Africa

Kenya: police tear-gas anti-hunger protest

Activists in Nairobi say police used tear-gas against several hundred protesters marching on the offices of Kenya’s president and prime minister to demand action over a growing hunger crisis in the East African nation.

Africa

Al-Qaeda mastermind killed in Somalia, authorities say

Al-Qaeda leader Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, said to be behind the 1998 bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, was killed at a checkpoint in Somalia by forces who didn’t realize he was the most wanted man in Africa.

Africa

Somalia: thousands displaced as Shabab battle Sufis

Thousands of families have been displaced in weeks of fighting between the Ahlu Sunna sufi militia and fundamentalist Shabab insurgents in central Somalia. Drought conditions in the countryside have worsened the plight of the displaced.

Africa

Africa: violence plagues mineral sector

Security forces killed seven when hundreds of local artisanal miners who invaded the premises of Barrick Gold’s North Mara mine in Tanzania—the latest in a series of deadly confrontations in Africa’s mineral sector.

Africa

Regime shuts down social media as protests rock Uganda

President Yoweri Museveni has ordered the Uganda Communication Commission to shut down all social networking sites, fearing they will be used as a tool for organizing protests following deadly unrest in Kampala.

Africa

Protests rock Swaziland

Inspired by the Arab Spring, protesters in Swaziland are calling for King Mswati III—Africa’s last absolute monarch—to allow multi-party democracy and rescind salary cuts to public employees.