The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) may have been hosting the London Conference on Somalia but there was no doubting that Downing Street was in the driving seat.

It was a tough week for President Mwai Kibaki, 80. While he was attending the Somalia Conference in London, two of his closest friends died.

John Stanley Njoroge Michuki had a hero’s send-off in his native Kangema constituency on 28 February, testimony that the idea of the Big Man is alive and well...

Work will begin soon on the long-awaited new Ethiopia-Djibouti Railway. The two governments and their Chinese contractors are creating a US$1.5-billion trade corridor from Addis Ababa to the Djibouti...

After two decades of political mayhem, Somalis and more perspicacious foreign diplomats are intensely sceptical about high-level conferences. Many approach the London Conference on Somalia on 23 February...

Sudan and South Sudan are dragging a reluctant China into their smouldering relations at a time when both sides say the situation is on the brink of open...

Tension in Sudan and South Sudan boosts the Kenyan backers of the Lamu port and corridor projects. South Sudanese officials had already been in talks to join their...

Few outside the Juba government had expected it to start shutting down oil production on 22 January. Warnings from the Government of South Sudan had been widely seen...

Whatever the outcome of the oil talks between the Khartoum and Juba governments, the current crisis has focused thinking on southward leading pipelines. Industry and diplomatic opinion is...

By approving the indictment of four very important people, the International Criminal Court has begun to unravel Kenya’s ruling networks of ethnic patronage. This is happening just as...