Women writers are being aggressively herded in this direction. It undercuts our expertise and presents us as narrowly self-obsessed instead of windows onto worlds.
Does trafficking necessarily fuel conflict in the Sahel? Our new
@crisisgroup
report on Niger challenges the assumption that trafficking is inherently destabilizing.
A thread!
President Bazoum's administration was in fact making the only meaningful security gains in the Sahel region, forging a delicate balance between security operations, dialogue and outreach with jihadists, and partnering with US & Fr forces
Rappelons que l'un des arguments des putschistes pour leur coup d'état est le mauvais résultat sécuritaire du Président Bazoum, un argument démenti par les faits
I am tremendously pleased to announce that I'm joining
@CrisisGroup
's West Africa project as Sahel analyst. Much to be inspired by in the brilliance of colleagues and their subtle, profound work.
Last year, while heavily pregnant, I began researching this longread, which casts a mostly critical eye on technosolutionist efforts to save Sahelian herders from the myriad crises they face. When my son was 3 months old, I took him to a herders' heaven -
Important context fo protest in Niamey: French troops fired on protesters 20 months ago in Tera, killing 3 and wounding 17 more, mostly students, with no consequences; protests have been banned and penalized under flimsy pretexts for years under Issoufou & Bazoum, repressing rage
Eight years into a French-led Sahel stabilisation effort that has cost billions of euros and drawn on security, development, and political initiatives from a powerful array of well-meaning external actors, violence is only getting worse. New report out!
The Biden administration has resisted walking back Trump's proclamation of US recognition of Moroccan sovereignty claims over Western Sahara. In my new piece for
@ForeignAffairs
, I argue that this flouts international law and sets a dangerous precedent
As some mourn the death of "the force" that was Idris Deby, thinking of the moment two months ago when his security forces stormed the home of an opponent, murdering his mother.
Inates emerged as a focal point of my recent research for an upcoming
@crisisgroup
report on North Tillabery. I discuss the context of Tuesday’s attack in our just-posted Q & A here
I call on all those directly or indirectly advocating for a military intervention in
#Niger
to share insights into what a possible favorable outcome might look like.
Please explain how an intervention force will be useful in dealing with mass protests, a dissenting military,
A few anecdotal observations on the rationality of the destruction committed during countrywide protests in Senegal. In the capital, protesters did not target foreign businesses, as is sometimes reported, but specifically French ones, particularly supermarket chains and
Some - as they say - *personal news*! At the end of this month, after 4 years with the Sahel project, and 3 on the Maghreb before that, I'll be taking my leave from the great ICG. It's been an absolute pleasure to work with such brilliant colleagues to produce some of the most
We welcomed a baby boy into our lives last week
@JCourtright08
Will be posting from joyful, sleepless maternity leave nights!
With deep gratitude to ancestors, family, friends, and Senegal, which has welcomed us so wonderfully into its worlds.
The U.S. needs a strategy in the Sahel. In this new policy piece, I argue the era of American CT-led engagement in the Sahara is over, and that this is something to be celebrated, not mourned.
Last June, I wrote about the fragility of the Western Saharan peace, focusing on Mariam, a Sahraoui governor who dreamed of leading a new war. Sahraouis believed they had become victims of their own good behavior. They may be ready to change tack.
Islamic State militants killed 53 Malian soldiers and 1 civilian in an attack on a Malian army base near the Mali-Niger border this weekend. The attack highlights several worrying trends.
A thread.
Congrats to my incredible colleagues at
@CrisisGroup
Sahel Project on the release of "Speaking with the 'Bad Guys': Toward Dialogue with Central Mali's Jihadists", which breaks taboos and brings to light neglected and surprising observations from the field
Our
@CrisisGroup
report on the politics of economic reform in Algeria has just been released. It analyses how redistributionist oil dependency, once stabilising, has entered a new phase of vulnerability.
“The crisis in Niger should not have come as a surprise. Over the past decade, efforts aimed at stabilizing the Sahel—led by France and backed by the United States—have steadily weakened the region’s civil institutions and failed to deliver security.”
A few things to look out for now: Moroccan domestic response to normalization of relations with Israel. Polisario’s response to an extremely provocative escalation from a US that has strived until now to appear impartial.
After Nagorno Karabakh, Western Sahara becomes the latest frozen conflict to thaw. Conditions have been overripe for dealing a fatal blow to the brittle ceasefire for years.
Today I ran 5k in solidarity with my colleague
#MichaelKovrig
, unjustly detained in
#China
for two years. Roughly the number of steps he takes daily to stay fit and hang on.
#freeMichaeKovrig
A thread on escalating violence in Mali’s Menaka, situated along the Mali-Niger border zone that is the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara’s stronghold. ISGS in the past 2 years has gone from waging sophisticated attacks on security posts to massacring civilians in villages.
With a 1-2 week lag in testing results coming back, we have no idea what the state of COVID-19 infections are in the United States right now. That's a huge problem
A few thoughts on the arrest of the Mayor of Fachi, caught with 200 kilos of cocaine in his official Toyota. Drawing from research and analysis featured in the 2018 report, Managing Trafficking in northern
#Niger
Crisis Group is recruiting a senior analyst for Ethiopia - what a dream job and what an incredibly fun time to do profound work on a country in the throes of an exhilarating transition
Made In Africa Inc. Gets $190 Million from Afriexim Bank to Acquire Vlisco Group. Netherlands-based Vlisco is a leading producer and distributor of fashion fabrics, especially of the African wax print style (Had missed this).
