On Friday, a Swiss court sentenced four members of Britain’s richest family to jail for exploiting Indian staff at their Geneva mansion.

The Hindujas, who were not in court, were acquitted of human trafficking but convicted on other charges in a stunning verdict for the family, whose fortune is estimated to be worth 37 billion pounds ($47 billion).

The presiding judge in Geneva sentenced Prakash Hinduja and his wife Kamal Hinduja to four years and six months in prison each, while their son Ajay and his wife Namrata received four-year sentences.

The cases stem from the family’s practice of bringing servants from their native India, and included allegations of confiscating their passports once they were flown to Switzerland.

Prosecutors argued the Hindujas paid their staff a pittance and gave them little freedom to leave the house.

The family denied the allegations, claiming the prosecutors wanted to “do in the Hindujas”.

The Hindujas reached a confidential out-of-court settlement with the three employees who made the accusations against them.

Despite this, the prosecution decided to pursue the case due to the gravity of the charges.

Geneva prosecutor Yves Bertossa had requested a custodial sentence of five and a half years against Prakash and Kamal Hinduja.

Aged 78 and 75 respectively, both had been absent since the start of the trial for health reasons.

In his closing address, the prosecutor accused the family of abusing the “asymmetrical situation” between powerful employer and vulnerable employee to save money.

Household staff were paid a salary between 220 and 400 francs ($250-450) a month, far below what they could expect to earn in Switzerland.

But the Hinduja family’s defence lawyers argued that the three plaintiffs received ample benefits, were not kept in isolation and were free to leave the villa.

“We are not dealing with mistreated slaves,” Nicolas Jeandin told the court.

Indeed, the employees “were grateful to the Hindujas for offering them a better life”, his fellow lawyer Robert Assael argued.

Representing Ajay Hinduja, lawyer Yael Hayat had slammed the “excessive” indictment, arguing the trial should be a question of “justice, not social justice”.

Namrata Hinduja’s lawyer Romain Jordan also pleaded for acquittal, claiming the prosecutors were aiming to make an example of the family.

He argued the prosecution had failed to mention payments made to staff on top of their cash salaries.

“No employee was cheated out of his or her salary,” Assael added.

Some staff even asked for raises, which they received.

The post UK richest family jailed for exploiting domestic staff in Switzerland appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.

Authorities in the United Kingdom have revoked the medical licences of Tijion Esho, a Nigerian doctor practicing in the western Europe nation.

Esho lost his medical licences after he was found guilty of administering free Botox injections to a woman in return for sex.

Esho is popular for his commentaries and opinions on medical issues, especially cosmetic surgery discussions, on top Television stations in the United Kingdom, including BBC and ITV.

Esho is the founder of the Esho Clinic, which also has locations in London, Liverpool, and Dubai and has a host of celebrity clients.

Telegraph reports that during his appearance before a Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service on Monday, Esho confessed to an unethical and inappropriate emotional relationship with the woman, referred to as Patient A, with whom he exchanged “inappropriate” sexual messages on Instagram.

He, however, stated that he never had any physical sexual relationship with Patient A, who provided sex services via OnlyFans and webcams.

But, an MPTS panel sitting in Manchester ruled earlier this month that Dr Esho did have sexual intercourse with Patient A at his clinic in Newcastle upon Tyne in 2021 and administered Botox free of charge.

It was reported that the tribunal also ruled that, at a consultation months earlier, he had stroked her hair and rubbed himself against her after he made inappropriate comments about the shape of her bottom.

The tribunal also established that the doctor, last year, made similar remarks to Patient A and allowed her to masturbate him.

Hence, the tribunal found Dr Esho’s fitness to practise was impaired because of his misconduct and the tribunal announced on Saturday that Esho’s name should be removed from the medical register.

The tribunal’s reasons for imposing the sanction will be released next week.

According to the Telegraph, among the “inappropriate” Instagram messages sent to Patient A between July 2019 and February 2022 was an exchange in September 2019 when he said: “What you doing to me lol. Morning Glory. Bloody has me wanting the real thing. That’s like every man’s dream.”

In November 2019 he posted: “Why you making me bulge lol. Send more, don’t be sorry lol.”

The following month, he wrote, “Lol loving the tongue” and “Ha free mls [millilitres of botox] I’d need the whole booty and more”.

Weeks later, he told her, “My God having you for a night/every night is a dream but if we do it for me I break the doctors’ code and I’d be a dead man x lol.”

The tribunal also ruled the conduct of the doctor, also known as Oluwafemi Esho, was sexually motivated but did not find Patient A to be vulnerable because of her profession.

