan further met and inspected military parade of the speed boats of members of Somali National Army who have been receiving naval training in Eritrea.

Speaking to the trainees, President Hassan indicating that the trainees are offspring of the once strong Somali Naval Force, are to date part of the force that is under restoration and that a lot is expected from them.

Likewise, President Isaias Afwerki yesterday, 10 July hosted dinner reception in honor of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud at the State House.

The reception was attended by senior Eritrean Government officials as well the Somali delegation that accompanied President Hassan.

The occasion was highlighted by cultural and artistic performances by ‘Sibrit’ cultural troupe.

Source: Ministry of Information Eritrea

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Two Bar Shootings Leave 19 Dead in South Africa

JOHANNESBURG — Two bar shootings, one in a township close to Johannesburg and another in eastern South Africa, left 19 people dead, police said on Sunday.

In Soweto, 15 people were killed as they enjoyed a night out when assailants drew up in a minibus taxi and began randomly firing at bar patrons, police said.

In the eastern city of Pietermaritzburg, police reported four people were killed and eight wounded during a shootout in a bar after two men fired indiscriminately at customers.

Police sources said it was too early to say if the assaults were in some way connected but observed their similarity.

In Soweto, Johannesburg’s largest township to the southwest of South Africa’s economic capital, police were called to the scene shortly after midnight.

“When we arrived at the scene, 12 people were dead with gunshot wounds,” local police officer Nonhlanhla Kubheka told AFP.

She added 11 people were taken to hospital. Three died shortly after arrival.

There were no details regarding the assailants.

“Nobody has been arrested. Officers are still on site. They came and shot at people who were having fun,” said Kubheka, commander of the Orlando police station, the Soweto district where the shooting took place.

Hundreds of people were massed behind police cordons Sunday as police investigated, AFP journalists reported. Only a small poster showing beer prices at the bar could be seen from outside the establishment.

Police led away relatives who tried to approach the crime scene.

Previous unrest

In Pietermaritzburg, four people were killed and eight wounded in a shootout around 8:30 p.m. (1830 GMT) that left eight others injured, local police spokesman Nqobile Gwala said.

Two men drove up, entered the bar and “fired random shots at the patrons,” before fleeing, Lieutenant Colonel Gwala said. “A total of 12 people were shot. Two people were declared dead at the scene and the other two died in hospital. Another eight people are still in hospital after they sustained injuries.”

The dead were aged between 30 and 45.

The two incidents come a year after an outbreak of the worst violence the country has seen since the end of the apartheid era three decades ago brought democracy.

Last July saw large-scale rioting and looting, ransacking of shops, a wave of arson attacks, and attacks on infrastructure and industrial warehouses leading to more than 350 deaths and several thousand arrests with the country already in the throes of a major COVID-19 wave.

Most of the unrest occurred in Johannesburg and the eastern province of Kwazulu-Natal as South Africans protested the sentencing and incarceration of former President Jacob Zuma.

Zuma was sentenced after refusing to testify on corruption charges stemming from his 2009 to 2018 tenure.

Source : Voice of America

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Anxiety Grows for Ukraine’s Grain Farmers as Harvest Begins

ZHURIVKA, UKRAINE — Oleksandr Chubuk’s warehouse should be empty, awaiting the new harvest, with his supply of winter wheat already shipped abroad. Instead, his storage bins in central Ukraine are piled high with grain he cannot ship out because of the war with Russia.

The green spikes of wheat are already ripening. Soon, the horizon will look like the Ukrainian flag, a sea of gold beneath a blue sky. Chubuk expects to reap 500 tons, but for the first time in his 30 years as a farmer, he’s uncertain about what to do with it.

“Hope is the only thing I have now,” he said.

The war has trapped about 22 million tons of grain inside Ukraine, according to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a growing crisis for the country known as the “breadbasket of Europe” for its exports of wheat, corn and sunflower oil.

Before Russia’s invasion, Ukraine could export 6 million to 7 million tons of grain per month, but in June it shipped only 2.2 million tons, according to the Ukrainian Grain Association. Normally, it sends about 30% of its grain to Europe, 30% to North Africa and 40% to Asia, said Mykola Horbachov, head of the association.

With Russia’s blockade of Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, the fate of the upcoming harvest in Ukraine is in doubt. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says the war is endangering food supplies for many developing nations and could worsen hunger for up to 181 million people.

Meanwhile, many farmers in Ukraine could go bankrupt. They are facing the most difficult situation since gaining independence in 1991, Horbachov said.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said his country is working with the U.N., Ukraine, and Russia to find a solution, offering safe corridors in the Black Sea for wheat shipments.

For now, Ukraine is trying less-effective alternatives to export its grain, at least to Europe. Currently, 30% of exports go via three Danube River ports in southwestern Ukraine.

The country also is trying to ship grain via 12 border crossings with European countries, but trucks must wait in line for days, and Europe’s infrastructure cannot yet absorb such a volume of grain, Horbachov said.

“It’s impossible to build such infrastructure in one year,” he told The Associated Press.

Russia’s invasion also caused transportation costs to soar. The price to deliver this year’s harvested barley to the closest Romanian port, Constanta, is now $160 to $180 per ton, up from $40 to $45. And yet a farmer selling barley to a trader gets less than $100 per ton.

The losses are piling up, along with the harvest.

“Most of the farmers are running the risk of becoming bankrupt very soon. But they don’t have any other option but to sell their grain cheaper than its cost,” Horbachov said.

On top of such challenges, not all farmers can sell their grain.

Before the invasion, Chubuk could sell a ton of wheat from his Kyiv region farm for $270. Now he can’t find a buyer even at $135 per ton.

