Sniff dogs could be trained to detect malaria in people infected with the disease even if they are not showing symptoms, according to a new study by Durham University.

While our findings are at an early stage, in principle we have shown that dogs could be trained to detect malaria infected people by their odour with a credible degree of accuracy, Steven Lindsay, lead researcher from Durham University, said in a press release.

Researchers from the Medical Research Council Unit of The Gambia and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine used nylon socks to collect foot odour samples from apparently healthy children aged five to 14 in the Upper River Region of The Gambia in West Africa.

A total of 175 sock samples were tested, including those of 30 malaria-positive children identified by the study using finger-prick tests and 145 from uninfected children.

The sock samples were then transported to Britain where dogs were trained to distinguish between the scent of children infected with malaria parasites and those who were uninfected.

According to the researchers, the dogs were able to correctly identify 70 per cent of the malaria-infected samples.

They were also able to correctly identify 90 per cent of the samples without malaria parasites.

The study, presented Monday at the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene Annual Meeting in the U.S. city of New Orleans, could potentially lead to the first rapid and non-invasive test for malaria.

The researchers believe that artificial odor sensors might be developed in the future to detect malaria parasites, but until then trained dogs could be a useful alternative at ports of entry.

According to the World Health Organisations latest World Malaria Report, there were an estimated 216 million cases of malaria in 2016, an increase of five million cases over the previous year.

Deaths reached 445,000, a similar number to the previous year.

Source: NAN

South Sudan armed opposition leader Riek Machar is coming home under the countrys latest peace deal, more than two years after he fled on foot into exile, a spokesman said Tuesday.

Lam Paul Gabriel told The Associated Press that Machar is returning to take part in a nationwide peace celebration on Wednesday, leading a small delegation but not bringing his own security despite concerns for his safety.

If this peace has to be implemented we need to trust each other, the spokesman said.

Machar is returning to let everyone know he is ready for peace, he added.

Under the deal signed last month, Machar will be President Salva Kiirs deputy once again.

That arrangement has twice collapsed in deadly fighting, when the civil war broke out in December 2013 and again in July 2016 when an earlier peace agreement collapsed and Machar fled into neighboring Congo.

Concerns are high that this latest fragile agreement will fall apart as well, with the United States among those openly wondering whether the two men whose rivalry has led to so much bloodshed can finally end the conflict.

South Sudans five-year civil war has killed almost 400,000 people with violence and disease, according to a recent estimate.

Millions have been displaced and parts of the country have been plunged into famine.

So far the new peace deal has been criticised for its slow implementation, with missed deadlines and continued cease-fire violations.

Machar wrote to Kiir last week saying he would attend Wednesdays celebrations only if certain conditions were met, including the release of all political prisoners, the lifting of the state of emergency, free movement inside the country for all opposition groups and a guarantee for his safety.

While there has been no indication by South Sudans government that the concerns have been met, Kiir in an interview with Kenyans Citizen TV last week said Machars safety would be secured by the government.

Source: NAN

Lewis Hamilton has won his fifth Formula One world championship putting him second on the all-time list, behind legendary Michael Schumacher the German having won seven.

The title puts Hamilton level with Argentinian legend Juan Manuel Fangio, who won five world championships in the 1950s.

The British driver needed just seven points at the Mexican Grand Prix to put him out of reach of title rival Sebastian Vettel with two races to spare.

Starting third, he immediately jumped past Daniel Ricciardo at the start but tyre issues saw both Mercedes cars struggle and Hamilton dropped back to finish fourth enough to earn 12 points.

The first to congratulate Hamilton was actor Will Smith, who said over the team radio: Thats how I taught you, thats how you do it, thats how you drive.

The Briton then set about performing the now-customary doughnuts on the track to the delight of the crowd.

*Reported by Sky Sports

Source: NAN

Another Bishop in Ekiti has described former governor Ayo Fayoses four-year term as a waste, barely a week after the Bishop of Ekiti Catholic Diocese, Rt. Rev. Felix Ajakaye also gave the administration some knocks.

The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that Bishop of the Diocese of Ekiti, the Church of Nigeria, Anglican Communion, the Rt. Rev. Christopher Omotunde gave the verdict at a thanksgiving on Sunday for the new deputy governor, Chief Bisi Egbeyemi in Ado Ekiti.

Bishop Omotunde said Ekitis progress was stunted in the last four years of the former governor.

He described the tenure as four wasted years in which life became unbearable for the people and in which hunger ravaged the land without any concrete effort to alleviate peoples poverty.

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had a golden chance to make a difference in the lives of Ekiti residents but abused the opportunity to the extent that the people became slaves under them, he said.

