AFP Asia Business

Thousands of demonstrators gathered in Gabes in southern Tunisia on Friday, calling for the closure of facilities at an ageing chemical factory blamed for hundreds of cases of poisoning.Anger has reignited in the city over pollution from the plant and its toll on residents’ health, while authorities push to expand the output of fertiliser, produced at the complex, to boost Tunisia’s struggling economy.Videos circulating online of children with apparent breathing issues prompted tens of thousands of people to take to the streets in Gabes on October 21 in an unprecedented mobilisation, according to activists.Protesters were out again in force on Friday.”The people demand the dismantling of polluting units,” chanted demonstrators marching towards the Tunisian Chemical Group (GCT) complex, carrying placards reading “Deserve to Breathe”.Khayreddine Debaya, coordinator of Stop Pollution, an NGO working for decades in Gabes, said: “The people have decided — these units must be dismantled as soon as possible.”One resident, Hassani Essouai, said protestors wanted to see a “total dismantling” of the site rather than “repairs or renovation”.Another local, Abderrazak Ounis, said: “No official is responding to our demands. Even still, the smoke is getting worse every day.”The plant, inaugurated in 1972, processes phosphate to make fertilisers, and some of the gases and waste it discharges into the open air and the Mediterranean are radioactive and can cause cancer, researchers have found.Production also emits sulfur gases, nitrogen, and fluorine, according to an audit carried out in July 2025 for the African Development Bank, which reported “major non-compliance” in terms of air and marine pollution.Various studies have highlighted a loss of more than 90 percent of marine biodiversity in the Gulf of Gabes.Doctors and local residents report a higher incidence of respiratory diseases and cancers than elsewhere in Tunisia.Tunisian President Kais Saied recently said he “shares the pain and aspirations” of the city’s inhabitants, promising solutions and that “every Tunisian will soon breathe clean air, free from all forms of pollution”.Authorities have been caught between efforts to develop the strategic sector and a 2017 promise to gradually close the Gabes plant.Equipment Minister Salah Zouari recently announced the implementation of “urgent measures” within “three to six months” after Chinese companies were appointed “to deal with gas emissions”.The GCT did not respond to requests for comment from AFP.According to several experts, the rehabilitation of polluting units, planned more than 15 years ago, remains possible but costly in a country with a debt level of around 80 percent of GDP.

Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces said they had arrested several fighters accused of abuses during the capture of El-Fasher, with the United Nations demanding an investigation Friday into the “horrendous accounts” of atrocities emerging from the city.At war with the army since April 2023, the RSF seized El-Fasher on Sunday, dislodging the army’s last stronghold in the western Darfur region after an 18-month siege marked by bombardment and starvation.Survivors who reached the nearby town of Tawila told AFP of mass killings, children shot before their parents, and civilians beaten and robbed as they fled.The RSF said late Thursday it had detained several men accused of “violations… during the liberation” of El-Fasher, including one known as Abu Lulu who appeared in multiple TikTok videos committing summary executions.In one clip verified by AFP, he is seen shooting unarmed men at close range. Another shows him standing among fighters celebrating near dozens of bodies and burnt vehicles.The RSF released footage appearing to show Abu Lulu behind bars in what they claimed to be a North Darfur prison.It pledged to ensure “military discipline during wartime”, and promised a fair trial for those detained.Since El-Fasher’s fall, videos circulating online have purportedly shown men in RSF uniforms carrying out summary executions around the city, which has been cut off from all communications.Emtithal Mahmoud, a US-based Sudanese poet from El-Fasher, told AFP she recognised her cousin, Nadifa, in a video shared by RSF accounts, lying dead on the ground.The UN said the death toll could reach the hundreds, while army allies have accused the RSF of killing over 2,000 civilians.- ‘Horror is continuing’ -On Friday, the United Nations voiced alarm at emerging details of executions, gang rapes and abductions in El-Fasher.”We have received horrendous accounts of summary executions, mass killings, rapes, attacks against humanitarian workers, looting, abductions and forced displacement,” said UN rights office spokesman Seif Magango.Magango called for “independent, prompt, transparent and thorough investigations” into all alleged breaches of international law.The World Health Organization, meanwhile, said it had verified that at least 460 patients and others were killed Tuesday in attacks on the Saudi Maternity Hospital — one of the last still functioning in El-Fasher.On Thursday, UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher told the Security Council that “the horror is continuing” in El-Fasher, and questioned the RSF’s commitment to investigating violations amid the “appalling news” from North Darfur.RSF leader Mohamed Hamdan Daglo had earlier vowed accountability for “anyone who has made a mistake”, while an RSF-led coalition maintained many incriminating videos were “fabricated” by the army.Satellite imagery analysed by Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab showed clusters in the city “consistent with adult human bodies”, and discoloration that may indicate “pools of blood”, its director told AFP.Sudanese analyst Kholood Khair said she was sceptical that the purported arrests would bring an end to the violence.”We expect these atrocities to continue, particularly against non-Arab groups,” she told AFP, citing communities such as the Zaghawa, Fur, Berti and Masalit in Darfur. In 2023, the RSF — descended from the Janjaweed Arab militias accused of genocide in Darfur two decades ago — was blamed for massacres against the Masalit tribe in West Darfur capital El-Geneina, killing up to 15,000 people.”Overall, these patterns reflect a disturbing repetition of ethnic tensions from 20 years ago, now compounded by disputes over resource control and political power in the country,” Khair said.More than 62,000 people have fled El-Fasher between Sunday and Wednesday, according to the UN’s migration agency, while the fate of tens of thousands of civilians still trapped in the city remains unknown.- Bloodshed in Kordofan -Fletcher warned that the bloodshed was spreading beyond Darfur, with atrocities reported in the neighbouring Kordofan region.According to UN figures, between Sunday and Wednesday more than 35,000 people fled five localities in North Kordofan state, including Bara, which lies north of state capital El-Obeid on a key route to Darfur and which was overrun by paramilitaries on Saturday.Martha Pobee, the assistant UN secretary-general for Africa, highlighted “reports of large-scale atrocities perpetrated” by the RSF in Bara, including “ethnically motivated” reprisals.At least 50 civilians were killed there in recent days, both in fighting and executions, including five Red Crescent volunteers, according to the UN.Kordofan is “clearly going to be the next area of military escalation”, analyst Khair said.The RSF Thursday accused the army of launching a drone attack on a school in eastern North Kordofan, claiming dozens of students and teachers were killed or injured — an allegation the army denied.AFP could not independently verify the attack.Both the army and the RSF have faced war crimes accusations over the course of the conflict.The RSF has received weapons and drones from the UAE, according to UN reports. Abu Dhabi has denied giving any support to the paramilitary group. Meanwhile, the army has drawn on support from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Turkey.The US has previously determined the RSF committed genocide in Darfur.El-Fasher’s fall to the RSF gave it full control over all five state capitals in Darfur, effectively splitting Sudan along an east-west axis. The paramilitaries have established a self-declared rival government in Darfur.The army holds Sudan’s north, east and centre.

Selling for nearly $1,000 a cup, a cafe in Dubai is offering the world’s most expensive coffee, brewed from Panamanian beans sold at a premium price. The wealthy emirate is known for its extravagant ventures including an enormous mall with an indoor ski area, the world’s tallest building and an artificial island dotted with five-star hotels. “We felt Dubai was the perfect place for our investment,” said Serkan Sagsoz, co-founder of the Julith cafe with the pricey offering. Located in an industrial neighbourhood that has become a hotspot for coffee lovers, Julith plans to serve “around 400 cups” of the precious beverage starting on Saturday, Sagsoz told AFP. For a price tag of 3,600 dirhams (around $980), the brew offers an experience of floral and fruity flavours reminiscent of tea.”There are white floral notes like jasmine, citrus flavours like orange and bergamot and a hint of apricot and peach,” said Sagsoz, who previously ran a cafe in his native Turkey. “It’s like honey, delicate and sweet,” he said. Dubai notched a Guinness record for the world’s most expensive cup of coffee last month, when Roasters offered one for 2,500 dirhams.The new record staggered some people, though residents also said it was par for the course for the desert city with a luxury lifestyle. “It’s very shocking but at the same time, it’s Dubai,” said Ines, who did not give her last name. “For wealthy people, it’s just another experience they can boast about,” added another resident, Maeva. The Julith cafe bought its beans at an auction in Panama after a tough battle that lasted many hours and drew hundreds of bids.It claimed to have paid the highest price ever for coffee.Twenty kilograms of the beans went for around 2.2 million dirhams, or $600,000, Julith said in a press release. Asian buyers, Emirati coffee enthusiasts and coffee bean collectors have since reached out to the cafe in the hopes of securing some of the “Nido 7 Geisha” beans, which are grown on a plantation near Panama’s Baru volcano.But the cafe said it does not plan to share its treasure, beyond a small amount reserved for Dubai’s ruling family.