Botox injections, according to a medical website, Cleveland, improve appearance by relaxing muscles that cause wrinkles. They also treat medical conditions, including migraines, hyperhidrosis, overactive bladder, and eye problems.

To maintain results, treatments are repeated every three to six months

The post Sex for Botox injection scandal: UK-based Nigerian doctor loses licences appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.

The administration claimed that the violence had “decreased” compared to previous nights, although the interior ministry reported 994 arrests and 79 injuries among police and gendarmes nationwide overnight.

This is more than on any other night since the protests began on Tuesday, following the killing of Nahel, 17, by a police bullet.

According to preliminary ministry figures issued early Saturday, 1,350 vehicles and 234 buildings were set ablaze, as well as 2,560 cases of fires ignited in public places.

The violence continued despite France sending 45,000 officers, the most on any night since the protests began, backed up by light armoured vehicles and elite police groups.

They were unable to put a halt to looting in Marseille, Lyon, and Grenoble, where bands of hooded rioters pillaged shops.

Despite rain pouring down on Paris and its suburbs since the small hours of Saturday, rioting also flared up there, with close to half the nationwide arrests, 406, made in and around the capital, a police source told AFP.

But during a visit to Mantes-la-Jolie west of Paris on Saturday, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin maintained that the night’s violence had been of “much less intensity”.

‘Exceptional’ deployment

Darmanin had announced an “exceptional” deployment of police and gendarmes to deal with the riots over the death of Nahel, who will be buried on Saturday in the Paris suburb of Nanterre where he lived and died.

Dozens of police vans were positioned not far from the entrance to the Vieux Pont district of Nanterre, which was the epicentre of the unrest, and nine people had been arrested for carrying Molotov cocktails and petrol canisters.

The French national football team joined calls for an end to the clashes.

“The time of violence must give way to that of mourning, dialogue and reconstruction,” the team said in a statement posted on social media by captain and Paris Saint-Germain superstar Kylian Mbappe.

Les Bleus said they were “shocked by the brutal death of young Nahel” but asked that violence give way to “other peaceful and constructive ways of expressing oneself.”

Marseille clashes

The southern port city of Marseille was again the scene of clashes and looting from the centre and further north in the long-neglected low-income neighbourhoods that President Emmanuel Macron visited at the start of the week.

Marseille police said the rioters and looters were “very mobile” young people who often wore masks.

A major fire “linked to the riots” broke out in a supermarket, according to a police source.

Marseille mayor Benoit Payan called for law enforcement backup from the central government to cope.

Looting and clashes between hooded protesters and police also occurred in parts of Grenoble, Saint-Etienne and Lyon.

Buses and trams in France have stopped running after 9:00 pm (1900 GMT) after several were destroyed in recent days, and the sale of large fireworks and inflammable liquids has been banned.

Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne also announced the cancellation of large-scale events across the country, which included two concerts this weekend by hugely popular singer Mylene Farmer at the Stade de France venue.

‘Unacceptable exploitation’

The killing of Nahel has revived longstanding grievances about policing and racial profiling in France’s low-income and multi-ethnic suburbs.

The teen’s mother, Mounia, said Thursday that the 38-year-old officer who was detained and charged with voluntary manslaughter, “saw an Arab face, a little kid, and wanted to take his life”.

But Macron, who initially denounced an “unforgivable” death, also criticised an “unacceptable exploitation of a death of an adolescent” in some quarters and vowed to work with social networks to curb “copycat violence”.

He also urged parents to take responsibility for underage rioters, one-third of whom were “young or very young”.

The UN rights office said Friday that the killing of the teen of North African descent was “a moment for the country to seriously address the deep issues of racism and racial discrimination in law enforcement”.

The unrest has raised concerns abroad, with France hosting the Rugby World Cup in the autumn and then the Paris Olympic Games in the summer of 2024.

Britain and other European countries updated their travel advice to warn tourists to stay away from areas affected by the rioting.

“Our hotel members have suffered a wave of cancellations of reservations in all the territories affected by the damage and clashes,” said chef Thierry Marx, president of the main association for hotel and catering industry employers.

The post French Police arrest 1000 in riots ahead of teen’s funeral appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.

Macron cancelled a media conference scheduled for the summit’s second and final day in order to return to Paris.

As he walked away from the press, he said nothing.

Protesters enraged by the police shooting of a teenager damaged a dozen buses in a depot in the French capital’s north overnight on Friday, disrupting public transport.

