Just hours after epic storm Daniel dumped torrential rains on Libya’s coast, breaching dams and killing thousands, some called it perhaps the deadliest and costliest Mediterranean tropical-like cyclone ever recorded.

Described by some scientists as the latest extreme weather event linked to climate change, analysts tell VOA that conflict, political division and neglect of public infrastructure also played a role in making Libya helpless as Daniel’s downpour burst two dams, sweeping entire neighborhoods of the coastal city of Derna into the sea.

“Bodies are lying everywhere in the sea, in the valleys, under the buildings,” one Libyan official told the Associated Press.

Some experts familiar with the stricken region say the sheer scope of the devastation goes beyond a climate crisis-induced catastrophe.

“Years of conflict and division, administrative malfeasance and misgovernance hitting this very vulnerable area” has compounded the impact of the storm, said Stephanie Williams, a non-resident senior fellow at Washington’s Brookings Institution, who served as a U.N. special advisor on Libya.

“All of this converged to create a terribly catastrophic situation now,” she told VOA. “Political instability is quite complicating in this environment and I’m sure there will be many who will want to play the blame game.”

Saudi Arabia’s Arab News newspaper said the “startling death and devastation” caused by the storm’s intensity also exposed Libya’s vulnerability after being divided between rival governments and “torn apart by chaos for more than a decade.”

“Libya, for the past 10 years, has gone [from] one war to another, one political crisis to another,” Claudia Gazzini, a senior Libya analyst for the International Crisis Group told The New York Times newspaper. “Essentially this has meant that, for the past 10 years, there hasn’t really been much investment in the country’s infrastructure.”

Malak Eltaeb, an analyst with Washington’s Middle East Institute, told VOA by email that conflict and unrest have left social services severely weakened.

“And a failure to maintain facilities, like dams — unfortunately, there were no mitigation strategies, early warning systems or evacuation plans in place,” he said of the disaster in Derna, which lies some 900 kilometers east of the capital, Tripoli, an area controlled by military commander Khalifa Haftar’s forces. “No measures were taken to protect civilians or reduce damage.”

But Brookings analyst Williams said that despite the geopolitical divide, the rival, internationally recognized government based in Tripoli in western Libya and allied with other armed groups, is coming to the aid of citizens in the country’s east.

“There’s a great outreach from all Libyans to the people, particularly in Derna, of the internationally recognized government in Tripoli,” she said. “It has sent assistance; it’s allocating funds to help with immediate humanitarian needs and long-term rebuilding.”

Desperately needed aid, she added, is also reaching people by civilian convoys from western Libya and by the national oil company to Libyans in the east. “The division right now is not a barrier to assistance,” she said.

Addressing a news conference on Tuesday, World Health Organization spokesperson Margaret Harris described the flooding as being of “epic” proportions.

Humanitarian groups have also expressed concerns that migrants and refugees from more than 40 countries who use Libya as a launch point for Europe may have been caught up in the floods.

Some information is from the Associated Press.
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Libyan authorities sealed off an inundated city on Friday to allow search teams to dig through the mud and hollowed-out buildings for 10,000 people missing and feared dead after the official toll from flooding soared past 11,000. Authorities warned that disease and explosives shifted by the waters could take yet more lives.

Two dams collapsed in exceptionally heavy rains from Mediterranean storm Daniel early Monday, sending a wall of water several meters high gushing down a valley that cuts through the city of Derna.

The unusual flooding and Libya’s political chaos contributed to the enormous toll. The oil-rich state has been split since 2014 between rival governments in the east and west backed by various militia forces and international patrons.

The disaster has brought rare unity, as government agencies across Libya’s divide rushed to help the affected areas. But relief efforts have been slowed by the destruction after several bridges that connect the city were destroyed.

Heaps of twisted metal and flooded cars littered Derna’s streets, which are caked in a tan mud. Teams have buried bodies in mass graves outside the city and in nearby towns, Eastern Libya’s health minister, Othman Abduljaleel, said.

But officials worried that thousands of bodies were still hidden in the muck — or floating in the sea, where divers were sent to search.

Adel Ayad, a survivor of the flood, recalled watching as the waters rose to the fourth floor of his building.

“The waves swept people away from the tops of buildings, and we could see people carried by floodwater,” among them his neighbors, he said.

Health officials warned that standing water opened the door to disease — but said there was no need to rush burials or put the dead in mass graves, as bodies usually do not pose a risk in such cases.

“You’ve got a lot of standing water. It doesn’t mean the dead bodies pose a risk, but it does mean that the water itself is contaminated by everything,” Dr. Margaret Harris, spokeswoman for the World Health Organization, told reporters in Geneva. “So you really have to focus on ensuring that people have have access to safe water.”

Imene Trabelsi, a spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross, warned that another danger lurked in the mud: landmines and other explosive remnants left behind by the country’s protracted conflict.

There are leftover explosives in Libya dating back to World War II, but most of the remaining ones are from the civil conflict that began in 2011. Between 2011 and 2021, some 3,457 people were killed and wounded by landmines and explosive weapon remnants in Libya, according to the international Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor.

Even before the flooding, Trabelsi said the “efforts and the capacity” to detect and demine areas were limited. After the floods, she said, explosive devices may have been swept to “new, undetected areas.”

To allow emergency crews to do their work, residents were being evacuated from Derna and only search-and-rescue teams would be allowed to enter, Salam al-Fergany, director general of the Ambulance and Emergency Service in eastern Libya, announced late Thursday.

The Libyan Red Crescent said as of Thursday that 11,300 people in Derna had died and another 10,100 were reported missing. The storm also killed about 170 people elsewhere in the country.

Officials have said that Libya’s political chaos has contributed to the loss of life.

“Government institutions are not functioning as they should,” Lori Hieber Girardet, the head of the risk knowledge branch the U.N. Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, told The Associated Press on Thursday.

Khalifa Othman, a Derna resident who is searching desperately for missing loved ones, said he blamed authorities for the extent of the disaster.

