The United States Government has officially signed an award with Tamra for Social Development Organization to implement the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) Community-Led Monitoring Project in Ethiopia in 85 health facilities nationally with a total grant of $590,000 (62 million ETB). The project will help reduce HIV infection and transmission, ensure all HIV-positive beneficiaries are retained in care, and improve the health and well-being of children living with and affected by HIV/AIDS. 

The PEPFAR Community Led Monitoring (CLM) aims to empower clients and communities, as well as to assist PEPFAR program and healthcare service providers in identifying and addressing persistent issues, challenges, and barriers related to the delivery, retention, and quality of HIV services at the community and facility levels. 

During the award signing ceremony, Ambassador Ervin J. Massigna emphasized that sustainability requires investing in a robust civil society that can advocate for patients.  

An Egyptian warship has delivered a second major cache of weaponry to Somalia including anti-aircraft guns and artillery, port and military officials said on Monday, in a move likely to stoke further friction between the two countries and Ethiopia. Ties between Egypt and Somalia have grown this year over their shared mistrust of Ethiopia, prompting Cairo to send several plane loads of arms to Mogadishu, Somalia’s capital, after the countries signed a joint security pact in August. Ethiopia angered Mogadishu by agreeing a preliminary deal in January with the breakaway region of Somaliland to lease land for a port in exchange for possible recognition of its independence from Somalia. Egypt, at odds with Ethiopia for years over Addis Ababa’s construction of a vast hydro dam on the headwaters of the Nile River, has condemned the Somaliland deal. The Egyptian warship began unloading the weapons on Sunday, one diplomat said. Security forces blocked off the quayside and surrounding roads on Sunday and Monday as convoys carried the weapons to a defence ministry building and nearby military bases, two port workers and two military officials told Reuters. (Reuters)

A group of South Sudanese lawyers filed a case challenging the postponement of elections and extension of the transitional government’s tenure for 24 months. Barely two weeks ago, South Sudan’s presidency announced an extension of the transitional period by two more years while elections initially scheduled for December 2024 was pushed until 2026. The extension was immediately endorsed by the cabinet and approved by the national assembly. But the lawyers, in a petition to the Supreme Court, want the extension nullified. “… As lawyers, we think that this extension is unconstitutional, is illegal and we (are) demanding our government to conduct elections within the time-frame,” Deng John Deng told reporters Monday. … The United States ambassador to South Sudan, Michael J. Adler said the extension of the transitional period marked the “failure” of South Sudan’s leaders to create conditions necessary to hold genuine, peaceful and inclusive elections. In August 2022, a similar extension was made by the parties, citing unpreparedness. (Sudan Tribune)

Cholera is spreading in war-torn Sudan, killing at least 388 people and sickening about 13,000 others over the past two months, health authorities said, as more than 17 months of fighting between the military and a notorious paramilitary group shows no sign of abating. The disease is spreading in areas devastated by recent heavy rainfall and floods especially in eastern Sudan where millions of war displaced people sheltered. The casualties from cholera included six dead and about 400 sickened over the weekend, according to Sunday’s report by the Health Ministry. The disease was detected in 10 of the country’s 18 provinces with the eastern Kassala and al-Qadarif provinces the most hit, the ministry said. Cholera is a fast-developing, highly contagious infection that causes diarrhea, leading to severe dehydration and possible death within hours when not treated, according to the World Health Organization. It is transmitted through the ingestion of contaminated food or water. … Fighting, meanwhile, rages in al-Fasher, the last major city in Darfur that is still held by the military. The RSF has been attempting to retake it since the start of the year. (VOA/AP)