WORLD BITES

SOMALIANS have been able to return to the cinema for the first time in three decades. The National Theatre in Mogadishu, which warlords used as a base in 1991 and was seized by Islamist militants who banned public entertainment in 2006, screened a double bill – horror film Hoos and ‘comedy’ Date From Hell.

FORTNITE maker Epic Games has been told the title will be ‘blacklisted’ by Apple until a legal battle and any appeals between the pair is resolved. Tim Sweeney, head of Epic, which accuses Apple of overcharging developers, called it ‘another abuse of its monopoly’. A resolution could take five years.

SEVEN people, including at least one child, are dead after their boat capsized on Lake Victoria in Kenya. Bad weather and water hyacinth were blamed for tipping the boat, which police say was overloaded with 19 passengers. The dead bodies were pulled from the lake but four people are still missing.

INFLUENTIAL black filmmaker Melvin Van Peebles has died aged 89. Described as the ‘godfather of black cinema’, he was best known for 1970s films Watermelon Man and Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song. His son, actor Mario Van Peebles, said: ‘Dad knew that Black images matter.’

GERMANY’S offer of £1billion compensation to Namibia for the genocide from 1904 to 1908 led to furious rows in parliament in the capital Windhoek. Opposition MPs said the SWAPO-led government should renegotiate the sum, which will fund regeneration projects for 30 years.

GARDENER Gibson Zwelakhe, 50, who admitted killing his 73-year-old employer with a hammer, had his life term reduced after an appeal court accepted she used him as a sex slave. Destiny Newberry was killed in 2019. South Africa’s High Court said the trial judge was wrong to call his excuse ‘utter nonsense’.