Police and locals help firefighters attempt to put out fire that was spread by strong winds overnight
Tanzanian authorities said on Sunday that a fire on Mount Kilimanjaro was mostly under control after flames burned Africa’s tallest mountain for more than 24 hours.
The blaze began on Friday evening near the Karanga site used by climbers ascending the famous peak, at about 4,000 metres altitude on its south side.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Privilege Style causes problem for Home Office as it bows to pressure from campaigners
A charter airline hired to remove people seeking refuge in the UK to Rwanda has pulled out of the scheme after pressure from campaigners.
A plane operated by Privilege Style first attempted to fly asylum seekers to the east African country in June but was grounded by an 11th hour ruling by the European court of human rights.
Continue reading...Authorities partly blamed after months of deadly flooding in African nation; jet stream causes temperature divide in US
Nigeria has found itself at the centre of devastating floods over the past week, with poor preparation from authorities partly blamed for the damage caused. At least 600 people have died across the west African nation, with two-thirds of states affected by the disaster.
An estimated 1.3 million people have been displaced, with up to a quarter of a million homes reportedly destroyed. The floods are a culmination of months of above average rainfall, with the first floods having occurred in summer.
Continue reading...Bodies of four men, believed to be en route to South Africa, found less than a mile from where 25 bodies were exhumed in Mzimba
Authorities in Malawi have discovered four bodies in a forest close to where dozens more were found in a mass grave on Wednesday.
Police say the bodies were found yesterday morning, less than a mile from where 25 others were exhumed in Mtangatanga Forest Reserve in the northern district of Mzimba.
Continue reading...‘Rebels’ accused of setting fire to ruling party HQ during demonstrations calling for faster democratic transition
Security forces in Chad’s capital, N’Djamena, have violently dispersed banned protests calling for a quicker transition to democratic rule, leaving at least 50 dead and dozens injured, according to the country’s prime minister.
Palls of black smoke could be seen in some areas in N’Djamena and the crack of teargas grenades could be heard throughout much of the day. Several roads had been blocked with barricades and burning tyres and most shops closed their doors to avoid looting.
Continue reading...Country investigating 206 cases of kidney injury that could be linked to ingredients in liquid medicines
Indonesia has banned the sale of all syrup medicines as it investigates the deaths this year of nearly 100 children, warning that the liquids may contain ingredients linked to fatal kidney injuries.
The move comes just weeks after the World Health Organization issued an alert over four Indian-made cough syrups that it said were potentially linked with acute kidney injuries and the deaths of 70 children in the Gambia.
Continue reading...Heavy rain and rising waters continue to take a deadly toll in countries including Nigeria, Thailand and Vietnam
It has been a drenched 2022 for many parts of the world, at times catastrophically so. A year of disastrous flooding perhaps reached its nadir in Pakistan, where a third of the country was inundated by heavy rainfall from June, killing more than 1,000 people in what António Guterres, the UN secretary general, called an unprecedented natural disaster.
While floods are indeed natural phenomena, a longstanding result of storms, the human-induced climate crisis is amplifying their damage. Rising sea levels, driven by melting glaciers and the thermal expansion of water, are increasingly inundating coastal areas, while warmer temperatures are causing more moisture to accumulate in the atmosphere, which is then released as rain or snow.
Continue reading...World Health Organization welcomes country’s ‘crucial step’ in backing use of long-acting injectable cabotegravir (CAB-LA)
Zimbabwe has become the first country in Africa and the third in the world to approve an HIV prevention drug recently recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO).
Regulators in Australia and the US have already given their backing to use the long-acting injectable cabotegravir (CAB-LA), and the WHO welcomed the move by Zimbabwe.
Continue reading...Authorities alerted by villagers in Mzimba area, 250km north of capital, to site believed less than a month old
Authorities in Malawi have discovered a mass grave in the north of the country containing the remains of 25 people suspected to be migrants from Ethiopia.
“The grave was discovered late on Tuesday but we cordoned it off and started exhuming today. So far, we have discovered 25 bodies,” said a police spokesperson, Peter Kalaya.
Continue reading...In interview from capital, Saleh Kebzabo says he wants powerful rebels to join transitional government
Chad’s new prime minister has said that uniting the population “is the only way forward” for the chronically unstable African country after its president, Mahamat Idriss Déby, appointed him to head an interim national unity administration.
Saleh Kebzabo, 75, a former opposition figure and journalist, has been tasked with leading the country towards the first free and fair elections in its political history.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Mark Fullbrook said to have acted as Fathi Bashagha’s PR adviser, as officials were lobbied on foreign policy
Mark Fullbrook, the No 10 chief of staff, accompanied a controversial Libyan politician involved in an attempted military coup to a meeting in the Foreign Office to lobby officials on foreign policy, it has emerged, raising further questions over his influence.