“My son, a doctor who is graduated this year, my nephew and all his family, my grandchild, my daughter and her husband are all missing, and we are still searching for them,” he said. “All the people are upset and angry — there was no preparedness.”
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The U.S. military acknowledged providing assistance to a Somali government operation against al-Shabab leaders last week in which five civilians died.

A spokesperson for the U.S. military’s Africa Command, known as AFRICOM, said the U.S. forces didn’t accompany Somali forces during the operation but assisted them remotely.

The U.S. “did not conduct airstrikes during or in support of this operation, nor were there U.S. personnel accompanying Somali forces during this counterterrorism operation against high-level al-Shabab combatants on September 6, 2023, in the vicinity of El Lahelay, Somalia,” Major Jessica Tait said in an email. “U.S. forces were advising and assisting the Somali forces’ mission from a remote location.”

Tait confirmed that Somali children were among those killed in the incident. “The command’s initial assessment is that one woman and three children were killed at the site,” she said. “At the request of the government of Somalia, U.S. Africa Command medically evacuated two injured children, with one surviving.”

The al-Shabab militant group in a statement on September 7 blamed the U.S. military for the killing of the civilians. Al-Shabab alleged the U.S. forces took away the bodies to “conceal” the truth of the incident.

The U.S. denied al-Shabab’s accusation. “The claim being spread by al- Shabab that U.S. forces caused the unfortunate harm to civilians is false,” AFRICOM said in the September 8 statement.

Tait said that U.S. forces “did not fire at any time while conducting the medical evacuation.”

The Somali government said it was investigating the incident.

“The government has received reports that civilians were hurt. An investigation is ongoing to verify that,” Minister of Information Daud Aweis told VOA Somali on Thursday. “We can’t confirm yet until the investigation is done.”

The Somali government declared in a statement on September 7 that three al-Shabab operatives had been killed in the operation. It identified the three as Olol Ali Guled, head of mobilization for al-Shabab’s Jabhat [military] in the area; Isse Barre and Shuuke Ali Dheeg. All were described as “wanted criminals.”

A Somali security commander who did not want to be identified told VOA that Guled was involved in an attack on a Somali base used by U.S. forces to train Somali forces in September 2019.

Barre was one of the commanders of al-Shabab’s police in the Bay and Bakool regions but was recently sent back to his clan base to mobilize fighters in light of the government offensive, while Dheeg was a weapons storage keeper, according to the commander.

Grandfather speaks out

The grandfather of the children, Ahmed Mohamud Shuuke, told VOA Somali that the children – four boys by his son and a girl from his daughter – were staying with his wife on the night of the operation. He said he was away from home that night along with the parents of the children and didn’t hear about what had happened until dawn.

“This disaster came upon them, and we don’t know where it came from,” he told VOA Somalia in a telephone interview.

Shuuke said he thought there had been an airstrike. He also said the family saw the tracks of vehicles at the site of the incident on the morning after the operation.

He said the bodies of his wife and grandchildren were unaccounted for.  “Their bodies have been taken away,” he said. “Up to now we don’t know their whereabouts.”

He said he had not had any contact from the government. He appealed for the return of any surviving relative.

During the interview, he did not single out any side or group for the killing, although when he spoke to al-Shabab media he appeared to have blamed “U.S. planes.”

“The people who killed [the children] know themselves, and the world sees it,” he said.

“I want any surviving ones given back,” plus compsenation for the deaths, he said.
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The government of Democratic Republic of the Congo will closely follow the case of detained journalist Stanis Bujakera, communications minister Patrick Muyaya said on Thursday in the government’s first comments since his detention last week.

Bujakera, who works for international media outlets including Reuters, was detained at the airport in the capital, Kinshasa, on September 8 on suspicion of spreading false information about the killing of a prominent opposition politician in an article published by French news magazine Jeune Afrique, the magazine said.

Bukajera is accused of “spreading false rumors” and the “dissemination of false information” about the case, the magazine said in online statements. But it said the article in question did not carry his name, and “he cannot be held responsible” for its content.

Local and international rights groups including Human Rights Watch have expressed concern about his detention, calling it an attack on press freedom.

Speaking to journalists in Kinshasa, Muyaya said “a journalist going to prison is not good news.”

Muyaya declined to comment on the merits of the case, citing the independence of the judiciary from the government, but said “we will follow the case closely until its conclusion.”

“We hold freedom of the press dear. It is a cardinal value of democracy, but it is also a freedom which does not give a blank check for disinformation,” he said. “We hope that the case, which is following a normal course, … can be resolved quickly.”
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Zimbabwe’s government is continuing with oil drilling near the border with Mozambique and Zambia, despite opposition from activists who warn that fossil fuel exploration will damage the environment. Columbus Mavhunga reports from Mbire. Camera: Blessing Chigwenhembe.
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Government officials in Cameroon and the Central African Republic say the number of civilian kidnappings has spiked along their borders, with armed gangs and rebels demanding as much as $50,000 in ransom.

In addition to the abductions, the rebels and armed gangs loot markets and ranches and send villagers fleeing for safety, said officials in Cameroon’s eastern border with the Central African Republic, or CAR.

Abdoulahi Bobo, a cattle rancher, said his two wives, three children and elder brother have yet to be found a week after they were taken to the bush by armed men. He said the abductors called him and demanded payment of about $10,000 to secure his family’s freedom.

Bobo spoke to VOA by messaging app on Thursday from Cameroon’s eastern district of Ngaoui, which borders Mont Ngaoui, the highest point in the Central African Republic. He said his family may have been taken to the mountain or neighboring forests.

Cameroon and CAR said rebel attacks are reported on both sides of the border almost daily.

Oumarou Abbo, mayor of Nyambaka, the capital of Cameroon’s Nyambaka district, said the rebels and armed gangs also attack remote communities throughout the district, so he has created militias in all the villages of his district to help government troops fight hostage takers. The militias are expected to report strangers as well as places where rebels and armed gangs hide, he said.