The buses were destroyed after Molotov cocktails were thrown overnight into the facility in Aubervilliers, north of Paris, causing “very significant damage” but no injuries, according to the RATP transport authority.

“We need to condemn this violence very strongly. Nothing can justify it,” Transport Minister Clement Beaune told reporters as he visited the scene, adding that he felt “indignation and disgust, when you see that public services are attacked it can only pile injustice atop injustice”.

“We are taking all the measures for public transport to work, we need our trams, buses and trains to work. Traffic is resuming as best it can this morning, but security comes first.”

Buses and trams had already stopped working from 9:00 pm (1900 GMT) Thursday after a tram had been attacked in protest the night before, only resuming in the early morning.

The metro has largely continued working without problem.

“People are attacking the things that make everyday life possible… in the areas where they’re really needed,” said RATP chief Jean Castex, a former prime minister under President Emmanuel Macron.

On Friday morning however some 23 bus lines out of a total of 350 in the city were not working while two tram lines were completely closed and others offered partial service or had major delays, operator RATP said.

Services were resuming “bit by bit, based on the state of the routes and the local security situation,” the RATP said.

“Traffic on the bus and tram networks will be very severely disrupted today,” it wrote on Twitter.

“We’re putting safety first and won’t take any unnecessary risks,” minister Beaune said, adding that security at bus depots would be stepped up.

France has seen three consecutive nights of nationwide protests and rioting after the killing of Nahel, 17, by a policeman during a traffic stop in the Paris suburb of Nanterre on Tuesday.

His death, with a bystander’s video undermining police claims he was shot as he drove directly at officers, has revived longstanding grievances about policing and racial profiling in France’s low-income and multiethnic suburbs.

The post Macron returns to France as protesters destroy 12 buses appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.

The publicly-funded NHS, which marks its 75th birthday on Wednesday, is facing an estimated workforce shortfall of 360,000 by 2037 due to an ageing population, a lack of domestically trained health workers and difficulties retaining existing staff.

The government’s long-term workforce plan would include reducing the time doctors spend in medical school and training more homegrown staff.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said: “On the 75th anniversary of our health service, this government is making the largest single expansion in NHS education and training in its history.

“In the coming years we will train twice the number of doctors and an extra 24,000 more nurses a year, helping to cut waiting lists and improve patient care.

“We will do more to retain our brilliant NHS staff and reform the way the health system works to ensure it is fit for the future,” he added.

NHS England currently has 112,000 vacancies as it struggles to fill the large number of workers leaving the service.

The NHS has seen unprecedented strikes over the last year, with staff complaining of being underpaid and overworked as they struggle to clear the backlog created during coronavirus lockdowns.

The government says the plan could mean an extra 60,000 doctors, 170,000 more nurses and 71,000 more health professionals in the NHS by 2037.

“The publication of our first-ever NHS long-term workforce plan now gives us a once-in-a-generation opportunity to put staffing on sustainable footing for the years to come,” said NHS England chief executive Amanda Pritchard.

“As we look to adapt to new and rising demand for health services globally, this long-term blueprint is the first step in a major and much-needed expansion of our workforce to ensure we have the staff we need to deliver for patients.”

Health is a devolved matter, with the governments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland setting policy there. The UK government oversees health in England.

The post UK begins recruitment, targets 300,000 doctors, nurses appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.

On Tuesday morning, Nahel M., 17, was shot in the chest at point-blank range, reigniting a discussion in France about police practises long attacked by rights groups for their treatment of people in low-income districts, notably ethnic minorities.

In honour of her only child, the teenager’s mother called for a march on Thursday afternoon in the Paris district of Nanterre, where he was killed.

The Elysee announced an early morning crisis meeting of President Emmanuel Macron’s ministers, indicating the gravity of the situation.

There had already been clashes the previous evening and while Wednesday night began calmly, unrest erupted in other French cities, including Toulouse, Dijon and Lyon before violence after midnight hit the Paris region, where around 2,000 riot police had been deployed.

“A night of intolerable violence against symbols of the republic, with town halls, schools and police stations set on fire or attacked,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin wrote on Twitter as he announced the 150 arrests figure.

He expressed support for police but added in an apparent swipe at the hard-left: “Shame on those who did not call for calm.”

In the region around Nanterre, masked demonstrators dressed in black launched fireworks and firecrackers at security forces.

A thick column of smoke billowed above the area where AFP journalists saw more than a dozen cars and garbage cans set ablaze and barriers blocking off roads.

Graffiti sprayed on the walls of one building called for “justice for Nahel” and said, “police kill”.

