UN Mission Reports Ethiopian Nationals among RSF Foreign Fighters, Urges Addis Abeba to Engage
The United Nations Independent International Fact-Finding Mission for Sudan has identified Ethiopian nationals among foreign fighters serving with the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), while urging the Ethiopian government to engage with its investigation into illicit activities linked to the Sudan conflict. In its report titled “Fuelling Sudan’s conflict: weapons, fighters and external support networks,” submitted to the UN Human Rights Council on 1 September 2026, the mission said witnesses reported fighters from Ethiopia, South Sudan and Chad serving primarily in frontline roles with the RSF. The fighters, including women, were reportedly identified in El-Fasher and elsewhere based on language, accent and, in some cases, uniforms. The report, however, does not suggest that the Ethiopian nationals identified as fighting alongside the RSF were recruited, deployed or otherwise involved in the conflict at the direction of the Ethiopian government. Nor does it make a specific finding that the Ethiopian government supplied the RSF with weapons, financing or other forms of military assistance. … According to the report, the mission sent Ethiopia a request for information on 11 June 2026 but received no substantive response. It subsequently listed Ethiopia, alongside Libya, South Sudan and Somalia, among states it considers “non-responsive.” The mission encouraged their governments to engage with it, particularly in light of evidence of illicit activities stemming from their territories documented in the report. Addis Standard
Fighting Erupts in Southwestern Somalia between Government and Militias
Fighting erupted early Thursday between government forces and militias on the outskirts of Somalia’s southwestern city of Baidoa, with reports of heavy gunfire and civilians fleeing their homes. Somalia’s Defense Ministry said government forces were responding to an attack by fighters loyal to former South West state President Abdiaziz Hassan Mohamed Laftagareen. … The clashes are the latest escalation in a political and security dispute between Somalia’s federal government and Laftagareen over control of South West state. Federal forces took control of Baidoa on March 30, after which Laftagareen resigned. He had governed the state since 2018. Clashes stopped in the early afternoon, but there was no official information on casualties or the extent of the fighting. Government troops patrolled the streets, ambulances rushed to the victims, and residents ventured out assessing damage and clearing out bloodied clothes from the pavement. AP
Former RFI Journalist Disappears in Niger after Attempted Coup
Reporters Without Borders has called for an investigation into the disappearance of Moussa Kaka, the director of a television station in Niger and a former correspondent for Radio France International, days after a failed coup in the country. Kaka, who worked for many years as an RFI correspondent in Niger and now directs private broadcaster Radio Télévision Saraounia, left his office in Niamey on Monday evening and never arrived home. According to Reporters Without Borders (RSF), his relatives and colleagues have been unable to contact him. “The disappearance of Moussa Kaka, a well-known journalist, is particularly concerning at a time when Niger is going through a period of heightened political and security tensions,” Sadibou Marong, director of RSF’s sub-Saharan Africa bureau, said in a statement. “RSF is following the situation closely and calls on Nigerien authorities to immediately open an investigation in order to find him and establish the circumstances of his disappearance without delay.” … Kaka’s disappearance comes after an attempted coup over the weekend that Niger said it shut down with military support from Russia. … Journalists in Niger, as well as activists and civil society figures, have come under increasing pressure since a military junta seized power in July 2023. RFI
Tunisian Cassation Court Upholds Long Sentences for Opposition Members
Tunisia’s Cassation Court on Thursday upheld prison sentences of up to 45 years imposed on opposition leaders, lawyers and businessmen on charges of conspiracy, their lawyers and families told Reuters. The opposition said the ruling, which is the final stage of the three-year legal proceedings and cannot be appealed, reinforces President Kais Saied’s authoritarian rule. Forty people were charged with conspiring to overthrow the president in one of Tunisia’s largest recent political prosecutions. Twenty fled abroad and were sentenced in absentia. “The ruling confirms that the judiciary is not independent,” said lawyer Haifa Chebbi, daughter of prominent opposition figure and National Salvation Front leader Nejib Chebbi, who was sentenced to 12 years. “Opponents entered prison by political decision and will leave when Saied falls,” she said. … In 2023, when most of the defendants were arrested, he said the politicians were “traitors and terrorists” and that judges who would acquit them were their accomplices. … Rights groups say Saied has controlled the judiciary since suspending parliament and seizing extraordinary powers in 2021, ruling by decree, dissolving the independent Supreme Judicial Council and sacking dozens of judges in 2022. Reuters
