#FreeOurGirls: Twitter users back Burundi schoolgirls, detained for defacing president’s photos in school textbooks

GITEGA, March 26 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Twitter users have rallied to the cause of three schoolgirls arrested for defacing photos of Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza by following their example. Crudely doctored images of the leader are being circulated online under the hashtag, #FreeOurGirls. The girls were charged last week with insulting…

Russia again denies meddling in US vote

MOSCOW, March 26 (NN-AGENCIES) – Russia reiterated denials that Moscow interfered in the 2016 US presidential election after Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report found conclusive evidence of Russian meddling. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists he had not seen the report but Russia’s “principled position on this matter is well…

Pres Bolsonaro orders celebration of March 1964 Brazil military coup: spokesman

BRASILIA, March 26 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro ordered the armed forces to hold “appropriate commemorations” of the March 1964 military coup — while denying it was a coup. “Our president has ordered the Defense Ministry to carry out appropriate commemorations related to March 31, 1964,” 55 years on,…

Italy: Flights cancelled due to air transport strike

ROME, March 26 (NNN-AGENCIES) —Air transportation workers went on strike for four hours on Monday to protest wage dumping, job insecurity, the lack of a national collective bargaining contract, and the lack of an industrial plan for Alitalia air carrier. The national strike by pilots and cabin crew, air traffic controllers, maintenance workers, baggage…

Kosovo PM fires deputy minister over comments about NATO

PRISTINA, March 26 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Kosovo Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj has fired the country’s ethnic Serb deputy justice minister after she called NATO’s 1999 bombing campaign against Serbia a “planned genocide”. Deputy minister Vesna Mikic comes from Kosovo’s Serb minority which accounts for about 5 percent of the country’s population…

Libyan oil workers at El Sharara, other fields demand salary increase

BENGHAZI, March 26 (NNN-AGENCIES) — A number of workers at Libya’s largest oilfield, El Sharara, and two other facilities are demanding a salary increase by two-thirds at a time when the OPEC country’s oil output is surging. The demands are the first sign of dissent at the 315,000-barrels-per-day (bpd) field…

DR Congo: Ebola epidemic exceeds 1,000 cases – health ministry

KINSHASA, March 26 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Democratic Republic of Congo’s Ebola epidemic has now exceeded 1,000 cases, the Health Ministry said, with a death toll of 629 in the world’s second worst ever outbreak. Health workers have been better prepared than ever for this latest epidemic of the hemorrhagic fever, which…

Rescuers hope to reach more cyclone victims as roads reopen in Mozambique

BEIRA (Mozambique), March 26 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Rescuers said they hope to reach hundreds of people still stranded more than a  week after a powerful cyclone struck Mozambique and swathes of southeast Africa, as roads started to reopen. Cyclone Idai lashed Mozambique’s port city of Beira with winds of up to…

Pres Bolsonaro says Brazil owes world nothing on environment

SANTIAGO, March 26 (NNN-AGENCIES) – Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said his country “does not owe the world anything” when it comes to the environment. Bolsonaro, who is critical of the Paris climate change accord, was speaking in Chile following Friday’s launch of PROSUR, a conservative-minded group of South American leaders.…

Ethiopian Airlines ‘believes in’ Boeing despite crash: CEO

ADDIS ABABA, March 26 (NNN-AGENCIES) – Ethiopian Airlines “believes in” Boeing despite the crash of its 737 MAX 8 plane that killed all 157 people on board and led to the model’s grounding, the carrier’s CEO said. “Let me be clear: Ethiopian Airlines believes in Boeing. They have been a…