Reuters, Juba
At least 45 people have died in fighting between ethnic groups in South Sudan’s northern state of Western Lakes, a local official said, in a new source of violence in a country already devastated by a four-year civil war.
Shadrack Bol Maachok, the state’s information minister, said the clashes in Malek county started after a group of young people from the Ruop ethnic group attacked rival youth from the Pakam tribe on Wednesday and Thursday.
World’s oldest eye
discovered
PTI, London
A 530-million-year-old fossil of an extinct sea creature contains what could be the oldest eye ever discovered, a study has found.
The remains include an early form of the eye seen in many of today’s animals, including crabs, bees and dragonflies, researchers said.
Scientists, including those from the University of Edinburgh in the UK, made the finding while examining the well-preserved fossil of a hard-shelled species – called a trilobite.
Taliban kill 3 Afghan soldiers
AP, Kabul
Taliban insurgents killed three Afghan soldiers in an attack on a checkpoint early Saturday, an official said.
Arif Noori, spokesman for the provincial governor of the eastern Ghazni province, said two other soldiers were wounded. He says eight insurgents were killed and more than 10 others were wounded.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the attack, saying the fighters were able to overrun the checkpoint and seize weapons and ammunition.
The Taliban has stepped up its attacks on Afghan security forces in recent years, seizing control of several districts across the country.
Zimbabwe names diplomat Moyo as top spy
Reuters, Harare
Zimbabwe has named a former diplomat as the head of its intelligence agency, state-owned newspaper The Herald said on Saturday.
Isaac Moyo, who was serving as an ambassador to neighboring South Africa and Lesotho, replaces retired army general Happyton Bonyongwe, the paper quoted chief secretary to the president, Misheck Sibanda, as saying.
No one was immediately available to comment in President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s office. The Herald is a mouthpiece for the government.
Moyo takes over a domestic spy network, the Central Intelligence Organisation, that permeates every institution and section of society and has been used by former President Robert Mugabe to stay in power.
