On June 15, Boko Haram released a video featuring English, French (Cameroonian), Fulani, and Hausa-speaking fighters “greeting” fellow fighters in Zamfara and Niger states.  Three weeks later, on July 7, Boko Haram released another video of fighters in Niger State returning “greetings” to Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau and “brothers” in Zamfara, which is one of Nigeria’s northwestern states; Lake Chad, which is the Boko Haram Bakura faction’s base; and Sambisa, Borno, which is Shekau’s base, like reported by jamestown.org.  These back-to-back videos recall the process of the Bakura faction’s pledge to Shekau one year earlier. Bakura’s joining Boko Haram turned Nigerian jihadism’s tide in Shekau’s favor vis-à-vis his rivals in Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP) and Ansarul Muslim Fi Biladis Sudan (Ansaru).

On September 23, 2019, Shekau had issued “greetings” to fighters on Lake Chad, which was reciprocated one day later in a video from an imam surrounded by two armed fighters near Lake Chad who claimed they were “commanded” by Bakura and “greeted” Shekau.  These two videos followed a series of Boko Haram-claimed attacks around Lake Chad using styles copying Islamic State (IS), despite only ISWAP being formally part of IS. These actions heralded Boko Haram’s resurgence in Lake Chad. Since Shekau’s August 2016 ejection from ISWAP, Lake Chad had been exclusively ISWAP’s area of operations, but by 2019 Boko Haram was also operating in the region. It was also only six months after those two videos that Boko Haram conducted the massive March 2020 raid in Bohoma, Chad that killed 92 Chadian soldiers stationed on Lake Chad. Shekau claimed responsibility for the raid.

Theses signaling videos are not exclusive to Boko Haram. In 2010, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), for example, released videos featuring Nigerian Hausa, Guinean, Malian Tuareg, and Fulani fighters to demonstrate AQIM’s expansion from Algeria to the Sahel (Al-Andalus, August 2010). This coincided with AQIM training Boko Haram members and preceded AQIM controlling territory in Mali in 2012 through local affiliates (Al-Andalus, April 2017). Despite French-led counter-insurgency operations escalating from then onward, the Sahel has remained a jihadist hotbed.

Thus, the question remains whether Boko Haram’s June and July 2020 videos about northwestern Nigeria will, like the group’s September 2019 Lake Chad videos and AQIM’s 2010 sub-Saharan African-oriented videos, lead to Boko Haram opening a new front in northwestern Nigeria or whether it will falter there like it has before.

Failed Forays and Recent Comebacks in Northwestern Nigeria

Neither ISWAP nor Boko Haram have attacked northwestern Nigeria with any consistency since ISWAP’s November 2015 attack on Nigerian Shias marching between Kaduna and Kano. However, Boko Haram’s efforts to expand to north-central and northwestern Nigeria from its northeastern Nigerian bases in Borno and its borderlands predate that 2015 attack. After Shekau declared jihad in July 2010, AQIM-trained Boko Haram members—including future U.S.-designated terrorists Khalid al-Barnawi and Abubakar Kambar—led cells in Kaduna, Kano, Plateau, and Kogi, from where Boko Haram conducted over 20 suicide bombings from June 2011 to 2013. Shekau also commanded Boko Haram’s attacks on Kano government buildings in January 2012 that led to nearly 200 civilian deaths. Al-Barnawi and Kambar’s formed Ansaru with AQIM’s approval as a separate faction from Boko Haram (Al-Andalus, April 27). Ansaru opposed Shekau’s killing of Muslim civilians. This combined with Boko Haram’s loss of civilian support, security forces’ dismantling Boko Haram and Ansaru cells in Kaduna and Kano, and the inability of Boko Haram’s predominantly Kanuri fighters to integrate into Hausa areas, meant Boko Haram’s jihad in north-central and northwestern Nigeria ceased in 2014.

Boko Haram, and ISWAP after its March 2015 formation, both concentrated only on Borno and neighboring Yobe and Adamawa states and borderland areas in Niger, Chad, and Cameroon after 2015. Meanwhile, Ansaru went into dormancy in 2015 following Shekau’s loyalists executing some of its leaders for betraying their loyalty to Shekau, while other members defected to ISWAP (Al-Haqaiq, June 2018). Nevertheless, Ansaru retained sleeper cells in northwestern Nigeria from 2015 onward, where it quietly developed hideouts and recruited among Fulani bandits. Khalid al-Barnawi’s deputy, for example, was a Fulani from Zamfara, which would have helped Ansaru recruitment there, and al-Barnawi kept arms stockpiled in Kaduna before his April 2016 arrest in Kogi (The Cable, April 13, 2016).

Despite Boko Haram’s fraught foray into northwestern Nigeria from 2011-2014, Shekau attempted to expand there again. This was evidenced by an internal Boko Haram video Shekau called “Message to Fulanis,” specifically in Niger and Katsina states, in late 2014. However, the video was found in a Boko Haram camp and only released online by Nigerian media agencies in 2016. Subsequent reports emerged that Boko Haram member Adam Bitri was arrested in Niger State in 2017 with two other Boko Haram members and that he had collaborated with Bakura to kidnap for ransom the elderly former minister Ali Monguno in Maiduguri, Borno as early as 2013 (Punch, May 26, 2017). Bitri had also been reported in Boko Haram-controlled territories in Borno in 2014 and was again reported in 2019 to have left Boko Haram, joined ISWAP, and worked to connect ISWAP with Ansaru in northwestern Nigeria (Vanguard, May 5, 2015). However, Bitri became disillusioned by Ansaru’s excessively long-term approach and returned to Borno with no deal made (Premium Times, February 27). Bitri subsequently clashed with ISWAP leadership and allied with Bakura, who became loyal to Shekau again in 2019 after having been with ISWAP since August 2016. Bitri apparently disapproved of ISWAP’s comparatively moderate leadership. Shekau and ISWAP’s bids in northwestern Nigeria from late 2014, therefore, failed amid factional squabbles, but neither group ceased trying to gain a foothold there.

