At least seven people have been killed and another 20 injured in an attack on a town in South Sudan, the medical charity Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, has said, as fears grow that the world’s youngest nation will relapse into all-out civil war.
MSF said in statement that it “strongly condemned the deliberate bombing of its hospital in Old Fangak” on Saturday and that the attack destroyed the last remaining functioning hospital and pharmacy there in the north of the country.
MSF initially urged in an X post: “Stop the bombing. Protect civilians. Protect healthcare.” It said the attack was “a clear violation of international law”.
It was not immediately clear why the facility was targeted. A spokesperson for South Sudan’s military could not be reached for comment, according to The Associated Press news agency.
🔴 Today, MSF’s hospital in Old Fangak, South Sudan, was bombed.
The pharmacy was destroyed. All medical supplies lost. There are reports of people killed and injured.
Mamman Mustapha, Head of Mission with MSF in South Sudan, told Al Jazeera from the capital Juba that his team on the ground reported “two helicopter gunships attacking the hospital”.
Mustapha said the helicopters bombed the hospital and its medical supplies, then “continued shelling the town of Old Fangak”.
“The civilian population has fled and the situation is quite horrific and catastrophic … We are quite shocked. The hospital has been there for 10 years, since 2014,” he added.
A further MSF statement said, “The attack began at around 4:30am (02:30GMT) when two helicopter gunships first dropped a bomb on the MSF pharmacy, burning it to the ground, then went on to fire on the town of Old Fangak for around 30 minutes…There are reports of more fatalities and wounded in the community.”
Additional attacks took place hours later near a market in Old Fangak, causing widespread panic and displacement of civilians, according to several witnesses.
Fears of renewed civil war
The United Nations has warned in recent weeks that South Sudan, plagued by instability since gaining independence from Sudan in 2011, is on the brink of a renewed civil war.
The country descended into conflict in recent months due to the collapse of a power-sharing agreement between rival generals, President Salva Kiir and First Vice-President Riek Machar.
Kiir and Machar represent the two largest ethnic groups, the Dinka and Nuer, respectively, which fought a civil war between 2013 and 2018 that cost some 400,000 lives before a 2018 peace deal saw the two leaders form a government of national unity.
Now, tensions between Kiir and Machar have boiled over again, the latter placed under house arrest since March for alleged subversion.
Old Fangak, where the attack on the MSF hospital occurred, is one of several major towns in Fangak county, Jonglei State, an ethnically Nuer part of the country that is historically associated with Machar’s Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-in-Opposition (SPLM-IO) party.
Reporting from Nairobi, Al Jazeera’s Catherine Soi said she had been speaking to the Fangak county commissioner, who pointed the finger of blame at the government for the attack. The official, she said, was allied with the SPLM-IO.
This commissioner told Al Jazeera that “only the army has the capacity to carry out such an attack”. “We’ve also been talking to eyewitnesses who say that … the aircraft was a government aircraft,” said Soi.
“We also know that two weeks ago another MSF facility in that area was also attacked and looted, so we are waiting for the government official to give their version of the story,” she said.
Last month, an army base was looted by gunmen in the northern town of Nasir in oil-rich Upper Nile State. Soi said the attack had allegedly been carried out by the White Army, which is said to be allied with Machar’s SPLM-IO.
“He is under house arrest, several of other opposition politicians have also been arrested,” said Soi. “We’ve heard from the government spokesman who says investigations are still going on. And when that happens, these politicians are going to be charged with rebellion.”
Smoke rises following an aerial bombardment that led to casualties at the facility run by medical charity MSF, destroying the last remaining hospital and pharmacy in the northern town of Old Fangak in Fangak county, South Sudan, May 3, 2025 [Medecins Sans Frontieres/Handout via Reuters]
The hospital attack is the latest escalation in a government-led assault on opposition groups across the country. Since March, government troops backed by soldiers from Uganda have conducted dozens of air raids on areas in neighbouring Upper Nile State.
Multiple Western embassies, including that of the United States, said in a statement on Friday that the political and security situation in South Sudan has “markedly worsened” in recent days.
The embassies urged Kiir to free Machar from house arrest and called for a “return to dialogue urgently aimed at achieving a political solution”.
An election, which was supposed to be held in 2023, has already been postponed twice and is now not scheduled until 2026.
Leader of the House of Commons Lucy Powell has sought to clarify her remarks after she appeared to describe grooming gangs as a “dog whistle” issue, prompting a backlash from political opponents.
During a heated debate on BBC Radio 4’s Any Questions on Friday, commentator and Reform UK member Tim Montgomerie asked Powell if she had seen a recent Channel 4 documentary on grooming gangs.
Powell responded “oh, we want to blow that little trumpet now do we” and “let’s get that dog whistle out shall we”.
But on Saturday, the Labour minister said she regarded child exploitation and grooming with the “utmost seriousness”, adding: “I’m sorry if this was unclear.”
Powell said: “I was challenging the political point scoring around it, not the issue itself. As a constituency MP I’ve dealt with horrendous cases.”
Montgomerie said the UK was “one of the most tolerant [countries] in the world”, but argued there “always needs to be more progress on racial issues”.
He said: “It’s not so much the amount of money that is spent on employing diversity officers.
“You talk to a lot of civil servants, the amount of time they now have to spend monitoring this issue [of diversity] above all others is an extraordinary diversion.”
Powell called his claims “absolutely rubbish”, and told Montgomerie to go and spend a day with council staff to “actually see what they’re dealing with”.
Montgomerie then asked Powell if she “saw the documentary on Channel 4 about rape gangs”, to which she responded: “Oh, we want to blow that little trumpet now do we. Let’s get that dog whistle out shall we.”
The documentary features five women who recount the abuse they suffered at the hands of grooming gangs, which it said revealed failures by police and social services.
It elicited reaction from several high-profile Conservative figures, including former home secretary Suella Braverman and former prime minister Liz Truss. Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has called for a national inquiry into grooming gangs.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said on Wednesday there had already been an inquiry, the recommendations of which his government would implement. He told Parliament that Labour was “delivering truth and justice for victims”.
Labour peer Baroness Hazarika said she was “disgusted” by “sickening” stories of grooming gangs, adding: “Many of us in the Muslim community are absolutely as appalled as anyone else.”
Following Friday’s exchange on Any Questions, shadow home secretary Chris Philp called for Powell to resign over her remarks, which he said “belittles thousands of girls who were raped by grooming gangs over decades”.
Robert Jenrick, the shadow lord chancellor, said Powell’s comments were “a disgusting betrayal of the victims”.
A Reform UK spokesman said Powell’s “abhorrent comments truly demonstrate how out of touch the Labour Party is”.
He went on: “She does not take the mass rape of young girls by predominantly Pakistani men seriously. The mask has slipped.
“After these comments, Keir Starmer should consider if Lucy Powell is fit to serve.”
Powell said the comments were made “in the heat of a discussion” and the government was “acting to get to the truth, and deliver justice”.
The BBC understands that Downing Street accepts Powell’s apology and her explanation that her comments did not reflect her views on the issue.
Jummai mai dauke da cikin wata tara ta tsere daga garinsu da ke Nassarawa a Arewacin Najeriya bayan jin karar harbe-harbe! Wannan ba shine karo na farko da take tserewa tashin hankali ba.
A cikin wannan shirin na #BIRBISHINRIKICI, mun ba da labarin asarar da sukayi da kuma gudun hijira.
Mai Gabatarwa: Rukayya Saeed
Marubuciya: Sabiqah Bello
Muryoyin Shiri: Sabiqah Bello
Fassara: Rukayya Saeed
Edita: Aliyu Dahiru
Furodusa: Alamin Umar
Babban Furodusa: Anthony Asemota
Babban Mashiryi: Ahmad Salkida
Jummai, who is nine months pregnant, fled her hometown in Nassarawa, Northern Nigeria, amid the sound of gunfire. This was not her first time escaping violence. The program “BIRBISHINRIKICI” highlights the struggles of such forced migrations and losses.
The production includes several contributors: Rukayya Saeed as the presenter and translator, Sabiqah Bello as the writer and voice, and Aliyu Dahiru as the editor. Alamin Umar and Anthony Asemota served as producers, with Ahmad Salkida as the lead planner. The podcast is available on Apple Podcast, Spotify, and through RSS feeds.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese rode an anti-Trump wave to a landslide victory and a historic second term Saturday. Voters, he said, chose “the Australian way.” Liberal Party leader Peter Dutton conceded defeat.
As trucks carrying vital supplies pile up at border with Egypt, hungry children look through rubbish for food.
At least 57 Palestinians have starved to death in Gaza as Israel’s punishing blockade of food, water, and other critical aid to the besieged enclave stretches into its third month amid relentless bombardment.
Gaza’s Government Media Office said on Saturday that most of the victims were children, as well as the sick and elderly, condemning the “continued use of food by the Israeli occupation as a weapon of war” and urging the international community to exert pressure on Israel to reopen the borders and allow in aid.
