Obama is in Africa, Mandela is reportedly on life support, Rio Tinto’s coal mining is in trouble in part of Africa, and you have to wonder what would make a young man give up a $40 million sports contract.

US President Barack Obama is in Dakar, Senegal on a weeklong, 3-country trip to Africa.  He’s got a lot of work to do on the continent to undo the past 13 years of inattention during which emerging China became Africa’s largest trading partner.

Obama’s visit could be overshadowed by the events in Pretoria, as South Africa.  Former SA President is in hospital and reportedly on life support.  South Africa’s current leader Jacob Zuma has cancelled a meeting in Mozambique to stay close to Mandela, whose 95th birthday is in three weeks on 18 July.

Rio Tinto is suspending coal exports from Mozambique because the opposition Renamo party is threatening to disrupt the railway line that carries coal to the coast.  Many locals say they are not seeing any benefits from Mozambique resources trade, handled largely by multinationals and foreign companies.  The Renamo Party was formed from a former guerilla movement.

A least two people were killed and scores are hurt in unrest in a city north of Cairo.  It happened a few hours before Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi gave an address marking his year in office.  It started out conciliatory and then went off into finger pointing bender at opposition politicians, judges, and a journalist.  The military deployed troops to several cities in advance of what is expected to be massive, planned demonstrations against Morsi on 30 June.

More than 100,000 people are now dead in the Syrian Civil War.  The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which has released many reports in support of the rebels, says most of the dead were combatants.  But it’s difficult to get an accurate count because neither side has been forthcoming with casualty counts.  The UN recently put the death toll at 93,000 lives lost.

Conservative PM Sali Berisha has conceded defeat, Tirana mayor Edi Rana’s Socialist Party is the apparent landslide winner of Albania’s elections, and Rana is promising to apply for European Union membership, perhaps as soon as within a year.  That’s going to require sweeping reforms to clean up organized crime and widespread corruption that the EU would likely require before Albania joins.

27 people are dead in violence in China’s far west Xinjiang province, where there is tension between the ethnic Han Chinese from the east and local Uigher Muslim communities.  The reports are not clear on which group attacked whom, but did said that knife-wielding mobs confronted police who opened fire.

Hours after he was arrested on suspicion of murder, the new England Patriots American Football team cancelled the 5-year, $40 Million contract of Aaron Hernandez.  Police say that the 23-year old Hernandez shot and killed his friend, 27-year old semi-pro Football player Odin Lloyd.  Hernandez’ lawyer says the cops’ case is circumstantial, but a judge ordered him held without bail.