He therefore warned the new All Progressives Congress (APC) administration to learn from the mistakes of the immediate past government and never disappoint the teeming masses looking up to it for meaningful governance.

Omotunde who delivered his sermon at the Emmanuel Anglican Cathedral, Okesa, Ado-Ekiti, said Fayose should be particularly blamed for all that went wrong during his tenure

The bishop said Fayoses daily criticisms and opposition to President Muhammadu Buhari, for instance, denied Ekiti of many benefits.

He said while Fayose was busy abusing the president, other wiser PDP governors were busy attracting projects to their states and financial support from the Federal Government because of their good relationship with the President.

The bishop, who described himself as a father of all politicians, said all members of his church belong to all political parties, and that he was duty bound to speak the truth when the need arises.

Omotunde said God had given Governor Kayode Fayemi another chance to make the difference in the lives of Ekiti people and must therefore not fail to do that because the expectations are very high.

He advised Fayemi to choose people who will be faithful in translating his dreams for the development of the state into reality and not those who would be advancing their personal and selfish interests.

The bishop said now that Fayemis party, APC, is in power at the federal level unlike what obtained during his first tenure, the Federal Government must grant all the requests of the governor to repair Ekiti and assist the state financially for its people to be relieved.

According to the Bishop: This our God is a God of another chance. He gave PDP another chance also but unfortunately they abused the chance to the extent that people became slaves under them, they rendered everybody hopeless under them.

They bewitched everybody that our eyes were closed. They bewitched us that we called evil good and the few that their power of bewitchment had no effect upon prayed and God looked down from heaven and visited this state again opening another door for Fayemis government

Your party (APC) is in power now, let them know that I said, its a government of another chance and God will try you again and see whether you will be faithful or not. It is left for you to prove yourself.

Tell me of one youth that the immediate past government empowered? Even though they called it a government of Okada riders; how many Okadas did he buy for the youths?

I was watching the television recently and Ebonyi State governor was listing his achievements in agriculture. He gave the Federal Government credit for his success and my (former) governor was also a PDP governor.

In many states, Buhari had many achievements and successes to show but the only achievement here was the repair of Ado-Itawure Road. But our (former) governor would not give him room to work.

The whole four years (under Fayose) was wasted; we were retrogressing, going backward. Many states were given opportunities in agriculture, nothing was given to Ekiti and all we needed was for the governor to give them land and banks were ready to finance the projects.

With hunger ravaging the land, the former governor was collecting N1,000 from each pupil. What did he use the money to do? We did not see what they did with the money.

Our people are hungry and they are suffering financial difficulties. They have been thrown into poverty so that they will become slaves to the rock but God brought somebody who knows how to break the rock
into pieces, he said.

Addressing the congregation, Egbeyemi called for the prayers and support of Ekiti people for the new government saying: the welfare of the people remains the focal point of this administration.

NAN reports that the service was attended by the wife of the governor, Bisi Fayemi; wife of the deputy governor, Margaret; Speaker, Ekiti State House of Assembly, Mr. Adeniran Alagbada and his wife Kike.

Others are former deputy governor, Prof. Dupe Adelabu; Secretary to the State Government, Mr. Biodun Oyebanji; Chief of Staff, Mr. Biodun Omoleye; Ewi of Ado-Ekiti, Oba Adeyemo Adejugbe and other traditional rulers.

Source: NAN

I am an active practitioner of restructuring, and I have gone to the Supreme Court 12 times to test restructuring, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo has said and doubted the sincerity of those clamouring for it now.

Osinbajo said that some of those clamouring for it were those who opposed the efforts on restructuring years back when they were in government.

He said at the 9th Public Lecture with the theme, Developing the Nation Through Youth Empowerment delivered at the Sigma Club at the International Conference Centre, University of Ibadan.

Let me explain my position clearly. I am not just an advocate of restructuring. There is no other government in Nigeria that has actively pursued restructuring such as we did when I was Attorney General in Lagos State.

People talking about restructuring, if you ask them what they meant by restructuring? They wont even know what it means and that is the problem we have to face, he said.

The vice president narrated how he pursued issues of restructuring to the Supreme Court when he was the Attorney General in Lagos State.

We started with fiscal restructuring, which is more of resource control. Should states control their own resources? We went to the Supreme Court. They argued that each state should control its own resources.

The states that argued in favour of autonomy for states to control their resources were the oil producing states in the country and Lagos State, while some others argued on the other side because they want to share oil money.

We lost at the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court said no, that you cannot control your resources. If you are an oil producing state, take 13 per cent extra, which is derivation.

