NIGERIA
President mocks first lady
Nigeria’s first lady has openly questioned her husband’s work and said she may not support him if he runs again — comments that President Muhammadu Buhari laughed off, saying, “I don’t know which party my wife belongs to, but she belongs to my kitchen and my living room and the other room.” His comments to reporters in Germany prompted German Chancellor Angela Merkel, standing at his side, to give him a short glare and then laugh. In an interview with the BBC Hausa-language service broadcast Friday, Aisha Buhari said her husband did not know many top government appointees, and she accused them of not sharing the vision of his All Progressives Congress party. Some Nigerians on social media blasted the president’s comments about his wife — who has a master’s degree from the Nigerian Defense Academy — as misogynistic.
DENMARK
Heir hurts spine on trampoline
Denmark’s royal household said Crown Prince Frederik fractured his cervical spine while trampolining at a private event and had to cancel his participation Friday in an official event for Danish Olympic athletes. The palace said the 48-year-old heir to Denmark’s throne will wear a cervical collar for the next 12 weeks. Frederik, the oldest son of Danish monarch Queen Margrethe, holds no political power. An avid sportsman, he is a member of the International Olympic Committee.
IRAQ
Forces arrive near Mosul
A few hundred Iraqi special forces arrived Friday at the front line near militant-held Mosul, one small part of a series of troop movements that have massed thousands of soldiers ahead of an operation seeking to retake the country’s second-largest city from the Islamic State group. Officials from Iraq and the U.S.-led coalition have said preparations and planning of the operation are ongoing, but there is widespread speculation it will be launched this month.
EGYPT
Militants kill 12 soldiers
Suspected Islamic militants in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula attacked an army checkpoint on Friday, killing 12 soldiers and wounding eight, according to security and medical officials. The officials said the attack took place about 50 miles east of the Suez Canal, near the town of Bir el-Abd, where the wounded were taken before being ferried to the city of el- Arish. The military said 15 of the attackers, who arrived in all-terrain vehicles, were killed in an ensuing gunbattle.
Compiled from wire reports