37 People Die from Fumes During Oil Pipeline Theft in Nigeria: NGO
At least 37 people died early Thursday in Nigeria’s oil-rich southern Niger Delta after inhaling fumes during the theft of fuel from a pipeline, a local NGO said. Illegal oil-siphoning is a major problem in Nigeria — an OPEC member and one of Africa’s largest petroleum producers — causing serious pollution. Accidents are common in swamps in the Niger Delta, where smugglers tap into pipelines to steal crude and refine it into fuel for sale. The Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre (YEAC-Nigeria) said it had “received and confirmed a report from its network of youth volunteers and human rights defenders in the Niger Delta in the Okrika Local Government Area of Rivers State that some persons, not fewer than 37 have been confirmed dead after inhaling ‘Indorama fuel’.” It said in a statement that those killed are “suspected to be oil thieves”, adding: “Many others are still missing.” It said “youths had connected a pipe to a tapping point on a pipeline that normally transports” crude from producer Indorama Eleme Petrochemical through the Port Harcourt Refinery to vessels loading for export. The men tapped into the pipeline and were loading oil into their own boats, it said. … The Niger Delta is home to Nigeria’s multi-billion-dollar oil and gas resources, but residents of the region live in poverty due to decades of oil exploration, neglect and pollution. AFP
Africa’s Peace Summit in Angola
African foreign ministers gathered in Luanda, Angola, over the weekend for the 26th Extraordinary Session of the African Union’s Executive Council. The closed-door talks were a prelude to a summit of heads of state on Sunday, 30 August, dedicated to strengthening the continent’s conflict prevention and resolution mechanisms. … The geography of Africa’s peace deficit was laid bare. “The peace and security challenges of our continent are well known, from Sudan to the eastern DRC, from Somalia to the Sahel, from Libya to northern Mozambique, passing through Madagascar,” said AU Commission Chairperson Mahmoud Ali Youssouf. He pointed to terrorism, violent extremism, piracy, transnational crime, and geopolitical competition as drivers of persistent crises. … The host, Angolan Foreign Minister Téte António, set the tone. “AU member states must move away from empty political statements and focus on practical, verifiable measures to stop conflicts before they start,” he warned. He stressed that the credibility of continental institutions depends on proactive crisis prevention, not reactive responses. His words were echoed by Youssouf, who insisted that financing the peace agenda can “no longer depend primarily on external resources”. He called for a strengthened AU Peace Fund and renewed support for UN Security Council Resolution 2719, which authorises UN-assessed contributions for AU-led peace support operations. Kenyan Foreign Policy
Health Officials Turn to Mobile-Phone Data to Track Ebola Spread in Congo
Health officials battling the Ebola outbreak in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo are using anonymised mobile-phone data to map population movements and identify areas where the virus could spread next, according to the World Health Organisation and researchers working with it. The approach, which has not been used before in an Ebola response, comes as authorities struggle to contain what the WHO has described as the fastest-growing Ebola outbreak on record. … Traditional risk assessments focus on outbreak hotspots and assume the virus is most likely to spread to surrounding areas. Analysing mobility data allows responders to identify risks in places that may be geographically distant but closely connected through travel patterns. … The analysis is produced by Swedish non-profit Flowminder, using anonymised records generated when mobile phone users connect to telecommunications networks. As people move around the country, their phones connect to different antennas on the network, generating records that show where those connections took place. Researchers use those records to estimate how people travel between different areas. The data is provided free of charge by Vodacom, Congo’s largest operator. Reuters
Ghana Tightens Gold Exports in Push to Keep More Value at Home
