Bruxelles et Niamey vont collaborer en matière de lutte contre le terrorisme, ont-ils annoncé en marge d’une visite du Centre National de Coordination du Mécanisme d’Alerte Précoce (CNAP) du Niger en Belgique.
Quel statut, quel mandat pour les militaires français au Sahel ? C’est la question que posent aujourd’hui des organisations de la société civile française. Ce mardi 23 mai, le Général Bruno Baratz, qui commande les Forces françaises au Sahel, selon le vocable actuellement utilisé par l’armée, s’est exprimé sur l’antenne de RFI. « Il n’y a plus d’opération française au Sahel » a-t-il assuré, pour exprimer l’idée que la philosophie ayant guidé la défunte force Barkhane est désormais caduque et que les militaires français toujours déployés dans la région sont dorénavant au service des pays hôtes, en l’occurrence le Niger, principalement, et le Tchad.
Turkey’s influence in Africa has been growing massively over the past 20 years and whoever wins Sunday’s presidential run-off will have to consider where next to take the relationship.
Ever since Recep Tayyip Erdogan took power in Turkey two decades ago, first as prime minister then as president, he has taken an increasing interest in Africa.
The arrest of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in March was the first time a Western journalist had been held on espionage charges in post-Soviet Russia — but it opened a floodgate of memories for Nicholas Daniloff.
Daniloff was working as a journalist in the Soviet Union in 1986 when he was snatched off the streets of Moscow and accused of spying for the United States.
When
May 30, 2023
1:00 pm – 2:30 pm
Where
Zoom Webinar
How Regional Power Politics are Fueling Deadly Wars
For the past year, much of the world’s attention has been focused on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and rising tensions between the United States and China over Taiwan—flashpoints that could trigger direct or even nuclear confrontation between the major powers. But the outbreak of fighting in Sudan should also give world leaders pause: it threatens to be the latest in a wave of devastating wars in Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia that over the past decade have ushered in a new era of instability and strife. Mostly because of conflicts, more people are displaced (100 million) or in need of humanitarian aid (339 million) than at any point since World War II.
Clashes between rival military factions broke out in Sudan’s capital Khartoum on Wednesday (24 May) and spilled over into Thursday, effectively undermining the ceasefire agreed to on May 20 after talks in Jeddah mediated by Saudi Arabia and the United States.
Earlier this week, the US declassified information revealing that the Wagner Group was trying to procure weapons for the Kremlin from Africa, specifically Mali.
Russia’s Wagner Group has recently provided Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) with surface-to-air missiles, the US said Thursday as it rolled out new sanctions against the Russian mercenary group.
North Africa morphing into a permanent host destination rather than a transit country on the way to Europe for hundreds of thousands of Sub-Saharan Africans is no news. What is new, however, is a rising Afrocentric discourse across social media platforms calling for “reappropriating” North Africa and “chasing” the non-black inhabitants of Morocco, Algeria, Libya, and Tunisia from the continent on the pretense that they are illegitimately colonizing the land.
The new Turkish assertiveness in Libya and Libya National Army (LNA) General Khalifa Haftar’s strategic retreat from the Western part of the country have created a new equilibrium in the conflict. This is a potential watershed moment that could lead Egypt, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Russia to rethink their support for Haftar and prepare a possible compromise over Libya, especially given the pronunciation of the so-called Cairo Declaration on June 6, 2020. In fact, Haftar is gradually losing internal and external support—from within his own forces to Egypt and the UAE—to the point that no one will likely bet on him again. In this fluid scenario, neighboring Egypt, which has emboldened Haftar since 2014, may play an important new role in order to protect its specific foreign and domestic interests in Libya.