Uganda plans to link a new railway line to neighbouring Tanzania, potentially opening up a new export route for minerals like gold, copper and iron ore.

Uganda currently sends the bulk of its commodities exports via the Kenyan port of Mombasa and has already announced plans to link its Standard Gauge Railway project to the one being built in Kenya, an initiative that remains in progress.

Uganda had not previously said it would seek to also connect the railway to Tanzania’s network and its port of Dar es Salaam.

In an official document, the Ugandan Ministry of Works and Transport said the railway would run from the border with Tanzania through the south and southwest of Uganda, ending at the town of Mpondwe on the border with Democratic Republic of Congo.

“The main objective of the project is to connect the vast and mineral-rich regions of both countries (Uganda and Tanzania) to the port of Dar es Salaam whilst saving time and transportation costs,” the document said.

The document also said that the African Development Bank (AfDB) could fund the project and that Democratic Republic of Congo could seek to link to it later.

A spokesman for the Ugandan ministry could not immediately be reached for comment.

The AfDB said it was considering a request to fund “preparation activities” for the rail project.

“The bank may consider financing the project, depending on the outcomes of the studies, if the project is found to be bankable,’’ bank official Epifanio Carvalho de Melo said.

“Late and clumsy” intervention by the government in trying to overturn the banning of Israeli Maccabi Tel Aviv fans from a match against Aston Villa only served to “inflame tensions”, a committee of MPs has found.

The move was “ineffective” and reflected “unfavourably on the culture of the Home Office”, the Home Affairs Committee report concluded.

The report into events surrounding the November Europa League match also found the decision by Birmingham’s Safety Advisory Group (SAG) may have been “unduly influenced by political pressure”.

A Home Office spokesperson said it was only informed a ban was “one possible option” before the decision was taken.

After reviewing evidence presented by West Midlands Police (WMP) the SAG ruled supporters of the Israeli club should not be permitted to attend the fixture over safety concerns. The force has since admitted it “overstated the evidence” used to make the decision.

Following the ban announcement, the government said it would do everything in its power to have the ban overturned.

Government intervention was “clumsy and came too late,” said Karen Bradley, chair of the Home Affairs Committee.

Police use of AI in drawing up its evidence led to “inaccurate and unverified information” which “reinforced false narratives”, said the report.

The “extraordinary measure” to ban fans seemed to have been taken to “make policing the match much easier”, added the Conservative committee chair.

“To justify this step, information that showed the Maccabi fans to be a high risk was trusted without proper scrutiny. Shockingly, this included unverified information generated by AI,” she said.

The former chief constable of the force, Craig Guildford announced his retirement on 16 January in the wake of damning criticism surrounding the issue.

It was “right” the chief constable had retired so the force could rebuild trust, the MPs’ report said.

Guildford’s retirement came after he admitted inaccuracies in evidence to the committee, including a denial the force had used AI to research evidence, including a non-existent match between the Israeli club and West Ham.

Senior officers did not intentionally mislead the committee over AI generated intelligence, but demonstrated a “remarkable lack of professional curiosity”, said the report.

The committee said it had considered the presence of Birmingham city councillors on the SAG, including one who had been campaigning against the fixture taking place.

Councillor for Aston ward, Mumtaz Hussain, had failed to declare an interest when attending a SAG meeting on 7 October, and “later characterised some Maccabi Tel Aviv fans as ‘thugs'”, the report states.

She recused herself from a later meeting on 24 October.

Councillor Waseem Zaffar, who has since passed away, did declare an interest as a campaigner against the match at the first SAG meeting.

It recommended that changes be made to ensure elected politicians can no longer sit on such groups.

Following a first appearance giving evidence to the committee, the force wrote to members of the Jewish community, apologising for giving the impression they had been consulted on the decision.

The report said it was “surprising and disappointing” Assistant Chief Constable Mike O’Hara was not more precise in his remarks about whether Jewish representatives had supported the ban.

The report concluded the government should give serious consideration to the proposal to introduce a new category for football matches of national significance.

The Home Office said it had sought to find ways by which fans could safely attend the game.

Following the incident, the home secretary withdrew confidence in the chief constable and said she planned to restore the power of government to sack police chiefs.

The report also criticised the West Midlands Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) who “appeared to prioritise defending the chief constable above holding him to account”.

In a statement, the PCC Simon Foster said he would be giving the report “careful consideration” but that he continued to hold the force to account.

WMP said it was “fully committed” to learning from the events surrounding the ban and was seeking to restore the public’s trust and confidence in the force.

Birmingham City Council leader John Cotton said that police evidence was the key driver of the SAG’s decision, “but there are also clear actions for the council, which we will undertake”.

Pakistan has carried out multiple overnight air strikes on Afghanistan, which the Taliban has said killed at least 18 people, including women and children.

Islamabad said the attacks targeted seven alleged militant camps and hideouts near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border and that they had been launched after recent suicide bombings in Pakistan.

Afghanistan condemned the attacks, saying they targeted multiple civilian homes and a religious school.

The fresh strikes come after the two countries agreed to a fragile ceasefire in October following deadly cross-border clashes, though subsequent fighting has taken place.

The Taliban’s defence ministry said the strikes targeted civilian areas of Nangarhar and Paktika provinces and had killed dozens of people.

In Girdi Kas village, in the Bihsud district of Nangarhar, a man named Shahabuddin told reporters while pointing at his destroyed house that of 23 members of his family, only five had survived the attack.

Local Taliban spokesman Sayed Taib Hamd said that 18 members of the family had been killed.

No deaths have been reported so far in the other areas hit. A guesthouse and a religious school were targeted in the Bermal and Urgun districts of Pakitka province, but they were empty at the time of the attacks, local officials and locals said.

Pakistan’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting said it had carried out “intelligence based selective targeting of seven terrorist camps and hideouts”.

In a statement on X, it said the targets included members of the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan, which the government refers to as “Fitna al Khawarij,” along with their affiliates and the Islamic State-Khorasan Province.

The ministry described the strikes as “a retributive response” to recent suicide bombings in Pakistan by terror groups it said were sheltered by Kabul.

The recent attacks in Pakistan included one on a Shia mosque in the capital Islamabad earlier this month, as well as others that took place since the holy month of Ramadan began this week in the north-western Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

Pakistan accused the Afghan Taliban of failing to take action against the militants, adding that it had “conclusive evidence” that the attacks were carried out by militants on the instructions of their leadership in Afghanistan.

The Taliban’s defence ministry later posted on X condemning the attacks as a “blatant violation of Afghanistan’s territorial integrity”, adding that they were a “clear breach of international law”.

It warned that “an appropriate and measured response will be taken at a suitable time”, adding that “attacks on civilian targets and religious institutions indicate the failure of Pakistan’s army in intelligence and security.”

The strikes come days after Saudi Arabia mediated the release of three Pakistani soldiers earlier this week, who were captured in Kabul during border clashes last October.

Those clashes ended with a tentative ceasefire that same month after the worst fighting since the Taliban returned to power in 2021.

Pakistan and Afghanistan share a 1,600-mile (2,574 km) mountainous border.