ISWAP, for its part, finally claimed it launched an attack on Nigerian police in Sokoto, northwestern Nigeria in October 2019 from a base across the border in Niger (Al-Naba #205, October 24, 2019). However, because ISWAP also encompasses the Mali, Burkina Faso, and northwestern Niger-based Islamic State in Greater Sahara (ISGS), which the United Nations and Nigerian “insider” journalist Ahmed Salkida’s media agency, among other sources, reported as operating in northwestern Nigeria in 2019, it is possible ISGS was involved in launching that attack (UN Security Council, July 15, 2019; HumAngle, May 19, 2019). Moreover, despite Bitri’s failed attempt to bridge ISWAP to Ansaru in northwestern Nigeria, the fact that some Ansaru members defected to, or collaborated with, ISWAP means it also cannot be discounted that jihadists operating in northwestern Nigeria and involved in the Sokoto attack had dual or overlapping affiliations to ISWAP and Ansaru, but not Boko Haram. Shekau’s faction is despised by both ISWAP and Ansaru because of his declaring takfir (excommunication) on them. The United Nations notably asserted Ansaru “reactivated” in October 2019, which makes one question whether Ansaru was actually involved in the Sokoto attack that month (UN Security Council, July 23, 2020

Meanwhile, in February, villagers in Niger State also reported that bandits operating in their vicinity told them they were from ISWAP (Daily Trust, February 10). This indicates ISWAP remained around northwestern Nigeria after October 2019, albeit without publicizing its presence in videos or other media. Like Ansaru, it was maintaining a low-profile in northwestern Nigeria to avoid attracting extra Nigerian military pressure, if not also foreign intelligence agencies’ reconnaissance. In July, the Nigerian Air Force announced it killed ISWAP members in a Zamfara airstrike, but, according to Ahmed Salkida’s colleague, Yusuf Anka, Ansaru members were killed in the airstrike (HumAngle, July 12). This nonetheless again indicates the ISWAP-Ansaru overlap in northwestern Nigeria and confusion about how distinct they actually are in northwestern Nigeria.

Ansaru also demonstrated its presence in north-central and northwestern Nigeria by carrying out its first claimed attack in five years on a Yobe emir’s convoy in Kaduna in January 2020 and then withstanding Nigerian security forces’ retaliation on its hideouts (The Cable, January 19; Punch, February 6). Although Ansaru stated on Telegram it was not “ripe” for publicity yet, the ambush was claimed by al-Qaeda’s semi-official media outlet, al-Thabat, in the name of “al-Qaeda in Biladis Sudan (Black Africa).” The attack occurred after several Ansaru members had traveled to Libya to train with IS, which again indicated Ansaru’s ties to IS/ISWAP were not antagonistic. Meanwhile, other Ansaru members arrested before Khalid al-Barnawi’s own arrest had also intended to train in Sudan. At least one Ansaru member from Sudan was arrested in Niger State in June (Punch, March 5, 2016; HumAngle, June 30). That member’s military fatigues and another slain “bandit’s” similar military fatigues in Zamfara in July resembled ISWAP’s uniforms. The uniforms suggested northwestern Nigeria’s “bandits” were professionalizing, whether or not they affiliated with Ansaru or ISWAP, or both (Twitter.com/ankaboy, July 16).

Friends With What Benefits? Shekau’s Calculations in Northwestern Nigeria

Boko Haram’s latest attempts to enter northwestern Nigeria reflect several trends. First, after seeing ISWAP and Ansaru gaining ground there in 2019, Shekau had to match his rivals. Shekau has already succeeded in defending southeastern Borno and neighboring parts of Cameroon from ISWAP’s encroachment. However, if ISWAP or Ansaru established cells in northwestern Nigeria and Boko Haram did not, it would indicate Shekau’s falling behind them and losing prestige as the top jihadist in Nigeria.

Moreover, after conducting the major Bohoma, Chad attack in March, Chad’s army launched significant offensives against ISWAP and Boko Haram around Lake Chad. Both groups retreated, but ISWAP has rebounded in Chad more effectively than Boko Haram, including revealing high-grade Israeli weapons and other ammunition taken from Chadian soldiers in a July ambush several miles from Nigeria’s border (al-Naba, July 16). Thus, Boko Haram’s Bakura faction around Lake Chad is weakened and adding new Niger and Zamfara state factions would compensate for Boko Haram’s struggles around Lake Chad.

