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Why US ordered diplomats’ families to leave Nigeria’s capital

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The State Department on Thursday ordered the families of U.S. embassy staffers in the Nigerian capital to leave due to heightened fears of a terrorist attack as it repeated a warning for all Americans to reconsider traveling to any part of the country and not to visit Abuja at all.

The announcement came just two days after the department said it would allow nonessential personnel at the embassy in Abuja to depart voluntarily due to elevated security concerns. It did not provide details but the change suggested the U.S. has indications that an attack may be imminent.

“The department (has) ordered the departure of family members of U.S. government employees from Abuja due to the heightened risk of terrorist attacks there,” it said in a revised travel advisory for Nigeria.

Nigeria has battled an Islamic insurgency in its northeast for more than a decade, but attacks have been rare in Abuja. In 2011, Islamic extremists linked to the Boko Haram group targeted the United Nations building there with a car bomb, killing 21 people.

The U.S. embassy in Abuja has been warning since Sunday about an “elevated risk of terror attacks” in the city, saying that possible targets include government buildings, places of worship and other public places. It has urged Americans there to avoid all nonessential movements and crowds.

The British mission in Nigeria has issued similar alerts.

Nigeria’s secret and intelligence police, the Department of State Services, has called for calm and has advised that “necessary precautions” are being taken to prevent such attacks.

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Mom Who Challenged Amanda Gorman Poem Makes a Bizarre Apology

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The lone Florida parent who successfully campaigned to restrict elementary students’ access to Amanda Gorman’s inauguration poem issued a bizarre apology Wednesday for her antisemitic Facebook posts. As The Daily Beast reported Thursday, the woman, Daily Salinas, posted a summary of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a centuries-old antisemitic conspiracy theory, on Facebook in March. Salinas, who is Cuban and whose first language is Spanish, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Wednesday that she only shared the post because she saw the word “communism” but didn’t read more. She also assured the JTA that she “loves the Jewish community,” has Jewish friends, and enjoys an Israeli series on Netflix. In addition to Gorman’s poem, Salinas also challenged books on Black and Cuban history, most of which the school agreed to relocate so only older students could access them.

Culled from the Daily Beast

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Texas House panel advances articles of impeachment against AG Ken Paxton

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The Texas House of Representatives’ Republican-led General Investigating Committee on Thursday advanced articles of impeachment against the state’s Attorney General Ken Paxton (R).

The panel had spent months probing Paxton and recommended impeachment for a range of alleged misconduct and potential crimes.

The state House could vote on the impeachment recommendation as soon as Friday. In Texas, impeachment — which requires a two-thirds vote in the House — would mean he has to step down from his top attorney post until he faces trial in the state Senate.

Four former state prosecutors, commissioned by the Texas House, revealed a number of allegations against Paxton earlier this week, including that he took bribes from a real estate developer and then fired deputies who reported it.

Paxton was indicted by a state grand jury for securities fraud in 2016.

The recommendation comes shortly after Paxton called for the resignation of the Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan, alleging the lawmaker had presided over the state chamber while intoxicated.

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Nigeria’s President-Elect, Tinubu is Back in France, Days Before his Inauguration

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With only a few days to go before his inauguration on 29 May, the Nigerian president-elect was once again in Paris as a private citizen.

Bola Tinubu is certainly no stranger to the Paris region. The Nigerian president-elect was in France for about two weeks in mid-May. Officially, it was a private trip for medical purposes.

According to our sources, the Nigerian, who is to be inaugurated as head of state on 29 May, wanted to carry out a final check-up at the American hospital in Neuilly-sur-Seine before the ceremony.

Discussions on military cooperationTinubu, 71, has been followed for many years by doctors at this state-of-the-art hospital, located west of Paris, while his predecessor, Muhammadu Buhari, preferred London institutions. The future president had already made a medical visit to France on 22 March, returning to Nigeria only at the end of April, more than a month after his arrival.

Highly sought in the French capital, Tinubu was been able to take advantage of his visit to address some key issues of his future mandate, primarily energy – a Nigerian sector whose opportunities attract the eye of French companies – and security.

According to our information, Tinubu was able to meet with senior officials of the French Ministry of Defence, including the Gendarmerie.

The French – whose relations with Buhari have sometimes been difficult and who are currently redeploying their resources to West Africa – hope to find in Tinubu and his entourage key interlocutors to improve military cooperation between the two countries. The president-elect is soon to appoint the new head of the Department of State Security, with the successful candidate potentially forming part of his delegation to Paris.

Back in Nigeria, he received on 23 May in Abuja the former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, whose foundation is particularly active on the continent.

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