Cameroon and CAR officials said that some armed rebels disguise themselves as people displaced by the ongoing armed conflicts in CAR. 

The U.N. peacekeeping mission to CAR, known as MINUSCA, which has troops from Cameroon, this week said forces were deployed to border regions to fight the rebels and seize weapons the rebels abandon when attacked. Cameroon and CAR officials said armed gangs often collect weapons abandoned by rebels and use them in either abducting civilians or stealing.

Cameroonian Defense Minister Joseph Beti Assomo said President Paul Biya dispatched him to Motcheboum — about halfway between the capital, Yaounde, and the border with CAR — to mobilize troops for civilian protection.

Kildadi Taguieke Boukar, governor of Cameroon’s Adamawa region, said rebel attacks on civilians have also been reported along Cameroon’s northern border with Chad. He said that government troops were deployed to the Adamawa region immediately to protect civilians after Assomo’s visit.

Boukar said military posts in all districts where the kidnappings are happening have been equipped with enough troops, weapons, artillery, vehicles and tracking devices. Troops with special training to investigate, arrest or eliminate armed gangs and rebels have also been deployed to protect civilians on both sides of the porous and permeable border between Cameroon and the CAR, he said.

In December, defense ministers from Cameroon and the CAR agreed to deploy a joint force along the 900-kilometer (560-mile) border to protect civilians. The ministers said the joint force would also seize weapons that rebels hid in border towns and villages.

Civilians said that after those troops retreated in March, rebels relaunched kidnappings and increased the ransoms from $20,000 to $50,000. Abductees whom rebels suspect of collaborating with government troops are tortured and ordered to pay more, according to border villagers.

Cameroonian military officials said the majority of abductees are merchants and cattle ranchers.

Cameroon officials said the nation is intensifying collaboration with neighboring countries to safeguard civilians.
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One of the world’s most popular apps, TikTok, is under growing scrutiny in Kenya over what critics see as explicit and offensive content, and hate speech. An activist has petitioned parliament to ban the Chinese app, even as millions of young Kenyans use it for entertainment, social connections, or even to make money. Francis Ontomwa reports from Nairobi. Camera: Amos Wangwa.
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Search and rescue teams worked Thursday in eastern Libya, where devastating floods left thousands of people dead and thousands more missing.

The exact toll remained unclear following the flooding that hit Sunday.

The Associated Press quoted eastern Libya’s health minister, Othman Abduljaleel, as saying 3,000 bodies have been buried with 2,000 more still being processed.

Abdel-Raham al-Ghaithi, the mayor of the city of Derna, told al-Arabia television that the death toll could reach 20,000.

Derna was the hardest-hit area, with torrential rain and dam failures wrecking buildings, burying areas in mud and washing people out to sea.

World Meteorological Organization Secretary-General Petteri Taalas told reporters Thursday in Geneva that “most of the human casualties” could have been avoided if Libya had a functional weather service.

“If they would have been a normally operating meteorological service, they could have issued warnings,” he said.

The international aid effort has included teams from Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia, Turkey, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

The International Organization for Migration said Wednesday the flooding displaced at least 30,000 people in Derna as well as thousands more in other areas.

Atiyah Alhasadi, a 30-year-old teacher from Derna, told VOA’s Heather Murdock he was in his home in the center of the city when he heard what sounded like “20 million drums exploding,” and water crashed in, rising 50 meters above the houses.

Alhasadi said he and his family went to the roof of the building because the lower floors were flooded immediately and watched the water rise to the fourth or fifth floors of some buildings. He said his two aunts on the first floor died in the initial rush of water but his family was able to escape to a relative’s home on higher ground.

Now, he said, he is with five or six families in one small house, searching for a vehicle to get to Benghazi or another town.

“We can’t find gasoline, fuel or water,” he said.

Alhasadi said people also need mattresses and medicine but there is no available humanitarian aid to be found. He noted people are sleeping on the streets without even tents and the only hospital is barely functioning. It was just a makeshift hospital, while the actual one was under construction.

Some information in this report was provided by The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters. 
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The U.S. military has resumed counterterrorism missions in Niger, flying drones and other aircraft out of air bases in the country more than a month after a coup halted those activities, the head of U.S. Air Forces for Europe and Africa said Wednesday. 

Since the July coup, the 1,100 U.S. forces deployed in the country have been confined inside their bases. Last week the Pentagon said some military personnel and assets had been moved from the air base near Niamey, the capital, to another in Agadez. The cities are about 920 kilometers apart. 

In recent weeks some of those intelligence and surveillance missions have been able to resume through U.S. negotiations with the junta, said General James Hecker, the top Air Force commander for Europe and Africa. 

“For a while we weren’t doing any missions on the bases. They pretty much closed down the airfields,” Hecker said. “Through the diplomatic process, we are now doing – I wouldn’t say 100% of the missions that we were doing before, but we’re doing a large amount of missions that we’re doing before.” 

Hecker, who spoke to reporters at the annual Air and Space Forces Association convention at National Harbor, Maryland, said the U.S. was flying manned and unmanned missions and that those flights resumed “within the last couple of weeks.” 

The significant distance between the two bases also means that while the flights are going out, some missions are “not getting as much data, because you’re not overhead for as long” because of the amount of fuel it takes to get out and back, he said. 

The U.S. has made Niger its main regional outpost for wide-ranging patrols by armed drones and other counterterror operations against Islamic extremist movements that over the years have seized territory, massacred civilians and battled foreign armies. The bases are a critical part of America’s overall counterterrorism efforts in West Africa. 

The U.S. has also invested years and hundreds of millions of dollars in training Nigerien forces. 

In 2018, fighters loyal to the Islamic State group ambushed and killed four American service members, four Nigeriens and an interpreter. 

West Africa recorded more than 1,800 extremist attacks in the first six months of this year, which killed nearly 4,600 people, according to ECOWAS, the Economic Community of West African States. 

