Pfc. Walter Lewark, 26, of Mountainair, N.M., died Thursday at Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti, the Defense Department announced in a statement Friday. He was assigned to Company A, 1st Battalion, 200th Infantry Regiment, 93rd Troop Command out of Rio Rancho, N.M.

Nigerian authorities on Friday confirmed the first case of the new coronavirus in sub-Saharan Africa as the outbreak spread to a region with some of the world's weakest health systems.

Police fired tear gas at a crowd of Kenyan ferry commuters as the country's first day of a coronavirus curfew slid into chaos. Elsewhere, officers were captured in mobile phone footage whacking people with batons.

African Lion, which was set to start March 23 in Morocco, will now only include activities that do not require lodging troops in close quarters, AFRICOM said.

For Augustine Ngabonziza, a survivor of Rwanda's genocide, it's difficult not to wonder whether God has become more distant these days. How else can one explain why a country that always comes together for the anniversary of the killings is now confined at home?

Even as Zimbabwe enters a “total lockdown” over the virus on Monday, social distancing is pushed aside in the struggle to obtain food, cash, cheap public transportation, even clean water.

Four soldiers and 63 jihadists have been killed in fighting between Niger’s army and heavily armed extremists in the nation’s west, the government said Friday.

The U.S. launched five airstrikes over two days against Al-Shabab militants in Somalia who were preparing to battle American-backed troops in a city south of Mogadishu, U.S. Africa Command said.

U.S. special operations forces begin large-scale exercises Monday in western Africa, where Pentagon leaders are mulling a troop cutback even as insurgent groups in the region gain ground.

South Africa announced its first deaths from the coronavirus Friday as the country's cases rose well above 1,000 and a three-week lockdown began, with military patrolling and police screaming at the homeless on quiet streets.

U.S. Africa Command said it is assessing a new allegation from a human rights group that two civilians were killed in separate February airstrikes in Somalia.

The Islamic state and al-Qaida are “on the march” in western Africa, where international efforts to counter extremists groups are insufficient, the head of U.S. Africa Command said Tuesday.

Spc. Henry Mayfield Jr., 23, from the Chicago suburb of Hazel Crest, was killed in the Sunday morning attack, his family told Chicago’s NBC affiliate.

Zimbabwe's public hospital doctors and nurses went on strike Wednesday over a lack of protective gear as the coronavirus begins to spread in a country whose health system has almost collapsed.

U.S. Africa Command said Monday that it has canceled one of its largest exercises on the continent over concerns about the coronavirus.

As long ago as late January, a Taiwanese American passenger on the MS Asara, a Nile River cruise ship, was carrying the coronavirus, health officials said. But the vessel would make at least four more cruises, and at least 12 crew members would turn out to be infected.

Gen. Stephen Townsend said Thursday that he has launched a security review of all bases housing U.S. troops in Africa in the wake of an attack on a Kenyan military post that left three Americans dead.

Documents shed light on Russia's apparent efforts to build influence in the oil-rich North African state at a time of U.S. disengagement.

The European Union announced Tuesday the launch of a new naval mission in the Mediterranean Sea aimed at enforcing the U.N. arms embargo on Libya, after Italy blocked a previous operation claiming that the warships attracted migrants to Europe's shores.

The cause of death is under investigation, according to Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa.

At the heart of the world's fastest-growing Islamist insurgency, a national force of approximately 12,000 soldiers struggles to defend a population of 20 million.

Groups linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State, at war with each other in the Middle East, are working together to take control of territory across a vast stretch of West Africa, U.S. and local officials say.

A day before the one-year anniversary of the Ethiopian Airlines crash of a Boeing 737 MAX that killed 157 people, the interim investigation report blamed Boeing’s design of the jet’s new flight control system and the training Boeing offered pilots.

U.S. and Kenyan military officials touted the delivery of the MD-530F Cayuse Warrior helicopters as a step that will enhance a force faced with a persistent terrorist threat coming out of neighboring Somalia.

The unit will be deployed to conduct missions to train, advise and assist “in spotlight African countries,” said Alyssa Farah, the chief Pentagon spokeswoman, in a prepared statement. No countries were listed in the statement nor how many people from the brigade will deploy.

An Arizona man contracted to fly aircraft for the U.S. military one of three Americans killed by Somali militants.

One U.S. servicemember and two Defense Department contractors were killed Sunday in Kenya after their military base came under attack y al-Qaida-aligned militants, U.S. Africa Command said.

A U.S. airstrike has killed a key planner in January’s deadly attack on U.S. forces in Kenya, where three Americans were killed after al-Qaida-connected militants stormed a local base, U.S. Africa Command said Tuesday.

Mohamud Haji Sirad, 55, a local manager of Hormuud, Somalia's largest telecom company, was killed when two missiles struck his farm on the outskirts of the rebel-held town of Jilib on Monday, Somali officials said.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan lobbed a rare direct rebuke at the rulers of Abu Dhabi over their backing of Khalifa Hifter and the Russian mercenaries fighting on his behalf in Libya.

Speaking at the end of his visit to Senegal, Mike Pompeo said he discussed the issue of the U.S. military presence in West Africa with President Macky Sall amid reports that the Trump administration intends to reduce troops in Africa.

After Trump's announcement, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari launched a committee to "study & address" the changes, his office tweeted Saturday.

Analysis

Turkey is in the ascendancy and Libya a divided, war-ravaged shell. Yet ties are being rekindled, inflaming a region that's still nursing the wound from the defining events of almost a half century ago.

The delivery comes as the U.S. vies with China for influence in Djibouti, a former French colony on the Horn of Africa that hosts China’s first overseas military base.