By BBC THE head of Sudan’s ruling military council, Lieutenant General Abdul Fattah al-Burhan, has met Eritrea’s President Isiaias Afwerki in the capital, Asmara. General Burhan is seeking to build up regional support for the military, which is under pressure to hand over to a civilian administration. Eritrea has already criticised the decision of the
By BBC A Kenyan MP has been charged with assault after allegedly slapping a female colleague because she did not allocate money to his constituency. Rashid Kassim is accused of slapping Fatuma Gedi – who sits on the budget committee – in the car park of the parliament building in the capital, Nairobi. He denied
BBC Nearly 100 people have been killed in an attack in a village in central Mali inhabited by the Dogon ethnic group, officials say. The attack happened in Sobame Da, near Sanga town in the Mopti region. The search for bodies is ongoing, but officials say 95 people have been found dead, with many of
BBC Sudan’s army ruler said Wednesday he was open to negotiations even as gunfire crackled across the capital after a crackdown that doctors close to protesters said left at least 60 people dead. Despite mounting international concern at what demonstrators called a “bloody massacre”, a bid at the UN Security Council to condemn the killings
AFP DR Congo’s health ministry said late on Monday that it had recorded more than 2 000 cases of Ebola, two-thirds of which had been fatal, since the disease broke out in the country’s east 10 months ago. “Since the start of the epidemic, the total number of cases stands at 2 008, of which
BBC Sudan’s military leaders say they are scrapping all existing agreements with the main opposition coalition and will hold elections within nine months. The announcement came as the military faced mounting international condemnation for their violent attack on protesters in the capital, Khartoum, which reportedly left at least 30 dead. The US said it was
BBC Nearly 150 refugees and asylum seekers have been flown from the Libyan capital, Tripoli, to the Italian capital, Rome, by the UN’s refugee agency, the UN says. Those taken are from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan and Somalia and many of them need medical attention and are suffering from malnourishment. Among those relocated are 65 children,
BBC Crowds in Kinshasa are still awaiting the arrival of the body of the father of Democratic Republic of Congo’s new president, two years after he died in Belgium. Opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi died in Brussels in February 2017 at the age of 84. But his body remained in a fridge in a morgue for
BBC South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has announced a new cabinet in which, for the first time in the country’s history, half of all ministers are women. Ramaphosa, whose African National Congress party won a general election earlier this month, has slimmed down what he called a bloated cabinet from 36 to 28 ministers. He
Times Live Violence in northwest Nigeria has forced about 20,000 refugees to flee to neighbouring Niger since April, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said on Tuesday. It voiced concern about deteriorating security conditions in the West African country, where military and police have been deployed to tackle criminal gangs behind a spate of killings and
AFP Malawi’s President Peter Mutharika on Tuesday urged opposition parties to accept the outcome of an election clouded by fraud allegations as he was sworn in for a second term. Thousands of supporters gathered at a sports stadium in Malawi’s commercial capital Blantyre to watch him take the oath of office, which had been announced
BBC Malawi’s President Peter Mutharika has been narrowly elected to a second term in office with 38.5% of the vote. The 78-year-old incumbent had faced strong competition in the 21 May election, including from his deputy. The result was announced on Monday after an injunction ordered by the country’s high court was lifted. Challenger Lazarus
AFP Five Nigerian soldiers have been killed and a number are missing after an ambush by Boko Haram’s Islamic State-backed faction, security sources said Sunday. Fighters from Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) on Friday opened fire on a column of civilian vehicles under military escort in the northeastern Borno State, according to the sources
BBC Botswana has lifted a ban on elephant hunting, citing growing conflict between humans and the animals, which at times destroy crops. Critics of the ban, imposed in 2014, say the restriction was causing problems to small farmers and to those who previously benefited from hunting. Botswana has some 130,000 elephants, the world’s largest population.
AFP People in Ebola-hit eastern Democratic Republic of Congo are struggling to come to terms with high-security burials that are part of a hard-pressed strategy to roll back the disease. Anyone who dies of the highly infectious haemorrhagic fever has to be buried in carefully-controlled conditions designed to minimise the risk of infection from body
AFP The World Health Organisation chief on Monday urged different political factions in the Democratic Republic of Congo to unite in the battle against Ebola, warning that the risk of spread “remains very high”. “Ebola does not take sides. It is the enemy of everybody,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told the opening of the
BBC Malawians are going to the polls to elect a new president in what has been described as one of the country’s most unpredictable elections. The 78-year-old incumbent, Peter Mutharika, is running for a second term, but he is being challenged by his own younger vice-president, Saulos Chilima, and the opposition leader Lazarus Chakwera. With
BBC Renewed talks have taken place between Sudan’s ruling Transitional Military Council and the opposition protest movement on the composition of a proposed sovereign authority. At a late night news conference after seven hours of talks, the Council’s spokesman, General Shamseddine Kabashi, said the two sides also discussed the terms for a three-year transition period.
BBC South Africa’s former President Jacob Zuma and representatives of French arms company Thales are due to appear in court in an attempt to have all corruption charges against them dismissed. The allegations centre on a $2.5bn ($1.96bn ) deal to modernize South Africa’s defence forces in the late 1990s in which Zuma is accused
BBC Facebook has removed hundreds of social media accounts and banned an Israeli firm due to “co-ordinated inauthentic behaviour” mainly targeting Africa. The fake accounts often posted on political news, including on elections in various countries, the firm said. Facebook has faced rising criticism for failing to stamp out misinformation on its platform. It launched
