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BBC HomepageSkip to contentAccessibility HelpYour accountLiveNotificationsHomeNewsSportWeatheriPlayerSoundsBitesizeMore menuMore menuSearch BBCHomeNewsSportWeatheriPlayerSoundsBitesizeCBBCCBeebiesFoodClose menuBBC NewsMenuHomeIsrael-Gaza warCost of LivingWar in UkraineClimateUKWorldBusinessPoliticsCultureMoreTechScienceHealthFamily & EducationIn PicturesNewsbeatBBC VerifyDisabilityWorldAfricaAsiaAustraliaEuropeLatin AmericaMiddle EastUS & CanadaJohn Hlophe: South Africa’s parliament impeaches top judgePublished2 hours agoShareclose panelShare pageCopy linkAbout sharingImage source, Getty ImagesImage caption, John Hlophe, seen here in 2009, was accused of trying to influence judges at the country’s top courtBy Kyle ZeemanBBC News, JohannesburgIn a historic move, South Africa’s parliament has impeached one of the country’s top judges for misconduct.An investigation found that John Hlophe, the leading judge in Western Cape province, tried to influence justices at the country’s top court in a case relating to former President Jacob Zuma.He approached two justices in 2008 to see if they would support Mr Zuma in a decision relating to a corruption case.Mr Hlophe always denied the accusation.The long delay between the alleged offence and his impeachment was a result of a lengthy appeals and investigations.The removal of a judge is unprecedented since the start of the country’s democratic era in 1994.A second judge, Nkola Motata, was also impeached for disorderly conduct and racial outbursts relating to a 2007 drunk-driving accident. Mr Motata, who has since retired, was a High Court judge in Gauteng province at the time of the incident.He also denied the accusation.President Cyril Ramaphosa will now have to sign-off the decision and set a date for their formal removal.The judges will then lose all benefits, including a lifetime monthly salary worth over 1m rand ($53,000; £42,000), a car allowance and comprehensive medical care.Mr Hlophe was the first to be impeached on Wednesday evening with MPs voting by the required two-thirds majority. The decision was backed by the governing African National Congress (ANC) as well as the main opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) plus other minor parties.A last-ditch attempt by Mr Hlophe to halt his possible removal was thrown out by a court just hours earlier.His impeachment was quickly followed by that of Mr Motata.An investigation by an oversight body, the Judicial Service Commission (JSC), found that in 2008 Mr Hlophe had made contact with two of the eleven judges of the Constitutional Court in an attempt to sway a ruling in Mr Zuma’s favour relating to a matter in his arms-deal corruption case.Mr Zuma has denied the corruption allegations and there is no suggestion that he had anything to do with Mr Hlophe’s actions.Neither impeached judges have responded to the MPs’ decisions, but Mr Hlophe had argued in court papers that the role of parliament was not simply to rubber stamp findings by the JSC but to do its own investigation.ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula said the party welcomed parliament’s decision, while the DA’s Glynnis Breytenbach said her party felt vindicated after “years of the ANC government dragging its feet” on the judges’ removal.”We may have waited 15 years for this moment, but the impeachment of Judge Hlophe, or any judge, has profound implications for judicial integrity in South Africa. It underscores the importance of upholding the highest ethical standards, the rule of law, and the constitution among judicial officers.”It also sends a clear message that no-one, regardless of their position or influence, is above the law,” Ms Breytenbach said.Opposition party the Economic Freedom Fighters voted against the impeachments, with MP Busisiwe Mkhwebane arguing that the judges were remorseful and should be allowed to live the rest of their lives in peace.”Can we let Judge Motata, in his misjudgement, be left to enjoy his retirement at home. We know that Hlophe was highly qualified and did his work with dignity. Punish this ANC government,” she told parliament, to cheers from her party’s benches.Lawyer and the co-ordinator of advocacy group Judges Matter, Alison Tilley, told