Sudan appears to be in a civil war “of the most brutal kind” and the world needs a new forum for talks in pursuit of a cease-fire, the United Nations humanitarian chief told The Associated Press Monday.

Martin Griffiths spoke as regional leaders met in neighboring Ethiopia following the breakdown of peace talks in Saudi Arabia in June. Egypt says it will host leaders from Sudan’s neighbors Thursday in search of peace, with few details.

“We don’t have a place, a forum, where the two parties are present … where we can broker the kind of basic agreements that we need to move supplies and people,” Griffiths said. He called Sudan the toughest place in the world for humanitarian workers in terms of access and warned that the crisis will only worsen as the fighting spreads to new areas.

“We have to re-create the architecture that we had for a little while in Jeddah,” he said of the Saudi- and U.S.-mediated talks. He criticized those discussions as “very clunky, very time consuming,” but said at least “it did produce some real movements” in facilitating aid access.

Sudan descended into chaos after fighting broke out between top army Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan and his rival, Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, commander of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, on April 15.

The army and RSF have agreed to at least 10 temporary cease-fires, but all have failed. Riyadh and Washington, in adjourning negotiations, accused both forces of failing to respect the agreements.

The conflict has killed over 3,000 people and wounded over 6,000 others, Sudan Health Minister Mohammed Ibrahim said last month and warned that the true death toll is likely to be far higher. More than 2.9 million people have fled their homes.

“If I were Sudanese, I find it hard to imagine that this isn’t a civil war … of the most brutal kind,” the U.N. humanitarian chief said. “Part of that is it’s not limited to one place, it’s spreading, it’s viral … it’s a threat to the state itself … and if that doesn’t qualify for being a civil war, I don’t know what does.”

Griffiths said there is a pressing need to create a forum to facilitate humanitarian access and local cease-fires so trucks and goods can get into specific areas. Any new forum should have greater representation for humanitarian organizations, he said.

In Sudan’s capital, RSF troops appear to have the upper hand in the streets, having commandeered civilian homes and turned them into operational bases. The army has retaliated with airstrikes that have struck residential areas and sometimes hospitals.

In the western Darfur region, the conflict’s other epicenter, entire villages have been overrun by RSF fighters and their allied militias, forcing tens of thousands of residents to flee to neighboring Chad.

In the province of West Darfur, the fighting has morphed into ethnic violence, U.N. officials have said, with the RSF and Arab militias reportedly targeting non-Arab tribes. Activists and tribal leaders from the province say residents have been killed, women and girls raped, and properties looted and burned.
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Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi will embark Tuesday on a rare Africa tour in the latest diplomatic efforts to reduce the Islamic republic’s isolation by forging new alliances.

The three-day trip — which includes Kenya, Uganda, and Zimbabwe — will be the first by an Iranian president to Africa in 11 years.

Raisi will head a delegation that includes Iran’s foreign minister as well as senior businesspeople. He is scheduled to meet with presidents from the three countries, according to the official IRNA news agency. 

On Monday, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani described the trip as “a new turning point” which could bolster economic and trade ties with African nations.

He also said the rapprochement is based “on common political views” between Tehran and the three African countries.

Iran has stepped up its diplomacy in recent months to reduce its isolation and offset the impact of crippling sanctions reimposed since the 2018 withdrawal of the United States from a painstakingly negotiated nuclear deal.

On Saturday, Raisi welcomed Algerian Foreign Minister Ahmed Attaf in a bid to boost relations with Algiers.

Last week, the Islamic republic became a member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization which includes Russia, China and India.

In March, Iran agreed to restore ties with its regional rival Saudi Arabia under a China-mediated deal. It has since been looking to reestablish ties with other countries in the region, including Egypt and Morocco.

In June, Raisi set out on a Latin America tour that included Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba before a trip to Indonesia. 
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Health officials are reporting a deadly outbreak of cholera in the South African province of Gauteng.

Authorities say nearly 50 people have died, with most of the deaths concentrated in the Hammanskraal area. Cases have been reported in other areas as well.

Medical officials have urged residents to be vigilant about what they consume and to practice good hygiene, like hand washing.

Cholera mainly spreads through contaminated water or food.

Symptoms include diarrhea, vomiting and dehydration.
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“Our first meeting with Total they said, ‘Your standard of living will be elevated, you will no longer be poor,” a 48-year-old Ugandan woman supporting seven children, told Human Rights Watch in March. “Now with the oil project starting, we are landless and are the poorest in the country.”

The woman was referring to the French fossil-fuel giant Total Energies. Her comments are included in a Human Rights Watch 47-page report — Our Trust Is Broken: Loss of Land and Livelihoods for Oil in Uganda — released Monday.

According to the rights organization, if the pipeline is completed, it will result in the displacement of more than 100,000 people, cause food insecurity and household debt. It will also force children to leave schools.

TotalEnergies does not view the project in the same way and said on its website that “Each family whose primary residence is being relocated may choose between a new home and monetary compensation in kind. An accessible, transparent and fair complaints-handling system will be running throughout the process.”

HRW says that while 90% of the people who have lost land to the pipeline project have received financial compensation, the payments were delayed for years and people were inadequately compensated.

Nicolas Terraz, vice president, TotalEnergies E&P Africa, said in a statement on the website, that his company has “been in close contact with the local people and has been striving to minimize the projects’ impact on the local community. We are proud to be a part of these major developments for the Company that promise to transform their host countries.”

“EACOP [East African Crude Oil Pipeline] is also a disaster for the planet and the project should not be completed,” said Felix Horne, HRW senior environment researcher.

“The pipeline route traverses sensitive ecosystems, including protected areas and internationally significant wetlands, posing threats to biodiversity and ecosystems that local communities depend on for their sustenance,” HRW said.

Some financial and insurance companies have already said they will not support the pipeline because of the risks it poses and the backlash from environmental activists.

