Category Archives: Africa

Allegations of extensive sexual abuse at Kenyan offsetting project used by Shell and Netflix

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NGOs report allegations of abuse and harassment at Kasigau Corridor conservation project in southern Kenya over 12 years

Male staff at a leading Kenyan carbon-offsetting project used by Netflix, Shell and other large companies have been accused of extensive sexual abuse and harassment over more than a decade, following an investigation by two NGOs.

The Kasigau Corridor conservation project in southern Kenya, operated by the California-based firm Wildlife Works, generates carbon credits by protecting dryland forests at risk of being destroyed in key elephant, lion and wildlife habitats west of Mombasa. The scheme was the first ever forest protection scheme approved by Verra, the world’s leading certifier of carbon offsets, and has also been accredited for its biodiversity and community benefits, probably generating millions of dollars in revenue in carbon-credit sales.

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China ‘world’s biggest debt collector’ as poorer nations struggle with its loans

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Country, estimated to be owed up to $1.5trn, is increasing penalties for late payments and cutting back on infrastructure projects

China has become the world’s biggest debt collector, as the money it is owed from developing countries has surged to between $1.1tn (£889bn) and $1.5tn, according to a new report. An estimated 80% of China’s overseas lending portfolio in the global south is now supporting countries in financial distress.

Since 2017, China has been the world’s biggest bilateral lender; its main development banks issued nearly $500bn between 2008 and 2021. While some of this predates the belt and road initiative (BRI), Beijing’s flagship development programme has mobilised much of the investment in developing countries.

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DRC offers free maternity care to cut death rate among mothers and babies

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Healthcare workers say clinics are being overwhelmed by women seeking help, amid lack of staff and facilities to back programme

Pregnant women across the Democratic Republic of the Congo are to be offered free healthcare in an effort to cut the country’s high rates of maternal and neonatal deaths.

Women in 13 out of 26 regions in the country will, by the end of the year, be entitled to free services during pregnancy and for one month after childbirth. Babies will receive free healthcare for their first 28 days under the scheme, which the government plans to extend to the rest of DRC – although there is no timetable for that yet.

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Former Guinea dictator Moussa Dadis Camara recaptured after armed prison escape

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Former junta leader back in jail hours after commando raid his lawyer says was an abduction

The former head of Guinea’s 2008 military junta has been recaptured and returned to prison hours after an apparent jailbreak led by a heavily armed commando, the army and his lawyer said.

At least two other former officials on trial alongside Moussa Dadis Camara over a 2009 massacre during his presidency were taken in the earlier operation that sparked heavy gunfire in the capital Conakry, a minister and lawyers said.

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Climate crisis talks resume on ‘loss and damage’ funding for poorest countries

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World leaders will reconvene in Abu Dhabi before UAE’s Cop28 after talks broke down two weeks ago

Governments will meet this weekend for a last-ditch attempt to bridge deep divisions between rich and poor countries over how to get money to vulnerable people afflicted by climate disaster.

Talks over funds for “loss and damage”, which refers to the rescue and rehabilitation of countries and communities experiencing the effects of extreme weather, started in March but broke down in rancour two weeks ago.

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First of 100-strong group of Britons cross Gaza border into Egypt

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Scotland first minister’s parents-in-law among those evacuated, amid concerns for those stuck in northern Gaza

The first people in a group of about 100 Britons due to leave Gaza on Friday have made the crossing into Egypt, amid concerns about whether individuals in the north of the Palestinian territory will be able to make it to the southern Rafah crossing.

By Friday, there were 127 people on the UK list to be evacuated into Egypt since the crossing opened on Wednesday, more than three weeks after the conflict began in which thousands of Palestinians and Israelis have been killed. Among those able to leave Gaza were the parents-in-law of Scotland’s first minister, Humza Yousaf, who described the last four weeks as a “living nightmare” for the family of his wife, Nadia El-Nakla.