Shekau has also remained more “Nigerian” than ISWAP or Ansaru. ISWAP has drifted from narratives related to condemning Nigerian government-aligned Salafists or Nigerian Muslim rulers not implementing sharia and now focuses predominantly on IS’ global narratives. Ansaru, for its part, was always conciliatory toward Nigerian Salafists because it sought to win their support, but promised to “defend” Nigerian Muslims from Christians, represent al-Qaeda in Nigeria, and revive Usman dan Fodio’s jihad. Dan Fodio was an 18th and early 19th century Fulani religious teacher and revolutionary jihadist. While dan Fodio-related narratives may resonate among some northwestern Nigerian Fulanis, albeit incongruously because dan Fodio was Sufi, Ansaru’s top leaders’ arrests and deaths have meant its ties to al-Qaeda’s nearest affiliate, AQIM, are weakened. Moreover, the reduction in Nigerian Muslim-Christian clashes in the past decade means Ansaru’s original raison d’être is also less pertinent.

Shekau and his Boko Haram loyalists, in contrast to ISWAP and Ansaru, scrutinize Nigerian Muslim discourses. In his videos, Shekau stalks Yobe-origin, but London-based, lawyer and analyst Bulama Bukarti, who opposes Boko Haram on Twitter and in other writings. Shekau also still threatens Nigerian Salafist and Shia leaders like Isa Ali Pantami and Ibrahim al-Zakzaky, as well as Salkida’s media agency, HumAngle (HumAngle, July 14). Boko Haram’s reference points might, therefore, have more common ground with rank-and-file northwestern Nigerians, including bandits, than more globally-oriented ISWAP or Ansaru.

Lastly, through kidnapping-for-ransom operations and village raids in Borno and its borderlands, Boko Haram has accumulated significant wealth over the past decade. The group, therefore, can certainly offer financial resources, military training, and ‘Islamic’ credibility to bandit groups that are competing not only with each other, but also fighting the Nigerian Army and Air Force, which has bombarded bandit camps. Such support would improve the bandits’ battle preparedness and professionalization and recruitment. In turn, bandit-turned-Boko Haram members’ loyalty to Shekau and attacks in northwestern Nigeria would boost Shekau’s prestige and his ideological goal of spreading jihad throughout Nigeria, just as the Bakura faction did for Shekau in Lake Chad. Boko Haram could also charge the bandits fees or a “tax” for its military assistance to them in a win-win deal.

Conclusion

Abubakar Shekau may appear ‘crazy’ in videos, but he is the longest-lasting jihadist leader globally. He became the leader of Boko Haram in 2010, one year before Aymen al-Zawahiri took over leading al-Qaeda. Boko Haram’s latest videos affirm Shekau remains Boko Haram’s undisputed leader and intends to create a hub-and-spoke organizational model with the Sambisa base being the hub and Zamfara and Niger states, Lake Chad, and Cameroon being spokes. Notwithstanding Shekau’s Nigerian orientation, one cannot discount his ambition. If his new expansionary project succeeds in northwestern Nigeria, Salkida’s suggestion that Shekau would attempt to create his own “African jihadist caliphate” project to compete with al-Qaeda and Islamic State also cannot be ruled out (HumAngle, Jul 12). Senegal, whose citizens fought with Boko Haram in Borno, would be one such location where Shekau has loyalists who could orchestrate attacks or at least help him fundraise (See TM May 4, 2018).

That said, Shekau’s expansionary project and related Boko Haram videos should be seen as a reaction to ISWAP’s and Ansaru’s prior entrenchment in northwestern Nigeria. Moreover, while the latter two groups have slow, steady, and surreptitious projects, Shekau’s is full of bluster. In the long-term, the other two groups’ more patient and civilian-centric approaches will help them win over bandit groups, professionalize them so they can withstand increasing pressure from security forces, and guide them in administering villages and towns from which the government is absent, or retreat in an ‘Islamic’ way that legitimizes their rule. Although ISWAP and seem more likely to succeed than Boko Haram, Shekau has historically overcome all odds to survive multiple attempts to kill him and even won over the Bakura faction in 2019. Thus, his eccentricity, reported Kanuri favoritism, and other vices might not preclude Boko Haram from gaining a northwestern Nigerian foothold.

In the short-term, Boko Haram, ISWAP, and Ansaru will likely compete for the loyalty of northwestern Nigerian bandit groups and clash similarly to fights between ISGS and al-Qaeda loyalists in Mali and Burkina Faso However, one key dynamic is the potential for ISWAP and Ansaru to overcome their conflicting loyalties to IS and al-Qaeda and instead cooperate to keep Shekau out of the northwestern Nigerian frontier and harm the reputation of the jihadists like they accuse of him of doing elsewhere in Nigeria. Boko Haram and ISWAP brigades in Borno will nevertheless both benefit from the Nigerian Army and Airforce’s diverting resources from Borno, where Boko Haram is actually targeted with airstrikes more frequently than ISWAP, to northwestern Nigeria.

Nigeria should approach Boko Haram, ISWAP, and Ansaru in northwestern Nigeria as the most serious security crisis since the insurgency began in the northeast in 2010. As detrimental as the crisis there has become, Boko Haram and ISWAP are relatively contained in Borno and its borderlands; the groups have struggled to break out of predominantly Kanuri areas into majority Hausa-Fulani areas. However, if these jihadist groups gain a foothold in northwestern Nigeria, there are few physical or socio-cultural boundaries that will prevent their continued expansion until northern Nigeria becomes overwhelmed and possibly inextricably linked with rising insecurity elsewhere in the neighboring Sahel region. In such a case, Nigeria’s territorial integrity will become even more gravely threatened.

The Sudanese government is sending more troops to the restive Darfur region, following a spike in violence there, like reported by bbc.com.

Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok said the forces would protect people during the farming season.

