The lions, which live on the edge of the national park, will be moved to avoid conflicts with people and livestock
Tanzania will find a new home for 36 lions following a slew of attacks by the big cats on people and cattle.
The lions, an increasingly endangered species, live on the edge of the safari mecca of the Serengeti national park, but have been affected by encroaching human activity.
Continue reading...Stella Nyanzi, imprisoned in Uganda after writing poem about president’s mother’s vagina, lambasts regime’s ‘fear of writers’
The Ugandan academic, writer and feminist activist Dr Stella Nyanzi, imprisoned for criticising the country’s president, has been awarded the Oxfam Novib/PEN International award for freedom of expression.
Nyanzi has been in Luzira women’s prison in Kampala, the capital, for nearly 15 months after writing a poem about President Yoweri Museveni’s mother’s vagina. The poem uses the metaphor of her vagina and Museveni’s birth to criticise his near 35-year rule.
Continue reading...£395m trade boost is aimed at countering China’s spending on the continent
Britain has unveiled plans to channel part of the £14bn aid budget through the City as it seeks to exploit the global reach of the finance sector to boost investment in Africa.
Details of the £395m package were announced by the international development secretary, Alok Sharma, ahead of a high-level UK-Africa investment summit next Monday.
Continue reading...Women and children bear brunt as drought and extreme weather leave tens of millions short of food
Southern Africa is in the throes of a climate emergency, with hunger levels in the region on a previously unseen scale, the UN has warned.
Years of drought, widespread flooding and economic disarray have left 45 million people facing severe food shortages, with women and children bearing the brunt of the crisis, said the World Food Programme (WFP).
Continue reading...Researchers predict worldwide turmoil will continue in 2020, with Venezuela, Iran and Libya at greatest risk
A quarter of all countries experienced a dramatic surge in civil unrest last year in a worrying trend that is likely to continue into 2020, researchers have found.
Verisk Maplecroft, a leading risk analysis and strategic forecasting company, said in a report published on Thursday that 47 countries experienced a significant rise in the number of protests over the course of the past year. Hong Kong, Chile, Nigeria, Sudan, Haiti and Lebanon were among the states affected.
Continue reading...Investment in health and education and an end to early marriage could transform Africa’s most populous country
If you want a window on the condition of children in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, there is no better vantage point than the Katanga health centre in the impoverished northern state of Jigawa.
In a hut that passes for a nutrition clinic, a group of 25 women wait with their children. Tiny bodies bearing the hallmarks of acute malnutrition – distended stomachs and twig-thin limbs – are lifted into a weighing harness and their arms measured to check for signs of wasting. Ali, who has just reached his first birthday, weighs only 5kg – the average age of a two-month-old in the UK. His mother is 14.
Continue reading...Whistleblower granted refugee status after hard-won campaign against deportation
A torture survivor from Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is celebrating after a Home Office U-turn allowed him to stay in the UK.
Otis Bolamu, 39, who lives in Swansea, was detained just before Christmas in 2018. The Home Office had planned to deport him to DRC on Christmas Day that year.
Continue reading...Health and climate concerns are behind the growth of plant-based diets which were once prevalent on the continent
In the meat-loving capital of Burkina Faso, customers at a small roadside joint eat bean balls, grilled tofu skewers and peanut butter rice while a report about chickens unfit for consumption being dumped on the street airs on the midday news.
A sign above the door proudly welcomes customers: “Vegetarian restaurant Nasa. Food for the love of health.” In Ouagadougou’s first plant-based restaurant, there are no knives on the tables.
Continue reading...By providing free school meals to some of the poorest children on Earth, a UK charity is also ensuring they get an education
It’s breakfast time in Domagbamatma (population: 63) in the depths of the Liberian rainforest, but there’s no food in evidence in the home of Massa Kamara. The eight-year-old has been up since dawn, collecting firewood, fetching water.
Now she’s ready for school in a crisp white shirt and navy-blue skirt in her family’s muddy, two-room shack.
Continue reading...General had been in Russian capital seeking deal with head of Libya’s UN-recognised government
Libya’s eastern strongman Gen Khalifa Haftar has left Moscow without signing a ceasefire agreement to end nine months of fighting in the country, leaving the future of a fragile truce uncertain..
