AFRICA

Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP | An elderly British couple have been kidnapped in South Africa, police said Thursday, amid reports they were abducted by extremists suspected to have links to the Islamic State group. The British foreign office confirmed that a pair of Britons had been kidnapped and warned …

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia | NBI | Ethiopia’s President Dr. Mulatu Teshome has said that one of the common challenges within the Nile Basin is that the majority of its inhabitants live under extreme poverty. Speaking during Thursday’s regional Nile Day 2018 celebrations at the UN Conference Centre in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, …

Damaturu, Nigeria | AFP | The families of dozens of girls missing for several days after a Boko Haram attack on their school in northeast Nigeria on Thursday faced an anxious wait for their return after confirmation some had been rescued. Police said on Wednesday that 111 girls from the …

Garowe, Somalia | AFP | The new freezers at Somalia’s only forensic laboratory can store thousands of DNA samples, although for now there are just five. The big hope is that they could be the start of a revolution in how the troubled Horn of Africa country tackles its widespread …

Kampala, Uganda | MATY KONTE | There’s no disputing that many African countries’ education systems are in trouble. Despite significant investment and some improvements linked to the push to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, children in large parts of Africa are simply not being well taught or learning what is needed …

Kolwezi, DR Congo | AFP | In global markets the price of cobalt, a mineral used in batteries for high-tech products from iPhones to Tesla electric cars, has nearly tripled to $81,500 a tonne in two years. But in the Democratic Republic of Congo, which produced two-thirds of the global …

Nairobi, Kenya | AFP | More than a hundred Tanzanian civil society groups raised their voices on Wednesday against “unprecedented” violations of human and democratic rights under the government of President John Magufuli. In a rare act of public solidarity, 105 organisations signed a statement warning of “multiple cases (of …

Damaturu, Nigeria | AFP | More than 100 girls were missing on Wednesday, two days after a Boko Haram attack on their school in northeast Nigeria that has raised fears of a repeat of the 2014 Chibok kidnapping that shocked the world. Islamist militants stormed the Government Girls Science Secondary …

Cape Town, South Africa | AFP | South Africans were hit by the first sales tax increase since apartheid when the country’s finance minister delivered a tough budget on Wednesday, dampening optimism spurred by the country’s new reformist president. President Cyril Ramaphosa took over last week from the scandal-plagued Jacob …

Jerusalem, Undefined | AFP | Hundreds of African migrants launched a hunger strike to protest Israel’s implementation of its controversial policy to expel or indefinitely imprison them, a spokesman for the group said Wednesday. Israel has resolved to expel thousands of Eritreans and Sudanese who entered illegally over the years, …