TotalEnergies said on its website: “The route of the pipeline was designed to avoid areas of environmental interest as much as possible, and generally crosses farming areas.”
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The Gambia has repatriated 296 migrants in a two-week period, more than half of whom had been stranded in Libya, the ministry of foreign affairs said on Sunday.  

One hundred and forty Gambians were repatriated between June 21 and July 4 after authorities in Senegal, Mauritania and Morocco each intercepted boats carrying citizens of the west African nation, a ministry spokeswoman confirmed.  

A total of 231 Gambians had been aboard the three boats, the ministry said in a statement, but many had “absconded” before being returned.  

Meanwhile, 156 Gambians were on June 24 repatriated from Libya, where they had been stranded, it said.  

On Thursday, Human Rights Watch accused Tunisia of expelling hundreds of sub-Saharan Africans to a desert area near the Libyan border since July 2, following violence against migrants in the city of Sfax.  

“Regarding the disturbing video of migrants in Tunisia circulating on social media, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is closely working… to ascertain their numbers and verify their nationalities as part of the evacuation procedures,” the statement said.  

Earlier this year, West African nations including Burkina Faso, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Mali and Senegal repatriated hundreds of citizens from Tunisia amid a wave of racist attacks there.  

It followed a tirade by the Tunisian president blaming “hordes of illegal migrants from sub-Saharan Africa” for crime and alleging a “criminal plot” to change the country’s demographic make-up. 
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West African heads of state on Sunday chose Nigeria’s new president, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, to lead their regional bloc for the next year, replacing Guinea-Bissau’s leader, Umaro Sissoco Embalo, AFP journalists reported. 

Speaking at a summit in Bissau after being named chairman of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), Tinubu said democracy was “the best form of government,” despite being “very tough to manage.”  

“We need it, to be an example to the rest of Africa and the world,” he said. “We will not allow coup after coup in West Africa.”  

Three ECOWAS members — Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso — have undergone five putsches since 2020.  

Omar Alieu Touray, president of the ECOWAS commission, urged those countries’ ruling juntas to respect agreed-upon deadlines to hand power to civilian leaders.  

“In the event of a failure to meet the transition deadlines, major sanctions could be imposed,” he said. 

The West African Economic and Monetary Union (UEMOA) on Saturday agreed to lift a suspension of Mali imposed in January 2022 over the military’s timeline for returning to civilian rule. 

ECOWAS had also imposed a range of measures against the Sahel state but lifted them in July 2022 after the junta agreed to a March 2024 transition. 

On Sunday, Touray said ECOWAS had set up a commission to examine security options in Mali as the U.N. winds down its decadelong peacekeeping mission there.  

“This commission has 90 days to reflect and make proposals,” he said.   

Mali has since 2012 been battling a jihadist insurgency that has since spread to Burkina Faso and Niger. 

Tinubu — who was in May sworn in as president of Africa’s largest economy — said ECOWAS members would pursue “inclusive” economic integration in the year ahead. 

“We should serve a warning to exploiters that our people have suffered enough,” he said on Sunday. “I am with you — and Nigeria, we are back.”
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At least 300 people who were traveling on three migrant boats from Senegal to Spain’s Canary Islands have disappeared, migrant aid group Walking Borders said Sunday. 

Two boats, one carrying about 65 people and the other with between 50 and 60 on board, have been missing for 15 days since they left Senegal to try to reach Spain, Helena Maleno of Walking Borders told Reuters. 

A third boat left Senegal on June 27 with about 200 people aboard. 

The families of those on board have not heard from them since they left, Maleno said. 

All three boats left Kafountine in the south of Senegal, which is about 1,700 kilometers (1,057 miles) from Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands. 

“The families are very worried. There [are] about 300 people from the same area of Senegal. They have left because of the instability in Senegal,” Maleno said. 

The Canary Islands off the coast of West Africa have become the main destination for migrants trying to reach Spain, with a much smaller number also seeking to cross the Mediterranean Sea to the Spanish mainland. Summer is the busiest period for all attempted crossings. 

The Atlantic migration route, one of the deadliest in the world, is typically used by migrants from sub-Saharan Africa. At least 559 people — including 22 children — died in 2022 in attempts to reach the Canary Islands, according to data from the U.N.’s International Organization for Migration. 
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Conflict-torn Sudan is on the brink of a “full-scale civil war” that could destabilize the entire region, the United Nations warned Sunday, after an airstrike on a residential area killed around two dozen civilians.

The health ministry reported “22 dead and a large number of wounded among the civilians” from what it described as an airstrike Saturday on Khartoum’s sister city Omdurman, in the district of Dar al-Salam, which means “House of Peace” in Arabic.

After nearly three months of war between Sudan’s rival generals, the airstrike is the latest incident to provoke outrage.  

Around 3,000 people have been killed in the conflict, survivors have reported a wave of sexual violence and witnesses have spoken of ethnically targeted killings. There has been widespread looting, and the U.N. warned of possible crimes against humanity in the Darfur region.  

A video posted by the health ministry on Facebook showed apparently dismembered bodies lying partly covered on the ground after the airstrike. Several women were among the victims.  

The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), fighting the regular army, claimed that the “airstrikes” killed 31.

Residents contacted by AFP also confirmed an airstrike but said it happened Sunday, the armed forces released a statement “clarifying that the air force did not deal with any hostile targets in Omdurman yesterday.”

Witnesses also reported more airstrikes Sunday near the presidential palace in Khartoum and in Omdurman, as well as machine gun clashes and artillery fire in the city’s south.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the air strike in Omdurman, which he said, “reportedly killed at least 22 people” and wounded dozens, his deputy spokesperson Farhan Haq said in a statement.

Guterres “remains deeply concerned that the ongoing war between the armed forces has pushed Sudan to the brink of a full-scale civil war, potentially destabilizing the entire region,” Haq said.

Meanwhile civilians began digging graves for those killed in Saturday’s airstrike, witnesses said.  

