Africa (except North Africa)

NAIROBI, July 13 (Xinhua) -- Sub-Saharan African countries should intensify action on climate change concurrently with COVID-19 containment in order to realize a speedy, inclusive and green recovery, campaigners said Tuesday.

Mithika Mwenda, executive director of Nairobi-based Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), said the continent should prioritize low carbon development pathways in order to boost resilience of communities and habitats during the pandemic era.

NAIROBI, July 13 (Reuters) - Rebels in Ethiopia's Tigray region said on Tuesday they had recaptured a main town from rival forces and were pushing to take back more territory.

Reuters was unable to independently confirm the claim because communication links to the region are down.

War broke out last November between Tigray's ruling party, the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), and Ethiopian federal forces.

JOHANNESBURG, July 13 (Reuters) - Protesters clashed with police in several areas of South Africa and looters ransacked shopping malls on Tuesday as frustrations over poverty and inequality boiled over into the country's worst unrest in years.

Security officials said the government was working to ensure the violence and looting did not spread further, but they stopped short of declaring a state of emergency.

KIGALI, Jul 12 (NNN-IRIN) – Students being treated for COVID-19 under home-based care in Rwanda, are to sit for their national examinations under strict health protocols, the country’s education ministry, said.

All examination centres will set up a separate examination room, which will be disinfected every day, for these students, the ministry said, in guidelines published yesterday.

LAGOS, Jul 12 (NNN-NAN) – Authorities in Lagos, Nigeria’s economic hub, raised alarm over a possible third wave of COVID-19 pandemic, following a recent increase in cases.

Governor of Lagos state, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, announced yesterday, restrictions and sanctions, after disclosing that the state’s daily confirmed cases had shot up recently.

Figures from the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control show the country has seen increase in COVID-19 cases for two weeks, ending on Jul 4.

LAGOS, July 12 (Reuters) - Nigeria's Lagos state faces a "potential third wave" of coronovirus infections, its governor said in a statement.

He warned of fines or even imprisonment for those who break rules to contain the virus and said Lagos state would step up its vaccination campaign, following the detection of the highly infectious Delta variant in an incoming traveller.

JOHANNESBURG, July 12 (Reuters) - South Africa's top court began hearing a challenge by former president Jacob Zuma against a 15-month prison term on Monday as police said six people had been killed and over 200 arrested in related protests and looting since last week.

Sporadic violence and looting continued on Monday, after a weekend of unrest by pro-Zuma protesters, mainly concentrated in his home province of KwaZulu-Natal (KZN). Some disturbances spilled into the country's largest city Johannesburg. 

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — Some in wheelchairs, others on canes, hundreds of South Africans waited recently on the ramps of an open-air Johannesburg parking garage to get their COVID-19 vaccine shots. Despite the masks, social distancing and blustery weather of the Southern Hemisphere winter, a celebratory atmosphere took hold.

“What a relief!” said Vincent Damon, a 63-year-old electrical technician, after getting his second dose. “In the last four days, I’ve lost four friends. All of them under 60. This pandemic has gotten worse. It’s frightening.”

JOHANNESBURG July 9 (Xinhua) -- As COVID-19 cases continue surging, acting Health Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi said the approval of the CoronaVac vaccine would enhance South Africa's vaccination rollout program.

"CoronaVac will boost the vaccine supply for country's vaccination rollout program in addition to those we already receive from Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson," she said at a media briefing Friday.

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — A large explosion in Somalia’s capital killed at least nine people and injured eight others, a health official said Saturday.

Dr. Mohamed Nur at the Medina Hospital told reporters that the toll reflected only the dead and wounded who were taken to the facility in Mogadishu where he works.

“I am sure the number is bigger as some of the victims were rushed to other hospitals, such as the privately owned ones,” he said.

The al-Shabab extremist group claimed responsibility.