Gaza has been under total Israeli blockade since March 2, video obtained by Al Jazeera Arabic showing large numbers of trucks carrying vital supplies piling up on the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip on Saturday, the queue extending south beyond the city of Arish, located approximately 45 kilometres (28 miles) from Rafah border crossing.
Al Jazeera’s team identified one of the latest victims on Saturday, a baby girl called Janan Saleh al-Sakafi, who died of malnutrition and dehydration in the Rantisi Hospital, west of Gaza City. More than 9,000 children have been admitted to hospital for treatment for acute malnutrition since the start of the year, according to the United Nations.
Reporting from Gaza City, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said he had witnessed heartbreaking scenes of children rifling through rubbish, “looking for whatever is left of canned food products”. The enclave, he added, had reached a “critical” point with international organisations out of supplies and community kitchens unable to prepare meals for displaced people.
“Finding a single meal has become an impossible quest,” Ahmad al-Najjar, a displaced Palestinian in Gaza City, told Al Jazeera. “People here have witnessed one charity after another declaring they’re out of supplies, that they’re shutting down their operations because they’re in no position to … offer the population the needed relief.”
“It’s frustrating and infuriating to have trucks piling up on the other side of the fence be denied entrance while the people, even children, are in dire conditions.”
Hospitals face ‘acute shortages’
Suhaib al-Hams, the director of the Kuwaiti Hospital in Rafah, said in a statement that medical services were experiencing “acute shortages in more than 75 percent of essential medicines”, with only around a week of supplies left.
He warned that most of the enclave’s medical services will stop without “immediate intervention” to reopen borders and allow medical and humanitarian aid through. He added that patients, who are “slowly dying every day without treatment”, needed to be evacuated urgently.
The continued blockade is the longest such closure the Gaza Strip has ever faced, and has come as Israeli forces continue bombarding the territory, killing at least 70 Palestinians and wounding 275 others over the two days spanning Thursday to Saturday morning, according to the Health Ministry.
The bodies of two infants, Yahya Sinwar and Seif Sinwar, who were killed in Israeli strikes on Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, are carried by their father and grandfather on May 3, 2025 [Abdel Kareem Hana/AP Photo]
On Saturday, two women were killed in an Israeli air raid on a house in the town of al-Fakhari near Gaza’s southern city of Khan Younis, according to reports from Al Jazeera Arabic.
Separately, a fisherman was killed and another injured by an Israeli naval attack off the coast of Gaza City.
Later in the day, two Palestinians were killed in an Israeli drone attack on southern Gaza’s al-Mawasi area, once an Israeli-designated “safe zone”.
Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 52,495 people and wounded 118,366 since October 7, 2023, according to the Health Ministry. Thousands more missing under the rubble are presumed dead.
Watch: Three things to know about the Australian election result
Labor’s Anthony Albanese has defied the so-called “incumbency curse” to be re-elected Australia’s prime minister in a landslide.
Official vote counting won’t finish for days, but Albanese’s centre-left government will dramatically increase its majority after the conservative Liberal-National coalition suffered a thumping defeat nationwide.
“Today, the Australian people have voted for Australian values: for fairness, aspiration and opportunity for all; for the strength to show courage in adversity and kindness to those in need,” Albanese said.
Coalition leader Peter Dutton, who lost his own seat of 24 years, said he accepted “full responsibility” for his party’s loss and apologised to his MPs.
Following the result, UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio both said they looked forward to deepening their bilateral relationships with Australia.
Cost-of-living concerns – particularly the affordability of healthcare and housing – dominated the five-week campaign, but international relations also reared its head, with the issue of how to deal with Donald Trump looming large over the election.
Labor has seen swings towards them right across the country – a rare feat for a second-term government in Australia – and Albanese becomes the first prime minister to win back-to-back elections in over 20 years.
The party’s success has also tempered a trend of voters abandoning the two major parties, which was the big story of the last election in 2022.
Labor is on track to finish with 86 seats, the Coalition about 40, and the Greens Party with one or two, according to projections by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). Other minor parties and independents are ahead in nine seats.
That represents an increase of nine for Labor and a significant drop in support for the Greens. However most “teal” independents have been returned in their more conservative, inner-city electorates.
It’s a remarkable turnaround from the start of the year, when polling put Albanese’s popularity at record lows after three years of global economic pain, tense national debate, and growing government dissatisfaction.
Getty Images
Anthony Albanese says his election was a vote for equality and kindess
In his Saturday night victory speech, Albanese addressed some of the election’s key issues, which also included migration, climate change and energy.
He reiterated his promises to make healthcare – most critically GP appointments – more affordable, put buying a house in reach for more Australians, and do more to address climate change and protect the environment.
Notably, he also vowed to advance reconciliation for First Nations people: “We will be a stronger nation when we Close the Gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.”
It’s a veiled reference to the biggest moment of Albanese’s tenure, the failed Voice referendum of October 2023, which sought to recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in the constitution, and simultaneously establish a parliamentary advisory body for them.
Australia remains the only Commonwealth country to have never signed a treaty with its Indigenous people.
Soul-searching after emphatic result
The Voice was one of Albanese’s most defining policies, and his most striking setback – it was overwhelmingly rejected after months of often toxic and divisive national debate.
The prime minister also found difficulty trying to walk a middle path on the Israel-Gaza war, raised eyebrows after buying a multi-million dollar beach pad in the midst of a housing crisis and, like other leaders globally, he grappled with tough economic conditions.
With tanking poll numbers, Albanese was broadly seen as the underdog coming into the election, and was poised to be the next victim of the “incumbency curse” – a term to explain a global trend where struggling constituents were turfing out governments after a single term.
Dutton, on the other hand, looked like he was writing a great political comeback – he was on the edge of bringing his party from its worst loss in 70 years back into office in a single term.
It has been almost a century since a first-term government has failed to win re-election, but as Australian National University Emeritus Professor John Warhurst said: “Dutton entered the campaign [year] in front. It was his to lose.”
Instead tonight Dutton has overseen a party loss so emphatic he has lost his own electorate of Dickson, to Labor’s Ali France.
Getty Images
Peter Dutton is one of the opposition’s most experience MPs
“I love this country and have fought hard for it,” he told supporters in Brisbane, conceding defeat.
“We have been defined by our opponents in this election which is not a true story of who we are, but we will rebuild from here and we will do that because we know our values, we know our beliefs, and we will always stick to them.”
His campaign was marred by unforced errors: including a series of policy backflips which caused confusion, awkward mistakes on important issues like cost of living and, perhaps most memorably, accidentally booting an AFL ball into a cameraman’s head.
“The opposition has been shambolic,” Prof Warhurst says.
But the government – while resolute and disciplined in its campaign – was timid. It’s strategy was largely allowing voters to judge Dutton and his party, rather than advancing bold or convincing policies, analysts say.
And that’s something we heard from voters throughout the campaign too.
Watch: ‘Boring’ and ‘weird’: Australians sum up their election in one word
While the Coalition turns to licking its wounds and choosing its next leader, it will again have to reckon with its direction.
Last election, analysts and some of the party’s own MPs cautioned against a move towards the right. They questioned whether Dutton – a polarising figure considered by many to be a conservative hard man – was the right person to rebuild support, particularly in the moderate areas where they lost a lot of it.
After a campaign which in its dying days ventured into culture war territory and what some say are “Trumpian” politics, the Coalition is going to have to ask those questions again – and if they want to be competitive, perhaps find different answers.
“We have to stop drinking the Kool-Aid from the fire hose and we need to have a serious review… we delude ourselves that we are just a few tactical devices away from winning an election,” former Liberal strategist Tony Barry told the ABC.
But meanwhile Labor has to decide what it wants to achieve with the large mandate Australia has handed them.
Albanese’s “incumbency curse” turned out to be a gift, with international uncertainty appearing to have swayed voters in countries like Canada away from change. Likewise, Australia voted for stability.
Labor struck a “middle-of-the-road path” with its a policy platform, but can now afford to be braver, says Amy Remeikis, chief politicial analyst at the Australia Institute think tank.
“That was the path that they took to the election, and that is what they are seeing has paid dividends for them. But the question now is: ‘Will Labor actually do something with power?'”
In the Nasser Medical Complex in Gaza’s Khan Younis, a volunteer doctor breaks down as he speaks of the things he has seen during his mission here.
It is impossible to get over the scenes of starving, shocked, and injured children, thoracic surgeon Ehab Massad says.
“The sight of a child standing at the door, bewildered because they have lost their entire family in a bombing, I could never forget that, ever,” he adds in a faltering voice as tears fill his eyes.
‘It will never feel like enough’
Massad is a member of a medical mission by the Rahma Worldwide organisation, one of four doctors working in Qatar to have joined.
“I feel like no matter what we do for [the people of Gaza], it will never feel like enough,” he says.
“[However] the helpless feeling of being outside Gaza and watching the news is gone now; at least I feel like I’m doing my part.”
