Capital News: US AID relief program saved 740,000 lives
WASHINGTON, May 16 – A US aid program aimed at helping foreign countries battle the AIDS epidemic saved 740,000 lives from 2004-2008, according to a US study published Tuesday. The US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, was started by former president George W. Bush in 2003 with a five-year, $15 billion investment [...]

Capital News: Indonesian organisers fight for Lady Gaga gig
JAKARTA, May 16 – Lady Gaga’s Indonesian promoters Wednesday vowed to fight to save her show, despite police denying it a permit and Islamic hardliners threatening “chaos” if she comes to the mostly Muslim nation. Production company Big Daddy reached out on Twitter to Lady Gaga fans, known as “little monsters”, saying it still hoped [...]

Capital News: Dalmas defends NHIF scheme even as clinics are barred
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 15 – The newly appointed National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) Caretaker Committee has suspended transactions with Clinix and Meridian health facilities over the controversial Sh4.3 billion Civil Servants medical scheme. This came even as Public Service Minister Dalmas Otieno told the Parliamentary Committee on Health that is probing alleged irregular allocation of [...]

Capital News: One dead in Mombasa restaurant grenade attack
MOMBASA, Kenya, May 16 – A woman has died after a grenade attack in the Kenyan port city of Mombasa, police said Wednesday, a day after armed men opened fire and threw explosives into into a restaurant. “We lost one of the victims, a lady who was a security guard at the club, she died [...]

Capital News: Fire Mudavadi, MPs urge Raila
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 15 – Prime Minister Raila Odinga has been given the okay by his party, the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM), to replace his deputy Musalia Mudavadi as Deputy Prime Minister. Mudavadi who decamped to the United Democratic Forum (UDF) resigned as ODM party deputy leader and Minister for Local Government a fortnight ago, [...]

Capital News: Police service commission headed for fresh nominations
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 15 – The Parliamentary Committee on National Security has rejected President Mwai Kibaki’s nomination of Amina Masoud to head the National Police Service Commission, and has instead proposed its own nominees. In their report which was tabled in the House on Tuesday, the committee chaired by Mt Elgon MP Fred Kapondi proposed [...]

Capital News: Parties must put their houses in order – Registrar
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 15 – The Registrar of Political Parties Lucy Ndung’u now says that she has played her part in ensuring discipline in political parties. She says her role is to ensure that political parties stay within the law and it was the parties that ought to ensure that there is discipline among their [...]

Capital News: Club Click owner, bouncer deny murder charges
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 15 – The proprietor of Club Click Jackson Maina Wangui and a bouncer accused of murdering a reveller in the bar two weeks ago have denied the charges. Maina and bouncer Joseph Kirero Sepi denied that jointly with others not before court, they murdered Kevin Onyango on the night of May 7 [...]

Capital News: IEBC wants nothing short of Sh31b for polls
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 14 – The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has once again revised its budget for the next General Election downwards from Sh35 billion to Sh31 billion. It however maintains the figure could rise to Sh35 billion in the event of a presidential runoff. “We actually reduced our budget from Sh41.4 billion [...]

Capital News: Ocampo 4 can skip June court sessions
NAIROBI, Kenya, May, 15 – The International Criminal Court (ICC) on Tuesday said the four Kenyans accused of crimes against humanity do not have to appear in person at the status conferences scheduled for June this year. ICC Spokesman Fadi el Abdallah told Capital FM News that the accused can be represented by their lawyers [...]

Capital News: AP killed, 2 injured in Dadaab landmine attack
DAADAB, Kenya, May 15 – An Administration Police officer was killed on Tuesday and two others seriously wounded after their vehicle drove over a landmine in Dadaab. The officers were escorting officials of a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) for an assignment when the incident occurred at Dagahaley, a town outside Dadaab refugee camp. “An officer has [...]

Capital News: Indonesian police veto Lady Gaga show
JAKARTA, May 15 – Indonesian police on Tuesday refused to allow pop phenomenon Lady Gaga to perform in Jakarta after Islamic hardliners vowed to mobilise thousands of supporters against the “devil’s messenger”. The show planned for June 3 in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country “will have to be cancelled”, national police spokesman Saud Usman [...]

Capital News: Foreign force strikes Somali pirate land base for first time
BRUSSELS, May 15 – A helicopter gunship swooped over the Somali coast to strike at a pirate stronghold Tuesday in a major escalation of an international effort to protect vital shipping lanes. The helicopter lifted off from one of several ships in an EU armada offshore, blasting a stockpile of pirate skiffs on a beach [...]

