Category Archives: Africa

Uganda jails hundreds of men for sex offences against women and girls

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Campaigners applaud move to curb gender-based violence after courts hold special sessions to clear backlog of cases

Hundreds of men in Uganda have been jailed for sexual offences against girls and women during a month of special court sessions to clear a backlog of cases.

Between November and December last year, 414 men and nine women were found guilty during 13 trials held in selected courts in 13 districts around the country, according to the justice, law and order sector, a body that brings together government ministries working on legal matters.

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State projects leave tens of thousands of lives in the balance in Ethiopia – study

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Giant dam and irrigated sugar plantations mean people in lower Omo valley face starvation and conflict, says US thinktank

A giant dam and irrigated sugar plantations are “wreaking havoc” in southern Ethiopia and threaten to wipe out tens of thousands of indigenous peoples , a US-based thinktank has claimed.

The Oakland Institute says that while the Ethiopian government has made considerable progress on human rights under prime minister Abiy Ahmed, it has yet to address the impact of state development plans on indigenous populations in the lower Omo valley, where people face loss of livelihoods, starvation, and violent conflict .

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Two Canadian women abducted in Ghana rescued by security forces

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Eight people arrested in connection with kidnapping of Lauren Tilley and Bailey Chitty, authorities say

Security forces have rescued two Canadian women who were abducted in Ghana earlier this month and arrested eight people in connection with their kidnapping, authorities said on Wednesday.

The pair were named as Lauren Tilley and Bailey Chitty by Youth Challenge International, an international development organisation headquartered in Toronto.

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US fought for right to launch fresh case against two Rwandans accepted by Australia

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Exclusive: court documents show US attorney wanted to be able to prosecute pair again for ‘horrendous’ crime, before they came to Australia in refugee swap deal

Two Rwandans accepted into Australia were accused of crimes so “grave” and “horrendous” that the United States fought for the right to prosecute them a second time, court documents show.

The Australian government sparked controversy last month for accepting two Rwandan militants previously accused of murdering tourists in targeted 1999 attacks in the Bwindi Impenetrable national park in Uganda.

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Botswana scraps laws criminalising gay sex in landmark ruling

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Major victory for LGBT rights campaigners after judges rule laws are unconstitutional

High court judges in Botswana have ruled that laws criminalising same-sex relations are unconstitutional and should be struck down, in a major victory for gay rights campaigners in Africa.

Jubilant activists in the packed courtroom cheered the unanimous decision, which came a month after a setback in Kenya when a court rejected an attempt to repeal similar colonial-era laws.

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Pragmatism and ideology drive Kremlin’s interest in Africa

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Attempts to make Africa a zone of influence recall Soviet-era activity on the continent

In spring 2018 a group of foreigners flew to Madagascar. They had not come to see the island’s lemurs or wildlife. The visitors were undercover Russian political consultants. Their mission was to help Madagascar’s ruling president Hery Rajaonarimampianina – or “piano”, as they named him for reasons of brevity – to win re-election.

The plan did not work. Last November the incumbent president failed to make it into a run-off vote. Other Russian-supported candidates did badly. Late in the day Moscow threw its support behind the eventual winner, Andry Rajoelina, who has denied receiving any Russian assistance or money. But after six months on the ground the operatives who arrived on tourist visas went home with little to show for their efforts.

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Leaked documents reveal Russian effort to exert influence in Africa

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Exclusive: Kremlin ally Yevgeny Prigozhin leading push to turn continent into strategic hub, documents show

Russia is seeking to bolster its presence in at least 13 countries across Africa by building relations with existing rulers, striking military deals, and grooming a new generation of “leaders” and undercover “agents”, leaked documents reveal.

The mission to increase Russian influence on the continent is being led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a businessman based in St Petersburg who is a close ally of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. One aim is to “strong-arm” the US and the former colonial powers the UK and France out of the region. Another is to see off “pro-western” uprisings, the documents say.

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Lights out: the price hikes leaving millions of South Africans in the dark | Kimon de Greef

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Electricity costs have tripled in the past decade under a utility company plagued by debt and corruption claims, wiping out decades of progress

Electricity, when it arrived in Nosisi Rasmeni’s life, seemed to promise a better future.

Like most black South Africans who grew up during apartheid, she was raised with gas stoves, candles and paraffin heaters. Her family’s shack was poorly lit and smelled of fumes. “Electricity was only for whites,” says Rasmeni, 37.

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Sudanese doctors say dozens of people raped during sit-in attack

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Hospitals in Khartoum record more than 70 cases of rape in aftermath of attack on protest

Doctors believe paramilitaries carried out more than 70 rapes during an attack on a protest camp in Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, a week ago.

More than 100 people were killed and as many as 700 injured in the attack last Monday on a sit-in and clashes afterwards, as paramilitaries from the Rapid Support Forces spread through the city to quell sporadic unrest.

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Scores killed in attack on Malian village

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Mayor says 95 bodies recovered so far and much of village is still burning

Gunmen killed nearly 100 people in an overnight massacre in Mali, local officials have said, amid a wave of violence in the Sahel region linked to Islamist extremists.

The attackers entered a traditional Dogon village in central Mali under cover of darkness and started “shooting, pillaging and burning”, local media quoted officials as saying. The attackers are believed to belong to the Fulani ethnic group.

