IVORY COAST
Deal reached to end mutiny
Ivory Coast’s president said a deal was reached Saturday to end a two-day army mutiny that renewed security concerns in the world’s top cocoa producer and Africa’s fastest-growing economy. President Alassane Ouattara made the announcement during a Cabinet meeting Saturday evening. Earlier in the day, his defense minister, Alain-Richard Donwahi, led a delegation to negotiate with disgruntled soldiers in the country’s second-largest city, Bouake, where the mutiny that saw troops shooting their weapons began Friday morning.
BRAZIL
Remarks lead to resignation
The Brazilian government’s national secretary of youth has resigned after celebrating the deaths of inmates killed in prison uprisings. Youth Secretary Bruno Julio resigned Friday. He had earlier declared that more inmates should be slain and there should be a mass prisoner killing per week. He also said the problem with prison killings is that “there aren’t enough of them.” At least 31 inmates were slain Friday in northern Brazil, some with their hearts and intestines ripped out during killings led by the country’s largest gang. The bloodshed came just days after 60 inmates were killed during rioting at two prisons in a neighboring state.
TURKEY
Thousands ousted in purge
Turkey has dismissed more than 8,000 civil servants for alleged ties to terror organizations, in the latest purge under a state of emergency imposed following the failed July 15 coup attempt. The latest dismissals were announced on the Turkish government’s Official Gazette late Friday. They include 2,687 police officers, 1,699 Justice Ministry employees and 631 academics. They join more than 100,000 people already suspended or dismissed from their jobs.
GHANA
President peacefully sworn in
Ghana’s newly elected President Nana Akufo-Addo was sworn into office Saturday in a peaceful handoff of power that stood out in a region facing political crises. Thousands of people gathered in Accra’s Independence Square, dressed in the red, blue and white colors of the New Patriotic Party, to witness the swearing in of Akufo-Addo as president and Mahamudu Bawumia as vice president. Akufo-Addo, 72, a former attorney general and foreign minister, won the Dec. 7 election on his third run for Ghana’s highest office, defeating incumbent John Dramani Mahama with the largest margin of victory for a presidential candidate since 1996.
Compiled from wire reports