IGIHE

Author: Publisher

  • Author Maya Angelou Dies Aged 86

    Author Maya Angelou Dies Aged 86

    {{One of America’s leading literary voices of the last 50 years, Angelou was best-known for her 1969 memoir I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

    It was the first of seven volumes of autobiography that traced her life from a childhood of abuse and oppression in the Deep South in the 1930s.

    The news was confirmed to the BBC by the mayor’s office in her home town of Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

    Mayor Allen Joines said he was “very sad of her passing”.

    Her poetry collections included Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water ‘fore I Diiie (1971), And Still I Rise (1978), Now Sheba Sings the Song (1987), and I Shall Not Be Moved (1990).

    Her poem On the Pulse of the Morning, written for US President Bill Clinton’s first inauguration, sold more than a million copies in the US.}}

  • Ronaldo is ‘World’s Most Marketable Footballer’

    Ronaldo is ‘World’s Most Marketable Footballer’

    {{Portugal and Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo has been named the world’s most marketable footballer, according to sports marketing experts Repucom.}}

    Argentina and Barcelona’s Lionel Messi is second, with a surprise entry from fellow Barca star, Spain’s Gerard Piqué, completing the top three.

    Ronaldo won his second FIFA Ballon d’Or global player of the year, and Champions League winners medal in 2014.

    Repucom said he was the most well-known and “trend-setting” footballer today.

    Globally, 83.9% of people know of the Portuguese star and in markets such as Italy, Spain, Germany, Turkey and Argentina, this figure is above 95%.

    Four-time Ballon d’Or winner Lionel Messi – the world’s best-paid player – scored highly for his endorsement potential and likeability.

    {{‘Global appeal’}}

    “With just over two weeks to go before the 2014 FIFA World Cup kicks off, the world’s gaze is firmly on the competing teams and players,” said Paul Smith, founder and boss of Repucom.

    “The World Cup is the most-watched sporting event in the world and as such, big brands, official partners or otherwise, will, and are, using its global appeal to drive sales.

    “Ronaldo is an endorser’s dream. His value is as important to the teams he plays for as they are for the companies that endorse him.”

    He said global awareness of Ronaldo was what drove his commercial power and with more than 82 million Facebook likes and 26 million Twitter followers, “he is also one of the most liked in the business”.

    {wirestory}

  • Leaders To Review EU Policies

    Leaders To Review EU Policies

    {{EU leaders have agreed to re-evaluate the bloc’s agenda after voters “sent a strong message”, European Council President Herman Van Rompuy has said.}}

    He said the 28 member state leaders had asked him to launch consultations over who would run the European Commission.

    He was speaking after a meeting in Brussels to discuss big election gains by populist and far-right parties.

    The results of the European Parliament election led to calls for an EU rethink by those leaders who suffered defeats.

    But despite gains by anti-EU groups, pro-European parties still won most votes overall.

    Tuesday’s summit was the first opportunity for leaders of all member states to discuss the way forward after last week’s polls.

    Media says reforms could include less regulation and less focus on economic austerity policies, while measures to boost growth and create jobs could address voter discontent.

    Mr Van Rompuy said the results of the European elections had shown “a mix of continuity and change” and that the Eurosceptic message from voters was “at the heart” of discussions between leaders.

    BBC

  • US Gives $5bn to Global Terror Fight

    US Gives $5bn to Global Terror Fight

    {{US President Barack Obama is to announce a $5bn (£3bn) “terrorism partnership fund” for other countries to tackle extremists.}}

    The cash will help countries in the Middle East, Africa and East Asia.

    He will announce the plan in a speech at the US Military Academy in West Point.

    On Tuesday, he said the full withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan in 2016 would free up resources to tackle emerging terror threats elsewhere.

    Describing 2014 as a “pivotal year”, he said: “In addition to bringing our troops home, this new chapter in American foreign policy will allow us to redirect some of the resources saved by ending these wars to respond more nimbly to the changing threat of terrorism.”

    Secretary of State John Kerry announced the $5bn cash plan on CBS This Morning, saying US foreign policy needs to reflect a “rapidly changing, more complex world where terrorism is the principal challenge”.

    The president, when he takes to the podium at 1000 local time (1400 GMT) at West Point in New York, will try to recast US foreign policy as one which acts on a platform of international consensus.

    wirestory

  • Pakistan Taliban Reportedly Split

    Pakistan Taliban Reportedly Split

    A split has emerged in the Pakistani Taliban after the major Mehsud faction walked out, saying the group leaders’ tactics were “un-Islamic”.

