>dough
Who is Matt Hancock?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Hancock
>Who is Matt Hancock?
On 25 June 2021, it was revealed that Hancock had breached COVID-19 social distancing restrictions with Gina Coladangelo, an adviser in the Department of Health and Social Care with whom he was having an extramarital affair, after CCTV images of him kissing and embracing her in his Whitehall office on 6 May were published in The Sun newspaper. The government's guidelines allowed intimate contact with people from a different household only from 17 May. The previous year, Hancock had failed to declare he had appointed Coladangelo as an unpaid adviser at the department and later to a paid non-executive director role on its board, for which Coladangelo would earn between ÂŁ15,000 to ÂŁ20,000 annually from public funds. Coladangelo had become a close friend of Hancock after meeting him while they were both undergraduates at Oxford University.
Later on 25 June, Hancock admitted that he "breached the social distancing guidelines in these circumstances" and apologised for "letting people down". Boris Johnson later said that he accepted the apology and considered the matter "closed". Hancock resigned on the evening of 26 June, however, stating "those of us who make these rules have got to stick by them", and he had not because of his "breaking the guidance". He was replaced as Health Secretary the same day by Sajid Javid.
Hancock said he had no idea that the camera, which was hidden inside a smoke detector in his office, existed. Former Cabinet ministers Alan Johnson and Rory Stewart both said there had never been cameras in their offices during their time in government, with Johnson saying: "I could never understand why there was a camera in the Secretary of State's office. There was never a camera in my office when I was Health Secretary or in any of the other five Cabinet positions." It was reported that the CCTV footage was leaked by a DHSC employee who opposed the government's lockdown restrictions, and on 27 June it was confirmed that an internal investigation was undertaken by the department to find the culprit, for fear of future CCTV footage being leaked to states hostile to the UK, for the purposes of blackmail.
On 12 October 2021, Hancock announced his appointment as the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa special representative for financial innovation and climate change, an unpaid position advising the Commission on the African economy's recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. Following objections related to his record as Secretary of State for Health, the United Nations announced on 15 October that the offer had been rescinded.
Hancock married Martha Hoyer Millar, an osteopath, in 2006. She is a granddaughter of Frederick Millar, 1st Baron Inchyra. They have a daughter and two sons; one of their children is adopted. Hancock forbids his children to use social media. The family lived in Little Thurlow in his West Suffolk parliamentary constituency. In June 2021, following an affair with political aide Gina Coladangelo, sources reported that he had left his wife for Coladangelo.
Hancock trained as a jockey in 2012 and won a horse race in his constituency town of Newmarket. Hancock supports Newcastle United, and auctioned his "pride and joy" signed team shirt to raise money for the NHS in May 2020.
Hancock told The Guardian in 2018 that he has dyslexia, something that he said first became apparent two decades earlier while he was studying at Oxford.
In April 2021, it was revealed that he had been given 20% of shares in Topwood Limited, a firm based in Wrexham which is owned by his sister and other close family members. The company specialises in secure storage, scanning and shredding of documents. It won a place on a "procurement framework" listing to provide services to NHS England in 2019, as well as contracts with NHS Wales. There has been no suggestion that Hancock intervened in the normal processes, and in April 2021 the company had not earned anything through the framework. Lord Geidt produced a report on ministerial interests saying that the awarding of the contract to Topwood could be seen to "represent a conflict of interest" that should have been declared. Hancock responded by saying: "I did not know about the framework decision, and so I do not think I could reasonably have been expected to declare it."
Welcome to 8kun, where all your dreams come true.
>losing its charm
>There's that number again..
https://apnews.com/article/religion-caribbean-kidnapping-haiti-puerto-rico-d17832d664f210adb63a05702f6859a7
US religious group says 17 missionaries kidnapped in Haiti
A group of 17 missionaries including children was kidnapped by a gang in Haiti on Saturday, according to a voice message sent to various religious missions by an organization with direct knowledge of the incident.
The missionaries were on their way home from building an orphanage, according to a message from Ohio-based Christian Aid Ministries.
“This is a special prayer alert,” the one-minute message said. “Pray that the gang members would come to repentance.”
The message says the mission’s field director is working with the U.S. Embassy, and that the field director’s family and one other unidentified man stayed at the ministry’s base while everyone else visited the orphanage.
No other details were immediately available.
A U.S. government spokesperson said they were aware of the reports on the kidnapping.
“The welfare and safety of U.S. citizens abroad is one of the highest priorities of the Department of State,” the spokesperson said, declining further comment.
