Region

WAD MADANI, Sudan — Sudan's General Abdel Fattah Al Burhan, at war for the past five months with paramilitaries, is visiting neighbouring Eritrea on Monday, officials in both countries announced.

It is the fourth foreign trip in two weeks by Burhan, the northeast African country's de facto leader since a coup in 2021. Since August 29 he has visited Egypt, South Sudan and, last week, Qatar. Experts say it is part of an effort to burnish his diplomatic credentials in the event of peace negotiations to end his country's devastating war.

Eritrea's Minister of Information Yemane Meskel announced on X, formerly Twitter, that Burhan arrived in Asmara on Monday "for working visit", and published a picture of him seated beside Afwerki.

They would discuss "the future of bilateral relations and strengthening them", a press release from Burhan's office said earlier.

Eritrea, which borders Sudan to the southeast, is one of the rare neighbouring countries that has not welcomed any of the more than 1 million refugees fleeing the war, as the border has been closed since 2019.

Eritrea is one of the world's most isolated states.

At the beginning of September Burhan announced from Kassala, a Sudanese state bordering Eritrea, that Sudan's border posts were reopening. It is also a sign that security will intensify along a border long known for its porousness.

Afwerki participated in a meeting in Cairo mid-July with heads of state of Sudan's neighbours, condemning "a war launched for no reason" in Sudan.

Battles that began April 15 between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) of General Mohamed Hamdan Daglo have killed nearly 7,500 people, according to a conservative estimate from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project.

In one of the war's deadliest single attacks, air strikes killed at least 46 people and injured dozens Sunday at a market in the south of Sudan's capital Khartoum, local activists said.

On Monday, the Mayo neighbourhood resistance committee announced it was going to bury “12 unidentified bodies” after the “massacre of the Qouro market”. The committee is one of many groups that used to organise pro-democracy protests and now provide assistance during the war.

The armed forces control the skies over Khartoum, while RSF fighters continue to dominate the city’s streets.

On Sunday RSF accused the military of the “air strikes against civilians in the south of Khartoum”. The armed forces denied attacking the market, saying it “fully adheres to international humanitarian law”.

The war has uprooted more than five million people, including one million who fled across borders, according to United Nations figures.

BENGHAZI, Libya — At least 150 people were killed in freak floods in eastern Libya as a result of storm Daniel which has swept the Mediterranean, an official said on Monday.

Images filmed by residents of the disaster area showed massive mudslides, collapsed buildings and entire neighbourhoods submerged under water.

"At least 150 people were killed as a result of flooding and torrential rains left by storm Daniel in Derna, the Jabal Al Akhdar region and the suburbs of Al Marj," Mohamed Massoud, a spokesman for the Benghazi-based administration in Libya, told AFP.

"This is besides the massive material damage that struck public and private properties," he added.

He said the prime minister of the east-based government, Oussama Hamad, and the head of a rescue committee as well as other ministers had travelled to Derna to evaluate the extent of the damage.

Hamad's government, which rivals a UN-brokered, internationally recognised transitional administration in Tripoli, on Monday declared Derna a "disaster area".

Experts have described storm Daniel, which also struck parts of Greece, Turkey and Bulgaria in recent days, killing at least 27 people, as “extreme in terms of the amount of water falling in a space of 24 hours”.

The storm struck eastern Libya on Sunday afternoon, notably the coastal town of Jabal Al Akhdar but also Benghazi, where a curfew was declared and schools closed for several days.

Rescue teams were also deployed in Derna, 900 kilometres east of the capital Tripoli.

With a population of 100,000, the city lies in the wadi of a river bearing the same name.

East Libyan authorities had “lost contact with nine soldiers during rescue operations” in the city, Massoud had said.

The United Nations mission in Libya on Monday said on X, formerly Twitter, that it was “closely following the emergency caused by severe weather conditions in the eastern region of the country”.

It expressed its condolences over the victims of the floods and said it was “ready to support efforts by local authorities and municipalities to respond to this emergency and provide urgent humanitarian assistance”.

Hundreds of residents are still believed to be trapped in difficult-to-reach areas as rescuers, backed by the army, try to come to their aid.

SIDON, Lebanon — At least six people have been killed and dozens wounded in clashes in a Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon, first responders said Monday as fighting raged for a fifth day.

Violence broke out late Thursday in the Ain Al Helweh camp on the outskirts of the coastal city of Sidon, just weeks after similar clashes pitted members of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement against Islamists.

The toll has risen to at least "six dead, one of them killed on Monday, and more than 60 wounded", said Imad Hallak from the Palestinian Red Crescent's Lebanon branch.

The casualties include both fighters and civilians, he added.

An AFP correspondent in Sidon reported ongoing clashes with automatic gunfire and shelling, after fighting had subsided somewhat overnight.

Lebanon's official National News Agency (NNA) said the city's southern entrance was closed to traffic.

The NNA had reported Saturday that three fighters and one civilian had been killed.

