Twin bomb blasts have killed at least 14 people and wounded several others in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, as violence continues to sweep through the African nation.

The bombs went off Thursday at the main entrance of Mogadishu airport, a Press TV correspondent reported.

Rwanda's President Paul Kagame has been “disappointed” about a leaked report saying Rwandan troops may have committed genocide, UN chief Ban Ki-moon says.

The draft UN report accuses Rwandan troops of massacring civilians in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 1996-97.

At least eight civilians and three troops have been killed during new clashes between African Union (AU) forces and al-Shabab fighters in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu.

The civilians have lost their lives after they were caught in cross-fire between AU troops and al-Shabab fighters in the north and south of the capital, a government security official said.

Hundreds of inmates have escaped from a federal prison in northeastern Nigeria after heavily armed gunmen attacked the detention center, witnesses say.

Four people — two security forces and two civilians — were killed during the clashes between the gunmen and soldiers in prison in Bauchi on Tuesday night.

The United Nations admits it has failed to protect the civilians of the Democratic Republic of Congo from the "systematic rape" by armed rebels, a senior official says.

"While the primary responsibility for protection of civilians lies with the state, its national army and police force, clearly, we have also failed," the UN Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Atul Khare told the UN Security Council.

South African public sector workers have returned to work after 21 days of strike, which was costing over $150 million per day to the country's economy.

The civil servants' unions said that this is only a suspension of the strike, since they are refusing the government's offer to increase employee salaries 7.5 percent and give a grant of 800 rands to cover housing costs, Fides news agency reports.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) says at least 230 civilians have lost their lives in Somalia over the past two weeks.

According to the UNHCR, during the fourteen-day violence between government forces and al-Shabab fighters in the capital city of Mogadishu, 400 were wounded and 23,000 people were displaced.

Somalia's President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed has fired military chief General Mohamed Gelle Kahiye along with several other top military and police commanders.

The move comes after thousands of tons of heavy weaponry were stolen from Somali government stores resulting in Sharif relieving the top military officials of their jobs on Sunday.

Violent clashes in Sudan's Darfur region have left more than 40 people dead this week, according to international peacekeepers.

The joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur (UNAMID) said clashes between different armed groups left six people dead and another 33 people injured on Saturday.

Hezbollah Secretary General Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah says the prominent Shia cleric Imam Moussa al-Sadr and his two companions are “alive and in custody in Libya.”

Speaking on the occasion of International Quds Day on Friday, Nasrallah called on Libya to release the cleric and his companions.

Mozambique police have fired rubber bullets and tear gas at protesters in the capital Maputo in the third consecutive day of clashes over food and fuel prices.

Ten people have been killed in the clashes since Wednesday when protests broke out in the central town of Chimoio, 760 kilometers (475 miles) north of Maputo. Two children were among the victims.

Protests over food and fuel prices turn violent for a second consecutive day in Mozambique, leaving at least seven people dead and hundreds injured.

Police used rubber bullets to disperse protesters in the capital, Maputo, on Thursday.

At least 19 people have been killed in fresh fighting between forces loyal to the Western-backed government of Somalia and al-Shabab fighters in Mogadishu.

Somali government troops backed by the African Union peacekeepers came under attack from al-Shabab fighters in northern district of Hodon on Thursday. Two al-Shabab fighters and five Somali government soldiers were among the dead. A number of soldiers from both sides were also injured in the conflict, a Press TV correspondent reported.

At least six people, including two children, have been reportedly killed in Mozambique's capital, Maputo, after police opened fire on protesters.

The government's decision to increase food and fuel prices in the poor African country triggered riots across the capital and the suburbs on Wednesday.

At least six people have been shot dead in Mozambique's capital during clashes between police and demonstrators protesting against rising food and fuel prices.

Police opened fire on protesters throwing stones and setting fire to tyres and barriers, but it was not immediately clear whether their bullets were responsible for the deaths.

An Israeli organization intends to 'revise' the online encyclopedia Wikipedia based on 'national and ethnic interests,' according to the IranianUK.com website.

"Wikipedia has turned into a key source for Israeli citizens and all of them refer to it," reported the website.

