ECCAS highlights importance of Malabo summit

 

Malabo - The president of the Commission of the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), Gilberto Veríssimo, on Saturday in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, highlighted the importance of the Summit on Terrorism and Unconstitutional Change of Governments in Africa. 

In statements to the press, the Angolan diplomat at the service of ECCAS said that the event will allow African leaders to find the reasons of the political and military instability in several regions of the continent. 

Gilberto Veríssimo expressed concern over the increase in cases of coups d'état in Africa and terrorist actions, which hinder the continent's socio-economic development. 

"The Heads of State and Government are concerned to know why this situation has worsened and to find joint solutions," he said. 

He said that, in many cases, the conflicts arise because the populations do not feel their problems are solved and always seek a way to express dissatisfaction, hence the unconstitutional change of regimes, associated with terrorism. 

The ambassador praised the efforts made by the Angolan authorities in the search for peace and stability in the continent. 

At the summit that ended this Saturday, the President of the Republic, João Lourenço, was designated "champion for peace and reconciliation. 

As for ECCAS, it is a community created in Libreville, Gabon, in December 1981, and became operational in 1985. 

The common aim of the community is to promote cooperation and self-sustainable development in the region. 

Members of ECCAS are Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Sao Tome and Principe and the Democratic Republic of Congo. 

U.S to review police response to Texas school shooting

 The US Department of Justice says it will investigate the police response to last week’s mass shooting at a school in Uvalde, Texas, which killed 19 children and two teachers.

Public anger is growing after it emerged that officers waited in the hallway as children trapped with the shooter made desperate 911 calls.

In Uvalde, President Joe Biden met the victims’ families on Sunday.

He also met survivors and first responders.

First Lady Jill Biden, herself a teacher, accompanied the president to a memorial at Robb Elementary School. They were seen comforting the school’s principal Mandy Gutierrez, beside a carpet of floral tributes for the teachers, and children – all under 10 years old – who lost their lives.

Both were seen wiping tears from beneath their sunglasses. Mrs Biden touched each child’s photo in turn.

The couple then attended a Catholic Mass at the local Sacred Heart church. Protesters outside the church shouted, “Do something!” as the president walked out.

“We will,” he answered.

Announcing its Critical Incident Review on Sunday, the US Department of Justice said the goal was to “provide an independent account of law enforcement actions and responses that day, and to identify lessons learned and best practices to help first responders prepare for and respond to active shooter events”.

The shooting on 24 May has provoked new calls for gun control measures, in a country reeling from two vicious shootings in under 10 days – although leading Republicans oppose tightening rules.

The US has now surpassed 200 mass shootings since the beginning of 2022.

A mass shooting is defined as an incident in which four or more people are shot or killed, excluding the shooter.

White House officials say Mr Biden is unlikely to offer specific policy proposals or seek to issue an executive order in the coming weeks to avoid interfering with delicate negotiations between Senate Democrats and Republicans.

The president’s visit comes days after 18-year-old Salvador Ramos shot his grandmother, and then opened fire on a classroom of fourth-graders with a legally acquired AR-15 style assault rifle.

The gunman’s rampage lasted for over an hour and police found as many as 1,657 rounds of ammunition and 60 magazines in his possession after he was shot dead.

Authorities have struggled to give a clear timeline of how events unfolded in Uvalde.

On Friday, officials admitted that police had delayed entering the school for over 40 minutes because they did not believe it was still an “active shooter” situation.

The senior officer on the scene decided to wait until the school janitor arrived with the keys because they thought that either “no kids were at risk” by then, or “no-one was living anymore”.

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Ukraine, Russia battle in the east as Zelenskyy visits front

 Russian and Ukrainian troops traded blows in fierce close-quarter combat Sunday in an eastern Ukrainian city as Moscow’s soldiers, supported by intense shelling, attempted to gain a strategic foothold to conquer the region. Ukraine’s leader also made a rare frontline visit to Kharkiv, the country’s second-largest city, to assess the strength of the national defense.

In the east, Russian forces stormed Sievierodonetsk after trying unsuccessfully to encircle the strategic city, Ukrainian officials said. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described the situation there as “indescribably difficult,” with a relentless Russian artillery barrage destroying critical infrastructure and damaging 90% of the buildings.

“Capturing Sievierodonetsk is a principal task for the occupation force,” Zelensky said, adding that the Russians don’t care about casualties.

The city’s mayor said the fighting had knocked out power and cellphone service and forced a humanitarian relief center to shut down because of the dangers.

The deteriorating conditions raised fears that Sieverodonetsk could become the next Mariupol, a city on the Sea of Azov that spent nearly three months under Russian siege before the last Ukrainian fighters surrendered.

