Africa’s Pastoralists: A New Battleground for Terrorism
Islamist terrorist groups in the Sahel and Sahara are attempting to exploit pastoralist grievances to mobilize greater support for their agenda, write Kaley Fulton and Benjamin Nickels.
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Islamist terrorist groups in the Sahel and Sahara are attempting to exploit pastoralist grievances to mobilize greater support for their agenda, write Kaley Fulton and Benjamin Nickels.
This report from UNODC’s Afghan Opiate Trade Project, provides a baseline assessment of the Afghan opiates trade in Africa. It describes the key routes out of Afghanistan, through Eastern and Southern Africa and then West Africa and finally to markets in North America and Europe. Large ungoverned spaces make it difficult to fully assess the scope of the Afghan opiate trade and its impact on economies, governments, and people. African governments need to improve their capacity to track this trade, examining potential links between opiate traffickers and other forms of organized crime or insurgent and violent extremist groups. They also require assistance in determining the public health impact of this trade on their populations.
While discussions of security cooperation often focus assistance from wealthy countries, intra-African assistance has become a major focus of multilateral efforts in crisis management and stabilization.
Three years of civil war have left South Sudan on the cusp of full-scale genocide. The only remaining path to protect its sovereignty and territorial integrity is through an international transitional administration, writes Africa Center Director Kate Almquist Knopf in a new report.
After years of decline, conflict in Africa has recently been increasing. Paul Williams, Phillip Carter, and Ibrahim Wani provided insight on why conflict persists in Africa at a roundtable hosted by the Africa Center.
A selection of Africa Center analysis of the ongoing drivers of the conflict in South Sudan, and priorities for establishing peace and stability.
“South Sudan is not on the brink of state failure. South Sudan is not in the process of failing. South Sudan has failed,” Africa Center Director Kate Almquist Knopf testified before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee about the crisis in South Sudan.
Although the vast majority of conflicts in Africa today involve non-state actors, there has been a significant increase in state-based violence since 2010. While there is now a better understanding of the need to engage at multiple levels of society, leveraging the political will and resources to facilitate these deeper connections has remained a challenge.
A snapshot of Africa’s displaced populations reveals that 71 percent of Africa’s 18.5 million displaced persons are from 5 countries (Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, Nigeria, and the Democratic Republic of Congo), and while much of global attention has focused on refugee migration into Europe, two-thirds of Africa’s dislocated population are internally displaced.
A CDC risk assessment found that Chad, Djibouti, and Eritrea are among the four countries where risk for Zika is “uniquely attributable” to their travel to the Olympics. So what exactly are the chances that Zika will spread in Africa?
Abdisaid M. Ali reviews the mainstreaming of Salafist ideology in East Africa and the polarizing impact of this more exclusivist interpretation of Islam.
Reestablishing stability in South Sudan will require addressing the fundamental drivers of the recurring conflict. Civilian actors who derive their legitimacy from means other than guns need to be given a voice. This should be complemented by peacemaking processes at the community level, demilitarization at a societal level, and security sector reform countrywide.