He said that Lagos State further argued that it had ports and the ports served the entire nation, so the state should also take 13 per cent derivation which the Supreme Court objected.

Osinbajo said that further argument led to the introduction of onshore and offshore law, which enabled the state to share from onshore resources.

All this time, this was 2000, some of those people, including the presidential candidate of PDP, who is talking about restructuring, was the vice president then.

They opposed every step we took. Of course, we were taking the Federal Government to court then. They opposed every step.

The next thing we did was that the states should be able to create their own local governments, which is autonomy of states.

So, we created 37 new local governments in Lagos. The president then, Chief Obasanjo, seized our local government funds and said we could not create new local governments, he said.

He also narrated how they challenged the seizure at the Supreme Court and the court ruled in their favour.

If you ask those people now talking about restructuring, none of them has done anything compared to what we have done. So, I am not a latter day convert to restructuring.

I am an active practitioner of restructuring, and I have gone to the Supreme Court 12 times to test restructuring, Osinbajo added.

Source: NAN

United Nations human rights experts called on Saudi Arabia on Monday to halt the imminent execution of six men sentenced to death for activities related to the 2011 Arab Spring.

They said that since the Saudis were all under age 18 at the time, imposing the death penalty on them would violate international law, including a treaty protecting children ratified by the kingdom.

Riyadhs human rights record has been in the spotlight since the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi at its Istanbul consulate this month. There has also been growing international criticism of the Saudi-led coalitions air strikes in Yemen that have caused heavy civilian casualties including children.

The charges against the six men are based on criminalisation of the exercise of fundamental rights, including freedom of assembly and expression, the U.N. experts said in a joint statement which gave scant details.

They were allegedly tortured and ill-treated, forced to confess, denied adequate legal assistance during trial and never had access to an effective complaint mechanism, it added.

The men were tried in a Riyadh specialised court that handles terrorism-related issues and there is no known appeals process, a U.N. human rights official told Reuters.

A Saudi source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that his understanding was that the men would not be executed, in line with recent changes to Saudi law.

However, the U.N. experts said that the revised law still allows for the death penalty to be imposed on defendants who committed crimes as juveniles between ages 15 and 18.

Death penalty sentences and executions for crimes committed by people under the age of 18 run contrary to international law and standards, they said. Saudi Arabia has ratified the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, which forbids capital punishment in such cases.

In these circumstances, the execution of these six individuals would constitute arbitrary executions, the experts said.

The U.N. statement named the six as: Ali al-Nimr, Dawood al-Marhoon, Abdullah al-Zaher, Mujtaba al-Sweikat, Salman Qureish and Abdulkarim al-Hawaj.

The five independent experts, who include the U.N. investigator on arbitrary executions Agnes Callamard, said they were in contact with Saudi authorities regarding the cases.

Saudi Arabia is the worlds third biggest executioner, following China and Iran, Amnesty International said in its latest annual report issued in April.

Source: NAN

By Edith Ike-Eboh

The Nigeria Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (NEITI) on Monday called for urgent action on some of the remediation issues identified in its audit reports on the industry to ensure value on investment.

NEITI Executive Secretary, Mr Waziri Adio made the call in Abuja, at a National Conference on Remedial issues with the theme Resolving Remedial issues in the NEITI report.

He named some of the unresolved remediation issues are cash call expenditure, domestic CRUDE allocation and management, unlimited Crude oil lifting by NPDC and incomplete reporting by CBN.

Others, he said, include undisclosed education tax liability, inadequate measurement infrastructure in oil and gas industry, unreconciled subsidy payments, among others.

He said that it was unfortunate that most of the issues raised through the various reports of NEITI had never been addressed adding that the Inter-ministerial Task Team (IMTT) had not functioned effectively.

This is because most people sent to represent some of the agencies indicted by some of reports are jurnior workers that may not be able to say anything about their organisation.

Unfortunately, there is nothing in the NEITI act that allows it to punish those who do not undertake the right things.

For instance, NEITI cannot punish Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation(NNPC), Department of Petroleum Resources or other organizations indicted by the report, he said.

He said that there was the need for high profile people to attend the IMTT to enable it tackle some of the remediation issues.

Adio suggested that political authorities should invest energy to strengthen the IMTT because they were key for results to be achieved.

For instance, if the office of the vice president calls for a meeting and all stakeholders involved in the issues are invited and are asked to give a feedback , they will respond quickly.

Remedial issues is too big to be left for NEITI because it has no powers, he said.

Also, Mr kolawole Banwo, Chairperson Civil Society Steering Committee on NEITI board said that said that much time was vested in discussing remediation issues other than action taken.

He said that government must demonstrate commitment on how to deal with the issues to ensure value for money spent.

