21, March 2020

Coronavirus Outbreak: EU abandoning Italy in viral crisis ⁰

The COVID 19 outbreak enters its fifth week in Italy amid fears that the pandemic will last longer than expected. The head of civil protection, Angelo Borrelli, announced on Friday that the peak in the infection spread is still two weeks away with Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte hinting at the possibility of extending the draconian lockdown measures nationwide well beyond April 3.

This is while over 40,000 people have contracted the virus and over 3,400 have died of it so far in Italy, surpassing the number of coronavirus deaths in China. Disappointment is growing in the country over a perceived lack of support from Europe. Earlier in March, when Rome asked for urgent supplies of medical equipment under a special European crisis mechanism, not a single EU country responded.

The healthcare situation is worsening particularly in the Lombardy region, the heart of the Italian coronavirus outbreak. Italy’s already-strained national health system is struggling with the lack of space, resources and staff after hospitals were deluged by coronavirus patients over the past weeks. Beds in intensive care departments are running out in the worst-hit regions and shortage of doctors has forced the government to hire retired doctors.

Meanwhile, a third team of 300 Chinese medical experts and nurses with tons of medical supplies landed in Milan on Friday. Some 21 other medical staff had already landed in Rome in the past days with 30 pulmonary ventilators, 200,000 face masks and nine tons of other supplies to help the Italian effort against the coronavirus.

Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio has praised China for its support saying that Rome-Beijing solidarity has deepened amid the coronavirus crisis. Also 65 doctors and nurses from Cuba are slated to arrive in Lombardy on Saturday.

Source: Presstv

21, March 2020

Trump attacks NBC News reporter after being asked about Americans worried about coronavirus ⁰

US President Donald Trump viciously attacked an NBC News reporter after he asked Trump what his message was to Americans who were afraid the coronavirus pandemic is spreading across the country.

The extraordinary exchange, which occurred on Friday at the White House’s daily coronavirus task force briefing, began when NBC News reporter Peter Alexander asked Trump whether he was giving Americans “false hope” by touting unproven drugs for treating Covid-19.

Trump has repeatedly used the term “fake news” to cast doubt on critical media reports about his administration, often without providing any evidence to support his case.

“What do you say to Americans, who are watching you right now, who are scared?” Alexander asked. The reporter cited the latest pandemic statistics showing thousands of Americans are now infected and millions are scared.

Erupting in anger, Trump unleashed a tirade: “I say that you’re a terrible reporter. That’s what I say. I think it’s a very nasty question and I think it’s a very bad signal that you’re putting out to the American people.”

Trump continued by blasting NBC News and its parent company, Comcast.

“You’re doing sensationalism,” Trump charged. “And the same with NBC and Comcast. I don’t call it Comcast. I call it ‘Con-Cast.'”

Moments later, Kaitlan Collins, a White House correspondent for CNN, asked Trump if it was appropriate to embark on tirades against members of the news media during a public health crisis.

Trump defended his verbal assault on Alexander, saying he’s “not a good journalist” and launching into another rant against him.

“Coming together is much harder when we have dishonest journalists,” Trump said.

At Thursday’s coronavirus press briefing, Trump smeared The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. “They’re very dishonest,” Trump said.

About 60 percent of Americans are now ‘very’ or ‘somewhat worried’ they or a family member will be exposed to the coronavirus, up from 36 percent in February, while confidence in the government’s ability to respond has fallen sharply, a Gallup poll released on Monday showed.

As of Saturday morning, at least 19,624 people across the US have tested positive for the coronavirus, and 241 people have died, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

Globally, over 275,000 people have now been confirmed with the virus, while nearly 11,400 have died.

Sick people across the US say they are being denied the coronavirus test, as American states scramble to slow the spread of COVID-19 and stop hospitals from being overwhelmed with a surge in critically ill patients.