Unidentified gunmen killed more than 60 people in the region on Saturday, and another 20 the day before, the UN said.

Hundreds of thousands of people have died in fighting between government forces and rebels since 2003. Millions have been forced from their homes.

In the latest upsurge, several villages were burned, and markets and shops looted, said the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

“The escalation of violence in different parts of Darfur region is leading to increased displacement, compromising the agricultural season, causing loss of lives and livelihoods and driving growing humanitarian needs,” it said in a statement.

No group has so far said it carried out the attacks.

Former President Omar al-Bashir, who was overthrown last year, is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for alleged war crimes and genocide in the region.

Last week, the 76-year-old went on trial in Sudan’s capital Khartoum in connection with the 1989 military coup that brought him to power.

He could face the death penalty if found guilty.

Militants from an Islamic State affiliate claimed responsibility Thursday for killing five aid workers who were kidnapped last month in northeastern Nigeria, like reported by abcnews.go.com.

The Islamic State West Africa Province, which broke away from Boko Haram several years ago, warned in June that it would target Nigerians working for international aid agencies along with those who helped the military. Nigeria’s president already had blamed the extremists for the slayings.

The group issued its claim online in its digital weekly newspaper, al-Naba, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors extremist groups. The aid workers were killed on Sunday, and a video of their deaths was later released on social media, SITE reported.

The alarming development threatens to further complicate relief efforts in northeastern Nigeria, where nearly 2 million people have been displaced by the ongoing insurgency. The U.N. World Food Program says 3 million in the northeast are facing hunger, and now also threatened by COVID-19.

The five were traveling by road to the state capital of Maiduguri when they were abducted last month by the militants. Nigeria’s presidency said the victims had worked for the Nigerian government and three international aid agencies: Action Against Hunger, International Rescue Committee and REACH International.

“They were committed humanitarians who devoted their lives to helping vulnerable people and communities in an area heavily affected by violence,” said Edward Kallon, the U.N.’s humanitarian coordinator in Nigeria.

Security has long been a concern for aid groups operating in the northeast, where humanitarian workers have been repeatedly kidnapped and killed during Boko Haram’s decade-long insurgency against the Nigerian government.

Those concerns have deepened though since the Boko Haram splinter faction warned last month that it would target civilians who help humanitarian groups. The splinter group previously was not known to target Muslim civilians but left threatening pamphlets in June.

A French soldier from the army’s First Parachute Hussar Regiment was killed in combat in Mali, President Emmanuel Macron’s office said Thursday.

“This soldier … was killed in fighting against armed terrorist groups, when an improvised explosive device was triggered next to his armoured vehicle,” the presidency said in a statement.

France has more than 5,000 troops in the West African Sahel region as part of international efforts to fight Islamist militants in the area.

The news of the French soldier’s death came as leaders of five West African countries were holding a one-day summit in the Malian capital, Bamako, in a bid to resolve the country’s escalating political and security crises.

The presidents of Senegal, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria and Niger were meeting with Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita and leaders of a protest movement clamouring for his resignation.

The unrest deeply worries Mali’s neighbours and allies, who fear a country bloodied by a jihadist insurgency could slide into chaos.

The impoverished nation of around 20 million people has been struggling to contain an insurgency that first emerged in the north in 2012 before spreading to its centre, as well as neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger.

Thousands of soldiers and civilians have died in the conflict, and hundreds of thousands of people have been driven from their homes.

France started its military operations in Mali in 2013, after northern Mali was seized by Islamist extremists who had hijacked a Tuareg rebellion in the country’s northern desert regions the previous year.

The French military successfully drove extremists from several key towns, but the jihadist insurgency has since spread throughout Mali and across the border to Niger and Burkina Faso.

Iran has established covert ties with the Somalia-based al-Shabab terrorist group well known for its attacks in the Horn of Africa. Following Russia’s playbook in Afghanistan and the surrounding regions, Tehran is allegedly using al-Shabab to attack the U.S. military and other foreign forces in Somalia and in the region, according to senior Somali government and security officials familiar with intelligence and briefed on the matter, like reported by foreignpolicy.com.

Using financial inducements as their means for recruitment, Iran has a proxy network in Somalia and uses facilitators to provide support to violent extremist organizations to counter the influence of the United States and Persian Gulf states, including using Somalia to funnel weapons to Houthi rebels in Yemen and to transit weapons to other countries such as Kenya, Tanzania, South Sudan, Mozambique, and Central African Republic.

Iranian engagement on the African continent is not new. In particular, Iranian religious groups and intelligence agencies have worked for decades to establish missionary and influence operations on the African continent. These include providing religious scholarship opportunities throughout sub-Saharan Africa and in the Horn region competing and countering Gulf states’ influences.

Furthermore, these educational efforts have allowed Africans to study in Shiite religious centers such as Qom in Iran, and then go back to their countries to engage in both direct and indirect proselytizing in favor of Tehran’s activities, making many of them witting or unwitting accomplices to those pursuing Tehran’s intelligence objectives in the region.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is the main Iranian organization in Somalia, and its Quds Force has established relations with extremist groups and criminal networks, according to Somali officials. Somali police and finance ministry officials claim the Quds Force uses these networks to smuggle Iranian oil into Somalia and then sell cheap oil across Africa to subvert U.S. sanctions, with some of the proceeds used to support militants in Yemen and Somalia.

