Alleged victims of Sudanese paramilitary and allied militia found in shallow grave in West Darfur
At least 87 people including ethnic Masalits have been found buried in a mass grave in Sudan’s West Darfur, the UN human rights office has said, adding that it had credible information that the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) were responsible.
RSF officials denied any involvement, saying the paramilitary group was not a party to the conflict in West Darfur.
Continue reading...Documents containing allegations of torture filed to court in support of complaint made by Bobi Wine
The Uganda president, Yoweri Museveni, and his son Muhoozi Kainerugaba have been accused of sponsoring violence and abusing critics in harrowing testimony filed before the international criminal court.
The submissions contain detailed allegations of the torture of opposition figures and activists who report being arrested arbitrarily and being held incommunicado in “torture centres”, where they were reportedly interrogated about their links with the opposition figure Bobi Wine and subjected to physical harm and indignifying treatment.
Continue reading...Move designed to send message to forces involved as fears grow conflict could become more widespread in the region
The UK has put sanctions on six companies it says are associated with the two sides fighting for power in Sudan, though the prospect of any of the Gulf states most entwined in the Sudanese economy joining the UK remain remote.
The Foreign Office slapped sanctions on three firms linked to leaders of the Sudanese armed forces and three connected to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
Continue reading...When Wagner forces turned their guns against Russian forces it led to panic in Moscow. But after the coup was aborted and its leader accused of treachery, it was business as usual for the group’s lucrative Africa operations. Pjotr Sauer and Jason Burke report
Yevgeny Prigozhin’s march on Moscow caused panic and led Vladimir Putin to go on the airways to condemn the head of Wagner. He decried the ‘treachery’ and vowed to ‘liquidate’ what remained of Wagner – and many assumed Prigozhin himself.
In the days that followed, something more subtle happened. As our correspondent Pjotr Sauer tells Nosheen Iqbal, while Russian state TV has called Prigozhin corrupt and traitorous, it emerged that he had been invited for a face-to-face meeting with the Russian president.
Continue reading...Nigerian stowaways survived for at least a week under ship that voyaged from Lagos via Lomé, Togo
The Spanish coastguard rescued two Nigerian men who survived for at least a week balancing on the rudder of a ship as it sailed from the west African country of Togo to the Canary Islands.
The two men were rescued on Monday night in the port of Las Palmas, and taken to a hospital for medical checks. They were later released and were transferred back to the ship, which will return them to their port of origin, the port police tweeted.
Continue reading...Residents of the South African city delight in rare snow day caused by a surge in humidity and cold temperatures
Residents of South Africa’s biggest city, Johannesburg, were stunned by the first snowfall in over a decade on Monday, with some children seeing snow for the first time.
While parts of South Africa regularly receive snow over the southern hemisphere winter months of June to August, Johannesburg last had snow in August 2012.
Continue reading...Police take action as activists, politicians and the company involved all condemn tactics used by managers investigating who put sanitary towel in wrong bin
Three senior managers from a Kenyan dairy company have been arrested over allegations of indecent assault after they forced a group of female employees to undress in order to find out which of them was on their period.
The incident, which happened last week at Brown’s Food Company’s dairy factory in Limuru, in central Kenya, followed failed attempts by the managers – all three of whom are women – to find out who had put a sanitary towel in the wrong bin.
Continue reading...António Guterres decries conflict’s ‘utter disregard’ for human rights law as clashes reported in multiple states
Sudan is on the brink of a “full-scale civil war” that could destabilise the entire region, the United Nations has warned, after an airstrike on a residential area killed about two dozen civilians.
The health ministry reported “22 dead and a large number of wounded among the civilians” from the strike on Khartoum’s sister city Omdurman, in the district of Dar al-Salam.
Continue reading...In a ‘message of hope’ the animals have been brought in from Namibia to establish a group in their historical homeland
After an epic 36-hour journey, the first native giraffes to be returned to an Angolan national park arrived from Namibia this week, in what many hope to be the first of multiple translocations to return the animals to their historical homeland.
The giraffes, seven males and seven females, travelled more than 800 miles (1,300km) from a private game farm near Otjiwarongo in the Otjozondjupa region of central Namibia to Iona national park in the south-west corner of Angola.
Continue reading...Greg Slater is co-founder with his wife Sharon of Family Watch International, a US group accused of financing propaganda about sexual and gender diversity
A group of human rights organisations in Africa renewed their calls this week for the American multinational Intel Corporation to dismiss a senior employee over his alleged involvement in fanning the growing anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment in several countries, including Kenya and Uganda.
In a change.org petition, supported by more than a dozen organisations, the rights groups claim that Greg Slater, Intel’s vice-president of global regulatory affairs, has been “actively responsible for exporting, financing, and spreading hate, homophobia” on the continent for decades, through the American conservative organisation, Family Watch International.