The former Surgeon General of the United States warned last week that America’s top medical centers are suffering from a severe shortage of coronavirus testing supplies and are being forced to turn away potential patients amid the fast-spreading pandemic.

Source: Presstv

21, March 2020

Military raids Ambazonia camps ahead of election rerun in Southern Cameroons ⁰

Cameroon’s military says it has killed 24 separatists who vowed to disrupt Sunday’s election rerun in the country’s English-speaking regions. The anglophone rebels say the casualties were on the military’s side, but witnesses say a number of those killed were civilians caught up in the fighting.

Military commander Brigadier General Valere Nka says 350 troops destroyed 10 rebel camps this week, as well as seizing rebel vehicles and weapons and killing a number of their fighters, including a commander.

“The so-called general was neutralized, and you had about 20 killed or neutralized, many who are wounded [are] on the run. We are satisfied. Let’s continue so that peace comes back to the west, northwest and southwest regions,” Nka said.

The separatists on social media acknowledged the military destroyed their camps but said most of the casualties were among the military. Nka, however, said all of his troops are alive, though a few suffered minor injuries.

Witnesses say the military also killed civilians during the raids.

Metombi Nchari, a 44-year-old nurse, says troops shot dead at least six civilians, including his daughter.

“Do you want to tell me that my daughter, my 17-year-old daughter who was going to the farm, was carrying a weapon, meanwhile she was carrying just a hoe to go and work?” he said. “Or do you want to tell me that my daughter who is 17 years is a terrorist fighter? That is not possible.”

Official’s response

Cameroon territorial administration minister Paul Atanga Nji rejected the possibility the military killed any civilians.

He says President Paul Biya ordered the raids to stop a spike in rebel attacks on candidates and voters ahead of Sunday’s elections for the National Assembly.

“The head of state gave instructions that the administrative authorities and the forces of law and order reinforce the mechanisms for the rerun,” Nji said. “We can tell you that the security situation in the northwest region is under control.”

Local reaction

But locals, and even ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement party officials, say fighting is common.

An official of the ruling CPDM party in the village of Mbiame, Ben Collins Nyuyberiwo, says rebels are always attacking in the area.

“Either they cut off your fingers or they cut off your hands completely,” he said. “Those who are not able to pay ransom are being killed. Ten houses belonging to my colleagues have been burned. Even this morning we received calls that they are coming to burn our houses if we take part in the rerun this Sunday. They have fabricated explosives and it causes a lot of havoc.”

Nyuyberiwo says they are pleading with the rebels to call off their attacks and with Cameroon’s military to offer protection.

The rebels, who are seeking an independent English-speaking state within French-speaking-majority Cameroon, have vowed to stop the elections.

Cameroon’s Constitutional Council ordered a re-do of the vote in parts of the western regions over widespread irregularities and fraud.

The court said Biya’s CPDM party, which was declared the winner, was guilty of violations ranging from ballot stuffing to chasing opposition voters from polling stations.

The party and government denied any wrongdoing.

Voter turnout was barely 5 percent in some English-speaking areas. Authorities have vowed to secure the area for a better turnout this Sunday.

Source: VOA

20, March 2020

Aurlus Mabélé: King of Soukous music dies from coronavirus’ ⁰

Congolese music star Aurlus Mabélé has died in hospital in France’s capital Paris, aged 67.

Posts on social media from friends and relatives say he died of coronavirus but this is not confirmed.

His fans called him the king of soukous – a high-tempo Congolese dance music popular across Africa.

His daughter, French singer Liza Monet, tweeted on Thursday that her father had died of coronavirus. “I am inconsolable” she wrote.

Fellow member of the supergroup Loketo, Mav Cacharel, also said on Facebook that he had died of coronavirus.

His manager, Jimmy Ouetenou, however, told BBC Afrique that it was not confirmed he died of coronavirus and that he had long-term health problems.

He was admitted to hospital on Thursday and died on the same day.

