Axadle - Breaking news and analysis from Somalia, the Horn of Africa, and across Africa.

Monday April 20, 2026 Manchester City hauled themselves to within touching distance of the Premier League summit on Sunday, edging leaders Arsenal 2-1 at the Etihad Stadium in a match that swung on moments of quality and error. Rayan Cherki put Pep Guardiola's side ahead after 16 minutes and Erling Haaland struck again in the 65th minute, leaving City three points adrift of Arsenal but with a game in hand. Victory at second-from-bottom Burnley on Wednesday would send them top. Cherki produced the standout opener, weaving…

Volodymyr Zelensky has denounced the loosening of restrictions on Russian oil, warning that revenue from those sales feeds Moscow’s war machine just as Washington moves to ease pressure on energy markets rattled by the conflict in the Middle East. "Every dollar paid for Russian oil is money for the war" and is used for devastating strikes on Ukraine, Mr Zelensky said in a post on X. Without naming the United States directly, the Ukrainian president’s remarks came after President Donald Trump's administration on Friday…

Monday April 20, 2026 Addis Ababa (AX) — Ethiopia’s National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) says it has detained 138 people it believes were tied to terrorist and extremist networks, alleging the group was preparing violence ahead of the country’s 7th general elections. In a statement released Saturday, the agency said those arrested were helping organize and sustain armed cells designed to undermine peace and stability and interfere with the electoral process. The detentions, it said, came during coordinated…

The wreckage still held the signatures of everyday life: a bottle of washing-up liquid, a packet of cucumber and vitamin E wax strips, baby talc, a tube of La Roche-Posay face wash. This was one of the buildings hit in central Beirut on a Wednesday at lunchtime, without warning. It was among the targets of 100 Israeli strikes launched in just 10 minutes, part of what became the deadliest day of the conflict in Lebanon so far. But even amid those intimate traces of lives interrupted, something else stayed with me more…

The Nigerian Federal Ministry of Finance is refuting claims made by the World Bank regarding alleged undisclosed expenditures and the misallocation of federal revenue. Minister of State for Finance, Taiwo Oyedele, has characterized these allegations as a misunderstanding of the situation. He emphasized that media narratives indicating a substantial portion of federal earnings is being improperly channeled are not only incorrect but also misleading. This clarification comes as the ministry addresses interpretations of the…

Iran put two men to death on Monday after convicting them of ties to Israel’s spy service, according to the judiciary, in the latest executions carried out since the war with Israel and the United States began. "The death sentences of Mohammad Masoom-shahi and Hamed Validi were carried out at dawn today," the judiciary's Mizan Online website reported. The report said the pair were "members of a spy network linked to Mossad," Israel's intelligence agency, but gave no details on when they were detained. Iranian authorities…

Monday April 20, 2026 Mogadishu (AX) – The United States Africa Command said it launched an airstrike in Puntland State on Friday, hitting Islamic State fighters in rugged terrain roughly 30 miles southeast of the port city of Bosaso in the Bari region. In a statement released Saturday, AFRICOM said the operation was carried out on April 17, underscoring the continued expansion of U.S. air activity in Somalia. The command gave no additional information about the strike, including casualty numbers or damage assessments,…

Princess Kasune Zulu — once a child bride and later one of Zambia’s first public figures to reveal her HIV status in the late 1990s — is now driving a sweeping shift in criminal justice. Her ministry has spearheaded a law that makes sexual offences non-bailable, placing her at the forefront of a landmark legal overhaul. Under the reform, all sexual offences are now non-bailable. With the passage of the Criminal Procedure Code (Amendment) Act No. 4 of 2026, suspects accused of grave crimes in Zambia — including child…

Bulgaria appears headed for its most decisive political reset in decades after former president Rumen Radev, a critic of the European Union who has urged a renewal of ties with Russia, won an outright majority in parliamentary elections, near complete official results showed. Radev's Progressive Bulgaria alliance captured 44.7% of the vote in yesterday's election, with 91.7% of ballots counted, according to official figures, leaving the grouping on track to secure about 130 seats in the 240-member parliament. The sweeping…

ADDIS ABABA - The African Union moved on Sunday to sharply rebuke reports that Israel plans to appoint a diplomatic envoy to the "so-called North Western State of Somalia," warning that the step could inflame tensions over Somalia's territorial integrity. In a statement, the 55-member bloc said it was "deeply concerned" by what it described as Israel's reported decision to assign a diplomatic envoy to North Western State of Somalia, the self-declared region in Somalia. The AU said it stands firmly behind the "sovereignty,…