NEWS OF THE DAY
From Around the World
_1 New president: Sierra Leone’s election commission declared main opposition candidate Julius Maada Bio as the West African nation’s new president Wednesday, giving the opposition party its first presidency in 10 years. Bio won a runoff vote Saturday with 51.8 percent of votes cast, the commission said. The former military leader running for the Sierra Leone Peoples Party beat ruling party candidate Samura Kamara, who received 48.2 percent. More than 2.5 million people, or 81 percent of eligible registered voters, cast ballots. The winner will now lead efforts to continue rebuilding the country after the devastating 2014-2016 Ebola epidemic and a mudslide in August that killed some 1,000 people in the capital, Freetown.
_2 Statue questions slavery: Two Danish artists unveiled a statue Wednesday of a black woman — a piece questioning the Nordic country’s colonial past in the Caribbean and its role in slavery — in the capital, Copenhagen. The nearly 23-feet tall sculpture, dubbed “I am Queen Mary,” is said to be the first statue of a black woman publicly displayed in Denmark. It depicts a black woman named Mary Thomas sitting in a chair, holding a torch in one hand and a cane cutter in the other in a reference to plantation slaves’ struggle for freedom. Thomas was a slave who led an uprising in the former Danish colony of St. Croix in 1878.
_3 Return to Raqqa: The United Nations says up to 100,000 people have returned to the Syrian city of Raqqa after a devastating air campaign by a U.S.-led coalition to drive out Islamic State fighters. Jan Egeland of the U.N. Syria envoy’s office estimated Wednesday another 100,000 are waiting outside Raqqa to return. Local leaders say 70 percent of Raqqa’s buildings are destroyed or damaged and the city is riddled with unexploded bombs, grenades and explosive traps set by Islamic State.
_4 Hostages freed: Cameroon’s government says security forces freed 18 hostages, including 12 European tourists, who had been seized by separatists fighting for the independence of English-speaking regions. Spokesman Issa Tchiroma Bakary says seven Swiss and five Italian hostages were freed Monday from Manyu in the southwest. He says residents helped the military locate the hostages, whose vehicle had been seized while they were visiting a lake several days earlier. The separatists took them after warning that English-speaking parts of Cameroon are now considered the independent state of Ambazonia and would not accept elections organized by an outside country. Tensions started in 2016 when English teachers and lawyers demonstrated against the use of French in Anglophone areas.
_5 Border protests: An Israeli human rights group called on Israeli soldiers to refuse orders to open fire on Palestinian protesters in the Gaza Strip. B’tselem spokesman Amit Gilutz says the group has never before taken such a step, but said he believes that Israeli tactics in last week’s border confrontations were “manifestly illegal.” Eighteen Palestinians were killed last Friday, including 13 in border protests. The Israeli military says the tough response was justified because the protests were organized by the anti-Israel Hamas militant group. It said the protesters were violent, throwing burning tires, firebombs and in several cases planting explosives along the border fence. B’tselem says Israel has a right to defend its border, but live fire is justified only if there is “tangible and immediate mortal danger” to troops.