Newscast - Africa

Mali’s foreign ministry says its transitional government has given the Economic Community of West African States’ special representative 72 hours to leave the country following actions incompatible with his status
ECOWAS, West Africa’s main political and economic bloc, has been pressing Mali to respect its commitment to hold presidential and legislative elections next February following an August 2020 military coup.

The UN says its flights to Mekelle in Ethiopia's Tigray region have been suspended after one of its planes had to abort its landing on the same morning as a military airstrike was carried out on the city.
The Ethiopian government says its planes had been targeting a training centre used by Tigrayan rebels.
The fact that airstrikes were being carried out in the same city on the same morning will be of great concern to the UN – as the plane had been cleared for take-off by the authorities in the capital, Addis Ababa.
Seven million people are now in urgent need of assistance and the UN says malnutrition rates are rising every day.

Sudan’s top general declared a state of emergency, dissolved the authorities leading the country’s democratic transition, and announced the formation of a new government after soldiers detained civilian leaders Monday in what activists denounced as a “coup”.
General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan’s says to rectify the revolution’s course, they have decided to declare a state of emergency nationwide… dissolve the transitional sovereign council, and dissolve the cabinet.
His statement came as clashes erupted in the capital Khartoum, with soldiers firing live rounds at people who took to the streets to protest against the power grab.

A UN Security Council delegation is in Mali to meet politicians, members of civil society and military leaders at a time when there are fears that the officers who carried out a coup in August want to delay a return to civilian rule.
The West African regional grouping Ecowas is insisting that the transitional President, Colonel Assimi Goita, hands over power after elections next February.
The visiting delegation - which includes the ambassadors to the UN from Kenya, France, Niger and the US - is also assessing the security situation.
Mali has seen frequent jihadist attacks as well as inter-ethnic violence in the north and the centre of the country.

The Presidency formally reacted to last week’s report by London-based The Economist magazine which said the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration wasn’t doing enough to address several challenges confronting the country, especially the rising state of insecurity.
A statement from the presidency says the Buhari-led government had been busy addressing the four identified threats to the nation’s stability including terrorist attacks, kidnapping, herders-farmers clashes and activities of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra in the South-East zone.
The Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, in a statement also emphasised that the resilience and fortitude of patriotic Nigerians would see the country through the current trying times

The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court is set to seek authorisation from the Pre-Trial Chamber of the court to open an investigation into cases of abduction of schoolchildren in several parts of Northern Nigeria.
A statement by Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project says they will also be investigated the closure of schools, and the persistent failure of Nigerian authorities at both the federal and state levels to end the abduction.
The agency’s Deputy Director, Kolawole Oluwadare, says the ICC prosecutor’s decision followed a petition sent to the court by SERAP.
SERAP argued that the severe and lifelong harms that result from depriving children of the right to education satisfy the gravity of harm threshold under the Rome Statute.

President Muhammadu Buhari has launched the country’s digital currency, naira.
President Buhari says the adoption of new CBN digital currency is estimated to increase Nigeria’s GDP by $29billion over the next 10years.
The President says Nigeria becomes the first country in Africa and one of the first few globally to introduce a digital currency to its citizens after countries like China, Bahamas, and Cambodia.
The digital currency has two applications – eNaira speed wallet and eNaira merchant wallet, which were launched on the Google Playstore and Apple Store.

European Union leaders pressured a defiant Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki to fall back into line on recognising that EU law trumps national decision-making, hoping that dialogue will stave off a fundamental crisis in the bloc.
Morawiecki instead painted a picture of an overbearing union treating its 27 member nations as mere provinces, usurping ever more powers and feeling free to impose its values at will against the wishes of sovereign peoples.
He countered that Poland will not act under the pressure of blackmail.

NATO defence ministers have agreed upon a new master plan to defend against any potential Russian attack on multiple fronts, reaffirming the alliance’s core goal of deterring Moscow despite a growing focus on China.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg says they continue to strengthen their alliance with better and modernised plans while also agreeing to a $1bn fund to provide seed financing to develop new digital technologies.
Officials stressed that they do not believe any Russian attack is imminent. Moscow has denied any aggressive intentions and said it is NATO that risks destabilising Europe with such preparations.

US President Joe Biden says the United States would come to Taiwan’s defence if the island were attacked by China, in comments that appeared to be a departure from a longstanding US policy of strategic ambiguity.
The White House told reporters that US policy on Taiwan had not changed.
A spokesperson says the US defence relationship with Taiwan is guided by the Taiwan Relations Act.
A spokesperson added that they will uphold their commitment under the Act and continue to support Taiwan’s self-defence.