Mabélé, whose real name is Aurélien Miatsonama, was from Congo-Brazzaville and moved to France in the 1980s.

His hits include the track Embargo.

Youtube post by Austine Malala: Aurlus Mabele Embargo

Mr Ouetenou said talks were already underway with the Congolese government for him to be buried in his home country.

In the meantime, his coffin will be placed in a burial vault until travel restrictions due to coronavirus are lifted, reports BBC Afrique’s Rose-Marie Bouboutou.

Mabélé took soukous around the world

Under his real name Aurélien Miatshonama, Mabélé founded Les Ndimbola Lokole with his friends in Brazzaville and recorded some of the hottest hits that moved the African continent in the 1970s, such as Embargo, Zebola and Waka Waka.

Later, he moved to Paris where he founded another band, Loketo, meaning “hips” in Lingala – the language of most soukous songs, which is widely spoken in western DR Congo and Congo-Brazzaville.

With more than 10 million albums sold over a 30-years of musical career, Aurlus Mabélé took soukous beyond Africa, around the world.

Source: BBC

20, March 2020

French Cameroun business tycoon Fotso Victor dies at age 94 ⁰

French Cameroun billionaire, Fotso Victor who also moonlights as the Mayor of Bandjoun is no more! The business tycoon turned politician died today Friday, March 20, 2020 in Paris aged 94. He was elected mayor of his home town whose town hall he built with his own money. He also constructed and donated to the Cameroon government the University of Technology in Bandjoun, thus offering French Cameroonians and the CPDM government one of its first institute of technology.

A celebrated polygamist and father of several children, Fotso Victor successfully raised a son – Yves Michel Fotso – imprisoned for corruption by the Special Criminal Court over his handling of the Cameroon Airlines Company, Camair-Co. Yves Michel Fotso was recently evacuated to Morocco for health reasons. Also renowned among his sea of children is a daughter who is a lawyer.

In 1994, in collaboration with Jean-Pierre Guyomard, he wrote an autobiographical work entitled Le Chemin de Hiala. The book is the story of his journey: from his childhood in Bandjoun (at the time, a small village in western Cameroon) to his success as a businessman. The book also provides a description of the political, economic and cultural context of Cameroon from the late 1920s to the early 1990s as perceived by the author.

Fotso Victor was also a father-in-law of Geremi Njitap Fotso, a former Cameroonian international footballer.

By Oke Akombi Ayukepi Akap in Glasgow

20, March 2020

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Coronavirus declares ceasefire in the English-speaking regions ⁰

The government of Cameroon had vowed that it must roll back the fighters who had challenged its authority and were seeking to establish an independent Southern Cameroons, but the times have changed and a new invisible boss is in control.

The Coronavirus has dictated a ceasefire which both sides are respecting without any questions.

Around the world, the virus is spreading like wildfire and it has sent thousands to an early grave. This has struck fear in the minds of the soldiers and fighters who have been at each other’s throat for almost four years.

The new rule is social distancing and neither the soldiers nor the fighters are in the mood to disrespect this rule which if disrespected could lead to death.

The soldiers and the fighters who were displaying how cruel they could be just a few weeks ago, are today avoiding each other like a plague.

Soldiers cannot even shake the hands of their friends and it will be hard for them to stand together to prosecute a war that was erroneously declared because of a misrepresentation of facts.

The whole world had said the war was unjustifiable, but ruled by ego, the country’s authorities refused to listen to any advice. Today, they are listening to a virus they cannot even see.

The ceasefire is effective and even soldiers are respecting it. They are no longer worried about Amba boys. It is their hope that the dangerous Coronavirus will take care of them before it disappears.

Amba fighters, for their part, are still walking the jungles of the two English-speaking regions of the country, hoping that the virus will not extend its reach to them, but they are also respecting the ceasefire against their wish.

Schools have been shut down and the entire country is on lockdown. No more ghost towns. The Coronavirus has instituted its own lockdown which is “ghost country.”

