Africa

At least 14 policemen have been killed in roadside bomb attacks in the past two days.

Africa Day is 25 May, it marks the creation of the Organisation of African Unity, now called the African Union.

Christian Atsu and Mubarak Wakaso are left out of Ghana's squad for next month's Africa Cup of Nations qualifier against Ethiopia.

Simplifying the requirements for a business license, offering incentives to tax payers, and tackling official corruption are among the recommendations by the United Nations agricultural organization to cut informal trade among African countries and boost economic prosperity, particularly for women.

Flying between the West African capitals of Freetown and Banjul should take about an hour. But as the BBC's Umaru Fofana found out, it can be quicker and easier to fly via Morocco or even Belgium.

Last year Salama Ali uncovered a secret - that the al-Shabab militant group was seizing Kenyan woman and turning them into sex slaves.

Despite “appalling conditions” in South Sudan, it is not too late to save more people from dying, the head of the United Nations agriculture agency said today, joining the World Food Programme (WFP) chief in a call to all parties enmeshed in the country’s conflict to end the violence and work together to ensure access to food and other life-saving support.

The head of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in South Sudan today urged the Security Council to unite behind a common strategy for advancing the political process and peace in the crisis-torn country.

Somali women vets have been deployed across the country to keep animals alive amid a devastating drought.

The BBC's Karen Allen asks whether the treason charges faced by Zambia's opposition leader Hakainde Hichilema are a sign that Zambia's reputation as a bastion of democracy is under threat.

Deteriorating security conditions have severely disrupted life-saving interventions for children in Greater Kasai in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in recent months, putting an estimated 400,000 children at risk of severe acute malnutrition, the United Nations Children&#39s Fund (UNICEF) has said.

With more than 100,000 people in Yemen believed to be at risk for cholera, the top United Nations humanitarian official in the country is appealing to Governments for urgent financial and political support

Two peacekeepers of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) were killed and another injured on Tuesday morning in an ambush in the northern Kidal region.

The US and Uganda are stopping the hunt for notorious rebel leader Joseph Kony but he is still a threat.

Italy's coastguard pull a man to safety after he was left clinging to a ship's rudder in the Mediterranean.

Feelings are heightened in South Africa over the safety of women, writes the BBC's Nomsa Maseko following a series of violent attacks against women.

May 21, 2017 (JUBA) – The South Sudanese government has announced that the national dialogue, will convene on Monday 22 May after a long delay in order to include holdout opposition leaders.

Juba has warned the armed and non-opposition groups which have refused to join the dialogue, that any attempt to sabotaging the government-led political process will not be tolerated.

According to leading members of the organising team, President Kiir has given the go ahead to invite, accommodate and provide necessary logistics to the national dialogue committee.

"I am glad to let the people of South Sudan through the media know that the long-awaited national dialogue committee on which the secretariat has been working will be officially opened on Monday," said Daniel Awet Akot, the Presidential advisor on military affairs.

"This will not only be in Juba alone. It is a bottom-up dialogue and so a general national dialogue will start in all the states across the country,” he further said.

Akot went on to say that President Kiir who is the chairman of the process would just open the proceedings, but the real work would be done by the co-chairpersons.

The Presidential advisor told Sudan Tribune on Sunday that President Kiir had already met delegates representing several factions.

Akot's commented that the President would no longer wait for opposition parties, adding that he would extend patience but he would not allow the dialogue to fail.

He noted that his administration could not force opposition parties to join the national dialogue, asserting that any attempt to undermine it would not succeed because of the significant political and social support it has received in the country.

Meanwhile, the Presidential press secretary said in a statement, “the office of the President appeals to all the members of the steering committee, including Co-Chairpersons, Vice Chairperson, the Rapporteur, and two deputy rapporteurs, Foreign External Members, and the Secretaries to came to sign their names.”

The press secretary further reminded the Centre for Peace and Development Studies, Ebony Centre, to send the names of two members into addition to the representative from South Sudan Council of Churches which has been allotted three members and South Sudan Islamic Council with one member.

(ST)

May 20, 2017 (KHARTOUM) - The government militia Rapid Support Forces (RSF) claimed they killed the commander of the Sudan Liberation Movement Minni Minnaxwi (SLM-MM) during fierce clashes in North Darfur State on Saturday.

The RSF has managed to defeat the rebels and kill SLM-MM General Commander Juma Mundi, said RSF Commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, (aka Hametti) in statements to the official news agency SUNA on Saturday evening.

He added they also killed and captured a number of SLM-MM fighters without providing the details, seized six armoured vehicles and a number of armed vehicles with all their military equipment.