Sievierodonetsk, located 143 kilometers (89 miles) south of the Russian border, has emerged in recent days as the epicenter of Moscow’s quest to capture all of Ukraine’s eastern industrial Donbas region. Russia also stepped up its efforts to capture the nearby city of Lysychansk, where civilians rushed to escape persistent shelling.

The two eastern cities span the strategically important Siverskiy Donetsk River. They are the last major areas under Ukrainian control in Luhansk province, which makes up the Donbas together with the adjacent Donetsk region.

Zelenskyy, meanwhile, visited soldiers in Kharkiv, where Ukrainian fighters pushed Russian forces back from nearby positions several weeks ago.

“I feel boundless pride in our defenders. Every day, risking their lives, they fight for Ukraine’s freedom,” Zelenskyy wrote on the Telegram messaging app after the visit.

Russia has kept up its bombardment of the northeastern city from afar, and explosions could be heard shortly after Zelenskyy’s visit. Shelling and airstrikes have destroyed more than 2,000 apartment buildings in the city since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, according to the regional governor, Oleh Syniehubov.

In a video address later Sunday, Zelenskyy praised Kharkiv regional officials but said he had fired the regional head of the country’s top security agency, the SBU, for his poor performance. In the wider Kharkiv region, Russian troops still held about one-third of the territory, Zelenskyy said.

After failing to seize Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, Russia is focused on occupying parts of Donbas not already controlled by pro-Moscow separatists.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told French TF1 television Sunday that Moscow’s “unconditional priority is the liberation of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions,” adding that Russia sees them as “independent states.”

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Neem: Tree With Million Benefits

 

It caught the attention of the public in the wake of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic due to the assertion that it could boost the immune system and fight the virus.

Until then, not much was known about the valuable plant which grows in almost every part of the world.

The neem tree, whose botanical name is Azadirachta Indica, is a popular ancient medicinal herb that has been part of traditional remedies that date back almost 2,000 years.

In many parts of the world, it is referred to as the miracle tree due to its many benefits.

Origin

According to environmentalists, the tree was brought into East Africa during the 19th Century by East Indian immigrants fundamentally for its medicinal properties.

It is now widely grown in Ghana, Mauritania, Senegal, The Gambia, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Mali, Benin, Niger, Nigeria, Togo, Cameroon, Chad, Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Mozambique.

Though wildly grown, it thrives well when planted in any environment.

The neem is a hardy tree that can tolerate temperatures up to 120 degrees Celsius.

However, extended cool weather with temperatures below 35 degrees Celsius would cause the tree to drop its leaves. It doesn’t tolerate colder temperatures, wet climates, or prolonged drought.

That being said, fresh neem tree seeds could be grown indoors in a pot filled with good quality, well-drained potting soil.

Medicinal values

According to traditional folks, all parts of the tree had the potential to cure various ailments. Oil can be extracted from the seeds which can be used as a natural insect repellent and are often incorporated into shampoo, soap, lotion, and other skincare products.

Additionally, the oil makes a great fungicide for issues such as powdery mildew, black spot, and sooty mould.

Although the bark of the plant isn’t widely used, it has anti-inflammatory and antiseptic properties which makes it useful as a mouthwash in treating gum disease.

Traditionally, natives chewed the twigs which served as effective, impromptu toothbrushes. The sticky bark resin is commonly used as glue.

Neem leaves also have anti-bacterial properties which are effective in treating infections and burns.

The leaves destroy the bacteria that cause infections, stimulate the immune system and promote rapid healing.

In most traditional set-ups, people usually boil some of the leaves and drink the water, while others squeeze out water from the leaves with their palms and add it to water to have their bath.

Others also boil the leaves, pour the hot water into a bucket and inhale the steam with a sheet over their heads, trapping the vapour.

Its flowers are widely appreciated for their sweet aroma, which honeybees love.

Potency

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the President of the Traditional Medicines Practitioners Association, Kojo Odum Eduful, recommended the inhalation of steam from boiled neem leaves as an effective practice to help treat symptoms of the virus.

“I can vouch for it because neem leaves can treat lots of fever; if it is true that the virus enters through the nose and tries to go down your lungs and also true that it can’t stand high temperature, then I advise you boil the leaves to a 100 degrees Celsius.

“I can vouch for it,” he said.

Afforestation

Aside from its medicinal purposes, the tree also helps to combat erosion and fight climate change.

For instance, in the Savannah Ecological Zone, the neem tree is one of the main trees that formed the ecosystem.

An environmentalist, Nana Yaw Osei-Darkwa, who is the Convener of the Green Republic Project, told the Daily Graphic that neem was a fast-growing tree and because it was evergreen, it was highly recommended for reforestation.

He indicated that the tree could help to combat erosion when planted on slopes and landslides, adding that the fallen leaves also helped to neutralize acidic soils.

He, therefore, called for the massive plantation of the tree to help restore the depleting vegetation and help the country in its quest to fight climate change.

