标签： Africa

Diplomatic tensions between Zambia and the United States have boiled over into public view, as Lusaka accuses Washington of linking a $2 billion critical health assistance package to preferential access to Zambia’s strategic mineral reserves — reserves that are central to the global green energy transition. The escalating row also exposes growing pushback across Africa against the Trump administration’s new “America First” aid framework, which has redefined traditional development support as transactional deals weighted toward U.S. commercial and geopolitical interests.

In a sharply worded statement released Monday, Zambian Foreign Affairs Minister Mulambo Haimbe pushed back against outgoing U.S. Ambassador Michael Gonzales, who had publicly accused Zambian leaders of rampant corruption and negotiation gridlock that had derailed the aid talks. Haimbe dismissed Gonzales’ claims as “mischievous, deeply regrettable and undiplomatic,” saying the allegations violate longstanding norms of mutual respect between sovereign nations. He clarified that negotiations have been stalled for months not because of Zambian intransigence or graft, but because of two non-negotiable U.S. demands Zambia finds unacceptable: intrusive data-sharing requirements that violate Zambian citizens’ right to privacy, and an insistence that U.S. companies receive preferential treatment for access to Zambia’s critical mineral reserves.

Zambia’s position is clear, Haimbe added: the southern African nation retains full sovereignty over its natural resources, and no single strategic partner will receive preferential treatment over others. The U.S. has rejected Zambia’s accusations, with Gonzales calling the claims of a mineral-for-aid link “absolutely and patently false” and “disgusting.” The U.S. Embassy in Zambia has not yet issued an official response to Haimbe’s latest remarks.

The dispute is not an isolated incident: it is the most high-profile example of growing pushback against the Trump administration’s complete overhaul of U.S. foreign aid policy. The administration has dismantled longstanding aid architectures including the United States Agency for International Development and the global AIDS relief program PEPFAR, replacing them with bilateral country-by-country agreements that frame aid as a reciprocal transaction. Under the new model, U.S. health funding is tied to a series of strict conditions, including commercial concessions, mandatory domestic spending commitments, broad disease surveillance access, pathogen sharing, and even religious provisions. As of mid-2000s, Washington has secured agreements with roughly 30 countries, most of them in aid-dependent African nations.

U.S. officials defend the framework as a pragmatic shift that reduces long-term donor dependency, empowers local governments to take ownership of their health systems, and protects core U.S. interests — most notably countering China’s growing economic and political influence across the African continent. China is already a dominant infrastructure and trade partner in Zambia and many other African countries, and Washington has made it a priority to secure alternative access to African minerals critical for manufacturing solar panels, electric vehicle batteries, and grid energy storage systems, key components of the global transition to clean energy.

But African governments and global health experts have raised widespread alarm about the new model, with multiple nations already rejecting or pausing proposed deals over unacceptable terms. Last week, Ghana turned down a drafted agreement over the lack of safeguards for sensitive public health data. Zimbabwe previously walked away from a $367 million aid package over identical concerns. In Kenya, a $2.5 billion agreement signed last December remains frozen after a court challenge argued it violates national data protection legislation. In Lesotho, local negotiators only managed to reduce a U.S. demand for 25 years of unrestricted access to health data and biological samples down to a five-year term.

Critics warn that the data-sharing provisions disproportionately benefit U.S. interests, with information flowing almost exclusively one-way to Washington. Following the U.S. withdrawal from the World Health Organization in January, the country abandoned multilateral global pathogen-sharing and vaccine access negotiations currently led by the WHO, and is instead pursuing direct bilateral access to disease surveillance data and biological samples from African nations. Health advocates warn this approach risks creating a fragmented parallel global health system that undermines multilateral coordination. In Zimbabwe’s earlier rejected deal, government officials noted the U.S. offered no guarantee that Zimbabwe would gain access to future medical innovations such as vaccines, diagnostics, or treatments developed using the shared data and samples. This echoes the inequitable experience of the COVID-19 pandemic, when many African nations contributed critical data and viral samples but were last in line to access life-saving vaccines.