Two violent incidents in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, have led to the deaths of at least 14 people.

Eight people were killed and 14 others wounded in a roadside bomb blast on Tuesday.

Al-Shabab fighters have attacked African Union (AU) troops stationed in the Somali capital of Mogadishu, killing at least four Ugandan peacekeepers.

Nine more AU soldiers were wounded when the fighters fired mortars at the country's presidential palace late on Monday, a Press TV correspondent reported.

Sudanese government secures the release of a female American aid worker abducted in Darfur 105 days ago, just a day after three Russians were kidnapped.

Flavia Wagner, 35, who worked for US charity Samaritan's Purse in Darfur, was kidnapped on May 18 in the village of Abu Ajura, in South Darfur state, along with two Sudanese colleagues who were freed after a week.

The Sudanese army says two Russian pilots have been seized by unknown gunmen in the Darfur region, the latest in a wave of kidnappings of foreigners in Sudan.

The pilots were abducted by a small armed group in Nyala, the capital of South Darfur state, on Sunday around 4:00 p.m. (1300 GMT), AFP quoted an Sudanese army spokesman as saying.

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi arrives in Italy on Sunday for a two-day visit amid controversy over Tripoli's growing influence on the Italian economy.

The media, however, has mostly focused on Gaddafi's tent -- in which he sleeps during his foreign visits -- and the 30 horses that he is bringing to take part in a horse show on Monday, when he is expected to meet Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

Thousands of people have poured into the streets in different cities across the Indian-administered Kashmir to protest New Delhi's rule over the disputed region.

On Sunday, demonstrators defied a strict curfew to hold a pro-independence rally in the capital city of Srinagar.

A fresh outbreak of fighting between the al-Shabab fighters and Somali government forces has left at least 11 civilians dead in the country's capital city, Mogadishu.

More than 30 other civilians were injured after the fighting broke out near the presidential palace in Mogadishu on Saturday, a Press TV correspondent reported.

Rwanda dismisses as “malicious, offensive and ridiculous” a leaked UN report that has accused it of war crimes in neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo.

A government statement accused the UN of trying to hide its own failures in the African Great Lakes region.

Five people have died due to lack of proper medical care because of a public workers' strike in South Africa's Eastern Cape, forcing the African nation's military health service to step in.

The South African Military Health Service (SAMHS) was deployed to 53 hospitals around the country. The military health service is now serving in 8 provinces, excluding the Western Cape.

A leaked UN draft report says that crimes committed against Hutus in the Democratic Republic of Congo from 1993 to 2003 could be classified as genocide.

Hutus in the Democratic Republic of Congo were butchered in a pattern of targeted, widespread, and systematic attacks that resembled the Rwandan genocide, AFP quoted the head of a new UN investigation as saying.

A war-crimes prosecutor has said Hutus who fled Rwanda to neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) after the 1994 genocide were butchered in a "pattern" similar to the Rwandan massacre.

Luc Cote, the head of a new UN investigation, said that Rwandan Tutsi troops and their rebel allies targeted, chased, hacked, shot and burned Hutus in the DRC, from 1996 to 1997, after the outbreak of a cross-border Central African war.

Fighting in Mogadishu has killed at least 43 people as Somali government forces continue street clashes and artillery exchanges with militants.

Nine people including five members of the Somali military were killed on Thursday when an improvised explosive device (IED) placed near a military vehicle in Mogadishu's southern district of Waberi went off, a Press TV correspondent reported.

Somalia's al-Shabab fighters say they have called in 11 truckloads of their armed forces to reinforce newly acquired positions in the capital, Mogadishu.

The call for reinforcements comes less than a week after the group declared a "final, massive war" to take over the Somali capital.

At least 17 people have reportedly lost their lives in the fierce fighting between al-Shabab fighters and government forces with both sides claiming advances.

Eleven civilians died after an artillery shell struck a building on the fourth day of clashes in the Somali capital Mogadishu where continuing violence is claiming more lives, The Associated Press reported on Thursday.

South African labour unions have said that they will cut ties with the ruling party, and widen a national public sector strike, unless their pay demands are met.

