ANTANANARIVO (Reuters) - Floods across the island of Madagascar has killed at least 12 people this week, with 18 missing, after unseasonably heavy rain, the national disaster office said on Thursday.

DAR ES SALAAM (Reuters) - Tanzanian President John Magufuli fired his home affairs minister Kangi Lugola on Thursday, accusing him of mismanaging a 408 million euro ($453 million) fire department contract.

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa's Department of Health said on Thursday port health authorities have enhanced surveillance for all travellers from Asia, especially China, following an outbreak of coronavirus in the country.

HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe has only 100,000 tonnes of grain in its strategic reserves, enough to last just over a month, as the southern African nation suffers the effects of a severe drought, according to the agriculture minister.

LISBON (Reuters) - Angola could issue an international arrest warrant for billionaire Isabel dos Santos if she fails to cooperate with a fraud investigation in which she has been named as a suspect, its chief prosecutor was quoted as saying.

THE HAGUE (Reuters) - The International Court of Justice on Thursday ordered Myanmar to take urgent measures to protect its Rohingya population from atrocities, a ruling hailed as a "triumph of international justice" by the tiny African country that brought the case.

ALGIERS (Reuters) - Algerian Foreign Minister Sabri Boukadoum told visiting envoys from other countries neighbouring Libya on Thursday that he hoped their meeting would strengthen a fragile truce in the country and help avert more foreign influence there.

OUAGADOUGOU (Reuters) - Burkina Faso's parliament has voted to provide funding and training to local vigilantes in response to the growing firepower of jihadist groups who threaten to overrun government forces across large swathes of the West African country.

MAKURDI, Nigeria (Reuters) - Thomas Tyavwva Maji is planting rice on more of his land in Nigeria's Benue State than ever to take advantage of a surge in prices since the country shut its land borders in August.

JUBA (Reuters) - Suspected Misseriya tribesmen killed at least 29 people, at least some of whom burned to death in their homes, in an attack on a village in the disputed Abyei border region of South Sudan on Wednesday, a regional administrator said.

DUBAI (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia has asked the United States to remove Sudan from its list of state sponsors of terrorism, Saudi state TV said on Wednesday, citing Minister of State for African Affairs Ahmed bin Abdul Aziz Qattan.

BLANTYRE (Reuters) - A prominent Malawi banker has been arrested in connection with a suspected attempt to bribe a panel of five judges presiding over the country's presidential election vote-rigging case, the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) said on Wednesday.

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Conservationists in Sudan are trying to save four lions they say have been underfed and neglected in a wildlife park in the capital Khartoum, after one lion died earlier this week.

LISBON (Reuters) - Angola's billionaire former first daughter, Isabel dos Santos, has decided to sell her stake in Portuguese bank Eurobic, the small lender said on Wednesday.

JUBA (Reuters) - South Sudan's President Salva Kiir has appointed a former deputy governor at the central bank as its new governor, a government official said.