Macron has just claimed that Islam around the world is ‘in crisis’
Upcoming legislation crafted to "protect" the Republic & French values promises to be deeply divisive, with French Muslims fearing it will unfairly single them out
It’s become cliche to say that there is no military solution to the Sahel crisis. What requires reflection and articulation are alternatives - especially, strategies for addressing the local drivers of a conflict that is increasingly rural and community-based. 🧵
“Punishing poor African governments, like those of CAR or Mali, for their Russian connections by reducing U.S. and European aid will not alter their behavior or protect civilians. It will only amplify Russian influence and erase U.S. leverage,
My analysis of Turkey’s role and ambitions in the Sahel, just up below, centres on rumours vs realities. Gulf and European anxieties over Turkish expansion there risk becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. Partners should focus instead on what Turkey does well, and work together to
"Les incursions de la Turquie au Sahel se sont jusqu'à présent limitées à projeter sa "puissance douce" (soft power)."
Lisez la nouvelle publication de notre analyste
@brkinibeachriot
sur l'engagement turc au Sahel 👇
I will be leaving to pursue writing and consulting projects, continuing what has somehow become a 15-year field-based focus on the Maghreb and Sahel, from my sweet perch in Dakar. Happy to discuss new projects and collaborations, please see e-mail in bio.☮️
Africa’s Sahel region has been an arena of French colonialism, liberation struggles, imperialist interventions, the war on terror & coups d’etat.
WATCH advisor and researcher
@brkinibeachriot
discuss on Dispatches w/
@RaniaKhalek
:
Tebboune is MIA, the Moroccans have gone a giant step further than they did during a similar Guerguerat standoff in 2017, and the Sahraoui people have lost all faith in the political process after decades of false starts and broken promises. Vast potential for escalation.
It's high time to revive tourism to the stunning desert landscapes of northern Niger. Security there has improved dramatically and tourism in Agadez once accounted for as much as 10% of Niger's GDP. Nice piece by
@MawliDayak
for
@WATHI_ThinkTank
#Sahel
For the past five years or so, I have made a point of (and greatly enjoyed) researching and writing about various crisis factors in the Sahel and Algeria - political contestation; economic vulnerability; regional neglect - that were around long before and will long outlast jihad.
Algeria is a young, secure, rich country with excellent ideals that finds itself supremely united. Here’s to new growth and an unleashing of the giant potential everyone who knows it comes to love 🥂
“In this country of 16 million known for its peaceful democracy and sense of community, Senegal's response to the coronavirus is notable not only for its humanity but for its thoroughness.” Probing piece by
@ricci_sh
Northern Niger's fragile formal economy takes a big hit with the closure of the French Cominak uranium mine. 600 salaried employees and 800 subcontractors have just been laid off. The environment has suffered untold damage due to improper disposal of radioactive waste
I’ve been worried about him since seeing these town halls where he routinely listens deeply to and absorbs the traumas of Americans scarred by health care failures, school shootings, etc
Ouch! Mayor
@Pete
Buttigieg responds to
@realDonaldTrump
slam that he is “Alfred E Neuman” —“I had to Google that..I guess it’s a generational thing.”
Since one month after his divorce, the King of Morocco has surrounded himself with a trio of ex-con German-Moroccan MMA fighters, trashing royal protocol and blowing off people like US Secretary of State Pompeo to hang out with them
Comment expliquer l'accalmie au nord Tillabery du
#Niger
, qui a connu une réduction d'environ 80 % de la violence contre les civils en 2022? Dans cette brief publiée par
@KAS_Sahel
, j’analyse les premiers signes de reprise 🧵
#Sahel
Tout projet de déplacement dans Les zones classées en rouge est à exclure. Les déplacements professionnels en zone orange restent possibles, sous réserve d’être en conformité avec l’ensemble des consignes détaillées par
@francediplo
et
@FranceauMali
.
"For the whole duration of the pandemic, Covid-positive results in
#Niger
averaged 4.5% for a total of about 125,000 swabs, compared with countries with similar testing levels per capita, Afghanistan and Madagascar with 16% and 30%."
Excellent piece depicting the subtle irony in how French colonial techniques of forest management created the perfect conditions - rural resentment, shelter from aerial surveillance - for jihadi repose
I spoke with the
@AP
on
#Niger
coup: “For ECOWAS and Western countries, this coup was seen as one too many. So far, however, the hard-line response seems to be having the opposite effect, and further entrenching the military regime.”
It's far simpler to view the Sahel as overrun by irrational radical men than to engage with more meaningful roots of instability, and does a grave disservice to the region by bringing attention only to where it is most helpless and aggrieved.
"I'm sure he's a jihadist," a French soldier guarding him later whispered. "He's making fun of us." // Polite Reuters embed with Barkhane featuring harassment of civilians and a 5 km drive that took 9 hours
#Tartufferie