World

It’s the start of a new school term in Sudan, yet nine-year-old Zahra Hussein stays home helping with household chores, forced to drop out as her family’s money grows ever tighter.

Zahra quit primary school a year ago after she had just started third grade in a rundown school building with old classrooms, cracked walls, broken desks and toilets with little running water.

Until then, she had attended school regularly, aced her exams and most recently, came top of her class.

“I had come third in my class in first grade,” the young girl told AFP at her home in the village of Ed Moussa in Sudan’s eastern state of Kassala. “My father doesn’t have money anymore … so he pulled me out of school.”

Zahra is one of nearly seven million children in Sudan who no longer go to school, a victim of what aid agencies have warned is a “generational catastrophe”. 

Sudan is already one of the world’s poorest countries, plagued by political instability, droughts, hunger and conflict, with an adult literacy rate of only around 60 percent according to the World Bank.

Sudan’s children have for years faced mounting difficulties gaining access to proper education, especially in rural areas.

Families struggling with severe economic hardship were already pulling their children out of school under the three-decade rule of president Omar al-Bashir, who was ousted in April 2019. 

More turmoil followed and Sudan has been reeling from the crippling aftermath of last year’s military coup led by army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan that derailed a transition installed after Bashir’s ouster.

Deepening political and economic crises, recurrent ethnic conflicts and prolonged school closures during the Covid-19 pandemic have compounded the education crisis.

Hundreds of teachers have repeatedly gone on strike against worsening living conditions.

On top of the political and economic instability, devastating floods this year damaged more than 600 schools, delaying the start of the academic year from July until October.

– No school, no meals –

Sudan was listed as the second worst — after Afghanistan — in a 2022 Risk Education Index, which ranked 100 countries on the vulnerability of their school systems.

“The education system in Sudan is very fragile and crippled with many underlying factors”, from poor infrastructure to the quality of education, according to Arshad Malik, Save the Children’s country director in Sudan.

“Out of 12.4 million in-school children, seven out of ten 10-year-olds are unable to read and understand a simple sentence,” he said.

For children such as Zahra, Sudan’s rundown school system still offers a way of getting ahead in life.

“I would go back to school right away if we found the money to buy meals or copybooks,” she said. 

Schools in Sudan had offered free lunches for pupils in some rural areas, providing an incentive for struggling families to send their children.

For many, the school meals — including lentils, vegetables and biscuits — were often the only food they would get during the day.

Sudan is already struggling with food shortages that have left a record 15 million people — around one-third of the population — facing “acute food insecurity”.

In the nearby village of Wad Sharifai, schools stopped providing meals two years ago, severely impacting attendance, said a teacher there, Mohamed Taha. 

Othman Abubakr, a day labourer who has nine children, says he could no longer afford to pay for the food, commute and school supplies for all his children. 

“If meals were still available in school … it could have helped,” said Abubakr, who has kept only two of his children in school.

“Now, the children can help bring money home.”  

– ‘Dire need’  –

Abdalla Ibrahim, who owns a coffee shop in Golsa, has several of his seven children either working with him or at a bakery.

Ohaj Soliman, a 43-year-old day labourer, says “putting the children to work is not good … but we have been forced to”.

Girls are especially vulnerable, warned a report last month by the United Nations children’s agency UNICEF and Save the Children. 

Sudanese girls are more likely to be married off early or taken out of school to do household chores, said Save the Children’s Malik.

He estimates around four out of 10 girls have dropped out of school in Sudan, in comparison to three out of 10 boys. 

Malik warned that, if no action is taken, the likely result is “more poverty and inequality”.

Parents who pulled their children out of school are bracing for an uncertain future.

“I know it’s the biggest disaster to leave children uneducated,” said Abubakr. “But we are in dire need.”

Ukraine said Wednesday it had reclaimed more territory in the south and welcomed a Western pledge to deliver air defence systems to Kyiv “as fast as we can” after days of intense Russian missile strikes. 

A US-led group of around 50 countries held talks at the NATO headquarters in Brussels and vowed to deliver new anti-missile systems to Kyiv.

Ukraine is reeling from Russian attacks that have left scores dead and wounded as well as villages and towns without power and hot water across the country.

“The systems will be provided, as fast as we can physically get them there,” US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said after the meeting, without giving details.

In a further show of Western solidarity, the G7 vowed to “stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes”, while International Monetary Fund chief Kristalina Georgieva pledged financial help for the sake of “moving with you in the direction of a strong Ukraine”.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has described the Russian missile attacks as an act of terrorism and has pressed the West for an “air shield”, welcomed the promised anti-missile systems.

“The more audacious and cruel Russian terror becomes, the more obvious it is to the world that helping Ukraine to protect the sky is one of the most important humanitarian tasks for Europe today,” Zelensky said in his daily address to the nation.

– ‘Come back to the table’ –

As Ukraine faces a barrage of Russian aerial assaults, Britain on Thursday said it would supply drones and, for the first time, rockets capable of shooting down cruise missiles.