The Islamic extremist group Boko Haram operates in neighboring Nigeria and Chad. Along Niger’s borders with Mali and Burkina Faso, the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara and al-Qaida affiliate Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin pose greater threats.
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Malawi is extending the maximum age of children eligible for the polio vaccination from 5 to 15. Since the discovery last year of its first polio case 30 years after the country eradicated the disease, the number of cases has increased to five this year — the latest victim being 14 years old.  

Malawi health authorities made the announcement Tuesday at the launch of the nationwide polio vaccination campaign that is targeting about 9.7 million children.     

Beston Chisamile, the secretary of health in Malawi, said the children will be vaccinated on their doorsteps.  

“Our health workers will be visiting parents’ homes and vaccinating [children],” said Chisamile. “We are aware that some of them were skipped in the previous vaccination phase, and we want to try and reach the majority.” 

Chisamile said the maximum age of children to be vaccinated was extended from 5 to 15 years of age after the discovery of another case this year of a 14-year-old. 

Polio resurfaces 

Polio is a viral disease that causes irreversible paralysis and has no cure. The disease can be prevented, however, by the administration of effective vaccines. 

Thirty years after it eradicated the disease, Malawi confirmed its first polio case in February 2022. Since then, the number of confirmed cases has increased to five. 

Malawi is among several countries in Africa that have registered confirmed cases of polio in recent years.  

The World Health Organization said in a statement released on August 30 that 187 confirmed cases of circulating variant poliovirus have been reported in 21 countries in the African region. 

The WHO said that although the region has been certified free of wild poliovirus, it is witnessing a resurgence of the disease because of a decline in immunization coverage and the disruption of essential health services caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

A push to vaccinate

UNICEF, WHO, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and other partners of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative are leading the vaccination campaign in Malawi. 

The UNICEF representative in Malawi, Shadrack Omol, said the United Nations’ children’s agency so far has procured and distributed 10.2 million doses of the polio vaccine across all 29 districts and 865 health facilities in Malawi. 

Omol also said UNICEF has installed 250 new refrigerators, repaired 125 broken ones, and distributed essential cold storage equipment. 

Health authorities in Malawi have noted with concern, though, that some parents refuse to have their children vaccinated because of cultural and religious beliefs. 

Authorities say this will impede efforts to meet vaccination targets.  

George Jobe, the executive director of the Malawi Health Equity Network, told VOA that his organization has been educating people about the importance of vaccinating children against polio. 

“We still maintain our plea and health education to those who don’t believe in medication that they should be mindful of the right to the good health of their children,,” said Jobe. “The children will make their own choices when they grow up. But at the moment, parents must not apply whatever they believe in on their children.” 
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The United Nations’ top envoy in Sudan is stepping down, four months after being told by the government to leave. In parting remarks, he criticized Sudan’s military and the rebel Rapid Support Forces, or RSF.

“This conflict is leaving a tragic legacy of human rights abuses,” Volker Perthes told a Security Council meeting on Wednesday. “Indiscriminate attacks against civilians committed by the warring parties constitute gross violations of human rights.”

The United Nations says at least 5,000 people have been killed and more than 12,000 injured since fighting erupted between rival generals on April 15. More than 5 million Sudanese are now displaced — more than a million of them as refugees in neighboring countries.

Of particular concern is escalating ethnically targeted fighting in the Darfur region. The region saw wide-scale ethnic violence and crimes against humanity in the early 2000s, and the U.N. fears a repeat now.

Perthes said hundreds of ethnic Masalit have been killed in El Geneina and other parts of West Darfur. The U.N. has also received credible information about the existence of at least 13 mass graves in El Geneina and the surrounding areas. RSF and their allied Arab militias have been attacking civilians in this region.

The envoy said there is “little doubt about who is responsible for what” in the conflict.

“Often indiscriminate aerial bombing is conducted by those who have an air force, which is the Sudan Armed Forces,” Perthes said. “Most of the sexual violence, lootings and killings happen in areas controlled by the RSF and are conducted or tolerated by the RSF and their allies.”

Perthes said both sides are arbitrarily arresting, detaining and even torturing and executing civilians.

“We need to impress on the warring parties that they cannot operate with impunity, and there will be accountability for the crimes committed,” he said.

A group of Security Council diplomats issued a statement expressing alarm about the rampant use of sexual violence in the conflict.

“Reports of rape, including gang rape, sexual slavery, abduction, and sexual harassment have been prominent throughout the conflict,” it said. “Women and girls, particularly in the Darfur region, are subjected to horrifying acts of sexual [violence] and reports of gender-based violence as a tactic of war to instill fear and control in the population and assert dominance over local communities.”

The diplomats urged the warring parties to stop such violence and uphold their obligations under international humanitarian law.

No peace in sight

Efforts to halt the fighting have so far failed, despite regional efforts by the African Union and the east African regional bloc IGAD, as well as the United States, European Union, Saudi Arabia and some of Sudan’s neighbors.

When asked about the situation by VOA at a news conference on Wednesday, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the best way to solve Africa’s problems is with African solutions.

“Unfortunately, we are witnessing a never-ending series of terrible fighting with dramatic impacts on civilian population, and this is absolutely intolerable,” he said. “I think that the international community must come together to tell those that are leading the fight in Sudan that they need to stop. Because what they are doing is not only the destruction of their own country but is a serious threat to regional peace and security.”

In the meantime, the humanitarian crisis is rapidly worsening: displacement at the rate of a million persons per month, a collapsing health care system and growing hunger.

The United Nations warns that 6 million Sudanese are on the brink of famine.

“If the fighting continues, this potential tragedy comes closer to reality every day,” Edem Wosornu, head of the operations and advocacy at the U.N.’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told council members.
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The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, FAO, has launched a plan to assist at least 10 million Sudanese farmers, herders and fishermen across 17 states. The 12-month program aims to address the threat of food insecurity in the country, which has been exacerbated by a five-month-old armed conflict.

