Jihadists attack two police posts in Burkina Faso…Read full details

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Police officers check cars at the entrance to the Pan-African Film / AFP PHOTO / ISSOUF SANOGO

Two police posts in Burkina Faso were attacked by jihadists on Monday night, officials said, just months after 12 soldiers were killed by militants in a raid near the Mali border.

It was unclear whether there had been any casualties from the latest attack, which took place in Soum province in the country’s north, security minister Simon Compaore told AFP.

Two other security sources told AFP jihadists were behind the attack.

“The attacks took place almost simultaneously,” said Mohamed Dah, Soum police high commissioner. “Gunfire has ceased but the assailants are still at the scene. We’ve dispatched military reinforcements.”

“We’re trying to find out if this is a diversion tactic, used to (get us to) mobilise security forces and then attack more important targets,” he said.

Another security source, who did not wish to be named, said the attack at one post began when “a dozen jihadis arrived on six motorbikes”.

The incident comes with the capital Ouagadougou on high security alert as it hosts the 25th Pan-African Film and Television Festival, with scores of cinephiles and international visitors in town.

Long spared the Islamist violence affecting several nations in the region, notably Mali and Niger, Burkina has been hit by a series of attacks and kidnappings since April 2015.

Most of the raids have occurred near the northern border, but in January 2016, 30 people were killed and 71 wounded in the capital Ouagadougou after gunmen stormed a restaurant and a four-star hotel, taking hostages.

Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb claimed responsibility for the attacks, which ended after Burkinabe troops and French counterterrorist forces posted in the country staged an offensive.

On December 12, jihadists killed 12 soldiers in an attack against an army squad about 30 kilometres (19 miles) from the Mali frontier.

The raid — the deadliest ever against Burkina Faso’s military — caused a public outcry, with some calling for the sacking of a military leadership accused of failing to match up to the jihadist threat.

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Benzema makes Real Madrid click, says Zidane

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PHOTO:AFP

Real Madrid boss Zinedine ZIdane hailed the impact of Karim Benzema after his compatriot lifted the European champions from the early blow of conceding to beat Napoli 3-1 on Wednesday.

Madrid are now on the brink of a seventh successive Champions League quarter-final as they aim to become the first team to retain the trophy in the Champions League era.

Lorenzo Insigne’s wonder strike from 40 yards after just eight minutes had given Napoli a shock lead at the Bernabeu.

However, Zidane was rewarded for keeping faith in Benzema despite fierce criticism of late from the Spanish press as he headed home his 51st Champions League goal to equalise before second-half strikes from Toni Kroos and Casemiro gave Madrid a commanding lead.

“I am always happy with him, said Zidane.

“He needed that goal which lately he didin’t get, but I am happy not only for the goal but also for how he played generally. He made the rest of the team play better and his movement is very good.

“The performances of Karim, Cristiano (Ronaldo), James (Rodriguez) they all made the rest of the team better.”

Benzema’s goal also moved him ahead of compatriot Thierry Henry as top French scorer of all-time in the Champions League proper.

“It was a great night. We all played well, not just me,” Benzema told Spanish TV station MEGA.

“I am very happy and proud of my work. There are a lot of sacrifices, but now I feel good.

“I scored a goal and saw that the fans were with me which is very good for my confidence.”

Napoli had chances to set up a mouthwatering second leg on March 7 as Dries Mertens blazed over with the goal at his mercy and former Madrid winger Jose Maria Callejon had a goal ruled out for offside late on.

However, Napoli boss Maurizio Sarri believes his side still have a chance of reaching the quarter-finals for the first time in their history.

“Clearly Madrid played their best game of the past three months and we didn’t play our best,” said Sarri.

“If we manage to play at our best we are not that far away. We may lose (in the second leg) but we can go for it.”

“It is the first game we have lost in four months. We didn’t manage to express ourselves 100 percent, but we can’t lose our confidence because we have the return game and league games to come.

“We don’t have a great chance of turning it around but we have a chance.”

