Africa

West African leaders are holding a crucial summit in Nigeria's capital Abuja, focusing on the morale-sapping departure of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger from their 15-member bloc Ecowas.

Few think the military rulers of the three dissident states can be persuaded to pause or reverse their decision.

While faced with this blow to regional unity, West Africa is also poised to start work on a 1,028km (689 miles) highway from Ivory Coast's main city Abidjan - through Ghana, Togo and Benin - to Nigeria's biggest city Lagos.

Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, has long been known as “the green city in the sun” because of its mix of forest and grasslands among the urban sprawl, but it all depends on where you are viewing it from.

Seen from one of the city’s comfortable apartment blocks or homes, then yes, perhaps – from one of its densely packed slums, then no.

There, life can be characterised by poverty and ecological disaster, such as flooding and deadly landslides.

A flock of rare breed sheep has been brought in to help conservation efforts over the winter months at a park.

The Dorset Down sheep have been introduced at High Woods Country Park in Colchester by the city council.

Their addition is part of the Legacy Grazing Project, which works with a number of councils in Essex to protect and nurture wild spaces using traditional grazing methods.

Dola Posh has multiple identities: Photographer; woman; Nigerian; mother; Briton.

Yet after giving birth, she no longer felt sure who she was.

Six days after her daughter was born, she was lying in a bed in an English hospital, in the midst of a covid lockdown.

She worried about how her life had changed and if she would ever again do what she loved - taking pictures.

Unable to visit, relatives kept on calling to check up on her and the baby. After a difficult pregnancy, Dola felt under pressure.