There were no signs of a resolution on Friday, nearly two weeks after more than one million public sector workers walked off the job, shutting down many hospitals and schools.

The Kenyan president has signed into law a new constitution, which will significantly alter the east African country's power structure.

Tens of thousands of residents thronged Nairobi's Uhuru Park as Mwai Kibaki signed the documents on Friday.

Heavy clashes between al-Shabab fighters and Somali government troops have claimed seven more lives on the fourth day of violence in the conflict-torn capital.

A mother and her six sons were caught in the crossfire and killed on Thursday, brining the death toll in Mogadishu to over 100 since fighting broke out on Monday.

Kenya is set to ratify a new constitution, which will significantly alter the east African country's power structure.

The new document, which is to be signed into law by Mwai Kibaki, the president, on Friday, addresses corruption, political patronage, land grabbing and tribalism.

As South African public service workers brace for the tenth day of a massive strike over pay disputes, union leaders warn the walkout could spread to other sectors.

Tens of thousands of public sector workers staged mass protests through Cape Town, Johannesburg, and some 20 other major cities on Thursday.

The UN Security Council has demanded that efforts be stepped up to prevent a repeat of the reported mass rape in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) a few weeks ago.

Council members on Thursday voiced open dissatisfaction at the late response of UN peacekeepers in the country, blaming the weak reporting line at the ground level.

The United Nations says more than 150 women and children were raped in eastern parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo in late July.

The UN said the residents of 13 villages in North Kivu Province were subjected to sexual violence by Rwandan Hutu rebels.

Hutu rebels from the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) have said they were "in no way involved" in mass rapes reported in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

A UN human rights team reported on Monday that at least 154 civilians were raped and assaulted by rebels from the FDLR and Congolese Mai Mai who occupied the town of Luvungi from July 30 to August 3.

South African civil servants are marching across the country over a wage dispute, with more than one million people expected to participate in strikes.

Labour unions planned the action on Thursday as part of continued pressure on the government to agree to improved pay terms and benefits.

More than one million South African civil servants are expected to march in protests across the country over low wages.

Labour unions planned the action on Thursday as part of continued pressure on the government to agree to improved pay terms and benefits.

At least six civilians have been killed in fresh violence between Somalia's al-Shabab fighters and pro-government forces in the capital Mogadishu.

The heavy clashes erupted in the northern and southern parts of Mogadishu on the third day of fierce street battles between the two rivals.

Leader of Lords Resistance Army (LRA) has called for massive abduction of children and adults in the Central African Republic (CAR) of Congo.

A recent report released by the US-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) has unveiled the alleged intentions of LRA leader Joseph Kony.

Heavy fighting in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, has flared for the third consecutive day, with five people being killed.

Another 25 people were injured in the latest attacks on Wednesday, in the Bakara market area.

The United Nations is dispatching a senior staff member to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), to investigate the recent rape of more than 150 civilians by two armed groups there.

The United Nations human rights team has confirmed that members of two armed groups in the volatile east in DRC raped more than 150 women during an attack on a village in North Kivu province last month, a UN spokesperson said today.

Security forces in Mauritania have killed a man attempting to ram a vehicle loaded with explosives into a military barrack, officials say.

The incident on Wednesday, shortly after midnight, occurred at the Nema military barrack, about 1,200km east of Nouakchott, the capital.

Al-Shabab fighters have stormed a hotel close to the presidential palace in the Somali capital of Mogadishu, killing at least 31 people, including six members of the parliament.

Authorities said on Tuesday al-Shabab fighters attacked the hotel where parliament members and government officials were staying.

At least 38 people have been killed and dozens injured in the latest clashes between al-Shabab fighters and pro-government forces in Somalia.

Fierce clashes broke out in the capital city of Mogadishu on Monday after al-Shabab fighters attacked positions of pro-government forces backed by African Union (AU) forces, a Press TV correspondent reported.

At least 29 Somali civilians have been killed in clashes between African Union-backed government troops and al-Shabab fighters in a fresh outbreak of violence, medics said.

The flare-up came after al-Shabab fighters declared a "massive" war against what they called "invaders" and attacked army barracks in several districts of the capital, Mogadishu, on Monday.

