Category Archives: Africa

Cop27: Egyptian hosts urge leaders to set aside tensions over Ukraine

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Organisers call on nations to carry on crucial climate negotiations despite differences on geopolitical issues

The Egyptian hosts of the next UN climate summit have issued a plea for countries to set aside tensions and animosity over the Ukraine war for the sake of focusing on the climate crisis.

Egypt will host the Cop27 conference in Sharm El-Sheikh in November, intended as a forum for companies to fulfil the promises they made at the landmark Cop26 summit in Glasgow last year.

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Saudi foreign minister defends role in securing Ukraine prisoner swaps

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Prince Faisal bin Farhan al Saud decries as ‘cynical’ accusations his country was trying to improve its image after Khashoggi killing

It would be cynical to see Saudi Arabia’s efforts to secure the release of international prisoners held by Russian proxies in Ukraine as an attempt to improve the country’s image after the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, its foreign minister has said.

Prince Faisal bin Farhan al Saud said on Friday that Riyadh had first approached the UK government in April, shortly after Aiden Aslin, a British citizen, and others were captured at Mariupol, and had acted for compassionate reasons, hoping to negotiate their release.

This story was amended on Friday 23 September 2022 to correct the name of the Saudi foreign minister.

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‘Humanitarian crime’: fighting cuts off insulin supply in Tigray

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International Diabetic Federation decries reports ongoing war has led to shortages of life-saving drug at Ethiopian region’s biggest hospital

Doctors at the biggest hospital in Tigray say they have just days supply left of insulin, as the resumption of fighting between rebels and Ethiopian government troops once again cuts off supplies to the region.

In what the head of the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) has branded “a humanitarian crime,” medics at Ayder specialist referral hospital warn they have already run out of one kind of the life-saving medicine and have only a week’s supply of another.

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Church of England bars Desmond Tutu’s daughter from officiating at funeral

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Church says same-sex marriage means Mpho Tutu van Furth cannot preside over godfather’s service

The daughter of the late Anglican archbishop Desmond Tutu has been barred by the Church of England from officiating at her godfather’s funeral in a Shropshire church because she is married to a woman.

Mpho Tutu van Furth, an ordained priest in the Anglican church, was invited to preside over the funeral of Martin Kenyon, who died last week at the age of 92. The C of E said its actions were “in line with the House of Bishops current guidance on same-sex marriage”.

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Horn of Africa drought puts 3.6m children at risk of dropping out of school

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Experts warn that girls’ education will be worst hit, as many families are forced to move away from schools

More than 3.5 million children are at risk of dropping out of school due to the drought in the Horn of Africa, the United Nations has said, amid warnings the crisis could lead to “a lost generation” that misses out on education.

According to new figures shared with the Guardian, Unicef now estimates that 3.6 million children in Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia are in danger of leaving school as a result of the cumulative pressure on households caused by the unrelenting drought.

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Tigrayan forces accuse Eritrea of launching full-scale offensive on border

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Tigray People’s Liberation Front says Eritreans are fighting alongside Ethiopian government forces

Forces in Ethiopia’s Tigray region said troops from neighbouring Eritrea launched a “full-scale offensive” on Tuesday and heavy fighting was ongoing in several areas along the border.

Reuters was not immediately able to verify the account on Twitter from Getachew Reda, a spokesperson for the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF).

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Ukraine war to take centre stage at UN as west and Russia vie for support

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The general assembly is expected to see fresh tussles over future of Ukraine, as well as the threats of famine and the climate crisis in the global south

The UN general assembly summit this week will be dominated by a struggle – between the US and its allies on one side and Russia on the other – for global support over the fate of Ukraine, as the global south fights to stop the conflict from overshadowing the existential threats of famine and the climate crisis.

With a return to fully in-person general debate, presidents and prime ministers will be converging on New York, many of them direct from London, where the diplomacy got underway on the sidelines of the Queen’s funeral.

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Equatorial Guinea abolishes death penalty, state television reports

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President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo signs new penal code for central African country

Equatorial Guinea, one of the world’s most authoritarian countries, has abolished the death penalty, according to state television, which cited a new law signed by President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo.

Capital punishment was “totally abolished” in the oil-rich central African country after the president signed a new penal code, the vice-president tweeted on Monday.

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Nigeria battling worst floods in a decade with more than 300 people killed in 2022

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Floods have affected half a million people, including 100,000 displaced, Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency says

Nigeria is battling its worst floods in a decade with more than 300 people killed in 2022 including at least 20 this week, as authorities said the situation is “beyond our control.”

The floods in 27 of Nigeria’s 36 states and capital city have affected half a million people, including 100,000 displaced and more than 500 injured, Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency said.

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‘End of an era’: how the Queen’s funeral was seen around the world

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From Melbourne to Paris, New York to Delhi, the solemn events in London resonated around the globe

As the doors to Westminster Abbey opened to allow guests to take their seats, across the other side of the world, Australians sat down in front of their TVs to watch the historic event.

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India reintroduces cheetahs to wild after big cats airlifted from Namibia

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PM Narendra Modi to welcome the eight animals amid fears that they may struggle with Kuno national park habitat or clash with leopards

Eight Namibian cheetahs have been airlifted to India, part of an ambitious project to reintroduce the big cats after they were driven to extinction there decades ago, officials and vets said.

