Latest news with #Kano
Arab News
13-07-2025
- Politics
- Arab News
Nigeria says jailed 44 for terrorism financing
KANO, Nigeria: Nigeria on Saturday slapped 44 Boko Haram jihadists with jail terms of up to 30 years for funding terrorist activities, a spokesman for a counterterrorism agency said. The convicted were among 54 suspects arraigned in four specially-constituted civilian courts set up at a military base in the town of Kainji in central Niger state, Abu Michael, a spokesman for Nigeria's counterterrorism center said in a statement. On Wednesday, Nigeria resumed trials of the suspects seven years after it suspended prosecution of over 1,000 people suspected of ties with the jihadist group that has been waging an insurgency since 2009 to establish a caliphate. 'The verdicts delivered from the trials resulted in prison sentences ranging from 10 to 30 years, all to be served with hard labor,' Michael said. 'With the latest convictions, Nigeria has now secured a total of 785 cases involving terrorism financing and other terrorism-related offenses,' said the statement. The trial of the remaining 10 cases was adjourned to a later date, he said. Nigeria is listed as a 'grey list country' by international monitors alongside South Sudan, South Africa, Monaco and Croatia due to deficiencies in preventing money laundering and terrorism financing. The Nigerian military's 16-year campaign to crush the jihadists in the northeast has killed more than 40,000 people and displaced around two million from their homes, according to the United Nations. The violence has also spilt over into neighboring Cameroon, Chad and Niger. In October 2017, Nigeria began mass trials of the Islamist insurgents, more than eight years after the start of the violence. That phase of the trials, which lasted five months, saw the convictions of 200 jihadist fighters with sentencing ranging from 'death penalty and life imprisonment to prison terms of 20 to 70 years,' Michael said. The offenses for the convictions included attacks on women and children, the destruction of religious sites, the killing of civilians, and the abduction of women and children. Human rights groups accused the military of arbitrarily arresting thousands of civilians, with many being held for years without access to lawyers or being brought to court.
India.com
10-07-2025
- Science
- India.com
Scientists found mysterious black eggs 20000 feet beneath the Pacific Ocean, inside they found...
Representational Image/AI-generated In a remarkable discovery scientists discovered mysterious jet black eggs sitting on the ocean floor at a depth of more than 20000 feet, but what was discovered inside was even more stunning and jaw-dropping because it changed many preconceived notion about invertebrate marine life existing at such depths. Where were the eggs found? According to media reports, the eggs were discovered in the Pacific Ocean at a depth of 6,200 meters (about 20,341 feet) by a team of researchers from Tokyo University and Hokkaido University in Japan, when they exploring the ocean floor with a remotely operated vehicle (ROV). The eggs, ominous-looking and pitch black in color, were found in what is known as the 'abyssopelagic zone', the deepest part of the ocean floor. Yasunori Kano, a marine researcher at the University of Tokyo decide to retrieve and study the eggs, but could only recover four of them as the rest were broken or badly damaged. What was inside the black eggs? Kano sent the eggs to invertebrate biologists at Hokkaido University, who discovered that these were actually tiny tiny cocoons hosting flatworms inside. Keiichi Kakui, a marine biologist at Hokkaido University who co-authored the research on the eggs published in the journal Biology Letters said he had 'never seen flatworm cocoons'. Kakui told IFLScience that a milky white liquid substance leaked from the eggs when they cut one open. Inside, they found discovered tiny white bodies encased in a shell, and realized that it was a cocoon with platyhelminths, commonly known as flatworms. Why the discovery is significant? As per researchers, this is the first instance when flatworms have been found at such depths. Earlier, flatworms had been discovered at depths of up to 5,200 meters. The latest discovery has pushed the limits of how deep invertebrates like flatworms could exist beneath the oceans. According to the study, DNA analysis of the eggs/cocoons revealed that these flatworms were an undiscovered species under the phylum Platyhelminth. However, despite being the 'the deepest known record of free-living platyhelminths,' the flatworms are not much different from the ones that live in shallow waters, according to the researchers.