Since the war began, many bodies have been left to rot in the streets in both Khartoum and the western region of Darfur, which has seen some of the most violent fighting.

Dangerous and disturbing

Nearly 3 million people have been uprooted by Sudan’s fighting, among them almost 700,000 who have fled to neighboring countries, according to the International Organization for Migration.

The U.N. and African blocs have warned of an “ethnic dimension” to the conflict in the western region of Darfur, where the United States, Norway and Britain have blamed the RSF and allied militia for most of the widespread violations.  

Concentrated in Darfur and the capital Khartoum, fighting has also been reported in Blue Nile state near Ethiopia, which also has a history of unrest, as well as in South Kordofan state.

Residents in El-Obeid, the capital of North Kordofan and a commercial hub south of Khartoum, reported renewed fighting in their area overnight Saturday-Sunday, and then again Sunday afternoon.

“There is an utter disregard for humanitarian and human rights law that is dangerous and disturbing,” said Haq, expressing support for efforts by the African Union and East African bloc IGAD to end Sudan’s crisis.

On Monday leaders of Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and South Sudan — IGAD members handling the Sudan file — are to meet in Addis Ababa.  

Sudan’s army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo have been invited but neither side has confirmed they will attend.

Several Sudanese civilian figures are already there, however, “in order to accelerate peace efforts,” said Khalid Omer Yousif, who was fired from the government in 2021 when Dagalo and Burhan led a coup, before their falling out.

Egypt, a close ally of Burhan’s, said it will host a summit Thursday of Sudan’s neighbors to seek an end to the conflict and its regional “repercussions,” a statement from the president’s office in Cairo said.

Numerous cease-fires in the war have been announced and ignored.
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Gabon’s President Ali Bongo will run for reelection in August, he said on Sunday, in a bid to extend his family’s 56-year grip on power in the central African country.

“Because nothing matters more than your success, I am announcing today that I am a candidate,” Bongo told a small crowd of cheering supporters.

Elections are scheduled for Aug. 26.

Bongo, 64, has been president of the oil-producing nation for two seven-year terms since succeeding his father Omar, who died in 2009 after ruling since 1967. Gabon has no constitutional term limits.

Both of Bongo’s election wins were disputed by the opposition, which said he won fraudulently. His 2016 victory triggered deadly clashes between police and protesters during which the parliament building was gutted by fire.

Bongo’s reelection bid was thrown into doubt when he suffered a stroke in October 2018 and was flown to Morocco for medical treatment. He spent three months abroad but returned shortly after a coup attempt was thwarted in his absence.
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Opposition party supporters in Zimbabwe chanted and sang freedom songs outside a courthouse Sunday following a decision to ban them from holding a rally six weeks before elections.

The court in the town of Bindura upheld Friday’s police order that the opposition Citizens Coalition for Change party could not hold the rally to officially launch its election campaign because the venue was unsuitable. The CCC had appealed in court against the order.

The decision increased tensions in the southern African nation, which has a history of violent and disputed elections.

The CCC immediately criticized the move as more evidence of a push by President Emmerson Mnangagwa and his ruling ZANU-PF party to silence the opposition using the police and the courts.

Mnangagwa, 80, replaced long-ruling autocrat Robert Mugabe in a coup in 2017. He promised a new era of freedom and prosperity for Zimbabweans, who had seen their country’s economy crumble amid some of the highest inflation rates ever seen.

But Mnangagwa has turned out to be as repressive as his predecessor, say critics, and the economy continues to collapse. There has been a crackdown on any kind of criticism.

The yellow-clad CCC supporters who gathered outside Bindura Magistrates Court sang “Dictatorship remains. When will this country be free?”

Police said that the opposition party’s chosen venue for Sunday’s rally was unsuitable because it was a “bushy” area with poor access via road, raising safety concerns for those attending. The police also said there was a “high risk” of the spread of communicable diseases.

A rally where thousands of ruling party supporters packed tightly together in a stadium to hear Mnangagwa speak was allowed to go ahead Saturday.

“We are getting into a match with both legs tied,” said CCC lawyer Agency Gumbo. “They would rather keep the opposition at the courts than on the campaign trail.”

There was “an uneven playing ground that shows that the democratic process has been corroded,” Gumbo said.

The CCC initially appealed against the police order at the High Court in the capital, Harare on Saturday. The case was moved to the court in Bindura, where the rally was scheduled to take place. The Bindura court eventually ruled late Sunday afternoon, hours after the rally was meant to start at 10 a.m.

The CCC says the repression in the buildup to the Aug. 23 elections has included violence and intimidation against its supporters, the arrest of its officials and bans on its meetings. The opposition has also raised concerns over alleged voters’ roll irregularities ahead of elections that will decide the presidency but also the makeup of the Parliament and nearly 2,000 local government positions.

Mnangagwa and his administration have denied the allegations of intimidation, with the president recently describing Zimbabwe as “a mature democracy.”

CCC leader Nelson Chamisa lost narrowly to Mnangagwa in the 2018 presidential election and had his claim of vote-rigging rejected by the Constitutional Court.

Mnangagwa and the 45-year-old Chamisa are two of 11 candidates who have registered to stand in next month’s presidential election.
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Egypt said on Sunday it would host a summit of Sudan’s neighbors on July 13 to discuss ways to end a 12-week conflict between rival Sudanese military factions that has triggered a major humanitarian crisis in the region.

Diplomatic efforts to halt fighting between Sudan’s army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have so far proved ineffective, with competing initiatives creating confusion over how the warring parties might be brought to negotiate.

Neither Egypt, seen as the Sudanese army’s most important foreign ally, nor the United Arab Emirates, which has had close ties to the RSF, have played a prominent public role.

The two countries were also not involved in talks in Jeddah led by the United States and Saudi Arabia that adjourned last month after failing to secure a lasting cease-fire.

