BBC News Middle East

Eighteen victims of human trafficking have been rescued en route to destinations in the Gulf nations where they were to be sold into slavery, according to Kenya’s Directorate of Criminal Investigations.

The victims, all male Ethiopian nationals, were found in a house in Athi River, on the outskirts of the capital, Nairobi, during a raid by detectives from the Transnational Organized Crimes Unit.

Three suspects, all Kenyan nationals, were detained, police said.

This comes just a day after 24-year-old Diana Chepkemoi jetted back to the country after experiencing cruelty at the hands of an employer in Saudi Arabia.

She said many other abused Kenyans were trapped in the Middle-Eastern country, and urged the government to help them.

Kenya’s Principal Secretary Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Macharia Kamau, said that the challenge the country faced was the export of labour as house helps to Saudi Arabia.

“We have told Kenyans repeatedly to stop sending this category of workers to Saudi. You’ve chosen not to listen,” Mr Kamau said.

But Kenyans online have criticised him, as well as the government, of ambivalence to the plight of its citizens working as domestic workers in Saudi Arabia.

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A Moroccan parliamentary group has proposed a bill that would see women granted paid menstrual leave days.

If made law, the country would be the second in Africa, after Zambia, to grant women menstrual leave.

In what would be a first for the Middle East-North Africa region, the proposal by the social justice group aims at improving the condition of women at work.

Female employees will not need to provide medical evidence every time they need to be away from work.

Speaking to the BBC, Mustapha Dahmani, the Coordinator of the Social Justice Group, said the bill still needs to be discussed and approved by the Moroccan government later this month.

If the bill becomes law, it will be rolled out in phases, starting with government employees, as a way of assessing how effective and practical it would be.

Some women support the proposal while others feel there are much more pressing issues the government should address.

“The proposal is not an emergency law. We have women who suffer and who give birth in difficult conditions in the absence of hospitals in remote regions of the country. I think that the parliamentary groups must focus on these difficult conditions of rural women and especially health matters.” Aicha Salmi, a member of a women’s association, told the BBC.

Other countries that offer paid menstrual leave include South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and Indonesia.

Spain's cabinet in May approved a bill that grants paid medical leave for women who suffer from severe period pain, but the proposed legislation must still be approved by parliament.

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A Moroccan imam who lost a court appeal on Tuesday against deportation from France for hate speech has gone missing.

When police arrived at Hassan Iquioussen’s home in Lorches, in northern France, he wasn’t there.

The interior ministry ordered Mr Iquioussen’s expulsion in July over what it called his “especially virulent and anti-Semitic speeches”.

But French cultural, academic and human rights figures claim the case is further evidence of anti-Islamic sentiment in France.

They've launched a petition calling on President Emmanuel Macron to stop his deportation.

ReutersCopyright: Reuters

An oil tanker ran aground in Egypt’s Suez Canal on Wednesday night, briefly blocking a section of the canal and clogging maritime traffic.

Traffic resumed hours later after the Singapore-flagged vessel, Affinity V, was refloated by tug boats.

The incident was caused by a technical fault to the ship’s radar that resulted in loss of control, the Suez Canal Authority said.

The Suez Canal is a vital waterway that connects the Mediterranean and the Red Sea and sees over 10% of the world's maritime trade.

Last year, a huge container ship, the Ever Given, ran aground after becoming wedged diagonally on the channel.

For about a week, the stranded vessel became a source of worry and frustration for the global shipping industry before it was freed.