Africa (except North Africa)

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Ethiopia’s prime minister on Friday said his government has carried out airstrikes against the forces of the country’s well-armed Tigray region, asserting that strikes in multiple locations “completely destroyed rockets and other heavy weapons” and made a retaliatory attack impossible.

ABIDJAN/CONAKRY (Reuters) - For plenty of Africans, President Donald Trump’s actions in the aftermath of the U.S. election have been a cause for dark humor, but others have reacted with dismay or disbelief.

In countries whose own recent elections were marred by accusations of cheating and violence, some expressed alarm about the signal that Trump’s premature declaration of victory, allegations of fraud and flurry of lawsuits might send to their own leaders.

ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) — Prominent dissident Guillaume Soro, a former prime minister who was blocked from running in Ivory Coast’s presidential election, called Wednesday on the country’s military to disobey President Alassane Ouattara after he was allowed to win a controversial third term.

Soro’s comments via his Facebook account put him on a direct crash course with his former mentor, and align him more closely with two other opposition leaders still in Ivory Coast who have pledged to push ahead with a transitional government of their own after Saturday’s election.

ABIDJAN, Nov. 3 (Xinhua) -- Cote d'Ivoire's incumbent President Alassane Ouattara has won last Saturday's presidential election by obtaining over 94 percent of the vote, provisional results released Tuesday by the country's electoral commission showed.

Ouattara obtained 3,031,483 votes and was re-elected president.

Out of a total of 6,066,441 voters, the commission collected 3,269,813 valid votes from 17,601 polling stations, with voter turnout totaling 53.90 percent.

KAMPALA (Reuters) - Ugandan opposition presidential candidate Bobi Wine was arrested on Tuesday after handing in his nomination papers to the election body, his party’s spokesman said.

Wine, 38, a musician turned politician whose real name is Robert Kyagulanyi, aims to end Yoweri Museveni’s more than a third of a century in power, which makes him Africa’s third longest-ruling president. Elections are scheduled for February next year.

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — South African pharmaceutical firm Aspen Pharmacare has announced a deal with U.S. firm Johnson & Johnson to manufacture its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, if it is approved in South Africa and internationally.

In a statement issued on Monday, Aspen said that if ongoing trials bring international health authorities to endorse the J&J vaccine as effective and safe, it would be produced at Aspen’s manufacturing facility in Port Elizabeth in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province.

YANGON (Reuters) - Hardline Buddhist nationalist monk Ashin Wirathu handed himself over to police in Myanmar’s commercial capital of Yangon on Monday after more than a year on the run from charges of sedition.

Wearing a face mask and shield, he spoke to supporters at a monks’ association in the city before driving to a police station in Dagon township, according to Reuters witnesses. Officials there did not immediately comment.

DODOMA, Tanzania (AP) — Tanzania’s president is poised to be declared the overwhelming winner of Wednesday’s election despite widespread allegations of fraud, while the ruling party appears to have secured the two-thirds majority in parliament required to change the constitution.

JOHANNESBURG, Oct. 28 (Xinhua) -- South African International Relations and Cooperation Minister Naledi Pandor said her counterparts from Ethiopia, Egypt and Sudan are scheduled to meet again in seven days over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) issue.

This comes after Tuesday's video conference discussion Pandor had with Foreign Affairs and Water and Irrigation ministers of Ethiopia, Egypt and Sudan.

ABUJA (Reuters) - Nigeria’s Lagos state government asked the army to intervene to restore order amid anti-police brutality protests, but soldiers did not shoot civilians, the military said, an assertion an Amnesty International investigation disputed on Wednesday.

Nigeria has been on edge following one of its biggest social upheavals in 20 years. Demonstrations across the country turned violent on Oct. 20 when witnesses in Lagos said the military opened fire on peaceful protesters shortly after local authorities imposed a 24-hour curfew, drawing international condemnation.