Iraq, Kenya, Myanmar.

Today's three stories you should know.

May 05, 2023

Iraq

At least 400 women are in the second week of a hunger strike in a high-security prison in Iraq’s capital Baghdad, the BBC reported today. The women, who were convicted of ISIS membership, are protesting trials that they say were unfair and the conditions in which they are being held. About 100 of their children are believed to also be held in the prison. Video apparently shot inside the facility and sent to BBC Arabic showed several emaciated women lying on stone floors. The group is reported to include foreign nationals from Russia, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, Syria, France, Germany and the US. The Iraqi government declined to comment on the report.

Kenya

Kenya’s President William Ruto today ordered the setting up of an official inquiry into the deaths of more than 100 cult members believed to have deliberately starved themselves to death. It came on the same day as a court gave police five more days to detain and question Paul Mackenzie, the pastor who led the cult, as he faces possible terror-related charges. Survivors told police that Mackenzie convinced members of the group they would be guaranteed to meet Jesus if they died of starvation.

Myanmar

A delegation of Rohingya refugees has traveled to Myanmar to visit two model villages built as part of a plan to repatriate members of the persecuted minority. Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya people from Myanmar fled into neighbouring Bangladesh in 2017 as the country’s military cracked down on the community in attacks that some say amounted to genocide. They have lived in squalid refugee camps since. Most Myanmarese view the Rohingya, who are largely Muslim, as interlopers from Bangladesh. Many Rohingyas are suspicious of the new scheme.