A hospital used by Ugandan schoolchildren to shelter from the heavy rains turned into a death trap as a landslide engulfed the building, leaving more than 50 pupils missing.

KENYAN authorities had arrested a man, now charged with attempting to kill a Danish cartoonist, after he arrived ahead of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s visit earlier this year, a police official said yesterday.

More US Navy forces were sent to surround a hijacked ship loaded with Russian-made tanks today.

The Irish aid agency GOAL is evacuating its staff from the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, amid escalating ethnic violence in the country.

Eleven people were killed in and around the Kenyan capital during a surge in violence overnight, including two people found beheaded and eight killed in a shoot-out, police said today.

Gunmen carjacked a US Embassy vehicle on the outskirts of the Kenyan capital today, killing two women in the car, police said.

Somali and Ethiopian forces skirmished with Islamic militiamen in southern Somalia Thursday, as US troops on the ground hunted for al-Qaida suspects.

A SENIOR al-Qaida suspect wanted for bombing American embassies in east Africa was killed in a US airstrike, a Somali official said yesterday.

Witnesses reported renewed air strikes aimed at Islamic militant targets in Somalia today, and a Somali official claimed that a senior al-Qaida figure had been killed.

Helicopter gunships attacked suspected al-Qaida fighters in southern Somalia a today – a day after US forces launched airstrikes in the eastern African nation.

Helicopter gunships were today seen launching new attacks in Somalia, close to the scene of a US airstrike aimed at suspected al-Qaida terrorists.

Somali government troops backed by Ethiopians today prepared to launch a major assault on the last stronghold of Islamic movement militiamen.

SOMALIA’S interior minister said yesterday that thousands of fighters loyal to the deposed Islamic Courts régime still pose a threat in the capital, while a Somali government spokesman said government troops — backed by Ethiopian soldiers — are fighting about 600 Islamic militiamen in the south of the country.

SOMALI Government troops backed by Ethiopian soldiers have entered Kismayo, the last major stronghold of a militant Islamic movement, residents said yesterday.

Somali government troops backed by Ethiopian soldiers have entered Kismayo, the last major stronghold of a militant Islamic movement, residents said today.

Fighting erupted today on the outskirts of Somalia's militant Islamic movement's last remaining stronghold as thousands fled advancing Ethiopian troops supported by tanks and MiG fighter jets.

Emergency workers in Nairobi pulled four survivors from a collapsed building today as rescue teams from Israel, Britain and the US arrived in the Kenyan capital, but the death toll rose to 14 despite their efforts.

A five-storey building collapsed in central Nairobi today with more than 280 construction workers inside, killing at least seven people and injuring more than 70, witnesses and officials said.

A powerful earthquake hit the Lake Tanganyika area of central Africa today and was felt as far away as the Kenyan coast.

Sudanese government and rebel officials signed an agreement today promising to end the 21-year civil war in Sudan by the end of the year.

GALWAY legend Joe Connolly has been busily spreading the gospel of hurling.

A FIRE raced through a Nairobi slum on Thursday night, destroying hundreds of ramshackle tin and timber houses and leaving up to 30,000 people homeless in the Kenyan capital.

Twenty-three people have died after an overloaded minibus plunged into a river near the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, today.

The search for an Irish child missing after three other members of its family drowned off the Kenyan coast is resuming this morning.

The Department of Foreign affairs is confirming an Irish woman, her British