Tag Archives: Sahel

Sevare, Mali | AFP | Two months ago, all 400 inhabitants of the Malian village Toou grabbed a few belongings and fled fighting between armed groups, leaving their homes behind among the ghosts of the country’s war. Today, they sleep in an abandoned school in Sevare near the regional capital Mopti, …

Dakar, Senegal | AFP |  Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Sunday that the United States favoured a “collective” approach with its allies when deciding on troop numbers deployed in Africa against jihadist insurgents. “We’ll get it right, we’ll get it right collectively, I’m convinced of that,” Pompeo told reporters …

Dakar, Senegal | AFP | Hundreds of children in the Sahel were killed, maimed or forcibly separated from their parents last year, the United Nations said Tuesday, as a jihadist conflict rages across the region. In Mali alone, 277 children were killed or maimed during the first nine months of 2019, …

Bamako, Mali | AFP | Brutal attacks that have killed nearly 300 people in less than two months have propelled the Islamic State to the status of the Sahel’s most-feared jihadist group, eclipsing al-Qaeda, experts say. The vast fragile region on the southern rim of the Sahara has been battling an …

Brussels, Belgium | AFP | The United States wants to reduce its military presence in Africa, Washington’s top military officer said, as France hosts Sahel leaders as it seeks to bolster the fight against jihadists in the region. Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, said …

Bamako, Mali | AFP | If military operations depend on winning hearts and minds, the thousands of foreign troops deployed to the Sahel to combat jihadism seem to be on losing ground. At first welcomed, these troops find themselves today in the crosshairs as a growing number of locals in …

United Nations, United States | AFP | UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is renewing his call for UN financing to shore up a regional force fighting an insurgency in the Sahel, despite opposition from the United States. Guterres said in a report to the Security Council seen by AFP on Wednesday …

Dakar, Senegal | AFP | A two-day African security forum was set to open in Dakar on Monday amid concerns about funding for a much-trumpeted initiative to bind five Sahel countries into an anti-terror force. Less than a quarter of the roughly 400 million euros ($455 million) pledged for the …

Nouakchott, Mauritania | AFP | A powerful jihadist alliance has claimed an attack on a French military vehicle in Mali that left two soldiers dead, Mauritanian media reported on Friday. Two soldiers from France’s counter-terrorism force in West Africa were killed and another was hurt on Wednesday when their vehicle …

Brussels, Belgium | AFP | European leaders on Friday doubled their funding for a joint African force tackling jihadists in the Sahel at an international conference in Brussels, as fresh violence highlights the region’s fraught security situation. The European Union announced an extra 50 million euros ($61 million) for the …