AFRICA

Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP | Two climbers were killed abseiling on Cape Town’s Table Mountain on New Year’s Day, with hundreds of tourists stranded on the summit for hours during the rescue effort, South African officials said Tuesday. The victims were one Japanese man, whose wife survived, and a …

Cairo, Egypt | AFP | A gunman killed two Copts celebrating the New Year in an Egyptian alcohol shop early on Monday, judicial and security sources said, the latest deadly violence against the Christian minority. The shooting came just three days after a gunman, identified as a wanted jihadist, killed nine …

Bamako, Mali | AFP | Mali will adopt a law on “national consensus” that may amnesty rebels who took part in a revolt in 2012, President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita said in a New Year’s speech. Keita, in a nationwide message late Sunday, said the law would draw on a so-called …

United Nations, United States | AFP | UN chief Antonio Guterres has urged Democratic Republic of Congo President Joseph Kabila to abide by an agreement to leave power, after at least eight people died in protests against his rule. Kabila, in power since 2001, signed a deal with opposition groups …

Nairobi, Kenya | THE INDEPENDENT |  Kenya’s investment in the Standard Gauge Railway will strengthen its business position in the region and will benefit local businesses. “We built a world-class railway on time and within budget. On the 2nd of January, that railway will begin carrying commercial cargo, cutting costs …

Kinshasa, DR Congo | AFP | Eight people were killed Sunday and dozens arrested as security forces in DR Congo cracked down on Catholic worshippers who gathered at churches across the country to demand President Joseph Kabila leave power, a UN source said. Despite appeals notably from the United Nations …

Malabo, Equatorial Guinea | AFP | The president of Equatorial Guinea said a war is being organised against his regime, days after a government official warned of a “destabilisation attempt”. A “war” is being prepared “because they say I have spent a lot of time in power,” President Teodoro Obiang …

  N’Djamena, Chad | AFP |  The President of Chad, Idriss Deby, on Sunday said general elections, scheduled for 2015 but much postponed, would be held in 2018. “I am happy to announce, on the cusp of the New Year, that legislative elections will be organised in 2018,” Deby said …

Nairobi, Kenya | AFP | Thirty-six people were killed and 11 injured early Sunday morning in a head-on collision between a bus and a lorry on a road in central Kenya, police said. “The death toll is now 36,” said Rift Valley traffic police chief Zero Arome, explaining the initial …

Lome, Togo | AFP | Tens of thousands of demonstrators thronged the streets of the Togolese capital on Saturday, the latest in a series of mass protests against the rule of President Faure Gnassingbe. Anti-government marches have been held across the country nearly every week since August, attracting hundreds of …