Even a pre-match pep talk from former Napoli great Diego Maradona couldn’t inspire the Italians to victory.

However, Sarri believes their fast start more than justified his decision to invite the Argentine into the dressing room before kick-off.

“Diego spoke with us for 30 seconds, but he is a legend so clearly it had an impact. Our first 10-15 minutes were our best.”

Despite that early blow, though, Madrid responded like European champions to take control and Sarri lamented his side’s distribution from the back under Real’s intense pressing.

“It was difficult to mount counter-attacks because we gave the ball away so much,” he added.

“We were playing a very good team, the best team in the world. The only thing is I feel we committed more errors than normal.

“It is normal to suffer in this stadium, it is normal to commit errors, but thanks to these type of games you improve.”

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Griezmann happy in Madrid despite Man Utd link

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Atletico Madrid's French forward Antoine Griezmann celebrates after scoring a goal during the Spanish league football match Club Atletico de Madrid vs RC Celta de Vigo at the Vicente Calderon stadium in Madrid on February 12, 2017. / AFP PHOTO / CURTO DE LA TORRE

Atletico Madrid’s Antoine Griezmann insists he feels “great” in the Spanish capital and hailed the impact Atletico boss Diego Simeone has had on his career despite being consistently linked with a big money move to the Premier League.

Manchester United lead the chase for Griezmann, who has a 100 million euro ($106 million) buyout clause inserted into a new contract he signed with Atletico in June last year.

“I feel great at the club and in Madrid,” Griezmann told FIFA.com.

Any move for the Frenchman would be complicated by Atletico’s reluctance to sell as they face a transfer ban on registering new players this summer and move to a new 67,000-seater stadium.

“On a personal level I’m very happy, and in football terms we’re about to move to a new stadium, which is very important,” added Griezmann.

“We’ll just have to see what the future brings, but for now I’m very happy here and I hope to win trophies with this club.”

Simeone is expected to remain for at least one more season at Atletico after reducing the length of his contract that was originally supposed to go to 2020 but now will run out at the end after the 2017/18 season.

And Griezmann said it is thanks to the Argentine his star has risen since joining from Real Sociedad in 2014.

“He’s changed me. He’s brought so many things to my game that it’s hard to even begin to say what they are.

“Let’s just say that I wouldn’t have been regarded as one of the best players in the world if it weren’t for him.

“More than anything he’s helped me to be more effective in front of goal, to take every chance that comes my way, and, of course, to run and run and work hard for the team.

“You can’t make it at Atletico if you don’t do that.”

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WATCH/DOWNLOAD VIDEO: Kiss Daniel – Duro 720p HD [Mp4]

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Pop Superstar Kiss Daniel has had a very busy past few months churning out video after video to hit singles off his “New Era” album which was released last year. The latest is the visuals to the ballad “ Duro” which many fans have labelled as one of Kiss Daniel’s most important works.

The video which was shot on location in Malibu and Los Angeles, California was directed by Patrick Elis and features the popstar serenading his “love” with smooth and sweet tunes imploring her to stay. He promises undying love to her irrespective of the season or time.

Early reviewers of the video came to a consensus that this track and its video will go a long way in impressing upon the minds of fans the versatility of the G-Worldwide artiste.

DOWNLOAD

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Akon wants to bring solution to ‘darkness’ in Africa…Read full details

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The Akon Lighting Africa Project is an initiative by the Senegalese-American hip hop singer Aliaume Damala Badara Akon Thiam better known as Akon.

With about 1 billion dollars credit line for launch from international banks, 15 countries of operation and 480 communities covered. 100,000 solar street lamps, 1,200 solar micro-grids, 102,000 solar domestic kits, about 75,000 dollars per village on average and about 5,500 indirect jobs created, Akon Lighting Africa is a reality in 15 African countries such as Mali, the Republic of Guinea, Benin, Senegal, Niger, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Congo-Brazzaville, Kenya, Sierra Leone, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Madagascar, Namibia.