The closed-door negotiation process for the new deals has also drawn fire for a lack of transparency and public accountability. “Secrecy is at the center of this. That puts accountability for results at risk,” said Asia Russell, executive director of global health advocacy group Health GAP. “It’s impossible to evaluate these deals properly without seeing the full terms. Part of what made PEPFAR successful was transparency. Now that’s been taken away.”

Beyond data and transparency concerns, the new agreements carry stricter financial terms: most offer lower overall funding than previous U.S. assistance programs, while requiring recipient nations to increase domestic health spending, with total funding at risk if domestic targets are not met. “These are going to be very heavy lifts,” said Jen Kates, senior vice president at U.S.-based non-profit health policy organization KFF. “Countries are already under strain.”

Critics ultimately warn that tying life-saving health support to commercial and geopolitical goals erodes global health security for all nations. “When health becomes a bargaining chip, everyone becomes less safe,” Russell warned.

A brazen drone strike on Sudan’s primary international gateway in Khartoum has ignited a sharp diplomatic row, with the Sudanese government formally accusing neighboring Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates of orchestrating the attack that it labels an open act of direct aggression against Sudanese sovereignty.

The assault, carried out on Monday, targeted not only Khartoum International Airport but also multiple military sites across the wider Khartoum metropolitan region. This attack breaks a months-long stretch of relative calm in the capital, a period of stability that followed the Sudanese Armed Forces’ successful ousting of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) from Khartoum last year.

Sudan’s state-run Sudan News Agency (Suna) quoted military officials as saying the country holds conclusive proof that the drones used in Monday’s assault were launched from Bahir Dar Airport located in northern Ethiopia. This accusation builds on prior claims made by Sudan’s military back in March, when it said the RSF had launched air attacks from Ethiopian soil. On that earlier occasion, Sudanese forces tracked and shot down a drone they confirmed was owned by the United Arab Emirates after it crossed into Sudanese airspace from Ethiopian territory. Military spokesmen now confirm that the drone used in Monday’s strike traces back to the same origin point.

Ethiopia has swiftly rejected the Sudanese accusations, labeling them completely baseless. The United Arab Emirates, which has repeatedly and forcefully denied allegations of providing military support to the RSF throughout Sudan’s ongoing civil conflict, has not yet issued an official statement on the latest accusation. Following the attack, Sudan’s Foreign Minister Mohieddin Salem announced that the country has recalled its ambassador to Ethiopia for urgent consultations in response to the incident.

Officially, no casualties were reported in the strike, Sudan’s Information Minister confirmed to Reuters. Minor damage was however sustained by an administrative building near the airport tarmac. The timing of the attack is particularly sensitive: it comes just one week after the first direct international commercial flight landed at Khartoum International Airport in three years, a milestone that was meant to mark the capital’s gradual return to normalcy after years of war. In the wake of the strike, airport authorities immediately ordered a 72-hour full suspension of all operations, with plans to resume activity once mandatory security inspections are completed.

Back in February, Reuters reporting exposed that Ethiopia had hosted a training camp for RSF fighters and upgraded military infrastructure at the nearby Asosa Airport to support drone operations, moves that the report claimed were backed by the UAE, a close Ethiopian ally. Both Ethiopia and the UAE denied those allegations at the time, just as they have denied involvement in the latest strike. Eyewitnesses contacted by AFP on Monday confirmed hearing multiple powerful explosions and seeing plumes of smoke rise from areas adjacent to the airport, matching official accounts of the attack.

