Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger, Chad and Benin pledge to cooperate against militant group that has kidnapped 200 schoolgirls African leaders at a summit in Paris have agreed on a regional plan of action to combat Boko Haram, the Islamist group that has abducted more than 200 girls and threatened to sell them into slavery. In a rare show of unity, the leaders of Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger, Chad and Benin pledged...
Developing countries are losing out on vital revenues, writes Oxfam's Claire Godfrey . It's time to reform international tax Too often tax is treated as a dirty word by business. It's not, or at least it shouldn't be. In fact, tax should be celebrated. The business case for tax is that revenue can be invested in public services and infrastructure both of which are necessary for a healthy, well-educated...
By engaging communities and co-ordinating agency efforts, Niger hopes to end its perennial battle against food shortage The UN's humanitarian chief, Lady Amos, has called for an extra $2bn (£1.25bn) from donors to combat another looming food crisis in the Sahel . The story is familiar : a poor rainy season and harvest in 2013 and a population struggling to recover from the previous crisis, in 2012....
Saadi Gaddafi, son of toppled Libyan Prime Minister Muammar Gaddafi, has been extradited from Niger to Libya ...
s global turnover is more than four times Niger's entire annual budget Another deadline has passed without agreement in Niger in the government's ongoing negotiations with the French nuclear company Areva on the renewal of the company's license to operate in the country. After months of discussions, the mining minister, Omar Tchiana, said last week that Friday would be the final deadline for the two...
France denies it paid ransom for the release of four hostages by the AQIM group; boost for unpopular François Hollande Four French hostages kidnapped by al-Qaida's north African arm three years ago in Niger have been released, President François Hollande said on Tuesday. Pierre Legrand, Daniel Larribe, Thierry Dol and Marc Féret were kidnapped by al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM)...
The four men were kidnapped in 2010 while working in northern Niger and held hostage by gunmen linked to al-Qaida Four French nationals held hostage for three years in the Sahara desert by gunmen linked to al-Qaida have left Niger on a French government plane. The men, who were kidnapped in 2010 while working for the French nuclear group Areva and a subsidiary of construction group Vinci in northern...
s performance. And like the World Bank , the UN is worried about the risks associated with a possible bumpy exit from quantitative easing programmes by the US Federal Reserve that have pumped money into the global economy. "Our forecast is made in the context of many uncertainties and risks coming from possible missteps as well as non-economic factors that could stymie growth," Shamshad Akhtar, UN...
s pension reforms prove divisive Czech Republic: outgoing government opposes amendment to civil service law The outgoing Czech government has come out against a draft amendment to the civil service law put forward by the social democrat party. The outgoing prime minister Jiri Rusnok said the draft legislation is basically unapplicable, and at odds with the constitution with regard to employees' rights....
10-year licences expired on 31 December without a new agreement, although Niger issued a decree on 27 December providing a legal framework under the 2006 mining law for operations to continue. The company is tight-lipped on discussions. Olivier Wantz, a senior executive vice-president of Areva, was in the capital Niamey this week for three days of talks. "Talks between the Niger government and Areva...
French forces capture man wanted in US for 2000 shooting of American diplomat and sentenced to 20 years for other killings A member of an extremist group wanted in the fatal carjacking of an American official in Niger more than a decade ago has been arrested by French soldiers in northern Mali, prosecutors said. The suspect, known as Cheibani Ould Hama, was due to be transferred to the capital, Bamako,...
I'm not making allusions' Marine Le Pen's public relations efforts to soften the image of the far-right Front National were dented this week after she caused outrage by questioning the beards and scarves worn by returning French hostages . Le Pen, whose party's trademark is speaking out against immigration and public displays of Islam, said the appearance of the four men who had been held captive by...
t want to be caught carrying us, since this was illegal." "Once we were in Niger, the drivers removed the bodies from the truck for burial. They laid them out on the ground. Mothers first, then their children on top of them. Many women and children died. The drivers had some water in jerry cans but they kept it just for themselves." Shafa said that t he drivers eventually drove off, saying they would...
s capital, said: "This was in fact a case of poor people and children who were being trafficked to Algeria. There is an inquiry underway but we know that this was trafficking because economic migrants go to Libya – in Libya you find people of all nationalities, from Nigeria, Cameroon and other countries, heading to Europe. "In this case all the victims were Nigerien from Zinder, and they were being...
s door on the compound. Francoise would later tell Le Monde: "They burst in with Kalashnikovs. Daniel went out straight away, then they came for me in the bedroom and I was taken as I was: barefoot and in pyjamas. Daniel was already lying in the pick-up when I was made to get in. I've never seen his face like that, he never thought they'd take me too." Around 160 days later, in 2011, Francoise, who...
s flagship population report. If current trends continue, the number of girls under 15 having babies in this region is projected to increase from 1.8 in 2010 to 3 million over the next 17 years. This would take the estimated total number of under-18s giving birth in sub-Saharan Africa to more than 16 million by 2030, up from 10.1 million in 2010. The report , Motherhood in childhood: facing the challenge...
s 22 refugee centres overflow, the zoo is being used to handle those picked up on the streets There are so many African migrants in Libya wanting to make the dangerous trip to Europe that Tripoli zoo has been turned into a processing centre for them. With the country's 22 refugee centres overflowing, the zoo – closed since the 2011 uprising – is being used to handle those picked up on the streets....
s narrow hilly roads. A $13.5bn (£8.4bn) railway project linking the Kenyan port of Mombasa to Kigali, the Rwandan capital, cannot come soon enough for Silas Lwakabamba, Rwanda's minister of infrastructure. "The trucks carry too much load, they end up spoiling the road," he said. "Rail will be faster and can carry more. Maintenance of rail will be much easier." The 1,824-mile (2,935km) line is one...
s latest scientific assessment of the phenomenon matches the observations and experiences of farming and other groups they partner in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The IPCC scientists, who acknowledge they often have only sketchy rainfall and temperature data for many areas in developing countries, say global temperatures have risen, extreme weather is more frequent and rainfall less predictable....
Ivoire on the coast and Burkina Faso and Niger," said Bernard Abeiku Arthur, a transport expert working on a World Bank project to increase transport infrastructure in the region. "It is something that has been talked about by French engineering firms for years, to access the port of Abidjan, and link it with the raw materials that would be on that particular line." The Niamey-Abidjan initiative is...