In the working-class 18th and 19th districts of northeastern Paris, police fired flashballs to disperse protesters burning rubbish, but instead of leaving, the crowd responded by throwing bottles.

“We are sick of being treated like this. This is for Nahel, we are Nahel,” said two young men calling themselves “Avengers” as they wheeled rubbish bins from a nearby estate to add to a burning barricade.

One said his family had lived in France for three generations but “they are never going to accept us”.

In the Essonne region south of the capital, a group set a bus on fire after forcing all the passengers off, police said, while in Clamart a tram was set on fire.

In the southern city of Toulouse, several cars were torched and responding police and firefighters pelted with projectiles, a police source said, while authorities reported similar scenes in Dijon and Lyon.

At France’s second-largest prison complex, Fresnes, protesters attacked security at the entrance with fireworks, a police source told AFP.

“They did not enter the prison grounds. The police were quickly called in,” the source added.

The victim was pulled over for breaking traffic rules.

Police initially reported that an officer had shot at the teenager because he was driving at him, but this was contradicted by a video circulating on social media and authenticated by AFP.

The footage shows the two policemen standing by the side of the stationary car, with one pointing a weapon at the driver.

A voice is heard saying: “You are going to get a bullet in the head.”

The police officer then appears to fire as the car abruptly drives off.

Hoping to tamp down the spreading violence, authorities have pleaded for calm.

On Wednesday, the Nanterre town hall urged an end to the “destructive spiral”, while the government issued rare criticism of the security forces.

“A teenager was killed. That is inexplicable and unforgivable,” President Emmanuel Macron said during an official visit to Marseille, southern France.

France is haunted by the prospect of a repeat of 2005 riots sparked by the death of two black boys during a police chase. Those protests resulted in around 6,000 people arrested.

“There are all the ingredients for another explosion potentially,” one government adviser told AFP on condition of anonymity.

Last year, 13 people were killed after refusing to stop for police traffic checks, with a law change in 2017 that gave officers greater powers to use their weapons now under scrutiny.

“What I see on this video is the execution by police of a 17-year-old kid, in France, in 2023, in broad daylight,” said Greens party leader Marine Tondelier said.

But far-right leader Marine Le Pen said the officer was entitled to the “presumption of innocence”.

The 38-year-old policeman filmed firing the lethal shot was taken into custody and is under investigation for voluntary manslaughter.

The post Fresh unrest erupts in France as police arrest 150 protesters appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.

“United States medical professionals will conduct a formal analysis of presumed human remains that have been carefully recovered,” the agency said.

On board were British adventurer Hamish Harding, French submarine expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet, Pakistani-British tycoon Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman, and Stockton Rush, CEO of OceanGate Expeditions, which operates the sub.

They were presumably killed instantly when the Titan sub, roughly the size of an SUV, imploded at a depth of more than two miles beneath the crushing pressure of the North Atlantic.

Mangled debris found from the small submersible was offloaded earlier today in eastern Canada, bringing a laborious search-and-recovery effort to a close.

That debris will now be taken aboard a US Coast Guard cutter to a US port for further analysis, the organization said.

“There is still a substantial amount of work to be done to understand the factors that led to the catastrophic loss of the Titan and help ensure a similar tragedy does not occur again,” said the leader of the US probe into the tragedy, Captain Jason Neubauer.

Television images showed what appeared to be the Titan sub’s nose cone and a side panel with electronics and wires hanging out being hoisted from a ship onto a flatbed truck at a Canadian Coast Guard terminal in St. John’s, Newfoundland.

Pelagic Research, the New York company that owns the Odysseus remote-operated vehicle used in the search for the ill-fated submersible, said its offshore search-and-recovery operation has wrapped up.

Canadian officials declined to comment on the recovery of the sub debris.

Titan was reported missing on June 18 and the US Coast Guard said last Thursday that all five people aboard the submersible had died after the vessel suffered a catastrophic implosion.

A debris field was found on the seafloor, 1,600 feet (500 meters) from the bow of the Titanic, which sits more than two miles (nearly four kilometers) below the ocean’s surface and 400 miles off the coast of Newfoundland.

The announcement of the implosion ended a multinational search-and-rescue operation that captured the world’s attention since the tourist craft went missing.

The Coast Guard has launched its highest level of probe, called a Marine Board of Investigation, into this accident.

The post Suspected human remains discovered in Titan sub wreckage appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.

According to the state prosecutor’s office, the violence occurred in Guachochi, one of the main cities in a remote mountainous territory inhabited by Indigenous Tarahumara people.