Ghana is requiring certain gold exporters to refine gold dore locally before it can be shipped abroad, in a move aimed at keeping more of the value generated by the country’s gold industry at home. Effective September 1, the Ghana Gold Board (GoldBod) barred Self-Financing Aggregators (SFAs) from exporting gold dore purchased under arrangements with approved offtakers unless it is first refined in Ghana. Dore is semi-refined gold that requires further processing before it can be turned into bullion. … [Clement Edem Asare Morjah, chief executive of United Gold International Limited] said refining gold locally could allow Ghanaian companies to capture margins that have historically gone to overseas processors. “In the entire value chain between refining and raw processed gold, the cost in between is a lot of margins. Historically, we have lost this to the outside world for decades. This is the first time deliberate government policy is trying to address this anomaly,” Morjah said. Al Jazeera
Migrant Boat Found Adrift near Spain’s Canary Islands with 5 Dead and Dozens Missing
A boat carrying West African migrants went adrift in the Atlantic Ocean and left at least five people dead and dozens more feared dead before the vessel was spotted and assisted, Spanish rescuers said Thursday. Forty-four people were brought to safety in the Canary Islands. Spain’s Maritime Rescue Service said Thursday that one of its planes had spotted a “precarious” boat drifting about 120 kilometers south of the island of Gran Canaria on Wednesday afternoon. Three survivors were evacuated by helicopter to a hospital on the island. The remaining 41 migrants were brought to safety by boat and disembarked early Thursday in the port of Arguineguín, where they were being cared for by the Red Cross. All of the survivors were men, some underage, and came from Mali or Senegal, said José Antonio Rodríguez Verona, a spokesperson for the Red Cross in the Canaries. … The survivors also told the Red Cross that more than 100 people were originally on board, including women and a baby. As people died on the journey, survivors tossed their bodies in the ocean until they had no more strength to do so. Spain’s Maritime Rescue Service said in a statement that it was not able to retrieve the remains of the five dead found inside the boat due to strong winds and waves that were 2.5 meters high. AP
Senegal Mother Turns Grief into a Fight for Missing Migrants
After her 19-year-old son disappeared while attempting to cross the Atlantic to Europe, Aminata Boye turned her grief into a mission to help other families facing the same loss. In Mbour’s Tefees neighbourhood, where many families have lost relatives to irregular migration, Boye helps search for missing migrants and supports their relatives. “That’s how I drew on my own experience to understand research methods and track down those who had taken the boats. I got in touch with the Red Cross so they could help me with the investigations.” Boye founded the Collective of Victims of Irregular Migration in Senegal in 2020. The group now supports more than a hundred women, while working with organisations including the Red Cross to trace missing migrants. “Young people don’t go to sea to kill themselves, nor to jeopardise their future. They want to earn a living and support their families.” For families like Ndeye Ndiaye’s, Boye has become a lifeline after the disappearance of her daughter. “It’s thanks to Aminata that I’m still here talking to you, because I had almost lost my mind.” Boye says governments must do more to give young people opportunities at home and allow safer, legal routes to travel. Africanews
UN to Vote on Adopting New World Map that Shows Africa’s True Scale
The UN general assembly will vote on Friday on a resolution for the world to formally phase out the traditional Mercator map of the globe in favour of one that more accurately displays Africa’s size. Robert Dussey, Togo’s foreign affairs minister, said the resolution was sponsored by Togo and backed by countries including the African Union’s 54 other member states. … UN resolutions are non-enforceable but if the vote passes, it could lead to an update of classroom curriculums and everyday technology, given the wide usage of the Mercator projection in education, technology and governance. The layout was introduced by the Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1569 to help sailors navigate the seas. Almost five centuries later it remains the global standard. Because of its projection style, however, regions near the equator appear significantly smaller than they are, whereas high-latitude areas look much larger. For example, the map shows Africa as being similar in size to Greenland, but the continent is 14 times larger than the Danish territory. The Guardian