Category Archives: Africa

Libya’s UN-recognised government launches peace initiative

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Plan comes after efforts to persuade US that White House had wrong message on Libya

Libya’s UN-recognised government in Tripoli has sought to break the deadlock in the country’s civil war by launching a peace initiative which will include a national peace forum followed by simultaneous parliamentary and presidential elections to be held by the end of the year.

The plan comes after sustained diplomatic efforts by the Tripoli-based government to persuade the US that the White House had got the wrong message on Libya and was in danger of backing anti-democratic forces of Gen Khalifa Haftar, on the false premise that he was leading a fight against terrorists.

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Sudan’s Bashir appears in public for first time since being ousted

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Ex-president is taken out of prison to the office of the anti-corruption prosecutor

Sudan’s former president Omar al-Bashir has appeared in public for the first time since he was overthrown, as he was taken out of prison to the office of the anti-corruption prosecutor.

Bashir, wearing traditional white robes and turban, was driven to the prosecutor’s office in Khartoum on Sunday, a Reuters witness said.

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Roadside bomb kills Kenyan police officers near Somali border

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Blast claimed by Islamist insurgents follows attack in Mogadishu that killed eight

A roadside bomb hit a police vehicle patrolling near Kenya’s border with Somalia on Saturday, killing several of the 11 officers inside, a Kenyan police spokesman has said.

Separately, another blast in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, killed eight people, according to emergency services.

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Italy adopts decree that could fine migrant rescuers up to €50,000

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New bill would fine NGOs bringing migrants on shore without permission but UN says it penalises rescues at sea

The Italian government has introduced a new security decree that would mean non-governmental organisation (NGO) rescue boats that bring migrants to Italy without permission could face fines of up to €50,000.

On Friday night the Italian president, Sergio Mattarella, signed a bill on security and immigration drafted by Matteo Salvini, the far-right interior minister and leader of the Northern League party, which has been described by aid groups as a “declaration of war against the NGOs who are saving lives at sea”.

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Global heating to inflict more droughts on Africa as well as floods

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New UK research predicts extremes of weather will hit food production

Global heating could bring many more bouts of severe drought as well as increased flooding to Africa than previously forecast, scientists have warned.

New research says the continent will experience many extreme outbreaks of intense rainfall over the next 80 years. These could trigger devastating floods, storms and disruption of farming. In addition, these events are likely to be interspersed with more crippling droughts during the growing season and these could also damage crop and food production.

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WHO calls for more funds to fight DRC Ebola outbreak

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Panel backs off from declaring international emergency despite spread into Uganda

The World Health Organization has backed off from declaring that an Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is an international emergency despite it spreading into Uganda.

After long discussions, a WHO committee ruled that although the outbreak was an emergency for DRC, it did not fit the criteria to be declared a public health emergency of international concern.

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Russia is not alone in exploiting Africa | Letters

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Tracey Lindner says the scramble for Africa is largely about securing resources that are crucial for military and civilian digital technology. Terry McGinn shines a spotlight on the US

Foreign involvement in Africa is far from unique to Russia (Leaked documents reveal Russia’s efforts to exert influence in Africa, 12 June). The new scramble for Africa involves more powers than the first round over a century ago. This time it’s in part about securing resources such as oil, gas and rare earth metals crucial for military and civilian digital technology, and denying these resources to rival powers.

The United States Africa Command (Africom) now has 7,500 American troops active in all but one African country, up from 6,000 in 2017. Apart from its huge base in Djibouti, controlling the narrow strait between the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, a vital chokepoint through which all shipping using the Suez Canal has to pass – most importantly (for the Americans) Chinese shipping – the US has constructed small “lily pad” bases, whose presence gives the US a strong military capability.

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Progress on ending child labour stalls in countries supplying goods to west

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China, India and Bangladesh among otherwise thriving countries failing to make headway on issue affecting 152 million minors

Progress towards ending child labour has stalled in the countries most likely to be supplying goods to the west, a study has found.

Despite high economic growth and big improvements in education and development, countries such as China, India, Bangladesh, Vietnam and Cambodia have made little progress in tackling child labour.

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Contraceptive injections do not increase risk of contracting HIV, study finds

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Research also finds scale of crisis among African women higher than expected

A landmark study has ended 30 years of anxiety that hormonal contraceptive injections may increase women’s chances of infection from HIV.

But the study found a dramatically higher rate of HIV infection among women in southern Africa than was expected, which one leading campaigning organisation said signified a public health crisis”.

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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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