Capital News: Kenyan policeman killed in landmine blast
NAIROBI, May 15 – A landmine killed a Kenyan policeman and seriously wounded two others, when it exploded beneath their vehicle as they escorted aid workers near the sprawling Dadaab refugee camp, police said Tuesday. “An officer has been killed, and there are two who are wounded, when their vehicle was blown up by a [...]

Capital News: Hollande sworn in as French president amid euro turmoil
PARIS, May 15 – Francois Hollande was sworn in as president of France on Tuesday with a solemn vow to find a new growth-led strategy to end the debt crisis threatening to unravel the eurozone. After brief ceremonies and a rain-lashed walkabout, the 57-year-old Socialist was to dash to Berlin to confront Chancellor Angela Merkel [...]

Capital News: KWS defends relocation of cheetah cubs
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 15 – The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) has defended its decision to transfer three orphaned cheetah cubs from the Mara Conservancy to the Nairobi Animal Orphanage. In a statement, KWS said it considered provisions of the Kenyan law, the national conservation and management strategy for cheetahs but also the condition under which [...]

Capital News: African ministers, AGs discuss skirting ICC
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 15 – African Justice Ministers and Attorney Generals are converged in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to discuss ways of expanding the mandate of the African Court of Justice to deal with crimes against humanity. The meeting that kicked off on Monday is centred on how to empower African courts to cover cases of [...]

Capital News: Strong growth in Africa not ending food insecurity
NAIROBI, May 15 – Sub-Saharan Africa posts economic growth rates higher than the worldwide average but has the planet’s greatest food security problems, the UN development agency said in a report Tuesday. “Impressive GDP growth rates in Africa have not translated into the elimination of hunger and malnutrition,” Helen Clark, administrator at the United Nations [...]

Capital News: Facts and figures about Facebook
SAN FRANCISCO, May 15 – Facts and figures about Facebook, which priced its initial public offering: - Facebook has more than 900 million active users. If the company were a country, it would be the third largest in the world after China (population: 1.34 billion) and India (population: 1.17 billion). - Some 488 million people [...]

Capital News: Hollande to take over French presidency
PARIS, May 15 – Socialist Francois Hollande was to be sworn in as France’s president Tuesday before naming a prime minister and dashing to Germany to battle with Berlin over how to tackle Europe’s debt crisis. Nine days after he defeated right-winger Nicolas Sarkozy in a fierce campaign, Hollande, 57, was to be inaugurated at [...]

Capital News: Clinix bosses grilled by MPs’ committee
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 14 – Concerns have been raised over the fast pace at which Clinix Healthcare Limited, one of the facilities that received a lion’s share of funds for the civil servants health scheme has grown its outlets since January. The parliamentary Committee on Health that is probing allocation of funds by the National [...]

Capital News: Ron Paul winds down White House quest, but is it over?
WASHINGTON, May 15 – Ron Paul, the ideological underdog who generated intense passion among supporters of his 2012 campaign, is trading his shot at the US Republican nomination for something more within reach: outsize influence at the party convention. His announcement Monday that he is suspending all active campaigning clears the way for the Republican [...]

Capital News: Chinese envoy on African affairs holds talks with Sudanese officials
KHARTOUM, May 14- China’s special representative on African affairs Zhong Jianhua on Sunday held talks with senior Sudanese officials in Khartoum on bilateral ties and regional situation. According to a statement by the Chinese embassy in Khartoum, Zhong talked withSudanese Minister of Foreign Affairs Ahmed Ali Karti, State Minister for Foreign Affairs Salah Wanasy, and [...]

Capital News: Chinese president meets ROK president, Japanese PM
BEIJING, May 14 – Chinese President Hu Jintao met here Monday morning with Republic of Korea (ROK) President Lee Myung-bak and Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda. Lee and Noda are in Beijing to attend the Fifth Trilateral Summit Meeting among China, the ROK and Japan held from Sunday to Monday. Hu hailed the positive results [...]

Capital News: Gumo hits out at ‘Railaphobes’
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 14 – Newly appointed acting Local Government Minister Fred Gumo is challenging those who want to be president to stop basing their campaigns on bashing Prime Minister Raila Odinga. Gumo says most of the aspirants have made Odinga their main campaign issue when they should be selling their vision for the nation. [...]