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News [1]
Opinion [2]
Business [3]
Sport [4]
Life [5]
Style [7]
Entertainment [8]
Travel [9]

Menu Sections

Africa

November 2022

A participant walks past a mock-up of the planet Earth globe at the Sharm el-Sheikh International Convention Centre, on the first day of the COP27 climate summit, in Egypt's Red Sea resort city of Sharm el Sheikh, yesterday. Photo: Mohammed Abd/AFP/via Getty

Ireland’s climate report card since last COP at best gives us a middle row seat at this one

The gathering of world leaders in Egypt for COP27 today prompts the question – what have they done for climate since COP26?

Rescuers attempt to recover the Precision Air passenger plane that crashed into Lake Victoria in Bukoba, Tanzania. Reuters

26 rescued after passenger plane crash lands into Tanzania’s Lake Victoria

A Precision Air flight carrying 43 people made a crash landing into Lake Victoria on Sunday while attempting to reach a nearby airport in Tanzania, the airline said.

A woman in a camp of internally displaced persons in Mogadishu, Somalia. Photo: Mark Condren

President Michael D Higgins Opinion COP27: Famines and the role of the rich in creating them must not slip the agenda of those with most to give

This week’s report from Somalia by Conor Feehan and Mark Condren in the Irish Independent has provided for us all a valuable account of the horrific situation facing people of the Horn of Africa. Somalia, for example, stands on the brink of a third famine in three decades.

Habiba Mohamud Omar (35) points to the unmarked graves of her two children at the Unicef camp in Dollow, Somalia. Photo by Mark Condren

‘Nobody can say what God has planned’ — the disaster uprooting a million Somalians

In the scorched red earth, a little brother and sister lie side by side in unmarked graves. Adan (2) and Hawa (3) died before they ever really lived.

October 2022

Abdirashid Muktar Nishow (5) looks over his father Muktar (40), who is suffering from severe malnourishment, in the Unicef-supported Ladan internally displaced persons camp in Dolow, Somalia. Photo: Mark Condren

Conor Feehan visits Somalia: Famine and drought threatens to wipe out a generation of children

Somalia is on the brink of famine disaster, with one child now admitted to a health facility every minute of every day for treatment of severe malnutrition.

Burkina Faso's self-declared new leader Ibrahim Traore is welcomed by supporters holding Russian's flags as he arrives at the national television standing in an armoured vehicle in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso yesterday. Photo: Vincent Bado/Reuters

Burkina Faso leader ‘in deal with junta to step down’ so long as he’s safe

Burkina Faso’s ousted coup leader has offered his resignation as long as his safety is guaranteed, and the new junta leader who overthrew him has accepted the deal, according to mediators.

September 2022

Women in Kenya taking their children to a malnutrition clinic. Image: ActionAid

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'Hunger does not affect all equally': Horn of Africa drought starves girls of food and their rights

As the drought crisis deepens and food gets scarcer, women in Kenya are resorting to the gastric band of the starving.

Tommy Tiernan with Ruth Mwangi, Trócaire's resilience programme officer in Luuq, Gedo Region, Somalia. Picture by Miriam Donohoe

Tommy Tiernan in Somalia: We can do better – and we must

I left Luuq, a town in Gedo region in southern Somalia, at noon. Twenty-four hours later I was on the M50 in Dublin. I’m not sure how many thousands of miles I travelled but I do know the length of time it took me to do it. A day. Everything that I saw is just a day away.

August 2022

Military vehicles backing the Government of National Unity enter Tripoli to resolve conflict. Photo: Ayman al-Sahili/Reuters

Fears of wider conflict over political stalemate after clashes on Tripoli city streets

Rival factions battled across Libya's capital on Saturday in the worst fighting there for two years as an eyewitness said forces aligned with a parliament-backed administration had moved on the city to try to take power.

Security forces outside the damaged Hayat Hotel in Mogadishu, Somalia, yesterday. Photo: Farah Abdi Warsameh/AP

Somalia hotel siege ends after militants kill at least 21 and leave 117 injured

Somali security forces say they have regained control of a hotel in the capital Mogadishu after an attack by al-Shabaab militants left 21 people dead and more than 110 wounded.

A police officer fires tear gas at protesters after the presidential election results were announced in Kisumu, Kenya. Photo: REUTERS/Baz Ratner

Chaotic brawl as deputy president wins close-run election in Kenya

Deputy president William Ruto, the son of a goat herder who has styled himself as Kenya’s hustler-in-chief, has been declared the winner of the presidential election in a stinging rebuke of the entrenched political dynasties.

A woman reacts after a deadly fire broke out at the Abu Sifin church, in Giza, Egypt. REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El Ghany

Children among 41 dead as fire rips through packed Egyptian church, sparking stampede

A fire ripped through an Egyptian church during mass, causing a stampede and killing at least 41 people, most of them children.