The commander’s abrupt departure in the early hours of Tuesday was a setback for an international diplomatic push in recent days, though Moscow insisted it would continue mediation efforts.
Continue reading...Irrigation systems and oases in the arid south are failing to keep up with the demands of thirsty palm plantations
Mansour Rajeb is wrapping a plastic protective sheet around the branch of a date palm in his oasis near the village of Bchelli, in southern Tunisia. Tying it up, he lingers.
“I’m worried,” he says. “The quality is getting worse. The dates are getting drier.”
Continue reading...Lawyers move to make headway with inquiry into accusations of police abuses during post-election violence
A group of lawyers in Malawi is taking legal action against the police for failing to investigate allegations of rape against their officers during post-election protests.
Mphatso Iphani, a spokesperson for the Women Lawyers Association of Malawi, said that three months since the alleged attacks, “no concrete action has been taken, despite the sheer amount of evidence that the girls and women were assaulted”.
Continue reading...Circumstances of deaths raise concerns about pressure on gathering and departure facilities
The fatal shooting of two Eritrean men in Libya has raised concerns about overcrowding in UN facilities for refugees there.
The pair were reportedly killed in Tripoli last Thursday, days after the UN refugee agency had pressed them to leave a so-called gathering and departure facility (GDF).
Continue reading...Warring sides also plan to deploy more troops despite Russian-Turkish brokered deal
A Russian-Turkish brokered ceasefire between the two warring groups in Libya was struggling to take hold in Tripoli as both sides accused the other of breaches and laid out plans to mobilise more forces.
In a breakthrough on Saturday, both sides in the civil war – the UN-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA), based in Tripoli, and the Libyan National Army (LNA) forces led from the east of Libya by Gen Khalifa Haftar – agreed to a ceasefire proposed last week by Russia and Turkey.
Continue reading...The International Festival of Porto-Novo is the capital’s annual celebration of Benin’s cultural diversity. The theme of this year’s festival is Ogoun, one of the spiritual entities of the voodoo religion
Continue reading...Murchison Falls is a magnet for tourism but energy projects, not least a possible dam, threaten the wildlife haven
Along the road that takes you into Murchison Falls national park, animals once roamed freely. Narrow roads provided the perfect environment for them, so “they [didn’t] feel like they are in a foreign land”, says tour operator Everest Kayondo.
But not any more. The park’s lush forest is being uprooted and red trucks and yellow diggers stand ready to pave the road – and the way for new energy projects.
Continue reading...Claims lodged in high court in Belfast on behalf of victims of bombings in Northern Ireland
A fresh attempt to sue Libya for supplying the IRA with the plastic explosive Semtex during the Troubles is being launched by victims and the bereaved in Northern Ireland.
Claims have been lodged with the high court in Belfast on Thursday on behalf of two men who are seeking compensation respectively for the 1993 Shankill Road bombing and a blast on the Falls Road, west Belfast, in 1988.
Continue reading...Erdoğan and Putin make call for ceasefire, as Italian PM hosts Libyan factions in Rome
An unprecedented drive involving Europe, Russia and Turkey has been launched to broker a Libyan ceasefire, and end the risk of the country collapsing into total all-out war.
However, it is unclear to which extent the joint Russian-Turkish call for a ceasefire by 12 January should be seen as complementary or in competition to an intensified Italian-led European push to end the fighting.
Continue reading...Railway operator apologises for delay of more than 24 hours to Johannesburg-Cape Town train
South Africa’s state-owned rail operator has apologised after passengers were left stranded for more than a day on a train from Johannesburg to Cape Town.
Shosholoza Meyl said the train, which departed on Sunday, was scheduled to arrive in Cape Town on Monday evening. It is now expected to arrive late on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Venezuela also in top five as IRC’s David Miliband warns of devastating impact from war, floods, droughts and disease
Yemen has topped an annual watchlist of countries most likely to face humanitarian catastrophe in 2020, for the second year running.
Continued fighting, economic collapse and weak governance mean that more than 24 million Yemenis – about 80% of the population – will be in need of humanitarian assistance this year, according to analysis by the International Rescue Committee (IRC), which found that another five years of conflict could cost $29bn (£22bn).
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