Campaign

Despite the numerous benefits of the wild tree, some people continue to fell them for firewood, charcoal and farming purposes.

In February 2020, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced plans to launch a campaign on protecting neem trees in the country.

Source: graphic.com.gh

 

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Alexandr Wang: Meet The World’s Youngest Self-Made Billionaire

 Alexandr Wang grew up in the shadow of New Mexico’s Los Alamos National Lab, the top-secret site where the United States developed its first atomic bomb during World War II.

His parents were physicists who worked on weapons projects for the military. Now he does too: Wang’s six-year-old San Francisco–based company, Scale AI, has already inked three contracts worth some $350 million or more, contingent on the government’s needs, to help America’s Air Force and Army employ artificial intelligence. Pretty impressive for a 25-year-old.

Scale’s technology analyzes satellite images much faster than human analysts to determine how much damage Russian bombs are causing in Ukraine.

It’s useful not just for the military. More than 300 companies, including General Motors and Flexport, use Scale, which Wang started when he was 19, to help them pan gold from rivers of raw information—millions of shipping documents, say, or raw footage from self-driving cars.

“Every industry is sitting on huge amounts of data,” Wang says, who appeared on the Forbes Under 30 list in 2018. “Our goal is to help them unlock the potential of the data and supercharge their businesses with AI.”

A $325 million funding round last year valued Scale, which generates an estimated $100 million in revenue, at $7.3 billion.

Wang’s estimated 15% stake is worth $1 billion, making him the world’s youngest self-made billionaire. (The next-youngest is Pedro Franceschi, the 25-year-old Brazilian cofounder of credit card company Brex.)

As a kid, Wang was a math whiz who competed in national math and coding competitions. In 6th grade, he signed up for his first national math competition intent on securing a free ticket to Disney World.

He didn’t win the competition, but he clinched his trip to the magic kingdom. By 17, he was working full-time coding at the question-and-answer site Quora, where he met Scale’s cofounder, Lucy Guo. He made a quick detour to MIT to study machine learning and started Scale with Guo the summer after his freshman year, with an investment from Y Combinator.

“I told my parents it was just going to be a thing I did for the summer,” Wang says. “Obviously, I never went back to school.”

DNT News

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Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov denies Putin illness

 Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has denied speculation that President Vladimir Putin is ill.

In an interview with French TV, Mr Lavrov said the Russian leader appears in public every day, and no sane person would see any signs of an ailment.

There has been increasing unconfirmed media speculation that Mr Putin, who turns 70 this year, may be suffering from ill health, possibly cancer.

The interview came as Russia continues its advance in Ukraine’s Donbas region.

Mr. Lavrov said the “liberation” of the eastern region was an “unconditional priority” for Russia.

He repeated the Kremlin’s widely discredited line that Russia is fighting a “neo-Nazi regime”.A Ukrainian soldier inspects Russian shell damage in Marinka, Donetsk region, this weekend

Noting that President Putin regularly appeared in public, Mr Lavrov told TF1: “I don’t think that sane people can see in this person signs of some kind of illness or ailment.”

“You can watch him on screens, read and listen to his speeches,” he said in comments released by the Russian foreign ministry.

“I leave it to the conscience of those who spread such rumours despite daily opportunities to assess how anyone is looking.”

British intelligence sources were quoted telling media outlets that Mr Putin was seriously ill in the last week. However, rumours about the condition of the Russian leader, long known for his healthy lifestyle and love of sport, have surfaced periodically for years.

Asked about the human cost of the fighting, which has seen devastating artillery and rocket attacks on some urban areas, the foreign minister insisted Russian soldiers were “under strict orders categorically to avoid attacks and strikes on civilian infrastructure”.

Since Russia invaded on 24 February, at least 4,031 civilians have been killed and 4,735 injured, according to the UN, and an unknown number of combatants have died or been wounded. More than 14 million people have fled their homes, with towns and cities reduced to rubble.

The fighting is now focused on the Donbas – the mining belt made up of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. Separatists in the two regions, which historically have strong ties to Russia, broke away in 2014 and are now fighting alongside Russian troops to take full control.

Mr Lavrov told TF1 that winning in “the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, recognised by the Russian Federation as independent states, is an unconditional priority”.

However, he added, it was up to the rest of Ukraine if people there were “happy to return to the authority of a neo-Nazi regime that has proven it is Russophobic in essence”.

Russia has already been forced to pull back from an attempt to overrun the capital Kyiv, after been repelled by Ukrainian forces.

They have also been pushed back from the second city, Kharkiv, in recent weeks, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky making a morale-boosting trip to the battle scarred city on Sunday.

Speaking in the city, he said his soldiers would defend their land “to the last man”. “They [the Russians] have no chance,” he said. “We will fight and we will definitely win.”

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