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Thirty-one migrants, including nine women, drowned off the coast of Libya during an attempted crossing to Italy on a dinghy according to survivors who managed to complete the journey. A dinghy carrying 53 migrants capsized on Friday evening, and witnesses said 31 of those who had been thrown off it drowned in the accident. The twenty-two survivors, who come from Nigeria, Gambia, Benin and Senegal, said the dinghy had capsized after three days at sea. They were rescued by a passing merchant ship and taken to Lampedusa island, the reports said.

NEW DELHI: Fewer countries are carrying out executions than a decade ago, but India along with nations like Gambia, Pakistan and Japan bucked the trend to resume handing out death penalties. An Amnesty International report says that 21 countries executed convicts last year as compared to 28 in 2003. But there is greater concern that Indian courts had meted out at least 78 death sentences with more than 400 estimated to be on death row at the end of this year. The new death sentences given by India (78) are second only to Pakistan (242) in the Asia-Pacific region. At...

Gambian President Yahya Jammeh (pictured) pledged to have all of the country’s death-row prisoners executed by mid-September in a stern Eid address aired on Sunday which targeted “heinous acts” including homosexuality and drug use. Gambian President Yahya Jammeh has told the people of his tiny west African nation that by the middle of September all those already sentenced to death for crimes will be executed. He added that crimes like banditry, drug trafficking or illicit use, homosexuality, murder, terrorism and other subversive activities against either the state or the people will not be tolerated. Jammeh said in a televised address...

Syria will be suspended from the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation on Wednesday for its violent suppression of a 17-month uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, a diplomat said on Monday ahead of an emergency OIC summit in Mecca. "The resolution regarding the suspension of the Syrian membership in the OIC is not facing obstacles ... It will be approved," said the diplomat, speaking on the sidelines of a preliminary foreign ministers meeting in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. He said the decision was likely to be formally announced at the end of the second day of the summit, which was called by Saudi...

As Tuareg rebels battle radical Islamists with heavy weapons for control of the northern Mali city of Gao, Mali and the other 15 nations of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) are planning a military offensive designed to drive both groups out of northern Mali in an effort to re-impose order in the region and prevent the six-month old conflict from destabilizing the entire region. So far, however, operational planning has not been detailed enough to gain the approval of the UN Security Council for authorization of a Chapter Seven military intervention, leaving ECOWAS and the African Union...

LUSAKA, April 27, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In the face of U.S. threats to cut off foreign aid, President Yahya Jammeh defended Gambian laws banning homosexual behavior in comments to the country’s National Assembly last Friday. “If you want us to be ungodly for you to give us aid, take your aid away, we will survive,” said Jammeh, in comments that were reported by the Daily Observer. “We will rather eat grass than accept this ungodly evil attitude that is anti-God, anti-human and anti-creation.” The country’s stance against homosexual behavior has come under increased scrutiny after President Obama announced in December...

Speaking at the launching ceremony, Momodou Joof, the deputy permanent secretary, Ministry of Tourism and Culture, who deputised the minister of Tourism and Culture, underscored the importance of the manual saying it is timely and in the right direction. He said the Ministry of Tourism and Culture is committed in ensuring that children are protected in the tourism industry... Joof stated that the government of The Gambia through the leadership of President Jammeh is committed to the welfare of children and the Gambian population at large. He further stated that the importance of the launching of the manual cannot be...

France has announced that talks for Gbagbo's surrender has failed, and forces loyalty to president elect Alassane Ouattara Wednesday mounted intense attack on the compound of the former president who remained in denial over a lost cause. President Ouattara is reported to be determined not to grant Gbagbo his apparent wish of becoming a martyr by having him killed in the process of forcing him out of hiding... The latest dreadlock came after Gbagbo refused to sign a UN document acknowledging the internationally recognised Ouattara as president of Ivory Coast... Gbagbo's three main generals also reportedly offered to the UN...

Recent events in Tunisia, Lebanon and Egypt spell a dangerous new trend in the region. There have been major developments in Tunisia, Lebanon and Egypt, each of which is of tremendous importance. In Tunisia, a popular uprising fueled by unemployment, economic suffering and long-term discontent has overthrown the dictator, but not necessarily the dictatorship. In 55 years of independence, the country has been governed by two dictators, the current one being Zine al-Abedin Ben Ali, who has been president for 23 years and was a key power in the regime even before that. Is this going to spread? Does it...

