Also today: Police break up Egyptian democracy rally; Somali government says al-Qaeda snooping around for new bases; Nigeria’s acting president sacks oil chief, reinstates predecessor’s choice; UN needs millions of dollars to tackle looming Niger famine.

Also today: Nigerian acting president installs new cabinet; African trade body aims to standardise investment rules; South Korean navy plays waiting game with hijacked tanker; Equatorial Guinea jails ostensible coup plotters.

Also today: Somali pirates hijack South Korean oil tanker; Kenyan MPs approve ‘historic’ draft constitution; Sudan election on shaky ground; Troops take back northern Congo airport.

Also today: Nigerian Senate confirms new ministers; Europeans say foreigners must respect African rights in agricultural deals; ICC to investigate Kenya’s post-election violence; Sharia court bans Twitter, Facebook debates on amputations.

Also today: UN says Africa growth back on track, but employment remains stubbornly high; Zimbabwe’s white farmers conduct land grab of their own; Bashir warns on south Sudan secession ahead of tense April election; Foreign banks scramble for Libyan licences; Niger authorities crack down on crime.

Also today: Darfur rebels claim to have downed army helicopters; Niger’s junta arrests former ministers; LRA denies responsibility for DRC massacre; Gaddafi again says Nigeria should be broken into pieces.

Also today: LRA massacre in DRC comes to light; UN agency says global recession, climate change bad for spread of Aids; Reported Tsvangirai words echo Mugabe on gay rights in Zimbabwe; Libya, EU mend relations, but Swiss still out in the cold; Somali government allies pledge to eradicate al-Shabaab.

Also today: Homes demolished near Mogadishu airport, fears of al-Shabaab attacks; Comorans back to their political wars over arrests; UN fights UN in Somali aid row; Nigerians approve $31 billion budget.

Also today: Gabonese attempt to sweeten offshore-oil deals; Black gold to boost Ghana’s revenues; Angolans on slippery ground over maritime border expansion; Nigerian Sharia court bans Internet debates on amputations.

Also today: Somali pirates set new distance record; South Sudan official jumps the gun on oil and independence; IMF tells Zimbabwe pay up, or else; Online campaigners target Ethiopia’s huge new dam.

Also today: Obama prioritises African food security; Malawi gay couple to face charges; France pointedly ignores inviting Bashir to summit; Cites nixes ivory sales plea; Angolans sentence killer police officers; DRC publishes minerals report, with discrepancies.

Also today: Former Sudan rebels say Bashir must face war crimes charges; Senior al-Shabaab commander assassinated; Nigerian deportee dies on tarmac at Zurich airport; Nigerians recall ambassador to Libya over Gaddafi statement; Mauritania severs ties with Israel; Darfur donor conference seeks $2 billion for reconstruction.

Also today: UN says sub-Saharan growth set to continue, but within narrow vein; Khartoum defies main Darfur rebels by making peace with minor militants; Zuma claims Zim leaders are hunky-dory, but nobody else thinks so; West African pirates release Chinese fishermen; UN tells Ivorians to get on with elections.

Also today: Africans blame climate change on themselves, God; AU sanctions Madagascan president and cohorts; BP’s Botswana pullout gives miners the jitters; UK explorer charts new DRC oil territory.

Also today: Chinese negotiate with Cameroonians over kidnapped fishermen; Uganda’s government tries to pass draconian press law; Senegalese arrest telecoms regulator over embezzlement of funds; Sierra Leonean woman wins high court bid to become chief; Nigeria’s election date depends on electoral reforms; Sierra Leone’s fisheries minister hung out to dry.

Also today: Somali government allies itself to moderate militia group for big push; Car bombs rock Niger Delta, threaten amnesty; Minor Darfur rebel peace talks hamper major rebel peace talks; Sudan’s authorities hassle journalists despite lifting censorship.

Also today: Nigerian women protest killings in Jos; Saharan states meeting to discuss threat of al-Qaeda; West African pirates hijack Chinese fishing boat; Wife of Charles Taylor gives birth to baby girl.

With the flow of worrying news from Nigeria intensifying daily, we may be forgiven for thinking that expats have a really bad time of it. Well, not exactly.

Also today: Clashes in Mogadishu kill many; Democratic Republic of Congo; Sudanese imply Darfur peacekeepers arming militants; Head of UN General Assembly on Swiss no-visa list.

Also today: South Sudan risks blotting its democratic copybook over arrests: Al-Qaeda’s North African wing frees Spanish hostage: Foremost Egyptian Muslim cleric dies: Niger’s junta appeals for millions of dollars in food aid.

Also today: Clinton adds pressure over Nigerian massacre; Ransom allegedly paid for abducted South African sound engineer; Zim high court says MDC speaker must stay; Family told to exhume Rwanda's first president for redevelopment project; Massive African polio vaccination campaign starts; Ugandans want to move people from landslide areas.

Also today: Americans free up Internet technology to foes; Bennett’s lawyers ask for ‘fictional’ terrorism trial to be scrapped; Gambian president turns on his own government; Kenyan politicians asked to stay home for constitutional debate.

Religious violence, unfortunately, is nothing new in Nigeria. In the latest apparent reprisals over the weekend, scores of women and children, mostly Christians, were killed in villages around the central Nigerian city of Jos.

Just weeks away from a conference where it will ask for $20 billion over three years – twice the record amount ever raised for health – the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria launched a report trumpeting its recent successes. The world is on the brink of eliminating mother-to-child HIV transmission, beating malaria (on a public health scale) and containing drug-resistant TB, it says. All it needs is a flood of money, in the middle of a fiscal drought.

Also today: Nigerian player dies of heart attack during soccer game; Togo’s opposition nixes poll result; Egyptian ‘anti-government’ blogger released; UN to start nominal withdrawal of DRC peacekeepers by June; Sudan’s Bashir backs Eritrea over sanctions; Zuma claims EU listening to his Zimbabwe calls - but it’s not; Niger’s junta frees ministers detained during coup; Nigerians lambast corrupt police.

Also today: Ugandans bury mudslide dead; Madagascar’s Rajoelina dismisses Addis Ababa talks; Geldof, charity and Ethiopians take swing at BBC aid-for-weapons report; UN discusses troop withdrawal from DRC; Ivorians getting payout over toxic waste claims.

Also today: It’s official: More women of reproductive age die from Aids-related illnesses than anything else; MDC gives Mugabe’s mob hard time over indigenisation law; ICC says Kenyan leaders guilty of fomenting deadly 2008 violence. Niger junta keeps some old guard soldiers in transitional government; Egyptians try blogger in military court.

Also today: Ugandan mudslide kills scores; IMF says Zambians must raise mining taxes; Ethiopian opposition candidate stabbed to death; France arrests wife of assassinated Rwandan president; Somali pirates attack aid trucks.

Also today: Darfur said to be in flames again; Niger’s junta warns of famine; Ugandans petitioned by concerned world over gay bill; Gaddafi’s son visits his patsy in Libyan jail.