June 15, 2021
essay / Paula Mora Brito [English version].
Terrorism in the Sahel is a neglected reality that affects millions of people. It is not surprising that the region is one of the most afflicted by this internship. Its complex geographical features make it difficult to control borders (especially those of the Sahara desert), and the lack of cultural and religious homogeneity, coupled with continuing economic and social challenges, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, make the region a fragile and convenient scenario for terrorist groups. In addition, Western countries (mainly France) are present in the area, provoking a certain rejection of their intervention in the eyes of the Sahelian population. Although data on this issue are scarce, which makes it difficult to study, this article will try to broaden the concepts and knowledge on terrorism in the Sahel, extending its geographical spectrum, to show the daily life of its inhabitants for several years. The focus of the analysis will be on Western intervention in the fight against terrorism.
The terrorist phenomenon
Terrorism is a controversial concept, as it is subject to individual interpretation: while some condemn a group for the use of indiscriminate violence under a political/social/economic goal , others consider its members heroes of freedom. Only its purpose defines this activity: to coerce and intimidate the general intention on an issue. It takes different forms: by geographical scope (regional, national or international) or by its goal (ethno-nationalist, political and/or economic ideology, religious or specific issues). This is why each one has different characteristics.
Religious terrorism, as highlighted by Charles Townshend in his book Terrorism: A very short introduction, has its own characteristics. Quoting Hoffman, he explains that the goal transcends politics because it is considered a theological demand. It is a bilateral relationship between the fanatics and God, in which there is no possibility of dialogue or understanding, only the establishment of the demand. This conception leads to international terrorism, even if it starts at the regional or national level, because the group of "enemies" is wider. Messianism is the engine of this activity, and martyrdom its most powerful weapon. The death resulting from the struggle is presented as a sacred act and reflects the certainty of the members of these groups to their ideology.
The West finds it difficult to address these threats because it understands the world in a secular way. However, the states in which these groups develop, religion represents the nation, the values and the way of life: the individual is religion and vice versa. As Edward Said said: "The entrenched West is blind to nuance and change in the Islamic world". Islamic religious terrorism arises as a response to colonialism and the internship of soft power in Arab and Islamic cultures, which has been reinforced through the current of Islamic fundamentalism.
Terrorism in the Sahel
The Sahel ("edge, coast" in Arabic) is an ecoregion that makes the transition between the north and south of the African continent, as well as from west to east, with a total area of 3,053,200 km², constituting a belt of 5,000 km. It is composed of Senegal, Mauritania, Mali, Algeria, Burkina-Faso, Niger, Nigeria, Chad, Sudan, Eritrea and Ethiopia. It is a privileged area, since the desert is understood as a means of communication.
The area has 150 million inhabitants, 64% of whom are under 25 years of age and mostly Sunni Islamic. In 2018, the latest year for which there is data on these countries, the annual mortality rate per 1,000 people was 8.05, a very high rate compared to Spain's 2.59 in 2019. The adult literacy rate (over 15 years of age), for which there is data for only seven of the ten countries, is 56.06%. In reality, it is very unequal: while Algeria has 81.40%, Niger or Mali have 35%. The rate on the incidence of poverty based on the national poverty line is 41.15% (only four countries have 2018 data ). Life expectancy is 63 years.
The territory faces an economic, political and social crisis. The Sahel is one of the poorest regions in the world, with northern Nigeria as one of the territories with the largest number of extremely poor people on the planet. The status has worsened this year with a historic fall in the price of raw materials (more than 20%), which account for 89% of its exports. The environmental crisis is hampering economic development .
Climate change has caused temperatures to rise 1.5 times faster than the global average , which has multiplied droughts (from one every ten years to one every two). Political instability in some countries, such as the 2012 coup d'état in Mali, hinders their economic development .
In this context, insecurity has increased since the 2004 attacks in Borno, a Nigerian state bordering Cameroon and Chad, by the Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram. Terrorist activity has spread through the leadership of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), present in northern Mali, eastern Mauritania, Niger and western Chad. This has led to a demographic crisis, with 4.2 million people displaced and more than one million unable to find work. The United Nations development program estimates that, between now and 2050, more than 85 million Sahelians will be forced to migrate.
