NEWS ANALYSIS

Sipopo, Equatorial Guinea | AFP | Gleaming but eerily empty, the luxurious Sipopo resort with its five-star hotel and exclusive facilities rises from a tropical beach, symbolising the dilemma of Equatorial Guinea — a notoriously closed country that has turned to tourism to help fill its coffers. The purpose-built town was …

London, United Kingdom | AFP | The race to become Britain’s next premier opened Saturday with an array of hopefuls promising to succeed where Theresa May failed and finally pull the divided country out of the EU. But European leaders insisted they had made their final offer after months of acrimonious …

  Pretoria, South Africa | AFP |  Newly-elected South African President Cyril Ramaphosa faces herculean tasks after he gets down to work after Saturday’s inauguration. They include: – Fixing the economy – South Africa has the most advanced infrastructure in the continent, but its commodities-dependent economy has been in a …

Washington, United States | AFP |  The United States announced Friday it was deploying 1,500 additional troops to the Middle East in response to what the Pentagon called an “campaign” of recent attacks approved by Iran’s top leadership. The escalation of the US military presence follows a decision in early …

Berlin, Germany | AFP | UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin has defended the decision to host the Europa League final in Baku in an interview with German news magazine Der Spiegel set to be published on Saturday. Chelsea and Arsenal are set to play in Baku on May 29, and UEFA has …

Florida, United States | AFP | SpaceX on Thursday launched a rocket containing the first 60 satellites of its “Starlink” constellation, which is intended to provide internet from space and could one day number 12,000 satellites. One of the company’s Falcon 9 rockets took off without incident from Cape Canaveral in …

Butembo, DR Congo | AFP | People in Ebola-hit eastern DR Congo are struggling to come to terms with high-security burials that are part of a hard-pressed strategy to roll back the disease. Anyone who dies of the highly infectious haemorrhagic fever has to be buried in carefully-controlled conditions designed …

  London, United Kingdom | AFP | After British Prime Minister Theresa May announced her resignation on Friday, here are the top contenders for her job: – Boris Johnson – A former mayor of London, “Boris” or “BoJo”, has confirmed he would “of course” contest any upcoming leadership contest, surprising …

Malabo, Equatorial Guinea | AFP | In a country awash with oil, the poorest survive in shantytowns a stone’s throw from smart modern apartments and family homes supposedly built to help those most in need. The government of Equatorial Guinea had billed the rows of state-subsidised housing as never-to-be-missed home-owning opportunities for the poor. But …

Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP |  Over the course of his 66 years, Cyril Ramaphosa has experienced the poverty of Soweto, jail for fighting apartheid, trade union activism, fabulous wealth — and now elected leadership of his country. Ramaphosa, who became president last year through internal ANC politics, won a …