Watch as Namibia's Christine Mboma finds out that she is the BBC African Sports Personality of the Year for 2021.

Christine Mboma, who became the first Namibian woman to win an Olympic medal, is the BBC African Sports Personality of the Year for 2021.

Kalkidan Yibeltal
BBC News

Image source, AFP

Prominent Ethiopian journalist and opposition figure Eskinder Nega has been freed after more than 18 months in prison on the day that Ethiopia celebrates Christmas.

He was jailed in June 2020 following the killing of musician Hachalu Hundessa. Eskinder was one of those accused of inciting the violence that broke out in the capital, Addis Ababa, and the country’s largest state Oromia.

Other prominent opposition figures such as Jawar Mohammed and Bekele Gerba, who were also imprisoned because of the violence, are expected to be released too.

More than 200 people died in the unrest.

In his Christmas statement, which was posted on social media, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said his government would work to end violence in the country through "peaceful and political means".

There have been repeated international calls to resolve the brutal civil war in the north and ethnic tensions across the country through dialogue and negotiations.

Mr Abiy's statement indicates a shift in tone on the part of his administration that has often vowed to crush rebels, in particular those from Tigray.

Richard Hamilton
BBC World Service newsroom

Thirteen civilians have been killed in Burkina Faso in two separate attacks by suspected Islamist militants.

Eleven people were killed in a raid on a village by heavily armed men on motorbikes, and two volunteers working with the army's anti-jihadist force were killed in the second incident.

Both attacks occurred on Wednesday in the country's Centre-North region.

Burkina Faso has been struggling with jihadist attacks since 2015, when militants linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group began mounting cross-border raids from Mali.

The alarm did not work and fire doors were left open when Sunday's blaze started, the fire service says.

Jonathan Paye-Layleh
BBC News, Monrovia

Image source, Getty Images

Police in Liberia have arrested a 29-year-old Sierra Leonean man and charged him with attempting to sell his 10-year-old son.

It was apparently a desperate bid to raise money to replace a stolen motorbike.

After his arrest, the man told investigating officers in the capital, Monrovia, that he needed around $1,000 (£750) as the bike, which had belonged to his friend, had been stolen from his home.

He was told the only way to raise this much money quickly was to go to neighbouring Liberia to try and find a buyer for his son.

Back home people had told him it would be easy to do that kind of deal over the border.

It was arranged through a middleman in December. During negotiations the boy was apparently referred to as a chicken not a human being to avoid detection.

Nonetheless the police received a tip-off, and the father was arrested as the buyer was reportedly on their way to collect the boy from a town outside Monrovia.

According to the Liberian online publication Global News Network, the child is currently in the care of the gender ministry.

Human trafficking is a major issue in West Africa.

Children sold into modern slavery are not allowed to contact their families and are often made to work as domestic servants or labourers.

BBC World Service

The authorities in Egypt are planning to demolish another area in Cairo to make way for new residential developments.

The Nasr City district in the east of the Egyptian capital contains apartment blocks built in the 1960s.

Residents have been asked to leave their homes to allow the project to go ahead.

They are reported to have been offered alternative housing or financial compensation.

The plans have triggered anger and concern online - there have been a number of similar development projects as part of what is seen as a government-backed gentrification programme.

Nasr City is, however, regarded as a relatively upmarket, middle-class area.

Peter Mwai
BBC Reality Check

Image source, AFP

The UN has warned that it will have to suspend operations by its aid agencies if no supplies are allowed into Ethiopia’s northern region of Tigray soon.

No humanitarian aid has reached the region since mid-December and a spokesperson for the UN chief says the humanitarian situation continues to deteriorate.

“Several UN and non-governmental organisations will be forced to cease operations if humanitarian supplies, fuel and cash are not delivered to Tigray very soon,” Stéphane Dujarric, the spokesman for the UN's secretary general, told journalists in New York.

He said aid agencies were short of cash to buy local supplies and pay local staff and were also running out of fuel to transport aid and staff.