It’s a feeling echoed by the three other doctors to whom Al Jazeera spoke. Orthopaedic surgeon Anas Hijjawi described a long line of doctors who had signed up for medical missions to Gaza, some of whom had to wait up to five months for a spot on a mission to open up.
Dr Diyaa Rachdan, an ophthalmic surgeon, struggles to keep his voice steady as he tells Al Jazeera that Tuesday was the last day of the mission and the doctors would be heading back to their respective hospitals the next day.
“But I am hoping that there will be more, longer trips to Gaza in the future,” he adds.
Their work in Gaza is not easy, but that is not the reason these doctors are sad to be leaving their mission behind. On the contrary, every day is a struggle as they try to cope with a volume of deaths, illnesses and injuries they simply do not have the equipment to address.
Israel has often prevented the entry of hospital supplies into Gaza during the course of its nearly 19-month-long war on the besieged enclave. Medical missions are not allowed to bring anything in with them.
So, the doctors struggle on with the equipment they can find, sometimes reusing “disposable” medical implements over and over, despite the danger that poses, because there is simply no other choice, Dr Rachdan says.
At the back of their minds, several doctors tell Al Jazeera, is always the thought that people in Gaza die of wounds and illnesses that would be easily treated in any other hospital that has adequate supplies.
Dr Mohammad Almanaseer reassures a young patient about the burns covering her body and face [Screengrab/Al Jazeera Mubasher]
“Sometimes we can’t cover a patient or take precautions to preserve the sterility of an operating room,” Dr Hijjawi says.
“Sometimes I don’t have the right size metal plates or screws that I need to mend a limb. I’ve had to use the wrong size item … just to get them better enough that they could, some day, travel for more treatment.”
The things that happen to people in war
While doctors coming into Gaza have often followed developments there closely before arrival, nothing, they tell Al Jazeera, could have prepared them for the level of destruction the people of Gaza have to cope with.
“Words can’t describe the pain people are in here, or the level of exhaustion of the medical teams. They’ve been working nearly around the clock for a year and a half now, despite their own personal pain and tragedies,” says the fourth Qatar-based volunteer, urology consultant Mohammad Almanaseer.
There’s a tentativeness in Dr Almanaseer’s voice as he speaks of the case that has impacted him the most deeply, the story of a little boy of about two years old who was brought into the emergency room after Israel had bombed him and his family.
“The usual resuscitation attempts were made with him, but he needed immediate surgery. I was in the operating room, assisting the paediatric surgeon, but it became clear to us that the child probably wouldn’t survive.”
The child died the next morning.
“He was the same age as my son, and even had the same name. Kinan, little Kinan, may God receive you and your mother, who was killed in the same bombing, by his side.”
Injuries as extreme and urgent as Kinan’s are what the medical teams deal with day in and day out, resulting in a large swath of patients who need less urgent care and who keep getting pushed down the list.
Like the patients who have been waiting for months or years for cataract surgery, some of whom were helped by Dr Rachdan during this mission.
The people of Gaza have been forced to carry on throughout the genocidal war on their existence. This strength has inspired a sort of bewildered regard among the visiting volunteer doctors.
Dr Hijjawi tells of an afternoon chat with an operating room nurse who was explaining how he struggles to get to work every day and how he says a final farewell to his wife and children every day, because he never knows what may happen to any of them.
Wounded people, including children, are brought to Nasser Hospital following an Israeli attack on displaced Palestinians’ tents in Khan Younis, Gaza, on April 23, 2025 [Hani Alshaer/Anadolu Agency]
“Then, we heard ambulances coming in,” Dr Hijjawi continues, “and we went to muster in the emergency room. Suddenly, the OR nurse came running past us, desperately asking for an ambulance to go to his house with him because he had heard it had been bombed.
“It took some time … but they finally went out and came back with his parents, who had been killed, and the rest of his family, who had injuries among them. And, you know what? Just two days after this happened to him, he’s here, he’s upstairs working.”
The silence of the shocked
All four doctors seem to have a soft spot for their paediatric patients. It is the children’s pain that affects them the most, and it is their suffering that they will take away with them in their memories.
Al Jazeera follows Dr Almanaseer on his rounds as he visits a young girl in intensive care. She is recovering from severe burns on much of her face and body. In quiet tones, she asks him about whether she will be left with big scars from the burns.
The doctor answers her quietly and seriously, taking time to talk to her until it seems like she’s reassured for today.
Dr Hijjawi is also on his rounds, speaking to a little girl, gently examining her leg and asking her to “lift both feet off the bed for me”. Then he asks a little boy to wiggle his toes so he can check on how he’s healing.
Next is a young girl lying under a recovery blanket in a room on her own. Her right arm is bandaged, which is what he’s there to look at.
He squats on the floor near her bed and moves her arm, then each of her fingers. He’s concerned because she seems to have lost sensation in two fingers and feels the problem will have to be explored surgically, as he tells a concerned relative.
The children are quiet, wide-eyed, doing as they’re told and not saying much else.
“There’s so much they’re dealing with,’ Hijjawi says. “Being in the hospital is scary, but on top of that, so many of them are just lying there waiting, hoping, for someone to visit them – a parent or grandparent or sibling. Some of them don’t know who’s left alive from their family outside the hospital walls.
“Add all that to their physical pain, yes, they are very quiet for very long periods, or their minds seem to wander,” he says quietly.
Dr Rachdan is holding fast to one memory of Gaza’s children that he seems to want to preserve as he gets ready to leave: “One thing that I don’t think I will ever forget is the sight of the children in Gaza who continue playing, despite the destruction.
“They make paper aeroplanes, play ball, despite the tragedy they are surrounded by. I will always remember that.”
Labor Party leader becomes the first Australian prime minister to win a second consecutive three-year term in two decades.
Anthony Albanese has become the first Australian prime minister to win a second consecutive three-year term in two decades, in a dramatic comeback for his Labor Party in a general election dominated by the cost-of-living crisis.
Albanese’s Labor Party was on track on Saturday for an unexpectedly large parliamentary majority, as Peter Dutton, leader of the conservative Liberal Party, conceded defeat and the loss of his own seat.
In his victory speech, left-leaning Albanese pledged to steer the nation through a rough patch of global uncertainty.
“Australians have chosen to face global challenges the Australian way, looking after each other while building for the future,” he told supporters in Sydney. “We do not need to beg or borrow or copy from anywhere else. We do not seek our inspiration overseas. We find it right here in our values and in our people.”
Albanese, third from left, celebrates with his partner Jodie Haydon, right, son Nathan Albanese and Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong, left, at the Labor Party election night event in Sydney [Saeed Khan/AFP]
He said the Australian people have voted for “Australian values”.
“For fairness, aspiration and opportunity for all,” he said amid a loud cheer. “In this time of global uncertainty, Australians have chosen optimism and determination.”
Dutton of the main opposition Liberal Party accepted full responsibility for poor election results on what he called “an historic occasion” for the party.
Dutton also lost the race for his own Dickson seat in Australia’s parliament to Labor’s Ali France, a former journalist and communications manager who has pushed for easing the cost of living through tax cuts, cheaper medicine, and investment in public healthcare and education.
Dutton stands with his family at the Liberal Party election night event in Brisbane [Patrick Hamilton/AFP]
Senator James Paterson, a Liberal spokesperson, suggested “the Trump factor” was in play in Australia, in reference to United States President Donald Trump. Trump had cast a long shadow over the six-week election campaign, sparking keen global interest in whether his tariff-induced economic chaos would influence the result.
For Australian voters, the high cost of living, healthcare, housing prices and clean energy were some of the top issues in this federal election.
Reporting from Sydney, Al Jazeera’s Jessica Washington said it was an historic win for the Labor Party.
“There was certainly a message of unity by the prime minister. There was also a short moment during his speech when the crowd began to boo Peter Dutton, and he immediately hushed them and said that wasn’t the Australian way,” she said.
“Labor has pledged to make it easier for young people to buy homes and has also made promises, including a 20 percent cut to student debt. This makes the loss doubly embarrassing for the opposition coalition because they are often seen as the economic managers, but they lost in an election held largely around those issues.”
The election is completing the party’s return to power after it had also managed to secure a parliament majority with 77 seats out of 151 in the House of Representatives in 2022.
After the 2022 election, Labor also secured 25 seats in the Senate while the coalition working against it secured 30, and the Greens took 11.
To form a government, a party needs to win a majority – at least 76 seats – in the House of Representatives. If no party wins an outright majority, the party with the highest number of seats forms a minority government by collaborating with smaller parties or independent members.
TV presenter Lorraine Kelly has revealed that she needs to undergo surgery to remove her ovaries and fallopian tubes.
The 65-year-old shared a video on social media from her hospital bed on Saturday, saying she had not been “feeling all that well for a little while”.
The ITV host said that the “wee procedure” was “purely preventative” and had been recommended after some scans and tests.
Kelly added that she was “going to be totally fine” and praised hospital staff, saying she felt “very lucky to be treated so well” in the video’s caption.
Kelly also thanked gynaecologist Dr Ahmed Raafat and hospital staff.
