LOS ANGELES (Al Jazeera) – Lawyers for the five-year-old son of a man who died in the United States after Los Angeles police repeatedly shocked him with a stun gun have filed a $50mn claim for damages against the city. The claim is required before Keenan Anderson’s son can sue the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) for civil rights violations after officers Tasered his father six times in less than a minute to subdue him on January 3. “He was a flower just beginning to bloom, but the LAPD unfortunately was a hammer,” the family’s lawyer, Carl Douglas, said at a news conference announcing the case. “They treated that flower like it was a nail.” The claim was filed on Friday on behalf of Anderson’s son, Syncere Kai Anderson, who stood with his mother, Gabrielle Hansell, alongside their lawyers. Anderson – a 31-year-old high school English teacher in Washington, DC, and cousin of Patrisse Cullors, co-founder of the Black Lives Matter movement – was a suspect in a hit-and-run traffic collision in Venice, California, on the U.S. west coast. Police said he ran from officers and resisted arrest. Anderson screamed for help after he was pinned to the street by officers, according to a video released by the LAPD. “They’re trying to kill me,” Anderson yelled. Footage showed an officer pressing his forearm onto Anderson’s chest and an elbow into his neck.

***
MWANZA (AFP) – Tanzania’s main opposition party held Saturday its first mass rally since the lifting of a ban imposed in 2016, raising hopes the government is committed to increased political freedom in the East African nation. “It was not easy after those seven years of banning political meetings,” the director for communications and foreign affairs for the Chadema party, Jon Mrema, told cheering supporters. Thousands of Chadema supporters gathered at the Furahisha grounds in the lakeside city of Mwanza, draped in the party’s blue, red and white colors. “We have been silent for almost seven years but finally, our right is restored and we are ready to move ahead,” Mwanza resident and party supporter Mary Dismas said. President Samia Suluhu Hassan this month lifted the ban introduced by her hard-line predecessor John Magufuli, who was nicknamed “Bulldozer” for his uncompromising leadership style. The government’s change of heart comes as Hassan, in power for 22 months, seeks to break with some of Magufuli’s policies. The move was cautiously welcomed as a gain for democracy by rights groups and the country’s opposition parties. Magufuli had banned political rallies early in his tenure, saying it was time for work, not politics. But critics said the ban applied only to opposition groups, with the ruling party free to assemble, and rival gatherings were violently broken up by police and their officials jailed.

***
BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) — Brazil’s government has declared a public health emergency for the Yanomami people in the Amazon who are suffering from malnutrition and diseases such as malaria as a consequence of illegal mining. The decree, signed by Health Minister Nisia Trindade late Friday, has no expiration date and allows for hiring extra personnel. It determines that the team in charge has to publish reports regarding the Indigneous group’s health and general well-being. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva also created a multiministerial committee, to be coordinated by his chief of staff, for an initial period of 90 days. He is traveling to Roraima state’s capital, Boa Vista, where many ill Yanomami have been admitted to specialized hospitals. The Yanomami are the largest native group in Brazil, with a population of around 30,000 that lives in an area larger than 9 million hectares (22 million acres), in the northern area of the Amazon rainforest, close to the border with Venezuela.

***
WELLINGTON (AP) – Education Minister Chris Hipkins is set to become New Zealand’s next prime minister after he was the only candidate to enter the contest Saturday to replace Jacinda Ardern. Hipkins, 44, must still garner an endorsement from his Labour Party colleagues, but that is just a formality now. An official transfer of power will come in the days to follow. “It’s a big day for a boy from the Hutt,” Hipkins said, referring to the Hutt Valley near Wellington where he grew up. “I’m really humbled and really proud to be taking this on. It is the biggest responsibility and the biggest privilege of my life.” Ardern shocked the nation of 5 million people on Thursday when she announced she was resigning after five-and-a-half years in the top role. The lack of other candidates indicated party lawmakers had rallied behind Hipkins to avoid a drawn-out contest and any sign of disunity following Ardern’s departure. Hipkins will have only a little more than eight months in the role before contesting a general election. Opinion polls have indicated that Labour is trailing its main opponent, the conservative National Party.

***
BEIJING (AP) – More bodies have been found following an avalanche that buried vehicles outside a highway tunnel in Tibet, raising the death toll to 28, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV reported. Images from the scene at the exit of the tunnel connecting the city of Nyingchi in Tibet’s southwest with an outlying county showed about half a dozen backhoes digging through deep snow. Reports said around 1,000 rescuers had joined the effort. Tons of snow and ice collapsed onto the mouth of the tunnel on Tuesday evening, trapping drivers in their vehicles. Many of the people were headed home for China’s Lunar New Year holiday, which starts Sunday. Nyingchi lies at an elevation of nearly 10,000 feet (3,048 meters), about a five-hour drive from the regional capital, Lhasa, along a highway that opened in 2018.

***
NEW DELHI (Al Jazeera) – Top Indian wrestlers have called off a protest near the parliament building following a government assurance that an inquiry into their allegations of sexual harassment of young athletes by the federation would be completed in four weeks. The wrestlers and their nearly 200 supporters held a sit-in protest for three days at Jantar Mantar in the capital, New Delhi, accusing the federation president of sexually and mentally harassing young female athletes. They had sought the immediate removal of Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) President Brijbhushan Sharan Singh and some other officials pending inquiry against them. Singh, who is also an MP of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, earlier dismissed the allegations as a political ploy to usurp his position and told media he was “ready to be hanged” if even any female wrestler proved the sexual harassment charge.