Continue reading...An initial 18m doses will be delivered over the next two years to combat a disease that kills nearly half a million children annually
A long-awaited vaccine for malaria has been announced for rollout across 12 African countries over the next two years, potentially saving tens of thousands of lives.
An initial 18m doses of the world’s first malaria vaccine have been assigned to the countries where the risk of children falling ill and dying from malaria is highest, according to a statement from the global vaccine alliance Gavi, the World Health Organization (WHO) and Unicef.
Continue reading...Despite Yevgeny Prigozhin’s rebellion against the Kremlin, his military contracts are proving too profitable to lose
Four days after Wagner group mercenaries marched on Moscow, a Russian envoy flew into Benghazi to meet a worried warlord. The message from the Kremlin to Khalifa Haftar, the self-styled general who runs much of eastern Libya, was reassuring: the more than 2,000 Wagner fighters, technicians, political operatives and administrators in the country would be staying.
“There will be no problem here. There may be some changes at the top but the mechanism will stay the same: the people on the ground, the money men in Dubai, the contacts, and the resources committed to Libya,” the envoy told Haftar in his fortified palatial residence. “Don’t worry, we aren’t going anywhere.”
Continue reading...Leak in informal settlement in Boksburg on outskirts of city may be linked to illegal mining, authorities say, as search continues for more casualites
At least 16 people, including three children, died when toxic gas leaked from a cylinder near Johannesburg, South African police have said. Emergency services said the leak appeared to be linked to illegal mining activities.
Emergency services initially announced that as many as 24 people might be dead in the Angelo informal settlement in Boksburg, a city on the eastern outskirts of Johannesburg. But police and Gauteng Province premier Panyaza Lesufi later said the number of deaths had been confirmed as 16 after a recount of the bodies. Police said the three children killed were aged one, six and 15. Two people were taken to the hospital for treatment, police said.
Continue reading...Official GOP account deletes tweet featuring Liberian flag, which has single white star where Stars and Stripes has 50
The Republican party was embarrassed when a tweet from its official account celebrating Independence Day featured the wrong flag.
The tweet read: “247 years ago, our forefathers told Ol’ King George to get lost! Happy Independence Day from the GOP!”
Continue reading...Gen Khalifa Haftar warned of military action unless oil revenues are divided fairly
Fears have been raised of a damaging oil shutdown in Libya with implications for global energy markets after Libya’s strongman in the east, Gen Khalifa Haftar, warned of military action unless oil revenues are divided fairly within the next two months.
With the country long divided between two governments in the east and west and little prospect of presidential elections designed to reunify the country at least until next year, politicians in the east have threatened to put oil revenues under judicial control preventing the revenue reaching the Central Bank from the National Oil Corporation (NOC), the state-run oil firm.
Continue reading...More than 100 signatories express concern in letter to foreign secretary over lack of progress in case of Alaa Abd el-Fattah
More than 100 MPs and peers have written to the foreign secretary to express concern over the lack of progress to free a jailed British-Egyptian activist.
It comes seven months after the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, shook hands with Egypt’s president, Abdel-Fatah al-Sisi, while Alaa Abd el-Fattah was close to death due to a hunger strike.
Continue reading...Confusion as spokesperson says reports Misuzulu Zulu in hospital after falling ill were untrue
Uncertainty reigned on Sunday over the health of South Africa’s Zulu king, the head of the country’s most influential traditional monarchy, with his spokesperson denying reports he had been hospitalised.
Misuzulu Zulu, 48, ascended the throne last year after the death of his father, Goodwill Zwelithini, amid a bitter feud over the royal succession.
Continue reading...Truck lost control at notorious junction in Londiani, hitting people and vehicles in latest road catastrophe
The death toll of a road crash in western Kenya rose to 52 on Saturday, officials said, as rescuers worked to clear the wreckage from one of the deadliest traffic accidents in the country in recent years.
A truck carrying a shipping container veered out of control and ploughed into multiple other vehicles and people thronging a busy roadside junction on Friday evening, plunging the nation into shock and mourning.
Continue reading...Home Office sent 24,083 letters of intent warning refugees they were being considered for forcible removal
More than 24,000 asylum seekers from about one-third of the world’s countries could face removal to Rwanda by the UK Home Office in the future, even though the scheme was found to be unlawful in the court of appeal on Thursday.
Home Office data obtained under a freedom of information request shows that, between January 2021 and March 2023, 24,083 asylum seekers were issued with letters warning them that they were being considered for forcible removal to Rwanda.
Continue reading...Villagers increasingly caught up in army crackdown on Islamist militants, with both sides accused of mass killings of civilians
Civilians in Burkina Faso are being punished by the “total war” the government is waging against Islamist militant groups, with both sides accused of war crimes.
The military has been accused of targeting the Fulani ethnic group, while jihadists have sought retribution against villagers they believe support the government.
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