Renewed fighting and insecurity have affected the movement of humanitarian supplies along the only available route from Semera, the regional capital of the neighbouring Afar region, to Tigray through Abala.

The UN estimates that 100 trucks need to be getting into Tigray daily but since mid-July less 12% than of the needed trucks have made it through.

Read more:

• What's stopping aid getting to Tigray?
• Tigray hospital running out of food for starving children
• Viewpoint: Why Ethiopia's Tigray region is starving, but no famine declared

Egypt delay their departure for the Africa Cup of Nations in Cameroon after coronavirus cases were reported in their camp.

BBC World Service

Image source, AFP

Four Kenyan police officers have been killed in an ambush in a coastal region bordering Somalia.

The attack took place in Lamu County, where the Kenyan government deployed security forces and declared a dusk-to-dawn curfew after the murder of seven civilians in a series of raids earlier this week.

The region has suffered frequent attacks from the al-Shabab Islamist group, often carried out with roadside bombs.

Al-Shabab fighters have staged numerous raids inside Kenya in retaliation for Nairobi sending troops into Somalia in 2011, as part of an African Union force to oust the jihadists.

Peter Jegwa
Lilongwe, Malawi

Image source, AFP

Violet Chakwera, the daughter of Malawi’s president, has officially taken up a post in the Malawian embassy in London - it follows months of speculation that she had joined the diplomatic service.

This has proved controversial as one of President Lazarus Chakwera’s key campaign pledges when he won elections in 2020 was to end nepotism.

He faced widespread criticism when Ms Chakwera attended a training session for newly appointed diplomats last year.

Reports had then indicated she would be going to Brussels to work as third secretary at the Malawi mission to the European Union.

But following the backlash, President Chakwera appeared to reverse the appointment.

He told BBC’s HardTalk programme in July that the allegation that he had appointed his daughter as an envoy was a lie, challenging “those making such claims to check their facts”.

In the following months, Ms Chakwera, who used to work in the travel industry, took up a job at State House, working as a personal assistant to her mother, First Lady Monica Chakwera.

A foreign ministry official has now confirmed that she has begun work at the Malawi High Commission in the UK as first secretary responsible for investments.

In an interview in Malawi's private Daily Times newspaper, President Chakwera says this was not his decision as he is only responsible for appointing ambassadors and deputy ambassadors - and all other posts are decided by the foreign ministry.

Chris Ewokor
BBC News, Abuja

Dozens of residents have reportedly been killed by gunmen who raided several communities in the Anka and Bukkuyum areas of Nigeria's north-western Zamfara state.

Some villagers told the BBC that many motorbike-riding bandits attacked villages, shooting indiscriminately and setting houses on fire.

This appears to be one of the biggest attacks by gunmen on villages in Zamfara in recent months.

Multiple sources have given different casualty figures - some have put the number of the dead at more than 100.

The attacks are said to have started on Tuesday night and continued into Wednesday as the gunmen moved from one village to another.

Police and local officials in Zamfara are yet to respond to enquiries about the attacks.

Local media report that the gunmen appeared to be moving to the western part of Zamfara state to escape an onslaught by Nigerian troops.

A number of vigilantes from some of the affected communities were killed as they tried to repel the attackers.

Hundreds of residents are reported to be fleeing to Anka, one of the big towns in the area.

Communities in Zamfara, and other states in the north-west, have come under persistent attacks in recent years by the gangs, known locally as bandits.

They are sophisticated networks of criminals who operate across large swathes of territory, often stealing animals, kidnapping for ransom and killing those who confront them.

The government has deployed thousands of troops to fight them.

The key, kept by a former guard, was going to be auctioned in the US until South Africa objected.

Shingai Nyoka
BBC News, Harare

Image source, AFP

Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa has declared that 28 parliamentary by-elections postponed in 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic will now be held on 26 March.

The state electoral body told the BBC that local government by-elections would also be held on the same day as numerous seats have become vacant.

Most had belonged to the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party, led by Nelson Chamisa.