In comments following the strike, Sudan’s Foreign Minister emphasized that even though Ethiopia has long been considered a brotherly neighbor to Sudan, the two nations have chosen the wrong path in their alleged involvement and will ultimately come to regret their actions. For its part, Ethiopia’s Foreign Ministry struck a measured but firm tone in its Tuesday response, noting that Sudan and Ethiopia share centuries of historic, enduring friendship. The ministry added that Ethiopia has so far refrained from publicizing grave violations of its own territorial integrity and national security committed by belligerent parties in Sudan’s civil war, and called for constructive dialogue between all warring factions in Sudan to end the ongoing conflict.

The conflict between Sudan’s regular armed forces and the RSF erupted in April 2023, and has since spiraled into one of the world’s worst humanitarian catastrophes. United Nations officials estimate that more than 150,000 people have been killed since fighting began, while over 12 million have been forced to flee their homes. The conflict has triggered widespread famine across large swathes of the country, and credible reports of systematic genocide in the western Darfur region have drawn international condemnation.

In a sharp escalation of cross-border tensions between two neighboring East African nations, Sudan has formally recalled its ambassador to Ethiopia and publicly accused Addis Ababa of orchestrating a series of recent drone strikes targeting key Sudanese sites, including the capital Khartoum’s international airport. The announcement, made during a press conference on Tuesday, marks one of the most serious diplomatic rifts between the two countries in years, unfolding against the backdrop of Sudan’s 13-month civil conflict between the national military and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group.

As Sudan’s brutal civil conflict enters its fourth year of sustained bloodshed, a hostile drone launched by the country’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the dominant paramilitary faction opposing the ruling national military, was intercepted and destroyed by air defenses before it could strike Khartoum International Airport on Monday, senior airport officials confirmed. This attempted strike marks the latest escalation in sporadic violence that has shaken the capital in recent weeks, after months of relative calm following the Sudanese army’s recapture of Khartoum last year.

The foiled attack comes just three days after an RSF drone strike on a civilian passenger convoy traveling on the outskirts of Khartoum left at least five people dead, a massacre that underscored the persistent threat to civilian life across the war-torn nation. According to anonymous airport officials, who were not cleared to speak to international media outlets, the Monday drone approached the airport from the southern corridor before it was shot down by military air defenses. The interception caused no infrastructure damage and no reported injuries or fatalities, a statement from the Sudanese military government later confirmed. A senior military source also told the Associated Press that the drone was launched from territory in a neighboring country, though no additional details about the nation or cross-border involvement were provided.

Flights at Khartoum International Airport were temporarily suspended immediately after the interception, but aviation authorities announced that full operations would resume following standard security inspections. The site’s gradual reopening over the past year had been hailed as a critical milestone in efforts to restore a semblance of normalcy to the capital, which has been the epicenter of the conflict since open fighting broke out between the Sudanese army and the RSF in April 2023. Prior to Monday’s attempted strike, the capital had seen very little large-scale RSF attacks after the army retook full control of Khartoum, though small, intermittent strikes have become more common in recent weeks.

As of the latest updates from independent monitors, the four-year conflict has already killed at least 59,000 people across Sudan, according to data from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, a leading independent organization that tracks global conflict casualties. International aid organizations warn that the true death toll is almost certainly far higher, as restricted access to active combat zones across the large country makes full casualty counting impossible. The United Nations estimates that the war has displaced more than 12 million Sudanese people both internally and across international borders, and has pushed multiple regions of the country into full-scale famine, creating what aid groups have widely called an “abandoned global crisis.”

Mali, the West African nation grappling with a decade-long Islamist insurgency, has entered a new phase of political and security upheaval after a devastating large-scale coordinated attack by an insurgent alliance left its sitting defense minister dead and triggered a major cabinet shakeup.

The violence that unfolded across the country starting on April 25 marked one of the most sweeping insurgent offensives in recent years. Residents of towns and cities from the northern desert regions to areas near the capital Bamako awoke that morning to the sound of sustained gunfire and explosions, as two disparate armed groups — the separatist Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) and Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), an al-Qaeda-affiliated jihadist organization — launched synchronized raids targeting military and government positions across the country.

