Africa (except North Africa)

ABUJA, July 19 (NNN-XINHUA) – Nigerian police rescued 14 women, a few hours after they were kidnapped by gunmen, in the northern state of Katsina on Saturday, according to a spokesman.

One suspect, identified as Amadu Yusuf, a leader of the gunmen, was arrested by the police, said police spokesman, Gambo Isah.

The gunmen, believed to be bandits, attacked Kwantawama village, of the Dutsinma local government area of the state, on motorcycles, Isah told reporters, adding that, the police fought a gunfight with them to rescue the women.

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — Countries from the U.S. to South Africa to India were struggling to hold down rising rates of the coronavirus, as global deaths from COVID-19 surged past 600,000 in a sign of how far off the world remains from a return to normalcy.

While the U.S. leads global infections, South Africa now ranks as the fifth worst-hit country in the pandemic with 350,879 cases — roughly half of all those confirmed on the African continent. Its struggles are a sign of trouble to come for nations with even fewer health care resources.

KINSHASA, Congo (AP) — Days of fighting between armed groups in villages in Congo’s South Kivu province killed at least 43 people, many of them women and children, residents said Saturday.

At least 40 others disappeared after members of the armed group known as Ngumino attacked the village of Kipupu on Thursday while they were being pursued by the Mai Mai rebel group, according to the coordinator of South Kivu civil society groups, Andre Byadunia.

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — Saying “we are at the breaking point,” the U.N. secretary-general made a sweeping call Saturday to end the global inequalities that sparked this year’s massive anti-racism protests and have been further exposed by the coronavirus pandemic.

“COVID-19 has been likened to an X-ray, revealing fractures in the fragile skeleton of the societies we have built,” Antonio Guterres said as he delivered the Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture.

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — One opposition leader was shot 16 times and fled the country. Another had his leg broken by unknown assailants and his newspaper was shut down. A third, the country’s most prominent, has been banned for a year from making so-called “seditious statements,” or what others might call dissent.

But he’s speaking out anyway. With Tanzania facing an October election that contentious President John Magufuli hopes to win, opposition leader Zitto Kabwe tells The Associated Press he’s trying to unite the opposition behind one candidate for the best shot at an upset.

ABIDJAN (Reuters) - Ivory Coast’s Vice President Daniel Kablan Duncan has resigned, President Alassane Ouattara’s office said on Monday.

Patrick Achi, the secretary-general of the presidency, told reporters that Kablan Duncan, who previously served as Ouattara’s prime minister, was leaving for personal reasons.

His resignation comes days after the sudden death last week of Prime Minister Amadou Gon Coulibaly, who was also the ruling party’s candidate for October’s presidential election.

LAGOS, July 12 (NNN-XINHUA) – Death toll from a building which collapsed in Lagos, Nigeria’s business hub, rose to three on Saturday, as authorities suspended search and rescue efforts.

The three-story building collapsed in the early hours of Saturday when the occupants were still asleep on Freeman street, in the Lagos Island area of the state.

BEIJING, July 12 (Xinhua) -- With joint efforts of both sides, China-Mexico relations have maintained a good momentum of development, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Zheng Zeguang has said.

Zheng made the remarks on Friday at the 17th political consultation between the two countries' foreign ministries via video link, which was also attended by Mexico's Deputy Secretary of Foreign Affairs Julian Ventura.

KANO (Nigeria), July 10 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The death toll from an insurgent attack on a military convoy in northeast Nigeria has risen from 23 to 35, while 30 troops are still missing, security sources said.

Militants linked to the so-called Daesh group ambushed the convoy on Tuesday at Bulabulin village, about 40 kilometres from Maiduguri, the capital of Borno state.

Twenty-three soldiers were initially thought to have been killed in Tuesday’s attack, and many were listed as missing.

But security sources said more bodies had now been found in nearby bush.

OUAGADOUGOU (Reuters) - Burkina Faso’s government on Friday questioned the conclusions of a Human Rights Watch report which said that the West African country’s armed forces may have carried out mass executions.

Wednesday’s HRW report said government forces were likely to have been behind killings between November 2019 and June 2020 around Djibo, a town in the north of Burkina Faso, where at least 180 bodies were found in common graves.