An overview of forests as global ecosystems
Nigeria has freed 308 people who had been held captive for months after a joint military, police and counter-terrorism operation recovered hostages from Kainji Lake national park. The group includes 163 people taken in February from Woro in Kwara state and 145 taken mainly in Niger state; survivors are receiving medical checks at an army facility.
Scientists reconstruct ancient forests using fossil leaf cuticles to show canopy loss during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, revealing how forests thin, then recover slowly—an event linked to today’s rapid CO2 rise and warming.
NDLEA has arrested a Mexican national, Arturo Carrera Loaiza, at Lagos airport as part of a crackdown on an industrial-scale methamphetamine network. Investigators link Loaiza to a forest-laboratory operation in Ogun and Oyo states and a dismantled Ebonyi facility, with substantial quantities of chemicals and equipment seized.
Algeria has moved to broaden the allowed uses of the death penalty to include arson that fuels wildfires and child kidnapping linked to torture or mutilation. The bill, already passed by parliament, would keep the moratorium on executions in place until worldlier review, with the senate to ratify before Tebboune signs off. Amnesty International condemns the move as retrograde while rights groups warn of deterred prevention efforts.