It is hoped after the Coronavirus leaves town, both parties will see the need for peace. For now, they must respect nature’s ceasefire, if not they will be swept away by the wave of death blowing across the world.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai with additonal reporting and editing from Dr Joachim Arrey

20, March 2020

Coronavirus killing Roman Catholic priests who bless the dying in Italy ⁰

They come to bless those suffering the most from the novel coronavirus. And then, more and more often, Italy’s priests die themselves.

The diocese of Bergamo northeast of Milan appears to have been ravaged the most by the stealth killer. At least 10 of its priests have died of COVID-19, the Catholic daily Avvenire reported Thursday.

The deaths, whether of priests or members of their communities, are “so numerous that it is difficult to count,” the paper wrote.

Five more fatalities were registered in the city of Parma. Still more virus-related deaths emerged among priests in Brescia, Cremona, and the northern industrial hub of Milan itself.

All these parishes are clustered in Italy’s north, the virus’ target from the day the Catholic country’s first death was reported four weeks ago.

More than 3,400 Italians have died of the virus since then.

Italy has taken over the grim title of being the global epicenter of the pandemic from China, where COVID-19 was first reported in late December.

Like doctors

Like doctors, Italy’s priests come in contact with the disease’s most serious cases.

And like doctors, priests are known to congregate among themselves in close quarters, creating the perfect conditions for contagion.

A count by Italy’s ANSA news agency on Thursday put the number of medics killed by the disease at 13.

Figures reported by Italian media suggest the death toll among priests is higher. At least 18 priests have been reported killed.

“Dressed in a mask, a cap, gloves, a robe and protective glasses, we priests walk around the halls like zombies,” Father Claudio del Monte told Italy’s Adnkronos news agency.

Del Monte has a parish in Bergamo, a walled, hillside city of 120,000, with square towers and slanted terracotta roofs familiar to tourists of many scenic Italian towns.

Its province is now Italy’s worst affected. With 4,634 infections as of Friday, it had piled up 11 percent of all of Italy’s cases.

Its population accounts for just 0.2 percent of Italy’s total.

Europe now ‘epicenter’ of coronavirus pandemic: WHO

Bergamo has so many dead that army trucks had to deliver supplies of freshly-made wooden coffins Thursday.

It has so many dead that mortuaries can no longer hold them all.

“We no longer know where to put the dead,” the bishop of Bergamo, Francesco Beschi, told the Vatican News site.

Standing and looking at the coffins makes him feel “very heavy,” Beschi said.

‘Dying of zeal’

Like all the other victims, the clergymen are buried without ceremony.

Funerals, along with weddings, have been banned for over a week to stem contagion. They may not be allowed again for many more weeks or months.

“It is painful to see the priests fall sick,” Enrico Salmi, the bishop of Parma, told the Avvenire. “Sometimes it happens (to them) out of pastoral zeal. They enter the intensive care unit where, naturally, no one is supposed to go.”

Touched by the plight of the priests of Bergamo, Pope Francis placed a call Wednesday to Beschi, the parish bishop.

Pope Francis was “very impressed by the suffering of the many dead,” Beschi said in a statement.

The Argentine-born pontiff has repeatedly called on priests to spend more time visiting the sick.

(Source: AFP)

20, March 2020

Paul Biya: Bullshitter-in-Chief ⁰

When the 87 year dictator President Paul Biya appointed Paul Atanga Nji as Minister of Territorial Administration, it was evidently clear that the onetime respectable African leader has lost everything and his utter ignorance of Cameroonian affairs was on display. And indeed, since then, the shallowness of Biya’s knowledge on the crisis in Southern Cameroons has been exposed further.

Declaring the war against English speaking Cameroonians four years ago and spending millions of US dollars to facilitate the arrest and forced extradition of the Southern Cameroons leader and his senior aides from Abuja to Yaoundé, the whole Francophone decision stands out now as deeply misguided as the crisis has grown.