Somali military officials maintain that Iran has been running secret operations to undermine the United States in Somalia, providing sophisticated weapons, improvised explosive devices, mortars, and chemicals used to make bombs. The military officials allege that Iran and its proxies are complicit in al-Shabab attacks on the U.S. military, Somali forces, and the African Union Mission in Somalia. A senior military official involved in operations against al-Shabab in south-central Somalia alleges that al-Shabab has received financial and material support from Iran and may have paid bounties to militants to attack U.S. forces in Somalia and the region.

According to Somali defense ministry and security officials, Iranian money, weapons, and ammunition may have been used in 2019 and 2020 al-Shabab attacks on U.S. military bases in Somalia and northern Kenya, as well as the European Union military convoy in Mogadishu.

Security forces involved in operations against al-Shabab in south-central Somalia discovered weapons as well as bomb-making materials and chemicals from Iran. These officials claim that al-Shabab attacks since 2017 have become more lethal and attribute the group’s increased capabilities to foreign-sourced weapons, with the majority coming from Iran and Yemen.

Somali National Army (SNA) backed by Jubaland state forces killed six al-Shabab extremists on Saturday in a security operation on the outskirts of Kismayo, a military officer confirmed according to dailynewssegypt.com.

Aden Mohamed Ibrahim, commander of Jubaland state army told journalists that the joint operation conducted by SNA’s 43rd Unit and Jubaland state army started when the forces got intelligence from the public of the militants’ presence in the area.
“There was a fierce fight between the army and the militants in Koban and Bula Haji villages, but our forces overpowered the militants, killing six of them,” Ibrahim said.

He added that the army also captured many villages and recovered ammunition during the operation.
Locals said that heavily armed government forces attacked Bula Haji village, prompting an exchange of fire between the army and the militants.

On July 12, the army backed by Southwestern state forces killed seven al-Shabab extremists and injured 5 others in another operation in Bardale town in the southern region of Bay.

Meanwhile, security minister, Abdinasir Said Muse, survived an assassination attempt on Saturday evening after a roadside bomb targeted his vehicle near Taleh junction in Mogadishu’s Hodan district.

The police said the bomb which was hidden on the roadside at a construction site exploded on the vehicle belonging to the deputy minister but Muse was not in the vehicle at the time.

The police officer who declined to be named said one of his guards was killed while three other people were injured.
There was no immediate comment from the militant group on the latest attack in the restive Mogadishu but the terrorist group which is fighting to topple the government have usually staged such attacks in the past.

Somali army backed by the African Union Mission in Somalia (Amisom) forced al-Shabab extremists out of the capital Mogadishu in August 2011, but the militants still hold swathes of rural areas in southern and central Somalia conducting ambushes and planting landmines as they stage attacks in the city and elsewhere.

The African region of Sahel might be relatively geographically distant from Europe, but it should be considered integral in security sense for the European Union (EU) given the ever-expanding activities of various jihadist and criminal organizations in that area, like reported by eeradicalization.com. Situated between the Atlantic Ocean and Red Sea and south of the Sahara Desert, the Sahel is being used as a transit hub for the trafficking of illicit goods—and people—to Europe. While factors such as drought, poor harvests, desertification, and state failure have driven many local farmers and herders into illicit trades simply to make a living, those in control are much more nefarious. Huge number of refugees and immigrants use these pre-existing smuggling networks to get to Europe, often through the chaos of Libya, lining the pockets of organized criminal and jihadist groups that control the networks.

According to United Nations (UN) Economic Commission for Africa, the annual revenues from illegal smuggling in the Sahel amount to $50 billion. A report of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) estimates that 60-70% of the region’s economy is “informal”, i.e. outside of the legal frameworks of the various states. Clear evidence demonstrates the long-lasting cooperation between Latin American drug cartels and local groups in West Africa. At least 50 tons of cocaine per year arrive from South and Central America to be redistributed across the Sahel, travelling north from there to Maghreb and thence to Europe’s streets.

The truth is that the Sahel is closer than it appears and its effects even closer to the EU. The EU might look at the weak and failing states that cannot solve economic crises or their inter-communal and tribal conflicts or mitigate the effects of climate change, and think it has little to do with them. But these maladies are carried by numerous vectors into Europe. The various radical jihadists and the criminal networks not only materially influence European security through illicit activities; they also spread hostile and radical ideologies, contributing to the already high levels of violence and chaos.

The regional crisis was not pacified even after the 2012 French military intervention in Mali and the establishment of an UN peace mission, which was followed by the 2015 Algiers peace accords. The radicals were defeated on the battlefield in many ways, but not completely eliminated, and found enough opportunities to regroup, grow, expand, and attack again. Between 2012 and 2018, 344 civilian and military personal of UN were killed in jihadist assaults. Terrorist and radical influence steadily spilled over from Mali to Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad, exploiting and exacerbating already existing social, political, and ethnic cleavages. Powerful Al Qaeda and Islamic State (ISIS) affiliates were able to capitalize on the insecurity and social marginalization of entire communities, using their version of religion as an alternative to the failed traditional sources of power. Between 2014 and 2018, the activity of eight jihadist groups was related to the deaths of over 1,100 civilians, including 400 in 2017 alone. According to UN, violence and instability have led to a refugee and humanitarian crisis with more than one million displaced people in Mali, Chad, Mauritania, Burkina Faso, and Niger. At the same time, the World Food Program warns of 2.4 million people in urgent need of humanitarian aid, and more than five million children at risk of malnutrition. Local governments have practically lost control over entire regions. There is real danger that these territories might fall permanently under jihadist influence and from there it can easily spill over to neighbouring Togo, Ghana, and Cote d’Ivoire as well.

