Suspected jihadists massacred more than 40 civilians in northern Mali and killed 12 troops in an ambush in neighbouring Burkina Faso, officials said yesterday, highlighting the security crisis gripping the two fragile states.

At least 12 soldiers were killed in an attack in northwestern Burkina Faso on Sunday and seven others are missing, three security sources said.

At least 30 South Sudanese soldiers were killed and 13 injured in clashes between forces loyal to Vice President Riek Machar and a splinter group, Machar’s party spokesman said in a statement on Saturday.

About 40 migrants were feared dead after a boat carrying about 50 people travelling from Western Sahara to Spain's Canary Islands capsized, a Spanish non-governmental organisation, said on Friday.

South Africa's jailed former president, Jacob Zuma, was admitted to hospital for medical observation on Friday, the government's Correctional Services department said.

A Supreme Court justice ruled Wednesday President Jair Bolsonaro should be investigated for unproven claims Brazil’s voting system is riddled with fraud, adding the far-right leader to an ongoing probe on the spread of fake news by his government.

President Jair Bolsonaro lashed out Tuesday at electoral authorities for ordering an investigation of his campaign against Brazil’s electronic voting system, saying he refused to be “intimidated” and that the country “is under attack.”

Thirty-three people died in a horrific collision between a fuel truck and a crowded bus in the Democratic Republic of Congo at the weekend, police said yesterday.

Fifteen soldiers were killed as a result of an ambush in southwestern Niger on Saturday, the country's defence ministry said, blaming the attack on "armed terrorist groups."

At least 249 rhinos were killed the first six months of this year in South Africa, the environment minister said yesterday, partly pushed by the easing of lockdown curbs that increased movement of poachers. 

The United Nations children’s agency said on Friday that more than 100,000 children in Ethiopia’s northern region of Tigray could suffer life-threatening malnutrition in the next 12 months, a 10-fold increase to normal numbers.

Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara and long-time rival Laurent Gbagbo hugged on Tuesday at their first meeting in over a decade, part of efforts to ease political tensions in the West African country.

At least half a million children face acute malnourishment in drought-hit southern Madagascar, causing irreversible damage to their growth and development, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) and Unicef warned Monday.

Opponents of Tunisia’s President Kais Saied, who sparked a crisis by ousting the premier and suspending parliament, yesterday challenged him to hold new elections instead of building an “autocratic regime”.

A boat carrying African migrants capsized off Libya’s coast Monday, leaving at least 57 people presumed dead, a UN migration official said. It was the latest disaster in the Mediterranean Sea involving migrants seeking a better life in Europe.

Heavy security was deployed outside Nigeria’s federal high court yesterday as the trial of a leading separatist extradited last month resumed, an AFP journalist at the scene reported.

The DR Congo’s Nyirangongo volcano has released large amounts of ash some two months after its eruption, sparking concerns for local residents’ health, experts said on Sunday.

A man accused of attempting to stab Mali's interim President Assimi Goita last week has died in hospital while in the custody of security services, the government said in a statement on Sunday.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Monday she has agreed to a request from Turkish authorities to accept the return of a New Zealand citizen accused of having links to the Islamic State, and her two young children.

Tunisia's president dismissed the government and froze parliament on Sunday in a dramatic escalation of a political crisis that his opponents labelled a coup, calling their own supporters to come onto the streets in protest.