Briefs
Rohingya attacked, says UN
Myanmar security forces have brutally driven out half a million Muslim Rohingya people from northern Rakhine state, torching their homes, crops and villages to prevent them returning, the United Nations human rights office said yesterday. It said the ’’clearance operations’’ began before Rohingya insurgent attacks on police posts on August 25, and included killings, torture and rape of children. The UN said the campaign was ‘‘well-organised, coordinated and systematic’’, and began with Rohingya men aged under 40 being arrested a month earlier, creating a ‘‘climate of fear and intimidation’’.
Drone kills ‘White Widow’
British Islamic State recruiter SallyAnne Jones, dubbed the ‘‘White Widow’’, has reportedly been killed in a US drone strike. Jones was killed close to the border between Syria and Iraq by the US Air Force strike in June, according to British tabloid The Sun. She and her husband Junaid Hussain went to Syria in 2013 to join Isis. He was killed by a US drone in
2015. News of her death was not made public amid fears that her
12-year-old son Jojo may also have been killed, according to the newspaper. Jones, who was previously a member of an all-girl punk rock group, left her home in Kent after converting to Islam. She used her Twitter account to recruit women and provide advice on how to travel to Syria and construct homemade bombs.
New French MPs shun wine
The novice MPs who entered France’s parliament after President Emmanuel Macron’s election victory pledged to revolutionise French politics. In one way, they have - they drink only half the amount of wine their predecessors swilled. Officials say MPs belonging to Macron’s La Republique en Marche party prefer soft drinks. The change has forced the National Assembly to cancel an order for 5100 bottles of claret, saving about €77,000 (NZ$129,000). Some of the newcomers drink beer instead of wine, although most appear to prefer non-alcoholic drinks, and the National Assembly’s bar is struggling to keep up with the rise in demand for soft drinks.