the BBC the removals were an important moment in the country’s history.”It has taken time but it shows the systems to hold the judiciary to account do work. There are mechanisms that are now in place that give us confidence that a similar process would not take as long.”Related TopicsSouth AfricaMore on this storySouth Africa country profilePublished24 July 2023Top StoriesLive. SNP’s Flynn says he has no confidence in Speaker after Commons chaosWhat does the Speaker of the House of Commons do?Published1 hour agoRosenberg: How two years of war have changed RussiaPublished6 hours agoFeaturesHroza, Ukraine’s village of orphansSahil Omar: The real story behind a fake criminalFamily share memories of Kenya’s marathon legendThe Papers: ‘Fury in Commons’ and ‘King’s tears’How AI is helping the search for extraterrestrial lifeWhy US politicians are on a pilgrimage to Taiwan’Recovering from food addiction is like walking a tiger’Olivia Colman on why sweary letters were original trollingMoment giant Antarctica drone takes off. 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[ad_1] “We may have waited 15 years for this moment, but the impeachment of Judge Hlophe, or any judge, has profound implications for judicial integrity in South Africa. It underscores…
![BBC HomepageSkip to contentAccessibility HelpYour accountLiveNotificationsHomeNewsSportWeatheriPlayerSoundsBitesizeMore menuMore menuSearch BBCHomeNewsSportWeatheriPlayerSoundsBitesizeCBBCCBeebiesFoodClose menuBBC NewsMenuHomeIsrael-Gaza warCost of LivingWar in UkraineClimateUKWorldBusinessPoliticsCultureMoreTechScienceHealthFamily & EducationIn PicturesNewsbeatBBC VerifyDisabilityWorldAfricaAsiaAustraliaEuropeLatin AmericaMiddle EastUS & CanadaPalestinian gunmen kill one person near West Bank settlementPublished4 minutes agoShareclose panelShare pageCopy linkAbout sharingRelated TopicsIsrael-Gaza warImage source, ReutersImage caption, The attackers got out of a car and fired automatic weapons at other vehicles on a highway near Maale AdumimBy David GrittenBBC NewsA man has been killed and seven other people have been wounded in an attack by three Palestinian gunmen near an Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank, Israeli police and medics say.A statement said the “terrorists” got out of a car at a checkpoint for Maale Adumim and fired automatic weapons at several vehicles waiting there.Police killed two attackers while the third was wounded and arrested.Palestinian armed group Hamas praised the attack but did not claim it.There has been a surge in violence in the West Bank since the start of the war in the Gaza Strip, triggered by Hamas’s deadly attacks in Israel on 7 October.At least 394 Palestinians – members of armed groups, attackers and civilians – had been killed in conflict-related incidents in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, or in Israel as of Tuesday, according to the UN. During the same period, 12 Israelis, including four security forces personnel, had been killed.West Bank Palestinians paying the price for Gaza warUK sanctions Israeli settlers accused of violence Israel’s police force said Thursday’s attack took place near the al-Zaim checkpoint on Highway 1, which connects Maale Adumim with Jerusalem.”Three terrorists… arrived in a vehicle, left the vehicle and started shooting using automatic weapons towards vehicles standing in a traffic jam,” it added.”Security forces neutralized two terrorists on the spot, and after scans [were] conducted another terrorist who tried to escape was located and neutralized.”Israel’s Magen David Adom ambulance service said the attack took place on a 500m-long (1,640ft) stretch of the highway and that paramedics found casualties in five vehicles.A 20-year-old man in one of the vehicles died of his wounds, while a 23-year-old pregnant woman sitting in another was seriously wounded in the upper body, it added. Four people were moderately wounded and one was lightly wounded. A number of other people were treated for shock.All the wounded were evacuated to hospitals in Jerusalem.The gunmen were identified as three Palestinian men from the West Bank city of Bethlehem, about 10km (6 miles) to the south-west. Israel’s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, told journalists at the scene: “The enemies… want to hurt us. They hate us.”He said authorities needed to “distribute more weapons” to Israeli civilians for protection and install more roadblocks around Palestinian communities in the West Bank, arguing that “our right to life is superior to the freedom of movement” of Palestinians.Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, another far-right politician, meanwhile called for the immediate approval of plans for thousands more homes in settlements like Maale Adumim.Israel has built about 160 settlements housing some 700,000 Jews since it occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war. The vast majority of the international community considers the settlements illegal under international law, though Israel and the US dispute this.Hamas called Thursday’s attack a “natural response” to Israeli “massacres and crimes” in Gaza and the West Bank, and called on Palestinians to take up arms.The shooting comes six days after a Palestinian man shot and killed two people at a bus stop near the southern Israeli town of Kiryat Malakhi. Related TopicsIsrael & the PalestiniansIsrael-Gaza warIsraelPalestinian territoriesWest BankMore on this storyIsrael W Bank hospital raid kills three Palestinian fightersPublished30 JanuaryUS demands probe into Palestinian-American’s deathPublished22 JanuaryIsrael accused of targeting civilians in deadly West Bank strikePublished17 JanuaryWoman killed, 17 hurt in Israel car-ramming attackPublished15 JanuaryTop StoriesLive. 50 MPs call for Lindsay Hoyle to quit as Speaker after Gaza vote chaosRosenberg: How two years of war have changed RussiaPublished4 hours agoFootballer Dani Alves guilty of nightclub rapePublished18 minutes agoFeaturesHroza, Ukraine’s village of orphansThe Papers: ‘Fury in Commons’ and ‘King’s tears’Sahil Omar: The real story behind a fake criminalFamily share memories of Kenya’s marathon legendHow AI is helping the search for extraterrestrial lifeWhy US politicians are on a pilgrimage to Taiwan’Recovering from food addiction is like walking a tiger’Olivia Colman on why sweary letters were original trollingMoment giant Antarctica drone takes off. VideoMoment giant Antarctica drone takes offElsewhere on the BBCFive geological wonders from around the worldFrom the very tip of the North Pole to the southernmost point of the AmericasAttributionBitesizeWhich classic did Elbow cover?The band join the BBC Concert Orchestra in the BBC Piano RoomAttributionSounds’We have built the world, perhaps inadvertently, for men’Philanthropist Melinda French Gates on what she’s learned from her life so farAttributionSoundsA tasty swap that could really improve our healthMichael discovers the benefits of incorporating wholegrains into our dietAttributionSoundsMost Read1Footballer Dani Alves guilty of nightclub rape2Rosenberg: How two years of war have changed Russia3Kremlin lashes out after Biden aims barb at Putin4Grandmother died from ‘unsurvivable’ XL bully bite5Police force ‘failed’ women who were killed6Whale song mystery solved by scientists7Suspensions after ‘Israel’ crossed out on document8’Fury in Commons’ and ‘King’s tears’9Respect the menopause or face being sued, firms told10’Recovering from food addiction is like walking a tiger’](https://newsinsightplus.com/wp-content/uploads/https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/branded_news/37D2/production/_132709241_36d58cc7875aea2db0e491a4dbbee83e564504c6.jpg)
![BBC HomepageSkip to contentAccessibility HelpYour accountLiveNotificationsHomeNewsSportWeatheriPlayerSoundsBitesizeMore menuMore menuSearch BBCHomeNewsSportWeatheriPlayerSoundsBitesizeCBBCCBeebiesFoodClose menuBBC NewsMenuHomeIsrael-Gaza warCost of LivingWar in UkraineClimateUKWorldBusinessPoliticsCultureMoreTechScienceHealthFamily & EducationIn PicturesNewsbeatBBC VerifyDisabilityWorldAfricaAsiaAustraliaEuropeLatin AmericaMiddle EastUS & CanadaRosenberg: How two years of war in Ukraine changed RussiaPublished2 hours agoShareclose panelShare pageCopy linkAbout sharingRelated TopicsWar in UkraineImage caption, A mural of fallen Russian soldiers in SolnechnogorskBy Steve RosenbergRussia EditorAs I stood watching Russians laying flowers in memory of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, a young