Features

Washington, United States | AFP |  The US administration-in-waiting nominated by President-elect Donald Trump is a circle of multimillionaire businessmen and women the public may view as a cabinet whose wealth is unprecedented in US history. Himself a billionaire real estate developer, Trump could entrench this characteristic should he choose …

Havana, Cuba | AFP |  Guerrilla revolutionary and communist idol, Fidel Castro was a holdout against history who turned tiny Cuba into a thorn in the paw of the mighty capitalist United States. The former Cuban president, who died aged 90 on Friday, said he would never retire from politics. …

Bangkok, Thailand | AFP |  He’s a mercurial army general known for penning saccharine ballads and angry tirades against his critics. Now Thailand’s junta chief has launched a new eye-catching project: trimming the waistlines of the kingdom’s civil servants. Former army chief turned Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha ditched his fatigues …

Baidoa, Somalia | AFP | With its security-sealed plastic boxes and cardboard polling booths, Somalia’s election –- under way since last month and still ongoing –- has the trappings of democracy, but few of the functions. Last week in the western city of Baidoa, 51 handpicked representatives of the Reer …

Butembo, DR Congo | AFP | The question is so absurd that Butembo’s deputy mayor misses a beat before answering. What is the town’s unemployment rate? “Unemployment is the norm around these parts,” says Godefroid Kambere Matimbya. “There aren’t any businesses.” Butembo is no ghost town, but a city of …

In 1992 Dorothy Kabagaju Okello set a record as the first woman to attain a First class degree in a male dominated course – Electrical Engineering – from Makerere University in Kampala. And in May this year, Eng Okello still defied the odds to become the first female president of …

Paris, France | AFP |  Mustard gas, which a watchdog on Friday said the so-called Islamic State group may have manufactured and used in Syria and Iraq, first terrorised battlefields during World War I. The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons also said IS was behind a mustard gas …

Washington, United States | AFP |  President-elect Donald Trump announced three important cabinet appointments Friday, for the posts of CIA director, attorney general and national security advisor. The following are thumbnail sketches of the three men: CIA director  Mike Pompeo, the Republican legislator nominated to lead the CIA, is a …

Dengfeng, China | AFP | The young martial arts pupils cartwheeled across a pitch, before football coach Sun Dawei ordered one to deliver him a kung fu kick to the stomach. “You see I avoid the kick like this,” Sun said, dodging out of harm’s way before grabbing his young …

Yumbe, Uganda | AFP | South Sudanese refugees in Uganda have described being forced to flee soaring ethnic violence at the hands of the South Sudanese army while avoiding forced conscription into rebel forces. Hundreds of thousands of people have fled the world’s newest country since renewed fighting broke out …