Children of third world countries and nations in transition have become 'laboratory rats' for the US' clinical tests for new drugs, an Indian newspaper says.

Under US' 1997 legislation called the Pediatric Exclusivity Provision , intended to speed up development of new drugs for American kids, the trials were carried out in countries such as Uganda and India, The Times of India reported.

Almost 200 women have been raped by rebels in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), during a four-day seizure of a town, aid groups have said.

A US aid worker and a Congolese doctor told the Associated Press on Monday that the attacks occurred within miles of a UN peacekeepers' base

Almost three thousand soldiers were deployed on Monday to 37 hospitals across the country to help keep basic health services running and prevent the public sector from falling into further chaos.

Two Spanish aid workers held hostage by al-Qaeda's north African branch have been released, putting an end to a nine-month kidnapping ordeal, Spain's government has confirmed.

"They are safe and sound after 268 days in the hands of their kidnappers," Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Spain's prime minister, said on Monday.

Sudan is planning to build a nuclear reactor and its first nuclear power plant for peaceful electricity purposes by 2020, state media say.

Director-general of the Sudanese Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed Ahmed Hassan el-Tayeb, said on Sunday that his government had begun the plan for the development of the nuclear reactor at the beginning of this year.

Two Spanish aid workers held hostage by al-Qaeda's north African branch are on their way to freedom, the Spanish government has reportedly said.

"They are en route to freedom but we can't make any more
comment until they are 100 per cent in safe hands," a government official was quoted by the Reuters news agency as saying on Monday.

Somali pirates have demanded a ransom of USD 4 million for the release of an Egyptian ship they attacked and captured on August 2 in the Red sea.

Panama-flagged MV Suez, a cargo ship carrying cement, was attacked with small arms fire while sailing in the Gulf of Aden.

Sudan is planning to build a nuclear reactor and its first nuclear power plant by 2020, the state news agency SUNA has said.

Mohamed Ahmed Hassan el-Tayeb, director-general of the Sudanese Atomic Energy Agency, said on Sunday that his government had begun the plan for the development of the nuclear reactor at the beginning of this year.

A South African court bans health workers from taking part in a nationwide strike that has left patients without medical care.

The Labor Court issued a verdict prohibiting "essential services" workers from striking on Saturday, said South African government spokesman Themba Maseko.

The Somali government says 10 anti-government fighters have been killed by their own bombs after the devices they were preparing went off prematurely in the capital, Mogadishu.

The fighters died in two separate incidents, 10 while preparing a car bomb and another as he planted a roadside bomb, the information ministry said on Saturday.

As South Africa's violence-plagued civil servants' strike enters its third day, Labor Unions have continued to insist on their proposed wage increase.

Police have fired rubber bullets at rioting schoolteachers and nurses as a nationwide public sector strike turned violent, Associated Press reported on Saturday.

Massive explosions have ripped through the al-Shabab group's largest headquarters in Somalia's capital Mogadishu, leaving 25 dead and 30 injured.

The simultaneous blasts hit the base in the southern sector of the city on Friday, a senior al-Shabab official told Press TV on condition of anonymity.

The two major civil service unions on strike against the South African government have vowed to intensify pressure in coming days, in a struggle pitting a million members of the middle and lower ranks of society against a confident government leadership fresh from hosting the World Cup.

Teachers from the SA Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu) and nurses from the National Health and Allied Workers Union (Nehawu) have continued picketing at schools, clinics and hospitals, leading to widespread shutdowns since August 18.

At least 5 people have been killed and 10 others injured as heavy clashes continue unabated in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu.

The clashes erupted Thursday evening in the city's Hodon district where mortars landed on civilian residents, causing causalities. Mortars also hit a refugee camp in the southern part of Mogadishu and claimed two lives. Four others civilians suffered injuries in the attack, a Press TV correspondent reported.

Britain has warned Libya not to celebrate the first anniversary of the Lockerbie bomber's return to his home country, saying that doing so would be "tasteless and offensive".

