LOME, Sept 14, 2007 (AFP) - Flooding across much of West and Central Africa has killed at least 75 people and threaten around a half million, according to UN officials and government ay as several countries reported worsening conditions.

At least 33 people have died in Burkina Faso Faso, 20 in Togo and six in Ghana, according to figures released by the UN humanitarian affairs office in Geneva on Friday. Further east 15 people have been killed in Rwanda, its government said.

Ghana, Burkina Faso Faso and Mauritania have all made appeals for international help.

DAKAR, Aug 31, 2007 (AFP) - Severe flood damage has in two months affected more than 65,000 people in west Africa, making thousands homeless and wrecking infrastructure, the Red Cross and Red Crescent organisations said Friday.

Heavy rain and 'unprecedented floods' from Senegal to Nigeria have caused the 'loss of human lives and devastated crop zones, plunging some populations into total penury,' the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said.

ABUJA, Aug 7, 2007 (AFP) - A west African regional bloc Wednesday cautioned politicians in Sierra Leone against instigating violence during weekend polls, the second ballot to be held since the end of a brutal 10-year civil war.

The Economic Community of West African States said it had 'zero-tolerance to any acts of violence in the electoral process,' the bloc's chairman Mohammed Ibn Chambas said in an open letter.