Newscast - Africa

The government says India will not change upcoming cybersecurity rules that force social media, technology companies and cloud service providers to report data breaches swiftly, despite growing industry concerns.
The Indian Computer Emergency Response Team issued a directive in April asking tech companies to report data breaches within six hours of noticing such incidents and to maintain IT and communications logs for six months.
They also mandated cloud service providers such as Amazon and virtual private network companies to retain the names of their customers and IP addresses for at least five years, even after they stop using the company’s services.

The United States government is moving to ease a few economic sanctions on Venezuela in a gesture meant to encourage resumed negotiations between the US-backed opposition and the government of President Nicolás Maduro.
Two senior US government officials say the limited changes will allow Chevron Corp to negotiate its licence with the state-owned oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela but not to drill or export any petroleum of Venezuelan origin.

Russian news agencies reported that Belarus has introduced the death penalty for attempts to carry out acts of terrorism charges that several opposition activists face in the ex-Soviet country.
The RIA Novosti news agency report that Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko signed a law on the possibility of the death penalty for an attempted terrorist act.
It says the law would come into force 10 days after its publication.

The US says it will provide a further $215m in emergency aid to 10 African countries as the continent struggles with food insecurity brought about by climate change, the Covid pandemic and the war in Ukraine.
The US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, says Algeria, Burkina Faso, Mauritania, Cameroon, Nigeria, Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, Tanzania and Zimbabwe are the countries who will benefit.
The UN warned that a growing global food crisis could last years if it goes unchecked.

The UK Home Office says legal challenges against its plan to send some asylum seekers to Rwanda have not delayed the scheme.
British media outlets however say they received notice that the Rwanda flights will now not take place until at least after 6 June.
A Home Office spokesperson says the first flights are expected to take place in the coming months, legal action has not yet had any impact on this.

Uganda Military says it will withdraw hundreds of troops it sent last year to help the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo combat an Islamist insurgency.
The Ugandan land forces commander Muhoozi Kainerugaba says that Operation Shujaa had only been intended to last for six months and would end by next month unless an extension was agreed.
The authorities in DR Congo said the terms and timeline for the Ugandan withdrawal would need to be agreed by both countries.

The federal government stated that Sub-Saharan Africa could require as much as $60 billion to access reliable electricity and clean cooking facilities between now and 2030.
The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, noted that an annual investment of around $35 billion could bring electricity access to 759 million Africans who currently lack it.
Sylva added that another $25 billion a year could help 2.6 billion people globally to access clean cooking by 2030.
He stressed that the required investment represents only a small fraction of the multi-trillion-dollar global energy investment needed overall.

President Muhammadu Buhari signed the National Health Insurance Authority Bill 2022 into law as eighty-three million Nigerians are set to be covered.
The presidential aide Garba Shehu says the bill repeals the National Health Insurance Scheme Act, Cap N42, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria 2004.
Garba Shehu says that a Fund will be set up to ensure coverage of 83 million poor Nigerians who cannot afford to pay premiums as recommended by the Lancet Nigeria Commission.
Buhari noted that the Authority will liaise with state government Health Insurance Schemes to accredit primary and secondary health facilities and enrol Nigerians into the scheme.

Lagos State Police Commissioner, Abiodun Alabi, clarified that residents who operate motorcycles for courier services or other private dealings will not be affected by the latest okada ban.
He says It does not affect couriers, but the couriers will not carry passengers, who are going to their various places of work.
He added that those who own power bikes are not affected, because it’s not meant for commercial purposes.

The Nigerian government has asked Facebook and other social media sites to stop allowing the Indigenous People of Biafra to use their platforms to incite violence and instigate ethnic hatred in Nigeria.
The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, says they have chosen Facebook as their platform of choice and their tools include disinformation, incendiary statements and hate speech.
Facebook's parent company, Meta, told the BBC that calling for violence on its platform was unacceptable.