Most of the attacks take place in the triple frontiers of Mali, Burkina-Faso and Niger; and Niger, Nigeria and Chad. Since the Berlin Treaty of 1885, African borders have been a serious problem because they were a European imposition that did not respect the tribal and ethnic reality of many regions, forcing and creating a nation of which its inhabitants do not feel part. This reality was reflected in the case of Mali, showing the pre-existing fragility of the region.
AQIM has divided the Sahel into katibas (branches): the Yahia Abou Ammar Abid Hammadu, which is established between southern Algeria and Tunisia and northern Niger; and Tarik Ben Ziyad, active in Mauritania, southern Algeria and northern Mali. The former is known to be more "terrorist", while the latter is more "criminal". This is due to the higher Degree of cruelty employee by the Hammadu, as they follow the takfirism (war against "infidel" Muslims) of Zarqawi (ISIS).
They take over territories through negotiations, in which they establish a market for illegal trafficking. Once they have acquired an area, they establish their settlements, their training camps and prepare their next attacks. Another means of financing is kidnapping. It is a way to subjugate, humiliate and get revenue from the West. The need for money, unlike a criminal organization, is not for the staff enrichment of the components, but to continue financing the activity: to buy loyalties, weapons, etc. There are no data on recruitment development, conditions, nor targets by age, class or sex.
The geographical and socio-political characteristics of the ecoregion have forced AQIM to develop its capacity to adapt, such as the subdivision of the group (Boko Haram), which sample that they no longer need a fixed physical base as in the 1990s (AQ in Afghanistan). In addition, there has been a change in strategy, as these groups are increasing their attacks on international organizations or government infrastructure by 250%, and decreasing attacks on civilians. This may be a new way of attracting locals as they promote themselves as protectors against state abuse.
In 2019 there was an average of 69.5 attacks per month in the Sahel and Maghreb, with 438 deaths recorded last March. In 2020 there has been a decrease in activity due to COVID-19. Terrorism brings political and social insecurity, as well as economic insecurity, as investors are not attracted to do business in an unstable area, causing the maintenance of precariousness. This causes and/or maintains the underdevelopment of a state, causing a large flow of migration. A vicious circle of underdevelopment and poverty then ensues.
For Spain, the most recent and shocking event took place on April 28, 2021, when journalists David Beriain and Roberto Fraile were murdered in Burkina-Faso by the Jama'a Nusrat ul-Islam wa al-Muslimin, a terrorist group linked to Al-Qaeda.
The recent sudden death of Chadian President Idris Déby Itno on April 19, 2021 at the hands of the Fighters of the Front for Change and Concord in Chad (FACT) has further increased instability in the region. The president of the last three decades was fighting against this rebel group , created in 2016 in Libya, which aimed to throw Déby and the dynastic regime out of Chad. Since this event, massive protests have covered the streets of Chad, calling for a democratic transition in the country, to which the army has responded by killing some of the protesters. This uprising is due to what appears to Chadians to be a repetition of their history and a violation of the nation's constitution. The Chadian army had announced the training of a Transitional committee , which would last 18 months, under the leadership of Mahamat Idriss Déby, the son of the former president. The problem is that his father, in 1999, created the same political body and promised the same. However, his promises were not kept. The Military Transitional committee suspended the Constitution, which states in its Fifteenth degree scroll that the transnational president must be the president of the National Assembly.
Chad's status is a core topic in the fight against terrorism in the Sahel. The country is located between the Sahel and the Horn of Africa. The withdrawal or weakening of troops on the country's borders poses a great risk not only to Chad, but also to its neighbors. Countries bordering Chad, will be exposed to violent attacks by terrorist groups, as Chad has the largest combined force in the G5 Sahel. The country is the stabilizer of the region. To the east, it prevents Sudanese political instability from spilling over the borders. To the south, Chad has been the new home to more than 500,000 refugees coming from the Central African Republic and its huge migration crisis. To the west, it mainly counters Boko Haram, which is now a major player in Niger and Nigeria. To the north, it counters Libyan rebel groups. It is important to understand that although Libya is not part of the Sahel, its instability resonates strongly in the region, as the country is the new hub for terrorist groups in the Sahel, as the death of the former president seems to demonstrate. The country has become the launching pad for Africa's terrorist groups seeking to impose their will across the continent. It remains to be seen what happens in Chad, because it will completely change the current Sahelian paradigm.