Moein al-Hattu’s home has been ripped apart, its cinder block walls blown out into the street and a dusty grey bomb hangs menacingly from a damaged pillar, its tip resting on a crushed chest of drawers.Weighing more than a tonne, the munition was dropped during an airstrike on Gaza City during fighting between Israel and Hamas but has not exploded — yet.”I’m living in terror and unable to remove it,” al-Hattu told AFP, as children wandering through the rubble paused to marvel at the threatening intrusion.The grey-bearded Palestinian wants to hang tarpaulins from the shell of his bombed-out home and move back in, but has been unable to find anyone in Gaza with the skills or equipment to remove the giant bomb. “The relevant authorities, whether the civil defence or the municipality, say they can’t remove it. Who can I go to and complain to?” he demanded. “If it had exploded, it would have caused massive destruction and destroyed at least five to six houses.”After two years of war, the ruined cities of Gaza, a densely packed territory home to more than two million Palestinians, are littered with military debris, including unexploded, still-deadly munitions.In the streets of Gaza City, children play with rocket parts and the tail fins of mortar shells, oblivious to or unbothered by the danger.According to a study by charity Handicap International, Israel has dropped around 70,000 tonnes of explosives on targets in Gaza since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 cross-border attack triggered the drawn-out conflict.- Cardboard for cooking –     In January this year, the United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS) warned that between five and 10 percent of these bombs did not explode — leaving their deadly payloads to be recovered by militants or discovered by frightened residents.At Gaza City’s Al-Shifa Hospital, Mohammed Nour sat beside a bed holding his two injured children.The pair watched mute and glassy-eyed, their legs bound and skin flecked with shrapnel as he explained how they had been injured. “We were setting up our tents and the boys went to look for wood, nylon and cardboard to burn to use for cooking,” Nour told AFP. “About ten metres away from us, we suddenly saw boys being thrown by the explosion. We didn’t think they were our children and then we found them scattered in every corner.”Nour’s sons may yet keep their limbs but in a nearby bed, six-year-old Yahya has lost part of his right hand and is all but covered in bandages. His grandfather Tawfiq al-Sharbasi sits by him, keeping vigil and strokes his hair. “These are children. What did they do wrong? They were playing,” he said.Jonathan Crickx, spokesman for UNICEF Palestine, told AFP it was very difficult to estimate how many children have been injured by unexploded ordnance.”Following the recent ceasefire, we have recorded reports indicating that at least eight children were seriously injured by explosive remnants of war,” he said, adding that UN agencies are trying to raise awareness of the threat.To date, no demining equipment has been authorised to enter the Gaza Strip by the Israeli army.

Crowds of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank town of Silwad attended the funeral of a 15-year-old boy on Friday after he was shot dead by Israeli forces overnight.About 200 mourners clapped and chanted as they carried the body of Yamen Hamed, wrapped in a Palestinian flag, through the crowded streets.Some waved Palestinian flags, while others clutched those representing the Islamist movement Hamas and its longtime rival Fatah — the party of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.Inside, women sobbed over the teenager’s body, stroking and kissing his face. Women sobbed over the teenager’s body, stroking and kissing his face. Earlier on Friday, the Palestinian health ministry had announced the death of “Yamen Samed Yousef Hamed… by occupation bullets in Silwad, northeast of Ramallah”. When asked by AFP about the incident, the Israeli military said that during an operation in Silwad, “a terrorist was identified with a suspicious flaming object that was suspected to be an explosive device.””After identification, the soldiers responded with fire and eliminated the terrorist,” it added.Yousef Hamed, the boy’s father, said his son had been joyful in his final moments. “Right before, he was at home with us, happy and playing,” he told AFP.”Usually, when he leaves, he just says: ‘Bye, I’m leaving’. This time as he was leaving, he said goodbye to each of his brothers, his mother, everyone, one by one…. It was as if he somehow felt it this time, or God inspired him,” he added.”He said goodbye to everyone, then he left, but did not come back.”Violence in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, has soared since the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023 triggered the Gaza war.A new ceasefire between Israel and Hamas took effect in the territory on October 10, mediated by the United States, Egypt and Qatar.At least 996 Palestinians, including militants, have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli forces or settlers since the start of the war in Gaza, according to the Ramallah-based Palestinian health ministry.During the same period, 43 Israelis, including soldiers, have been killed in Palestinian attacks, according to official Israeli figures.