Musings From Abroad

3 Americans sentenced to death in DR Congo for thwarted coup

Published

2 months ago

September 15, 2024

A military court has sentenced 37 accused persons to death for their roles in the failed coup attempt in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in May, including three US nationals.

On May 19, armed men took over the presidential residence in Kinshasa for a short while until security forces assassinated their leader, Christian Malanga, a politician from the Democratic Republic of the Congo who was living in the US.

Marcel Malanga, his son, and Tyler Thompson, a friend of Marcel’s who played football with him in high school in Utah, were two of the Americans on trial. They’re both in their 20s.

Christian Malanga’s business associate Benjamin Zalman-Polun was the third American.
All three received the death penalty in a decision that was read aloud on television after being convicted guilty of terrorism, criminal conspiracy, and other offences.

Malanga had already informed the court that his father had threatened to murder him if he didn’t take part. In addition, he informed the court that he was going to Congo for the first time at his father’s invitation—a relationship he had not had in a long time.

After the failed coup, some fifty individuals, including citizens of the US, UK, Canada, Belgium, and the Congo, are awaiting prosecution. Thirty-seven offenders received death sentences.

The decision was announced in the courtyard of the military jail Ndolo, which is located outside of Kinshasa, beneath a tent. The defendants, dressed in prison-issue blue and yellow tops, were seated in front of the judge.

July marked the start of the trial. Ambassador personnel were present at the proceedings, according to State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller in Washington, and they will keep a careful eye on any further developments.

“We understand that the legal process in the DRC allows for defendants to appeal the court’s decision,” he told a briefing.

Jean-Jacques Wondo, a citizen of Belgium and Congo, is one of the 37 defendants. Before the trial, Wondo’s family made video messages to Congo President Félix Tshisekedi pleading for his release.

Related Topics:Ameriacans Congo DR Featured

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Musings From Abroad

UN Security Council deliberates stance on Sudan war

Published

4 days ago

November 13, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

The UN Security Council is discussing a British-drafted resolution calling on Sudan’s warring parties to stop hostilities and permit safe, quick, and unimpeded assistance supplies across borders and front lines.

The world’s largest relocation crisis began in April 2023 when the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces engaged in a power battle ahead of a planned transfer to civilian administration.

Waves of ethnically motivated violence have resulted, with the RSF mostly to blame. The RSF has blamed the action on rogue actors and denies causing harm to civilians in Sudan. Two RSF generals were named last week by a Security Council committee in the first U.N. sanctions levied during the ongoing conflict.

“Nineteen months into the war, both sides are committing egregious human rights violations, including the widespread rape of women and girls,” Britain’s U.N. ambassador, Barbara Woodward, told reporters at the start of this month as Britain assumed the Security Council’s presidency for November.

“More than half the Sudanese population are experiencing severe food insecurity,” she said. “Despite this, the SAF and the RSF remain focussed on fighting each other and not the famine and suffering facing their country.”

According to diplomats, Britain wants to vote on the draft resolution as soon as possible. A resolution must receive nine votes or more to pass and not be vetoed by the United States, France, Britain, Russia, or China.

Nearly 25 million people, or half of Sudan’s population, require aid, according to the U.N., since 11 million people have abandoned their homes and famine has spread to displacement camps. Of those, around 3 million have departed for other nations.

In its draft language, Britain “demands that the warring parties immediately cease hostilities” and “demands that the Rapid Support Forces immediately halt its offensives” throughout Sudan.

It also “calls on the parties to the conflict to allow and facilitate the full, safe, rapid, and unhindered crossline and cross-border humanitarian access into and throughout Sudan.”

Additionally, the draft urges that assistance deliveries continue to be made through the Adre border crossing with Chad “and stresses the need to sustain humanitarian access through all border crossings, while humanitarian needs persist, and without impediments.”

Sudanese authorities have permitted the U.N. and relief organisations to enter Darfur through the Adre border crossing for three months, ending in mid-November.

Musings From Abroad

South Africa worry Trump’s victory might affect climate fight

Published

7 days ago

November 10, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

South Africa’s environment minister has expressed concern about the potential effects of Donald Trump’s victory on climate change negotiations.

The demise of Germany’s coalition government this week and Trump’s election coincide with COP29 negotiations to address global warming, which experts credit for this year’s devastating hurricanes, floods, and heatwaves.

“We are concerned about America because we don’t know what they’re going to do … how (it) is going to approach COP,” South African Environment Minister Dion George told Reuters.

“Mr. Trump said that he would withdraw from the Paris Agreement, but we don’t know what will happen,” George added in a telephone interview on Friday.

International partners are concerned that the prospect of an administration led by Trump, who has called climate change a hoax, will de-motivate poor and middle-income countries who want rich nations to shoulder more of its financial burden.

South Africa, which is one of the world’s top 15 greenhouse gas emitters and accounts for 30% of the continent’s emissions, has accepted $11.6 billion from rich nations, mainly in loans, for a switch from coal to renewable energy.

This is seen as a potential model for other ‘Global South’ countries who say financing pledges of $100 billion, which took years to come through, are insufficient.

“It’s certainly not enough. We need another target,” George said. “But then the question is: as the voter base is shifting in developed economies, are they actually going to pay it?”

The South African minister said he had been reassured by German officials that Europe’s stance at the COP29 climate talks will not be hurt by Berlin’s political crisis.

George said that Jennifer Morgan, Germany’s state secretary for international climate action, had contacted him to say it will be up to the European Union to maintain leadership.

“Their position is not changed and that is how they will approach COP,” George said, adding: “They’re on Team Europe. The European Union and German have clearly set out their objectives.”