The FAO will add to recent seed distribution efforts to enhance food production, with the hope of feeding 13 to 19 million people in coming months.

Abdulhakim Elwaer, FAO regional representative for the Near East and North Africa, said the Emergency Livelihood Response Plan is designed to combat hunger and poverty in Sudan.

“The ELRP aims to mitigate the impact of the recent conflict on vulnerable people, address their immediate needs, and enhance their ability to recover and strengthen their resilience, besides achieving food security at its minimum level for the overall population,” Elwaer said. “Agriculture remains a lifeline in Sudan.”

Sudan plunged into conflict in April, sparked by a power struggle between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces.

The conflict has killed thousands of people, displaced millions, and prompted millions more to seek refuge in neighboring countries in search of food, medicine and shelter.

Mohamed Abdulrahman, a farmer in Sudan’s Upper Nile State, expressed optimism about the assistance.

“I think this will help us and others be encouraged to look for and seek such kind of help and organize themselves,” he said. “But the condition is demanding; seriously, the Sudanese people need help from the international community because they lost their government.”

Aid agencies say during Sudan’s dry season, which runs from November to May, farmers reliant on rainfall face food shortages, while livestock owners are faced with water and pasture shortages, leading to threatened livelihoods.

According to Integrated Food Security Phase (IPC) projections published last month, more than 20.3 million Sudanese are food insecure, with six million suffering from emergency levels of acute hunger.

Abdulrahman said that Sudanese farmers use seeds to produce food, but also require so much more.

“I don’t think that’s enough because the farmers need more than the seeds,” he said. “They need money to make the preparations. They need money to continue with other agricultural activities.”

The FAO said that much of the support for the vulnerable farming and herding households will be delivered through cash assistance and livelihood input packages, including seeds and agricultural, animal and fishing tools.

Elwaer said the successful execution of their plan could prevent a humanitarian crisis and famine in Sudan.

“FAO does not supply food directly to individuals, but supplies seeds and agricultural inputs to farmers who are actually food producers to thousands of people,” he said. “So if we reach out to 1.5 million farmers in Sudan in 14 states, we are literally providing food supplies, mainly vegetables and fruits and seeds like corn and wheat, for the large population of Sudan by the next harvest season, which will mitigate the situation and the crisis to a large extent.”

The agricultural agency said it needs $123 million to achieve its goals, with the program expected to end in August 2024. 
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Johannesburg, South Africa’s most populous city, has for years struggled to keep up with housing demand due to an influx of people who come in search of opportunities. Some residents, many with little financial means, find themselves in sub-par housing that has a high risk of fire and little to no access to water and electricity. Jan Bornman reports from Johannesburg, South Africa. Camera: Zaheer Cassim
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The International Organization for Migration said Wednesday that the deadly flooding that hit eastern Libya has displaced more than 30,000 people.

The U.N. agency said at least 30,000 of the displaced were from the city of Derna, with thousands more from other areas including Benghazi.

More than 5,000 people are believed dead, with exact figures difficult to confirm in the country where rival governments have competed for control for a decade. Some officials say that number could double.

Hichem Abu Chkiouat, minister of civil aviation in the administration that runs eastern Libya, told Reuters that more than 5,300 bodies had been counted in Derna. The city was the hardest hit after Mediterranean Storm Daniel brought torrential rains and two dams collapsed.

Fatma Balha, a medical student in Derna, told VOA English to Africa’s Hassuna Baishu that the center of Derna has suffered major damage.

“It’s all gone. All the buildings are gone. It all went with the floods, probably they have gone to the sea. We cannot see the building,” Balha said.  “I have my aunt. She’s there and we cannot find her. None of her kids, none of their bodies, none. Not even the building. It’s gone. It’s not there at all.”

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said Wednesday the situation in Derna is very bad and that international support is needed.

Mey Al Sayegh, the head of communications at the IFRC Middle East and North Africa office, said in a briefing on X that there is no clean drinking water in Derna and no medical supplies, and that the only hospital in the city could no longer take patients.

Al Sayegh said what is needed now is water, shelter, medical aid, food and psychosocial support.

Ahmed Bayram, media advisor for the Middle East for the Norwegian Refugee Council, told VOA’s James Butty that Libya had already faced challenges for years and needs funding.

“This is going to be a tragic situation for tens of thousands, not just in Derna, but also across Libya,” Bayram said.  “The thing about this is that Libya, with its many problems, has been off the headlines for months, if not over a year now. Now it’s back in the spotlight and it is important to stress that Libya has been left behind. The Libya crisis has been left behind. And now it’s time for donors to get back on track and fund this emergency.”

Hassuna Baishu and James Butty contributed to this report. Some information was provided by the Associated Press and Reuters
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The death toll in Morocco has now risen to 2,900 after a 6.8-magnitude earthquake shook the High Atlas Mountains southwest of Marrakech on Friday. More than 5,500 people have reported injuries, more than twice the previous tally. Many survivors complain of a lack of aid from Morocco’s government.  

This earthquake is the North African nation’s worst in more than 60 years.  

After four nights exposed to the elements, locals who have been left homeless are frustrated with the emergency response. 

Mehdi Ait Bouyali, 24, has been stranded along the Tizi N’Test, a lengthy road that connects Marrakech to outlying rural valleys. In the aftermath, he has been camping on the roadside with others who escaped. 

They have received no government support and say if not for food and blankets from strangers driving by, they would have nothing.  

“The villages of the valley have been forgotten,” he said. “We need any kind of help. We need tents.”

Government spokesman Mustapha Baitas on Monday disputed the accusations of inaction. 

“From the first seconds this devastating earthquake occurred, and in following the instructions of His Royal Majesty, all civil and military authorities and medical staff, military and civil, have worked on the swift and effective intervention to rescue the victims and recover the bodies of the martyrs,” he said. 

