November 02, 2023

Books and Bombs

NEED TO KNOW Books and Bombs SOMALIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/15cd6f05-9c0c-4887-86f7-20dad73138cf.png"] A locally filmed, 10-part television series about Mogadishu high school students called “Arday” hit the Somali airwaves earlier this year, the Washington Post reported. A book fair, newly opened theaters, and art exhibitions have also cultivated a new Somali culture...

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October 27, 2023

Bittersweet Chocolate

NEED TO KNOW Bittersweet Chocolate IVORY COAST [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/a564b077-08a4-45ea-b17f-6979ff1e43c2.png"] Half of the dark chocolate in the world comes from cocoa that originates from Ivory Coast (Côte d’Ivoire). As the Hindu explained, the West African country wants to leverage its key location in this massive and lucrative supply chain to...

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October 10, 2023

The Devils You Know

NEED TO KNOW The Devils You Know LIBERIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/9eb32998-6471-45a3-a560-2a676df24771.png"] The Supreme Court of Liberia last week called on the West African country’s National Elections Commission to make its voter rolls public before the Oct. 10 presidential ballot. The commissioners said they had posted the information on their website,...

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September 28, 2023

An Absolute Problem

NEED TO KNOW An Absolute Problem ESWATINI [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/e564c03c-87c1-b4d7-d7d9-39a3e0290133.png"] Late last year, pro-democracy activists, political dissidents, and others gathered in South Africa to discuss how they might compel King Mswati III, the absolute monarch of the tiny, independent landlocked nation of Eswatini, to resign. Soon after, in January 2023, gunmen...

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September 26, 2023

Bricks and Blood

NEED TO KNOW Bricks and Blood MOROCCO [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/f7407425-5e72-f4fb-9024-3d6b302b6efd.png"] Mohammed Ounasser lost his wife and two daughters when a 6.8 magnitude earthquake struck Morocco on Sept. 8 and leveled their village of Tnirte in the High Atlas Mountains. “This once-idyllic hamlet, nestled in apple and apricot groves, is now...

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September 21, 2023

Scattered and Scarred

NEED TO KNOW Scattered and Scarred ERITREA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/a90fd977-7674-18bb-a4c1-4c046edb3465.png"] Recently, the Israeli government appropriated $7.85 million to “encourage the voluntary repatriation of infiltrators” and repair any damage they may have caused. “The distress of the residents of the neighborhoods that are saturated with infiltrators is a problem for all of...

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September 15, 2023

A Worn Out Welcome

NEED TO KNOW A Worn Out Welcome GABON [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/8b6af594-29cd-4ef9-63c5-84ef31e981ea.png"] The leaders of the Aug. 30 coup that ousted President Ali Bongo Ondimba of Gabon from office recently appointed one of his opponents, economist Raymond Ndong Sima, as interim prime minister. Sima served as prime minister under Bongo from 2012...

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September 01, 2023

Old Story, New Horrors

NEED TO KNOW Old Story, New Horrors SUDAN [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/224b0e8f-5be6-4e44-b799-a1b865717c98.png"] Sudan’s military-led central government and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a paramilitary force formerly allied with the government, have been waging a civil war for almost five months. Around 4,000 people have died in the fighting, but neither side...

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August 25, 2023

All the Spoils

NEED TO KNOW All the Spoils GABON [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/8b6af594-29cd-4ef9-63c5-84ef31e981ea.png"] Gabon and the Bank of America recently finalized a “debt-for-nature swap,” the first on the African continent, to reduce its debt payments in exchange for promises to invest in conservation measures. Specifically, Gabon will expand a marine park and reform...

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August 23, 2023

Lose, Lose

NEED TO KNOW Lose, Lose ZIMBABWE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/32d2805e-affb-4474-9ba4-8fc5eae44e98.png"] Police in Zimbabwe arrested 40 leaders of the opposition Citizens’ Coalition for Change (CCC) party on charges of blocking traffic about a week before the southern African country’s voters go to the polls to choose a new president, parliament, and local...