“The whole system backs up,” including storage options, said James Heneghan, senior vice president at Gro Intelligence, a global climate and agriculture data analytics company. The system was meant to keep Ukraine’s exports flowing, not store them.

Without money coming in for grain, future harvests are challenging. “Farmers need to purchase fertilizers, seeds, diesel, pay the salary,” Horbachov said. “Ukrainian farmers can’t print money.”

The country hasn’t yet run out of storage as the harvest begins.

Ukraine has about 65 million to 67 million tons of commercial grain storage capacity, according to Horbachov, although 20% of that is in Russian-occupied territories. Farmers themselves can store 20 million to 25 million tons, but some of that is also in occupied areas.

By the end of September, when the harvest of corn and sunflower seeds begins, Ukraine will face a shortage of storage capacity.

The FAO recently announced a $17 million project to help address the storage deficit. Heneghan of Gro Intelligence noted that one temporary solution could be providing farmers with silo bags for storage.

In eastern and southern regions near the front line, farmers continue to work their fields despite the threat to their lives.

“It can be finished in a moment by bombing, or as we see now, the fields are on fire,” said Yurii Vakulenko in the Dnipropetrovsk region, black smoke is visible in the distance.

His workers risk their lives for little return, with storage facilities now refusing to take their grain, Vakulenko said.

Ukraine had a record-breaking grain harvest last year, collecting 107 million tons. Even more had been expected this year.

Now, in the best-case scenario, farmers will harvest only 70 million tons of grain this year, Horbachov estimated.

“Without opening the (Black Sea) ports, I don’t see any solution for Ukrainian farmers to survive,” he said. “And if they don’t survive, we won’t be able to feed African countries.

Source : Voice of America

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President Hassan visited development projects in Southern Region

President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud of the Federal Republic of Somalia and his delegation accompanied by Presidents Isaias Afwerki today toured various development projects in Southern Region including Logo and Mislam Dams, agricultural projects, solar energy grids, dairy farms and processing plant for milk and milk products.

During his visit, President Hassan was provided briefing by the coordinators of the projects.

President Hassan also visited the members of the Somali national army that were provided three years military training.

At the event, the Commander of the trainees explained that they have been provided with adequate military training and gained experience from the people of Eritrea on building one and united country and that they are ready to discharge their national obligation.

Congratulating the trainees for successfully completing their military training, President Hassan expressed the expectation that part of the Somali national army to live up to the expectations of the people and Government of Somalia.

President Isaias Afwerki on his part asserting the exceptional historical relations and friendship between Eritrea and Somalia said that Eritrea feels honored and proud to contribute to the training and building of the Somali national army.

Source: Ministry of Information Eritrea

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PM Lapid approves closure of Israeli embassy in Eritrea after ambassador blocked

Israeli prime minister Yair Lapid has approved the closure of the regime’s embassy in Eritrea as authorities in the Northeast African country have not been allowing the arrival of a diplomat from the occupied territories in the past two years.

Lapid, who is still serving as Israeli foreign minister, took the decision on Saturday to shutter the diplomatic mission in the Eritrean capital city of Asmara, after the local government had been delaying Ishmael Khaldi to take up the post despite his appointment.

According to Israeli media outlets, the embassy has remained empty in the aftermath of the Eritrean government’s decision, and many of its staffers are currently in their homes without doing any particular tasks.

The outlets added that the Tel Aviv regime spends tens of thousands of dollars per month on rent and other fees for the employees.

The last Israeli ambassador left Asmara in September 2018. Since then, the Israeli Foreign Ministry has sent a temporary administrator for the embassy from time to time.

Until April 2020, the head of the embassy’s security was the only Israeli representative in Eritrea, and his wife was responsible for the administrative work.

The Israeli foreign ministry then decided to evacuate the embassy in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. The embassy has been abandoned ever since.

On July 5, 2020, the regime’s foreign ministry’s appointments committee appointed Ishmael Khaldi to serve as ambassador to Eritrea. The approval of his appointment was, however, delayed by Eritrean authorities.

Palestine’s official Wafa news agency, quoting the London-based online newspaper Rai al-Youm and other sources reported on August 1, 2021, that at least 14 countries including South Africa, Tunisia, Eritrea, Senegal, Tanzania, Niger, the archipelago of Qamar, Gabon, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Liberia, and the Seychelles had agreed to expel Israel from the 55-member African Union.

On July 22 that year, Israel attained observer status at the AU after nearly 20 years of lobbying.

Making the move official, Israeli ambassador to Ethiopia, Burundi and Chad Aleli Admasu presented his credentials to Moussa Faki Mahamat, the chairman of the African Union Commission, at the bloc’s headquarters in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.

Experts say Israel’s observer status is largely seen as part of Tel Aviv’s continued campaign to normalize ties in Africa.

Pro-Palestine language is typically featured in statements delivered at the AU’s annual summits. Palestine already has observer status at the African Union.

Source: Dehai Eritrea Online

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Eid Al Adha colorfully celebrated

Asmara, 09 July 2022- Eid Al Adha, 1443 Hijiri year, was colorfully celebrated nationwide today, 9 July.

At the celebratory event held at Bahti Meskeram Square, Sheik Salem Ibrahim al-Muktar, Mufti of Eritrea, said that Eid is a religious and cultural event in which the faithful extend hands to disadvantaged citizens.

Sheik Salem called on nationals to make use of the educational opportunity being provided by the Government of Eritrea and send their children to school and especially females for educating women is educating the society.

Sheik Salem also wished Happy Eid Al Adha to the Eritrean people inside the country and abroad in general and to the faithful in particular as well as to the Eritrean Defense Forces.

 

Source: Ministry of Information Eritrea