The number of people displaced by conflict and natural disaster in Central and East Africa is now more than 11 million, the United Nations said on Monday.

Somalia's worst drought in a decade is pushing growing numbers of children into near-famine conditions and deepening the humanitarian crisis caused by political violence, the United Nations warned on Tuesday.

Some 3.2 million Somalis are among an estimated 19 million people in the Horn of Africa in urgent need of life-saving food assistance, top UN aid officials said.

International researchers launched a $12 million study on Monday intended to help many of the world's poorest farmers benefit from multi-billion dollar schemes to limit emissions of greenhouse gases.

The 18-month Carbon Benefits Project will examine rural sites in Kenya, Niger, Nigeria and China to see how much carbon is stored in trees and soil when land is managed sustainably.

A Kenyan and a Tanzanian pleaded guilty on Monday to illegal possession of ivory after being caught with hundreds of kilos of elephant tusks in one of east Africa's biggest seizures for years.

The two men were driving a car loaded with 512 kg (1,129 lbs) of tusks when they were arrested in Kenya on Saturday, 50 km (30 miles) from the Tanzanian border.

A network of "super-reefs" off east Africa are unusually resilient to climate change and could provide important lessons for coral conservation in other parts of the world, researchers said on Friday.

Experts say the planet has lost about a fifth of its corals and warn that many of the remaining reefs could die in the next 20 to 40 years, unless greenhouse gas emissions are reduced.

A Kenyan man bit a python who wrapped him in its coils and hauled him up a tree in a struggle that lasted hours, local media said on Wednesday.

Farm manager Ben Nyaumbe was working at the weekend when the serpent, apparently hunting for livestock, struck in the Malindi area of Kenya's Indian Ocean coast.