Meanwhile, a senior U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the United States is in touch with Haitian authorities to try to resolve the case.
Haiti is once again struggling with a spike in gang-related kidnappings that had diminished after President Jovenel MoĂŻse was fatally shot at his private residence on July 7, and following a 7.2-magnitude earthquake that struck southwest Haiti in August and killed more than 2,200 people.
Gangs have demanded ransoms ranging from a couple hundred dollars to more than $1 million, according to authorities.
Last month, a deacon was killed in front of a church in the capital of Port-au-Prince and his wife kidnapped, one of dozens of people who have been abducted in recent months.
At least 328 kidnapping victims were reported to Haiti’s National Police in the first eight months of 2021, compared with a total of 234 for all of 2020, according to a report issued last month by the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti known as BINUH.
Gangs have been accused of kidnapping schoolchildren, doctors, police officers, busloads of passengers and others as they grow more powerful. In April, one gang kidnapped five priests and two nuns, a move that prompted a three-day protest, with Haitian now preparing for another protest scheduled for Monday to decry the lack of security in the impoverished country.
“Political turmoil, the surge in gang violence, deteriorating socioeconomic conditions – including food insecurity and malnutrition – all contribute to the worsening of the humanitarian situation,” BINUH said in its report. “An overstretched and under-resourced police force alone cannot address the security ills of Haiti.”
On Friday, the U.N. Security Council voted unanimously to extend the U.N. political mission in Haiti.
The kidnapping of the missionaries comes just days after high-level U.S. officials visited Haiti and promised more resources for Haiti’s National Police, including another $15 million to help reduce gang violence, which this year has displaced thousands of Haitians who now live in temporary shelters in increasingly unhygienic conditions.
Among those who met with Haiti’s police chief was Uzra Zeya, U.S. under secretary of state for civilian security, democracy, and human rights.
“Dismantling violent gangs is vital to Haitian stability and citizen security,” she recently tweeted.
https://apnews.com/article/new-york-capitol-siege-0814e7d8cfc5ab1e6c413da08c157268
Risky business: Some Capitol riot defendants forgo lawyers
https://apnews.com/article/europe-africa-migration-only-on-ap-birds-d84260007646147679759ed2bce9628c
Migrants navigate on an overcrowded wooden boat in the Central Mediterranean Sea between North Africa and the Italian island of Lampedusa, Saturday, Oct. 2, 2021, as seen from aboard the humanitarian aircraft Seabird. At least 23,000 people have died or disappeared trying to reach Europe since 2014, according to the United Nations' migration agency. Despite the risks, many migrants say they'd rather die trying to reach Europe than be returned to Libya.
Volunteers in the sky watch over migrant rescues by sea
As dozens of African migrants traversed the Mediterranean Sea on a flimsy white rubber boat, a small aircraft circling 1,000 feet above closely monitored their attempt to reach Europe.
The twin-engine Seabird, owned by the German non-governmental organization Sea-Watch, is tasked with documenting human rights violations committed against migrants at sea and relaying distress cases to nearby ships and authorities who have increasingly ignored their pleas.
On this cloudy October afternoon, an approaching thunderstorm heightened the dangers for the overcrowded boat. Nearly 23,000 people have died or gone missing in the Mediterranean trying to reach Europe since 2014, according to the United Nations’ migration agency.
“Nour 2, Nour 2, this is aircraft Seabird, aircraft Seabird,” the aircraft’s tactical coordinator, Eike Bretschneider, communicated via radio with the only vessel nearby. The captain of the Nour 2, agreed to change course and check up on the flimsy boat. But after seeing the boat had a Libyan flag, the people refused its assistance, the captain reported back on the crackling radio.
“They say they only have 20 liters of fuel left,” the captain, who did not identify himself by name, told the Seabird. “They want to continue on their journey.”
The small boat’s destination was the Italian island of Lampedusa, where tourists sitting in outdoor cafés sipped on Aperol Spritz, oblivious to what was unfolding 60 nautical miles (111 kilometers/68 miles) south of them on the Mediterranean Sea.
Bretschneider, a 30-year-old social worker, made some quick calculations and concluded the migrants must have departed Libya approximately 20 hours ago and still had some 15 hours ahead of them before they reached Lampedusa. That was if their boat did not fall apart or capsize along the way.
Despite the risks, many migrants and refugees say they’d rather die trying to cross to Europe than be returned to Libya where, upon disembarkation, they are placed in detention centers and often subjected to relentless abuse.
Bretschneider sent the rubber boat’s coordinates to the air liaison officer sitting in Berlin, who then relayed the position (inside the Maltese Search and Rescue zone) to both Malta and Italy. Unsurprisingly to them, they received no response.
