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It was January 1998 and Robert Bourgi was waiting to see the Gabonese president Omar Bongo, in an antechamber at his seaside palace in Libreville. He was there to collect funds for the approaching French presidential election on behalf of the centre-right Gaullist candidate Jacques Chirac, who was mayor of Paris at the time. Who […]

A zookeeper has been mauled to death by a lion in south-western Nigeria after he failed to secure the locks on its enclosure when he went to feed it, police say. The victim, a 35-year-old man, worked at the Presidential Library Wildlife Park, owned by former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, in Abeokuta, capital of Ogun […]

For Daniel Guerra, an aspiring Brazilian sailor keen to travel the world, the job ad was a dream come true. A British yacht owner was seeking two deck-hands to help sail his boat from Brazil across the Atlantic, one of the great ocean journeys. There would be no salary, but all expenses paid – and, […]

An 88-year-old man who is the world’s longest-serving death row inmate has been acquitted by a Japanese court, after it found that evidence used against him was fabricated. Iwao Hakamada, who has been on death row for more than half a century, was found guilty in 1968 of killing his boss, the man’s wife and […]

More than 430 people have died from cholera in the past month, Sudan’s health ministry says, as civil war continues to ravage the country. The number of infections has risen to about 14,000, it said in a statement. It said it was doing all it can to “combat cholera in the affected states, amid the […]

A soldier sacked by the Nigerian military after she accused some senior officers of rape and sexual harassment has released a video condemning her treatment. Ex-private Ruth Ogunleye made the allegations via her TikTok account in January, saying she had suffered immensely as a result of her ordeal at the hands of a general and […]

Eswatini’s main opposition leader has been poisoned as part of an assassination attempt and is being treated in hospital, his party says. Mlungisi Makhanya, 46, has been living in exile in neighbouring South Africa for the last two years, saying he fears for his life at home following a violent crackdown on pro-democracy activists in […]

Three men in Benin, including a former minister and the man in charge of President Patrice Talon’s security, have been arrested on suspicion of plotting a coup, the state prosecutor has said. Ex-sports minister Oswald Homeky was caught on Tuesday while handing over six bags of money to the head of the Republican Guard, Elonm […]

A long-distance bus has come under attack by gunmen in South Sudan on a main road south of the capital, Juba, leaving at least one person dead and several others feared kidnapped, the army has said. The passenger vehicle, heading for the Ugandan capital, Kampala, was targeted on Tuesday morning. Images from the scene show […]

Zambia’s President Hakainde Hichilema has suspended three top judges over alleged judicial misconduct, prompting accusations of political interference in the judiciary. In 2016, the three Constitutional Court judges dismissed President Hichilema’s petition, in which he challenged the election victory of former President Edgar Lungu. They also took part in a controversial ruling allowing Lungu to […]