The Egyptian interior ministry has said security forces in Egypt have mistakenly killed 12 people, including Mexican tourists during an anti-terror operation, BBC reported Monday morning that the tourists were travelling in four buses that entered a "banned area" in the Wahat area of the Western Desert, the ministry said in a statement.

A total 320 were rescued from an overcrowded smuggling boat in the Mediterranean Sea north of Libya, VOA reported Saturday adding that  40 migrants had been reported dead.

The Italian navy was quoted as saying the fatalities were believed caused by what appeared to be inhalation of exhaust fumes in the hold of the boat, although the death toll was not yet final.VOA says Europe has been flooded by tens of thousands of desperate migrants fleeing poverty and armed conflicts in North Africa and the Middle East.

As Chad grapples to secure islands on Lake Chad used by Nigeria’s rebel group Boko Haram as hideouts and bases to launch attacks, Chadian forces have reportedly killed seven of the rebels in a clash on Wednesday, a security source said.

Last week Chad said it killed 117 Boko Haram fighters as part of a two-week offensive on the lake that borders Nigeria, Niger and Cameroon, according to Reuters.

Amnesty International said Friday that many Muslims returning to western areas of the Central African Republic after last year's intercommunal massacres are being threatened and "forced to abandon their religion," Uganda’s Daily Monitor reported Saturday.

"Having forced tens of thousands of Muslims to flee western CAR, anti-balaka militias are now repressing the religious identity of the hundreds of Muslims who remained or who have returned," said Joanne Mariner, the London-based rights group's senior crisis response adviser.

Zimbabwe’s environment minister Oppah Muchinguri has said his country is working around the clock to have the American dentist who killed Cecil the lion extradited to Zimbabwe.

The announcement made Friday is the first official comment from Zimbabwe following Cecil’s killing which grabbed worldwide attention this week.Muchinguri said Prosecutor General had started the process to have 55-year-old Walter Palmer extradited from the United States. He described Cecil as an exceptional black-maned lion renowned by tourists in the Hwange National Park, as an "iconic attraction".

Thousands of illegal Nigerians who have been living illegally in Cameroon have been deported as part of new security initiatives aimed at preventing further attacks by Boko Haram Militants.Regional newspaper L'Oeil du Sahel reported that about 2,500 Nigerians had been "rounded up" in Kousseri, in the far north of Cameroon, and sent back to their country on Thursday.

At least five people are dead after a suicide bomber struck in Gamboru market on Friday, reports from the town of Maiduguri in northeastern Nigeria said according to VOA.

A reporter with VOA quoted witnesses to Friday's bombing as saying a number of people were injured as well. Although no one has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, VOA says the region is a hotbed of Boko Haram activity. Boko Haram has carried out a string of such assaults in the area that have killed hundreds in recent weeks.

In a new twist to solve the current crisis  affecting heavily indebted states in the Nigeria, some of Nigeria’s commercial banks heavily exposed to Nigeria’s near bankrupt states impounded the dividends from the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG). This move is intended to offset the loans granted to the states.

This revelation was made today by Governor Abdulazeez Yari of the northern Nigeria Zamfara state. He was explaining the current salary crisis in several states even with the release of the funds anticipated to give some assistance to the indebted states.

The Nigerian Army says they have rescued 71 people from the home grown Boko Haram militants. The captives, mostly girls and women were freed during firefights that killed many Boko Haram militants in villages near the northeastern city of Maiduguri on Thursday.

A leading fisherman and a resident in northeastern Nigeria have said the notorious Boko Haram rebels on Monday  killed 10 fishermen on the shores of the Lake Chad in northeastern Nigeria , Express Tribune reported Thursday.

“On Monday around 4pm (1500 GMT), Boko Haram attacked three villages on the shores of Lake Chad where they slaughtered 10 people, all of them fishermen,” Abubakar Gamandi, head of the fishermen’s union in Borno State, told AFP according to Express Tribune.