AFRICA

Maputo, Mozambique | AFP |  Mozambique has started legal action against a French-Lebanese billionaire, Iskandar Safa, whose shipbuilding company is at the heart of a $2 billion debt scandal, officials said Friday. A source at the attorney general’s office, in an emailed reply to AFP, confirmed “a case is ongoing” …

Khartoum, Sudan | AFP | Sudan’s ruling generals announced Friday that nine paramilitaries had been arrested for the killing of four teenage demonstrators earlier this week after four people were killed protesting their deaths. The move against the feared paramilitaries of the Rapid Support Forces came as talks between protest leaders and the ruling generals …

Maputo, Mozambique | AFP | Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi and Renamo opposition leader Ossufo Momade on Thursday signed a landmark agreement aimed at formally ending decades of military hostilities, state TV said. The signing took place in the Gorongosa National Park in central Mozambique, nearly 27 years after the end of the …

Goma, DR Congo | AFP | An Ebola epidemic in eastern DR Congo marked its first anniversary on Thursday with two more cases in the densely-populated frontier city of Goma and accusations by Kinshasa that Rwanda had rushed to shutter its border in response to the crisis. The two new cases …

Khartoum, Sudan | AFP | Four protesters were shot dead at a rally in the Sudanese city of Omdurman Thursday, medics said, as protest leaders and ruling generals started talks to thrash out remaining issues on transitioning to civilian rule. The gunfire occurred as thousands of demonstrators took to the streets …

Paris, France | AFP |  Teodoro Obiang Nguema, president of Equatorial Guinea for 40 years on Saturday, is the world’s longest-serving living leader apart from Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II, on the throne for 67 years. Africa’s longest-serving ruler was also a monarch: Ethiopian emperor Haile Selassie reigned for 44 years …

Kampala, Uganda | Julius Businge | The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa Secretariat in collaboration with the African Union Commission and the United Nations Development Programme’s Regional Service Centre for Africa are holding a training workshop for member states on green/climate financing. on August 1-2 in Harare, Zimbabwe. A media …

Kigali, Rwanda | THE INDEPENDENT & AFP | Rwanda’s border with the Democratic Republic of Congo is not closed, the country’s ministry of health has clarified in a statement. The statement comes hours after DRC President Felix Tshisekedi’s office condemned what it said was the closure of the border, that affected …

Goma, DR Congo | AFP | Rwanda has shuttered its frontier with Ebola-hit Democratic Republic of Congo after a third case of the deadly virus was detected in the border city of Goma, the Congolese presidency said Thursday. The announcement coincided with the first anniversary of an epidemic that has claimed …

Benin City, Nigeria | AFP | She was only just 18 when she gave birth without a doctor in a Tripoli apartment, gripping the hand of her best friend who had come on a journey they hoped would lead from Nigeria to Europe. For Joy, who told her story to AFP on …