The Akon Lighting Africa Project is an initiative by the Senegalese-American hip hop singer Aliaume Damala Badara Akon Thiam better known as Akon. He was listed by the Guinness Book of World Records as the Number One selling artist for master ringtones in the world.

At the United Nations COP22 which held in Marrakech, Morocco in November, the singer, songwriter and producer had an interview with Dolapo Aina. 

What is your foundation about?
Well, it is not a foundation; it is Akon lighting Africa Project. And ultimately, what we want to do is to be able to give light in Africa especially in the rural areas where there is complete darkness. So we want to be the solution to the darkness, energy and poverty issues.

How long has this project been ongoing?
The concept came about in 2012-2013 and since then, we have pretty much hit the ground running. I have been learning a lot; building up a team that has a high knowledge of energy and where we could be effective. And ultimately, we have been moving and have been in operation for the past three years.

What are the success stories you have had?
In the beginning, we started off just trying to illuminate a million homes because the need is so vast in Africa; now we are currently in fifteen countries. Actually, we are moving five times than we projected at this particular moment.

What would you term as success and what is your target ar the end of the day?
The target is usually to get to forty eight countries in Africa and we are trying to set up hundred and fifty thousand mini-grids through out West Africa alone. And we are going to do that within the next five years.

Have you been getting positive responses from African governments and parastatals?

Yes. They have been very supportive. They always lend a hand when they can and allow us to be in a position to present the project and really get to understand what we are doing. Invariably, due to this, we have been able to move a lot faster.

What are the challenges you have had to overcome?
The biggest challenge was in the beginning. Getting the governments to understand what we were trying to do. You have to realise that three years ago, solar was not really a focus in Africa. Before the COP conventions, solar was not something they understood. A lot of the leaders were a lot older and they did not really understand the impact of what solar could do. We felt that solar could be the solution especially in the rural areas. So, it just took time in convincing a lot of the African leaders.

And coming from an entertainment background and talking about energy was something they did not really take seriously. That was one of the challenges.

What is the next step?
The next step is to try to move forward as much as we can. And pretty much deliver on all the contracts that we currently cover which are all in fifteen countries, to make sure they are officially lit up. And then, from there, try to incorporate a lot of the smart lighting that Africa can definitely benefit from.

 

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Riding high, Beyonce fails to break Grammy curse…Read full details

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Singer Beyonce poses with her Grammy trophies in the press room during the 59th Annual Grammy music Awards on February 12, 2017, in Los Angeles, California. / AFP PHOTO / Robyn BECK

Is Beyonce too edgy for the music industry? Or do the Grammy Awards suffer from an underlying racial bias? The superstar’s failure to win top prizes is vexing her many admirers — among them the night’s big winner Adele.

Beyonce had led the Grammy nominations with nine for “Lemonade,” her most daring album to date, which she crafted as a celebration of the resilience of African American women.

But Beyonce, whose tour was one of the industry’s most lucrative in 2016, took only two awards Sunday, again losing in the leading categories of Album and Record of the Year.

Adele, whose blockbuster album “25” stuck to her trusted style of wrenching ballads, for the second time swept three top Grammys — and she earned praise from Beyonce’s fans for saying that “Lemonade” deserved to win.

“My view is, kind of, what the fuck does she have to do to win Album of the Year?” Adele told reporters at the Los Angeles gala.

The English singer said that her black friends found “Lemonade” to be “empowering” and hailed Beyonce’s creativity for intertwining the album with a film.

“Obviously the visual is very new and the Grammys are very traditional, but I just thought that this year would be the year that they would kind of go with the tide,” Adele said.

Adele’s triumph comes a year after Kendrick Lamar’s “To Pimp A Butterfly,” hailed as a hip-hop landmark and whose song “Alright” became an anthem of the Black Lives Matter movement, also lost to a best-seller, Taylor Swift’s “1989.”