man shared his reaction to Mr Navalny’s death in prison.”I’m in shock,” he told me, “just like two years ago on 24 February: when the war started.”It made me think about everything that has happened in Russia these last two years, since President Putin ordered the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It is a catalogue of drama, bloodshed, tragedy.Russia’s war has brought death and destruction to Ukraine. The Russian military has suffered huge losses, too.Russian towns have been shelled and come under drone-attack;Hundreds of thousands of Russian men were drafted into the army;Wagner mercenaries mutinied and marched on Moscow. Their leader Yevgeny Prigozhin later died in a plane crash.The International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Russia’s president for alleged war crimes.Now Vladimir Putin’s most vocal critic is dead.24 February 2022 was a watershed moment. But looking back the direction of travel had been clear. It was in 2014 that Russia had annexed Crimea from Ukraine and first intervened militarily in the Donbas; Alexei Navalny had been poisoned with a nerve agent in 2020 and jailed in 2021. Domestic repression in Russia pre-dates the invasion of Ukraine, but it has accelerated since. As for Vladimir Putin, two years into this war he sounds increasingly confident and determined to defeat his enemies at home and abroad. He rails against America, Nato and the EU and presents Russia’s war in Ukraine as a war on Russia by the “collective West”, an existential battle for his country’s survival. How and when will it end? I can’t predict the future. I can, however, recall the past. In a cupboard at home recently I found a dusty folder with copies of my Russia despatches from more than 20 years ago: the early Putin years.Sifting through them, it was like reading about a different galaxy light-years away.Russia accused of executing prisoners of war in Avdiivka Is Russia turning the tide in Ukraine?”According to a recent poll, 59% of Russians support the idea of Russia joining the European Union…” I wrote on 17 May 2001.”Nato and Russia are actively seeking closer cooperation: a sign to both sides that the real threat to world peace lies not with each other…” [20 November 2001]So, where did it all go wrong? I’m not the only person wondering.Image caption, Former Nato chief Lord Robertson says Russia’s loss of superpower status “ate away” at Vladimir Putin”The Putin I met with, did good business with, established a Nato-Russia Council with, is very, very different from this almost megalomaniac at the present moment,” former Nato chief Lord Robertson told me recently when we met in London. “The man who stood beside me in May of 2002, right beside me, and said Ukraine is a sovereign and independent nation state which will make its own decisions about security, is now the man who says that [Ukraine] is not a nation state.”Lord Robertson even recalls Vladimir Putin contemplating Nato membership for Russia.”At my second meeting with Putin, he said explicitly: ‘When are you going to invite Russia to join Nato?’ I said, ‘We don’t invite countries to join Nato, they apply.’ And he said, ‘Well, we’re not going to stand in line beside a bunch of countries who don’t matter.’ Lord Robertson said he does not think that Putin really wanted to apply for Nato membership. “He wanted it presented to him, because I think he always thought – and increasingly thinks – that Russia is a great nation on the world stage and needs the respect that the Soviet Union had,” he told me. “He was never going to comfortably fit inside an alliance of equal nations, all sitting round the table debating and discussing interests of common policy.”