The Scottish presenter was sent well-wishes by fellow ITV colleagues Katie Piper, Charlotte Hawkins and Susanna Reid on Instagram, who wished her “a speedy recovery”.
The procedure, known as an laparoscopic bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy, takes one to two hours and requires several more hours of recovery in hospital.
According to the NHS, you must stay off work for two to four weeks after having the procedure, which could mean Kelly could take a short break from presenting her show, Lorraine.
Kelly has been a presenter and journalist for more than 37 years, starting her career on Good Morning Britain in 1988.
She has been presenting her eponymous morning news programme Lorraine since 2010.
Former Tunisian Prime Minister and deputy head of the Ennahda Movement, Ali Laarayedh, was sentenced to 34 years in prison on terrorism-related charges, media reports said Saturday.
Tunis Afrique Presse, (TAP), citing judicial sources, said Laarayedh and eight other defendants were charged with aiding the formation of a terror organisation, joining such a group within Tunisia, and facilitating the travel of Tunisian youth abroad to join terror groups.
The case is known as the “human trafficking trial.”
All defendants were sentenced to terms ranging from 18 to 36 years for allegedly trafficking individuals to regions where the Daesh/ISIS terror group is active.
A deadly attack in Indian-administered Kashmir shattered a narrative Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has spent years constructing – that Kashmir was safe, open for business, and back to “normal”.
In response, Indian officials have launched a sweeping crackdown and spurred nationalist rhetoric. Much of the media is echoing the government line.
Too busy demanding revenge to ask the most basic of questions: How did this happen?
Contributors: Anuradha Bhasin – Managing editor, Kashmir Times Sreenivasan Jain – Journalist and author Swasti Rao – Associate professor, Jindal Global University; consulting editor, The Print Nirupama Subramanian – Journalist
On our radar
In Pakistan, the media narrative on what happened in Kashmir has been dominated by powerful military and intelligence figures. But on social media, users are pushing back with satire and scepticism. Ryan Kohls reports.
The White House and the memefication of cruelty
Donald Trump has completed the chaotic first 100 days of his second term, marked by aggressive policies, talk of annexing neighbouring countries, and declarations of war against the mainstream media, universities and law firms.
His administration’s online presence, filled with brash language and often cruel memes, reflects and amplifies his confrontational political style. Meenakshi Ravi reports.
Featuring:
Meredith Clark – UNC Hussman School of Journalism and Media Jon Roozenbeek – Professor of psychology and security, King’s College London Jude Russo – Managing editor, The American Conservative
A York MP has called for a “modern approach” to rules on drinking at football matches
Football needs a “modern approach” to alcohol being drunk in the stands, an MP has said.
Legislation from 1985 bans fans from consuming alcohol in view of the pitch in the top five tiers of the men’s game in England.
At the time it was part of attempts to eradicate hooliganism, but other sports were not affected by the ban.
Labour MP for York Outer Luke Charters said it was time trials took place to see what impact lifting the restrictions might have.
“Its been 40 years since alcohol was banned in view of the pitch,” he said.
Charters said it has created an anomaly in that supporters of other sports are free to enjoy a drink while watching their chosen games.
“I just think we need a modern approach to a modern game,” the MP said.
“You look at fans in Germany and in Italy, they are still able to have a beer while they are cheering on their team.”
Charters accepted it would not work on every occasion.
“We do need those family zones where it won’t be appropriate.”
The Football Supporters Association (FSA) said it backed the MP’s comments “absolutely” and would welcome trials in the men’s game.
A spokesperson said: “In the past this is actually something many clubs have called for too.”
House of Commons
Luke Charters says he wants to start a conversation on the issue
A trial on allowing the consumption of alcohol in view of the pitch has taken place in the women’s game, which is not covered by the 1985 ban.
Four clubs – Bristol City, Southampton, Birmingham City and Newcastle United – have participated in the trial for certain games in the latter part of the season.
At the time the trial was announced the chief executive of Women’s Professional Leagues Limited (WPLL) Nikki Doucet said it was about giving fans choices.
“While obviously maintaining the safety and what we need to do in terms of being responsible,” she said.
The FSA’s head of women’s football Deborah Dilworth said the trials were a chance to be “innovative, creative and offer more choice to supporters”.
Charters said similar small-scale trials in the men’s game would be welcome to see what might work going forward, initially in the lower leagues.
“Limited trials and a conversation is really what I am talking about.”
He said it was about allowing fans who want to drink the “chance to do so responsibly” and it was an opportunity to give back to fans who support their teams loyally.
The English Football League (EFL) did not wish to comment but its former boss Shaun Harvey did call for the ban to be lifted in 2018 and said he thought it “disproportionate”.
Charters raised the issue in the House of Commons during a debate on the Football Governance Bill alongside a call for strengthening and expanding the Premier League cap on away game tickets to all the top five leagues.
Romanians will head to the polls on Sunday, May 4, to elect their next president in the first round of a “do-over” election, the second such poll within six months.
The Eastern European country previously held a presidential election on November 24, 2024, from which far-right candidate Calin Georgescu, who was polling in single digits during the campaign, surprisingly emerged victorious.
That result was annulled after reports emerged of alleged Russian election interference in favour of Georgescu, throwing the country into a political crisis.
Romania’s elections authority banned the pro-Moscow independent in March. He is now subject to criminal investigations.
Here’s everything you need to know about the redo vote and who the top contenders are:
Where and when will polls open in Romania?
Polls will open at 7am (04:00 GMT) on Sunday, May 4 and close at 9pm (18:00 GMT).
Voters can cast their ballot at any of 18,979 polling stations around the country. An additional 965 stations will be set up in countries with big diaspora communities, including Malta, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Moldova and the United States.
How do presidential elections work in Romania?
The president is elected for a five-year term in a two-round voting system. A president can serve up to two terms.
A candidate must secure more than 50 percent of all registered votes to be declared a winner in the first round.
If no candidate achieves the 50 percent threshold on May 4, a run-off will be held on May 18 between the two top finishers. The candidate with the most votes will be declared the winner.
What are the main issues driving this election?
Wages and inflation
The rising cost of food and other basics in the country is likely to be the biggest factor in how people choose to vote.
The country’s economy has steadily been on the decline for decades, forcing many young people to seek work abroad. Close to one-third of the population faces poverty.
Corruption
There is deep-rooted anger over how establishment parties have run the country since the fall of the communist government in 1989.
Romania scores among the bottom four countries in Europe in terms of corruption, according to Transparency International. Voters generally have little trust in public institutions and politicians.
Ideological divide
Romania, like several other European nations, faces growing questions from sections of its population about its support for Ukraine in the war against Russia. More right-leaning voters are against additional backing for Kyiv.
Overall, voters are split between wanting a government more removed from the West and closer to Russia, and one that’s pro-European Union and NATO.
This divide is reflected in the makeup of Romania’s parliament.
Following parliamentary elections on December 1 last year, Romania’s pro-Europe parties came together to form a majority government in a bid to shut out far-right nationalists.
The ruling National Coalition for Romania was formed when the pro-Europe Social Democratic Party (PSD), which topped the polls in the December election but failed to achieve a majority, reached an agreement with the centre-right National Liberal Party (PNL), the reformist Save Romania Union party (USR), and the small ethnic Hungarian UDMR party.
Overall, the coalition holds 58 of the 134 seats in the Senate, the upper house, and 135 seats out of 331 in the lower Chamber of Deputies.
On the anti-EU side, the most popular party is the far-right Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), which is led by presidential candidate George Simion. It holds 28 seats in the Senate and 61 in the Chamber of Deputies.
SOS Romania, also a far-right party, holds another 12 seats in the Senate and 28 seats in the Chamber of Deputies. The far-right Party of Young People (POT) holds 24 lower and seven upper seats. Overall, these euro-sceptic parties hold 113 seats in the Chamber of Deputies – not far behind the ruling coalition’s 135.
Given this divide, the EU will have its eyes on this presidential election.
Who are the main contenders?
George Simion, 38
The right-wing, eurosceptic politician is leader of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) and is currently leading the polls with support from 30 percent of voters as of April 26, according to Politico’s Poll of Polls (an average of all the polls).
Simion, who is perceived as being pro-Moscow – like Georgescu who is a former member of AUR – and is backed by nationalist camps, criticised the decision to annul the controversial November elections.
He is opposed to same-sex marriage and is a euro-sceptic. He has also spoken out against sending aid to Ukraine.
He has advocated for taking back territory from Ukraine and Moldova that once belonged to Romania. In May 2015, Simion was declared “persona non grata” by Moldova and barred from entering the country for five years on the grounds that he was “endangering national security”. This ban was renewed for a further five years in February 2024.
Simion was criticised in 2019 for supporting the election to parliament of two former military officers accused of suppressing revolutionaries in the country’s 1989 overthrow of communist rule.