The United States has signed a deal with Bhutan giving US citizens in the country immunity from prosecution by the International Criminal Court (ICC), the State Department said Tuesday. The deal with Bhutan brings to 34 the number of countries with which the United States has signed so-called "Article 98" agreements exempting US citizens from the court's jurisdiction, said Lynn Cassel, a department spokesman. Bhutan and Bosnia-Herzegovina both agreed to the pacts on May 16 but the deal with Thimphu was not announced until Tuesday. Washington refuses to support the ICC, arguing that it could become a forum for politically...

BANJUL, Gambia -- Gambia's government is cutting off economic, political and social ties with Iran and expects Iranian government officials to leave the tiny West African nation by Wednesday.

MYFOXNY.COM - A passenger was reportedly pulled off of an Emirates Airlines aircraft at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens on Thursday morning. The passenger was reportedly discovered to be on the no-fly list, according to Breaking News Network.

The Gambia’s minister of Forestry and the Environment, Hon. Jato Sillah has promised the people of Bakadaji in Nianija District of the Central River Region that the government under the leadership of His Excellency, Sheikh Prof. Dr. Alh. Yahya AJJ Jammeh has heard their cry on the incessant attack of hippopotamus on rice farms in the area and other places, and that a solution would soon be proffered. The minister said this during his nationwide tour of forest resources at the Bakadaji Forestry Station in Nianija while responding to a complaint raised by one Sarjo Sillah of Bakadaji who said...

SNIPPET: "In fact, Mower said, the pilot described it as "a serious security risk." Mower was unable to see the man who was taken off the plane, she said. " SNIPPET: "Two sources confirmed to Fox News that the man in question, a citizen of Gambia, had been added to the no-fly list while Flight 215 was in the air. The man had already been on the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment list, which is comprised of more than 500,000 people with even limited ties to known terrorists, one source said."

"US Accuses Guinea-Bissau Military Officers of Drug Trafficking Two top officers are named as major players in cocaine shipment from Latin America to Guinea-Bissau" SNIPPET: "Na Tchuto denied the allegations on Friday and said that he will cooperate with the United States government. He also said the charges of drug trafficking do not make sense because he was in Portugal on June 29, 2008 when the cocaine shipment from Venezuela arrived. Na Tchuto said he did not return to Guinea-Bissau until July. Na Tchuto also pointed out that he was not arrested by Interpol when he was in Gambia or...

After threatening to kill every homosexual, the Gambia’s leader threatens rights groups Human Rights groups in Africa are demanding that the African Union human rights commission Headquarters be removed from Gambia following a fierce threat made by the Gambian president on opposition leaders and human right workers. "If you are affiliated with any human rights group, be rest assured that your security is not guaranteed... we are ready to kill saboteurs. I will kill anyone who wants to destabilize this country. If you think that you can collaborate with so-called human rights defenders, and get away with it, you...

A British couple working as Christian missionaries in Gambia have been jailed for one year with hard labour for sending emails that were critical of the Muslim state. David Fulton, 60, a former Army major, and his wife, Fiona, 46, pleaded guilty to making seditious comments "with intent to bring hatred or contempt against the president or the government". Their sentence, in a country which has one of west Africa's worst human rights records, sparked concern after reports that other prisoners on similar charges have been poisoned while in jail. The couple, originally from Torquay in Devon, have spent 12...

OSLO (Reuters) - Police in Norway have arrested a Gambian-born man and charged him and his wife with subjecting five of their six daughters to genital mutilation, officials said on Friday. ADVERTISEMENT The practice, also known as female circumcision, is outlawed in Norway and arouses horror among many people in the West but is a rite of passage for young women in many countries, predominantly in Africa. The youngest of the five mutilated girls, all born in Norway, is five years old, police officials said. The others are aged seven, 10, 13 and 14 and live in Gambia, national broadcaster...

Gambian President Yahya Jammeh says he will “cut off the head” of any homosexual caught in his country. Addressing supporters at the end of his meet the farmers tour here Sunday, Jammeh also ordered any hotel or motel housing homosexuals to close down, adding that owners of such facilities would also be in trouble. He said the Gambia was a country of believers, indicating that no sinful and immoral act as homosexual would be tolerated in the country. He warned all homosexuals in the country to leave, noting that a legislation “stricter than those in Iran ” concerning the vice...

Jammeh has so far refused to disclose details of his herbal concoction, saying only that the treatment uses seven plants - "three of which are not from Gambia." The treatment begins with the president applying the green paste, stored inside a deli-style plastic container. Next is a gray-colored solution, which he splashes on the patient's skin. It is stored inside an old Evian bottle, as is the yellowish, tea-like brew which patients are asked to drink. The therapy is administered numerous times over the course of several weeks. After treating the original nine, Jammeh emerged from his black-tinted treatment chamber,...