Zimbabwe has also entered a new form of Level 4 lockdown which has the potential to disrupt cross-border movement with South Africa.

Protesters in eSwatini defied a curfew, taking to the streets in what activists say is a tipping point in Africa's last absolute monarchy.

Pro-democracy activists in eSwatini said on Wednesday several people were killed and injured in overnight clashes with police, the latest bout of unrest in days of protests rocking Africa's last absolute monarchy.

A group seeking a separate homeland for the ethnic Igbo people of Nigeria's southeast demanded 'justice and fair hearing' on Wednesday, after their leader Nnamdi Kanu was detained.

The backing of ICBC was seen by RioEnergy as a fresh start in a plan to develop the plant and end recurrent power outages in Zimbabwe.

Many soldiers and civilians have been killed in the conflict in Ethiopia's Tigray region, a spokesman for the Ethiopian government task force for Tigray said on Wednesday.

News24 has appointed seasoned journalist Lynsey Chutel to head up its Africa desk.

Zimbabwe is adopting level 4 lockdown measures which will curb working hours, despite calls from business leaders to maintain normal working activities.

Nearly half of the 206 protected areas in central Africa are under threat from the oil and gas industries, a report published Tuesday by the Central African Forest Observatory (OFAC) said.

The WHO said it was supporting the five remaining countries yet to start their Covid-19 immunisation campaigns, as the planet clocked up administering three billion vaccine doses.

Following days of unrest, which culminated in violent protests on Tuesday, the eSwatini government has instituted a strict Covid-19 curfew.

Somalia will indirectly pick a new president on 10 October, the prime minister said on Tuesday, potentially easing a political crisis brought on by a delay in holding the election.

eSwatini government rubbishes claims that King Mswati III has fled as demonstrators target royal property, demanding multiparty democracy.

The African Union has criticised an EU decision not to include Covishield, a version of AstraZeneca's coronavirus vaccine used by the global Covax facility.

Nigeria has barred passengers who are not citizens or permanent residents from entering the country if they have been in South Africa in the past 14 days over Covid-19 concerns.

eSwatini deployed soldiers overnight to an industrial town near the capital to crack down on protests against the ruling authorities in Africa's last absolute monarchy, pro-democracy activists said on Tuesday.

The eSwatini government has denied reports that the king fled after protests erupted in the country.

Zimbabwe faces prolonged power outages after a surge in electricity imports from neighboring South Africa overloaded its network and caused generating plants to fail, Energy Minister Soda Zhemu said.

The Algerian coastguard has seized almost half a ton of cocaine after fishermen alerted authorities to "suspicious" items floating off the northwest coast, a defence ministry statement said.

Tanzania will spend $470 million buying vaccines and supporting economic sectors hit hard by the coronavirus, President Samia Suluhu Hassan said.