South Africa’s ex-president loses bid to have arms deal graft charges dropped

A high court judge in South Africa on Tuesday dismissed an application by former President Jacob Zuma to end his graft trial.

Zuma together with French company, Thales, are facing charges, including corruption, money-laundering, and racketeering, that date back to a 1999 multibillion rand arms deal.

Together, they had applied to have all of them dropped, claiming that repeated delays and the death of two witnesses had irreparably…