ADF

Kenya’s Military Embraces the Role of Disaster Responders BERENIKA STEFANSKA The Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) received global attention during the devastating terror attack at the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi that left more than 60 dead in September 2013. The crisis tested the military’s capacity to manage and control an extended security incident on its home soil like few other events have in the nation’s history. Yet, every year, the KDF battles calamities that are equally deadly — natural disasters. These disasters do not attract as much international attention but are a testament to the role the KDF plays in…

BBC NEWS AT BBC.CO.UK/NEWS Ethiopian running star Haile Gebrselassie said he is entering politics with the aim of winning a parliamentary seat in the 2015 election. The 40-year-old’s announcement in July 2013 came after long-standing rumors that his running career was drawing to a close. Haile, who once set a world record time in the marathon, is regarded as a national icon by most Ethiopians. He did not say under which party’s banner he will contest the election. Ethiopia’s Parliament is dominated by the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front. It has only one opposition member. “Nelson Mandela is my…

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE When Eritrean cyclist Natnael Berhane crossed the finish line of the Tour of Turkey in May 2013, he made history not only for his country but for his continent. Natnael, 22, who took first place after the winner was disqualified for doping, was the first person from Sub-Saharan Africa to win a race of that class. Several Eritreans in this cycling-mad Horn of Africa state are making their mark on the sport, showing another side of a nation that makes headlines more for brutal repression than world-class athletes. Eritrea offers an ideal training ground for serious cyclists, with…

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE Nigeria’s Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, author of the best-seller Half of a Yellow Sun, said writing a novel about the civil war that devastated her home region helped people connect with a past that most no longer discuss. In October 2013, a month after the film based on the book premiered, Adichie, 36, reflected on the impact of the book about Nigeria’s 1967-1970 Biafran War, which left more than 1 million people dead after the writer’s home southeastern region tried to secede. “I have heard from many people who have read Half of a Yellow Sun and said that…

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE It is an extremely popular book form that originated in Japan, where it became a cultural phenomenon. Now manga comics are flourishing in Algeria as well. “The Algerian manga is our trademark,” said Salim Brahimi proudly. “It’s what we call the DZ manga.” Brahimi is the founder of Z-Link, Algeria’s first publisher of manga comics. Z-Link’s manga are 100 percent Algerian, from the drawings to the text. Published in French, colloquial Arabic and soon in north Africa’s Berber language, DZ manga has put a distinctly local stamp on a major Japanese product. The comics are flying off the…

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE The European Union announced plans to increase security efforts in the Gulf of Guinea, the West African maritime region that has become a global piracy hot spot. The new measures will not include sending warships to the region, a move that helped reduce pirate attacks off East Africa, said German Rear Adm. Jurgen Ehle, who heads a European Union (EU) military working group for West Africa. “The EU is developing a Gulf of Guinea strategy,” Ehle said, adding that European leaders would likely finish the document by the end of October. Speaking to a maritime security conference in…

BBC NEWS AT BBC.CO.UK/NEWS A prize-winning scientist at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) has used his winnings to promote particle physics in Africa. Professor Tejinder Virdee, who was born and raised in Kenya, was part of the team that played a key role in the discovery of the Higgs boson, a tiny element nicknamed the “God particle.” Virdee, a winner of the 2013 Fundamental Physics prize, used his money to bring science teachers from Africa to the CERN lab in Geneva, Switzerland. “I wanted to do something to promote science education in an international context, in ways that…

REUTERS Algeria has put the Army in charge of fighting drug trafficking, identified as the country’s top national security threat. “We are waging a war. It is a war against a new form of terrorism: drugs trafficking,” Daho Ould Kablia, then Algeria’s interior minister, told the APS state news agency in July 2013. Algeria is concerned about the link between extremism and rising drug trafficking, particularly in the Sahel region. Senior al-Qaida member Mokhtar Belmokhtar, who claimed responsibility for the deadly attack on an Algerian gas plant in January 2013, provided security to drug traffickers in Algeria in the past…

DEFENCEWEB The Libyan Army has taken delivery of 200 high-mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicles, commonly known as Humvees, for use in border patrol and security duties. The country continues to rebuild and strengthen the Armed Forces against the backdrop of growing insecurity and the proliferation of militias and transnational jihadist groups. The donation from the United States Army comes as the Libyan Army struggles to secure the country’s borders against arms dealers, terrorists and drug traffickers who took advantage of the security vacuum created by the fall of Moammar Gadhafi in October 2011. Libyan Army chiefs unveiled the armored cars in…

MAGHAREBIA.COM Mauritania and Niger signed a military cooperation agreement in Nouakchott in August 2013 that both sides hope will help combat terrorism in the Sahel. Nigerien Foreign Minister Mohamed Bazoum signed the accord after the first Mauritania-Niger Joint Commission session, Agence France-Presse reported. Bazoum also met Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz during the two-day conference. “Mauritania and Niger are two brother countries united by a strong fabric of historical, cultural, sociological, geographical and security relations,” Mauritanian Foreign Minister Hamadi Ould Baba Ould Hamadi said. “Our two countries indeed share a common destiny at three levels: subregional, regional and international.”…