Sudan’s two largest neighbors, Egypt and Ethiopia, have been at odds in recent years over the construction of a huge hydroelectric dam on Ethiopia’s Blue Nile, close to the border with Sudan.

The summit in Cairo on Thursday aims to “develop effective mechanisms” with neighboring states to settle the conflict peacefully, in coordination with other regional or international efforts, Egypt’s presidency said in a statement.

Meanwhile, Sudanese delegations, including from civilian parties that shared power with the army and RSF after the overthrow of former president Omar al-Bashir four years ago, are expected to meet on Monday in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa for exploratory talks.

The leaders of former rebel groups from Darfur that signed a partial peace deal in 2020 are expected to travel to Chad for talks, though the timing of the talks is unclear and travel in and out of Sudan remains complicated due to the conflict.

The fighting that erupted on April 15 in Sudan’s capital Khartoum has driven more than 2.9 million people from their homes, including almost 700,000 who have fled to neighboring countries, many of which are struggling with poverty and the impact of internal conflict.

Over 255,000 have crossed into Egypt, according to latest figures from the International Organization for Migration.

There were clashes on Sunday between the army and the RSF in El Obeid, southwest of Khartoum, as well as in the south of the capital, residents said.

On Saturday, Sudan’s health ministry said a strike by fighter jets in Omdurman, part of Sudan’s wider capital, left 22 people dead, an incident that drew condemnation from U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres.

On Sunday, the army denied responsibility for the strike, saying its air force had not hit targets in Omdurman the previous day and that the RSF had bombarded residential areas from the ground at times when fighter jets were in the sky before falsely accusing the army of causing civilian casualties.

The army has depended largely on air strikes and heavy artillery to try to push back RSF troops spread across Khartoum, Omdurman and Bahri, the three cities that make up the capital around the confluence of the Nile.

Violence has also flared in other parts of Sudan including the western region of Darfur, where residents say militias from Arab tribes along with the RSF have targeted civilians on the basis of their ethnicity, raising fears of a repeat of the mass atrocities seen in the region after 2003.
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The U.S. military says it has conducted three new airstrikes against al-Shabab fighters in Somalia, killing 10 militants overnight.

The “collective self-defense” airstrikes were carried out in support of the Somali National Army who were engaged by al-Shabab, the U.S. Africa Command known as AFRICOM said in statement.

AFRICOM said the strikes took place at the request of the Federal Government of Somalia, in a remote area near Afmadow town in the Lower Juba region, approximately 105 kilometers (65 miles) north of Kismayo.

“Working with the Somali National Army, U.S. Africa Command’s initial assessment is that the U.S. airstrike killed 10 al-Shabaab terrorists and that no civilians were injured or killed,” the statement read.   

AFRICOM said it will continue to assess the results of this operation and will provide additional information as appropriate.

“Specific details about the units involved and assets used will not be released in order to ensure operations security,” the statement said.

This brings the number of airstrikes carried out by the U.S. in Somalia this year to 13.

Earlier the Somali government also reported three operations conducted by Somali forces in support of “international partners” that took place near Afmadow. A statement by the Ministry of Information put the number of militants killed in the three operations at over 40.

Meanwhile, Somali government troops supported by Jubaland regional security forces have entered the al-Shabab-controlled town of Xagar in the Lower Juba region, Sunday.

Xagar is 80 kilometers (50 miles) from Buale, the capital of Jubaland state, which has been controlled by al-Shabab for more than 15 years. Buale is also the regional capital of Middle Juba, the only region entirely controlled by al-Shabab. It is unclear if the troops will establish a regular base in Xagar or advance to Buale.
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BANGUI, CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC – The departure of hundreds of Russian Wagner troops from the Central African Republic is part of a rotation of forces rather than a withdrawal, a spokesperson for the CAR presidency said Saturday.

The short-lived mutiny led by Wagner mercenary founder Yevgeny Prigozhin in Russia in June has raised questions about the outlook for his group’s sprawling network of military and commercial operations across CAR, other parts of Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere.

Reports of the recent departure of large numbers of Wagner personnel from CAR by plane have fueled speculation in recent days that the group is pulling out of the country, where they have been helping the government to quell several rebel insurgencies since 2018.

But CAR presidential spokesperson Albert Yaloke Mokpem said “it is not a definitive departure but a rotation.”

“Some have left, and others will come,” he said at a press conference in the capital, Bangui.

Several hundred Wagner troops have recently left the country, a military source told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity and without giving further details.

It is not known how many remain. About 1,900 Russian mercenaries, including from Wagner, were believed to be operating there.

Any restructuring of Wagner operations in CAR could have substantial commercial ramifications.

Analysts have said Wagner received logging rights and control of a gold mine in CAR. In June the United States put sanctions on a CAR company as one of several, including one from the UAE, that it said was involved in financing Wagner through illicit gold dealings.  
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An airstrike in a Sudanese city Saturday killed at least 22 people, health authorities said, in one of the deadliest air attacks yet in the three months of fighting between the country’s rival generals. 

The assault took place in the Dar es Salaam neighborhood in Omdurman, the neighboring city of the capital, Khartoum, according to a brief statement by the health ministry. The attack wounded an unspecified number of people, it said. 

The ministry posted video footage that showed dead bodies on the ground with sheets covering them and people trying to pull the dead from the rubble. Others attempted to help the wounded. People could be heard crying. 

The attack was one of the deadliest in the fighting in urban areas of the capital and elsewhere in Sudan. The conflict pits the military against a powerful paramilitary group known as the Rapid Support Forces. Last month, an airstrike killed at least 17 people including 5 children in Khartoum. 

The RSF blamed the military for Saturday’s attack and other strikes on residential areas in Omdurman, where fighting has raged between the warring factions, according to residents. The military has reportedly attempted to cut off a crucial supply line for the paramilitary force there. 

A spokesman for the military was not immediately available for comment Saturday. 