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August 02, 2023

Palace Intrigue

NEED TO KNOW Palace Intrigue NIGER [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/770c49e5-a303-44c1-86fc-05e51df3933a.png"] Two years ago, the president of Niger, Mohamed Bazoum, was elected in the West African country’s first peaceful, democratic change of government since independence from France in 1960. He almost didn’t make it – a coup was attempted to thwart him from...

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July 28, 2023

The Hired Hands

NEED TO KNOW The Hired Hands CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/c7e5325a-3ac2-4df5-8925-90bdfbdaf0d9.png"] Mercenaries from Russia’s Wagner Group arrived in the Central African Republic (CAR) around two weeks before a July 30 referendum that would allow President Faustin-Archange Touadéra to run for a third term – which the current law forbids...

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July 19, 2023

Moving On

NEED TO KNOW Moving On ETHIOPIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/bf55b5d2-7db8-404a-b87b-c88a42597d29.png"] Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed claims that he is remaining neutral in the civil war now raging in neighboring Sudan, according to Deutsche Welle. Ahmed has said that, even though Sudan occupied the Al-Fashaga border region between the two countries when...

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July 13, 2023

Twenty Years

NEED TO KNOW Twenty Years SUDAN [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/224b0e8f-5be6-4e44-b799-a1b865717c98.png"] The Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, the rebel paramilitary group fighting against the central government of Sudan in the country’s civil war, has laid siege to the southern city of el-Obeid for more than a month. Located at a strategic crossroads,...

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July 04, 2023

Gassed

NEED TO KNOW Gassed NIGERIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/6c258edc-b123-4d47-98e3-f42e226ea64f.png"] One of Bola Tinubu’s first actions, when he became president of Nigeria in May, was eliminating the oil-producing country’s fuel subsidy. As the Economist explained, the subsidy that in 2022 reached $10 billion a year has long been a drag on the...

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June 29, 2023

Cracks in the Foundation

NEED TO KNOW Cracks in the Foundation SENEGAL [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/3676cf10-2f23-4295-b085-c86147830390.png"] Senegalese opposition politician Ousmane Sonko has filed a 170-page-long court complaint in France against Senegalese President Macky Sall and top members of the West African country’s security forces for alleged crimes against humanity. The charges stemmed from the Senegalese government’s...

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June 22, 2023

Pushing For Normal

NEED TO KNOW Pushing For Normal SIERRA LEONE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/fa024dc5-dbe7-d0c9-dd70-64d5fc0b96a9.png"] Samura Kamara, the leader of the All People’s Congress (APC) party and the main opposition candidate in Sierra Leone’s presidential election on June 24, recently called for every member of the small West African nation’s electoral commission to resign,...

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June 13, 2023

Direction: Hopelessness

NEED TO KNOW Direction: Hopelessness CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/c7e5325a-3ac2-4df5-8925-90bdfbdaf0d9.png"] Fighting in the civil war in Sudan has prompted 14,000 refugees to flee across the border to their neighbor to the southwest, the Central African Republic (CAR). As Africa News wrote, however, the CAR is not a safe haven. The...

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June 07, 2023

Musical Chairs

NEED TO KNOW Musical Chairs SOUTH AFRICA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/5516b8d6-0af4-46a7-8454-a3339ff1009f.png"] Apartheid, or legal segregation based on race, ended in South Africa almost 30 years ago. Yet anyone walking around Johannesburg could be forgiven for believing the hateful policy was still in place, according to Catalyst, a free-market-oriented news publication. The...

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June 02, 2023

Seed to Stem

NEED TO KNOW Seed to Stem GUINEA-BISSAU [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/c68ca5ff-fb6a-431d-be96-939a6f3c5eae.png"] Farmers in the West African nation of Guinea-Bissau are planting their maize, millet, and sorghum in anticipation of the June rainy season. Among them are the women known as “seed keepers” in the Bijagos archipelago of islands on the country’s Atlantic...

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