The leader of the radical-right Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) party, George Simion, looks on following initial exit polls at the party’s campaign headquarters on the day of the parliamentary election, in Bucharest, Romania, December 1, 2024 [File: Alkis Konstantinidis/Reuters]
Crin Antonescu, 65
The independent candidate and longtime politician is backed by the more centrist governing Social Democratic Party and National Liberal Party alliance (PSD-PNL).
According to Politico’s Poll of Polls, Antonescu, who was a one-time acting president and head of the Senate, was polling at 24 percent as of April 26.
He supports Romania’s membership of the EU and NATO. He is also in favour of sending more aid to Ukraine.
Antonescu has highlighted his political experience in his campaigns.
Electoral posters are seen in Bucharest before Romania’s presidential elections on April 29, 2025 [Andreea Campeanu/Reuters]
Nicusor Dan, 55
The activist and mathematician is the mayor of Bucharest, a position he has held since 2011. He is running as an independent candidate on an anticorruption ticket and is polling at 22 percent, according to Politico.
For more than a decade before becoming mayor, Dan campaigned against the demolition of heritage buildings in the capital city and against the conversion of public parks to construction sites.
He is favoured by liberal camps who support closer ties with the EU and want to prevent the rise of right-wing candidates like Simion, but who do not favour the centrist ruling coalition.
Dan was re-elected as mayor last June, and his announcement to run following the annulled presidential elections in November came as a surprise.
His campaign promises are to reform institutions, get rid of corruption and inefficiencies, and increase defence spending. He is also promising to unite Romanians across ideological lines.
Presidential candidates Crin Antonescu and Nicusor Dan take part in a presidential debate hosted by Digi24 TV station in Bucharest, Romania, on April 28, 2025 [Inquam Photos/Octav Ganea via Reuters]
Victor Ponta, 52
Prime minister until 2014 under the ruling Social Democratic Party (PSD), Ponta is also running as an independent candidate in this election, polling at 10 percent at the end of April, according to Politico.
His stint in the top job was marred by allegations of tax evasion and money laundering that eventually forced him to resign, however. In 2018, a court acquitted him of the charges, marking his comeback to politics.
Ponta is currently a legislator in the Chamber of Deputies.
He has highlighted nationalist and protectionist themes in his campaign: He is against buying Ukrainian grain and wants to protect the interests of Romanian farmers.
Elena Lasconi, 53
Lasconi is a journalist and the mayor of Campulung in south-central Romania. She is popular with liberal voters.
She is running as leader of the political party, Save Romania Union (USR) and is polling at 7 percent in Politico’s Poll of Polls.
Lasconi placed second in the November elections and was set to face Georgescu in the run-off vote before it was annulled.
As mayor, she is in favour of EU support, which her office said allowed Campulung to build parks and other critical infrastructure.
What powers does the Romanian president have?
The president of Romania is head of state and can issue official decrees.
Under the constitution, the president has the power to nominate the prime minister, who must then be approved by parliament.
The president does not have the power to dismiss the prime minister once in place, although he or she can appoint an acting prime minister if the current one becomes incapacitated. The prime minister and his cabinet have ultimate control when it comes to running the country.
While the president is required by the constitution to maintain a neutral stance, if Simion does win the presidency, that would place him ideologically at odds with the coalition government.
Fred VanVleet scored 29 points as the Houston Rockets produce stunning 115-107 victory over the Golden State Warriors.
The Houston Rockets rode a crushing fourth quarter to a 115-107 victory over the Golden State Warriors on Friday to set up a game-seven showdown in their NBA Western Conference playoff series.
The Rockets will be trying to become just the 14th team to rally from 3-1 down to win an NBA playoff series when they host game seven on Sunday.
Fred VanVleet scored 29 points and Alperen Sengun added 21 points and 14 rebounds for the Rockets, who led most of the game and silenced an 18,000-strong crowd at the Warriors’ Chase Center arena with an explosive fourth quarter – putting together a 12-0 scoring run in the final frame to push their lead to as many as 17.
Amen Thompson added 14 points for Houston and veteran New Zealand big man Steven Adams added 17 points off the bench, connecting on four of four from the floor while providing a formidable defensive presence.
Houston Rockets guard Fred VanVleet holds onto the ball next to Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry, left, guard Brandin Podziemski, second left, and guard Moses Moody, second right, during the NBA match [Cary Edmondson/Reuters]
Adams had three of Houston’s five blocked shots as the Rockets kept the Warriors’ potent offence led by Stephen Curry in check.
Curry scored 29 points, but he connected on just nine of 23 shots from the field and coughed up five turnovers.
Jimmy Butler added 27 points but no other Warriors starter scored in double figures.
“Just make everything tough,” VanVleet said of the Rockets’ mindset as they took a two-point lead into the fourth quarter. “Obviously, we know what they bring to the table.
“You want to make everything tough, contest everything … I just think our youth and our athleticism can wear on them over the course of the game, and we’re able to have some success lately.”
Overwhelmed early in game five on Friday, the Warriors got off to a marginally better start, but in a nip-and-tuck first quarter that featured 10 lead changes they never led by more than two and Houston were up 25-21 at the end of the first period.
A Curry three-pointer tied it at 46-46 with 1:59 left in the first half, but again the Rockets pulled away to lead 53-48 after a first half in which the Warriors made 11 of their 17 turnovers.
“That’s the key to the whole series is our ball security,” said Warriors coach Steve Kerr.
Houston led 86-84 going into the fourth, but VanVleet drilled a three-pointer in the opening seconds, drawing a foul and making the free throw in a sign of what was to come.
“I thought the key play was a four-point play to start the (fourth) quarter,” Kerr said. “We didn’t guard VanVleet, they threw it up the floor and he knocks it down and gets the free throw, and it felt like a game-changing play.”
Draymond Green added: “We can’t give up a four-point play in a two-point game.”
Kerr also singled out 31-year-old Adams, whose 31 minutes on the floor were his season-high.
“Adams was fantastic tonight,” Kerr said. “They controlled the game while he was out there.”
The Warriors resorted to fouling Adams, a low-percentage free-throw shooter, but he made nine of 16 foul shots and the Rockets managed to grab the rebounds of a couple of his misses to score anyway.
The winners of the series will take on the Minnesota Timberwolves, who ousted the Los Angeles Lakers in five games.
Harar, Ethiopia – When Abdallah Ali Sherif was growing up in eastern Ethiopia, his parents never spoke about the history of his city.
“When I asked my parents about our history, they told me we didn’t have one,” the kind-faced 75-year-old recalls as he reclines on a thin mattress on the floor of his home in Harar’s old walled city. Shelves of dusty cassettes line the walls and old newspapers lie scattered about the floor.
The father of five and grandfather of 17 pauses to pluck some khat leaves to chew as he explains: “Our parents were afraid to teach us about our culture or our history.”
A woman walks through one of the narrow streets of Harar’s old walled city [Jaclynn Ashly/Al Jazeera]
‘Peeking through a window’
For centuries, Harar, with its colourful clay houses and narrow cobblestone streets, was a centre of Islamic scholarship and home to a thriving manuscript culture producing Qurans, legal texts and prayer books in Arabic and Ajami, a modified Arabic script used to write Indigenous African languages.
Nestled atop a plateau that overlooks deserts and savannas linking the coastal lowlands and central highlands of Ethiopia and Somalia, in the 16th century, Harar became the capital of the Adal Sultanate, which at its height controlled large parts of modern-day Somalia, Ethiopia, Djibouti, and Eritrea.
Governed by powerful Muslim rulers, it was situated along trade routes that traversed the Red Sea to connect the Horn of Africa to the Arabian Peninsula and beyond.
Then, in 1887, Harar’s military was defeated by the forces of Menelik II, and the city was forcefully absorbed into a Christian empire.
The following decades were shaped by state repression, social discrimination and the erosion of the city’s Islamic culture and institutions.
Arabic street signs were replaced with Amharic ones, Harar’s largest mosque was turned into an Ethiopian Orthodox Church and numerous Islamic educational centres were demolished. Severe restrictions were placed on religious practices and education – once a central part of Harar’s identity.
It was against this backdrop that Sherif grew up.
“We learned from a young age that if we expressed our culture or talked openly about our history, then we could end up in the prisons,” he explains, smacking his wrists together to mimic handcuffs.
When Sherif was growing up in Harar, he knew that expressing his culture could get him sent to prison [Jaclynn Ashly/Al Jazeera]
Then, in 1991, ethnic federalism, which organised and defined federated regional states by ethnicity, was implemented throughout the country, allowing newfound religious and cultural freedom. The Harari people now belonged to the Harari region, with Harar as its capital.
Ever since, Sherif has been on a mission: To explore his city’s cultural identity by collecting artefacts, from old music cassettes to minted coins and, most importantly, manuscripts.
After years of painstaking searches going from household to household, he collected enough items to open Ethiopia’s first private museum, Abdallah Sherif Museum, 14 years ago in the hope of reconnecting Harar’s people with their history. The collection of hundreds of old manuscripts has become a particular passion.
“Each book I find, it feels like I am peeking through a window into a beautiful and rich culture that was almost forgotten,” he says.