Rescue teams, including some brought in from Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Britain and Spain, have built tent camps and have begun to deliver food and water where they can. 

But the situation is desperate for those in remote areas, where access routes have been obstructed by landslides, and where many live in old-style mud brick huts that have collapsed on their occupants. 

Hamid Ait Bouyali, 40, who was camping with Medhi on the side of the road, described the devastation. 

“The authorities are focusing on the bigger communities and not the remote villages that are worst affected,” he said. “There are some villages that still have the dead buried under the rubble.”

Everyday, citizens have been aiding in the response. Brahim Daldali, 36, of Marrakech, has been delivering vital supplies on his motorcycle to those hit the hardest. 

“They have nothing, and the people are starving,” he said. 

All of the residents in the village of Kettou were miraculously spared, as they were participating in an outdoor pre-wedding celebration. Meanwhile, their stone and mud brick houses were razed by the earthquake.

Some parts of Marrakech’s old city were damaged, but most of the city emerged unharmed, including buildings where the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are scheduled to hold meetings in October. The government is reluctant to reschedule. 

Some information from Reuters was used in this report. 
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Nigerians are praising the lifting of a visa ban by the United Arab Emirates following a meeting in Abu Dhabi this week between President Bola Tinubu and United Arab Emirates President Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.

Nigerian authorities also secured an investment deal worth billions of dollars, according to the presidency.

Nigerian presidential spokesperson Ajuri Ngelale said Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates have established a framework for investments worth billions of dollars across multiple sectors, including defense and agriculture.

Speaking to Lagos-based Channels Television, Ngelale said the pact also resulted in the immediate lifting of a visa ban imposed by the UAE in October 2022.

“What we’ve done today is to not only normalize relations but then to add new dimensions to that relationship or partnership that are mutually beneficial to both nations,” he said. “And I think as we move forward, the details of those investments will become clear.”

The UAE imposed the visa ban on Nigeria in connection with a number of diplomatic disputes.

Dubai’s Emirates airline also suspended flight operations to Nigeria over Abuja’s inability to send the UAE an estimated $85 million in revenue that Dubai said had been blocked in the African nation. The monies could not be repatriated due to dollar shortages.

Additionally, the UAE’s Etihad Airways stopped flights to Nigeria.

But Ngelale said Emirates and Etihad airlines are expected to resume operations immediately without any payment by the Nigerian government.

The spokesperson also said Tinubu successfully negotiated a new foreign exchange liquidity program with the UAE.

Nigerian experts such as economist Emeka Orji welcomed the president’s move as a step that could reverse negative economic trends.

“It should be a no-brainer for them to reverse it,” Orji said. “The major chunk of their tourism, whether it is education or for holidays, Nigeria would show up on the list of its major tourism income-earning countries.”

In a recent statement, the UAE’s official Emirates News Agency noted that its leader and Tinubu explored opportunities for further bilateral collaboration in areas that served the sustainable economic growth of both countries.

The statement, however, did not go into detail about the lifting of the visa ban on Nigerians and the resumption of flights.

Orji says there will be a positive impact.

“International relations between the two countries will likely lead to an increase in economic activity,” he said. “There may be some interest in investing in some sectors in Nigeria. That would be an obvious gain for Nigeria.”

For now, experts said they hope the new pact is fully implemented for both countries to benefit.
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The Botswana government responded to criticism from an anti-hunting activist, saying the number of elephants legally killed by hunters since the lifting of a hunting ban in 2019 is negligible.

South Africa-based activist Adam Cruise recently published a report titled “Trophy Hunting in Botswana: a tale of declining wildlife, corruption, exploitation and impoverishment.”

In it, Cruise, who is among the leading campaigners pushing for a ban on trophy hunting, said that the killing of elephants and other large animals threatens Botswana’s wildlife.

Additionally, he said that hunting impoverishes communities because they do not benefit from revenue generated from the sport.

Thato Raphaka, permanent secretary in Botswana’s Ministry of Environment and Tourism, described Cruise’s report as malicious and misleading. Raphaka, in a statement, said that the allotment of hunted animals is approved by international conservation body CITES, and that the number of elephants killed compared to the overall elephant population is negligible.

Elephants are considered an endangered species, but protection measures have allowed their numbers to grow in southern Africa. A recent census of the Kavango Zambezi Trans-frontier Conservation Area, or KAZA, found that nearly 230,000 elephants live in the five-country protected zone.

About 130,000 of the elephants live in Botswana.

Isaac Theophilus, the chief executive of the nonprofit Botswana Wildlife Producers Association, supported the government’s stance, saying, “Botswana is a free and democratic country capable of managing her own resources without outside interference.”

He said that the country manages its resources, including wildlife, for economic development and to improve the people’s livelihoods.

“It is not by chance that the country has so many wildlife resources roaming around,” Theophilus said.  

International hunters can currently buy licenses to shoot about 300 elephants in Botswana per season. Theophilus said that number is reasonable.

“The hunting quota for elephants, which has been less than [the] 400 [that] CITES approved, is very conservative,” he said. “Based on recently released KAZA aerial survey results, the quota is less than 0.003% of the population. Any scientist can tell you that this is an extremely conservative quota.”

Conservationist Map Ives said that the government conducted countrywide consultations prior to reintroducing the sport in 2019, and that the majority of the population supported trophy hunting. 

“The number of elephants hunted are of course negligible compared to those being born,” Ives said. “I don’t know if that argument holds any water. What I do know is that in a democracy, which Botswana is clearly a democracy, most of the people support hunting, based probably on a historical culture.”

Ives said he doubts that the debate over trophy hunting will go away because of growing opposition in many Western countries, especially in Europe.

“The last outpost of hunting seemingly is here in southern Africa, where there is still a large number of elephants, for example, and there is still a number of people that get a great deal of pleasure from hunting,” he said.

Some western countries, including the United Kingdom and Germany, are pushing for a ban on legally harvested animal trophies from Africa.