All these facts are clearly visible for the European political elite, and the escalating resources Brussels devotes to the area suggests they understand that the Sahel region will become an ever-increasing priority for the EU.

So far, the biggest contributor to regional defense and security has been France, the former colonial power and traditional power-broker in this part of Africa. In the summer of 2014, Operation “Serval” in Mali was succeeded by “Barkhane”, which had a much wider geographical scope. Some 5,100 soldiers have been so far deployed across Mali, Niger, Chad, and Burkina Faso, including 600 sent since the start of this year in the context of increased activity by the jihadist groups. Between 1,500 and 2,000 French soldiers operate in the Northern and Eastern parts of Mali and the rest are spread out between the headquarters in N’Djamena, at least four bases and airfields in Niger, as well as one special forces unit in Burkina Faso (Operation “Sabr”).

The French soldiers engage in wide range of activities from joint patrols with local partners, to intelligence gathering, providing training and in general, any kind of capacity-building support to fill the vacuum of governance left by the absence of state institutions. A special emphasis is placed on conducting counter-terrorist operations that have led to the termination of some high-ranking jihadists, such as Djamel Okacha – one of the leaders in the powerful Al-Qaeda affiliate known as Jama’at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimiin (Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims). However, these battles come at a great cost. In November 2019, the French army lost thirteen soldiers in an accident involving two helicopters sent as a support during a special forces operation in the isolated border area between Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso. In total, 41 French soldiers have been killed in the region since the country first intervened in January 2013.

While Paris concentrates on military activities, the EU works on broader issues. In 2011, Brussels presented a comprehensive and multicomponent strategy for the Sahel region. It was upgraded in 2014 and 2015 and now this plan specifically targets Burkina Faso, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, and Chad, and extends into Maghreb countries and Nigeria. In practice, the strategy is based on the classical 3D approach—combining diplomacy, defense, and development. The first component is related to the appointment of an EU Special Representative for Sahel, whose tasks include coordination and mediation between the main stakeholders. The defense and security part of the strategy involve deployment of three missions in Mali and Niger. Their aim is to provide training for the local police and army forces in the context of the battle against terrorism, organized crime and trafficking. However, these missions do not have mandate to participate in military or counter-terrorist operations. In development and economic sense the EU has put in motion several programs and funds, with estimated provision of eight billion euros between 2014 and 2020. In addition to these investments, the EU along with the UN and the World Bank has pledged additional 1.3 billion euros of support for the Priority Investment Plan – a regional investment initiative of the G5 Sahel countries aimed at developing over 40 infrastructure projects.

But how effective are all these measures? At least for now, there does not seem to be any significant progress in stabilizing the region. Violence and attacks in Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad are progressively increasing. Burkina Faso is close to complete collapse, with the state suffering more jihadist attacks than any other country in the region. Radical Islamism in not the only threat to civilians. Local criminal groups, gangs or ethnic-based self-defense militias are also responsible for many atrocities. Just recently, at least 43 civilian people lost their lives as a result of inter-communal violence in Burkina Faso. Even government security forces contribute to the instability and chaos by disproportionate responses to factors considered as threats.

The lack of success so far may be due to the use of inadequate and incomplete strategy. The 3D approach might not be sufficient in the context of the social-political dynamics of the Sahel and the neighbouring countries. It practically aims to pacify the whole region by destroying violent armed militias that pose a threat to stability and security; brokering peace deals between local political elites; forging political and constitutional reforms; and increasing the defense capacity of local security forces to assume more responsibility. But this is a strategy that sees local militaries and political elites as part of the solution, when in most cases they are actually among the root causes of the problems. And this strategy is not “new”; these elites have been receiving European support for decades in many cases. Blaise Compaore the former longtime president of Burkina Faso is a good example of such cooperation. So is the current leader of Chad, Idriss Deby, who has been ruling the country for 30 years, often relying on French military support to tackle political rivals and rebels.

There is no easy solution to these overlapping crises; too much irreparable damage has already been done to millions of people. In such extreme environments, the choice to go towards radicalization, violence, and revenge is very easy. To prevent this, the present approach needs to be reshaped. Supporting the current political models has been historically proven to be inefficient, and could cost much more to Europe in the long-term than the current activity of several jihadist groups. The longer this instability persists, the more anti-Western sentiments will entrench in local communities that are already sensitive about their colonial past.

It is probable that the solution for the Sahel lies in local communities. The aggregation of their interests, needs, and perspectives should be the basis for all future economic and political reforms. The war against Islamic radicalism and organized crime cannot be won without gaining the trust of local communities. Europe should demonstrate that it has no will to colonize these areas again and respects the local peoples; a violation of such promises could push more people into radicalism. But if these promises are fulfilled and assistance offered from Europe to local peoples in accordance with their wishes, as expressed from the bottom-up, this could pave the path to a solution.

A Malian jihadist police chief committed “unimaginable crimes” during a reign of terror and sexual slavery in the fabled shrine city of Timbuktu, prosecutors told the International Criminal Court at the start of his trial Tuesday, like reported by sbs.com.au.

Al Hassan Ag Abdoul Aziz Ag Mohamed Ag Mahmoud, 42, personally oversaw corporal punishments including amputations and floggings while the Malian city was under the control of Islamist militants for almost a year from early 2012, prosecutors said.

