Africa

US Secretary of State John Kerry said on Sunday he was “confident” Egypt will receive Apache gunships soon, as he made a surprise visit to Cairo. Kerry became the highest-ranking American official to visit Egypt since President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi came to power after overwhelmingly winning an election in May.

French Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian visited Mali to show his support for a landmark peace deal agreed in the former colony to end years of unrest and ethnic divisions. Just two days after Mali’s Tuareg-led rebel alliance added its signature to the Algiers Accord — aimed at stabilising Mali’s …

EU High Representative Federica Mogherini, met here Wednesday with the foreign ministers of Mali, Mauritania, Nigeria, Chad and Burkina Faso and discussed the EU’s relations with the five countries of the Sahel region. “We have decided to meet regularly at ministerial level and our technical services will work on three …

The United States plans to provide $5m to help support a regional military force fighting Nigeria’s Islamist militant group Boko Haram, a state department official said on Tuesday. Boko Haram last year held a vast swathe of territory in north-eastern Nigeria of just over 30 000 square kilometres, about the …

The French President confirmed Monday, in Algiers, that a military operation against a Libyan site where the terrorist Mokhtar Belmokhtar was took place, adding that there is a “great probability” that this terrorist was killed in this operation.

Algeria “welcomes” the opening on Monday in Geneva of peace talks among the Yemeni parties and voices hope that this dialogue reaches a “political” solution to the crisis the country is facing, Foreign Ministry’s spokesman Abdelaziz Benali Cherif said.

Egypt’s ousted president Mohamed Mursi was sentenced to death by a Cairo court on Tuesday for accusations of escaping from the Wadi al-Natroun prison. The former president and 128 other defendants are accused of collaborating with international bodies, the Palestinian Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah, to escape prison during the January …

French President Francois Hollande heads to Algeria on Monday as the two nations, once bitter foes, work ever closer to resolve the political turmoil and jihadist threat in Mali and Libya. The trip will be Hollande’s second to Algiers since a 2012 visit during which he recognised France’s century of …

In a firefight, the Kenyan army killed 11 militants – including two apparent foreigners – from the Somali extremist group al-Shabaab and suffered two fatal casualties, a military spokesperson said Sunday.

Twenty-three people were killed and more than 100 wounded in twin suicide bombings targeting police in the Chadian capital Monday, with the government blaming Boko Haram militants for the bloodshed. They were the first such attacks in the capital of the central African nation, which has been on the frontline …