    It is the first major rift in Pakistani Taliban ranks since 2007 when the umbrella group was first formed.

    Analysts say the split may help advance peace talks with the government.

    Tens of thousands of people have died in militant attacks in Pakistan in the last seven years, most of them claimed by the Taliban.

    The rift comes after over a month of infighting in which dozens of fighters from the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) were killed.

    The powerful faction comprising militants from the Mehsud tribe – the core around which regional militant groups initially gravitated to form the TTP – said it was forming its own separate group called Tehrik Taliban South Waziristan.

    A spokesman for the new group, Azam Tariq Mehsud, told reporters the decision to part ways with the TTP was made when efforts to persuade the TTP leadership to give up practices which were “contrary to Islam” failed.

    “We consider the bombing of public places, extortion and kidnappings un-Islamic, and since the TTP leaders continued with these practices, we decided we should not share the responsibility,” he said.

    wirestory

  • Snowden Says He Was Trained ‘As a Spy’

    Snowden Says He Was Trained ‘As a Spy’

    {{Former U.S. spy agency contractor Edward Snowden, who leaked details of massive U.S. intelligence-gathering programs, said in a U.S. TV interview he “was trained as a spy” and had worked undercover overseas for U.S. government agencies.}}

    In an advance excerpt of his interview in Moscow with “NBC Nightly News” that aired on Tuesday, Snowden rejected comments by critics that he was a low-level analyst.

    “Well, it’s no secret that the U.S. tends to get more and better intelligence out of computers nowadays than they do out of people,” Snowden told NBC news anchor Brian Williams.

    “I was trained as a spy in sort of the traditional sense of the word in that I lived and worked undercover overseas – pretending to work in a job that I’m not – and even being assigned a name that was not mine.”

    Describing himself as a “technical expert,” Snowden said: “I don’t work with people. I don’t recruit agents. What I do is I put systems to work for the United States. And I’ve done that at all levels from – from the bottom on the ground all the way to the top.”

    He said he worked undercover overseas for both the CIA and NSA and lectured at the Joint Counterintelligence Training Academy “where I developed sources and methods for keeping our information and people secure in the most hostile and dangerous environments around the world.”

    “So when they (critics) say I’m a low-level systems administrator, that I don’t know what I’m talking about, I’d say it’s somewhat misleading,” Snowden added.

    Snowden, who fled to Hong Kong and then Moscow last year, is believed to have taken 1.7 million computerized documents. The leaked documents revealed massive programs run by the NSA that gathered information on emails, phone calls and Internet use by hundreds of millions of Americans.

    He was charged last year in the United States with theft of government property, unauthorized communication of national defense information and willful communication of classified intelligence to an unauthorized person.

    agencies

  • Deadly Pig Virus re-Infects U.S. Farm

    Deadly Pig Virus re-Infects U.S. Farm

    {{An Indiana farm has become the first to confirm publicly it suffered a second outbreak of a deadly pig virus, fueling concerns that a disease that has wiped out 10 percent of the U.S. hog population will be harder to contain than producers and veterinarians expected.}}

    The farm, through its veterinarian, publicly acknowledged on Tuesday a repeat incident of Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus (PEDv), which has killed up to 7 million pigs and pushed pork prices to record highs since it was first identified in the United States a year ago.

    Matt Ackerman, whose veterinary practice is in southeastern Indiana, told Reuters the farm’s operators did not want to be identified but authorized him to speak on their behalf.

    The state and federal effort to stamp out PEDv has operated on an assumption that a pig, once infected, develops immunity and will not be afflicted by the disease again for at least several years. Likewise, farms that had endured the disease were not known to suffer secondary outbreaks.

    But a year after the virus was identified, repeat outbreaks have occurred at farms but not been publicly confirmed before now. These so-called secondary outbreaks are a challenge to efforts to stem the disease, which is almost always fatal to baby piglets.

    Nationwide, PEDv outbreaks seem to recur in about 30 percent of infected farms, the American Association of Swine Veterinarians told Reuters, confirming for the first time the likelihood of repeated outbreaks.

  • Rwandan Fugitive to be Deported from Canada

    Rwandan Fugitive to be Deported from Canada

    {{The Canadian government has given a Rwandan national Jean Berchmans Habinshuti 59, to leave the North American territory by April 11:20 PM.