Even then, the Biya Francophone regime’s obsession with the war in Southern Cameroons was just wrong. As the US Assistant Secretary for African Affairs, Hon. Tibor Peter Nagy Jr. had explained some times last year during a press conference in Paris, France, that Cameroon should not have gone down that road.

Today, the level of barbarism being perpetuated by the Cameroon government army soldiers supported by armed government militias as they pursue their genocidal war and scorch earth policy to completely annihilate the Southern Cameroons (Ambazonia) is frightening.

Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the International Crisis Group have all estimated that some 20,500 people have been killed, over 282 towns and villages burnt down, some 120,000 people are seeking refuge in Nigeria, over 1million people are internally displaced or living in bushes and 3,000 persons incarcerated in prisons and detention facilities in both French and British Southern Cameroons.

Local human rights groups have also reported that over 4.5. Million people are at risk of famine. Things are growing from bad to worse as the international community is now focused on the outbreak of the coronavirus.

However, one thing we of the Cameroon Concord News Group know for sure is that the 87 year old President Biya of French Cameroun and the Cameroon government army including the private militia sponsored by the regime in Yaounde will be held accountable for these crimes.

President Biya and the consortium of ruling CPDM crime syndicates have resisted all requests by independent humanitarian organizations to visit Southern Cameroons and establish the facts. The coming of the coronavirus is indeed a god-sent opportunity for Mr Biya as international pressure now seems washed away.

Cameroon government health officials have meticulously followed international trends by announcing some few coronavirus cases and reportedly quarantined Air France passengers clearly for PR reasons as just after the Governor of the Littoral Region left the Douala International airport, it was revealed that none of those passengers were detained in any hotel and none had the virus. The Francophone regime has also announced a lockdown of the country while its army soldiers continue to kill innocent Southern Cameroons civilians.

The coronavirus lockdown and Biya’s optimistic statement that compatriots should observe recommended hygiene rules have looked increasingly absurd. Cameroon has so far reported 7 cases as the virus continue to spread across the globe.

Living permanently in his palace at Mvomeka’a, Biya is wrong about exactly how big the coronavirus crisis could become in Cameroon. What his entire senior health officials picked from his clan have been doing in Yaoundé is simply providing the public with mistaken predictions. The problem is at 87, Biya seems to misunderstand entirely the nature of the various crises he is facing as head of state and the ways in which his administration has had an excellent backward approach in responding to them.

One of the biggest failings of the Biya administration is that it relies on old and inefficient men and women who are simply struggling to maintain a state apparatus designed to take care of the needs of the head of state, his family and closed collaborators. This is explains why Southern Cameroonians have opted to pullout of the failed union and set up their own country-the Federal Republic of Ambazonia.

The outbreak of the coronavirus and all its uncertainties simply provided Biya and his gang another golden opportunity to do what they have always done: lies. Misrepresenting figures and fabricating their own projection of how the number of cases was likely to rise to attract millions of dollars from the World Health Organization. Interestingly, all the coronavirus cases with French passports in Cameroon have been reported as fully recovered.

It seems pretty clear that what the regime in Yaounde has been trying to do with the virus pandemic is to divert attention away from the crimes its soldiers are committing in Southern Cameroons. But Biya’s words did nothing to calm the Ambazonia Restoration Forces. Biya is simply interested in putting on a happy one and indivisible Cameroonian face than grappling with reality.

Paul Biya is indeed-a Bullshitter-in-Chief

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

20, March 2020

Dozens of Malian soldiers killed in suspected jihadist attack ⁰

Suspected Islamist militants killed 29 Malian soldiers on Thursday in an attack on a base in the country’s northeast, the army said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack in the town of Tarkint, which is about 125 km (78 miles) north of the city of Gao. Mali’s army has repeatedly suffered heavy casualties from jihadist fighters active in the area with links to al Qaeda and Islamic State.