Hametti said they lost four militaries, including Colonel Hamdan al-Samih and a number of wounded.

The two parties traded accusations of breaching a unilateral cessation of hostilities they declared since last year.

The government says the rebels entered into the region from Libya where Khartoum claim they are based, while the SLM-MM says the government forces attacked their positions in North Darfur state.

The Sudanese government, Justice and Equality Movement and SLM-MM expressed willingness to resume peace talks in an informal consultations-meeting in Berlin on Friday 19 May.

The warring parties in the western Sudan diverge on the reference to the Doha Document for Peace in Darfur which is rejected by the two armed groups while the government says it is now part of the constitution.

(ST)

May 20, 2017 (JUBA) - Members of South Sudan's armed opposition faction (SPLM-IO) have dismissed as untrue reports that their leader Riek Machar was replaced with his wife.

Angelina Teny addressing the international Women's Day in Juba, March 6, 2013 (ST)

Social media was awash with news that Angelina Teny had allegedly been appointed acting chairperson of the armed opposition movement.

But Machar's press secretary Lam Kuei Lam denied the veracity of the said document, describing it as “fake and forgery”.

He called on all supporters, members of the movement and South Sudanese not to believe the "fake" document claiming Angelina was acting chairperson of SPLM-IO.

“The document being circulated on social media about the appointment of Madam Angelina Jany Teny, as acting chairperson of the movement (SPLM-IO) under the leadership of Dr. Riek Machar Teny, is a fake document,” Kuei wrote on Facebook.

The document, rebel officials say, could have been circulated by government officials. Such a document is similar to the ones supporters of the government of President Salva Kiir have always circulated, purporting them to have been done by Machar.

Political analysts have always interpreted the motive for the circulation of faked documents in the name of Machar as part of the political campaign using propaganda to foment discontent within the leadership, with view aimed at encouraging split and disintegration into ethnic and family factions unable to challenge the government.

Such political machinations are designed to weaken the support base of Machar as the leader of the movement and to portray him as someone selfish and pursuing personal interest in the name of advocating for change and democracy while his actions in appointments shows the opposite.

(ST)

May 20, 2017 (JUBA) - South Sudanese government forces killed 114 civilians in Yei, a town located about 100 miles from the capital, Juba between July 2016 and January 2017, the United Nations said.

Sudanese Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA) soldiers singing pro-war song (AFP file photo)

The U.N, in a new report, also documented various crimes of rape, looting and torture, allegedly committed by government forces in and around Yei town.

"Attacks were committed with an alarming degree of brutality and, like elsewhere in the country, appeared to have an ethnic dimension," partly reads a section of the U.N investigation report.

Yei, a relatively peaceful region until mid-last year, has lately been experiencing lots of clashes between government forces and the armed opposition troops loyal to ex-First Vice President, Riek Machar.

The U.N investigations report also highlights various cases of sexual violence, including rape, allegedly committed by pro-government forces on women and young girls in and around the town of Yei.

"In view of the restrictions of access faced by (the UN), the number of documented cases may only be a fraction of those actually committed. Some of the human rights violations and abuses committed in and around Yei may amount to war crimes and/or crimes against humanity and warrant further investigation,” it says.

ARMY DENIES ALLEGATIONS

South Sudan army spokesperson Colonel Santo Domic Chol has, however, dismissed the U.N report, describing it as “baseless”.

"This is not the first time the UN has accused the SPLA and tried to portray us as enemies of the people," Chol told Reuters.

“The SPLA is one of the biggest military institutions in the country and it accommodates people from different background and the whole SPLA cannot go out and rape citizens... so it has to be specific that we have seen two or three SPLA soldiers in such location committing such crimes,” he added.

The military official said President Salva Kiir ordered all army commanders in Yei to punish soldiers who committed gender-based violence.

Last week, two U.N agencies appealed to donors to step up support for people fleeing crisis-hit South Sudan as the $1.4 billion response plan remains 86 percent unfunded.

According to the U.N, the situation in war-torn South Sudan continues worsening, with a combination of conflict, drought and famine leading to further displacement and a rapid exodus of people fleeing one of the world's most severe crises.

South Sudan has reportedly now become the world's fastest growing refugee crisis with more than 1.8 million refugees, including one million children, having sought safety in Uganda, Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the Central African Republic (CAR).

South Sudan has witnessed renewed clashes between forces loyal to South Sudan President Kiir and the armed opposition faction (SPLM-IO) backing the country's former First Vice-President, in spite of the August 2015 peace deal.

(ST)