esides economic cooperation and integration, the East African Community is involved in stabilization efforts in the region. For instance, it is playing a key role in organizing the peace process in DR Congo, which has been troubled by recurring conflict since the 1990s.
A single currency for the East African Community (EAC) can be achieved within the next three or four years, Peter Mathuki, the bloc’s secretary general, has reportedly said.
"This year will are going to finalize where we will have the East Africa Monetary institute – the constitution that will create a roadmap for having one currency. Hopefully in the next 3-4 years will have a common currency," the official said.
The initial deadline for the project was 2024, but a technical working group later said that it should be moved to 2031. According to the secretary general's latest statements, the plan could be implemented sooner than expected.
"The single currency will ease business and movement of persons within the region. It is in line with our goal to make the region borderless so that people can move and trade freely as envisioned in the Common Market Protocol," Mathuki pointed out.
The Common Market Protocol has been in force since 2010 with the goal of creation of the common currency, and, in eventually, a full political federation.
Mathuki also stressed the positive trends in the development of intra-bloc trade, noting that the value of trade between member states reached $9.5 billion in 2022, compared to the 2019 figure of $7.1 billion.
It has also been reported that the EAC is sending a delegation to Somalia in connection with the country’s intention to join the bloc. Representatives of the Horn of Africa nation applied for Somalia's membership in the community in March 2012.
According to Mathuki, Somalia's entry to the organization could be of great value for the EAC.
"The exploitation of Somalia’s blue economy resources such as fish and the expansive coastline is also set to boost the regional economy," he noted.
East African nations have a long history of close cooperation. One of the successive regional organizations, the EAC was created in 1967 and was active before its dissolution in 1977. The bloc was reestablished in 2000, currently consisting of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Tanzania, Kenya, Burundi, Rwanda, South Sudan, and Uganda. Since 2008, the bloc has been part of a common free trade area with the Southern African Development Community and Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa.
https://sputniknews.com/20230114/eac-single-currency-can-be-achieved-in-three-or-four-years---secretary-general-1106313207.html
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), a leading civil rights organization, has accused Israel of carrying out “an organized and systematic practice of sexual torture” against Palestinian detainees from the besieged Gaza Strip.
PCHR said in a new report that its investigators have documented extensive sexual violence against both Palestinian women and men detained by Israeli forces across Gaza over the past two years.
According to PCHR, researchers and lawyers interviewed several Palestinians recently released from Israeli custody, who described repeated incidents of rape, forced stripping, filming of abuse, and sexual assault using objects and dogs, along with other forms of psychological humiliation.
One 42-year-old mother, detained while crossing an Israeli checkpoint in northern Gaza in November 2024, told investigators she endured repeated rape and physical abuse over several days.
“They put me on a metal table, pressed my chest and head against it, cuffed my ...
Accepting the Washington-based lender’s plan would be a “disgrace” for Dakar, the African state’s prime minister has said
Senegal has rejected a debt-restructuring proposal put forward by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The West African country’s prime minister, Ousmane Sonko, said following the plan would amount to a national “disgrace.”
Sonko made the remarks at a rally in the capital, Dakar, on Sunday, days after the Washington-based lender concluded a two-week mission to Senegal without a new financing deal.
Senegal’s public debt has risen to over $11 billion amid the discovery of $7 billion in undeclared loans. The IMF has since frozen a $1.8 billion lending facility to the former French colony, citing misreporting and hidden debt.
Senegalese President Bassirou Diomaye Faye, who came to power in April 2024, has blamed his predecessor, Macky Sall, for the debt crisis.....more here
https://www.rt.com/africa/627581-senegal-rejects-imf-debt-restructuring-proposal/
While Washington dreams of a Golden Dome, Beijing is quietly building one that actually works
When Donald Trump unveiled the Golden Dome in May 2025, he promised nothing less than a revolution in American security – a $175-billion missile defense shield designed to intercept any threat to the United States.
Modeled on Ronald Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative, the new project envisions an integrated network of satellites, next-generation interceptors, radars, and laser weapons extending from the Earth’s surface to outer space. The ambition is clear: complete, preemptive, and absolute protection by 2029.
Yet behind the spectacle of technological grandeur lies a troubling pattern. No concrete system architecture has been presented, and early projections suggest the true cost could triple the official figure. More importantly, the concept of “absolute security” signals an enduring American desire for unipolar dominance – one that undermines, rather than reinforces, global ...