“The AMRAAM rockets… will be provided in the coming weeks for use with the NASAMS air defence systems pledged by the US,” the British defence ministry said in a statement.

In an interview, French President Emmanuel Macron also promised air defences.

“We’re going to deliver… radars, systems and missiles to protect them from these attacks,” Macron said, adding that France was also negotiating to send another six Caesar mobile artillery units.

It was not immediately clear whether the weapons promised by Macron were part of the commitment made in Brussels or separate.

Macron also called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to resume diplomatic negotiations with Kyiv.

“Today, first of all, Vladimir Putin must stop this war, respect Ukraine’s territorial integrity and come back to the table for talks,” Macron told broadcaster France 2.

The United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday to condemn Russia’s annexation of parts of Ukraine, sending what US President Joe Biden said was a “clear message” that Moscow could not erase a sovereign state.

– ‘Under the rubble’ –

Since Monday, Russia has pummelled Ukraine with missiles, damaging energy facilities nationwide in attacks that Putin said were retaliation for last week’s deadly explosion at a Crimean bridge. 

That blast ripped through a road and rail link Moscow uses to transport its military equipment.

Just after 1:00 am Thursday (22:00 GMT), the bombing blitz targeted the Black Sea port of Mykolaiv, obliterating the top floors of a five-storey residential building, according to the mayor.

“(The) rest is under the rubble. Rescuers are working on the spot,” Oleksandr Senkevych wrote on Telegram.

And in the town of Avdiivka, Russian strikes killed at least eight people at a market, according to the Ukraine-appointed chief of the region.

The Russian military meanwhile said it has fended off Ukrainian attacks in the eastern Donetsk, Lugansk and Kharkiv regions.

But in the latest setback for Putin, Kyiv said Wednesday that it has retaken five more settlements in the southern region of Kherson — one of the four territories Moscow said it annexed in September.

For Ukrainians trapped on the frontline, fears over the relentless exchange of fire are now compounded by the prospect of a winter without power or water.

“Firewood… how can I get it?” said Oleksandra Pylypenko from the eastern town of Bakhmut.

“I don’t know how we’ll survive.”

– ‘Need more artillery’ –

Some of the anti-aircraft defence systems pledged by Western allies began arriving in Ukraine this week.

On the frontline in Donetsk, Western weapons have helped boost Ukrainian morale and the abilities of Kyiv’s forces.

“We definitely need more artillery,” said an officer who gave his name as “Sergiy” with Ukraine’s 5th Regiment on a hill overlooking Russian-held Gorlivka in Donetsk.

“When it comes to artillery, they still have an advantage so we can’t return fire equally,” he added. 

“We are firing more precisely now, but with fewer strikes.”

With Russia’s bombing blitz escalating nuclear fears, UN nuclear agency chief Rafael Grossi arrived in Kyiv for talks on setting up a nuclear safety and protection zone around Ukraine’s Russian-held Zaporizhzhia plant.

Kim Jong Un supervised the launch of two long-range cruise missiles, state media said Thursday, adding that the weapons were equipped to carry tactical nukes and had already been deployed to North Korean army units.

Pyongyang has conducted a blitz of ballistic missile tests recently which it described as tactical nuclear drills that simulated taking out airports and military facilities across South Korea.

Analysts warned the isolated regime had completed preparations for another nuclear test.

The cruise missiles — which travel at much lower altitudes than ballistic missiles, making them harder to detect and intercept — travelled 2,000 kilometres (1,240 miles) over the sea Wednesday before hitting their targets, the Korean Central News Agency said.

Kim expressed “great satisfaction” with the tests for improving combat efficiency of the cruise missiles, which KCNA said have already been “deployed at the units of the Korean People’s Army for the operation of tactical nukes.”

Kim said the country’s nuclear combat forces were at “full preparedness for actual war” and said that the tests were another warning to the country’s enemies.

North Korea must “continue to expand the operational sphere of the nuclear strategic armed forces to resolutely deter any crucial military crisis and war crisis,” the report added.

“Kim Jong Un stressed that we should focus all efforts on the endless and accelerating development of the national nuclear combat armed forces,” it said.

Pyongyang is not technically banned by the UN from testing cruise missiles, but all ballistic missile launches violate sanctions and are typically flagged by Seoul or Tokyo. Neither alerted the Wednesday test.

Kim made acquiring tactical nukes — smaller, lighter weapons designed for battlefield use — a top priority at a key party congress in January 2021, and this year vowed to develop North Korea’s nuclear forces at the fastest possible speed.

“The latest test means the North is operating tactical nuclear capability on cruise missiles, which are harder to detect for their low-altitude flight,” Hong Min of the Korea Institute for National Unification told AFP. 

“It is a testament to Pyongyang’s capability to mount nuclear warheads,” he said, adding that cruise missiles can also have irregular flight paths making them harder to intercept. 

– Military drills –

The country revised its nuclear laws last month to allow preemptive strikes, with Kim declaring North Korea an “irreversible” nuclear power — effectively ending the possibility of negotiations over its arsenal.