Al Hassan also arranged for women and girls to be forced to marry militants as part of a system of “gender-based persecution”, the ICC’s chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda told the court.

Al Hassan is charged by The Hague-based court with war crimes, crimes against humanity, rape and sexual slavery.

“Today marks the beginning of the long-awaited trial of the unimaginable crimes which have been committed in Mali,” Ms Bensouda said.

“Al Hassan was directly involved in the violence and torture inflicted on the men, the women and the children of Timbuktu. He worked in the heart of a repressive, persecuting system.”

Al Hassan – who appeared in court in The Hague wearing a traditional turban, and a face mask to protect against coronavirus – said he “understood” the charges but did not enter a plea.

‘Scared out of their minds’
The prosecutor said Al Hassan was a key figure in the Islamic police and court system set up by the militants after they exploited an ethnic Tuareg uprising in 2012 to take over cities in Mali’s volatile north.

The jihadists from the Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and Ansar Eddine groups also destroyed the centuries-old shrines of Timbuktu.

“Timbuktu the pearl of the desert, whose population had been living in peace for years, was subject to their diktats,” Ms Bensouda said, adding that the militants’ aim was to “strike fear into people, to spread terror”.

Al Hassan arrested people, conducted investigations during which suspects were tortured, referred cases to the Islamic court and “participated personally in the meting out of corporal punishment by the police,” Ms Bensouda said.

She said the court would see a video in which a man’s hand is amputated in a public square before the entire population of Timbuktu “in the most brutal way possible, with a type of long knife”.

The prosecutor said Al Hassan had admitted to investigators that Timbuktu residents “were scared out of their minds”.

‘Women suffered the most’
The Islamists are also accused of forcing women and girls to marry militants as part of a system of “gender-based persecution”.

“It was the women and girls of Timbuktu who were targeted and suffered the most,” Bensouda said, with some raped repeatedly by “one or more members” of the militant group.

One victim told investigators that “all that was left of me was a corpse”.

Al Hassan was also shown on video being “personally involved” in the flogging of women accused of adultery, the prosecutor said.

Other women were beaten and imprisoned for breaching rules including failing to wear prescribed clothing, giving water to a man or not having gloves.

Al Hassan is the second Islamist extremist to face trial at the ICC for the destruction of the Timbuktu shrines, following a landmark 2016 ruling at the world’s only permanent war crimes court.

In the court’s first case to focus on cultural destruction, the ICC judges found Ahmad al-Faqi al-Mahdi guilty of directing attacks on the UNESCO World Heritage site in 2012.

He was sentenced to nine years in jail.

Timbuktu’s tombs were rebuilt after the jihadists were thrown out, but the city remains in the grip of insecurity and tourists who once flocked there are now scarce.

A joint EU special ops force formed to back Mali’s fight against jihadist groups will deploy in the West African country on Wednesday, French Defence Minister Florence Parly said according to dailymail.co.uk.

Around 100 French and Estonian troops will initially make up the force dubbed Takuba, Parly told the online version of the daily La Croix on Sunday.

A second contingent of around 60 Czech soldiers will deploy in October, to be followed by some 150 Swedish troops in January 2021, Parly said.

“Italy has just indicated its wish to join us,” she added.

Jihadist and inter-ethnic violence in Mali and neighbouring Niger and Burkina Faso killed at least 4,000 people in 2019, according to the United Nations.

The entire Sahel region is seeing ever more brazen attacks by Islamist groups despite the beefing up of national armies and the deployment of 5,100 French anti-terrorism troops.

As jihadist forces have weakened, however, they have increasingly resorted to the recruitment of minors, Parly said.

“Despite all precautions taken, some (child soldiers) can be wounded or killed during fighting,” she warned.

Scorned and underrated, Abubakar Shekau, the leader of Jama’atu Ahlul Sunnah Lidda’awatu Wal-Jihad (JAS), otherwise known as Boko Haram, is currently pulling a massive stealth strategy of organisational makeover destined to connect the north-east, the north-west and the north-central in a bewildering expansionist agenda, like reported by premiumtimesng.com.

Defined by welcoming former apostates; engaging in factional reconciliations; admitting of modest ideological shifts, and proposing a balanced role for clerics and combatants in his group, Shekau is on the move to consolidate his ranks and establish himself as the ‘African Jihadi Caliph’ after his 2012-13 falling out with Al Qaeda, the embattled Islamic State in Iraq and the Levent.

Often portrayed as silly sick bag, on account of his frequent melodramatic video appearances, where he is either dancing, singing, mimicking others or indiscriminately shooting machine gun into the air, insurgency experts and knowledgeable sources on the identity of social movements in the Nigerian northeast, believe Shekau is emerging more of a strategic and calculated schemer than past or current assessment of him is admitting.

Insurgency experts in Maiduguri and Abuja told Humangle that no other leader has so far exerted comparable influence to sustain such a bloody villainy in the now decade-old insurgency which has consumed about 30,000 lives and scattered more than two million citizens into a cruel internal flight from their homes.

After the demise of Muhammed Yusuf in 1999 when he became the putative leader of Boko Haram, and the immediate period of floundering and mediocre Shekau leadership, during which he survived several coups and counter-coups by even far more superior fighting forces within the jihadi community, the wily insurgent has embraced a far-reaching restyling with an unmistakable eye on expansionist ambitions.