To preserve these manuscripts, Sherif has also revitalised the ancient tradition of bookbinding. By tracing the last Hararis with knowledge of this art form, he has brought a once-extinct practice back to life.
The main gate into Harar Jugol, the old walled city, with a portrait of Abd Allah ash-Shakur, the last Emir of Harar who led the defence of the city against the forces of Menelik II [Jaclynn Ashly/Al Jazeera]
A city of manuscripts
The production of manuscripts – as a way of sharing and safeguarding religious knowledge – was an important aspect of Harar’s culture, says Nuraddin Aman, an assistant professor of philology at Addis Ababa University.
Manuscript making is believed to have emerged in the city in the 13th century, when an Islamic scholar, known colloquially as Sheikh Abadir, is said to have come from what is today Saudi Arabia and settled in the area with about 400 followers.
According to Sana Mirza, a researcher at the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University who specialises in Islamic art, Harari scripts were influenced by Indian Gujarati, Yemeni, and Egyptian Mamluki styles.
“The Indo-African relationship was very deep,” explains Ahmed Zekaria, an expert in Islamic and Harari history. “There was a strong linkage between India and Africa for centuries before the British arrived.”
Some Qurans found in Harar use a unique cursive calligraphic script said to have been developed in India’s northern Bihar region at about the 14th century and rarely seen outside India.
Manuscript makers developed their own style that merged local creativity and outside influences.
Within families, manuscripts were considered sacred heirlooms passed down through generations. Each Harari house had at least two or three manuscripts – often, the Quran, Hadiths, or other religious texts – Zekaria says.
According to Aman, the structured production of manuscripts made the city unique. Artisans were required to get permission from a local Islamic scholar – someone descended from Sheikh Abadir or one of his followers – to produce each religious manuscript. Then, before circulation, they needed approval from the incumbent emir. Still, full-time scribes were rare. “Most of them were farmers and produced manuscripts in their free time,” says Zekaria.
Harar also grew into a centre for bookbinding with artisans making leather covers to protect manuscripts, and people travelling to the city to learn the craft.
The Medhane Alem church in the central Faras Magala market was once Harar’s largest mosque, but was turned into an Ethiopian Orthodox Church after Menelik II conquered the city [Jaclynn Ashly/Al Jazeera]
When Harar was absorbed into the Ethiopian empire, education centres, once responsible for manuscript production, were shut down or destroyed. Without new manuscripts, bookbinding disappeared. Meanwhile, madrasas (religious schools) were shuttered, and children were forced to attend government schools teaching only Amharic.
Sherif was born into a middle-class Muslim family in 1950. He grew up during the reign of Emperor Haile Selassie, who ruled Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974 and under whom repression of Muslims escalated.
In the 1940s, Harari elites united with their Somali neighbours inside Ethiopia to organise a rebellion, advocating for Harar to join Somalia. When Selassie caught wind of this, he deployed thousands of soldiers into Harar. Mass arrests followed, leading to dozens of Hararis being imprisoned for years without charge or trial. Selassie’s forces confiscated the properties and belongings – including cherished manuscripts – of residents believed to be rebellion supporters. An estimated 10,000 Hararis fled to other Ethiopian cities or Somalia and Middle Eastern countries.
While Sherif says he grew up knowing he was Harari, he did not know what that meant outside of being Muslim and speaking the Harari language. Fearing state repression, Harari families were forced to hide their histories from their children. But as a teenager, Sherif could no longer suppress his curiosity about his identity.
In high school, he remembers asking his teacher if the city ever had Muslim leaders.
“The teacher responded that we had no leaders outside the Ethiopian Christian ones. After this, the other [Christian] students began teasing me about not having a history,” he recounts.
“I was taught that Haile Selassie was our king, and there was one country, one history, one language, and one culture,” he continues.
“Our community was too afraid of the state to challenge this or to teach us about our real history. They feared we would become angry over it and fight against the state.”
In 1974, when Sherif was in his 20s, the Derg, a Marxist-Leninist military group, overthrew Selassie.
The group brutally suppressed any opposition. Half a million Ethiopians were killed and thousands were crippled as a result of torture.
When the 1977-1978 Ogaden War broke out, with Somalia attempting to annex Ethiopia’s Ogaden region that is inhabited by ethnic Somalis, the Derg accused Hararis of collaborating and carried out massacres of civilians in Harari neighbourhoods of Addis Ababa.
In their region, Hararis were still the land-owning class, and many were completely dispossessed of their livelihoods as the Derg sought to eradicate private land ownership. Harari youth – like young men from all communities – were forcibly conscripted into the army. When an anti-Derg resistance movement emerged in Harar, the repression increased, while more Hararis moved abroad to escape it.
Today, Hararis are a minority in their region, with more living abroad than in Harari.
An old manuscript that Sherif and his employee Elias Bule are restoring [Jaclynn Ashly/Al Jazeera]
‘Missing pieces of myself’
Like many Harari families, when Sherif graduated from high school, his parents began educating him on who he really was.
He was bewildered to discover that what he’d been taught in school was a lie. “My whole life, I have suffered from a severe identity crisis,” says Sherif, sighing loudly and tossing a leafless khat stalk to the side. “I have always felt like there were pieces of myself that were missing – and I couldn’t feel peace until I found them.”
After high school, Sherif began a science degree in Addis Ababa, but dropped out within a year when he found out the woman he loved, who was his then-girlfriend, was being forced by her family to marry another man in Harar. “There was nothing in my life more important to me than her,” he says, with a wide, bashful smile. He returned home to marry this woman, Saeda Towfiqe – today his most enthusiastic supporter – and began working in the family business.
It wasn’t until 1991, when the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), led by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), overthrew the Derg and implemented a system of ethnic federalism designed to promote minority ethnic and religious rights, that Hararis, along with various other groups, suddenly found themselves with the freedom to develop and express their cultures and histories.
“I became mad to understand my history,” explains Sherif, the tone of his speech rising sharply as he smacks his head. “I really became mad.”
Taking advantage of this opening, Sherif began collecting hundreds of old cassettes of traditional Harari music. But he quickly realised that the history he sought existed in the old manuscripts still owned by many families in Harar. Through these religious and legal manuscripts, Sherif was able to glimpse the rich intellectual life of his ancestors.
“Each manuscript I found added a missing piece to a puzzle,” he explains.
A book cover being restored at Sherif’s museum workshop [Jaclynn Ashly/Al Jazeera]
Over centuries, families had developed a practice of conserving and transmitting manuscripts to the next generation, Aman explains.
Manuscripts were inherited or given at significant life events, such as weddings, the birth of a child, or during religious ceremonies. Scholars and religious leaders also gave them to students as a token of appreciation, “thereby fostering an environment of knowledge sharing and manuscript mobility”, says Aman.
People kept the manuscripts wrapped in cloth and would only uncover them on special occasions.
At first, Sherif, who was 40 when he began his project, purchased the manuscripts. “Eventually, when the community saw the importance of what I was doing for our heritage, they started donating manuscripts and other artefacts to me.”
But Sherif found that the covers and bindings of many manuscripts he acquired were in disarray.
The last bookbinder in Harar was Kabir Ali Sheikh, a local Quran teacher who learned the craft from elders and kept the tradition alive until his death in 1993. The ancient art of Harari bookbinding died with him. But Sherif was able to learn the traditional process from a few of Ali’s former students. He also went to train in Addis Ababa and Morocco.
“If you don’t bind the books, then you will lose them,” Sherif says. “Collecting manuscripts is useless if you do not also work on their restoration and preservation. If you lose just one page, you can lose the whole book. Beautiful things need to be protected and covered.”
It took Sherif two years of practice to perfect the art. He is now considered one of the best bookbinders in Africa, Zekaria says.
Sherif has strictly adhered to the traditional Harari way of bookbinding by using old ornamental stamps retrieved from around Harar – which are also displayed at his museum – to block-press motifs onto the front and back of covers, in the same way his ancestors did.
A view of Sherif’s museum, in the old residence of Haile Selassie’s father, once governor of Harar [Jaclynn Ashly/Al Jazeera]
Ensuring a history stays alive
In 1998, Sherif opened his private museum in his house. But, in 2007, a year after Harar’s old town with its unique architecture was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the regional government provided Sherif with the double-storey former residence of Ras Makonnen Wolde Mikael, the father of Selassie who served as governor of Harar under Menelik II, to use for his museum. The museum reopened to the public in 2011.
Sherif’s museum now houses the world’s largest collection of Islamic manuscripts from Harar, numbering about 1,400. Almost half are Qurans, one of which is more than 1,000 years old. There are also more than 600 old music recordings, tools, swords, coins, and items of jewellery, basketry, and weaponry.
Over time, Sherif’s museum has transformed from a space showcasing Harar’s cultural heritage to one actively revitalising it. In a side room of the museum is a manuscript conservation room with locally assembled tools and equipment for restoring manuscripts, with a particular focus on bookbinding.