Frank Ocean, the introspective hip-hop trailblazer whose debut album was edged out by in 2013 by English folk revivalists Mumford & Sons, chose not to even submit his follow-up, “Blonde,” for Grammy consideration.

After Sunday’s awards, Ocean wrote an open letter asking the Grammy organizers to discuss the “cultural bias and general nerve damage” caused by the show.

Ocean, who defiantly released “Blonde” independently, said he initially wanted to take part in the Grammys for the tribute to late pop icon Prince.

“But then I figured my best tribute to that man’s legacy would be to continue to be myself out here and to be successful,” he wrote.

“Winning a TV award doesn’t christen me successful. It took me some time to learn that.”

– By and for black women –
The Grammys — determined through voting by some 13,000 music professionals in the Recording Academy — have hardly ignored Beyonce. With 22 career Grammys, she is among the most recognized artists in history.

Stevie Wonder is tied for the record of winning Album of the Year three times but the top prize has been especially elusive for black women. Only three — Natalie Cole, Lauryn Hill and Whitney Houston — have won it.

On “Lemonade,” the film blurs present and past with flashbacks to slavery in the Deep South, where African American women are shown as proudly self-sufficient.

“Lemonade” draws a link to 21st century America, taking on police brutality as well as marital infidelity as the music spans influences and culminates in hip-hop.

“‘Lemonade’ is really about how black women are treated in society historically, and in the contemporary moment, and it’s about loving ourselves through all of that,” said LaKisha Simmons, an assistant professor of history and women’s studies at the University of Michigan.

“So in some ways, it’s kind of fitting that she was left standing there.

“Beyonce will be fine,” she said. “But I think for the rest of us, it stings because of that — it’s almost like, ‘Get back in your place.’”

– Challenging industry –
In a tongue-in-cheek commentary on the Grammys, Beyonce emerged after the awards on a new song by rapper DJ Khaled. She speaks of being in music for 20 years and says: “All of this winning / I’ve been losing my mind.”

The Grammys marked Beyonce’s first public appearance since revealing she was pregnant with twins. Her performance returned to the theme of matriarchy as she donned a crown and her female troupe glided beneath her on a sea of flowers.

Yet Beyonce is hard to pigeon-hole as an experimental artist. When she last was passed over for Album of the Year, it went to alternative rock icon Beck, who is far less commercial.

But one constant is Beyonce’s innovations on selling albums. Her self-titled 2013 album was also a surprise accompanied by videos.

“She really challenges the people in the Recording Academy and the music industry,” said Kevin Allred, who has lectured on Beyonce at Rutgers University.

Beyonce is “breaking the rules and succeeding, and is also a very powerful black woman who has achieved a level of power that few do.”

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Unbelievable! Woman ‘Dash Out’ Her Daughter to Church as Tithe After Suffering Four Miscarriages (See Photo)

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A Harare woman shocked everyone by giving her second child to the church as thanksgiving offering after finally bearing children after four miscarriages that almost destroyed her marriage.

According to SundayMail Zimbabwe, the woman identified as Convictions Mapfumo from Sally Mugabe Heights gave her child, who is now in Grade Three, to Holy Baptist Apostolic Church founder Bishop Susan Ziki Dube, who has assumed the role of the mother while the daughter assists in the church.

It is a repetition of the Biblical account of Hannah and her son Samuel. Explaining her decision, the woman said after going through the painful experience of miscarrying four pregnancies, the leader of Holy Baptist Apostolic Church prayed for her, and she has now conceived three girls born in 2005, 2009 and 2011.

She said it was a way of showing her gratitude. Bishop Ziki Dube is well-known in the area as offering powerful prayers for people with varying needs and ailments.

“After my struggle to conceive, I decided to give this child to God as a tithe to thank Him for answering my prayers. I was prayed for by the leader of the church. I have also given myself to working in this church because there is nothing more I can give to God for what He has done for me.

“I was prompted to give this child because even in conceiving I did not know I was pregnant. In addition during the period of the pregnancy people would come to Mrs Ziki and give her preparation for the child.