The foreign office said any repeat of the home-coming ceremonies seen last year after Abdelbaset al-Megrahi's release from a Scottish jail would be "deeply insensitive".

Southern Sudan has unveiled ambitious plans to reshape its provincial capitals in the shapes of animals and other symbols found on their state flags.

The proposal, which includes reordering the regional capital Juba in the shape of a two-horned Rhino, comes ahead of a referendum on independence scheduled for January.

The Democratic Republic of Congo army has arrested two suspects in the killing of three UN peacekeepers in the east of the country.

Thursday's arrests came after dozens of fighters attacked a UN peacekeeping base in Kirumba city of North Kivu province, hacking to death the three Indian troops and wounding seven other peacekeepers.

South African police have used rubber bullets and water cannons against teachers and other workers taking part in a civil servants' strike outside a hospital in the city of Johannesburg.

The violence in the township of Soweto erupted on Thursday morning, the second day of the strike which has been called to demand higher wages.

Two videos and an audiotape found by the CIA in 2007 have revealed the secret interrogation in Morocco of a man implicated in the 9/11 attacks.

While Ramzi Bin al-Shibh was detained in a prison in Morocco, US officials said, Moroccan officials videotaped several of his interrogation sessions and handed the recordings over to the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), The New York Times reported on Tuesday.

At least 10 people have been killed and 30 others wounded in clashes between Somali villagers and Ethiopian forces in Ethiopian-controlled Somali region of Ogadeni.

According to witnesses, the clashes broke out after Ethiopian troops attacked Jeed village of Shillaabo region in Ethiopia leading the residents to take up arms against the Ethiopian forces, a Press TV correspondent reported.

At least nine people have been killed and 53 others wounded in renewed fighting in Somalia's capital.

Local officials in Mogadishu said the fighting took place between pro-government troops and members of Somalia's al-Shabab group at a camp for the displaced.

Nigeria's former military ruler has declared that he will seek the ruling party's nomination for the presidential election next year, challenging Goodluck Jonathan, the incumbent president.

Ibrahim Babangida, who was forced to step down in 1993, announced his ambition in a speech on Monday.

A court in Somalia's semi-autonomous region of Puntland has jailed a journalist for interviewing a Muslim  leader with ties to al-Qaeda-inspired fighters, local media and an international watchdog have said.

Armed police seized Abdifatah Jama Mire, the deputy director of Horseed FM, and seven of his colleagues, late on Friday after the radio station broadcast an interview with Sheikh Mohamed Said Atom.

Two police advisers with the joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force in Sudan's Darfur region have been abducted by armed men.

The officers were seized in Nyala, the capital of South Darfur state, on Saturday, the Unamid peacekeeping mission said in a statement.

A leading official of south Sudan's main ruling party has warned that the independence referendum scheduled for January could face a delay unless the country's election commission quickly resolves an internal dispute.

The commission was authorised by Sudan's parliament last year, and should have been formed early in 2010. But its members were only appointed in June, and commissioners still cannot agree on who should be secretary-general.

Paul Kagame, Rwanda's incumbent president, has claimed victory after early results gave him a huge lead in the country's second presidential race since the 1994 genocide.

Preliminary results early on Tuesday morning showed Kagame had won 92.8 per cent of the vote in 11 out of a total 30 districts, the national electoral commission announced.

On 3 August 2010, Jackie Selebi was handed down a 15-year sentence by a Johannesburg Court on charges of corruption.

Evidence was provided that the defendant had received huge bribes from a mafia chief and had fabricated false evidence.

A US actress has challenged testimony from Naomi Campbell, the British model, over an alleged gift of diamonds from Charles Taylor, the former Liberian president, who is on trial for war crimes in The Hague.

Contadicting Campbell's evidence that she had not known where the diamonds had come from, Mia Farrow said the model had told her that Taylor had sent them to her.

South Africa has recalled its ambassador to Rwanda to discuss the situation in the country before elections there next week and after a dissident Rwandan general was shot in the South African capital.

Gladstone Dumisani Gwadiso was travelling back to South Africa on Friday, but Johannesburg was not severing diplomatic ties with Rwanda, according to Mahlatse Mnilele, a foreign ministry official.