Two Omdurman residents said it was difficult to determine which side was responsible for the attack. They said the military’s aircraft have repeatedly targeted RSF troops in the area and the paramilitary force has used drones and anti-aircraft weapons against the military. 

At the time of the attack early Saturday, the military was hitting the RSF, which took people’s houses as shields, and the RSF fired anti-aircraft rounds at the attacking warplanes, said Abdel-Rahman, one of the residents who asked to use only his first name out of concern for his safety. 

“The area is like a hell … fighting around the clock and people are not able to leave,” he said. 

The conflict broke out in mid-April, capping months of increasing tensions between the military, chaired by Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan, and the Rapid Support Forces, commanded by Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo. The fighting came 18 months after the two generals led a military coup in October 2021 that toppled a Western-backed civilian transitional government. 

Health Minister Haitham Mohammed Ibrahim said in televised comments last month that the clashes have killed more than 3,000 people and wounded upwards of 6,000 others. More than 2.9 million people have fled their homes to safer areas inside Sudan or crossed into neighboring countries, according to U.N. figures. 

“It’s a place of great terror,” Martin Griffiths, the United Nations humanitarian chief, said of Sudan on Friday. He decried “the appalling crimes” taking place across the country and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people. 

The conflict has plunged the African country into chaos and turned Khartoum and other urban areas into battlefields. Members of the paramilitary force have occupied people’s houses and other civilian properties since the onset of the conflict, according to residents and activists. Additionally, there were reports of widespread destruction and looting across Khartoum and Omdurman. 

Sexual violence, including the rape of women and girls, has been reported in Khartoum and the western Darfur region, which have seen some of the worst fighting in the conflict. Almost all reported cases of sexual attacks were blamed on the RSF, which hasn’t responded to repeated requests for comment. 

On Wednesday, top U.N. officials including Volker Türk, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, called for a “prompt, thorough, impartial and independent investigation” into the increasing reports of sexual violence against women and girls. 

The Sudanese Unit for Combating Violence against Women, a government organization that tracks sex attacks against women, said it documented 88 cases of rape related to the ongoing conflict, including 42 in Khartoum and 46 in Darfur. 

The unit, however, said the figure likely represented only 2% of the true number of cases, which means there were a possible 4,400 cases of sexual violence since the fighting began on April 15, according to the Save the Children charity. 

“Sexual violence continues to be used as a tool to terrorize women and children in Sudan,” said Arif Noor, director of Save the Children in Sudan. “Children as young as 12 are being targeted for their gender, for their ethnicity, for their vulnerability.” 
…

The conflict between military factions in Sudan has caused a surge in cases of rape and the abduction of women and girls, some as young as 12, aid agencies and officials said.  

Teenage girls are being sexually assaulted and raped by armed combatants in “alarming numbers,” Save the Children said in a statement on Friday, while the United Nations reported a “marked increase” in gender-based violence. 

The war that erupted on April 15 pits Sudan’s army against the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which fell out over plans for a political transition toward civilian rule. Fighting has been concentrated in the capital Khartoum and the western region of Darfur.  

While dozens of cases of rape resulting from the conflict have been verified, the Sudanese government’s Combating Violence Against Women (CVAW) unit estimates that figure may represent just 2% of the total.  

“We know that the official numbers are only the tip of the iceberg. Children as young as 12 are being targeted for their gender, for their ethnicity, for their vulnerability,” Save the Children’s Sudan director Arif Noor said in a statement. 

Some parents were marrying off their daughters at a young age to try to protect them from further abuse, he said. 

There have also been reports of girls being held for days while being sexually assaulted, and gang rapes of women and girls.  

“Health care providers, social workers, counselors and community-based protection networks inside Sudan have all warned of a marked increase in reports of gender-based violence as hostilities continue across the country,” United Nations agencies said in a joint statement this week. 

“Reporting violations and getting support is also made difficult, if not impossible, by the lack of electricity and connectivity, as well as lack of humanitarian access due to the volatile security situation.” 

CVAW also reported an escalation in cases of abduction of women and girls, especially in Khartoum, citing several recent cases for which it said RSF fighters were responsible. 

The RSF has not directly addressed accusations of assault and sexual violence by its fighters but has said that those who commit abuses will be held to account.  

The U.N. estimates 4.2 million people are at risk of gender-based violence, up from 3 million before the conflict started in mid-April. Sudan has a population of 49 million.  

The U.N. said the risk was especially high when women and girls were on the move, seeking to reach safe locations.  

More than 2.9 million people have been uprooted by Sudan’s conflict, including nearly 700,000 who have fled into neighboring countries.  

Some women are arriving pregnant as a result of rape, according to the U.N. refugee agency. 
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BLANTYRE, MALAWI –  Malawi President Lazarus Chakwera has ordered the country’s education authorities to immediately start introducing the Swahili language into the country’s school curriculum for easy business communication with Swahili-speaking countries.

Chakwera spoke Friday during a televised joint news briefing with visiting Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan about ways to strengthen bilateral relations between the two countries.

“I am pleased to inform you, everyone, that I have shared with Her Excellency the exciting news of my administration’s decision to introduce language studies to strengthen both Malawi and Swahili-speaking sister countries like Tanzania,” he said. “And my ministry of education is instructed to implement that policy with the agency.”

Education experts in Malawi have said learning the Swahili language, which is one of the most spoken languages in many parts of Africa, would help Malawi boost trade partnerships with Swahili-speaking countries.

Hassan was on a three-day visit to Malawi, where she was invited as a guest of honor during Malawi’s 59th independence anniversary celebrations held Thursday in Lilongwe.

She told reporters that Tanzania would provide Malawi with everything needed for the introduction of the Swahili language.

“On Kiswahili [another term for Swahili], my brother said it well,” she said. “And I thank you for the decision you have taken. Tanzania is ready to give all what is required to make Kiswahili being taught in Malawi schools. We are ready for that.”

