A collection of the Africa Center’s analyses of Somalia’s battle to defeat al Shabaab and regain stability.
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Mounting Fatalities Linked to Militant Islamist Violence in Africa amid Shifting Tactics
Fatalities linked to militant Islamist violence in Africa surpassed 20,000 for the fourth consecutive year, underscoring the resiliency of militant groups across the Sahel, Somalia, the Lake Chad Basin, and Mozambique.
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Countering Terrorism Financing in East Africa
Defeating al Shabaab and other terrorist groups in East Africa will require degrading their increasingly sophisticated revenue generation capabilities through strengthened national and regional coordination.
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The Widening Scope of Africa’s Militant Islamist Threat
Increasingly capable and organized militant Islamist groups in the Sahel, Somalia, and the Lake Chad Basin continue to expand their reach and lethality.
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Somalia at Risk of Becoming a Jihadist State
Persistent resistance to power sharing between Somalia’s federal and state governments has brought al Shabaab to the precipice of taking Mogadishu and escalating the threat from international jihadists.
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Africa Surpasses 150,000 Deaths Linked to Militant Islamist Groups in Past Decade
Escalating violence in the Sahel and Somalia has caused fatalities linked to militant Islamist groups in Africa to surge by 60 percent since 2023.
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Mapping Gulf State Actors’ Expanding Engagements in East Africa
Gulf state actors are expanding their engagements in critical infrastructure, ports, and the security sector in East Africa as they seek opportunities and compete for influence—reshaping the investment and political contours of the region.
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Expanding Al Shabaab–Houthi Ties Escalate Security Threats to Red Sea Region
Growing collaboration between al Shabaab and the Houthis is enabling both militant groups and contributing to heightened maritime and land-based threats on both sides of the Gulf of Aden.
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Military Drone Proliferation Marks Destabilizing Shift in Africa’s Armed Conflicts
A revolution in unmanned systems is reshaping the dynamics of Africa’s armed conflicts. Professional militaries must balance the tactical advantages of drones with an understanding of their limitations and risks.
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Practical Lessons to Improve Stabilization Operations in Somalia
Insufficient operational coordination between local military officials and civilian administrators on stabilization functions is limiting the consolidation of gains in the fight against al Shabaab.
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Militant Islamist Groups in Africa Sustain High Pace of Lethality
Fatalities and violent events linked to militant Islamist groups in Africa sustained near record pace, with the Sahel and Somalia accounting for 79 percent of related deaths.
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Famine Takes Grip in Africa’s Prolonged Conflict Zones
Eighty percent of the record 163 million Africans facing acute food insecurity are in conflict-affected countries, including potentially 840,000 people confronting famine in Sudan, South Sudan, and Mali.
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Africa’s Constantly Evolving Militant Islamist Threat
Fatalities linked to militant Islamist violence in Africa have surged by nearly 60 percent since 2021, though this is marked by widely varying regional threat trajectories, actors, and objectives.
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African Union and United Nations Partnership Key to the Future of Peace Operations in Africa
The use of United Nations–assessed contributions to support African Union–led peace operations has the potential to revitalize peace operations in Africa.
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African-Led Peace Operations: A Crucial Tool for Peace and Security
African-led peace operations have been vital tools for managing Africa’s complex array of security challenges, though continued reform is needed to intervene more decisively in the continent’s most devastating conflicts.
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Reclaiming Al Shabaab’s Revenue
Cutting off al Shabaab’s estimated $100 million in extortion-generated annual revenue will require restoring the integrity of Somalia’s compromised financial, judicial, and intelligence agencies.
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Conflict Remains the Dominant Driver of Africa’s Spiraling Food Crisis
More than 80 percent of the record 137 million Africans facing acute food insecurity are in conflict-affected countries underscoring that conflict continues to be the primary driver of Africa’s food crisis.
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Sahel and Somalia Drive Rise in Africa’s Militant Islamist Group Violence
Militant Islamist violence in Africa has risen continuously over the past decade, doubling in just the past 3 years.
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Trajectories of Violence Against Civilians by Africa’s Militant Islamist Groups
Extremist group violence against civilians is driven by context-specific factors—outgroup grievances, intimidation to control territory, and a response to heavy-handed security responses—that require enhanced community-level mitigation and military professionalism.
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Africa’s Complex 2022 Elections: Restoring Democratic Processes
Responding to the coups, conflicts, and other derailments of democratic processes in recent years, Africa’s 2022 elections are, in large part, an effort to right the democratic ship of state on the continent.
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Drones and Violent Nonstate Actors in Africa
The risk of militarization of drone technology in Africa represents a new asymmetric tool that violent nonstate groups may deploy to extend the reach of their coercion, reshaping the African battlefield.
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Q&A: Somalia Charts Security Transition
Somalia’s National Security Advisor Abdisaid Ali talks about political will, security reforms in Somalia’s Transition Plan, and the commitment to domestic and international coalition building to sustain the country’s progress.
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AMISOM’s Hard-Earned Lessons in Somalia
In an interview with the Africa Center, Simon Mulongo, deputy to the AU Commission in Mogadishu, says that AMISOM’s gains could never have been realized if it had continued to rely on the traditional peacekeeping template.
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Al Shabaab Remains Virulent as ISIS Shifts to Egypt
A quarterly update of a map tracking militant Islamic group activity in Africa as compiled by the Africa Center for Strategic Studies. Al Shabaab has been involved in over half of all violent events related to militant Islamist groups in Africa in the first three quarters of 2017 (987 of 1,827 total).
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Peacekeeping Crucial for African Stability
Despite their shortcomings, African peace operations have saved lives, built security sector capacity, and helped mitigate conflict—reducing pressure on international actors to become directly involved.
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The Illicit Superhighway: Transnational Organized Crime in Africa
The distinction between legitimate and illicit business in Africa is fluid due to the significant size of informal trade on the continent. At the same time, globalization has allowed organized criminal groups to link up with international networks, including violent extremists.
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Islamist Extremism in East Africa
Abdisaid M. Ali reviews the mainstreaming of Salafist ideology in East Africa and the polarizing impact of this more exclusivist interpretation of Islam.
Interview
Ask the Expert: Dr. Hussein Solomon on Radical Islamism in Africa
In this edition of Ask the Expert, Dr. Hussein Solomon, a leading expert on militant Islam and counterterrorism strategies in Africa—who lectures at the Department of Political Sciences at the University of the Free State in South Africa—assesses the state of fundamentalism on the continent.
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Responses to Islamic militancy in Africa must avoid conflating distinct Islamist actors while addressing local level perceptions of disaffection and under-representation that underpin support for militants.
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