Among the highest-profile casualties of the offensive was Sadio Camara, Mali’s then-defense minister, who died in a suicide truck bombing targeting his residence just outside Bamako. More than a week after the initial attacks began, the country remains mired in a spiraling security crisis that has called into question the capability of Mali’s ruling military government to contain the decade-long insurgency.

In an official decree broadcast on Malian state television Monday, junta leader General Assimi Goïta announced he would step into the vacant defense minister role to lead the government’s counter-insurgency response. General Oumar Diarra, the Malian army chief of staff, was appointed to support Goïta as a delegate minister, according to the announcement.

Goïta, who first seized power in a 2020 military coup, initially rose to prominence on a promise to resolve Mali’s long-running security crisis and restore stability to the conflict-torn nation. But the recent offensive has delivered a major blow to the junta’s credibility: the coordinated attacks forced Malian government forces and their Russian allied fighters to withdraw from Kidal, a key strategic city in northern Mali, a retreat that has fueled widespread public and international skepticism about the government’s military hold on the country.

In the days following the offensive, Malian authorities have moved to crack down on alleged internal complicity in the attacks. Over the weekend, security services announced the arrest of a group of active and retired Malian soldiers suspected of providing support to the insurgents. The public prosecutor for a Bamako military court confirmed that an ongoing investigation has confirmed links between both serving and former military personnel and the planning and execution of the April 25 raids.

To ramp up counter-insurgency operations, Mali has partnered with military forces from neighboring Niger and Burkina Faso to launch joint air strikes against the insurgent alliance. Officials from Niger confirmed that the coordinated cross-border operation began just hours after the initial insurgent attacks were launched. All three Sahel nations are currently led by military governments, and together they formed the Alliance of Sahel States in recent years after expelling French counter-insurgency troops, the former colonial power that had deployed to the region to combat the insurgency. The three governments instead turned to Russian military fighters to support their counter-insurgency campaigns.

Despite this shift in military partnerships, the insurgency has continued to expand across the Sahel region. Large swathes of territory in all three countries remain outside of government control, and coordinated attacks on military and civilian targets have become increasingly frequent, leaving local populations trapped between ongoing violence and ineffective government security provision.

Amid a resurgence of violent anti-immigrant demonstrations in South Africa, Nigeria has launched a voluntary repatriation program to bring home more than 100 of its citizens stranded in the Southern African nation, the country’s top foreign affairs official confirmed Monday.

Nigerian Foreign Minister Bianca Odumegwu-Ojukwu announced the initiative after summoning South Africa’s acting high commissioner to Abuja to deliver the Nigerian government’s formal statement of deep concern over the recent unrest. She told reporters that 130 Nigerians have already registered to return, with additional people expected to join the voluntary repatriation effort in the coming days.

The renewed wave of protests targeting foreign migrants in South Africa, which unfolded last week, has not resulted in any Nigerian fatalities, according to the foreign minister. For years, migrants in South Africa have faced recurrent xenophobic hostility, with scapegoating rooted in the country’s persistent high unemployment rate, where locals often blame immigrant workers for taking scarce formal jobs.

South African authorities have already taken public steps to address the unrest, formally denouncing the violent attacks and pledging strict enforcement against all xenophobic criminal acts. In a separate diplomatic move, South African Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola held a bilateral phone call with Odumegwu-Ojukwu to discuss the broader tensions around irregular migration. The two officials agreed to collaborate on unpacking the root causes of the unrest and advancing mutually acceptable solutions to the ongoing challenges.

Beyond the recent anti-immigration protests, the Nigerian government has also raised urgent concerns over two separate fatal incidents from last month that claimed the lives of two Nigerian citizens at the hands of South African security operatives. Following Monday’s diplomatic meeting, Nigerian foreign ministry spokesperson stated that Abuja has formally requested a full, transparent investigation into the two deaths and is seeking cooperative action from South African authorities to share autopsy reports with the victims’ next of kin.