The wild cheetahs were moved by road from a game park north of the Namibian capital of Windhoek on Friday to board a chartered Boeing 747 dubbed “Cat plane” for an 11-hour flight.

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Libyan militia detains hundreds of Chadians after poachers arrested

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At least 400 Chadian workers rounded up in east Libyan town of Ajdabiya after security forces in Chad arrest four Libyan poachers

Hundreds of Chadians are being rounded up and detained on the streets of a Libyan town for a ninth day in retaliation for the Chad government’s arrest of four Libyan men on suspicion of poaching endangered animals.

At least 400 people have now been arrested in the city of Ajdabiya by a militia linked to the warlord Khalifa Haftar, commander of the self-styled Libyan National Army.

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Lenders urged to cancel Zambia debt as country faces economic collapse

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Economists accuse bondholders of standing to make huge profits at the expense of the crisis-hit country

More than 100 economists and academics have urged international lenders to crisis-stricken Zambia to write off a significant slice of their loans during financial restructuring talks this month.

Zambia is seeking up to $8.4bn (£7.3bn) in debt relief from major lenders, including private funds run by the world’s largest investment manager, BlackRock, to help put its public finances back in order.

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Extreme hunger soaring in world’s climate hotspots, says Oxfam

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Charity says 19 million people facing starvation in report highlighting link with extreme weather

Extreme hunger is closely linked to the climate crisis, with many areas of the world most affected by extreme weather experiencing severe food shortages, research has shown.

The development charity Oxfam examined 10 of the world’s worst climate hotspots, afflicted by drought, floods, severe storms and other extreme weather, and found their rates of extreme hunger had more than doubled in the past six years.

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Campaigners call for climate crisis global day of action during Cop27

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Groups urge action during the talks in Egypt to demand climate justice for Africa and the global south

Civil society groups around the world are calling for a global day of action on the climate catastrophe, to urge governments to cut greenhouse gas emissions and shift to a low-carbon economy.

The day of action will take place on Saturday 12 November, at the mid-point of the Cop27 UN climate talks, which run from 6 to 18 November in Sharm el-Sheikh, hosted by the Egyptian government.

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Kidnapped New Orleans nun details harrowing ordeal: ‘Prayer sustained me’

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The former school principal was abducted during a medical mission in Bukina Faso in a case that drew international attention

A Catholic nun from New Orleans who was kidnapped while working in western Africa, contracted malaria as she was held for nearly five months and was ultimately freed, said reciting prayers helped her survive her ordeal.

“Prayer sustained me,” Suellen Tennyson, 83 and a former principal of a Catholic elementary school, told the in-house newspaper of the New Orleans archdiocese. “That was the thing that kept me going because I had nothing.”

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Prosecutors urged to examine French role in Egyptian airstrikes on civilians

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NGOs want investigation into border counter-terrorism operation that allegedly ended up bombing suspected smugglers

Two international NGOs have asked French prosecutors and the UN to investigate the French state’s involvement in Egypt allegedly committing crimes against humanity in a secret military operation on the Egyptian-Libyan border.

A 2021 leak appeared to show how French officers complained they were being asked to facilitate Egyptian airstrikes, codenamed Operation Sirli, on the Egyptian-Libyan border, even though the original counter-terrorism purpose had been subverted by the Egyptian military into taking out vehicles containing nothing more than contraband. Dozens are estimated to have been killed or injured.

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‘A brutal legacy’: Queen’s death met with anger as well as grief in Kenya

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Politicians pay warm tributes but memories of colonial atrocities prompt fierce criticism too

In 1952, the then Princess Elizabeth was on a royal tour with Prince Philip at Treetops lodge in Kenya. Unknown to them at the time, she would receive news of her father’s death during that visit, and the forest lodge would long be remembered as the place where Britain’s longest-serving monarch “went to sleep a princess and awoke a queen”.

Just two years after her visit, the Mau Mau, Kenyan freedom fighters opposed to British colonial rule, burned the lodge down. It was rebuilt in 1957, and older residents who live along the long and winding path to the lodge remembered her second visit to the area in 1983 fondly, saying it had placed their neighbourhood on the map. But Treetops was not open for the end of the Queen’s life. It closed its doors last year after a dive in tourism during the pandemic forced it out of business.

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Ban Bain & Co from US government contracts, Joe Biden is urged

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Exclusive: Labour peer calls on US president to follow UK in banning firm over misconduct in South Africa

Joe Biden should follow the UK in banning the global management consultancy firm Bain & Company from future government contracts, the Labour peer Peter Hain has said.

In a letter shared with the Guardian, the former minister and anti-apartheid campaigner urged the US president to “act on this matter and establish a clear precedent that will signal to all US global companies, consultancies, lawyers, auditors and financial advisers that collusion with corrupt politicians and their business cronies in other countries will not be tolerated”.

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More than 20 people die after bus crashes and catches fire in Nigeria

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Police blamed the accident, in which passengers burned to death, on speeding and reckless driving

At least 20 passengers burned to death when a bus collided with another vehicle and caught fire in south-west Nigeria, police and an official have said.

The accident at Lanlate in the Ibarapa area of Oyo state on Friday, is the latest road crash in the vast west African nation of 210 million people.

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