Category Archives: Africa

Thousands flee homes after rebel attack in southern Sudan city

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Families said to have run away with nothing as three forces fight in South Kordofan state

Thousands of people have fled their homes in the capital of South Kordofan state in Sudan after an attack by the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North rebel group, one of three forces now fighting in the area.

The SPLMN has been trying to capture the city from the regular army, known as the Sudanese Armed Forces, since June, when it entered the conflict that broke out in April between the SAF, led by Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.

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Delegation from west African bloc meets Niger’s ousted president

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Ecowas group seeking restoration to power of Mohamed Bazoum also met army officers behind coup

A delegation from west Africa’s economic bloc has arrived in Niger and met the ousted president on Saturday, as it sought a peaceful solution after army officers seized power in a coup.

Mohamed Bazoum was “in good spirits”, a source close to the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) told AFP – though he remained under detention and his electricity was still cut off.

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William Gladstone: family of former British PM to apologise for links to slavery

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Descendants of PM, whose father’s wealth came from sugar plantations, travel to Guyana for 200th anniversary of rebellion by enslaved Africans

The family of one of Britain’s most famous prime ministers will travel to the Caribbean this week to apologise for its historical role in slavery.

Six of William Gladstone’s descendants will arrive in Guyana on Thursday as the country commemorates the 200th anniversary of a rebellion by enslaved people that historians say paved the way for abolition.

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Cape Verde boat disaster: vessel drifted for month after alarm raised, says NGO

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Walking Borders said it told authorities in four countries on 20 July about vessel with more than 100 asylum seekers onboard

A Spanish NGO alerted authorities from four countries on 20 July about a boat carrying an estimated 130 asylum seekers that was found earlier this week with just 38 survivors and the bodies of seven dead people on board.

Relatives of those onboard said the large fishing vessel had left Fass Boye, a seaside town in Senegal on 10 July, and was heading for Spain’s Canary Islands. The boat was spotted on Monday about 150 nautical miles (277km ) north of the Cape Verdean island of Sal.

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West African bloc prepared for military intervention after Niger coup

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Ecowas says it is ready to restore democracy and describes president Mohamed Bazoum as a hostage

A west African regional political grouping has reiterated it is prepared to intervene militarily in Niger following last month’s coup, describing the country’s detained president, Mohamed Bazoum, as a hostage.

Ecowas’s commissioner for political affairs, peace and security, Abdel-Fatau Musah, made the comments as military chiefs of staff from the bloc met in the Ghanaian capital, Accra, on Thursday and accused Niger’s military junta of “playing cat and mouse” with the grouping by refusing to meet its envoys.

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At least 63 people feared dead after boat found off Cape Verde

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Fishing vessel with 100 asylum seekers was travelling from Senegal to Spain’s Canary Islands

More than 60 people are believed to have died after the boat they were travelling on from Senegal was found off Cape Verde, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said on Wednesday.

At least 63 asylum seekers are thought to have died, while the 38 survivors include four children between the ages of 12 and 16, an IOM spokesperson told AFP.

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CEO regrets her firm took on Facebook moderation work after staff ‘traumatised’

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Outsourcer Sama facing legal cases brought by Kenya-based employees alleging exposure to graphic content

The chief executive of a company contracted to moderate Facebook posts in east Africa has said she regretted taking on the work, after its staff said they were left traumatised by graphic content on the social media platform.

The US outsourcing firm Sama is facing a number of legal cases brought by Kenya-based employees, who alleged being exposed to graphic and traumatic content such as videos of beheadings, suicide and other material at a moderation hub.

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Niger coup backers call for mass mobilisation amid military threat from regional bloc

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As Ecowas chiefs prepare to meet to discuss possible action against junta, civic group says ‘we need to be ready’

Supporters of the Nigerien junta are calling for the mass mobilisation of citizens against the threat of military action by a west African regional bloc that is calling for the restoration of the country’s deposed president, Mohamed Bazoum.

With a delayed meeting of military chiefs of staff of the Ecowas bloc scheduled to take place later this week, regional tensions over the July coup against Bazoum appeared to be deepening, despite the junta’s efforts to suggest they were open to talks.

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Family of academic detained in Egypt accuse US of breaking pledge to help

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Salah Soltan, a US green card holder and critic of Abdel-Fatah al-Sisi, claims he faces death in Cairo jail and urges Biden to act

A prominent Egyptian prisoner of conscience has told his family that he faces death in detention, spurring them to accuse the Biden administration of abandoning their father, despite previous promises on human rights.

In a letter smuggled out of prison, Salah Soltan, a US green card holder and Islamic jurisprudence scholar, said he felt “as if I stared death in the eyes while lying on the ground, paralysed and denied help and medicine for days,” after collapsing in his cell earlier this year following complaints of chest pains. His family say the letter was his first unsupervised contact in two and a half years.

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‘Dire crisis for children’ in Sudan, aid groups warn as millions more go hungry

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Up to 17,000 more children a day lack food, Save the Children say, as global indifference to humanitarian crisis condemned as ‘racist’

The past four months of fighting in Sudan has pushed millions into food insecurity – with an additional 1.5 million children expected to fall into crisis levels of hunger by September – as aid agencies say they are struggling to reach people.

Up to 17,000 children a day have been falling into crisis levels of hunger, Save the Children warned on Tuesday. With 4 million people displaced so far, the charity said more people were facing hunger in Sudan than at any point since records there began in 2012.