By the time the child was born she had more than she needed in terms of preparatory items. So I felt convicted in my heart to give her away to the work of God,” said Mapfumo, who is the secretary at the church.

The child has now assumed Bishop Ziki Dube’s surname and addresses her as mother, while Mapfumo has assumed the role of aunt.

“She no longer calls me mother, but auntie. The church leader, who also happens to be my niece, is now her mother. This was agreed upon with the consent of my husband.

“All the responsibilities that concern her have been assumed by Bishop Ziki Dube.

Even when she gets married, Bishop Ziki Dube is entitled to get part of the lobola entitled for the mother of the child, and I have no problems with it,” Mapfumo said.

Mapfumo said she registered her church leader as the mother of the child on the birth certificate.

“We did not encounter problems and my husband had also waited to be guarantor so that the process would go on well. And it did. So she is now the legal mother,” said Mapfumo.

“I have given myself to the church. Even when the child used to call me mother I would not answer until the point where she is now used (to calling someone also mother). I see it as a tithe when I count the children I have miscarried and those I now have; hence it’s a befitting gift to God,” she said, adding that she desires to have a son.

“I have been prayed for and I am now pregnant. I have been asking God for a baby boy and I believe I will have him,” she said.

Mapfumo follows the example of the Biblical Hannah who gave up her son, Samuel, to the care of High Priest Eli in the Tabernacle.

In 1 Samuel 1, Hannah promised to give her child to the work of God if God fulfilled her desire to conceive. She later conceived more children.

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70,000 evacuated in Greece to defuse WWII bomb

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A policeman looks into a hole in Thessaloniki, northern Greece where an unexploded World War II bomb was found during work to expand a petrol station's underground tanks on February 8, 2017 (AFP Photo/Sakis MITROLIDIS)<br />

Greek authorities on Saturday began evacuating some 70,000 people in the city of Thessaloniki ahead of an operation to defuse a bomb from World War II.

The bomb, containing nearly 250 kilograms (550 pounds) of explosives, was unearthed in the northern city during road works last week and is due to be defused on Sunday.

More than 300 disabled people and bedbound patients were set to be the first evacuated on Saturday using 20 ambulances, authorities from Greece’s second city said.

The full evacuation of all residents within a 1.9-kilometre (1.1-mile) radius of the bomb site, affecting three working-class neighbourhoods around west of the city-centre, is due to be completed before 0800 GMT on Sunday.

Evacuation is “obligatory”, regional security chief Apostolos Tzitzikostas told reporters Friday.

The operation is unprecedented in Greece, “where a bomb of this size has never been found in an area this densely populated,” Tzitzikostas added.

Regional authorities said the entire operation would take up to eight hours, but local military spokesman Colonel Nikos Phanios was more cautious.

“We don’t know what we’re going to find,” he told AFP. Defusing the bomb and then moving it to a military shooting range “could take us up to two days”, he added.

It is not yet known which side in the war dropped the bomb or when it fell, Phanios said.

A thousand police officers have been mobilised for the operation, with residents given several days’ warning via the media, leaflets and posts on social networks.

Thessaloniki residents were facing disruption on the bus and train networks, with facilities set up to host evacuees in need of shelter.

People living in a nearby refugee camp will also have to be evacuated, the migration ministry said, without specifying the number affected. At their request, the refugees will use the evacuation as an opportunity to visit the local archaeology museum, the ministry added.

Seven decades after the end of World War II, unexploded bombs from the conflict are still being found around the globe.

On January 23 dozens of people were evacuated after a bomb was found near a Hong Kong university, while three days before that Britain’s navy disposed of a suspected World War II bomb found close to the parliament in London.

In the German city of Augsburg, 54,000 people had an unwelcome Christmas surprise on December 25 when they had to leave their homes while authorities dealt with a bomb dropped by Britain during the war.