Tanzania, which is a predominantly Swahili-speaking nation, is among neighboring countries where most Malawian traders go to buy their goods, including clothes and motor vehicle spare parts.

Many complain about the high cost of Swahili language interpreters.

It was not clear whether Swahili lessons in Malawi would be compulsory.
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Kenyan police have used tear gas on opposition-led protesters, who were demonstrating Friday against tax hikes, including the doubling of a tax on fuel.

Thousands of protesters marched through streets in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, and other towns, demanding the state abolish recently hiked taxes. They carried placards that read “Tumechoka,” which means “We are tired” in Swahili.

Gacheke Gachihi, the coordinator of the Mathare Social Justice center that co-organized the protest, said the bill had a huge impact on people.

”Immediately [after] the finance bill was passed, the cost of petrol, diesel was increased, immediately the cost of traveling skyrocketed,” Gachihi said. “Many people were affected, and you know even before the bill was signed the court had stopped the implementation of the finance bill.”

Police fired tear gas to disperse the swelling crowds. Dozens of people were arrested in the protests, arrests that Irungu Houghton, director of Amnesty International Kenya, described as arbitrary.

”It is really shocking that several arrests have been made of protesters from what we can see from social media or mass media and our monitors in Nairobi,” Houghton said. “They were essentially peaceful protests against the cost of living and the recent tax provisions that have been introduced by the Kenya Kwanza government.”

Kenya’s opposition leader, Raila Odinga, called for an anti-government protest over the impact of the taxes on Kenyans. Kenya President Willaim Ruto said the tax hikes are essential to addressing debt repayment and for creating jobs.
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Security officials in Kenya said at least 23 al-Shabab fighters were killed by Kenyan Special forces during the ambush in Orgene village, in Mandera County in northeast Kenya.

Six Kenyan soldiers were killed during the encounter that left eight others injured.

The incident comes just a day after the country’s security minister Kithure Kindiki vowed to flush militants from Kenyan territories while on a security tour of the country’s northeast.

“There is an increasing tendency of terrorists to attack our people including our security officers,” Kindiki said. “We will sustain the war, we will win the war and we request for the patience and cooperation of the public.”

In the last month, militant groups have killed at least 25 people in a spate of terror attacks near the Kenya-Somalia border. Addressing residents in Wajir, Kindiki said Kenya will use all possible means to eradicate terrorists and their sympathizers from the region.

“We are going to upscale our partnership between the security agencies and the local communities to ensure that we flush out this enemy, the way our neighbors in Somalia have collaborated between the security agencies and the local communities,” Kindiki said.

Al-Shabab operations along the Somalia border in northeastern Kenya have disrupted development and caused suffering to locals in the counties of Wajir, Garissa and Mandera. Speaking to journalists Friday, Wajir County Governor Ahmed Abdullahi urged locals to help security agencies defeat the militants.

“We must work with our security agencies,” Abdullahi said. “We must give information and we must be at the forefront ourselves of fighting Al-Shabab.”

Earlier this year, Kenya announced plans to reopen its border with Somalia, which has been closed for over a decade. Those plans have now changed following the increase in militant attacks.

In the past, Islamist al-Shabab militants have attacked Kenyan cities and towns, trying to force the withdrawal of Kenyan troops from Africa Union-led peacekeeping forces in Somalia.
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Female leaders of the Fulani, an ethnic group of mostly nomadic herders across West Africa and the Sahel, say women can play a vital role in reducing long-running friction with farming communities. In this report from Lake Chad, reporter Henry Wilkins meets women making digital maps to establish boundaries between the two communities.
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BLANTYRE, MALAWI – The Association of Persons with Albinism in Malawi, or APAM, is appealing for urgent intervention to stop continued attacks on people with albinism in the country.

This comes after unidentified people in June tampered with a grave in Blantyre, a city in southern Malawi, exhumed a body and removed its arms and legs. The incident has raised existing fears within the community, advocates say.

Young Mahamba, president of APAM, said the incident is the seventh this year alone.

“We also had three tampering with graves and another two attacks on the 9th of last month [June 9],” Mahamba told VOA. “And also, in Phalombe [a district in the southern region of Malawi], there was the tampering of graves. This one was discovered on 20th March without limbs as [was] this one.”

Since 2014, more than 170 albinos have been killed or attacked in Malawi because of false beliefs that concoctions mixed with their body parts bring luck and wealth, according to official data.

In the past, religious leaders, police, herbalists and relatives of the deceased have been named and arrested in connection to the attacks and body exhumations.

A high court in Blantyre sentenced a police officer, a Catholic priest and four others to 30 years imprisonment with hard labor in late June after finding them guilty of transacting human remains of a person with albinism.

The spokesperson for the Ministry of Gender, Children, Disability and Social Welfare, Pauline Kaude, told VOA that since 2019 the government has been working on seven priority areas in its national action plan to end such attacks.

Kaude said the areas include enhancing security, administration of justice and empowerment of people with albinism.

The government is also boosting security at the homes of vulnerable people with albinism. But APAM’s Mahamba said it needs to be a collaborative effort.

“We just hear of projects concerning welfare of people with albinism, but we do not see them on the ground,” Mahamba told VOA. “The international organizations should come forward and assist. They should not wait for the issue to come out of hand [and] to be hearing three or four cases per day, no.”

Mahamba said the government needs to review — and improve — its efforts to protect people with albinism from attacks and make changes where needed.

“If you ask each and every person with albinism here in Malawi, they will tell you that this issue hasn’t stopped, and we don’t have peace. So, there is no time [to] relax, to hold the breaks in terms of our security,” Mahamba said.

Peter Kalaya, national spokesperson for Malawi Police Service, said police are not able to make progress because of the false beliefs by some that there is a viable demand for body parts.

“People just believe there is a market, and they have been attacking people with albinism chopping off their limbs and body parts. They do not even know where to sell them,” Kalaya said. “If we ask the suspects that we have arrested, there has been no one who has come to us and said, ‘I was taking these to someone, and he is the one who buys body parts.’”