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Sudan: more than a million people have fled ‘spiralling’ conflict, says UN

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Joint statement from UN agencies lays bare the effect of violence on the country’s food and healthcare systems

More than 1 million people have fled Sudan to neighbouring states, as people inside the country are running out of food and dying due to a lack of healthcare after four months of war, the United Nations has said.

Fighting between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has devastated the capital Khartoum and sparked ethnically driven attacks in Darfur, threatening to plunge Sudan into a protracted civil war and destabilise the region.

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Croatian police looking for 10 handball players from Burundi missing from competition

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Players have not been heard from since leaving their accommodation last Wednesday

Police in Croatia are looking for 10 young handball players from Burundi who have disappeared before a world championship match.

The Primorje-Gorski Kotar county police department said efforts were under way to locate the players and determine the facts of their disappearance.

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Airstrike in Ethiopia’s Amhara region kills at least 26 people

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Residents say attack on town square in Finote Selam targeted ethnic Fano militia but civilians were also hit

An airstrike on a busy town square in Ethiopia’s Amhara region has killed at least 26 people, in the latest instance of violence in Ethiopia’s second-biggest state, where militia have been fighting the army.

The attack occurred in the early hours of Sunday morning in Finote Selam, a town in Amhara’s West Gojjam zone, a local doctor told the Guardian.

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Niger junta says it will prosecute deposed president for ‘high treason’

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Mohamed Bazoum – ousted by military last month – could face death penalty if found guilty

Niger’s military junta has said it will prosecute the deposed president, Mohamed Bazoum, for “high treason” and undermining state security, as concerns were raised about the detention conditions and health of Bazoum and his family.

The statement on Bazoum’s prosecution came hours after the junta indicated to religious mediators that they were open to a diplomatic resolution to the crisis that followed July’s coup. Bazoum could face the death penalty if convicted.

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Kenya launches inquiry into claims of abuse by British soldiers at training unit

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Nairobi MPs say findings could have implications for the defence deal that allows UK troops to train in the country

The Kenyan government has launched an inquiry into allegations of abuse by the British army, which MPs say could have implications for the future role of UK troops in the country.

The investigation will examine the activities of the British Army Training Unit Kenya (Batuk), whose soldiers have been accused of murder, sexual abuse, and damaging land close to its base in Nanyuki, about 125 miles (200km) north of the capital, Nairobi.

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Eritrean diaspora vow to continue disrupting festivals that ‘promote dictatorship’

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Events marred by violence in Sweden, Canada and the US were billed as cultural, but activists say they are militaristic and full of hate speech

After opponents of the Eritrean government stormed a festival in Stockholm that was allegedly promoting the east African country’s regime earlier this month, setting light to cars and throwing stones, the Swedish government tried to distance itself from it all. The justice minister, Gunnar Strömmer, said it was “not reasonable for Sweden to be drawn into other countries’ domestic conflicts”.

But in the sunlit cafeteria of a community space in Kista, a few miles from the festival site in Järvafältet, a wooded area north of the Swedish capital, Abdulkader Habib disagreed. Opposition to Eritrea’s dictator, Isaias Afwerki, was not an Eritrean problem: “this is a big international problem,” he said.

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Blistering barnacles! Tintin mystery in Brussels after bust of Hergé vanishes

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The disappearance of a statue of the comic book artist in his Belgian birthplace was thought to be an act of decolonisation

It would have been a suitable assignment for Tintin, the intrepid Belgian boy reporter and his multi-talented, intuitive dog, Snowy.

Across Brussels, where Hergé, the creator of the eponymous comic books, was born, there are constant reminders of one of its most famous exports. A giant image of the character clinging to the back of a steam train from the book Tintin in America adorns one of the exits from the city’s Eurostar station, while a mural of Tintin, his seafaring friend Captain Haddock and Snowy covers the gable end of a house just over a mile away, surviving graffiti and vandalism.

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At least two dead and five missing after boat sinks off Tunisia

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Thirteen people rescued after Europe-bound vessel sank near city of Gabes, says coastguard

At least two Tunisians including a baby died when their Europe-bound boat sank off the north African country’s south-eastern shores, the coastguard said, adding five others were missing.

The vessel carrying 20 Tunisians went down at 2am 120 metres (395ft) from the beach in Gabes, a statement said, as search operations continue.

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Defiant leaders of Niger coup confident of holding on to power

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Analysts says key figures in new regime were underestimated as elected president remains confined to residence

The leaders of the military takeover in Niger remained defiant this weekend, apparently confident that disarray among regional opponents, support from other military regimes in neighbouring countries and a wave of popular mobilisation at home will allow them to keep power for the indefinite future.

Mohamed Bazoum, the democratically elected president of Niger, remains confined to his official residence in Niamey, the capital, amid faltering international efforts to convince the new rulers of the unstable but strategically important country to return to barracks two weeks after launching a coup.

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Global heating likely to hit world food supply before 1.5C, says UN expert

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Water scarcity threatening agriculture faster than expected, warns Cop15 desertification president

The world is likely to face major disruption to food supplies well before temperatures rise by the 1.5C target, the president of the UN’s desertification conference has warned, as the impacts of the climate crisis combine with water scarcity and poor farming practices to threaten global agriculture.

Alain-Richard Donwahi, a former Ivory Coast defence minister who led last year’s UN Cop15 summit on desertification, said the effects of drought were taking hold more rapidly than expected.

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