Repeated drone attacks near the Sudan capital’s airport have disrupted flights and raised questions about passenger safety, while aviation experts call for a temporary suspension of commercial operations pending an independent risk assessment. Five successive waves of drone attacks attributed to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have struck Khartoum, including areas around the capital’s international airport, killing a man and four children and raising fresh concerns over aviation safety. The attacks targeted seven locations across the city, according to Radio Dabanga. Air defences reportedly intercepted threats directed at the airport and its facilities, while a drone fell in an unoccupied area east of the runway, with no casualties reported at the site. Radio Dabanga

In Mekelle, shops are reopening, and banks are resuming services, but residents remain anxious about what comes next. Ethiopian federal forces and allied fighters retook the Tigray regional capital on October 4, as renewed fighting raised fears that the region’s fragile recovery could be derailed once again. Tigray, in northern Ethiopia, is still recovering from the 2020–2022 war between federal forces and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), the region’s dominant political movement. For residents, the return of fighting has brought new uncertainty over jobs, education, security and the future. … Near the Eritrean border, military movements and conflicting accounts of troop deployments have heightened fears that the fighting could spread beyond Tigray. Al Jazeera

A senior official with Tanzania’s main opposition Chadema party was on Wednesday charged with treason, which carries a potential death penalty. The prosecution of John Pambalu represents another example of the repression of government critics after the October 2025 elections which were marked by widespread and bloodily repressed protests. Pambalu, a member of Chadema’s national council and former leader of the party’s youth wing, is accused of intending to “persuade the public to cause obstruction of the General Election” in 2025, the charge sheet read. … The party was eventually excluded from the October 2025 vote, which was eventually won by President Samia Suluhu Hassan with 98 percent of the vote, according to official results. Around 2,000 people were killed by the police and security forces during the post-election demonstrations, according to the opposition and rights groups. AFP

Africa has for decades been a transit point for Latin American cocaine making its way to European markets. The explosion in demand for cocaine and synthetic stimulants (notably methamphetamine), coupled with growing interdiction efforts in the Western Hemisphere, has resulted in a significant scaling up of Latin American cartel operations in Africa in recent years. While the organizational arrangements between Latin American and African criminal networks often remain opaque, the growing influence of Latin American criminal organizations in Africa is having far-reaching implications for security, the enrichment of African criminal organizations, the viability of licit markets, and accountable governance on the continent. Africa Center for Strategic Studies