Kalaya said the police are, however, working with various interventions to end the attacks, including a program that empowers members of the community to detect and report suspected incidents aimed at people with albinism.

The program, Kalaya added, has led to the arrest of many people suspected of being attackers.

This story originated in VOA’s English to Africa Service.  
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Nigeria’s Electoral Commission this week began its monthlong review of the presidential and local elections held in February and March of 2023. The voting was marred by violence and technical glitches, and was considered among the most controversial in the country’s recent history.

Mahmood Yakubu, chair of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), met with state electoral officials Tuesday in the capital. While praising INEC’s successful deployment of the voter accreditation system, Yakubu said INEC will evaluate its operations and the effectiveness of technologies used in the process.

Yakubu said the exercise will be carried out without bias and that INEC will make its findings public.

“The time has come for introspection, stocktaking, review and evaluation,” Yakubu told journalists. “Since the conclusion of the elections, diverse opinions have been expressed by political parties, candidates [and] observers, and the commission welcomed all of them as far as their purpose is to improve the conduct of elections and consolidate our democracy.”

Officials said INEC has received 54 reports from various observer missions regarding the way in which the election was conducted.

The review is beginning a week after the European Union observer mission published its final report on the elections, prompting some debate.

The EU said elections did not ensure the well-run, transparent, and inclusive democratic process that the INEC had promised. It also said public confidence and trust in the INEC were severely damaged during the presidential poll and were not restored in state-level elections.

In addition, the report cited security issues, noting the political atmosphere was exceptionally tense prior to the election.

The Nigerian presidency this week rejected the EU’s report.

However, Idayat Hassan, director at the Center for Democracy and Development, said the report was correct in citing an already challenging political environment even before the elections.

“INEC overpromised and they underdelivered, nobody is taking that away, [but] it should take into cognizance the prevailing factors surrounding this election,” Hassan said. “For instance, this election held against the backdrop of fuel and Naira scarcities, it dampened the morale of Nigerians, it suppressed their ability to move to different parts of the country to even participate.”

Hassan said INEC must carry out the review in a broader context, including previous elections, and its collaborations with security agencies and other stakeholders.

The February 25 and March presidential and subnational polls were marred by violence that left at least 21 people dead.

There also were operational difficulties and logistics issues, and observers allege that voting was suppressed in some states.

Emmanuel Njoku of the nonprofit Connected Development, one of the election observers, said the INEC lacked the expertise to conduct elections, and he faults their appointment process.

“You can review yourself, but you cannot score yourself in an examination. If the European Union has given a report, that is what they’ve observed, and for us at Connected Development, we align with a couple of the things that they reported. They worked closely with us. Beyond the technical glitch at the headquarters, the issue around logistics and operational failure, they [INEC] failed woefully,” Njoku said.

INEC has been evaluating its performance in elections since 2011.

The commission is also reviewing evidence of infractions in more than 200 investigations concluded by the police, including cases involving high-ranking officials.

Meanwhile, an appeals court in Abuja closed the defense hearing Wednesday for lawsuits challenging Bola Tinubu’s election by the opposition groups. The court will resume later this month.
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A rare visit to Nigeria this week by the Chinese navy is once again raising questions about Beijing’s military intentions in the strategically important Gulf of Guinea.

Three Chinese warships have been docked in the port of Lagos for five days, with Nigerian and Chinese officials saying the visit is aimed at enhancing maritime security in the region, which is plagued by piracy. China already has a military base in Djibouti on the east coast of the African continent and U.S. officials have long speculated that Beijing is planning more.

Asked by VOA whether part of the reason for the trip is to explore the possibility of establishing a second military base in Africa, officials from the Chinese embassies in both Nigeria and Washington declined to comment, with the latter writing: “Unfortunately we have nothing to offer on the specific question you mentioned.”

The U.S. State Department also declined to directly answer questions relating to a possible base, telling VOA: “We do not want to limit African partnerships with other countries. We seek to offer African countries a choice by demonstrating the benefits of our governance and economic partnership models.”

However, Washington has been vocal about the issue in the past, with General Stephen J. Townsend of the U.S.-Africa Command telling a House Armed Services Committee hearing last year: “The thing I think I’m most worried about is this military base on the Atlantic coast.”

“As a first priority, we need to prevent or deter a Chinese space on the Atlantic coast of Africa,” he added.

A Chinese base in West Africa would give Beijing a military presence across the Atlantic from America’s East Coast, perceived as a threat to national security.

Townsend said at the time he believed the Chinese were favoring Equatorial Guinea as the location for a West Africa base.

In a statement, China said the stop in Nigeria was simply a “friendly visit,” intended to “jointly address maritime security threats and maintain peace and stability in the Gulf of Guinea.”

Nigeria’s navy spokesman Commodore Adedotun Ayo-Vaughan told local media: “It is not a strange thing that the Chinese are doing this port visit. Americans, Europeans, French and Spanish do it very often.”

Earlier this year, the U.S. led annual joint military exercises in Nigeria.

A more secure Nigeria is important for China, which has thousands of citizens working in the oil-rich country — Africa’s largest economy. Nigeria has also been a major beneficiary of President Xi Jinping’s pivot to Africa with his Belt and Road infrastructure initiative. Earlier this year, a Chinese-built $1.5 billion deep-sea port was opened in Lagos.

Nigeria, however, is wracked by an insurgency in the north, and Chinese have become favorite targets of kidnapping gangs looking for ransom.

Additionally, Nigeria is among China’s top oil suppliers, but shipments of the commodity have also been targeted. Earlier this year, pirates boarded a Chinese-owned oil tanker in the Gulf of Guinea.

Shift from East Africa

Darren Olivier, director of the conflict research consultancy African Defense Review, told VOA the Chinese navy has so far been predominantly focused on East Africa due to their military base in Djibouti. They have participated in Gulf of Aden anti-piracy patrols for years.

