Africa

Mariano Nhongo, a rebel leader in Mozambique has been killed following an intense gun battle with government troops in his forest hide-out in central Sofala province, police have said. Mariano Nhongo, former leader of the Renamo Military Junta was killed along with a close associate of his. Mariano Nhongo had …

Two men have been arrested for killing two protected elephants at the Wologizi national park in Liberia, the park’s head, John Flomo, has told AFP news agency. The bodies of the elephants were discovered with their tusks still intact earlier this month, AFP reports. Read also: South Africa: a German …

A German tourist and a crew member have died after a luxury houseboat caught fire on a dam in South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal province, local media report. The South African Maritime Safety Authority (Samsa) said it was investigating the cause of the blaze, the BBC reports. The boat was reportedly on …

Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), a rebel group in Ethiopia say federal troops and their allies have launched coordinated attacks on all fronts. They said heavy artillery, tanks, fighter jets and drones were being used against them, BBC News reports. A senior member of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front said …

Nearly 120 school pupils in South Sudan have been hospitalised after a deworming exercise by public health officials led to them falling ill, local media reported. Local media reported that the children were allegedly given expired tablets or an overdose, but this was denied by the health ministry. “Preliminary findings …

The head of an Islamic school has been suspended by the government in Nigeria’s north-central Kwara state after a video emerged showing a group of students being repeatedly lashed. The students, who included some males and a female, were accused of drinking alcohol at a birthday party of one of …

Laurent Delahousse, the head of the European Union in Liberia said he is sorry for saying that the Liberian capital Monrovia is a “disgusting” and “dirty” city, following a backlash. Speaking at an event organised by the Monrovia City Corporation last week, the EU envoy in Liberia said that Monrovia …

The Algerian president Abdelmadjid Tebboune has asked “total respect” from France as the diplomatic tensions among the two countries are worsening. In his first public comments on the matter, Abdelmadjid Tebboune said France should forget that Algeria had once been its colony. The current dispute between the two countries was …

Police in Nigeria say they have rescued 47 people from what they describe as a “torture house” in the northern state of Kano. The property, in Kano city, was supposed to be a rehabilitation centre. In other words, a privately run facility where parents send their children who they believe …

Following the enactment of a law by President Julius Maada Bio prohibiting the death penalty which was accepted by lawmakers in July, Sierra Leone officially abolished the death penalty. “As a nation, we have today exorcised horrors of a cruel past,” the president said in a statement quoted by AFP …