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Spain Swears in Government with Mostly-Female Ministers 14 Friday International Friday, June 8, 2018 Spain swears in government with mostly-female ministers Openly gay former judge new interior minister MADRID: King Felipe VI yesterday swore in liament president Josep Borrell foreign minister. Spain’s new pro-EU government, with women The new executive includes two veteran Socialists holding the majority of ministerial posts. Socialist - Carmen Calvo, vice-president, and Borrell. Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez named 11 women to Calvo, who was culture minister from 2004 to top posts including defense and economy in a cab- 2007, will also be in charge of equality. inet with six male ministers. That makes it the Eu- That is a priority for Sanchez’s government in a ropean government with the most women after country where women staged an unprecedented Sweden’s, which has 12 female cabinet ministers strike to defend their rights on March 8. “This is a and 11 men. Sanchez’s administration risks not last- government that has to work every day for the most ing until the end of the current mandate in 2020, important thing of democracy: to reduce inequali- however, given the fragmented state of Spain’s po- ties, and build the greatest equality, that between litical parties. His Socialist Party holds just 84 seats men and women,” she said after being sworn in. in the 350-seat congress. That is the smallest par- The new Spanish executive’s pro-EU creden- liamentary presence of any Spanish government tials sets it apart from certain other parts of Eu- since the return to democracy in the 1970s. rope. They contrast with the eurosceptic stance of the populist government about to take office in Gender equality Italy and the Brexit process in Britain. Calvino’s ap- Sanchez, 46, ousted conservative veteran Mar- pointment as economy minister was welcomed by MADRID: The new Spanish government’s ministers pose with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro iano Rajoy as prime minister last Friday in a no- the EU Commission. Borrell was European parlia- Sanchez (seventh left) and king Felipe VI (center) after taking oath of office at La Zarzuela confidence vote. The vote was sparked by ment president between 2004 and 2007. Anti-ter- palace yesterday. — AFP corruption convictions against former officials from ror prosecutor Dolores Delgado became justice Rajoy’s Popular Party (PP). It ended more than six minister and former Supreme Court judge Mar- movement in his home region of Catalonia. He will an award-winning author, became culture minister. years of PP government and ushered in a progres- garita Robles defense minister. Other women have be tasked with defending abroad his government’s With its parliamentary minority, the government sive administration under Sanchez. The swearing- been put in charge of education, employment and commitment to Spanish unity. Day to day, Meritxell will rely on the votes of far-left party Podemos as in ceremony at the Zarzuela palace near Madrid health. The new interior minister is Fernando Batet, another Catalan, has been put in charge of well as Basque and Catalan nationalist lawmakers broke with tradition by not involving a Bible, cru- Grande-Marlaska, an openly gay former judge at relations with Spain’s regions. She will have the who supported his no-confidence motion. cifix or other religious symbols. Spain’s top-level National Court. He has handled prickly task of trying to ease the situation in her Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias wished the new Each new cabinet member vowed to “faithfully cases against Basque separatist group ETA. own deeply divided home region. Sanchez’s new government “good luck”. He warned during an in- fulfill the duties of minister with conscience and team also includes a minister in charge of science, terview with public television channel TVE that his honor”. EU budget manager Nadia Calvino be- Catalans, astronaut, author innovation and universities. That role goes to party would “influence from within parliament to came economy minister and former European par- Borrell fiercely opposes the independence Spain’s first astronaut, Pedro Duque. Maxim Huerta, change things. —AFP Son who slaughtered Stockholm truck rich family with axe attacker jailed for life handed 3 life terms STOCKHOLM: A Swedish court yesterday sentenced a radi- calized Uzbek asylum seeker to life in prison for terrorism after CAPE TOWN: A young South African man convicted of slaying he mowed down pedestrians with a stolen truck in central his wealthy parents and brother and maiming his sister in a fren- Stockholm last year, killing five people. The assault, which mir- zied axe attack was handed three life sentences yesterday. Judge rored other truck attacks in 2016 that left scores dead in France, Siraj Desai described 23-year-old Henri Van Breda’s January Germany and the UK, occurred as Sweden grappled with the 2015 rampage as “savage and vicious” with “an almost unprece- CAPE TOWN: Henri van Breda is handcuffed and led out of the aftermath of having taken in more migrants per capita than any dented degree of disregard for one’s family”. “Each murderous Western Cape High Court after being sentenced yesterday. — AFP other country in Europe. attack on a family member is a severe crime and warrants the Arrested hours after the April 7, 2017 attack, Rakhmat Ak- severest punishment,” Desai told the packed Western Cape High - estimated at $16 million - was derived from property. The family ilov, 40, who swore allegiance to the Islamic State (IS) group Court in Cape Town after the headline-making trial. had moved to Australia many years ago before returning to South on the eve of his assault, told the court during his trial that IS Van Breda, who wore a light grey suit, blue shirt and patterned Africa in 2014. Van Breda was convicted of three counts of mur- members had given him the green light on encrypted chat sites tie, was also jailed for 15 years for the attempted murder of his sis- der, one of attempted murder and one of obstructing justice on to carry out a suicide attack in the Swedish capital. However, ter. After a trial that had sought in vain to understand the motive May 21 with the judge describing the verdict as “inescapable”. the organization never claimed responsibility for the assault. for the bloodbath, Van Breda remained emotionless as the sen- Defense lawyer Pieter Botha had called for a “merciful” sentenc- The Stockholm district court convicted Akilov of “terrorist tence was handed down. He was then led away by court officers ing, arguing that Van Breda was a first-time offender who was crimes” for five murders and 119 attempted murders in one of as his girlfriend watched from the public gallery. He had denied “barely 20” when he killed his family. Stockholm’s busiest shopping streets. Three Swedes, including murdering his 21-year-old brother Rudi and parents Martin, 54, He said Van Breda had been in counseling for six months, was a girl who would have turned 12 yesterday, as well as a 41-year- and Teresa, 55, and leaving his sister Marli struggling with near- “appropriately emotional” when the murders were mentioned, and old British man and a 31-year-old Belgian woman were killed. fatal injuries to her head, neck and throat after the bloody attack. was taking medication for depression and epilepsy. Since his con- Ten more were injured. During his almost three-month trial, Ak- viction Van Breda has been held in the medical wing of South ilov, who confessed almost immediately to the attack, expressed ‘Axe-wielding son’ Africa’s notoriously violent Pollsmoor prison. During the trial, Van no remorse. His gaze often remained empty, even when photo- “They were attacks involving a high degree of uncontrolled graphs and footage of the bloody attack were projected onto Breda had told the court that a late-night intruder had entered the a large screen in the courtroom. “He acted with the direct in- violence. The victims were unarmed (and) they faced an axe- family’s luxury residence on the ultra-secure De Zalze Golf Estate tention to kill as many people as possible,” the court said in its wielding son or brother, probably not expecting the worst,” said in Stellenbosch, outside Cape Town. His claim had echoes of the de- verdict, adding Akilov would be expelled after serving the life Desai. “We have heard no explanation... you have shown no re- fence used by Oscar Pistorius, who said he thought a burglar was term, which averages 16 years in Sweden. —AFP morse.” The trial generated global interest in how a privileged hiding in an en suite bathroom to explain why he fired four times son unleashed such a brutal attack on his family, whose fortune through the door, killing his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.—AFP .
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