Testimony about the events of 13 August 2012, when five people died at Marikana, has provided new details of the police’s incompetent handling of the striking mineworker situation.
Following a decade of wars and ensuing social and economic decline, Balkan countries find themselves ill-equipped to handle growing juvenile crime and delinquency. In 2007, youngsters were responsible for 10% of all known offences committed in Bosnia and Serbia, and 5% in Croatia, official statistics show.
Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili declared victory on Thursday in a parliamentary election that the opposition said was rigged in his favour and vowed to challenge by calling street protests. Saakashvili said Wednesday’s vote was fair, but the rigging allegations and the threat of protests will test his claim to lead the most democratic state in the region.
A British citizen was charged on Thursday with war crimes in the Balkans 16 years ago and faces trial in Belgrade for allegedly taking part in the murder of at least 200 Croatian prisoners by Serbian firing squads. Milorad Pejic, a Croatian Serb from the Croatian border town of Vukovar, lived in Corby in Northamptonshire for 10 years until last month.
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/ 20 February 2008
Nato peacekeepers closed off roads between Serbia and northern Kosovo and armed United Nations police officers guarded smouldering border checkpoints on Wednesday as thousands of Serbs protested against Kosovo’s independence. For three days, Kosovo’s Serbs have shown their anger over Sunday’s declaration of independence.
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/ 1 February 2008
Russia accused Europe’s main election watchdog of trying to sabotage plans for monitoring its presidential election next month, the latest round of an increasingly bitter dispute with the West over democracy. Russia said the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s monitoring body, ODIHR, was trying to politicise monitoring of the March 2 election.
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/ 24 December 2007
Uzbekistan’s autocratic ruler Islam Karimov on Sunday tightened his grip on power, when he was re-elected president in an election condemned by opposition activists as illegal and a ”farce”. Karimov won an overwhelming victory despite being ineligible to stand as a candidate.
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/ 17 December 2007
A party controlled by Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev won a huge majority in a snap parliamentary election, early official results showed on Monday, although opposition parties complained of fraud. Bakiyev’s Ak Zhol party won 47% of Sunday’s vote, the Central Election Commission said on its website.
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/ 3 December 2007
International observers declared on Monday that Russia’s parliamentary elections failed to meet widely accepted democratic standards, saying President Vladimir Putin and his government abused their power to favour the dominant Kremlin-backed party while opposition forces were harassed.
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/ 26 November 2007
President Vladimir Putin accused Washington on Monday of plotting to undermine December parliamentary elections seen widely as a demonstration of his enduring power in Russia. Putin, drawing on resurgent nationalist sentiment ahead of Sunday’s poll, also said Russia must maintain its defences to discourage others from ”poking their snotty noses” in its affairs.
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/ 10 November 2007
A senior member of Europe’s main human rights body launched an outspoken attack on the Russian Federation’s elections on Friday, three weeks before they take place, saying he had serious doubts that they would be free, fair, open, democratic or transparent. The Kremlin has indicated that world observers are not welcome at next month’s poll.