Women protest outside the Krugersdorp, South Africa, Magistrates Court. More than 80 men suspected of the gang rapes of eight women and armed robbery of a video production crew in the mining town, west of Johannesburg appeared in court on Monday. Picture: AP

84 miners appear in South Africa court over gang rape of eight women during music video shoot

A total of 84 men suspected of the gang rapes of eight women and the armed robbery of a video production crew in South Africa have appeared in court.

July 2022

Protesters run away after being confronted by riot police outside the UN compound in Goma yesterday. Photo: Esdras Tsongo/Reuters

Five killed during protests at UN mission in Congo

At least five people were killed when United Nations peacekeepers opened fire on Congolese protesters after they stormed the mission’s headquarters in Goma yesterday.

Hamma al-Hammami, an activist and former political prisoner, confronts with police during a protest against the President Kais Saied's upcoming referendum on a new constitution in Tunis, Tunisia on Friday. Photo: Zoubeir Souissi/Reuters

Hundreds take to streets in Tunisia as vote on new constitution sparks fears of return to dictatorship

Hundreds of Tunisians took to the streets to protest against a controversial referendum that has sparked fears the country is on the cusp of becoming a dictatorship again.

There have been a dozen major Marburg outbreaks since 1967

Marburg virus: Ghana confirms two cases of highly infectious disease

Ghana has confirmed two cases of the Marburg virus, a highly infectious disease similar to Ebola, the country’s health service said on Sunday.

A woman watches over a herd of goats in Milimatatu Village, Kaeris, Turkana County in Northern Kenya. Photo by Lisa Murray/ Concern

Time running out for Kenya as worst drought in 40 years threatens disaster

Herders learn the hard way in northern Kenya, where the unforgiving landscape and climate mean mistakes have deadly consequences.

Broken walls at the Kuje prison in Abuja after a rebel attack on Tuesday night. Photo: Chinedu Asadu/AP

Hundreds of inmates on loose as jihadi rebels attack Nigerian jail

At least 600 inmates escaped in a jailbreak in Nigeria’s capital Abuja, officials said, blaming the escape on a prison attack by Islamic extremist rebels.

Two women killed in shark attacks off Egypt’s Red Sea coast

Two women have been killed in separate shark attacks on Egypt’s Red Sea coast.

There is nothing for livestock to eat in the parched plains of Kenya. Photo: Stock image

Herders face dreadful dilemma as drought plaguing vast areas of the Horn of Africa intensifies

It was a journey that ended in heartbreak and death. Sometime in recent weeks, a herder searching for pasture and water brought his weak and hungry cattle to Mbalambala where their rotting carcasses now lie.

Two tourists killed in separate shark attacks in Red Sea

A Romanian tourist has been killed in the second fatal shark attack to take place off the Egyptian coast in recent days.

June 2022

Ngirethi Ekakutan holds her younger sister Mary as she has her measurements taken at a malnutrition clinic in Lekwasimyen in Northern Kenya’s Turkana province on Tuesday. Photo: Lisa Murray

350,000 severely malnourished children face death in drought-stricken East Africa

In the worst cases, when the malnutrition swells the children’s entire bodies and bloats their faces into round moons, desperate parents cut their flesh to try to drain the gathering fluid.

The tragedy took place the city of East London, South Africa (Google)

South African nightclub deaths: At least 22 young people found dead as police probe cause

South African authorities are investigating the deaths of at least 22 people found inside a popular tavern in the city of East London.

Migrants run on Spanish soil after crossing the fences separating the Spanish enclave of Melilla from Morocco. Photo: AP Photo/Javier Bernardo

18 dead as over 2,000 African migrants storm border into Spanish enclave of Melilla

Eighteen African migrants have died and dozens have been injured in an attempt to cross into the Spanish North African enclave of Melilla, Moroccan authorities have said.

The Amhara people are being slaughtered in the African country

At least 200 feared dead in massacre as ethnic tensions erupt in Ethiopia

Witnesses in Ethiopia say more than 200 ethnic Amhara have been killed in an attack in the country’s Oromia region and are blaming a rebel group.

The region relies on bi-annual rains but droughts have been increasing over the past two decades and some parts of Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya have had no rain since 2019. Photo: Stock image

More than 1,800 a day dying of hunger as agencies warn famine looms in drought-stricken Horn of Africa

Irish aid agencies have joined forces to plead for help to stave off famine in Africa’s drought-stricken east.

Habiba Mohamed Noor, a Somali displaced woman holds her one year old child Hassan Mukhtar Mohamed as he is screened for malnutrition after they arrived at the Dollow hospital in Dollow, Gedo Region, Somalia. Picture: Reuters

‘Only God can help’: Hundreds die as Somalia faces famine

No mother should have to lose her child. Owliyo Hassan Salaad has watched four die this year. A drought in the Horn of Africa has taken them, one by one.

At least 50 people are believed to have been killed during the attack in the southwestern Nigerian state of Ondo, though others put the figure higher. Photo: PA

Dozens slain as gunmen attack Nigerian church with explosives

Dozens of massgoers have been shot dead after gunmen opened fire and detonated explosives at a Catholic church in south-western Nigeria.

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