Scholars are still tracking down various manuscripts from Harar that are scattered around the world, Zekaria says. Most of them left with European travellers, especially in the 19th century, when colonialists were expanding into the Horn of Africa. Many of these manuscripts are preserved in Italy, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom. In the US, the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC alone has 215 manuscripts from Harar.
In the meantime, Sherif continues to look after the manuscripts he acquires.
“When I first get a manuscript, I carefully clean it,” he explains. He removes dust and dirt, adds new pages to damaged manuscripts, and fills in the missing text. He covers the paper in transparent paper and has bound and digitised almost all the books.
“Each new piece of information I get about my history, it opens up a new world for me and I realise how far we still have to go to preserve our culture,” Sherif says.
Bule sits at the museum workshop where he restores and binds manuscripts [Jaclynn Ashly/Al Jazeera]
About a decade ago, Sherif began training dozens of youths around Harar in bookbinding and has also led training in neighbouring Somaliland.
One of his students was Elias Bule, a soft-spoken 31-year-old, who was first hired as a security guard at Sherif’s museum. After a few months, “Sherif asked me if I wanted to learn the Indigenous way of bookbinding,” explains Bule, as he sorts through scattered pages of an old manuscript in the museum’s conservation workshop. “Of course, I accepted immediately.”
Bule is now employed full-time at the museum, supporting Sherif’s various endeavours and giving tours to visitors.
“I feel very happy that I can give this to the future generations,” Bule says, with a proud grin, gesturing at the papers on the table. “With each manuscript that is bound, we are ensuring that knowledge is preserved and that our culture and heritage will continue to survive.”
After a year lay-off, an overly cautious Haney, who was dropped three times by Garcia last year, never really got going in a below-par showing.
He circled around the ring, landing the occasional lead left hook, but neglected his jab as single shots did enough to edge the rounds.
Defensively, it was a sound performance by Haney, largely because gun-shy Ramirez did so little.
The judges scored it 119-109, 119-109 and 118-110.
The bout was best summed up by Scotland’s former undisputed light-welterweight world champion Josh Taylor, who said on social media that Haney looked “terrified” and “frantic”.
Haney-Ramirez sapped the ‘Big Apple’ of its energy and vibe but the early drama in the headline bout lifted the mood.
Romero landed a stinging double left hook to floor Garcia. It was a flush and hurtful punch which he later followed with a clubbing right before Garcia regained his senses.
With both fighters unwilling to over-commit, Romero edged the rounds with better use of the jab, coupled with Garcia’s tentativeness.
“Get busy,” trainer Derrick James pleaded with Garcia before the championship rounds.
The pep talk had no impact as Romero landed a combination to head and body in the 11th. Haney, now ringside, was left shaking his head at the final bell.
Two stories captivate the Saturday papers: Reform UK’s performance in local elections around England and a BBC interview with the Duke of Sussex after he lost a legal challenge over his security in the UK. The Daily Mail splits its front page in half, headlining on the “Reform revolution” that it reports “sent shockwaves through the political establishment” after Nigel Farage’s party won 650 councillors and two mayors in local elections. On the royals, the Mail leaves it to a quote from Prince Harry to tell the story: “The King won’t speak to me… I don’t know how much longer he has left.”
The Times similarly splits its front page between the two stories. It reports that Farage has said people who mocked his aspirations to be prime minister were “not laughing now”, describing his party’s wins as a “reformquake”. Writing in the Times, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer acknowledged that voters weren’t feeling the benefits of his policies, but accused Farage of offering “easy solutions” and insisted he would not give in to “ideological zealotry”. The paper also delves into Prince Harry’s interview in which he reflects on losing an appeal over the levels of security he and his family are entitled to while in the UK. In a caption under an image of the prince, the paper highlights that his family were “unlikely” to visit Britain and he feels sad that this children – Archie, five, and Lilibet, three – would not get to see his “homeland”.
The Daily Telegraph illustrates its front page with one of the most striking images to come out of England’s local elections – Farage reacting to the cameras over the six votes that decided the local election in Runcorn and Helsby for Reform UK. In a similar fashion to the prime minister reacting via the Times, Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch writes in the Telegraph that the results were a “bloodbath” for her party. Meanwhile, the Prince Harry story is advertised via a banner at the top of the page, highlighting the prince’s wish to “heal (the) rift with my father”.
The i weekend features a similar split down its front page on Saturday. On local elections, it reports Reform UK’s party pledges to “cut local authority spending, axe diversity roles and stop council employees from working from home”. It reports “angry Labour MPs” – revealed within the folds to include South Shields MP Emma Lewell – place the blame on winter fuel cuts among other issues for the government’s falling support.
The Financial Times Weekend edition is the only paper not to feature the latest from the British Royal Family on its front page. Instead, it leads on England’s local elections, describing Reform UK’s victories as a “populist insurgency similar to those witnessed in the US, France, Italy and Germany”. It quotes one unnamed Conservative MP calling it an “existential challenge” to Badenoch’s party, but another rules out any leadership change as “we’d look ridiculous”. The FT also makes space for a report on concerns over strict restrictions on British soldiers training with drones leaving them ill-prepared for warfare with Russia. Soldiers heading to eastern Europe lack the training that is “completely bog standard warfare now,” Labour MP Fred Thomas tells the paper. The Ministry of Defence responds that it was aware of the restrictions, but there had been no reports of any effect on activities.
It’s all about the Royals on the front page of the Daily Express as it leads on that “bombshell interview” from Prince Harry. The paper also offers a further story marking the birthday of his niece, Princess Charlotte. In text over a photo of the smiling now-10-year-old taken by her mother in Cumbria earlier this year, it remarks that the young princess is “growing up fast”.
The Sun dedicates most of its front page to Prince Harry, describing his comments as an “incendiary attack on his family”. While Buckingham Palace has reacted to the legal ruling at the centre of this row, saying that the issues “have been examined repeatedly and meticulously by the courts, with the same conclusion reached on each occasion”, the Sun quotes an unnamed palace insider for another perspective. Its source says King Charles was “frustrated and upset” by the fight over the prince’s security protection in the UK. Local election results feature on the sidebar on the left, illustrated by another photo of Farage holding up six fingers in reaction to those six votes.
The Daily Mirror also leads on the revelations from the Duke of Sussex, focusing on his concerns around the King’s cancer diagnosis. “I don’t know how much longer my father has,” the Mirror quotes him as saying. The tabloid also features footballer Duncan Ferguson on its front page, billing an exclusive interview about his three months in prison in the 1990s. His stint in prison after headbutting another player on the pitch is described as his “jail hell”.
The Daily Star makes the rare move of aligning with its competitors in its choice of front-page story, by focusing on the comments from Prince Harry. It quotes the prince’s claims that he is the victim of an “establishment stitch-up” following his court defeat. In a statement responding to his interview, the Palace said: “All of these issues have been examined repeatedly and meticulously by the courts, with the same conclusion reached on each occasion.”
Writing in the Times, Sir Keir Starmer insists Labour is moving the country in the right direction but says: “am I satisfied with where we are? Not even close.” The Daily Mirror’s editorial offers this thought: “Mr Farage claims to stand up for ordinary people”, it says, “but Reform’s policies will do harm. To beat him, Labour must become Labour”. The Sun’s political editor, Harry Cole, writes: “Nigel Farage not only tipped over the apple cart of English politics, he set it alight for good measure. And the fumes are choking both Downing Street and the Tories.”
The i reports that “doubts are emerging” within the Conservatives about how long Kemi Badenoch will be given to prove herself as leader. Writing in the Mail, the former Prime Minister Boris Johnson calls Badenoch “interesting and impressive”, and predicts voters will return to the Tories. He argues that “the brute facts of electoral maths, and the first-past-the-post system, mean there will be only one way to expel this Labour government – and that is to vote Conservative”.
The Guardian’s sketch writer, John Crace, sees problems ahead for Reform: “the danger for Farage is that with success comes obligations. An expectation to deliver. A problem Nige has never encountered before. He’d only ever carped from the sidelines.”
The army of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) asked the Senate this week to revoke former President Joseph Kabila’s immunity from prosecution.
Removal of Kabila’s immunity would pave the way for him to be prosecuted on charges of “supporting a rebel insurgency” in the country’s troubled eastern region, Justice Minister Constant Mutamba said.
Last week, the government placed travel restrictions on Kabila’s family, signalling a deepening rift between Kabila, who led the country for more than a decade until 2019, and current President Felix Tshisekedi, who took over from him that year.
Tension between the two has kept Kabila away from the country for several years, living for the most part in South Africa. But his reported reappearance last month in the rebel-held Goma territory in DRC’s eastern Kivu region has led to speculation that he may have allied himself with the armed rebel group, M23.
His reappearance in DRC appears also to have angered the government, which has been battling the Rwanda-backed M23 group in a deadly conflict in the country’s east for months. Last week, the rebels announced a ceasefire following mediation talks in Qatar.