A bill called the Hunting Trophies Import Prohibition is being debated before the U.K.’s House of Lords.
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In a historic move, the African Union has secured a permanent place in the Group of 20, also known as the G20, a development that could have major implications for Africa’s role in global geopolitics. 

As the continent faces an array of challenges, ranging from climate change to political instability and economic inequality, experts disagree on how big an impact G20 membership will have as the AU joins 20 of the world’s largest economies.

Robert Besseling, chief executive officer of Pangea-Risk, an intelligence advisory group based in South Africa and Britain, told VOA it is more of a symbolic development than a substantive event.

“The AU seat at the G20 will be meaningless,” Besseling said, if the African body cannot react decisively to events that include “the spree of military coups and irregular elections that have set back Africa’s democratic trajectory in recent months.”

Seven African countries have experienced military-led coups since 2020, most recently Gabon and Niger, raising questions about political stability, the lack of which makes it harder to address pressing issues like terrorism and food shortages in many countries.

Dennis Matanda, adjunct professor of American politics and international business at Catholic University, told VOA English to Africa Service’s TV program “Africa 54” that Africa’s membership in the G20 could pay dividends.

“There is a real opportunity here for the African Union to come to the table. And that is a strength, and that is the opportunity,” he said. He added that “the significance here is that for the first time, the African Union is being juxtaposed with the European Union.”

Besseling, however, has doubts about the AU’s ability to act cohesively.

He also said the AU’s membership in the G20 is mainly driven by tensions on the world stage between competing alliances.

“The G20 is increasingly becoming a counterweight to the China-led BRICS, and the AU’s entry should be viewed in that same context of geopolitical rivalry,” Besseling said.

On a more positive note, Besseling said the AU’s entry into the G20 may help diversify global alliances and open new avenues for cooperation.

Matanda said it is time for African nations to defend their own interests and not be used to further the objectives of global powers.

“I think we need to stop thinking about what the other places want, what China wants, what Europe wants, and start the process of generating Africa’s own narrative,” Matanda said. “Africa, the African Union, needs to undertake a comprehensive assessment of its opportunities. And the primary opportunity here is the region’s development finance institutions.”

As the G20 evolves into a forum of considerable influence, the AU’s presence amplifies the continent’s voice within this arena, he said.

“If they’re going to have global capital playing in Africa, you need to come to the table with the best people who can actually control the finances and basically channel those resources to the opportunities that achieve the most effective impact for the region,” Matanda said. “And from that perspective, we need to remember that the African Union can be all it wants to be, but it needs to have more power.”

This story originated in the Africa Division. English to Africa’s Esther Githui-Ewart contributed to the report.
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Zambian President Hakainde Hichilema is in China this week at the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping. The state visit comes after much of Zambia’s debt to China and other countries was restructured in June through a $6.3 billion deal approved by the International Monetary Fund. Kathy Short reports from the Zambian capital, Lusaka. Camera: Richard Kille
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The death toll from flooding in eastern Libya could reach thousands, an official from the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies told reporters Tuesday.

“The death toll is huge,” said Tamer Ramadan, head of the IFRC’s Libya delegation.

Ramadan said the agency confirmed from independent sources that there were 10,000 people missing.

Officials in eastern Libya said Monday that as many as 2,000 people were believed dead in the city of Derna. 

The area was hit hard by torrential rains and flooding from Mediterranean Storm Daniel, causing dams to burst and entire neighborhoods to be washed away. 

Video posted to social media showed streets turned to raging rivers in Derna as well as Benghazi, Sousse, Al Bayda and Al-Marj.

Some information for this report was provided by The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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Spain is sending more rescue teams to Morocco as search crews work to find any remaining survivors from a powerful earthquake that struck south of Marrakech on Friday.

Spain said late Monday it was adding teams with 31 specialists, 15 search dogs and 11 vehicles.

The Moroccan government said Monday the death toll had increased to at least 2,862 people, with another 2,500 people injured.

Komenan N’guessan Leon, an artist living in Morocco, told VOA that following the earthquake, many people have been sleeping outside amid fears of another quake.

“Now people sleep in the street, they go to the garden to sleep because they are afraid of—they think maybe the house can fall on them and they think maybe everything can begin again.”

Elisabeth Myers, a lawyer and North African political analyst who lives in Morocco, told VOA the earthquake collapsed complete villages and that landslides made many areas inaccessible.

“There’s a lot of devastation and a lot of people who are now just homeless,” Myers said.  “They literally have nothing, just the clothes on their back when they ran out of those houses, the ones that survived.”

Myers highlighted the risks people will face with no shelter as seasonal weather changes take hold.

“After an incredibly hot summer, the nights are now beginning to be cooler, but I think the real the real danger is going to happen in another month or two when the weather gets cold and we still have people who are going to be homeless because there’s literally nowhere for them to go,” Myers said.

Emmanuel Victoire Ngapela and Carol Van Dam contributed to this report. Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters
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Malawi’s president has launched a large-scale crop production initiative known as “mega farms,” aimed at boosting the country’s agricultural-based economy and help end persistent food shortages.  

Malawi has long faced food shortages at both national and domestic levels each year. This, despite various efforts to boost agricultural production, including the Targeted Inputs Program, in which farmers buy seed and fertilizer at cheaper prices.   

According to a report last month from the Famine Early Warning Systems Network, 4.4 million Malawians, representing 22 percent of the country’s population, are facing food shortages. And the situation is expected to worsen from October to March 2024. 

Speaking during the televised launch of a mega farm in northern Malawi over the weekend, President Lazarus Chakwera said the program aimed to improve the country’s foreign exchange reserves and make the country food sufficient.      

“This approach is also a game changer for our economy as a whole, because most of our forex revenue comes from farming. But given the forex challenges we have faced in the recent past as a consequence of debt left behind by past administrations, it is clear that our long-term solution has to involve boosting and intensifying agriculture productivity for exports.”  

