Liverpool has made history by choosing the UK’s first directly elected black female mayor and the first woman to lead the city. The election of Joanne Anderson was one of the few good news stories for Labour on Friday. Anderson, 50, beat Stephen Yip, an independent, while the Conservative candidate, Katie Burgess, lost her deposit. Anderson won 59% of the total votes (46,493 to Yip’s 32,079), although the race went to second preferences for the first time in its history.

In her victory speech, the 6ft-tall leftwing socialist apologised to the people of the city for the political scandal that had erupted last December when the former mayor, Joe Anderson (no relation), was arrested over corruption claims, leading to a damning emergency inspection of the council. He has denied any wrongdoing, but stood aside from the mayoral race.

Joanne Anderson promised to put the city on “a restorative path” and said she wanted Liverpool to have “the best accountability and transparency structures in the country”. Describing herself as “scouse and proud”, she said she was honoured to be the first black woman in the role. “Liverpool has always been a city of firsts – one that does things differently and that charters its own path. Today, we made history”.

When she was chosen as Labour’s candidate, Anderson spoke of growing up in Thatcher’s Britain in the 80s, feeling as though she was “the bottom of the pile” and “wouldn’t amount to much” and has promised to make politics more inclusive. Her historic appointment may be short-lived, however, as she has has said she would campaign to scrap the mayoralty.

A referendum will be held in 2023 on the continuation of the role.

Anderson, who served as a councillor for two years, has said she was reluctant to get into politics. Describing her decision to put herself forward last month, she said: “It hasn’t been a lifelong ambition, but I could see our city was in peril”. However, she did grow up in a political environment, raised by a “fiesty” single mother who, she said, once locked some political figures in a cupboard “for not doing as they were told”.

Anderson, who has one son, says she will make violence against women and girls a personal priority. She prides herself on her forthright manner, and speaks openly about having been declared bankrupt twice, in 2003 and 2019. She believes many Liverpudlians will identify with her situation, particularly after the pandemic: “It’s actually quite hard to live without getting into debt”.

She worked as a freelance equality and diversity consultant, including for the CPS for 10 years, at a time when Keir Starmer was director of public prosecution.

Simon Woolley, the founder and director of Operation Black Vote, described her victory as “a truly historic win on so many levels”, pointing to the significance of Liverpool, once a major slave port, being run by a black woman.

Yip, her opponent, is founder of the children’s charity Kind and stood on a platform of reforming the local authority, including a big reduction in the number of councillors. By Maya Wolfe-Robinson, Guardian/Yahoo News

Turkish Ambassador to Rwanda Burcu Cevik (right) after handing over the donation to Sheik Salim Hitimana, Mufti of Rwanda (left)

The Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TIKA) on Wednesday delivered aid packages for needy families in Rwanda.

According to a statement by Turkey's Embassy in Kigali, a total of 1,000 families benefited from the assistance of TIKA.

Food packages were handed over and hygiene items essential amid the COVID-19 pandemic were given to the people. - Gokhan Kavak/Ali Murat Alhas, Anadolu Agency

French lead prosecutor Remy Heitz said Monday that the investigations carried out by the French government could not prove direct involvement of French troops in the Rwandan genocide and asked the investigating magistrates to drop the case.

The investigation centers on the 991-page report that was published by the Research Commission on the French Archives relating to Rwanda and the Tutsi genocide, known as the Duclert Commission. In March, the Duclert Commission’s report found that France was not complicit in the Rwandan genocide, but that France bears responsibility for its failure to act. Although the report cleared France of complicity with the massacre of 800,000 people, the report said, “France was involved with a regime that encouraged racist massacres. It remained blind to the preparation of a genocide by the most radical elements of this regime.”

The investigation targets five French military officers who were involved with the UN-backed Operation Turquoise. At this time, no charges have been brought by the investigating magistrates and, with Heitz’s recommendation to drop the claims, it is likely that the case will be dropped. In a statement, Heitz said that the Duclert report “did not make it possible to establish that the French forces could have been guilty of the crimes of complicity in genocide and crimes against humanity,” and that the inquiry failed to establish the existence of any “help or assistance from the French military forces during the carrying out of the atrocities.”

Although the Duclert Commission found that France was not complicit in the genocide, the complementary report issued by the Rwandan government and prepared by Robert Muse of the US-based law firm Levy Firestone Muse found that French political interests in Africa were directly responsible for France’s complacency and failure to take action in the early days of the Rwandan genocide. The Muse report found that “the effect of the French presence in Rwanda and its conscious indifference to Tutsi suffering was to create a sense of impunity amongst the perpetrators that would grow and find its fullness in the Genocide.”

The claims were originally brought in December of 2005 by human rights activists and survivors of the genocide. The final decision for whether the claims will be dropped is at the discretion of the French investigating magistrates. - Robert Kaufman | U. Pittsburgh School of Law, US / JURIST