An Algerian court has sentenced blogger Merzoug Touati to 10 years in prison for sharing sensitive information with a foreign country.

The court in the port city of Bejaia found Mr Touati, 30, guilty of "leaking intelligence to agents of a foreign country to damage the military and diplomatic interests of Algeria".

The prosecutors have sought life imprisonment.

Expatriates working in Kenya have been given 60 days to regularise their status with the authorities as the government intensifies a crackdown on illegal foreign workers in the country. The interior minister, Fred Matiang’i said the government is determined to weed out undocumented foreigners because they are a security threat and deny the government tax revenue in addition to cheating Kenyans of job opportunities.

South Africa is set to launch its first automated optical telescope on Friday, in the province of Northern Cape, the headquarters of the country's space exploration project. The multimillion MeerLICHT optical telescope could soon help unravel the mysteries of the universe, beginning with a closer look at the vast African skies.

More than 7,500 prisoners have been pardoned in the Ethiopian state of Oromia, bringing the number of those released there in the last year to more than 30,000.

Those freed in this round had not been found guilty of murder, rape or corruption, Taye Dendea, from Oromia’s justice bureau, told the BBC.

Ethiopia has been hit by a wave of political unrest in recent years.

Fighting between Somalia’s semi-autonomous Puntland region and breakaway Somaliland has killed dozens of soldiers, according to a witness and a military commander who spoke of a “hellish” outbreak of violence, according to Reuters. The clashes on Thursday morning appeared to be a resumption of more than 10 years of periodic conflict between Puntland and Somaliland over the disputed Sool region.

About 50 people have died after a boat sank in the Condo River in north-west of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Deputy Governor of Tshuapa province Richard Mboyo Iluka said. The deputy governor, said the fishing boat that left the village of Monkoto for Mbandaka was loaded with passengers when it sank while on transit.