Kambale Musavuli, a researcher at the Center for Research on Congo-Kinshasa, a think tank, said the DRC’s move to prosecute the ex-leader was a positive step.
“Putting him on trial could be a pivotal moment for the DRC, not only in seeking justice for past crimes but also in breaking the cycle of impunity that has plagued our leadership since independence,” he said.
Democratic Republic of Congo’s former President Joseph Kabila attends a memorial service for Sam Nujoma, who became Namibia’s first democratically elected president, at the Independence stadium, in the Windhoek, Namibia, on February 28, 2025, several weeks before his reported reappearance in DRC [Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters]
What is Kabila’s history?
Joseph Kabila, 53, is a former military officer who was fourth president of the Democratic Republic of the Congo from 2001 to 2019. Although his term was supposed to end in 2016, he controversially delayed elections until huge protests broke out. Presidents in the DRC are elected for a five-year term and are only permitted to serve two terms. A new constitution, adopted in 2006, reset Kabila’s two-term tenure.
He took over leadership of the country in 2001 at the age of just 29, after his father and former coup leader, President Laurent Kabila, was assassinated. DRC presidents, former presidents and senators are immune from prosecution unless they commit “gross misconduct” according to the country’s constitution.
Kabila’s relationship with President Tshisekedi, a former opposition leader of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS), is fraught. Although the two men agreed in 2019 to an awkward power-sharing pact that allowed members of Kabila’s People’s Party for Reconstruction and Democracy (PPRD) to take part in the new government, they clashed over who could appoint which officials to office. Their alliance broke down a year later, in 2020.
Tensions were also mounting over the M23 rebellion which began in 2012. Kabila has accused Tshisekedi of failing to tackle the matter with tact, complaining that the president has relied on external mediation rather than engaging in direct dialogue with the rebels.
In a recent opinion piece in South Africa’s Sunday Times, Kabila wrote that under Tshisekedi, the DRC “is close to imploding as a result of the civil war”. He also accused the president of attempting to hang onto power, referring to Tshisekedi’s plans to push for a constitutional review. Tshisekedi said in 2023 his government would review the constitution and leave the matter of term limits “for the people to decide”, without expanding further.
Kabila has held talks with opposition leaders, including Moise Katumbi, leader of the Together for the Republic party, although it is unclear what was discussed. Observers say Kabila is angling to act as a lead negotiator between M23 and Kinshasa, but he has not publicly made that claim himself.
For his part, Tshisekedi blames Kabila for undermining his government and accuses him of supporting M23, citing his close links to former election chairman-turned-rebel-leader, Corneille Nangaa.
Nangaa, who declared his alliance with the rebels in 2023, was head of the country’s electoral commission from 2015 to 2021 and oversaw the disputed 2018 elections that brought Tshisekedi into office. The two later fell out over how the elections were run, causing Nangaa to publicly criticise Tshisekedi and eventually join a rebel group.
On April 20, the DRC’s government suspended Kabila’s party, PPRD, and ordered his assets to be seized on charges of supporting M23. It is not clear if those assets are yet under state control.
People gather around market stalls as residents begin to venture out onto the streets following clashes at Kadutu Market in Bukavu on February 18, 2025 [Luis Tato/AFP]
Why is the DRC government seeking to lift Kabila’s immunity?
DRC Justice Minister Constant Mutamba told reporters on Wednesday that the state has amassed evidence implicating Kabila in “war crimes, crimes against humanity and massacres of peaceful civilians and military personnel” in the country’s east. He did not give specific details of these crimes.
Swaths of the eastern region are currently under control of the M23 group, which seeks control of mineral wealth and has ambitions to take power in Kinshasa. The United Nations and United States claim the group is backed by neighbouring Rwanda.
In relation to this, Kabila is accused of “treason, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and participation in an insurrectional movement”, the justice minister said.
It’s not clear when the Senate will approve the army’s demand, or when a trial might begin.
What is the M23 and what does it want?
The M23 armed group is the most prominent of more than 100 armed groups vying for control of eastern DRC’s trillions of dollars in mineral wealth, critical for the production of much of the world’s technology.
According to UN experts and the US, M23 rebels are supported by about 4,000 soldiers from neighbouring Rwanda.
Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame has not explicitly denied supporting the group. In February, he told a CNN reporter he did “not know” if Rwandan troops had boots on the ground in the DRC.
The group, which is largely composed of Tutsi fighters, says it wants to protect Congolese Tutsis of Rwandan origin from discrimination and wants to transform the DRC from a failed state into a modern one, though critics say this is a pretext for Rwanda’s involvement.
Many M23 members were indeed former ethnic Tutsi rebels who integrated into the DRC army following the Congo Wars (1996-2003) but later defected, citing discrimination and broken peace deals.
Those wars had roots in the 1994 Rwandan genocide of minority Tutsis and centrist Hutus. Thousands of genocidaires fled over the border into refugee camps in the DRC following the fall of the Hutu government, and from there, launched attacks on Rwanda. That conflict led to fighting in an already unstable DRC.
President Kagame’s government, meanwhile, accuses the DRC of enlisting remnant Hutu forces in the form of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), which fights alongside the Congolese army.
In a previous uprising in 2012, M23 briefly seized Goma, a strategic regional hub, but withdrew after international pressure.
Since January, the group, which analysts say is eyeing political power this time, has again captured Goma as well as Bukavu, a city of 1.3 million people. At least 3,000 people were reported killed and thousands displaced in the Goma fighting in January.
Congolese traffic police officers affiliated with the M23 fighters direct traffic on the roads around the Birere Market in Goma on February 17, 2025 [Michel Lunanga/AFP]
What will happen to Kabila next?
Kabila has not responded to the DRC government’s recent allegations or its moves to prosecute him. However, his allies have criticised these moves. Ferdinand Kambere, a senior member of Kabila’s PPRD, said Kinshasa’s actions were a “relentless persecution” of the former president.
“For us, these mistakes that those in power keep making against the former president, thinking they are humiliating or intimidating him, actually show that the regime is nearing its end. They have nothing left to use against Kabila,” Kambere told The Associated Press news agency.
But some say the move is necessary for justice. Kabila’s reported appearance in Goma should not be seen as a coincidence, Musavuli, the researcher, said, but rather indicates that he may be shoring up alliances or defying Kinshasa. Kabila and any others implicated in crimes should be tried, he said.
“His regime is deeply implicated in enabling armed groups, particularly in the east. Many of these crimes occurred under his watch, if not with his direct complicity, certainly with his strategic silence. The people want a transparent and credible judicial process, one that doesn’t just scapegoat one individual but exposes the broader networks of power, both domestic and international, that have profited from the suffering of the Congolese people,” he added.
Meanwhile, an opposition alliance against President Tshisekedi is forming. On Thursday, opposition leaders Moise Katumbi, Martin Fayulu and Delly Sesanga, together with Kabila, issued a joint call for national dialogue in what looked like a united front.
In a statement, they questioned the strength of the Qatar-led ceasefire deal and instead called for a return to Congolese-led mediation mechanisms, including one being led by the country’s Catholic Church leaders, to deal with the “root causes” of the crisis, among them “bad governance”.
Government says 100km-long Texas National Defense Area runs east from the Texas-New Mexico border in El Paso.
The United States military has created a second military zone along the border with Mexico, adding an area in Texas where troops can temporarily detain migrants or trespassers, following another zone newly designated in New Mexico last month.
The announcement of a new military encampment comes as President Donald Trump has launched an aggressive anti-immigration crackdown since taking office, increasing troops at the southern border and pledging to deport millions of people from the US.
Some of the people the Trump administration deported have included children who are American citizens.
The US military said late on Thursday that it had established the “Texas National Defense Area” in a 100-kilometre (63-mile) strip running east from the Texas-New Mexico border in El Paso.
According to the Pentagon, US troops can detain migrants in the zones, and the detainees will then be handed over to the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) or other civilian law enforcement, which maintains jurisdiction over illegal border crossings.
In April, the Trump administration designated an 18-metre-wide, 270km-long (60 feet by 170 miles) strip along the base of New Mexico as a “National Defense Area”.
A total of 82 migrants have so far been charged for crossing into the New Mexico military zone, according to the US Attorney’s Office. US troops did not detain any of them, and they were dealt with by CBP officials.
The military zones are intended to allow the Trump administration to use its military forces to detain migrants without invoking the 1807 Insurrection Act that empowers a president to deploy the US military only to suppress events like civil disorder.
About 11,900 US troops are currently stationed on the border with Mexico. According to government data, the number of migrants caught crossing illegally into the US in March fell to the lowest level ever recorded.
Texas Governor Gregg Abbott, a Republican, on Thursday posted pictures of a razor wire barrier construction on the border, saying, “Texas continues to work with the Trump Administration to stop illegal immigration.”
Since 2021, Abbott has deployed the state’s National Guard and police to border security.
However, New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham has opposed what she called a “deportation buffer zone” in her state.
In a March social media post, the Democrat called it “a waste of resources and military personnel, especially when migrant crossings are at the lowest in decades”.
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