Sahel seeing ‘Cold War’ in parallel to counter-terrorism efforts, expert says • FRANCE 24 English

Sahel seeing ‘Cold War’ in parallel to counter-terrorism efforts, expert says • FRANCE 24 English

now it’s time for perspective and high
level Summit is being held in Nigeria
with the aim of countering terrorism
across Africa now the conference is
looking at the priorities to tackle it
as it’s co-hosted by the UN and the
Nigerian president comes as well as the
ability foreign governments to help in
the fight against extremists across
Africa is becoming increasingly
difficult French troops were in five
former French colonies as part of
operation Baran no longer though in Mali
Bina Faso or ner after being effectively
forced out by the country’s new leaders
following cous we’re joining us now from
Oslo is Professor of international
relations at the Norwegian University of
Life Sciences stick yal Hansen he’s also
author of horn sahal and Rift fault
lines of the African Jihad thanks very
much for joining us on the program uh
the conference then has heard that the
situation is particularly dire in the
sahal region of North Africa the region
now accounting for almost half of all
deaths terrorism globally would you say
that with the ejection of these
International troops notably those
French troops have extremist groups been
able to take even more of a hold in this
region do you
think I think they have uh and what we
also seen is that the malan authorities
have perhaps been become less
reconciliar with other fractions also in
the malan north so it emboldened the
malan forces perhaps to look away from a
NE go negotiation Solutions with some of
the two actions in the north that have
contributed to this but when that is
said we have to understand that also the
French troops were rather seen as
passive and uh not strong enough to
basically protect civilians so there was
some kind of uh anger at the French
forces there because they H didn’t
contribute to any strategic victory
since the start of their deployment back
in 2013 2014 where they were crucial in
preventing then the jihadists from
actually taking the capital it it sounds
like what you’re saying is the blame
lies on two sides it’s not quite as
simple as a vacuum being left because
those forces have come out yes there
need to be a proper inquiry into Western
doctrines and Western counterinsurgency
Theory and uh there wasn’t any strategic
uh victories that France scored after
2013 2014 and this is very important a
lot of malians but also a lot of area
experts talked about forever Wars and
then the Russians were seen as some kind
of
uh replacement that could add some
momentum to the country Insurgency but I
also think that the Russians have a lot
of problems in uh when they’re fighting
together with the malan forces but if I
might add what’s interesting here now is
this three parted game that is played
out Western forces are whing for support
as Insurgency experts versus the
Russians so there’s a kind of cold war
going on in the side parallel to the
counter Insurgency against the uh
against the jihadists and on top of that
you will have uh local Quests for
autonomy and also basically local
conflicts that spill over when you have
jihadists entering into local conflicts
and taking sides and presumably the fear
is as well that if the governments or
the the the the coup leaders in these
countries are unable to control these
groups that they could spread and start
influencing other countries I’m thinking
notably of Ghana and Nigeria itself
where this conference is being held I
think that is uh actually likely to
happen uh that’s my rather gloomy view
because uh the Russians also commit a
lot of mistakes they directly seemingly
there at least there’s a lot of press
coverage when there are stories on how
the Russians Target civilians move much
more extensively than other forces and
as I said it embold the Malia government
to go away from seeking reconciliation
uh versus other fractions that are non
Jihadi and that will weaken the malan
government in the long run and we also
see that the Russians now have made some
leeway in influencing Shad but Shad is
still hanging in the balance if uh and
uh is still a crucial player in preven
ing the jihadists but we don’t know
howad will end up in the future will it
be more Pro Russian or will it be with
the west or perhaps some some kind of
neutral position this is not clear now
so so it’s uh it’s going to be a lot of
uh possibilities for changes in this
region in the in the future looking at a
summary of what’s been said at the
conference so far it didn’t seem like
although call you know there were calls
for more Regional cooperation that kind
of thing but there didn’t seem to be any
kind of you know magic bullet or
anything like that to solve these
problems is there anything that can be
done to to to bring things back in the
other
direction I I frankly I it’s going to be
hard because we see that you need some
kind of African support mechanism you
need to have Africans willing to fight
and support some of the these countries
so far it seems like Chad have been
acting like a kind of a regional heon
and been quite active in fighting it but
should also have limitations to its
capacity other countries as Ghana but
also ARA has been SP been spoken of are
reluctant into entering uh basically
fighting cont Insurgency in the sah so
so there seem to be a lack of African
cooperation here and a lot of distrust
because of the new kind of cold war
cleavages between the Russian local
supporters and perhaps more Western
local supporters echos unable to do
anything absolutely I think I think they
will be unable to do anything and and
the irony here is Nigeria who in the 90s
was seen as the strong military strong
African heon who is not really able to
provide safety to even its own nth let
alone winning in the N against uh the
Islamic States West African Province and
and also the remains of the old
Wu Haram that split off from the Islamic
State West African province in your book
horn sahal and Rift you also talk of the
fear of such groups spreading even
further asking if their Ambitions even
spread out of Africa do you think that’s
a real
risk I think uh this these groups are
fluid what we see with janim is that
they have been very reluctant in uh
talking about attacks in Europe in fact
they issued a statement saying that they
will not attack uh France inside France
so there has been a reluctance from some
of these organizations but you know when
they gain a lot of territory if they’re
going to gain a lot of Terr this might
change and we also see in the Islamic
State in Sahara we’ve seen the Islamic
State in West Africa none of these
entities have a tradition of planning
attacks in Europe but we’ve seen some of
these states uh making aggressive claims
to the extent and there might be some
will to Target Western Targets in Africa
as we’ve seen before for example in the
in amas attack s Hansen good to talk to
you on the program today that’s sansen
joining us from Oslo author of the book
horn sahal and riff fault lines of the
African Jad thank you very much thank
you very much

Africa’s Sahel region now accounts for almost half of all deaths from terrorism worldwide. That was the stark warning heard at a high-level summit in Nigeria that aims to counter terrorism across Africa. It comes as the threat of Islamist extremist attacks is on the rise. International troops, notably French forces, have been forced to leave Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger after a series of coups. In Perspective, we spoke to Stig Jarle Hansen, a professor of international relations at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences and the author of “Horn, Sahel and Rift: Fault-lines of the African Jihad”. He told us that the withdrawal of French troops has inevitably led to the spread of Islamist militant attacks, and that a “Cold War” is playing out amid increased Russian influence in the region.

Read more about this story in our article: https://f24.my/AHLU.y

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