Ethiopia

ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - The first batch of protective and medical equipment donated by Chinese billionaire and Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma was flown into the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa on Sunday, as coronavirus cases in Africa rose above 1,100.

The virus has spread more slowly in Africa than in Asia or Europe but has a foothold in 41 African nations and two territories. So far it has claimed 37 lives across the continent of 1.3 billion people.

TULU FARA (Ethiopia), March 9 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Hundreds gathered on Sunday at the site where Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crashed last March, killing all 157 on board, for a ceremony symbolising the country’s emergence from a year-long period of mourning.

The crash of the Nairobi-bound Boeing 737 MAX six minutes after takeoff on March 10, 2019, triggered the global grounding of the MAX and the worst crisis in Boeing’s history.

The traditional ceremony of the Oromo ethnic group – Ethiopia’s largest – involved prayers, songs and offerings to the dead.

ADDIS ABABA, March 5 (Xinhua) -- The Eritrean government on Thursday disclosed that it has successfully contained a new desert locust invasion that swarmed in excess of 400-hectares-of-land in the country's Northern Red Sea region.

ADDIS ABABA, March 4 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UN-ECA) on Wednesday disclosed the postponement of a high-level ministerial conference, which was scheduled to be held later this month in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, due to concerns pertaining to the COVID-19.

ADDIS ABABA, Feb. 23 (Xinhua) -- The Chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, has congratulated the people and government of South Sudan on the successful formation of the Revitalized Transitional Government of National Unity (R-TGoNU) on Saturday.

The South Sudan agreement known as the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS) was signed on Sept. 12, 2018, and the Revitalized Transitional Government of National Unity (R-TGONU) was scheduled to be formed on Feb. 22, 2020.

ADDIS ABABA, Feb 23 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Ethiopia plans to release an interim report into a deadly Boeing 737 MAX crash, which killed 157 passengers and crew, ahead of the first anniversary of the accident next month. 

“We are not ready to release the final report and so we are releasing an interim one which will come out before the anniversary of the accident. We are finalising it,” Amdye Ayalew, the country’s chief crash investigator, said.

He declined to give a precise date for the release of the final report.

ADDIS ABABA, Feb 23 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The World Health Organization warned that African health systems would be ill-equipped to respond to the deadly coronavirus outbreak should cases start to proliferate on the continent.

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called on African Union member states “to come together to be more aggressive in attacking” the virus, known as COVID-19.

ADDIS ABABA, Feb 21 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Ethiopia’s government on Thursday assumed custody of a priceless 18th-century crown that a former refugee had kept hidden in his apartment in the Netherlands for two decades.

The handover took place at a ceremony in the capital, Addis Ababa, attended by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Sigrid Kaag, the Dutch minister for foreign trade and development cooperation.

Sirak Asfaw, the one-time refugee who is now a Dutch citizen, fled Ethiopia during the late 1970s during the so-called “Red Terror” purges.

ADDIS ABABA, Feb 10 (NNN-ENA) – The African Union (AU) and the Arab League (AL), voiced their rejection of the newly unveiled U.S. peace plan that has sparked growing tensions between Palestine and Israel.

African Union Commission Chairperson, Moussa Faki Mahamat said, the U.S. plan was devised without consulting Palestinians and violates existing AU and UN resolutions on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

(Reuters) - Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Sunday that he raised the cases of Canadians being detained in Egypt with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

“We always stand up for Canadians in difficulty around the world”, Trudeau told a press briefing in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where he is attending an African Union summit.

"Yes I did bring up the consular cases in Egypt with President al-Sisi", he added bit.ly/2uvo9aU.