Worancha ወራንቻ

SWERVING around potholes and speeding through chaotic traffic makes skateboarding the crowded streets of Ethiopia’s capital a risky game. Yet, growing numbers of fans are taking up this once unknown sport in Addis Ababa and attracting the support of skateboarders worldwide. In the bustling market district of Shiro Meda, gangs of children rattle down the hills, flipping boards painted in the colours of Ethiopia — green, yellow and red — as they show off the latest tricks they’ve learnt. It’s a tough area and skateboarding offers moments of fun and escape for the young people living here. “There’s nothing for the kids in the neighbourhood, nothing to inspire them,” said Israel Dejene, founder of a local skateboarding group, who said he was inspired by watching children slide down the pavements with bits of plastic fixed to the bottom of their shoes for fun. “These skate sessions are the only positive thing they can do,” added Israel, who named his Megabiskate project after th

Jump media player Media player help Out of media player. Press enter to return or tab to continue. Media caption Relief for these migrants as they are freed after 48 hours hiding in a hay-bale truck By a checkpoint outside the Libyan city of Misrata, a truck full of hay-bales is opened by border guards and a badly-kept secret is revealed. Inside are women and children, and men too. Fifty people, migrants, in each truck, smuggled across the desert. They had been inside for two days without food or water, some almost suffocated. Abdul Rahim thought he would die. He has since been transferred to a Libyan jail. Abdul Rahim says he was treated like cargo "I paid 3,570 Libyan dinar (£1,700; $2,600) to be smuggled," he told me. "We were treated like cargo, the smugglers took a cut at every step." People smugglers don't take too kindly to enquiries about their business but, after weeks of searching, one agreed to speak to me if he cou

Within a week, Ethiopians were hit with a quadruple whammy. On April 19, the Libyan branch of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL)  released a shocking video  purporting to show the killings and beheadings of Ethiopian Christians attempting to cross to Europe through Libya. This came only days after an anti-immigrant mob in South Africa  killed at least three Ethiopian immigrants  and wounded many others. Al Jazeera America reported that thousands of Ethiopian nationals  were stranded in war-torn Yemen. And in the town of Robe in Oromia and its surroundings alone, scores of people were reportedly grieving over the loss of family members at sea aboard a fateful Europe-bound boat that sank April 19 off the coast of Libya with close to 900 aboard. These tragedies may have temporarily united Ethiopians of all faiths and ethnic backgrounds. But they have also raised questions about what kind of desperation drove these migrants to leave their country and risk journeys through