The army said earlier in the day that just two soldiers had died but tweeted later that the death toll had “heavily evolved” to 29 killed and five wounded.

Vast swathes of central and northern Mali are effectively lawless, used by the jihadists as a base for attacks in Mali and into neighbouring Niger and Burkina Faso, where security has deteriorated markedly over the past year.

Former colonial power France has had thousands of troops across the semi-arid band beneath the Sahara Desert known as the Sahel, but French officials acknowledge they have failed to slow the violence.

French army chief Francois Lecointre told senators last month that the Malian, Nigerien and Burkinabe armies were losing the equivalent of one battalion per year to the militants’ attacks.

(REUTERS)

20, March 2020

Coronavirus death toll in Italy overtakes China’s after rising to 3,405 ⁰

Italy’s death toll from coronavirus overtook that of China, where the virus first emerged, on Thursday as hospitals said they were being overwhelmed and the government prepared to prolong emergency lockdown measures.

A total 427 deaths were registered in Italy over the past 24 hours, bringing the total nationwide tally to 3,405 since the outbreak surfaced on Feb. 21. China has recorded 3,245 deaths since early January.

However, Italy has far fewer confirmed cases – 41,035 as of Thursday against 80,907 in China.

Officials and experts believe the total number of infections there is significantly higher, with testing largely limited to those arriving for hospital care. The country’s large, elderly population, who are particularly vulnerable to the virus, is also seen as factor for the high number of fatalities.

“We’re working in a state of very high stress and tension,” said Daniela Confalonieri, a nurse at a hospital in Milan, the capital of the wealthy northern region of Lombardy, which has been the epicentre of the epidemic.

“Unfortunately we can’t contain the situation in Lombardy. There’s a high level of contagion and we’re not even counting the dead any more,” she said.

Underscoring the scale of the drama, soldiers transported bodies overnight from the northern town of Bergamo, northeast of Milan, whose cemetery has been overwhelmed.

An army spokesman said 15 trucks and 50 soldiers had been deployed to move coffins to neighbouring provinces. Earlier local authorities had appealed for help with cremations as their own crematorium could not cope with the huge workload.

“Look at the news that’s coming out of Italy and take note of what the situation really is like. It’s unimaginable,” said the Milan nurse, Confalonieri.

Police checks

Italy went into virtual lockdown before other countries in Europe but, with cases still rising, the government is considering even tougher measures that would further restrict the limited amount of outdoor movement currently permitted.

Luca Zaia, governor of the Veneto region neighbouring Lombardy, demanded stronger curbs from Rome, including closing all shops on Sunday, and said if they were not passed, he would consider passing a regional decree.

“I hope there will soon be measures to restrict people jogging or going out for walks. I’m sorry about that, but the alternative is intensive care, hospitalisation and contagion,” he said.

At the other end of the country, in Sicily, the regional governor said the army would now help police make spot checks to ensure only people with legitimate reasons were out.

Police across Italy have stopped more than 1.2 million people over the past week and booked some 51,000 for violating the rules, the interior ministry said on Thursday.

Corriere della Sera newspaper quoted Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte as saying the government would extend the deadline on emergency rules closing schools and many businesses.

The measures currently order most shops to stay shut until at least March 25 and schools till April 3. He did not say how long schools would have to remain closed.

Education Minister Lucia Azzolina told SkyTG24 television that schools would reopen only when there was “certainty of absolute safety”, adding that the end of the school year would depend on how well online lessons went in coming weeks.

The contagion is also badly damaging Italy’s economy, which had already been on the brink of recession before the virus struck last month and the government imposed a nationwide clampdown, causing many businesses to grind to a halt.

The Treasury has announced a 25 billion euro ($26.84 billion) package of measures to support companies and workers and sources said it was considering extending guarantees on bank loans to help firms hit by a collapse in orders. ($1 = 0.9315 euros).

Source: REUTERS