Twice a year, an international team goes to the impoverished African nation to perform transformative facial surgery on social outcasts, says Tony McNamara

Colin Sheridan on Ireland’s footballing philosophy. The Beautiful Game it ain’t.

A record 20,000 runners will stride out on Merrion Square South tomorrow morning for the SSE Airtricity Dublin Marathon, with club runners from Acorn AC right through to Youghal in search of that coveted finishing medal.

Sir Mo Farah insists it is the right time to quit the track despite missing out on a fairytale finale.

An emotional Sir Mo Farah broke down in tears after missing out on a fairytale finale at the World Championships.

Furious Usain Bolt admitted he must improve his start as he plots a winning farewell at the World Championships.

Damien Enright visited an EFDA project in Ethiopia, and saw it was doing genuine good work

ETHIOPIA will forever leave images of solitary walkers in my mind’s eye, lone men and women walking beside country roads or on paths across endless plains, miles from villages or any habitation, writes Damien Enright.

Damien Enright recounts more tales from his travels in Ethiopia. 

LAST week, I said I’d be writing my next column from Ethiopia, and indeed I am, writes Damien Enright.

Damien Enright is heading off to roam the highlands and lowlands of Ethopia but not before he leaves you with some springtime inspiration.

UN envoy Mary Robinson has called for schoolchildren to be taught more about how their lives directly impact climate change.

Former president of Ireland Mary Robinson has said it is unfair that Ethiopians are suffering the worst effects of climate change as 10m people are hit by food shortages following the worst drought in 50 years.

Former president of Ireland Mary Robinson has said it is unfair that Ethiopians are suffering the worst effects of climate change as 10 million people are hit by food shortages following the worst drought in 50 years.

Up to 500 migrants may have drowned last week in the Mediterranean when human traffickers crammed people onto an already overcrowded ship, causing it to sink, the UN refugee agency said.

Up to 500 people are feared dead after a boat sank in the Mediterranean Sea last week, the UN refugee agency said.

ON A weekend when Islamic State released what appears to be a film of the murders of about 30 Ethiopians for no reason other than the fact that they were Christians, the differences thrown up by next month’s referendum on marriage equality may seem petty, almost academic.

Fionnuala Britton had to settle for fourth at the Antrim IAAF International Cross Country meeting in Greenmount on Saturday, succumbing in the closing stages having led on the last lap of the 5.6km course.

In a week where all things African were celebrated throughout the world we talked to some Afro-Irish about how important celebrating their African culture is.

Horses in their winter jackets look somewhat doleful as they stand casting long shadows in the sloping fields above the sea.

THEY are used to focusing on O’Byrne Cup and Waterford Crystal Cup action in January but five GAA inter-county stars are getting set for a pre-season game with a twist next week when they play in front of 20,000 Ethiopians.

Five people were killed when foreign tourists, including Austrian, Belgian, German, Hungarian and Italian nationals, were attacked by gunmen in Ethiopia.

ETHIOPIA is forcing tens of thousands of people off their land so it can lease it to foreign investors, leaving former landowners destitute and in some cases starving, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said yesterday.

WHILE the world’s attention is firmly focused on the famine in Somalia, another deepening food crisis is emerging in Ethiopia and is now affecting a population the size of Ireland, it has been warned.

Police in Kenya arrested a suspect in connection with the Uganda bomb attacks that killed 76 people watching the World Cup final on television.

Government borrowing to run the country for 10 days matches the entire overseas aid budget for one year, an under-fire junior minister revealed today.

Junior Minister Peter Power has defended the Government's record on overseas aid despite a €220m cut in the aid budget this year.

Police seized dozens of protesters in raids on two squats today as the hunt for violent G20 anarchists continued.

The pilot who managed to safely land a plane on the Hudson River in New York today, saving the lives of all 150 passengers on board, did “absolutely everything right,” according to an aviation expert.

Hundreds of Ethiopian soldiers have started pulling out of the Somali capital Mogadishu amid fears the troops’ departure will allow Islamic insurgents to take even more control of the lawless country.

THE European Commission and the international community must allocate further food resources to help the people of Ethiopia. It is accepted by the government there that 4.6 million people are at acute risk due to food shortages.

An Irish aid agency has ordered more than 70 tonnes of seeds for farmers whose families are starving to death in rural Ethiopia, it was revealed today.

THE combination of severe drought and rising food prices that has left hundreds of thousands in Ethiopia threatened with starvation must provoke a real sense of déjà vu for people in the west.

The generosity of Irish donors could prevent a chronic food shortage from taking the lives of thousands of hungry people, an aid agency claimed today.

TENS of thousands of Ethiopians are on the brink of starving to death because of a huge food shortage.

Tens of thousands of Ethiopians are on the brink of starving to death because of a massive food shortage.

A leader of Somalia’s ousted Islamic movement rejected a United Nations-brokered peace deal between the government and an opposition alliance, vowing the militants would fight on.

THE African dominance of global running was reinforced to stranglehold proportions at the world cross-country championships in Edinburgh yesterday where Ethiopians raced to all four individual gold medals and were deprived of gold in just two of the team races by their Kenyan neighbours who won both the senior and junior men’s contests.

R&B diva Beyonce Knowles began her world tour in front of an audience of 5,000 adoring and hysterical fans in Ethiopia, a country usually unimpressed by Western music.

THE Government must use its influence with the Ethiopian authorities to allow food aid to flow to the people of the Ogaden.

Rebels stormed a Chinese-run oil field at dawn in eastern Ethiopia today, killing 74 workers and destroying the facility, the guerrilla group and government officials said.

Eight Ethiopians who had been captured along with a group of European tourists who were released earlier today made their way back to the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa after being held for 52 days in one of the most inhospitable areas on Earth.

Heavy shelling and tank fire rocked Mogadishu today, the sixth day of raging battles in Somalia’s capital that have plunged the country deeper into chaos and left more than 200 people dead.