Nigeria has asked neighbouring Niger for support in a week-old offensive against Islamist insurgent bases in its semi-desert frontier region, underlining moves towards West African
Fighting has broken out in northern Mali between Tuareg separatists and local Arab-led gunmen, only days after the African country won a $4.2 billion aid pledge.
Chadian authorities arrested two senior generals and a member of parliament allied to President Idriss Deby on suspicion of involvement in a foiled coup plot.
The African-led force assisted by French forces trying to stabilise Mali will officially be replaced by a United Nations (UN) Peacekeeping mission on July 1st.
Police have arrested two suspected members of al-Qaeda's North African branch in Spain, one of whom Spanish authorities alleged praised the Boston Marathon bombings...
TheUN Security Council has officially taken up the question of how best to transition the African-led International Support Mission in Mali into a peacekeeping operation.
A suicide bomber blew himself up Saturday in the northern Malian city of Timbuktu, raising fears of a new wave of violence by Islamist insurgents after a separate land mine blast killed two soldiers.
France will reduce its troop numbers in Mali to 2 000 by July and to 1 000 by the end of the year, down from 4 000 at present, President Francois Hollande said on Thursday.
The proliferation of the small arms in Africa is a serious emerging threat not only to human rights but also to human security, writes Jean-Pierre A. Lukamba.
Mali's interim president defended the country's rights record yesterday against accusations by the UN that the military was guilty of atrocities against ethnic groups.
French Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian arrived in Mali today on a surprise visit to French troops who are engaged in a battle to flush Islamist militants out of the north of the country.
