Africa

The number of people requiring humanitarian assistance in Niger, a country which the UN humanitarian agency, OCHA, says is “being assaulted on all fronts”, is expected to increase in 2020. 

Ordinary Congolese hoped Felix Tshisekedi would transform their lives when he became president.

Authorities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the UN peacekeeping operation in the country, MONUSCO, are being urged to develop a comprehensive joint strategy to address insecurity in Beni territory, located in the east. 

The top UN aid official in Nigeria has condemned a weekend attack against a major humanitarian facility in the north-east of the country. 

Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia are dealing with desert locust swarms of “unprecedented size and destructive potential” that could spill over into more countries in East Africa, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) warned on Monday.

The world should not accept the “dire and untenable” situation facing children in wartorn Libya the head of the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, said on Friday.

Fresh clashes in the Central African Republic’s southeast have driven some 400 people to seek shelter at a UN base there, the United Nations Spokesperson said on Wednesday.

Implementation of the 2015 peace agreement in Mali provides the only pathway for stabilization there, the head of UN peacekeeping told the Security Council on Wednesday. 

Ongoing instability in Sudan’s West Darfur region has left the lives, health and safety of thousands of women hanging in the balance, according to the  United Nations Population Fund, UNFPA. 

The mining of gold in unregulated and often hand-dug pits in West Africa, can be a deadly occupation, but one which many impoverished people in the region are pushed into by necessity, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).   

The targeting of the Hema community in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) with violence, including killings and rape, may amount to crimes against humanity, said the UN on Friday. 

The top UN official in West Africa and the Sahel updated the Security Council on Wednesday, describing an “unprecedented" rise in terrorist violence across the region.

Countries are being asked to step up assistance to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) which is facing the world’s worst measles epidemic, with more than 6,000 deaths since the start of last year. 

Around 40,000 have been displaced in Sudan’s West Darfur state in recent days, following intercommunal clashes, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Tuesday, citing Sudanese Government data.

The top UN official in Libya has delivered a stern message urging other nations to stop intervening in the country’s ongoing crisis. 

The UN Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), on Sunday strongly condemned the bombing of a military academy in the capital Tripoli, which according to news reports left at least 30 dead and more than 30 others wounded.

Authorities in Sudan are being urged to restore peace and order in the wake of intercommunal clashes in West Darfur state which erupted on Sunday and left 65 people dead, 54 injured, and thousands displaced.   

The abducted four-year-old son of a UN migration agency worker who was killed in South Sudan in October has been released and reunited with his father during an emotional reunion in the capital Juba on Friday.

Shelling near a major facility run by the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) in the Libyan capital Tripoli on Thursday, has sparked deep concern for the safety of refugees and asylum seekers there.

January 2, 2020 (KHARTOUM) - 18 people were killed, including military personnel, judges and four children, after the crash of a military cargo plane, in El-Geneina airport.

The Antonov-12 cargo plane crashed minutes after taking off from the capital of West Darfur State, on Thursday evening, according to the Sudanese army spokesman Amer Mohamed al-Hassan.

The plane "crashed 5 minutes after taking off, resulting in the death of its 7-member crew," four officers and three other ranks, "in addition to three judges and eight civilians, including four children," said al-Hassan

The Russian four-engine plane crashed while it was heading back to Khartoum after transporting humanitarian assistance for the victims of the tribal clashes that erupted in El-Geneina on 29 December.

Last year several the Antonov-12 cargo planes crashed under similar circumstances shortly after taking off.

The Sudanese military spokesman gave no reason for the incident but said the crash will be investigated.

Sudanese Minister of Justice, Nasr al-Din Abdel Bari had to fly on the plane which crashed in El-Geneina but he missed the fight due to the ongoing investigations into the clashes.

Prime Minister Abdallah Hamdok is still in El Geneiena as he continues to meet tribal leaders after the bloody tribal clashes.

(ST)