China’s navy has also been active in the Indian Ocean, with Chinese warships taking part earlier this year in joint exercises off Durban with their South African and Russian counterparts.

However, they were not neglecting West Africa, said Olivier.

“China’s sending a naval task force to exercise with Nigeria is likely to be part of a similar pattern to what was first observed in East Africa,” he told VOA.

“First, regular involvement in anti-piracy patrols and maritime security exercises, followed by the creation of a West African naval base to support those operations, to protect Chinese oil and other exports from the area, and to provide security assistance to both China’s allies in the region and its citizens and businesses,” Olivier said.

“This doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s looking to build a base in Nigeria itself, but it’s certainly a possibility.”
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The West African nation of Niger and China have been discussing deals that include an industrial park, an oil pipeline and a uranium mine.  

The Chinese ambassador to Niger, Jiang Feng, said China would build an industrial park that would impact industries including agro-food, manufacturing, mining and real estate, according to a tweet from Nigerien President Mohamed Bazoum’s official account. It said the deal is a result of a China-Niger Investment Forum held in April.

“China does what it says and says what it does,” said Jiang. 

The tweet also mentioned that the Chinese ambassador recently visited the starting point of the Niger-Benin Export Pipeline and described it as “very impressive.” With the China National Petroleum Corporation as the developer, the nearly 2,000-kilometer-long pipeline would allow landlocked Niger to ramp up its crude production and access international trade by way of a terminal on Benin’s coast, officials say. 

Days before comments on these deals, a delegation from the National Uranium Company of China, or CNUC, discussed the resumption of exploration and mining of uranium in Niger’s northern regions nine years after the project was abandoned because of poor sales of the commodity in international markets. 

“Prices [of uranium] are now favorable internationally. It is for us to better develop this sector with all the partners, including the CNUC, who already have operating permits,” said Ousseini Hadizatou Yacouba, Niger’s Minister of Mines.

Yacouba and Xing Yongguo, CNUC’s president, signed a new deal in Niamey on June 27 to resuscitate activities at the uranium site in Arlit in the Agadez region, located in northern Niger.

Ahmed Mousa, the mayor of Ingall, a town in the Agadez region, the district where the main uranium project is taking place, is happy that work is resuming, saying it will provide electricity and other infrastructure for local communities. 

“It is great that they are back at work. We have been waiting for them to return. This will generate jobs for our people. It will help the economy,” Mousa said. 

The project is part of an ongoing effort by Beijing to invest in African countries. China is Africa’s largest trading partner with two-way trade totaling over $200 billion per year. More than 10,000 Chinese firms have forged partnerships across the continent since 2005, with an estimated $300 billion investment in projects, according to a report by the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Some civic groups in Niger oppose the plan, warning that mining poses environmental dangers.

Iliyasou Aboubakar, a member of ROTAB, a nongovernmental organization that goes by its French acronym, said African countries, including Niger, must not allow China to have free rein around their natural resources. The advocacy group focuses on policy, transparency and other rights in the mining industry in Niger. 

“This project has the potential to adversely affect humans, animals and plants. Authorities must make sure measures are taken to safeguard the health of the environment. This project should be stopped from moving forward,” Aboubakar said.

Niger has two major uranium mines that provide about 5% of the world’s highest-grade uranium ore, according to the World Nuclear Association. In 1971, the country’s first commercial uranium mine began operations. In 2021, Niger produced more than 2,248 tons of uranium.

VOA’s Salem Solomon contributed to this report.
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Kenya said Wednesday it was delaying the planned reopening of its long-closed border with Somalia after a number of deadly attacks on its soil attributed to the Islamist militant group al-Shabaab.

Interior Minister Kithure Kindiki said the phased reopening of border posts in Mandera, Lamu and Garissa along the lengthy frontier with Somalia would not go ahead as announced in May.

The decision comes after the murder of five civilians and the deaths of eight police officers in Kenya in separate incidents near the border last month blamed on al-Shabaab.

“The government will delay the planned reopening of Kenya-Somalia border points until we conclusively deal with the recent spate of terror attacks and cross-border crime,” Kindiki said during a visit to the Dadaab refugee camp in far eastern Kenya near Somalia.

The frontier was officially closed in October 2011 because of attacks by al-Shabaab, which has been waging an insurgency against the central government in Mogadishu for more than 15 years.

The two nations had announced plans in July last year to reopen the border at talks between then Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta and his Somali counterpart Hassan Sheikh Mohamud but they never materialized.

But on May 15 this year, following a high-level ministerial meeting in Nairobi, officials from both countries agreed to the phased reopening of three border posts.

 ‘Criminal elements’ 

Mandera was to reopen within 30 days of the announcement, followed by Garissa in 60 days and Lamu in 90 days.

However on June 13, eight Kenyan police officers were killed in Garissa when their vehicle struck an improvised explosive device.

On June 24, five civilians had their throats cut in an attack in Lamu near the Somali border. Some were beheaded.

Kenya has suffered retaliatory attacks on its soil by al-Shabaab since sending troops over the border into Somalia in 2011 to crush the al-Qaida linked jihadists.

More than a decade later, Kenya is still a major contributor to an African Union force in Somalia trying to curb al-Shabaab’s capacity to wage deadly attacks.

Among the deadliest attacks in Kenya was a massacre at Garissa University in 2015 that left 148 people dead, almost all of them students.

Two years earlier, 67 people were killed when militants stormed the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi.

Kenya hosts tens of thousands of refugees at Dadaab, most of them Somalis fleeing violence, poverty and a ferocious drought over the border, and successive governments have voiced suspicion about some of those sheltering there. 

Kindiki said “99.99 percent of refugees are good and law abiding and we will do our best to help them”.

“However, there are few criminal elements who will not be allowed to hurt the interests of bona-fide refugees and the host communities,” he said.
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