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Egypt tries to stop sale of Tutankhamun statue in London

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Officials fear bust of pharaoh might have been looted from Karnak temple in Luxor

Egyptian authorities are trying to stop the auction of a statue of Tutankhamun’s head at Christie’s auction house in London next month after concerns were raised that the bust might have been stolen from the Karnak temple in Luxor.

The statue, a brown quartzite head of the young pharaoh, which portrays him as the ancient god Amun, is expected to raise more than £4m at auction on 4 July.

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Millions join general strike in Sudan aimed at dislodging army

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Shutdown called in protest against bloody crackdown on protesters last week

Millions of people in Sudan have joined a general strike called by ​pro-reform groups, shutting down the centre of cities across the country despite a wave of arrests and intimidation​.

The massive shutdown was called to take place on Sunday, the first day of the working week, and is aimed at relaunching an opposition movement battered by a brutal crackdown and forcing the country’s new military leaders to resign.

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Sudan’s generals launch renewed crackdown to defeat general strike

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Arrests of white-collar workers to discourage protest follow assault by regime’s paramilitaries

The military regime in Sudan has launched a new wave of arrests and violent intimidation in an effort to undermine opposition plans for a widespread campaign of civil disobedience.

Pro-reform groups have warned of a “frenzied campaign launched by the military junta to arrest political activists and revolutionaries” this weekend ahead of a general strike set to start on Sunday.

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In a world full of wars, why are so many of them ignored? | Simon Tisdall

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Instability across central Africa has resulted in a humanitarian crisis. There needs to be greater focus on conflict resolution

Cameroon, a central African state of 24 million people on the Gulf of Guinea, is rarely in the news – which is surprising, given the awful things happening there. In a warring world full of conflict, the country’s troubles barely rate a mention. That’s short-sighted. As Yemen shows, today’s local difficulties have a habit of becoming tomorrow’s international crises.

Long-running tensions between Cameroon’s French and English-speaking communities came to a head last week with the arrest of at least 350 members of the main opposition party, whose leader has been jailed since January. Human Rights Watch accused security forces of using “excessive and indiscriminate force”.

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‘Prejudiced’ Home Office refusing visas to African researchers

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Academics invited to the UK are refused entry on arbitrary and ‘insulting’ grounds

The Home Office is being accused of institutional racism and damaging British research projects through increasingly arbitrary and “insulting” visa refusals for academics.

In April, a team of six Ebola researchers from Sierra Leone were unable to attend vital training in the UK, funded by the Wellcome Trust as part of a £1.5m flagship pandemic preparedness programme. At the LSE Africa summit, also in April, 24 out of 25 researchers were missing from a single workshop. Shortly afterwards, the Save the Children centenary events were marred by multiple visa refusals of key guests.

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Protests in Liberia over George Weah’s failure to tackle corruption

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Ex-footballer under pressure 18 months into presidency, as thousands take to the streets

Thousands of people have gathered in Liberia’s capital to protest against failures to tackle corruption, economic mismanagement and injustice under the former footballer turned president George Weah.

Riot police lined the streets of Monrovia where more than 5,000 people turned out despite the rain for one of the city’s biggest protests in living memory, according to witnesses. The protesters walked to Capitol Hill to present the government with a list of demands.

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Two Canadian volunteers missing in rare kidnapping in Ghana

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The women were abducted in Kumasi, and security sources have suggested it was a kidnapping for ransom

Two Canadian women who were volunteering with an international development organisation have been abducted in Ghana, a rare attack in a country seen as one of the most secure in the West African region.

The Canadians, who are ages 19 and 20, were taken on Tuesday evening in Kumasi, Ghana’s second city, some 200km (125 miles) north-west of the capital Accra.

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Leopard kills toddler in South Africa’s Kruger park

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Big cat that attacked two-year-old was hunted down and shot dead to avoid risk of a repeat

A leopard has killed a two-year-old boy inside a fenced-off staff compound at South Africa’s Kruger national park, officials said.

“The toddler was only 30 months old,” the park said in a statement on Thursday. “The boy was certified dead by doctors at the Shongwe hospital after being rushed there by family members.”

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As a gay man, my life will be over if I’m deported to Kenya. I urge the Home Office for mercy | Ken Macharia

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After making my home in England for 10 years, I have received a notice to leave everything I love behind

On Monday, I opened the letter I never wanted to receive. After 10 years living in the UK I was told that I am no longer welcome and should make arrangements to leave the country “without delay” or risk being deported in the middle of the night. As a gay man, whose country of birth, Kenya, persecutes homosexuals, I felt my whole world collapse around me as I read the matter-of-fact words on the Home Office headed paper.

Related: Gay rugby player faces deportation to Kenya as asylum claim rejected

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Two million people at risk of starvation as drought returns to Somalia

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Agencies sound the alarm over ‘climate crisis’ after devastation of crops and livestock

More than 2 million people could face starvation by the end of the summer, unless there are urgent efforts to respond to the drought in Somalia.

Mark Lowcock, the UN’s humanitarian chief, said the country is facing one of the driest rainy seasons in more than three decades, and a “rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation”.

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