Running low on fuel, the Seabird had to leave the scene.
“We can only hope the people will reach the shore at some moment or will get rescued by a European coast guard vessel,” Bretschneider told AP as they made their way back.
The activists have grown used to having their distress calls go unanswered.
For years human rights groups and international law experts have denounced that European countries are increasingly ignoring their international obligations to rescue migrants at sea. Instead, they’ve outsourced rescues to the Libyan Coast Guard, which has a track record of reckless interceptions as well as ties to human traffickers and militias.
“I’m sorry, we don’t speak with NGOs,” a man answering the phone of the Maltese Rescue and Coordination Center told a member of Sea-Watch inquiring about a boat in distress this past June. In a separate call to the Rescue and Coordination Center in Rome, another Sea-Watch member was told: “We have no information to report to you.”
Kenyan mob lynches 'bloodthirsty vampire' child killer
Kenyan villagers on Friday lynched a man believed to be a "bloodthirsty vampire" child murderer, days after the self-confessed serial killer escaped from police custody, officials said.
Masten Milimo Wanjala was arrested on July 14 over the disappearance of two children, but in a chilling confession, admitted to killing at least 10 others over a five-year period, "sometimes through sucking blood from their veins before executing them", the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) said at the time.
The 20-year-old was due for a court appearance Wednesday in Nairobi over the cold-blooded murders which targeted 12- and 13-year-old children, when officers noticed during the morning roll call that he had disappeared.
But a mob caught up with him Friday after he was identified by schoolgoing children at his rural home in Bungoma, more than 400 kilometres (250 miles) from the police station he had escaped from.
"He comes from this area and so the children saw him and knew it was him and that is when information spread around and locals started pursuing him," area administrator Bonface Ndiema said.
"In the end he ran into a neighbour's house but he was flushed out and lynched."
Police had in July described Wanjala's arrest as a major breakthrough in an investigation into a spate of disturbing child disappearances in the East African country.
His victims were drugged and drained of their blood and some of them strangled, police said.
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'Submerged in sewers' -
According to police, Wanjala's first victim was a 12-year-old girl he kidnapped five years ago in Machakos county east of Nairobi.
The murder of his next victim in western Kenya sparked protests, with locals torching the house of the person they suspected killed the boy.
"Unbeknownst to some of the worried families, their children were long executed by the beast and their remains dumped in thickets. Others were submerged in sewer lines in the city and left to rot away," the DCI said in July.
The bodies of several children feared to have died at Wanjala's hands have yet to be found.
Three officers who were on duty at the Nairobi police station where he was held were arrested this week on allegations that they either aided or "neglected to prevent" his escape.
A court ordered their release on bail on Friday as a probe into the escape gets under way.
Police spokesman Bruno Shiosho told AFP they have launched a forensic investigation into the identity of the lynched man.
"The locals have said it is him… For now we can confirm that a man locals say is Masten Wanjala who was on the run has been lynched in Bungoma," he said.
>Three officers who were on duty at the Nairobi police station where he was held were arrested this week on allegations that they either aided or "neglected to prevent" his escape.
>"The locals have said it is him… For now we can confirm that a man locals say is Masten Wanjala who was on the run has been lynched in Bungoma," he said.
They don't say how, and I almost don't want to know. Almost.
>sometimes through sucking blood from their veins before executing them
>Masten Wanjala who was on the run has been lynched in Bungoma
https://www.kenyans.co.ke/news/69439-tactics-masten-wanjala-used-beat-police-dragnet
“It is easy for one to claim that Masten’s case might be a set-up like Kangogo’s where police were accused of murdering her."
“However, for the young man’s case, this was pure negligence from my expert perspective. He did not have any financial muscle to buy himself from custody. Also, consider his age and state of mind, from confessing to chilling crimes to even playing football on his last day when he was spotted by neighbours and was beaten to death,” Musamali explained.
He noted that this case was different from that of wanted terrorist Samantha Louise Lewthwaite, also known as Sherafiyah Lewthwaite or the White Widow, who evaded police ambushes in Kenya or the late jihadist Fazul Abdullah Mohammed who escaped from Kenyan police stations several times.
“For the two cases touching on the terrorists, there were reports alleging that police were paid to bungle raids and arrests. This shows that people have disappeared before from custody and Masten’s did not have such a status to claim that his case was a set up by police,” Musamali added.
The late police officer Caroline Kangogo. She was found dead at her parent's bathroom on Friday morning, July 16