JENJE-BARA

Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Thursday that he expects to meet with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, early in December, in the aftermath of the downing of a Russian SU-24 fighter plane over Syria on Tuesday. Cavusoglu said during a brief visit to the Turkish occupied part of Cyprus that the meeting will take place on the sidelines of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe to be held in Belgrade on December 3-4.

Two men, who allegedly gang-raped a 21-year-old lady on Thursday appeared before an Ikeja Magistrates’ Court. The accused are a trader, Adeniyi Gidado, 25, who lives at 5, Osanyinpeju St., Agege, Lagos and Simeon Nwaugo, 25, also a trader, who lives at 9, Akeem Boye St., Iju-Ishaga, near Lagos. The accused are facing a two-count charge of conspiracy and rape. The Prosecutor, Cpl. Felicia Okwori, told the court that the offences were committed on Nov. 24 at a hotel situated at 156 Dopemu Road, Agege, Lagos. Okwori said that the first accused, Adeniyi, who was a boy friend to the victim invited her for a date at the hotel. “On getting there, they both decided to sleep in the hotel since it was already late to go home but unknown to the victim, her boy friend had invited the second accused. “It was after the victim had slept that the second accused came in to the room and they gang-raped her,” she said. The prosecutor said that it was the screa...

  Average long-term U.S. mortgage rates slipped this week after they climbed recently expectations that the Federal Reserve may soon raise its key short-term interest rate. Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Wednesday the average rate on a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage slipped to 3.95 percent from 3.97 percent a week earlier. The key 30-year rate was nearly unchanged from its level of a year ago, 3.97 percent. But the average has increased over the past months from 3.76 at the end of October. The average on 15-year fixed-rate mortgages was unchanged at 3.18 percent from 3.20. Rates have risen in recent weeks as some of the global economic turmoil has calmed down. Foreign buyers poured into 10-year U.S. Treasury bonds in October, temporarily depressing mortgage rates that have since risen as the market focus has returned to the Fed.

  The World Bank Group has unveiled a new plan that calls for $16 billion in funding to help African people and countries adapt to climate change and build up the continent’s resilience to climate shocks. Entitled ‘Accelerating Climate-Resilient and Low-Carbon Development’, the Africa Climate Business Plan will be presented at COP21, the global climate talks in Paris, on November 30. At a ceremony on Tuesday, the Bank laid out measures to boost the resilience of the continent’s assets – its people, land, water, and cities – as well as other moves, including boosting renewable energy and strengthening early warning systems. “Sub-Saharan Africa is highly vulnerable to climate shocks, and our research shows that could have far-ranging impact — on everything from child stunting and malaria to food price increases and droughts,” said World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim. “This plan identifies concrete steps that African governments ca...

ABUJA – The All Progressives Congress, APC, led Federal Government yesterday said that the payment of the N5000 stipend to the unemployed Nigerians will commence next year. It regretted that the payment could not take off now due to non budgetary provisions. Minister of Youth and Sports, Barrister Solomon Dalong revealed this yesterday in Abuja when he paid a condolence visit to the national chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief John Odigie-Oyegun at the nationL secretariat in Abuja on the demise of Prince Abubakar Audu, the erstwhile governorship candidate of the party in Kogi State election. Dalong who spoke with Journalists assured that APC government would also create more jobs to fulfill its campaign promises