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Austria to work with UK on Rwanda-style plan for asylum seekers

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Suella Braverman signs ‘migration and security agreement’ with Austrian counterpart in move to work more closely together

Austria is seeking to adopt a Rwanda-style deal to deport asylum seekers to a third country, having agreed a deal to work with the UK on migration.

Suella Braverman signed a “migration and security agreement” with her Austrian counterpart, Gerhard Karner, in which the two countries agreed to work more closely together.

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King Charles’s ‘deep regret’ for colonial atrocities was a ‘miss’, Kenyans say

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Rights groups repeat calls for apology while President William Ruto says ‘much remains to be done to achieve full reparations’

King Charles’s expression of “greatest sorrow and deepest regret” over colonial atrocities committed by British forces in Kenya has been criticised as a “miss” in the east African country.

Reactions to the king’s statement were mixed, with the president, William Ruto, diplomatically welcoming Charles’s “courage and readiness to shed light on uncomfortable truths that reside in the darker regions of our shared experience”, but calling Britain’s colonial suppression of Kenya’s freedom movement “monstrous in its cruelty”.

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‘Tiredness on all sides’ over war in Ukraine, Italian PM tells prank caller

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Giorgia Meloni ‘misled’ into phone conversation reportedly with Russian comedian posing as African political leader

The Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, told a prank caller posing as an African leader there was “a lot of tiredness” over the war in Ukraine and that she had some ideas up her sleeve on how to “find a way out”.

Meloni’s office confirmed that she had been “misled” into the phone call – reportedly by two Russian comedians – that took place on 18 September “by an impostor who passed himself off as the president of the African Union Commission”.

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Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt opens for limited evacuation

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Crossing open for first time in weeks to allow evacuation of foreign passport holders and injured Palestinians

The Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt has opened for the first time in more than three weeks of brutal conflict to allow the evacuation of dozens of injured Palestinians requiring hospital treatment and hundreds of foreign passport holders.

Witnesses at the border on the Gaza side saw scores of people and cars hurrying to get through the gates towards the Egyptian side through the damaged terminal area, some carrying their belongings. Ambulances whisked away the wounded to Egyptian field hospitals, including one young boy with heavy bandaging around his stomach.

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King Charles stops short of apology for ‘abhorrent’ colonial violence in Kenya

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Visiting monarch speaks of sorrow and deepest regret for past ‘wrongdoings’ under British rule

King Charles has spoken of Britain’s “abhorrent and unjustifiable acts of violence” committed against Kenyans during their fight for independence, but stopped short of an apology despite human rights groups demanding one.

The monarch made the comments in a speech, delivered during a banquet in Kenya held in his honour, in which he referred to the “greatest sorrow” and “deepest regret” for the “wrongdoings” of the past.

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French couple take dealer to court for share of African mask’s €4.2m sale price

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Pensioners sold rare object found in attic for €150 – but campaigners say it must be returned to Gabon

A retired French couple who sold an African mask to a secondhand goods dealer for €150 (£130) have gone to court for a share of the proceeds after the mask fetched €4.2m (£3.7m) at auction.

But campaigners insist that the rare artefact instead should be returned to Gabon, in a case that has raised questions over Africa’s cultural heritage looted by colonial France.

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King Charles asked for ‘unequivocal apology’ by Kenya’s rights commission

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King urged to offer apology while in Kenya for UK’s ‘brutal and inhuman treatment’ during the Mau Mau uprising in the 1950s

The Kenya Human Rights Commission has called on King Charles to offer an “unequivocal public apology” for colonial abuses, during his visit to the country this week.

“We call upon the king, on behalf of the British government, to issue an unconditional and unequivocal public apology (as opposed to the very cautious, self-preserving and protective statements of regrets) for the brutal and inhuman treatment inflicted on Kenyan citizens,” the KHRC said.

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Kenya to scrap visas for all African nationals

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President William Ruto says change aims to boost trade and allow goods, services, people and ideas to move freely across continent

Visas to visit Kenya are to be scrapped for other African nationals from next year as part of a movement towards opening up trade and travel within the continent.

