By Rédaction Africanews with agencies Catholic Pope Leo XIV, speaking to crowds in St Peter’s Square after Sunday’s noonday prayer, has called for an end to ongoing violence in Nigeria. Gunmen killed three villagers and abducted 11 people Saturday, including a Catholic priest, while at least 170 were killed in Woro earlier in the week. Kaduna’s Catholic Diocese of Kafanchan said men had attacked the priest’s residence in the Kauru local government area of Kaduna state during the afternoon. “It is with sorrow and concern that I learned of the recent attacks against various communities in Nigeria leading to a…
Author: Montage Africa
By Rédaction Africanews with agencies South Africa has announced the withdrawal of its troops from a United Nations mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo. President Cyril Ramaphosa’s office said on Saturday that he had informed the UN Secretary‑General, Antonio Guterres, of the decision. South Africa has supported the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the DRC for 27 years and has more than 700 soldiers deployed there. The Presidency said Pretoria will work jointly with the UN to finalise the timelines and other modalities of the withdrawal, which will be completed before the end of this year. It said…
Today, President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi received President of the Federal Republic of Somalia, Dr. Hassan Sheikh Mohamud. Spokesman for the Presidency Ambassador Mohamed El-Shennawy said the reception ceremony featured an official salute by the guard of honor and the playing of the national anthems of both the Federal Republic of Somalia and the Arab Republic of Egypt, followed by a commemorative photo for the two Presidents. Later, President El-Sisi and Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud held a bilateral meeting, followed by an expanded session of talks attended by the two countries’ delegations. Afterward, President El-Sisi hosted a luncheon in honor…
An apparent Nigerien military drone strike killed at least 17 civilians, including 4 children, and injured at least 13 others at a crowded market in western Niger on January 6, 2026, Human Rights Watch said today. The strike, which also killed three Islamist fighters, violated laws-of-war prohibitions against indiscriminate attacks and might amount to a war crime. The attack occurred in the village of Kokoloko in Tillabéri region, about 120 kilometers west of the capital, Niamey, and less than 3 kilometers from the border with Burkina Faso. Residents said the Islamic State in the Sahel (IS Sahel), an Islamist armed group,…
By Africanews with AFP An Iranian court sentenced human rights activist Narges Mohammadi to a six-year prison term for gathering and collusion to commit crimes, her lawyer said on Sunday. Mohamadi’s lawyer Mostafa Nili added that his client had had also received a two-year ban on leaving the country. She was also handed a one-and-a-half-year prison sentence for propaganda activities and is to be exiled for two years to the city of Khosf in the eastern province of South Khorasan, the lawyer stated. Nili expressed hope that due to Mohammadi’s health issues, she could be temporarily “released on bail to…
For seven days, dancers, musicians and craftspeople from dozens of communities across the Sahara meet there, with Niger as guest of honour alongside groups from Mali, Morocco, Mauritania and Burkina Faso. The programme mixes concerts, parades and camel races, with more than 400 dromedaries taking part. Visitors can also see local crafts and taste regional food, from camel milk to traditional dishes. Beyond the shows, organisers want to highlight desert heritage, tourism and cooperation between southern countries. After 10 years, the festival has become a rare meeting point for Saharan cultures and shared futures.
Although their forefathers were seized from West and Central Africa centuries ago, the bond between African-Americans and their ancestral home has been a lasting one. For instance, Liberia, Africa’s oldest republic, was founded by freed black American slaves in 1822. After Ghana became independent in 1957, a wave of black intellectuals and artists moved there from the US. Martin Luther King, Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali subsequently paid high-profile visits to Ghana, while Guinea became home to Black Panther leader Stokely Carmichael. This transatlantic connection has ebbed and flowed over time – but in recent years, there has been a…
King Charles III and Queen Camilla will host Nigeria’s president in the country’s first state visit to the UK in 37 years, Buckingham Palace has announced. Bola Tinubu and First Lady Oluremi Tinubu have accepted an invitation to be guests of the King at Windsor Castle from 18 to 19 March. State visits are considered a form of soft-power diplomacy, using the pomp of royal hospitality to strengthen relations with important international partners. The last Nigerian state visit to the UK took place in 1989, when military ruler Gen Ibrahim Babangida travelled to meet the late Queen Elizabeth II for…
Jihadist groups are increasingly carrying out drone strikes in West Africa, raising alarm that they are building the capacity to wage a “war from the skies”. A leading violence monitoring organisation, Acled, has recorded at least 69 drone strikes by an al-Qaeda affiliate in Burkina Faso and Mali since 2023, while two Islamic State (IS) affiliates have carried out around 20 – mostly in Nigeria, which has been battling numerous insurgent groups for almost 25 years. The latest drone attack took place in Nigeria’s north-eastern Borno state on 29 January, when jihadists carried out a two-pronged assault – with multiple…
By Rédaction Africanews and AFP Namibia has slammed an offshore exploration deal between TotalEnergies and Petrobras in the Luderitz basin, saying the government has not been notified, as required by law. The two oil giants announced on Friday that they’d each acquired stakes in an exploration licence for an offshore field within Namibia’s territorial waters. Namibia’s national oil company Namcor would hold 10 percent stakes alongside the French and Brazilian companies, according to Total’s press release. Namibia’s ministry of industries, mines and energy said on Sunday that it wasn’t notified of the sale and that any transfer of licence requires…