BBC News
30-06-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Aminu Dantata: Nigerian billionaire to be buried in Saudi Arabia
One of Nigeria's wealthiest businessmen, Aminu Dantata, is set to be buried in Saudi Arabia later after he died on Saturday in the United Arab mogul Dantata, 94, an uncle of Africa's richest man Aliko Dangote, leaves three wives, 21 children and 121 body was transferred from Abu Dhabi where he died to Medina after Saudi authorities approved his burial in their was his wish to be buried in a city he adored and where Islam's prophet Muhammad lived and died. Nigeria's President Bola Tinubu described Dantata's death as a "monumental national loss' in a said Dantata had made "sterling contributions to Nigeria's growth and development" through decades of enterprise, service, and was known across Nigeria for his philanthropic activities. Last year, he donated 1.5 billion naira ($972,000; £710,000) to victims of the devastating floods in north-eastern Borno business interests cut across agriculture, real estate, construction and first made his name in agriculture, starting trading kola nuts and groundnuts in the came from a business family - his father Alhassan Dantata was once considered to be the richest man in West his riches, Dantata lived in one of the poorest areas of the northern city of Kano, like his parents before influence was also felt in politics, with politicians eager to seek his blessings before elections.A video of President Tinubu bowing to greet him before the 2023 elections went viral on social media.A special prayer was held for him in Kano, where he lived all his Nigerian governors and the defence minister have gone to Medina for his funeral. More about Nigeria from the BBC: Nigeria's major tax overhaul explainedWhat is behind the wave of killings in central Nigeria?Culture and colour come out in praise of a Nigerian king Go to for more news from the African us on Twitter @BBCAfrica, on Facebook at BBC Africa or on Instagram at bbcafrica
SoraNews24
27-06-2025
- SoraNews24
A nearly 400-year-old Kyoto temple ordinarily closed to public is accepting visitors this summer
A rare chance to see this temple-within-a-temple that's off the beaten tourist track. Kyoto is one of Japan's top travel destinations, and with good reason, as the city boasts the densest distribution of historically significant temples in the whole country. As a matter of fact, you can find temples inside temples at Kyoto's Myoshinji. Founded in 1337 and located in northwestern Kyoto, Myoshinjji is a Zen temple that's the head temple of the Rinzai sect, and also a complex that contains more than 40 sub-temples. Most of these sub-temples are closed to the public, but this summer Tenkyuin Temple is making an exception, and we took part in a press tour (which also gave us permission to photograph on the premises) to get a rare look at this ordinarily off-limits part of Kyoto. ▼ Myoshinji Myoshinji is about a five-minute walk from Hanazono Station on JR/Japan Railway Company's Sagano Line. Though many of Kyoto's more famous temples are packed with tourists these days, Myoshinji is slightly removed from the city center, making the crowds smaller and the atmosphere more relaxed than at a lot of other Kyoto sightseeing spots we've been to recently. ▼ It was peaceful enough that we had time to stop and smell the enticing aroma of the gardenias that were blooming on the temple grounds. Tenkyuin Temple was built in 1631, with its construction spearheaded by Lady Tenkyuin, the daughter of samurai lord Ikeda Terumasa, who ruled over the Himeji domain (part of present-day Hyogo Prefecture). Among the design points Lady Tenkyuin decided on was commissioning a set of exquisite wall/sliding doorpaintings for the abbot's chambers. She selected two of the most renowned artists of the day, Kano Sanraku and his son-in-law, Kano Sansetsu. With Sanraku having been born in 1559 and Sansetsu in 1590, the pair's work represents not only a bridge between generations, but also a transitionary period in Japanese art history as the centuries-long civil war of the Sengoku Period gave way to the stability of the Edo Period, which began at the start of the 1600s. Because of their historical value, a number of the Kanos' Tenkyuin paintings are now kept and displayed at the Kyoto National Museum, in an environment where the temperature and humidity can be more tightly controlled, and so some of the panels seen inside Tenkyuin are actually extremely high-quality reproductions by Canon. There are original Kano paintings mixed in among the sections pictured below, however. Not all of Tenkyui's beauty is contained within its walls, though, as it also has a lovely garden. The conventional wisdom says that you should avoid traveling in Japan in June, when the weather is hot and humid in most of the country, and especially so in Kyoto. If you can bear with the steamy conditions, though, this can be an excellent time for visiting gardens, as the misty skies can sometimes give the greenery and floral colors a moist, shimmery look. You don't have to go to Tenkyuin during the June rainy season, though, as this year it'll be open to visitors from June 7 all the way through August 31. Admission is priced at 2,500 yen (US$17.25) and prior reservations are required, and can be made online here through JR Central's EX ticketing service. Reference: Myoshinji official website, JR Sou Da Kyoto Ikou tourism website (1, 2), Kyoto National Museum Photos marked JR東海 provided by JR Central All other photos ©SoraNews24 ● Want to hear about SoraNews24's latest articles as soon as they're published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter! [ Read in Japanese ]
BBC News
14-06-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
The Documentary Podcast The TV drama that shocked the Arab world
Earlier this year, the Egyptian TV drama Lam Shamseya aired across the Arab world. It tackled sensitive topics, including child sexual abuse, and sparked difficult conversations in society. Faranak Amidi discusses the issues raised by this hit show with Ahmed Abdallah from BBC Arabic. If you have been affected by the issues discussed in this episode, you could speak to a health professional, or an organisation that offers support. Details of help available in many countries can be found at Befrienders Worldwide. In the UK a list of organisations that can help is available at Plus, Wycliffe Muia from BBC Africa explains why Uganda's iconic crested crane is endangered, and Mansur Abubakar, also from BBC Africa, meets one of the very few women driving kekes, small three-wheeled vehicles that people use as cabs, in the Nigerian city of Kano. This episode of The Documentary comes to you from The Fifth Floor, the show at the heart of global storytelling, with BBC journalists from all around the world. Presented by Faranak Amidi Produced by Alice Gioia, Hannah Dean and Caroline Ferguson (Photo: Faranak Amidi. Credit: Tricia Yourkevich.)
