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Flash floods following torrential rains in Ethiopia's Gambella regional state have spread to four woredas [districts] and displaced thousands more people, an official in the area said.

Somalia is moving more rapidly than expected into a serious humanitarian crisis, with an estimated 3.2 million people both in urban and rural areas facing extreme poverty, according to humanitarian officials.

Flash floods following torrential rains in Ethiopia's Gambella regional state have spread to four woredas [districts] and displaced thousands more people, an official in the area said.

Tanzania has announced plans to issue an international bond to raise money for infrastructure financing.

An unnamed Ugandan national is one of 96 passengers of a Sudanese plane that was hijacked forced to land in Libya.

Two hijackers who seized a Sudanese airliner flying from the Darfur region to the capital, Khartoum, have released the flight's 87 passengers in Libya, the Sudan Tribune newspaper reported Wednesday.

Somali president Abdullahi Yusuf, prime minister Nor Adde and the speaker of the parliament Sheikh Aden Mohamed Nor Madobe have Wednesday touched down at the airport of Baidoa town the temporary seat of Somali parliament from Addis Ababa where they have been holding squaring off talks officials said.

Conditions for thousands of internally displaced persons (IDPs) camping on the outskirts of the Somali capital Mogadishu are getting worse, with malnutrition cases increasing as more arrive daily, sources told IRIN.

UK's African Eagle Resources plc has announced the discovery of early nickelassay on the basis of results from drilling at its Dutwa gold and base metals project in Mwanza Region.

The quality of education provided in the country is by regional and international standards poor and a detriment to competitiveness of the national economy, the World Economic Forum has said.

Mobile firm Zain Tanzania Ltd is the leading operator in the country in terms of coverage and reaching people in rural areas, a senior official said in a statement yesterday.

While China is Sudan's largest trading partner, most investments are in the north. That may yet change, according to officials, as China opens a consulate in Juba, with a clear plan to tap into the potential of the less explored autonomous Southern Sudan region.

Lawyers representing two South Africans who were arrested at Entebbe Airport on terrorism suspicions last week have petitioned Court seeking orders compelling the commanding officer of the Joint Anti Terrorism Task Force to produce them before Court immediately.

Kisutu Court principal resident magistrate Addy Lyamuya yesterday ordered Zain (formerly Celtel) country director to produce before the court a printout of alleged threat messages sent to the editor of MwanaHalisi Mwanahalisi tabloid, Mr Said Kubenea.

AS the SIFA African Children's choir prepared to perform at a church in the West Side Lawndale in the US on Sunday afternoon, one of their two vans was broken into and their valuable items, worth millions of shillings, stolen.

THE families of the South Africans accused of terrorism have hired Ugandan lawyers.

The rains are back but how prepared are we to handle what is likely to be another year of floods? When the floods hit the eastern region in the last quarter of 2007, more than 3.5 million people were left homeless with millions of shillings worth of agricultural products and infrastructure destroyed.

The United Nations relief chief will travel to Ethiopia next week to assess the situation in the Horn of Africa country first-hand, where millions of people need humanitarian aid because of a devastating drought and the soaring prices of many basic foods.

The leaders of Kenya's two main political parties, ODM and PNU, will appear before the Waki commission investigating post-election violence on Wednesday.

It is apt that a key world meeting on climate change and food security attended by 150 legislators from 15 countries in Africa and Europe as well as Japan should be held in Kenya.