Minister of Trade and Industry, Simplex Chithyola Banda, said the ministry has already found markets for produce from the mega farms. 

He said in June of this year, the Malawi government agreed with a foreign bank to build industrial parks in the capital, Lilongwe, and also the commercial capital, Blantyre.   

“The aim of these industrial parks is to engage in agro-processing and value addition. What it means is therefore the mega farms already have the markets to offtake their produce, and this will spell the boom of economic growth in this country,” said Banda.   

Executive director of the Farmers Union of Malawi, Jacob Nyirongo, says he hopes the mega farm program will help solve challenges facing small-scale farmers, like access to markets.   

“Mega farms can become anchor farms and integrate small–scale farmers in the business model. So, through that integration, small-scale farmers can have access to advisory services. They can have access to credit, But also, they can have access to a market,” Nyirongo said.

William Chanza, executive director of an independent agricultural policy think tank in Malawi known by the acronym MwAPATA (Malawi Agricultural Policy Advancement and Transformation Agenda), said authorities should make more room for private investors to make the mega farm model sustainable.  

“As also make sure that we address some of the policy barriers to private sector engagement in agriculture, especially market and exported related issues, so that when they invest and produce, they are able to take commodities on the export market,” Chanza told VOA.

President Chakwera said 800 medium- and large-scale farmers have so far registered to grow various crops in over 63,000 hectares of land to be cultivated during this year’s growing season.   
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A series of coups in Western Africa is putting the unity and capability of the Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS, to the test as it seeks to restore civilian rule in countries such as Burkina Faso, Guinea, Mali and Niger. These four nations have joined forces to resist economic sanctions and potential military action by the other 11 countries within the bloc.

On July 26, the military junta in Niger placed President Mohamed Bazoum under house arrest, accusing his administration of mismanaging the country’s resources and allowing the security situation to deteriorate.  

In response, ECOWAS imposed trade sanctions on Niger and even threatened military intervention. 

But the ongoing political and security crises in Niger, as well as in Burkina Faso, Guinea and Mali, are proving to be challenging for the other ECOWAS member countries.

Paul Melly, a consulting fellow of the Africa Program at Chatham House, says the coup leaders are not adhering to the established rules and engagement of the regional bloc.

“This series of coups, if you like, is a really serious blow to what had been ECOWAS’s greatest strength,” he said. “And the fact that the military regimes are defying the long-established ECOWAS tradition of collaboration in setting governance rules and in managing crises is a real threat a real challenge to the region’s unity.”

In 2017, ECOWAS garnered praise for its collective military action against Gambian President Yahya Jammeh, forcing him to step down after he lost an election to the current president, Adama Barrow. 

Francis Mangeni, a regional integration expert, notes that the current situation is quite different, with some coups enjoying apparent support from the people.

“Now we’re having situations where it’s not that clear, where you have the people themselves apparently supporting the coups. So this introduces a certain element of complexity. So in other words, the legitimacy of the constitutionally elected government seems to be in question,” Mangeni said. “And this is an interesting thing really to say because if they are constitutional, they are supposed to be legitimate, but apparently the people don’t think so.”

African Union leaders have been slow to condemn heads of state who change constitutions to extend their terms and alter age limits to remain in power.

According to experts, the rise of military takeovers in Africa is due to leaders overstaying power, electoral malpractices, and elected leaders’ failure to work for the betterment of the citizens.

Aware of the challenges, Nigeria’s Senate advised President Bola Tinubu, who also heads ECOWAS, to explore alternative approaches to address the crisis in Niger. 

Melly says that the affected coup countries now treat their crises as internal matters.

“The collaborative culture under which essentially all ECOWAS countries accepted that the internal problems of a member state were, in fact, also the business of the whole bloc, that has been seriously eroded, because they are not accepting the concept that ECOWAS as a whole has the right to become involved in managing their crises and moving them back towards constitutional rule. And that’s a very big change,” Melly said.

Mangeni says the region needs the support of other African countries to solve the problems of frequent coups and coup attempts. 

“We need action at the AU level by the highest political organs of the AU with input from all stakeholders. We need real action to address this problem,” Mangeni said. “And this action, as I said, should come from a consultative, inclusive process. And then, we need the goodwill of the international community and all partners. Because, as I said, some of these problems are caused by interference by some of our partners who are pursuing their interests.”

The African Union has already suspended six countries where military forces seized power from civilians, including the four ECOWAS countries, plus Gabon and Sudan. 
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A Somali regional parliamentarian was among three people killed in a landmine explosion in the town of El Garas blamed on al-Shabab militants.

Local officials say Mohamed Mohamud, known as Mohamed Yare, was killed Monday in the explosion.

A local city councilor in the city of Dhusamareb, Abdullahi Ibrahim, and a civilian were also killed, regional Information Minister Abshir Abdi Sheikhow told VOA Somali.

“The incident happened after they stepped on the landmine planted by the terrorists, and they died there,” Sheikhow said. “When they [al-Shabab] were leaving the town they planted lots of landmines. The coalition forces conducted mine clearance but these officials took the wrong road and they met the explosion.”

The officials were accompanying Somali government and local forces who captured the town from al-Shabab early on Monday.

“We are in a war, we are prepared for that, things like this can happen,” Sheikhow said.

Sheikhow said Galmudug state leader Ahmed Abdi Karie was “not far” from the area of the explosion but is unharmed. He said the region’s parliament and the cabinet members were released from work so that they can take part in the ongoing offensive against al-Shabab.

Immediately after government troops captured El Garas, Karie, Somali National Intelligence and Security Agency chief Mahad Salad, and Somali Defense Minister Abdulkadir Mohamed Nur visited the town, state media reported.

On Sunday, Somali government forces repulsed an al-Shabab attack on a key base in the strategic town of Awdhegle in the Shabelle region. The Somali government and al-Shabab each said they inflicted heavy losses on the other.

It’s unclear if government forces will hold the town or vacate after the operation.
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