‘Growing ego’Lord Robertson points out that the Soviet Union was once recognised as the second superpower in the world, but Russia can’t make any claims in that direction today. “I think that sort of ate away at [Putin’s] ego. Combine that with the feebleness, sometimes, of the West and in many ways the provocations that he faced, as well as his own growing ego. I think that changed the individual who wanted to cooperate with Nato into somebody who now sees Nato as a huge threat.” Moscow sees things differently. Russian officials claim it was Nato enlargement eastwards that undermined European security and led to war. They accuse Nato of breaking a promise to the Kremlin, made allegedly in the dying days of the USSR, that the alliance wouldn’t accept countries previously in Moscow’s orbit. “There was certainly nothing on paper,” Lord Robertson tells me. “There was nothing that was agreed, there was no treaty to that effect. But it was Vladimir Putin himself who signed the Rome Declaration on 28 May 2002. The same piece of paper I signed, which enshrined the basic principles of territorial integrity and non-interference in other countries. He signed that. He can’t blame anybody else.” Image caption, A war memorial in Solnechnogorsk commemorates Russians killed in the “special military operation”In the town of Solnechnogorsk, 40 miles from Moscow, the last two dramatic years of Russia’s history are on display in the park. I spot graffiti in support of the Wagner mercenary group. There are flowers in memory of Alexei Navalny. And there’s a large mural of two local men, Russian soldiers, killed in Ukraine. Painted alongside is a Youth Army cadet saluting them.In the town centre, at a memorial to those killed in World War Two and the Soviet war in Afghanistan, a new section has been added:”To soldiers killed in the special military operation.”Forty-six names are etched into stone.I ask Lidiya Petrovna, passing by with her grandson, how life has changed in two years. “Our factories are now making things we used to buy abroad. That’s good,” Lidiya says. “But I’m sad for the young men, for everyone, who’ve been killed. We certainly don’t need war with the West. Our people have seen nothing but war, war, war all their lives.” When I speak to Marina, she praises Russian soldiers she says are “doing their duty” in Ukraine. Then she looks across at her 17-year-old son Andrei. “But as a mother I’m frightened that my son will be called up to fight. I want peace as soon as possible, so that we won’t fear what comes tomorrow.”Related TopicsWar in UkraineRussiaVladimir PutinUkraineMore on this storyRussia accused of executing prisoners of war in AvdiivkaPublished2 days agoIs Russia turning the tide in Ukraine?Published5 days agoInside Ukraine’s struggle to find new men to fightPublished12 FebruaryThe Ukrainians ‘disappearing’ in Russia’s prisonsPublished10 FebruaryTop StoriesLive. Speaker Lindsay Hoyle facing calls to quit after Gaza ceasefire vote chaosRosenberg: How two years of war have changed RussiaPublished2 hours agoOur killed daughters asked for help and police failed them, say mothersPublished2 hours agoFeaturesHroza, Ukraine’s village of orphansThe Papers: ‘Fury in Commons’ and ‘King’s tears’Sahil Omar: The real story behind a fake criminalThe sacrifices key to Kenya’s late marathon legendHow AI is helping the search for extraterrestrial lifeWhy US politicians are on a pilgrimage to Taiwan’Recovering from food addiction is like walking a tiger’Olivia Colman on why sweary letters were original trollingMoment giant Antarctica drone takes off. VideoMoment giant Antarctica drone takes offElsewhere on the BBCFive geological wonders from around the worldFrom the very tip of the North Pole to the southernmost point of the AmericasAttributionBitesizeWhich classic did Elbow cover?The band join the BBC Concert Orchestra in the BBC Piano RoomAttributionSounds’We have built the world, perhaps inadvertently, for men’Philanthropist Melinda French Gates on what she’s learned from her life so farAttributionSoundsA tasty swap that could really improve our healthMichael discovers the benefits of incorporating wholegrains into our dietAttributionSoundsMost Read1Whale song mystery solved by scientists2Rosenberg: How two years of war have changed Russia3’Fury in Commons’ and ‘King’s tears’4Police force ‘failed’ women who were killed5Suspensions after ‘Israel’ crossed out on document6US hospital halts IVF after court says embryos are children7Biden’s dog bit Secret Service agents 24 times8Firms must make ‘adjustments’ for menopausal woman9Historical sites in Afghanistan ‘bulldozed for looting’10Baby loss certificates introduced in England](https://newsinsightplus.com/wp-content/uploads/https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/branded_news/664E/production/_132709162_solnechnogorskmural1.png)
