‘No safe place left’ for children in war-torn regions of Sudan, says UNICEF
The war in Sudan, which continues to rage in its fourth year, has killed or injured at least 330 children in the first half of 2026, the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) said on July 6. Darfur and the Kordofan regions have the highest child casualty rates.
Except for some small towns along Sudan’s western border with Chad, where the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) retain a foothold, the Darfur region has been under the control of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) since November 2025, when it overran El Fasher.
The last major holdout of the SAF in this vast western region, North Darfur state’s capital, El Fasher, fell in November 2025, when the RSF, after besieging the city for over 500 days, overran its defenses and killed civilians in what is estimated to be tens of thousands.
The campaign had all the “hallmarks of genocide”, concluded a probe by the UN, several of whose agencies warned last month that these atrocities may repeat in El Obeid, the capital of North Kordofan state.
Laying siege for 500 days on this city, strategically located on the highway connecting El Fasher to the national capital, Khartoum, the RSF has been repeatedly bombarding its markets, schools, health facilities, water supply, etc.
Uganda’s largest non-state media group under military siege
Repression continues in Uganda, as channels and radio stations of Nation Media Group are shut down.
Mali fights yet another wave of attacks on multiple cities by terror groups
A coalition of Al Qaeda and Tuareg separatists attacked more than five cities and towns from the northeast to the southwest of Mali across a 1,700 km axis on July 4.
Ebola death toll exceeds 500 as the first clinical trial begins
“Even if the outbreak is contained, the DRC alone could lose more than USD 1 billion and 55,000 jobs,” said UNDP Resident Representative Damien Mamma, warning that a million more in the country could be pushed into poverty.
Burkina Faso severs diplomatic relations with France, citing its ‘neocolonial ambitions’
“In the face of these imperialist designs to dominate our country and subjugate our people, we have chosen the path of responsibility and sovereignty,” Burkina Faso’s communications minister, Gilbert Ouédraogo explained.
At least 360 killed and 1,274 infected as Ebola continues to spread in DRC
Ebola has killed at least 360 people and infected 1,274 as of Monday, June 29, in less than 45 days since the outbreak was declared on May 15, according to the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), the continent's top health body.
Satish Pillai, incident manager for CDC's Ebola response, announced in a media conference on Friday that the “CDC is raising our Ebola response to a Level One activation, which represents the highest level of response.”
Less than two months since the outbreak, it is already “the second largest Ebola outbreak ever recorded in DRC,” Pillai said. The largest in the DRC was in 2018, killing over 2,200. But that death toll was over a span of almost two years. In less than a month and a half, the current outbreak – the 17th recorded in DRC – has already claimed over half the number of lives claimed in the 23 months of the 2018 outbreak.
It is also the “third largest Ebola outbreak documented globally,” added Pillai. However, the CDC’s director general, Jean Kaseya, had warned a day earlier, “If we don’t stop this outbreak now, for sure it will be the largest Ebola outbreak ever.”
That record is currently held by the West Africa outbreak that killed over 11,000 and infected 28,600 in three countries between 2014 and 2016. However, spreading at a rate of over 3.5 times the 2014-16 outbreak, the current outbreak could become the worst ever.
EU slaps Somalia with punitive measures after it refuses to accept non-Somali deportees
The standoff between Somalia and the EU comes on the heels of a recently overhauled anti-migration policy, as part of which European countries are scouting for African countries to serve as “return hubs” to which migrants will be deported.
UNSC warns ‘imminent risk of mass atrocities’ as RSF amasses troops around El Obeid
On Saturday, June 20, the UN Security Council raised concerns over "the imminent risk of mass atrocities" on the civilians in El Obeid, capital of war-torn Sudan's North Kordofan state.
The city has been encircled by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which has been at war with its former ruling partner, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), since April 2023.
Amid an increasing build-up of RSF troops around the city, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk, warned on June 18 of an "imminent offensive," with the risk of "serious international crimes."
The UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, is also "alarmed" by the RSF's "substantial military reinforcements around El Obeid," said his spokesperson, Stéphane Dujarric, adding, “We must not allow the horrors of El Fasher to be repeated in El Obeid.”
The city of El Fasher was the last major SAF holdout in the vast Darfur region in western Sudan. Laying siege for over 500 days to cut off the supplies of food, medicines, and other essentials, the RSF caused a famine and subjected the population weakened by hunger to repeated bombardment before finally overrunning their defenses.