United Nations (United States) (AFP) - The UN Security Council on Thursday agreed to a major drawdown of peacekeepers in Sudan's troubled region of Darfur after US pressure led to a $600-million cut in the UN budget for peace operations. The council unanimously adopted a British-drafted resolution that will cut the number of troops and police se ...

New York (AFP) - A United States national team that's unbeaten since Bruce Arena replaced Jurgen Klinsmann as coach entertains World Cup nemesis Ghana on Saturday as a tuneup for next month's Gold Cup. The Americans play host to the Black Stars -- whom they have beaten once and lost to twice in the past three World Cups -- in a Saturday friendly ...

Nairobi (AFP) - Burundi on Thursday said it has faith in the new UN envoy to the crisis-hit country but warned Michel Kafando against bias in favour of opposition groups, an accusation also levelled at his predecessors. Appointed last month Kafando, a former president of Burkina Faso, is the fourth UN envoy to be named since June 2015 after ...

The Hague (AFP) - A Dutch-Moroccan national at the centre of a diplomatic row between the two countries was arrested Thursday as Rabat pushes for his extradition, Dutch media reported. Morocco said late Saturday it had been in talks with Dutch officials in the past two days urging them to extradite a notorious drug trafficker who allegedly fun ...

Cotonou (AFP) - Benin President Patrice Talon has returned to Paris for a routine health check after having two operations in France earlier this month, the presidency said on Thursday. The 59-year-old head of state left Wednesday evening from Cotonou after chairing a cabinet meeting. He announced at the cabinet meeting that he was returni ...

New York (AFP) - The human voice is the most basic of all musical instruments. But when singers come together as choirs, quality standards vary widely around the world. A festival in Washington is bringing together top-tier choirs from a dozen countries in a bid to show music's universality -- how the joy of singing together transcends cultures. ...

N'Djamena (AFP) - Teodorin Obiang, Equatorial Guinea's vice president and son of its leader, denounced a French legal case against him Thursday as a fabricated vendetta designed to damage the country's government. The 47-year-old, known for his taste for fast cars, luxury homes and bespoke suits, is charged with plundering Equatorial Guinea's co ...

Paris (AFP) - Spanish plane leasing company Swiftair was charged Thursday in a French probe into the crash of an Air Algerie plane in Mali in 2014 in which 116 people died, a judicial source said. Investigating magistrates believe there were serious lapses in the training of the pilots, the source told AFP. The leasing company faces a number ...

Gaborone (Botswana) (AFP) - Botswana's government has moved to crack down on the multi-billion dollar trade in donkey skins following a spate of killings of the animals across the country fuelled by soaring demand from China. Export licences for donkeys and their products have been suspended indefinitely, the Ministry of Agricultural Development ...

In a brand new eight-part series, renowned BBC World News presenter, Zeinab Badawi, travels to the land of her birth to discover some of Africa rsquo;s most treasured history. The continent of Africa has a long, complex history, and its people built civilizations which rivalled those which existed anywhere else in the world. However, much ...

Paris (AFP) - Three non-governmental associations said Thursday that they had filed a lawsuit against BNP Paribas accusing the bank of complicity in the 1994 genocide of the Tutsi minority in Rwanda. The groups accuse the French bank of financing the purchase of 80 tonnes of arms used to carry out genocide by the Hutu regime, even though th ...

Abidjan, C ocirc;te d rsquo;Ivoire, 28 June 2017 - The African Development Bank (AfDB) in conjunction with UNFCCC and West African Development Bank (BOAD) convened the ECOWAS Green Investment Round Table on 21 June 2017 at AfDB Headquarters, Abidjan, Cote d rsquo;Ivoire, aimed at catalyzing and launching a program of work initiatives that promot ...

Washington (AFP) - The US Supreme Court's partial reinstatement of President Donald Trump's controversial travel ban has immigration lawyers and travelers trying to unpack how exactly the ban will be implemented when it takes effect Thursday. The court ruled that the president's executive order targeting citizens from six mainly Muslim countries ...

Washington (AFP) - US President Donald Trump's order to block arrivals from six mainly Muslim countries takes partial effect Thursday after he won a Supreme Court victory over rights groups. But implementation of the order after five months of legal challenges could be chaotic, in part due to the meaning of a key term used in the court's ruling ...

Ostrava (Czech Republic) (AFP) - Record-setting Wayde van Niekerk could be the athlete to take over track and field from Usain Bolt, according to the Jamaican sprint star himself. Bolt is in his final season of a glittering career that has seen him win eight Olympic and 11 world gold medals with a charisma and charm that have made him one of the ...

Zoomlion Ghana limited, the leading waste management company in Africa was the toast of audience consisting of waste managers, Non-Governmental Organizations and students among others who trooped to the IdrissDebyItno auditorium of the UniversiteD rsquo;Abomey ndash;Calavi (premier University of the Republic of Benin) to learn from Zoomlion rsq ...