Free Republic

Michigan police have released footage of a black man being shot in the back of the head by a white cop during a struggle over a Taser following a traffic stop in Grand Rapids, sparking protests across the city with hundreds of people calling for justice. Amid public outcry for transparency, police released the footage on Wednesday showing Patrick Lyoya, 26, face down on the ground as he is fatally shot outside a house in Grand Rapids, Michigan on April 4. The vides also depicts the events leading up to the shooting, including the traffic stop that led to a...

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) — A Black man face-down on the ground was fatally shot in the back of the head by a Michigan police officer, the violent climax of a traffic stop, brief foot chase and struggle over a stun gun, according to videos of the April 4 incident released Wednesday. Patrick Lyoya, 26, was killed outside a house in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The white officer repeatedly ordered Lyoya to “let go” of his Taser, at one point demanding: “Drop the Taser!” Citing a need for transparency, the city’s new police chief, Eric Winstrom, released four videos, including critical...

City official: More Congolese migrants headed to San Antonio [link to KENS5, San Antonio]. -- The city said they sent the Congolese migrants to 16 different cities across the country including 35 families sent to Portland, Maine, 13 families to New York City. ... The city told KENS 5 they did not know how many more central African migrants would be coming into town but said they would be arriving in the coming days and weeks.

The calls kept coming. It was last Saturday, and Sabine Ntongo was reportedly working at her Houston-area hair braiding business. Hours before she had dropped her children off with her husband, Jean Pierre Ndossoka. Now he was repeatedly ringing Ntongo throughout her workday.

Stone Mountain, Georgia — a city with just over 6,000 residents and a poverty rate well above the national average — has resettled more Syrian refugees than Los Angeles and New York City combined. Since October 1 (the start of the fiscal year), 72 Syrian refugees have been placed in Stone Mountain, State Department data shows. Los Angeles has resettled just 45 Syrian refugees, while NYC has only resettled nine. Syrians aren’t the only refugees placed in Stone Mountain this year. Since October 1, 299 refugees have been resettled in the Georgia town. That’s roughly five percent of Stone Mountain’s...

A Congolese man accused of strangling his girlfriend and taking a selfie with her corpse has pleaded guilty to murder in southeastern Minnesota. The Star Tribune reported that Marc Amouri Bakambia admitted to killing Dorothy Redd in August 2014 after she ended their relationship. Bakambia pleaded guilty to second-degree murder Tuesday after a nine-day trial. Dakota County prosecutors say the 29-year-old Bakambia will serve a 30-year prison sentence and then be deported to Congo.

United Nations officials have received new disturbing allegations that peacekeepers in the Central African Republic sexually abused three young women -- the latest claims targeting the scandal-tainted UN mission. UN spokeswoman Vannina Maestracci told reporters on Wednesday that the events took place in recent weeks.. These new allegations concern a report that three young females were raped by three members of a MINUSCA military contingent.. One of the alleged victims is a minor. Maestracci declined to name the nationality of the troops, but sources said they were from the Democratic Republic of Congo. ... UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon last week...

A US trade adviser appointed by Barack Obama orchestrated a deal to buy gold worth millions of dollars from a wanted Congolese warlord, according to a UN report. Kase Lawal, a Nigerian-born US oil tycoon, transferred millions of dollars to the notorious rebel leader Bosco Ntaganda between December 2010 and February 2011 as part of the deal, the report by the UN's Group of Experts on the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) states.If true, this would be a contravention of UN resolutions banning individuals or organisations from financing illegal armed groups in the wartorn eastern DRC.

UN peacekeepers in Congo sexually abused and exploited women and girls, some as young as 13, according to a report released by a UN watchdog today. Sexual contact between peacekeepers and Congolese women and girls occurred regularly, usually in exchange for food or small sums of money, an investigation by the Office of Internal Oversight Services found. The problems were “serious and ongoing” and it was ”disturbing” that there was no deterrence or protection programme, the report said by the UN oversight agency said. Sexual activities continued even while the investigation was going on, the OIOS found, noting that freshly...

HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe has seized a U.S.-registered cargo plane with 64 suspected mercenaries of various nationalities and a cargo of "military material", Home Affairs (Interior) Minister Kembo Mohadi said on Monday. "A United States of America-registered Boeing 727-100 cargo plane was detained last night at about 19:30 hours at Harare International Airport after its owners had made a false declaration of its cargo and crew," Mohadi said in a statement.

Congolese officials say hundreds of foreign troops have been spotted in the far west of the Democratic Republic of Congo, less than 400 kilometers from the country's capital Kinshasa. The fighters, who are believed to be Rwandan and Burundian Hutu extremists and Ugandan rebels, were all used as proxies by the former government in Congo's five-year war. Senior Congolese officials, including Congo's vice president in charge of defense and security, Azarias Ruberwa, confirmed reports of a large group of foreign fighters in the western town of Kikwit, in Bandundu province. The officials have said that the presence of one such...

Congolese cheer French troops arriving in Bunia By Declan Walsh in Bunia 07 June 2003 French special forces led a rapid reaction force that deployed in north-eastern Congo yesterday to halt the spate of ethnic massacres that led to 430 deaths last month. Hundreds of joyous Congolese cried "Liberated!" as officers from the advance force, which will eventually number 1,400, sped up Bunia's main street. Surly fighters from the Hema militia controlling Bunia looked on. Five British officers also arrived to prepare for British deployment. The final UK troop numbers remain unconfirmed. Hundreds of refugees poured out of the UN...

Artisanal mining was not illegal in the DRC prior to the 1980s, but diamonds could only be sold within the mining zone, or in adjacent villages. It was illegal to sell diamonds in Kinshasa and in the main urban areas in the Kasai provinces, although this was not fully respected. Corrupt officials allowed a limited trade to exist, but government attitudes vacillated and harsh measures were taken intermittently to purge the diamond fields of prospectors, especially in areas around or within the concession of La Société Minière de Bakwanga (MIBA), the diamond mining parastatal. MIBA provided the bulk of Zaire’s...