An unknown disease has killed more than 50 people in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), according to doctors.

The World Health Organisation’s (WHO) Africa office said the first outbreak was discovered in the town of Boloko, in the northwest of the country.

It is reported that three children ate a bat and died following haemorrhagic fever symptoms.

The interval between the onset of symptoms and death has been 48 hours in the majority of cases.

“That’s what’s really worrying,” Serge Ngalebato, medical director of Bikoro Hospital, a regional monitoring centre, told the news agency, The Associated Press.

The outbreak began on 21 January and 419 cases have been recorded including 53 deaths.

There was a second outbreak of the mystery illness in the town of Bomate on 9 February.

Samples from 13 cases have been sent for testing to the National Institute for Biomedical Research in the DRC’s capital, Kinshasa, the WHO said.

All samples have been negative for Ebola or other common haemorrhagic fever diseases like Marburg. Some tested positive for malaria.

Last year, another mystery flu-like illness which killed dozens of people in another part of Congo was considered likely to be malaria.

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Scientists have had concerns for a long time about diseases jumping from animals to humans in places where wild animals are eaten.

The number of these types of outbreaks in Africa has surged by more than 60% in the last decade, the WHO said in 2022.

The arrest of a British couple in Afghanistan was over a “misunderstanding”, the Taliban has said.

Peter Reynolds, 79, and his wife Barbie, 75, were detained by the Taliban’s interior ministry on 1 February.

The reason for their arrests was immediately unknown.

But the Taliban said on Tuesday that the couple were detained due to a “misunderstanding” that they had fake Afghan passports.

The four adult children of the couple said last week that their parents were married in Kabul in 1970 and have lived in Afghanistan for 18 years – remaining after the withdrawal of Western troops and the Taliban’s return to power in 2021.

The couple runs an organisation named Rebuild, which provides education and training programmes for businesses, government agencies, educational organisations and nongovernmental groups.

Mr and Mrs Reynolds, who are also Afghan citizens, allegedly texted their children after their arrests saying they did not want Western authorities to get involved.

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In a letter to the Taliban, their children wrote: “Our parents have consistently expressed their commitment to Afghanistan, stating that they would rather sacrifice their lives than become part of ransom negotiations or be traded.

“We trust that this is not your intention, as we are instructed to respect their wishes to remain with you.”

The Taliban have released no further details nor confirmed if the couple have now been released.

On Monday, the BBC reported the Taliban as saying they would “endeavour” to release the couple “as soon as possible”.

Harun is sitting hunched on a bed with a sheet over his head.

He lives in a state of psychosis and wants to return to his home in central Khartoum.

He tells us where to turn and which bridges to cross to get him there.

The war has ripped away the stability that kept him sane and permeates the mental illness that now haunts his days.

“I have 37 bullets still inside me and a sniper shot me in my legs. I took 251 bullets in my legs and hip,” he says after lifting the blanket and pointing to parts of his body that show no signs of harm.

He may not have been wounded but he is deeply scarred.

We find him in a shelter for discharged hospital patients who cannot return home.

In a tented corner in the yard outside his ward, there are men nursing gunshot wounds and amputated limbs.

Badreldeen was trapped in the Shambat neighbourhood of Khartoum North as it was occupied by paramilitary fighters and militiamen belonging to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

“I told the RSF that we are not army soldiers. We are civilians but they just fired at us,” he says looking down at his bandaged leg.

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As the RSF battles Sudan’s military for control of the capital and country, millions have been displaced and dispossessed with tens of thousands of people killed, injured and detained.

He adds: “In Shambat, lots of people died. Five people were killed in our street alone.”

Shambat is a residential district in Khartoum North – the northeastern wing of Sudan’s tri-capital known as Bahri – that has now been fully reclaimed by the military.

Some are slowly returning to their devastated homes in once-occupied areas and others wounded and brutalised under siege are flooding hospitals in the capital’s old city Omdurman.

The sounds of shells whizz over us as we move through Bahri’s southern edges.

Gunfire rings out aimed at positions just across the Blue Nile.

The turning road to Kober Bridge and into Khartoum is bordered by a residential compound full of identical bullet-riddled orange blocks.

The charred, chewed-out corners of some of the buildings are a harsh break from uniformity.

The bridge is still intact but its base is a haunting scene.

An abandoned RSF position where blackened car bodies and beds are surrounded by stolen household items and hundreds of bullet and shrapnel shells.

A wedding dress and baby photos sit among the used ammunition.

The remnants of life ripped out of the surrounding homes and discarded.

We walk into a family home north of the bridge in Bahri and see what fills the houses instead.

Everything is turned over – couches, toy cars, roller skates, dishes.

Even the electric cables are ripped out of the walls.

The corner of the living room is burnt by the wood broken off the antique furniture.

The clothes, cushions and anything of little monetary value are dumped in the centre of the room into a rubbish heap.

Shells boom as we leave the wreckage of the home and motorcycles with steely-eyed army soldiers whizz by on their way to the nearest front.

A military victory may be imminent in Sudan’s capital but a long road to restoration and recovery still lies ahead.

You can watch a special programme on Sudan tonight on The World with Yalda Hakim from 9pm on Sky News.

Yousra Elbagir reports from Khartoum North with camera Garwen McLuckie and producers Nkululeko Zulu and Chris Cunningham