“By the end of this year, no African will be required to have a visa to come to Kenya,” Kenya’s president, William Ruto, said at a climate change conference in Congo-Brazzaville.

Costly and time-consuming visa requirements, as well as high air fares, have long created barriers to inter-African travel for African passport holders; 32 out of 54 African countries still require the nationals of half or more countries on the continent to obtain a visa.

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UK accused of plan to further cut cost of bananas at expense of poorest African producers

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UK refusing to commit to EU pledge to stop cutting tariffs on big producers despite bananas being as cheap today as three decades ago

It is one of the few British supermarket staples to have bucked the trend during the cost of living crisis, with the price of a bunch of bananas today no more expensive today than three decades ago. Every country in the world with cheaper prices than the UK has its own producers of the fruit.

The government has now been accused of pursuing an irresponsible post-Brexit policy that could reduce the price of bananas further in the shops – but at the cost of the livelihoods of thousands of workers on small plantations in some of Africa’s poorest countries.

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Sudanese paramilitary group says it has seized country’s second-largest city

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Claim by Rapid Support Forces to have taken the trade hub of Nyala could mark a turning point in the war

The paramilitaries fighting Sudan’s army say they have seized control of Nyala, the country’s second-largest city outside the Khartoum area, in a potential turning point in the six-month war.

The Rapid Support Forces said in a statement they had taken over the army’s main headquarters in the city, which is the capital of South Darfur state, and seized all of its equipment. The RSF published video, which Reuters could not verify, of their soldiers celebrating with gunfire, claiming to have overrun the base.

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Girls in Africa quitting school over cost of living crisis, says charity

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Camfed calls for six-year plan to get 6 million girls into school, warning that drop-out rate is limiting children’s chances

Governments and donors need to redouble efforts to encourage girls back to school across Africa after the cost of living crisis pushed many to spurn education for low-paid work or early marriage, a charity has warned.

Camfed, which operates in five African countries, said its partnership model proved this could be achieved and called for a six-year plan to get 6 million girls into school.

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Scientists discover why dozens of endangered elephants dropped dead

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In 2020, 350 elephants mysteriously died in Botswana, with a further 35 dying in similar circumstances in Zimbabwe. Now scientists think they may have found the reason why

In May and June 2020, the death of 350 elephants in Botswana’s Okavango delta baffled conservationists and sparked global speculation about what had caused it. Elephants of all ages and both sexes were affected, with many walking in circles before dying suddenly, collapsing on their faces. Two months later, 35 more elephants died in north-western Zimbabwe.

At the time, the deaths in Botswana were attributed to an unspecified cyanobacterial toxin, government officials said, and no further details were published.

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Sudanese evacuees in the UK fear limbo as six-month visas begin to expire

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Some of the people evacuated by British after civil war broke out say they have received no information from Home Office about their future

People who were evacuated to the UK from war-torn Sudan fear they will be left in limbo when their six-month visas begin to expire this week. Evacuees, who have been living in hotels or with family members since April, say they have received no information from the Home Office about their future status.

“I’m worried that on 26 October I finish the six months and if nothing happens with my visa and there’s no extension I’ll become an illegal immigrant,” said Azza Ahmed, who was a university lecturer in the capital, Khartoum, and is now living in a hotel in London with her son.

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Access to remains of Bambuti baby withdrawn by London museum

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Hunterian had listed stillborn child of African descent as viewable for medical research but removed it after criticism from author

The remains of a stillborn Bambuti baby have been removed from a museum’s catalogue of items that can be viewed for medical research after criticism from a Booker prize-shortlisted author.

Novelist Nadifa Mohamed is the presenter of an upcoming Channel 4 documentary examining the history of “human zoos” in Britain, in which African and Asian people were put on display to the wider public in a practice which is now deemed to have been deeply racist.

Britain’s Human Zoos is on Channel 4 on Saturday 28 October

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