A boat with at least 45 refugees has capsized off the coast of Yemen’s Taiz on Wednesday night, and there are only four survivors, the U.N. refugee agency in Yemen said on Thursday. The boat capsized because of strong winds and overloading, the agency added. It said it was working with the International Organization for Migration (IOM) to assist the survivors and provide protection. No further details were provided about the rest of the refugees. In June, at least 49 migrants died and 140 went missing after their vessel, which departed from Somalia carrying 260 migrants, capsized of the Yemeni coast. IOM, which runs a tally of migrants who are killed or go missing on migration routes, has since 2014 recorded 1,860 migrant deaths and disappearances along the route running from East Africa and the Horn of Africa to Gulf countries. According to the United Nations, 97,000 migrants arrived in Yemen from the Horn of Africa last year. (Reuters)

In a statement released [yesterday], the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Somaliland said it “vehemently rejects any potential deployment of Turkish naval forces within Somaliland’s recognized maritime zones.” This comes in the backdrop of the recent announcement that Turkey was poised to send its navy support to Somali waters following an earlier agreement between Ankara and Mogadishu that will allow Turkey to send an exploration vessel off the coast of Somalia to prospect for oil and gas…In February this year, Turkey and Somalia signed a defense cooperation in the wake of Somalia’s rejection of the Memorandum of Understanding signed between Ethiopia and Somaliland earlier in January. (Addis Standard)

Eritrean authorities have suspended all flights by Ethiopian Airlines to the East African nation effective Sept. 30, the airline said on Wednesday. Flights from Ethiopia to Eritrea had resumed in 2018 after two decades, following a peace deal between the two neighbours that earned Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed a Nobel peace prize a year later…State-owned Ethiopian Airlines is ranked the largest in Africa by revenue and profit by the global industry body International Air Transport Association. (Reuters)

The UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported that the death toll from the landslide that struck the Gofa zone in South Ethiopia region has reached 257 as of Thursday, 24 July 2024…According to the office, search and rescue operations are still ongoing under the leadership of local authorities with the support from the Ethiopian Red Cross Society and community members – mainly digging through mounds of mud with their bare hands and spades for lack of other options, and local officials expect the death toll to rise to up to 500 people. In its second flash update report since the incident on Monday this week, the UNOCHA said more than 15,000 people, including at least 1,320 children under 5 years of age and 5,293 pregnant and lactating women, are at high risk of further landslides and need to be evacuated to safe zones immediately. (Addis Standard)