BAGHDAD: Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki ordered a shake-up of senior security officers yesterday after a spate of unrest that has killed more than 380 people so far this month, an official said.
Maliki, “after consultation with security officials, issues orders ... for changes in the operations commands and commanders of divisions,” the senior official said on condition of anonymity.
One of those changes was to sack Staff Lieutenant General Ahmed Hashem, the head of the Baghdad Operations Command, which is responsible for security in the capital, the official said. The shake-up comes a day after Maliki said he would change the country’s security strategy as well as top personnel.
Dubai seizes 259 smuggled tusks
CAPE TOWN: A shipment of 259 elephant tusks smuggled out of Africa has been seized in the UAE, the International Wildlife Fund for Animal Welfare said yesterday.
The tusks were discovered at a Dubai port in a container shipped from Mombasa, Kenya labelled as wooden furniture.
Demand for ivory in east Asia has prompted a surge in poaching in recent years, threatening the existence of animal populations.
First coronavirus death in Tunisia
Tunis: A 66-year-old Tunisian man has died from new coronavirus, a strain of a virus that emerged in the Middle East last year, after a visit to Saudi Arabia, the health ministry said yesterday. The man, a diabetic, died in hospital in the city of Monastir, ministry spokesman Ibrahim Labassi said. It was the first death in Tunisia from the virus. “Tests showed that his two sons were infected by the same virus and they are under medical observation,” Labassi said.
Libyan interior minister quits
TRIPOLI: Libya’s interior minister has submitted his resignation, two official sources said yesterday, after months of efforts to curb armed groups who helped topple Muammar Gaddafi but have since stalled the transition to democracy.
Agencies