Experts date this remodelling to 2012 when he lived in Kano, Northwest Nigeria, before moving to the remote forest areas of Alagarno and Sambisa in Borno State in the Northeast. HumAngle’s own investigations show that after executing several of his associates at the slightest provocation, Shekau appeared to have come round to the view that this excesses was responsible for the defection of hundreds of previous members across Nigeria and into the diaspora, even while others joined forces with other insurgents to form ANSARU in 2012 and ISWAP in 2016.

With a studied eye on current developments within rival groups, Shekau staked a handsome bet: ANSARU evidently had not grown in any prestige, because of, according to sources, the lack of leadership; while ISWAP continues to be bogged down by constant leadership feud. In the light of all these, Shekau’s smartest move, it seemed, was to invest in growth and expansion.

Multiple sources knowledgeable about the inner workings of Shekau’s group started noticing an astonishingly tolerant evolution in him, adopting a lenient posture towards his troops and commanders. He is believed to be currently extending a hand of reconciliation to defectors, something previously unthinkable, although he remains agnostic towards the Islamic State West Africa (ISWAP) and its members, to which a defected member of Shekau’s flock said, “He still has zero-tolerance them.”

The deft weaving of alliance and the development of a renewed cosy gesture to others have invariably eased his expanded footprints, starting from the lucrative Lake Chad region through, the north-central zones of the country, to the north-west regions. All these developments speak to a new vision of the insurgency; and to the ultimate purpose of a caliphate, insights that appear to have evaded the radar of scholars and the security forces.

In the Lake Chad basin area, Shekau courted Sa’alaba and Bakura, two prominent fighters who were reluctant to commit to any side during the feud between the late Abu Musab [son of the group’s founder Yusuf] and the late Mamman Nur whose ISWAP fighters duelled Shekau-led Boko Haram forces in 2016.

With the Sa’alaba/Bakura group in the play, their over 300 fighters, as at December 2018, pledged allegiance to Shekau early in 2019 dramatically redrawing the map of the resource-rich Lake Chad basin as a contested terrain which ISWAP had monopolized for a while.

Unconfirmed reports claimed that this Shekau’s manoeuvre, of offering fighters groups under him which are operating outside of the Sambisa general area in central and southern Borno, and in parts of Cameroon, to operate semi-autonomously, is the critical factor helping to cement these new alliances. The idea of a sub-faction, with Shekau serving only as a spiritual leader, became a win-win that offered major attraction to many fighters as to the expansionist Shekau himself.

Thus, fighters who defected from Boko Haram, but showed no interest in joining the government’s safe corridor window suddenly became part of the groups showing interest in Shekau’s new offerings. HumAngle sources believe that these are fighters Shekau is particularly courting for a measure of an expanded alliance by licensing them to “go to more than 10 locations within and outside Nigeria and fight as members of JAS,” according to source familiar with the group’s new big-tent programme.

This mother-breast strategy appears to have hit the chord for many as one former fighter told HumAngle that after fleeing Sambisa Forest in 2018 to Kano, he could not find a job to do, a fate that also affected many of his comrades in arms who found it hard to reintegrate into the civil society in northern Nigeria. Every day, they claimed, they were afraid to meet someone from Maiduguri who knew them and life became a nightmare. “Some of us joined ANSARU and moved to the forests in Northwest Nigeria because, at any rate, it was very difficult to find jobs in the cities,” said the former fighter.

Now that “Imam Shekau has created cells in Niger and Zamfara states we are free to rejoin the group without the fear of reprisals,” he added.

Shekau’s ideological shift is at its striking peak. His departure from the past seemed total that he had soft-pedalled to the point of categorising Muslims living outside his fold not as takfiris (apostates) but now in welcoming tones as “brothers.” Not all past allies and current freelancer fighters are believers yet, but, according to sources, they are openminded enough to venture a try, like fighters in Taraba, Kogi, Katsina and Sokoto states who are currently in the process of sealing such allegiance, according to competent sources and as already disclosed in an exclusive report by HumAngle on June 16.

What has given momentum to this strategy of sealing alliances, HumAngle learnt, was a prudent of theology, culture and history. Before any allegiance is sealed, Shekau will typically normally send emissaries to the location, carry out investigations and explain clearly his ideology, and speak of the value of strength in unity. A historian of the region said this was a complete resort to empire-building lessons from the 19th century Kanem Borno.

So when there is an understanding, after the back and forth interactions, the emissaries will accept the Bai’a (pledge of allegiance) on behalf of Shekau and stay back to organise the Katiba (detachment) in different components – Shurah Council, Jaish (military), Amniyat or Sariya (intelligence), Hisbah (police), I’ilan (media unit), among other structures.

Typical example is the Sa’alaba/Bakura in the Republic of Niger, operating close to the border with Nigeria, that has the above structure in place and is reported to have the largest number of fighters (Katiba) outside the Sambisa general area with about 1,000 fighters. This is next in strategic importance to Shekau’s Katibas in Cameroon, Republic of Chad and Niger State, North-Central Nigeria and Zamfara in Northwest Nigeria.

It remains unclear here if the Nigerian government and international partners in the war against terrorism understand or have plans to alter or indeed forestall this expansionist programme of Boko Haram.

Notwithstanding that Shekau’s fighters have been under intense attacks from both the Nigerian military and the Multi-National Joint Task Force, the group currently faces little or no resistance from counterintelligence and counter doctrinal messaging perspective to dent their current violent expansionist onslaught.