    The Order to depot Habinshuti has been based on the Canadian immigration law that forbids anyone who was a senior official in the Rwandan government between 1990 and 1994 from entering the country.}}
    http://en.igihe.com/news/rwandan-fugitive-ordered-to-leave-canada.html
    Mr Habinshuti had appealed the order on May 26 claiming he was not a senior official of the Genocide regime.

    “I was not a senior official,” Habinshuti said during an interview in the living room of his family’s modest semi-detached home in this southern Ontario city.

    “I was a civil servant — private secretary to the prime minister.”

    Canadian officials believe Habinshuti a native of Rwanda was in a position of power and influence leading up to the genocide that lasted over 100 days.

  • Six Including Local Leaders Arrested over Sex with Students

    Six Including Local Leaders Arrested over Sex with Students

    {{Six suspects including three Executive Secretaries are being held at Nyagatare police station in connection with eloping with students from schools around Nyagatare.

    Senior Superintendent Benoit Nsengiyumva the Police Spokesperson of Eastern Province told IGIHE that the suspects connived with a student at the school that has been pimping other girls at the school and delivering them to these men.

    Among the suspects include the Executive secretary of Rwempasha Sector and a group of traders within Nyagatare town that have been sleeping with the students.}}

  • Police Recovers Rwf52M Evaded Taxes Monthly

    Police Recovers Rwf52M Evaded Taxes Monthly

    {{The Rwanda National Police (RNP) Revenue Protection Department recovers at least Rwf52 million monthly, approximately Rwf13 million weekly, through intercepted smuggled goods and undervalued products, supporting the government tax body to hit its revenue collection targets, the Commanding Officer said.}}

    Chief Superintendent Emmanuel Kalinda, in an interview said the money includes recovered taxes that are evaded through smuggling, fraud and undervalued goods.

    The Revenue Protection Department (RPD) is the RNP unit attached to Rwanda Revenue Authority to help the tax body in preventing, detecting and investigating cases related to combating tax evasion and smuggling.

    “We intensified the operations and identified illegal borders used by smugglers which help us to seize such goods sneaked into the country illegal and to recover the evaded taxes,” said CSP Kalinda.

    “When you look at the nature of our borders, they are open and this facilitates cross-border smuggling, but we work hand-in-hand with other institutions like RRA and the general public to combat these illegal acts,” he added.

    Though cases of smuggling are on the tremendous decreased, he said, cases of fraud are still rampant partly facilitated by technology.

    “Previously, we used to intercept vehicles with smuggled good, but this is changing face as people involved in this fraudulent business now forge receipts and undervalue their commodities so as to pay less taxes,” he observed.

    To address this, he noted, they sometimes visit countries where goods are purchased to get the real prices of some commodities, which helps to identify undervalued merchandise.

    CSP Kalinda outline liquors, nido, a powdered milk, a local attire known as ibitenge, soaps, salt and salsa, a tomato paste as some of the common smuggled products.

    He also downplayed claims by some traders that their goods a confiscated for days, which hurts their businesses.

    “Some of these traders actually can’t produce receipts when asked while others undervalue their goods to the extent that even a blind person can notice it.

    These are some of the issues that make the process long otherwise we wouldn’t want to have all these vehicles are goods…in our warehouses.”

    He urged traders to always go through legal channels to avoid risks of paying heavy fines, which are way higher than what they pay in customs, and sometimes losing their merchandise.

    He also warned traders against tendencies of bribery and refusal to use the Electronic Billing Machines.

    The e-billing machines help in automatically calculating value added tax (VAT) owed by businesses to RRA, as well as controlling sales and stock by processing and storing invoices.

    Richard Tusabe, Commissioner General of RRA also warned the business community against fraudulent business like corruption and refusal to install or use the e-billing machine.

    “If you want inclusive growth, you must have inclusive participation. It is not our intention to penalize tax evaders but we will hold back to ensure that this illegal business, which has an impact on the economy and discourages legal imports, is combated,” Dusabe told the business community in Kimihurura yesterday.

    Between 2007 and 2013, the Revenue Protection Department intercepted goods smuggled into the country worth over Rwf4 billion, with goods worth Rwf1.2 billion seized in 2012 alone.

    Experts say smuggling undermines the local industry, discourages legal imports and reduces the volume of revenues collected from duties and levies by the state and is likely to bring into market, substandard products, some of them which might have negative ill-effects on people’s health.