Ain Al Helweh is home to more than 54,000 registered refugees and thousands of Palestinians who joined them in recent years from neighbouring Syria, fleeing the civil war there.

The camp, Lebanon's largest, was created for Palestinians who were driven out or fled during the 1948 war at the time of Israel's creation.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, said Sunday that “hundreds of families have left the camp” since the clashes began.

Some 400 families were sheltering in a mosque, while others were taking refuge with relatives or in emergency shelters, it added in a report.

The Lebanese army said Sunday that shells hit two military sites near the camp, “leaving five soldiers wounded, one of them in critical condition”.

By long-standing convention, the army stays out of the Palestinian camps and leaves the factions to handle security there.

In a statement on X, formerly Twitter, the army warned “the relevant parties inside the camp” against endangering military sites, adding that it would “take appropriate measures”.

Five days of clashes that began in late July left 13 people dead and dozens wounded, in the worst outbreak of violence in the camp in years.

That fighting erupted after the death of an Islamist militant, followed by an ambush that killed five Fateh members including a military leader.

Lebanon hosts an estimated 250,000 Palestinian refugees, according to the UN agency.

Most live in Lebanon’s 12 official camps, and face a variety of legal restrictions including on employment.

TAFEGHAGHTE, Morocco — Moroccans on Sunday mourned the victims of a devastating earthquake that killed more than 2,000 people as rescue teams raced to find survivors trapped under the rubble of flattened villages.

The strongest-ever quake recorded in the North African country has killed at least 2,012 people and injured over 2,000, many seriously, according to the latest official figures.

Friday's 6.8-magnitude quake struck 72 kilometres southwest of the tourist hub of Marrakesh, wiping out entire villages in the hills of the Atlas mountain range.

"I've lost everything," said Lahcen, a resident of the mountain village of Moulay Brahim, whose wife and four children were among those killed.

Rescue workers recovered the bodies of Lahcen's three daughters from the rubble of their home, but had not yet found the remains of his wife and son.

"I can't do anything about it now, I just want to get away from the world and mourn," he said.

Troops and emergency services have scrambled to reach remote mountain villages where victims were still feared trapped under the rubble of houses, many of which were constructed from mud bricks.

Al Haouz province, site of the epicentre, suffered the most deaths with 1,293, followed by Taroudant province where 452 lives were lost, authorities reported.

Citizens on Sunday rushed to hospitals in Marrakesh to donate blood to help the many injured.

‘Everyone lost family’ 

Bouchra, another resident of Moulay Brahim, dried her tears with her scarf as she watched men wielding pickaxes to dig graves for the victims.

“My cousin’s grandchildren are dead,” she said. “I saw the devastation of the earthquake live and I’m still shaking. It’s like a ball of fire that swallowed up everything in its path.

“Everyone here has lost family, whether in our village or elsewhere in the region.”

Many residents of the usually bustling tourist hotspot of Marrakesh spent a second night sleeping out on the streets, huddled together under blankets and among bags filled with their belongings.

Fatema Satir, a Marrakesh resident, said many were sleeping in the street for fear of their houses collapsing.

“Look where all these people are sleeping,” said Satir. “There is no help for us. Our houses have been cracked, others destroyed, like my daughter’s house which was wiped out. We are in a chaotic state.”

In the city’s historic Jemaa Al Fna square, about 20 people were huddled on the ground, wrapped in blankets, while others were staying on the lawn of the nearby town hall, with its 12th century ramparts partially collapsed.

“We spent the night outside the old town, in a safe place,” said Maria, a Spanish tourist.

The kingdom declared three days of national mourning while countries including France, Israel, Italy, Spain and the United States have offered aid.

US Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer said: “We’ve got search and rescue teams ready to deploy... We are also ready to release funds at the right time.”

Spain meanwhile said it would send search and rescue teams and other aid after it received a formal request for help from Rabat.

Algeria, which has long had rocky relations with neighbouring Morocco, opened its airspace, which had been closed for two years, to flights carrying humanitarian aid and evacuating the injured.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose country in recent years established ties with Morocco, offered to send search-and-rescue teams, declaring that “Israel stands by Morocco in its difficult time”.

‘Under the debris’ 

The Red Cross warned that it could take years to repair the damage.

“It won’t be a matter of a week or two... We are counting on a response that will take months, if not years,” said Hossam Elsharkawi, its Middle East and North Africa director.

The village of Tafeghaghte, 60 kilometres southwest of Marrakesh, was almost entirely destroyed by the quake, an AFP team reported, with very few buildings still standing.

“Three of my grandchildren and their mother are dead,” said 72-year-old Omar Benhanna. “They’re still under the debris. It wasn’t so long ago that we were playing together.”

Residents buried around 70 victims on Saturday, cries and screams punctuating the funeral rites.

In the evening, television channels broadcast aerial images showing entire villages of clay houses in the Al Haouz region completely destroyed.