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Kenya court blocks closure of Dadaab refugee camp

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(FILES) This file photo taken on April 28, 2015 shows an overview of the part of the eastern sector of the IFO-2 camp in the sprawling Dadaab refugee camp, north of the Kenyan capital Nairobi. A Kenyan court cancelled the closing of the Dadaab refugee camp, AFP reported on February 9, 2017. / AFP PHOTO / Tony KARUMBA

Kenya’s High Court on Thursday blocked the government’s decision to close the Dadaab refugee camp — the world’s largest — and to send Somali refugees home.

Judge John Mativo ruled that the plan to shut down the camp was unconstitutional and amounted to persecution of refugees.

Dadaab is home to some 256,000 people, the vast majority of them Somalis who fled across the border following the outbreak of civil war in 1991.

The government has taken a hardline stance on the sprawling camp, saying it acts as a terrorist training ground for Shabaab Islamists, and repeatedly stating its intention to deport all Somali refugees.

But Mativo ruled that “the government decision specifically targetting Somali refugees is an act of group persecution, illegal, discriminatory and therefore unconstitutional”.

The shutdown was ordered without proper consultation of people affected by the decision, in violation of the constitutional right to fair legal proceedings, he said in his ruling.

“Hence the said decision is null and void,” he said, adding that sending refugees home would be in breach of Kenya’s obligations under international law.

The ruling also blocks the government’s decision to disband the Department for Refugee Affairs.

The government can appeal the court ruling, which comes after the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights and rights group Kituo Cha Sheria filed a case challenging the legality of the shutdown.

Amnesty International’s East Africa chief Muthoni Wanyeki hailed the ruling as “historic”.

“Today is a historic day for more than a quarter of a million refugees who were at risk of being forcefully returned to Somalia, where they would have been at serious risk of human rights abuses,” Wanyeki said.

“This ruling reaffirms Kenya’s constitutional and international legal obligation to protect people who seek safety from harm and persecution.”

– Security threat? –
The government caught refugees, aid groups, the United Nations and Kenya’s Western partners offguard last May when it announced plans to shut down the huge camp near the border, citing security concerns.

Since sending troops into neighbouring Somalia in 2011, Kenya has come under repeated attack from Al-Qaeda-linked Shabaab militants.

The government has presented Dadaab as a security risk, saying Somali Islamists inside the camp planned the Shabaab attacks at Nairobi’s Westgate shopping mall in 2013 and the Garissa university attack in 2015, though it has not provided evidence.

Authorities initially planned to close Dadaab at the end of November, but delayed the shutdown until May 2017 at the request of the UN refugee agency and against a backdrop of growing accusations of forced refugee returns to Somalia.

In September, Human Rights Watch warned in a report that the repatriation of Somalis from the camp violated international standards and that refugees were returning home involuntarily only to face persecution and hunger. The Kenyan government dismissed the report.

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FIFA extends ban on Chris Giwa, others…See full details

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Chris Giwa

World football’s governing body FIFA on Tuesday said it had extended a ban on five officials who have been involved in a leadership battle for control of the game in Nigeria.

FIFA said its disciplinary committee had “decided to extend the five-year ban from taking part in any kind of football-related activity” on Chris Giwa and four others.

The ban would apply worldwide, it said in a statement on its website.

Giwa, the former owner of Giwa FC in the central city of Jos, has insisted since August 2014 that he was elected as the rightful president of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF).

But the result of the ballot was disputed and prompted FIFA to threaten to ban Nigeria from international competition unless the election was re-run.

Amaju Pinnick was duly elected as NFF boss but Giwa has since dragged the federation to court to challenge its legitimacy.

In May last year the NFF banned him and his supporters for impersonation and breaching FIFA rules by taking football matters to a civil court.

The Confederation of African Football (CAF) also confirmed the ban.

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Boko Haram kill 3 in Borno (Read full details)

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PHOTO: AFP

Boko Haram Islamists raided a village in northeast Nigeria earlier this week, killing three men and abducting seven women, police said Thursday.

The militants raided a village in the northeastern district of Askira Uba on Monday, firing weapons and burning buildings to the ground, Borno state police commissioner Damian Chukwu told AFP.