If we have been implementing recommendations of auditors, some of the corruption issues in the sector could have been reduced, he said. (NAN)

Source: NAN

Even with U.S. sanctions on Iranian exports due to come into force on Nov. 4, oil prices have fallen about $10 a barrel since four-year highs reached in early October.

The prices edged lower on Monday as Russia signalled output will remain high, but losses were limited ahead of U.S. sanctions on Iranian exports that are expected to reduce supplies when they come into effect in just under a week.

Brent crude LCOc1 futures fell 21 cents to $77.41 a barrel by 12:56 p.m. EDT (1656 GMT). U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude CLc1 futures fell 41 cents to $67.18 a barrel.

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said on Saturday there was no reason for Russia to freeze or cut its oil production levels, noting that there were risks that global oil markets could be facing a deficit.

The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), led by Saudi Arabia and non-OPEC member Russia, agreed in June to lift oil supplies, but OPEC then signalled last week that it may have to reimpose output cuts as global inventories rise.

When the Russians start talking about keeping the production levels high and even the possibility that they need to increase it because of a possible tightness in supply, that brought on some selling pressure, said Gene McGillian, director of market research at Tradition Energy in Stamford, Connecticut.

Industrial commodities such as crude and copper have also been rattled by hefty losses in global equities due to concern over corporate earnings, and fears over the impact to economic growth from escalating trade tensions, as well as a stronger dollar.

Though equity markets recovered on Monday, the benchmark S

The Nigerian Navy said its men have begun an investigation and search and rescue operation for the 11 crew of MV Pomerania Sky, a container ship.

The men were kidnapped in the attack by pirates, operating off-Lagos. A Navy spokesman said an update would be provided soon.

Pirates boarded the container ship off the coast of Nigeria, seizing 11 crew including eight from Poland, the vessels management firm and Polish state media reported.

The attackers struck the MV Pomerania Sky, bound for the Nigerian port of Onne, early on Saturday and abducted 11 of the crew, Midocean (IOM) Ltd said in a statement on Sunday. The firm added that nine others remained on board and were unharmed.

Our priority is securing the earliest release of the 11 crew who have been taken and we are working closely with our partners and the local authorities to achieve that, Midocean said.

The families of those crew members taken are being kept informed of the situation, said the company. It added the vessel had proceeded to safe waters.

Midocean declined to say where the kidnapped crew members were from, but Polish state media, citing Foreign Minister Jacek Czaputowicz, said eight of them were from Poland.

The nationality of the three other abducted crew members was not immediately clear.

Kidnappings and piracy in Nigeria and the Gulf of Guinea are common.

Source: NAN

Ibrahim said leaders across the continent need to tackle a taboo against birth control and ensure their youth have prospects, as he launched his foundations annual index showing the state of governance across 54 African countries.

We see the risks we can see the rise in armed groups (like) Boko Haram and al Shabaab, he said, referring to Islamist militants in northern Nigeria and Somalia.

It isnt a coincidence, its linked to dissatisfaction arising from a number of factors, most importantly lack of hope when young people cant see a future, he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in London.

The index report found governance is slowly improving on average across Africa.

However, it warned the economic growth of the last decade was mainly jobless, while many children and young people were missing out on quality education even as the continents population increased sharply.

Population growth is outstripping our economic growth. It is like running on a treadmill and we are not moving forward, said Ibrahim.

Africa is expected to account for more than half the worlds population growth between 2015 and 2050, according to U.N. data. Its population is projected to double by 2050, and could double again by 2100.

Ibrahim said a lack of prospects was pushing some youth toward militant groups and also helping to drive the migrant crisis that has seen tens of thousands enter Europe each year.

Im really afraid that unless we deal with the issue of rising population and the large number of unemployed youth then we are in for trouble, he said.

Mauritius, the Seychelles and Cape Verde were the top performers in terms of governance overall, while Libya, South Sudan and Somalia ranked worst.

Zimbabwe, where longtime leader Robert Mugabe was ousted last year, was among the most improved countries, while war-torn Libya was named as having the worst deterioration.

Civil rights and freedom of expression have on average eroded over the last five years, the report said, amid what Ibrahim described as a global phenomenon for political strongmen who have often stripped back freedoms.

The report cites surveys from the last three years by research network Afrobarometer which found over a quarter of Africas citizens are not free to say what they think and almost three quarters are careful about what they say when discussing politics.

Countries are also increasingly diverging in their performance, the report warned, with the best showing swift improvements as others decline.

We see countries that get it right are able to go on and build on that, and we see countries that are going into this downward spiral of lack of governance, said Ibrahim.

Source: NAN