“The public authorities are still mobilised to speed up rescue operations and evacuate the injured,” the interior ministry said.

The tremor was also felt in the coastal cities of Rabat, Casablanca and Agadir, where many panicked residents rushed onto the streets in the middle of the night.

The quake was the deadliest in Morocco since a 1960 tremor destroyed Agadir, a disaster in which more than 12,000 people died.

MOULAY BRAHIM, Morocco — Morocco's deadliest earthquake in decades has killed more than 1,000 people, authorities said Saturday, as troops and emergency services scrambled to reach remote mountain villages where casualties are still feared trapped.

The 6.8-magnitude quake struck late Friday in a mountainous area 72 kilometres  southwest of tourist hotspot Marrakesh, the US Geological Survey reported.

With strong tremors also felt in the coastal cities of Rabat, Casablanca and Essaouira, the quake caused widespread damage and sent terrified residents and tourists scrambling to safety in the middle of the night.

"I was nearly asleep when I heard the doors and the shutters banging," said Ghannou Najem, a Casablanca resident in her 80s who was visiting Marrakesh when the quake hit.

“I went outside in a panic. I thought I was going to die alone.”

In the mountain village of Moulay Brahim near the quake’s epicentre, rescue teams searched for survivors in the rubble of collapsed houses while residents began digging graves for the dead on a nearby hill, AFP correspondents reported.

The army set up a field hospital in the village and deployed “significant human and logistical resources” to support the rescue operation, state news agency MAP reported.

It was the strongest-ever quake to hit the North African kingdom, and one expert described it as the region’s “biggest in more than 120 years”.

“Where destructive earthquakes are rare, buildings are simply not constructed robustly enough... so many collapse, resulting in high casualties,” said Bill McGuire, professor emeritus at Britain’s University College London.

Updated interior ministry figures on Saturday showed the quake killed at least 1,037 people, the vast majority in Al Haouz, the epicentre, and Taroudant provinces.

Another 1,204 people were injured, including 721 in a critical condition, the ministry said.

Civil defence Colonel Hicham Choukri who is heading relief operations told state television the epicentre and strength of the earthquake have created “an exceptional emergency situation”.

‘Unbearable’ screams 

Faisal Badour, an engineer, said he felt the quake three times in his building in Marrakesh.

“There are families who are still sleeping outside because we were so scared of the force of this earthquake,” he said. “The screaming and crying was unbearable.”

Frenchman Michael Bizet, 43, who owns three traditional riad houses in Marrakesh’s old town, told AFP he was in bed when the quake struck.

“I thought my bed was going to fly away. I went out into the street half-naked and immediately went to see my riads. It was total chaos, a real catastrophe, madness,” he said.

Footage on social media showed part of a minaret collapsed on Jemaa Al Fna square in the historic city.

An AFP correspondent saw hundreds of people flocking to the square to spend the night for fear of aftershocks, some with blankets while others slept on the ground.

Mimi Theobold, 25, a tourist from England, said she was with friends on a restaurant terrace when the tables began shaking and plates went flying.

Houda Outassaf, a local resident, said she was “still in shock” after feeling the earth shake beneath her feet, and losing relatives.

“I have at least 10 members of my family who died... I can hardly believe it, as I was with them no more than two days ago,” she said.

Hotelier Bernard Curi said he had been thrown out of his bed by the force of the shock. “The shaking was so strong I couldn’t get back up again right away.”

The interior ministry said authorities have “mobilised all the necessary resources to intervene and help the affected areas”.

The regional blood transfusion centre in Marrakesh called on residents to donate blood for those injured.

The Royal Moroccan Football Federation announced that a Cup of African Nations qualifier against Liberia, due to have been played on Saturday in the coastal city of Agadir, had been postponed indefinitely.

Significant damage likely 

“We heard screams at the time of the tremor,” a resident of Essaouira, 200 kilometres west of Marrakesh, told AFP. “Pieces of facades have fallen.”

The USGS PAGER system, which provides preliminary assessments on the impact of earthquakes, issued a “red alert” for economic losses, saying extensive damage is probable.

Foreign leaders expressed their condolences and many offered assistance, including Israel with which Morocco normalised relations in 2020.

Neighbour and regional rival Algeria announced it was suspending a two-year-old ban on all Moroccan flights through its airspace to enable aid deliveries and medical evacuations.

US President Joe Biden said he was “deeply saddened by the loss of life and devastation”.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping expressed “deep grief for the victims” and hope that “the Moroccan government and people will be able to overcome the impact of this disaster”.

Pope Francis expressed “his profound solidarity with those who are touched in the flesh and heart by this tragedy”.

In 2004, at least 628 people were killed and 926 injured when a quake hit Al Hoceima in northeastern Morocco, and in 1960 a magnitude 6.7 quake in Agadir killed more than 12,000.

The 7.3-magnitude El Asnam earthquake in Algeria killed 2,500 people and left at least 300,000 homeless in 1980.