The Western fight against terrorism
There are institutional initiatives to address these regional issues jointly, such as the G5 Sahel group , composed of Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso and Chad, with the support of the African Union, the European Union, the United Nations and the World Bank, among others.
There is also international financial aid to the region, mainly from France and the European Union. Since 2013, at the request of the Malian government, the French government launched Operation "Serval" with the goal of expelling terrorist groups in northern Mali and other Sahelian nations. It was followed a year later by Operation "Barkhan", which focuses on attendance the G5 Sahel member states in providing the necessary resources and training to enable these countries to manage their own security independently. Spain, Germany, Estonia and the United Kingdom are also participating in this operation. Last year, 2020, Task Force "Takuba", composed of French and Estonian special forces, was launched in the Sahara-Sahel belt. To date, France has deployed 5,100 military personnel, trained more than 7,000 G5 Sahel soldiers, deployed 750 training or combat support activities and has 75 cooperation officers in the region.
France has also been at the forefront of international intervention in the Sahel. In 2012, in the United Nations Security committee , it promoted Resolution 2085 to underline the need for international attendance in the region. In 2017, France was the forerunner of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization mission statement in Mali (MINUSMA), created under Resolution 2391 to attendance the Malian government in stabilizing its country. It has more than 15,000 civilian and military personnel providing logistical and operational support.
The European Union has also been involved through three main missions in the framework the Common Security and Defense Policy (CSDP): European Union training mission statement (EUTM) Mali, EUCAP Sahel Mali and EUCAP Sahel Niger. The former was created in 2013 to train and advise the Malian armed forces. It also cooperates with the G5 Sahel member states to improve border control. The other two are civilian missions whose goal is to train the police, the gendarmerie and the national guard, as well as to advise the government's security reforms. EUCAP Sahel Niger was created in 2012 and is still in force. As for EUCAP Sahel Mali, it was created in 2014 and has been extended until 2023. In addition, France and the European Union also contribute financially to the region. Last year, the European Union contributed €189.4 million to the region. France contributed around €3.97 billion during 2019-2020.
However, the uncertainty over Déby's death has reshaped local perceptions of Western, mainly French, intervention. The protests that have taken place in recent weeks in Chad have also involved an indictment of France for backing the military committee against the will of the people. Together with the African Union and the European Union, Macron declared at Déby's funeral "France will never be able to make anyone question (...) and threaten, neither today nor tomorrow, the stability and integrity of Chad", following Mahamat's promises to "remain faithful to the report" of his father. These statements were understood by Chadians to mean that Mahamat will follow his father's style of leadership and that France does not care about the oppression the people have suffered for decades. It is at this point that France risks only caring about the stability that Chad brought in the region, especially in its geopolitical interests regarding especially Libya and West Africa. Perhaps this is why Macron felt the need to clarify a week later his words: "I will be very clear: I supported the stability and integrity of Chad when I was in N'Djamena. I am in favor of a peaceful, democratic and inclusive transition, I am not in favor of a succession", he said. However, Sahelians are getting tired of being the puppets of Western games, as demonstrated this year in Mali by the protests of the inhabitants against the French military presence in the country. The West must show its real commitment to promoting human rights by pushing for a democratic transition while maintaining its fight against terrorism.
In conclusion, Islamist religious terrorism has been on the rise in recent years as a counterpoint to U.S. power in the Cold War. The Sahel is one of the predominant scenarios for these activities, as it is an area with pre-existing political-economic instability that terrorists have taken advantage of. Terrorism is changing its ways of acting, showing its adaptability in terms of geography, methods of action and resource acquisition. France has proven to be the leader of the Western initiative in the region and has made progress in the region. However, the West, especially European countries, must start paying more attention to the causes of the problems in this region, gathering data and knowing their reality. Only then will they be able to address these problems effectively, helping the existing regional institutions, looking for long-term solutions that will satisfy the population.