Labour has said Fullbrook’s position as Liz Truss’s most senior official is “untenable” after it was revealed that he facilitated unofficial meetings in June with senior cabinet ministers for Fathi Bashagha, a Libyan politician. Bashagha, who is seeking international support as a rival prime minister, has links to the Russian Wagner Group and a military strongman in the east of the country.
Continue reading...Telecoms entrepreneur says continent’s people should be allowed to use their vast reserves
One of Africa’s richest entrepreneurs, the telecoms billionaire Mo Ibrahim, has criticised developed countries for seeking to dissuade African nations from exploiting their vast reserves of gas.
Ibrahim told the Guardian in an interview: “We need a balanced and a fair policy for everybody. Gas can be useful to our transition … [Those who say otherwise] are hypocrites.”
Continue reading...Exclusive: halt to production of Shanchol vaccine alarms WHO amid ‘unprecedented’ global outbreaks
The manufacturer of one of only two cholera vaccines for use in humanitarian emergencies is to halt production at the end of this year, just as the world faces an “unprecedented” series of deadly outbreaks, the Guardian has learned.
Shantha Biotechnics, a wholly owned Indian subsidiary of the French pharmaceutical company Sanofi, will stop production of its Shanchol vaccine within months and cease supply by the end of 2023, causing alarm among health officials.
Continue reading...Eritrean woman, 28, in acute distress having spent most of her life in search of safety
A heavily pregnant rape survivor from Eritrea has been threatened with forced removal to Rwanda by the Home Office.
Human rights campaigners say it is the “most egregious” case they have come across so far in the government’s scheme to outsource the processing of UK asylum claims to the east African country.
Continue reading...Culture minister says UK institution ‘should learn from what has happened’ as Smithsonian returns 29 Benin artefacts
The culture minister of Nigeria has urged the British Museum to follow the example of the Smithsonian Institution, which on Tuesday returned ownership of 29 Benin bronzes to Nigeria at a celebratory event in Washington.
Lai Mohammed praised the move by the US National Museum of African Art, which follows a recent restitution agreement with Germany that included the handover of two Benin bronzes. Last year, Mohammed’s ministry formally requested the return of Benin artefacts from the British Museum in London.
Continue reading...Urgent aid response needed as climate crisis, Covid, local conflicts and soaring fuel prices push millions more into hunger
• ‘We need urgent help’: Somalis displaced by drought and famine fight to survive
Decades of work to reduce hunger in Africa are being reversed as the continent struggles to cope with conflict, climate crisis and the global economic downturn, the UN’s Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) has warned.
About 278 million people in Africa – approximately one-fifth of the total population – went hungry in 2021, an increase of 50 million people since 2019, according to UN figures. Based on current trends, this is projected to rise to 310 million by 2030.
Continue reading...Britain is no longer the key humanitarian player and ‘great ally’ it once was, says envoy trying to get support for Somalia’s drought
The UK has lost its leadership role in the world and is letting down its allies, a senior official in the Somali government has said.
Abdirahman Abdishakur Warsame, the presidential envoy for Somalia’s drought response, said Britain used to be second only to the US as a key player in international forums and advocacy, but has since slipped, saying that countries such as Somalia were being left without support to face “the new climate reality”.
Continue reading...Witnesses claim the attacks in Amhara region last month were carried out on those the TPLF suspected of supporting Ethiopian federal forces
Tigrayan rebel forces have killed dozens of civilians during their latest occupation of a town in the Amhara region, survivors claim, after fighting resumed last month in the northern area of Ethiopia.
The alleged killings took place in the town of Kobo, located along the highway to the capital, Addis Ababa. Between 13-15 September, Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) fighters shot dead unarmed civilians they suspected of supporting federal forces and local militias, survivors have told the Guardian.
Continue reading...Vessel capsized in Ogbaru area of Anambra state, one of 29 to have experienced heavy flooding this year
The death toll from a boat accident in Nigeria’s south-eastern state of Anambra has risen to 76, the president has said.
The vessel capsized on Friday amid heavy flooding in the Ogbaru area of Anambra, according to officials on Saturday, when they said at least 10 people had died and 60 were missing.
Continue reading...Kunti Kamara charged with torture, cannibalism and complicity in crimes against humanity during civil war between 1989 and 1996
A former Liberian rebel commander will go on trial in Paris on Monday charged with acts of barbarity including torture, cannibalism, forced labour and complicity in crimes against humanity during the country’s first civil war more than 25 years ago.
It is the first trial in France of a non-Rwandan suspect accused of wartime atrocities since the special crimes against humanity tribunal was set up in Paris in 2012.
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