But dozens of his allies have been expelled from parliament, and more than 100 MDC councillors were recalled in 2020 after the Supreme Court declared that Mr Chamisa was not the party’s legitimate leader following a legal wrangle with a splinter group.

These by-elections are seen as an early test for general elections scheduled for mid-2023.

Previous national elections have been marred by allegations of violence and electoral fraud.

Critics had accused the government of using the Covid pandemic to thwart democracy.

Opposition parties have long alleged that the ruling Zanu-PF party rigs elections - which it denies.

They have called for various reforms, including an overhaul of the electoral body, equitable access to the media and for Zimbabweans living abroad to be allowed to vote.

The Newsroom
BBC World Service

Image source, AFP

Three suspected pirates detained for six weeks on board a Danish naval frigate off West Africa have been released at sea, after Denmark's justice minister waived charges of attempted manslaughter against them.

The men were detained in November following an exchange of fire with the Danish vessel in the Gulf of Guinea, off Nigeria, that saw several other suspected pirates killed.

They could have been brought to Denmark for criminal prosecution, but the justice ministry said there was a risk that they could not subsequently be deported, irrespective of any possible conviction.

This fact might prove an incentive for others to commit criminal acts in an attempt to get prosecuted in Denmark, it said.

A fourth suspect, who was injured in the incident and taken to a hospital in Ghana, has been flown to Denmark where he is expected to be prosecuted for attempted manslaughter.

Denmark said it had no other option as diplomatic efforts to find a solution with Ghana failed, and it was felt he could not be released at sea.

BBC Monitoring
The world through its media

Image source, Pen Pinter Prize

The wife of Ugandan novelist Kakwenza Rukirabashaija, who was detained after Christmas, has started legal action against the country's police chiefs - demanding that she be able to see him.

Eva Basima is suing the special forces command chief and police inspector-general.

She says she has not seen her husband, a critic of veteran President Yoweri Museveni, since he was arrested by heavily armed special forces officers on 28 December at their home.

On Tuesday, a court ordered the police to release Rukirabashaija unconditionally, but he remains in custody.

Robert Kyagulanyi, an opposition leader and singer better known by his stage name Bobi Wine, has said the failure to free the author is a crime against humanity.

The police accuse Rukirabashaija of using social media to “abuse and belittle" the president and his son, army commander Lt Gen Muhoozi Kainerugaba.

In a tweet he had described the general as "obese" and said "the Musevenis have imposed enormous suffering on this country".

Rukirabashaija won last year's Pen Pinter Prize's International Writer of Courage award, external

He is best known for The Greedy Barbarian, a satirical novel which describes high-level corruption in a fictional country, and Banana Republic: Where Writing is Treasonous, an account of the torture he was subjected to while in detention in 2020.

Ugandan police routinely disregard court orders and often re-arrest suspects released on bail.

Sampdoria defender Omar Colley is hoping The Gambia can surprise at their first-ever Africa Cup of Nations.

James Copnall
BBC Newsday, Limbe

Image source, @JamesCopnall

A senior official involved in Cameroon's hosting of the Africa Cup of Nations has assured the BBC that separatist rebels pose no threat to the tournament, which begins on Sunday.

Engamba Emmanuel Ledoux admitted that last week groups fighting for the independence of Anglophone Cameroon set off an explosion in the town of Limbe, which will host some of the games.

But he said the government had introduced security measures to stop the rebels from attacking the event or the nearby town of Buer, where some of the players are expected to stay.

"The threats have been going on. This is not the first time. You know, we organised the Chan [African Nations Championship] last year within the same environment," he said.

Can you name all the 14 teams to have lifted the Africa Cup of Nations trophy since the tournament began in 1957?

Image source, Getty Images

The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) has said severe lockdowns are no longer the best way to deal with coronavirus waves.

Governments are now being urged to use public health and social measures to reduce the number of virus infections.

There should also be an emphasis on vaccinations, the Africa CDC briefing said.

Several countries experienced new waves of infection towards the end of last year.

South Africa attributed the recent surge in cases to the new variant Omicron.