President Kabbah and the guerrilla leader Foday Sankoh arrange for shared government in Sierra Leone

A peace plan signed in Lusaka brings to an end eleven months of renewed civil war in the Congo

An amnesty is declared for some 8000 Muslim terrorists held in Algeria's gaols

Approximately 130,000 Hutus are held in gaol awaiting trial for their part in Rwanda's genocide

The UN commits 6000 troops to a peace-keeping role in war-torn Sierra Leone

Laurent Kabila, the president of the Congo, is assassinated in a failed coup attempt

The death of Jonas Savimbi is soon followed by the disbanding of UNITA and the end of 27 years of Angolan civil war

Civil war breaks out in the Darfur region of the Sudan, resulting in large numbers of civilian deaths and accusations of government-sponsored genocide

The Ebola virus epidemic begins, infecting at least 28,616 people and killing at least 11,310

In the Chibok schoolgirls kidnapping: more than 250 girls and women are abducted by Boko Haram to be held hostage.

Lethal attacks attributed to Boko Haram take place in a marketplace and bus station in Jos, Nigeria

A series of massacres in Baga, Nigeria and surrounding villages by Boko Haram kill more than 2,000 people.

Scientists announce the discovery in South Africa of Homo naledi, a previously unknown species of early human

The UN warns that the world is facing the largest humanitarian crisis since World War II, with up to 20 million people at risk of starvation and famine in Yemen, Somalia, South Sudan and Nigeria

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe is placed under house arrest, as the military take control of the country. He resigns six days later, after 37 years of rule

The world's last male northern white rhinoceros dies in Kenya, making the subspecies functionally extinct