Leaders of Ecowas at a meeting in Abuja, Nigeria on 10 December 2023.
Nigerian Presidency /Handout/Anadolu via Getty Images
Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger announced their intention to leave Ecowas. This may be a pointer to a deeper crisis in the Sahel region.
Supporters of Niger’s coup leaders wave Niger’s flag (R) and a flag bearing Wagner’s logo during a protest on 16 September 2023.
AFP via Getty Images
France’s withdrawal from Niger could hurt the regional fight against terrorism, create an opportunity for Wagner’s influence and increase Europe’s migrant crisis.
An African antelope at the Mekrou river in the W National Park, Niger.
DeAgostini/Getty Images
Trans-border collaboration is required to recover protected areas that transverse Niger, Burkina Faso and Benin Republic from armed groups.
Nigeria’s President Bola Tinubu, new ECOWAS chairman.
Kola Sulaimon/AFP via Getty Images
The new ECOWAS chairman must focus on strengthening democracy and security in west Africa.
Malians demonstrate against the presence of foreign troops.
Annie Risemberg/AFP via Getty Images
The transitional government is determined to change its partners to fight insecurity in Mali – but results will be hard to come by.
Members of the Nigerian Armed Forces Sniper Unit
Stefan Heunis/AFP via Getty Images
Spiralling insecurity is one of the biggest takeaways when considering Nigeria’s year in review, in 2022.
People cheer at the army after the latest coup in Burkina Faso.
Photo by Olympia De Maismont/AFP via Getty Images
To understand the latest coup in Burkina Faso, one must appreciate the internal power struggles in the country, their links with violent extremism as well as the role of external state actors.
Motorbikes riders in Nigeria’s capital Lagos.
Photo by Pius Utomi Ekpei/AFP via Getty Images
Rather than ban motorcycles, the Nigerian government must intensify its military campaigns and address socioeconomic causes of insecurity.
Christians hold signs as they march on the streets of Abuja in March 2020.
Photo by Kola Sulaimon/AFP via Getty Images
Incidents of terror attack on churches in Nigeria don’t happen in a vacuum. They are driven by jihadism, pastoral conflicts and related criminality.
Christians hold signs as they march on the streets of Abuja calling for peace and security in Nigeria.
Photo by Kola Sulaimon/AFP via Getty Images
Recent incidents have been read as a campaign against Christians, but other religious groups feel they are targets too.
French Marine Special Operation Forces trained Mali’s soldiers under the Task Force Takuba mission.
Photo by Thomas Coex/AFP via Getty Images
Though its full impact is unpredictable, the withdrawal of France from Mali will have some likely effects.
Demonstrators hold a picture of Lieutenant Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba who led the coup against Burkina Faso president Roch Kabore.
Photo by Olympia De Maismont/AFP via Getty Images
The latest coup now presents a fork in the road for West African, French, and American policymakers.
Taliban fighters investigate inside a Shiite mosque after a suicide bomb attack in Kunduz on October 8, 2021.
AFP
The Taliban say they won’t allow jihadi groups to flourish under their rule. But there is good reason to believe that al-Qaida, IS and other regional groups will benefit from the takeover.
A group of Niger soldiers on patrol
Boureima Hama/AFP via Getty Images
Resolving jihadist conflicts in the Sahel requires treating jihadists not as terrorists only but also as political actors who seek to provide an alternative form of governance to the status quo.
GettyImages
In the wake of the Christchurch and Auckland attacks, should official definitions of terrorism conflate the actions of a white supremacy extremist and a radical Islamist extremist?
Riot police officers in front of demonstrators during a march in Ouagadougou in September 2019 called by the UAS union to call for better security measures against terrorism.
Issouf Sanogo/AFP
Burkina Faso faces a new terrorist threat. Terrorist groups are now flourishing within its borders.
Kenyan military troops and US marines carry out a joint military exercise in Manda Bay near the coastal town of Lamu.
EPA/Simon Maina
Declining US involvement in The Horn would leave a vacuum that others can fill.
A U.S.-backed Syrian soldier reacts as an airstrike hits territory held by Islamic State militants outside Baghouz, Syria, in February 2019. The Islamic State group has been reduced from its self-proclaimed caliphate that once spread across much of Syria and Iraq at its height in 2014 to a speck of land on the countries’ shared border.
(AP Photo/Felipe Dana)
Only by prosecuting extremists will the world be able to marginalize those who carry out violent acts and those who give credence to their ideas.
A weak Malian state prompted local ethnic communities to organise armed self-defence groups.
Flickr
The absence of a strong government in Mali
allows jihadists to enter new areas and flourish.
People had to run for cover during the exchange of fire between al-Shabaab and Kenyan security forces.
EPA/Dai Kurokawa
Kenya has done a great deal to prevent and manage terror attacks but there are still many problems that need to be addressed.