Since then, Seoul, Tokyo and Washington have ramped up combined military exercises, including deploying a nuclear-powered US aircraft carrier to the area twice, infuriating Pyongyang, which sees such drills as rehearsals for invasion.

In response, North Korea “decided to organise military drills under the simulation of an actual war” that gamed out hitting South Korea’s ports, airports and military command facilities, KCNA said Monday.

North Korean army units involved in “the operation of tactical nukes staged military drills from September 25 to October 9 in order to check and assess the war deterrent and nuclear counterattack capability”, the agency said.

Kim oversaw these tests as well, it said.

This report also said that North Korea’s October 4 missile launch, which flew over Japan and prompted rare evacuation warnings, involved a “new-type ground-to-ground intermediate-range ballistic missile”.

The volley of KCNA statements about the country’s recent tests — which are unusual, as state media no longer routinely comments on launches — indicates Pyongyang is concerned about the recent US-led joint drills, analysts say.

A feisty and little-known woman senator has emerged as kingmaker in Brazil’s very close presidential runoff.

Many Brazilians saw Simone Tebet, a lawyer and university professor, for the first time when she took stage the night of August 29 for the campaign’s first televised debate, standing alongside rightwing President Jair Bolsonaro and leftist icon and ex-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. 

And in a surprise, Tebet made a strong impression. 

When Bolsonaro at one point insulted a woman journalist asking questions at the debate, the senator leapt to her defense, pointing at the president with her index finger and saying in a firm voice: “I am not afraid of him.”

Tebet, 52, finished third in the first round voting with four percent of the votes, far behind Lula, who took 48 percent, and Bolsonaro with 43 percent.

But her share of the pie amounts to 4.9 million votes — and the difference between the two frontrunners was 6.1 million.

Instantly, Tebet became the candidate to woo. And she endorsed Lula.

– ‘Third option’ –

Tebet’s candidacy was organized by centrist parties and supported by part of the Brazilian establishment as a way to temper the polarization generated by the far-right president Bolsonaro and the leftist hero of the working class and poor, Lula, of the Workers Party.

Tebet is from the city of Tres Lagoas, which has a population of 125,000, and she was its mayor from 2005 to 2010. It is in the west-central state of Mato Grosso do Sul, where the economy is based on agribusiness.

Tebet is married to a politician from her state and they have two daughters. She is Catholic and describes herself as feminist.   

Tebet played a prominent role on a congressional committee that in 2021 investigated the government’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic. And while on this panel, she clashed loudly with Bolsonaro allies. 

Tebet was also the first woman to preside over the Brazilian senate’s Constitution and Justice Committee, considered the chamber’s most important panel.

But her biggest jump to notoriety came with her presidential candidacy, which was promoted as a third way between the right and left.

Tebet managed “to fill a lagoon that was empty,” said Marco Antonio Teixeira, a professor of political science at the Getulio Vargas Foundation in Sao Paulo.

She succeeded because “she billed herself as an actual third option, strong in her criticisms of Bolsonaro and of the Workers Party in a balanced way, not simply seeking confrontation,” said Teixeira.

In the presidential debates, she challenged Bolsonaro and urged him to show respect for women; the president has a penchant for making remarks seen as sexist.

This helped Tebet grab third place from center-left candidate Ciro Gomes, who polls had predicted would take that spot.

– Conservative and close to agribusiness –

Up through the midway point of Bolsonaro’s term, Tebet supported his government in 86 percent of the votes taken in the Senate, including one that extended gun-carrying rights to land outside rural properties, according to investigative news outlet Agencia Publica. 

Tebet owns three rural estates, one of which sits on land claimed by Indigenous people in Mato Grosso do Sul.

She broke with Bolsonaro after she joined the congressional commission that probed the pandemic, which killed more than 680,000 people in Brazil.

During the campaign for the first round of presidential voting, Tebet promised to bring transparency to huge amounts of money administered by Congress, boost spending on science and technology, and provide scholarships for students at the intermediate level of education to head off school dropouts.

Now, as analysts say Lula has to veer toward the center to win new supporters, Tebet — who has said Brazil is conservative and not ready, say, to legalize abortion — is an important person to have on your side.

Last week, she formally endorsed Lula in the runoff on October 30, while denying that this gesture meant she has given up on creating a third path in Brazilian politics.

Tebet’s party, however, called the Brazilian Democratic Movement, chose to remain neutral in the race between Bolsonaro and Lula.

“What is at stake is bigger than each of us,” she said.

Tebet said she would vote for Lula because of his “commitment to democracy and the constitution,” which she said she does not see in Bolsonaro.

But she criticized Lula, credited with bringing millions of people out of poverty during his rule from 2003 to 2010, for not really “looking in the rear view mirror” and making new proposals for how he would govern if he regains power.

“Tebet has a way of speaking with agribusiness and women that is much more direct than Lula,” said Teixeira.

She can lure for Lula centrist voters tired of the tensions born of Bolsonaro-Lula polarization, he added.

Brazilian press reports have suggested Tebet could become a minister in Lula’s government if he wins. Tebet has denied being interested in such a job.