Ivory Coast may pardon former first lady Simone Gbagbo in a gesture of national reconciliation after she was sentenced to 20 years behind bars Tuesday over deadly post-election violence.

With her husband -- ex-president Laurent Gbagbo -- still awaiting trial on crimes against humanity charges and no rival leaders prosecuted over the 2010-2011 violence that killed nearly 3,000 people, Simone Gbagbo's hefty sentence has provoked complaints the verdict smacked of "victor's justice".

More than 300 migrants were feared drowned Wednesday after their overcrowded dinghies sank in the Mediterranean, the latest boat disaster on the perilous crossing from Africa to Europe.

The victims were among migrants mainly from sub-Saharan Africa who had left the coast of Libya at the weekend in four small boats, the U.N. refugee agency said.

Eighteen people were killed after an overloaded boat capsized in western Ivory Coast, a local official said Wednesday. 

Twenty-five people survived the accident that took place on Monday afternoon on the Sassandra river near the town of Guessabo, Florentine Banto told AFP. 

Max-Alain Gradel was the hero once again for the Ivory Coast on Wednesday as his thumping strike secured a 1-0 win against Cameroon and took the Elephants into the Africa Cup of Nations quarter-finals.

Gradel, whose late equalizer earned the Ivory Coast a 1-1 draw with Mali at the weekend, struck 35 minutes into the deciding Group D game in Malabo as Herve Renard's men went through in first place to a last-eight tie against Algeria on Sunday.

The disappearance of 20 children in recent weeks in Ivory Coast -- raising fears of a wave of ritual sacrifices -- is a "very worrying phenomenon", a government minister said on Saturday.

Ivory Coast needs to face up to this "new type of crime" Anne Desiree Ouloto, the families and children minister, said.

Ivory Coast's former first lady Simone Gbagbo went on trial Friday for "attempting to undermine the security of the state" in events leading to a bloody 2010-2011 crisis that left thousands dead.

Just across the sea from the sunny tourist beaches of southern Spain where many Europeans spend their Christmas holidays, a violent crisis is intensifying on Europe's borders with Africa.

Every week, hundreds of Africans try to scramble over the high fences that encircle Ceuta and Melilla, two Spanish-ruled enclaves on the northern tip of Morocco.

Almost 500 people detained in Ivory Coast in the wake of the country's 2010-2011 post-election bloodshed have gone on hunger strike to protest their continued detention, a source with the penitentiary system said Thursday.

A total of about 480 are under medical observation after starting hunger strikes across the country, with about 70 prisoners taking part in Abidjan's Maca facility, the prisons official told Agence France-Presse, asking not to be identified.

Ex-Ivory Coast leader Laurent Gbagbo, detained at the International Criminal Court, has been approved as a candidate to head his political party ahead of next year's presidential vote, the party said Wednesday.

A party committee has declared Gbagbo’s candidacy valid in the race to head the Ivorian Popular Front (FPI), which the former president founded.

Burkina Faso army strongman and new Prime Minister Isaac Zida is set Saturday to name his ministerial team, amid fears of continued military influence over the phased return to democratic rule.

Lieutenant Colonel Zida, in charge of Burkina Faso since the ouster of veteran leader Blaise Compaore three weeks ago, formally handed power to interim civilian President Michel Kafando on Friday.