Government critics abducted, killed or arrested in run-up to vote as Samia Suluhu Hassan faces first electoral test

Tanzania’s president looks on course to strengthen her grip on the country as it holds a general election on Wednesday against the backdrop of rapidly intensifying repression and the exclusion of opposition candidates.

Samia Suluhu Hassan, a former vice-president who took office after the death of her predecessor, John Magufuli, in 2021, has left nothing to chance for her first presidential and parliamentary electoral test.

Soyinka, 91, who recently compared US president to Idi Amin, says ‘I have no visa – I am banned’

The Trump administration has revoked the visa for Wole Soyinka, the acclaimed Nigerian Nobel prize-winning writer who has been critical of Trump since his first presidency, Soyinka revealed on Tuesday.

“I want to assure the consulate … that I’m very content with the revocation of my visa,” Soyinka, who won the 1986 Nobel prize for literature, told a news conference.

Rapid Support Forces accused of killing more than 2,000 unarmed civilians in El Fasher in recent days

Reports of ethnically motivated mass killings and other atrocities are emerging from El Fasher after the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces took control of the city in Sudan’s western Darfur region over the weekend.

Video released by local activists showed a fighter known for executing civilians in RSF-controlled areas shooting a group of unarmed civilians sitting on the ground at point-blank range.

Exclusive: two dossiers of material seen by the security council raise questions over export of British arms to the UAE, which has been accused of supplying weapons to paramilitary RSF group

British military equipment has been found on battlefields in Sudan, used by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a paramilitary group accused of genocide, according to documents seen by the UN security council.

UK-manufactured small-arms target systems and British-made engines for armoured personnel carriers have been recovered from combat sites in a conflict that has now caused the world’s biggest humanitarian catastrophe.

Low turnout said to have made for most peaceful election in years, as 83-year-old accused of clampdown on dissent wins 89.77% of vote

Alassane Ouattara has been declared the winner of the presidential election in Ivory Coast by a landslide.

According to provisional results announced by the Independent Electoral Commission (CIE) on Monday evening, the 83-year-old won a fourth term as head of the west African country with 89.77% or 3.75m votes.

Reports of families trapped by floodwaters in Jamaica, as hurricane moves on to threaten Cuba’s second-largest city

• Hurricane Melissa makes landfall in Jamaica

• Visual guide to Hurricane Melissa

• Tell us if you’ve been affected

The National Hurricane Center has, once again, downgraded Melissa to “a category 3 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale,” but said it is still “an extremely dangerous major hurricane.”

The centre warned the hurricane could “cause life-threatening and potentially catastrophic flash flooding with numerous landslides” as approaches Cuba.

Melissa is expected to make landfall soon along the southern coast of eastern Cuba as an extremely dangerous major hurricane.

On the forecast track, the core of Melissa is expected to move over eastern Cuba through this morning, move across the southeastern or central Bahamas later today, and approach Bermuda Thursday and Thursday night.