At a crossroads, “Eight lifeless people were found, three of them burned, as well as an injured male person, who was transferred for medical attention,” the official statement said.

Authorities also discovered two burned-out vans.

According to local media, the clash involved competing cells of the Sinaloa cartel, one of Mexico’s most powerful, and one of the fatalities was thought to be a local head of the criminal organisation.

The Tarahumara mountain area, located on one of the drug routes to the United States, has been rocked for years by violence linked to drug trafficking.

According to reports from Chihuahua newspapers, in recent weeks the clashes in Guachochi have intensified, forcing numerous people to leave the town of some 14,500 inhabitants.

A year ago, in Cerocahui, another town nestled in the mountains, Jesuit priests Javier Campos and Joaquin Mora were killed by a man who broke into a church while chasing a tour guide, who also died in the attack.

Mexico has recorded more than 350,000 killings, most attributed to criminal organizations, since the launch of a controversial military anti-drug strategy in December 2006.

The post Eight suspected cartel members killed in Mexico shootout appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.

According to UNHCR representative in Italy Chiara Cardoletti, the shipwreck occurred on Thursday, and at least one newborn baby is among those missing.

The ship set sail from Sfax in Tunisia, carrying 46 migrants from Cameroon, Burkina Faso, and Ivory Coast, according to Flavio Di Giacomo, a spokesman for the UN migration agency IOM.

The boat capsized in strong winds and high waves, he said. “Some survivors were taken to Lampedusa and others were brought back to Tunisia”.

“Among those missing were seven women and a minor. The survivors are all adult men”, he added.

“We have noticed more arrivals of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa than Tunisians” via the Tunisian route since November, he said.

He explained this was due to people from sub-Saharan Africa fleeing discrimination in Tunisia.

“It is unacceptable to continue counting the dead at the gates of Europe”, Cardoletti wrote on Twitter, referring to deadly shipwrecks of migrant boats which have already occurred in Italy, Greece and Spain.

“A coordinated and shared rescue mechanism at sea between states is now also a matter of conscience.”

Di Giacomo also stressed the fragility of the badly welded boats, which sank at the first damage.

“We are therefore not aware of certain shipwrecks,” he said, calling for “patrols of European ships to monitor the Tunisian route as well as the Libyan route, otherwise we will witness a disaster this summer.”

Located about 145 kilometres (90 miles) from the Tunisian coast, the southern Italian island of Lampedusa is one of the main entry points for migrants crossing the Mediterranean.

Last year, more than 46,000 people arrived there, out of a total of 105,000 in Italy, according to the UNHCR.

Migrant boat shipwrecks have increased in recent months, while the number of migrants entering the EU via the central Mediterranean “more than doubled” in 2023 compared to the same period last year, according to the European border agency Frontex in mid-June.

Last week a crammed trawler from Libya sank off the Greek coast. The death toll stands at 82, with 104 survivors pulled from the water, but witness accounts suggest many hundreds more went down with the ship, with their remains still missing at sea.

The tragedy occurred a few days after EU ministers reached an agreement on a long-stalled revision of the bloc’s rules to share the hosting of asylum seekers and migrants more equitably.

In September 2020, the European Commission presented a New Pact on Migration and Asylum, a package of reforms which it hopes to see adopted by spring 2024 which notably concerns compulsory help between EU members in the care of asylum seekers and a strengthening of the external borders.

The post 40 missing in Italy migrant boat shipwreck, says UN appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.

According to the Dailymail, Dominique discovered the men on a website called ‘Without Her Knowing,’ where members discuss performing sex acts on unconscious partners and saving the evidence in a file called “ABUSES” on a USB stick.

Investigators reported 92 rapes between 2011 and 2020, and 51 people ranging in age from 26 to 73 have been identified and accused of raping his wife of 50 years, nicknamed Françoise.

The husband is accused of slipping the sedative Lorazepam into his wife’s food to make her sleepy, then inviting guys to have sex with her at their Mazan, near Avignon, house while she was asleep.

Investigators learned of the horror after Dominique was detained in 2020 for photographing the skirts of shoppers in a local supermarket in Carpentras, with a search of his Provence home uncovering camera equipment and “dozens of videos” of his wife’s abuse.

Those charged include a fireman, a municipal councillor, a prison guard, a nurse and a journalist.

In 2021, it was reported that a total of 33 had so far been jailed, with nine under arrest.

The post French man drugs wife, films 83 men raping her appeared first on NEWS PICKS — WITHIN NIGERIA.