Casting doubt on government claims that Boko Haram is “technically defeated”, the police chief said officers had been deployed in the area to forestall further attacks.

“Homes and vehicles were burned in the attack which made villagers ran into the bush,” said Chukwu.

Askira Uba is near the town of Chibok, where more than 200 schoolgirls were abducted in April 2014, drawing global attention to the raging Boko Haram insurgency in Nigeria’s northeast.

Nigeria recently said it has forced the jihadists out of their Sambisa forest stronghold, but residents in the area believe the IS-affiliated group is still present.

The raid was the latest in a string of assaults or attempted attacks in Borno state by suicide bombers, often young women.

At last 20,000 people have been killed since the start of the Boko Haram insurgency in 2009. Violence continues, despite government and military claims the group is on the verge of defeat.

Boko Haram kill 3 in Borno

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Boko Haram kill 3 in Borno

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PHOTO: AFP

Boko Haram Islamists raided a village in northeast Nigeria earlier this week, killing three men and abducting seven women, police said Thursday.

The militants raided a village in the northeastern district of Askira Uba on Monday, firing weapons and burning buildings to the ground, Borno state police commissioner Damian Chukwu told AFP.

Casting doubt on government claims that Boko Haram is “technically defeated”, the police chief said officers had been deployed in the area to forestall further attacks.

“Homes and vehicles were burned in the attack which made villagers ran into the bush,” said Chukwu.

Askira Uba is near the town of Chibok, where more than 200 schoolgirls were abducted in April 2014, drawing global attention to the raging Boko Haram insurgency in Nigeria’s northeast.

Nigeria recently said it has forced the jihadists out of their Sambisa forest stronghold, but residents in the area believe the IS-affiliated group is still present.

The raid was the latest in a string of assaults or attempted attacks in Borno state by suicide bombers, often young women.

At last 20,000 people have been killed since the start of the Boko Haram insurgency in 2009. Violence continues, despite government and military claims the group is on the verge of defeat.

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Konta calls Serena thrashing ‘best experience’ (Read full details)

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Britain's Johanna Konta reacts after a point against Serena Williams of the US during their women's singles quarter-final match on day ten of the Australian Open tennis tournament in Melbourne on January 25, 2017. / AFP PHOTO / WILLIAM WEST /

Johanna Konta said playing Serena Williams was a highlight of her life and she learned a lot from being on the other side of the net to the tennis great.

The Briton had been on a nine-match win streak and in impeccable form heading into her Australian Open quarter-final with Williams on Wednesday, making her a genuine title contender.

But, like so many others before her, found getting past the 35-year-old American is no easy task.

Williams was at her thundering best in the first set and while ninth seed Konta was able to get more of a look in during the second, the 22-time Grand Slam champion was an unstoppable 6-2, 6-3 winner.

“I think it was probably one of the best experiences of my life,” Konta, 25, said of facing someone she idolised as a young girl growing up.

“I think there’s so many things I can learn from that, so many things I can look to improve on, also acknowledge some things that I did well.

“Credit to her, she played an almost perfect first set. I felt she really did incredibly well. I mean she just showed and shows why she is who she is.

“And also she obviously has tremendous power, force, and speed.”

Konta has been in scintillating form over the past 12 months, crashing inside the top 10 with some brilliant performances and results, including making the Melbourne semi-finals last year.

After beating her, Williams said Konta would be a future champion.

The Briton said: “I will do my best. I will try”, adding that she would take on board what she had learned.

“I definitely would have liked to have done a bit better. But I’m also really grateful and feel very good that I had this opportunity,” she said.

“Hopefully I’ll get another chance to play her, but not just her, but in other matches and other players who are able to make you feel that similar kind of time pressure within the points.

“But also just the way that they’re able to impose themselves. I think I’ll be able to use a lot of things that I learnt from today in other matches as well.”

Konta calls Serena thrashing ‘best experience’

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