North Africa’s Security
Security | Defense | Terrorism
Sahel: Three Sahel States Join Forces in Northern Mali Offensive
The Alliance of Sahel States (AES)—linking Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso—has entered a new phase of joint military coordination as shared drone operations and intelligence networks converge on militant strongholds across Mali’s northeast.
SECURITY & DEFENSE
Middle East: Carnage in Baghdad with dozens killed in suicide attack ahead of Eid
By Salam Faraj: Iraq was in mourning Tuesday for dozens of people killed when a bomb ripped through a crowded Baghdad market on the eve of a Muslim feast in what the Islamic State group claimed as a suicide attack. The bloody carnage Monday evening, one of the...
Sahel: French warplane crashes in central Mali
A French Mirage warplane crashed in an uninhabited area of central Mali on Tuesday after suffering a technical malfunction, but its two crew ejected and were quickly recovered, the French army said. The plane was carrying out surveillance near the town of Homburi in...
Sahel: Failed assassination attempt on Mali’s interim president
Assimi Goita’s Profile By Amaury Hauchard with Laurent Lozano in Dakar An enigmatic special forces commander, Mali's interim leader Assimi Goita is known to be publicity-shy but with a penchant for power. He grabbed headlines in May when he ousted Mali's former...
Libya’s normalization efforts at an impasse
The UN envoy for Libya, Jan Kubis, on Thursday warned of an impasse in the political, security and budgetary plans for the country, which is supposed to hold general elections on December 24 but which are looking increasingly in doubt."I am deeply concerned about the...
Catholic hostages freed in Mali
A Malian priest -- the last of a group of five Catholics kidnapped in mid-June -- has been freed, church and government sources said Wednesday. Armed men took the five people hostage in the centre of Mali on June 21 after they left Segue to attend the funeral of...
Burkina Faso: Attack on Niha-Mossi village leaves 10 dead
Ten people were killed in northern Burkina Faso, seven of them members of a civilian defence force, security sources said Monday, in an attack in a region that has been repeatedly hit by jihadists. "Unidentified armed men yesterday attacked the village of Niha-Mossi,...
Niger: Civilians, soldiers and armed attackers killed in Tillaberi clash
Five civilians, four soldiers and 40 armed attackers were killed Sunday in a clash in Niger's restive southwest region near the border with Mali, the government said. Around 100 heavily armed "terrorists" riding motorcycles attacked the Tchoma Bangou village, striking...
Sahel: Despite announcing troop drawdown plan, France insists it will not leave the Sahel
France to start closing military bases in Mali by year-end President Emmanuel Macron said Friday that France would start closing its bases in northern Mali before the end of the year, part of a drawdown of French troops fighting Islamist extremists in the Sahel. "The...
Libya: Russia and Turkey signaling willingness to pull tiny number of their mercenaries from Libya
By Hui Min Neo and Shaun Tandon Hopes grew Wednesday for Libya's stability following a decade of bloodshed as Russia and Turkey reached a tentative plan in talks in Berlin to start withdrawing foreign mercenaries, officials said. The UN-sponsored conference -- the...
Burkina Faso: Mass casualty in ambush on policemen near Barsalogho
Around 10 policemen have been killed in an ambush by suspected jihadists in northern Burkina Faso and several more officers are missing, security sources told AFP on Tuesday. "On Monday evening, a group of police officers were targeted in an ambush by armed...
INSURGENCIES & TERRORISM
Tunisia: Tunis rocked by twin terror attacks, as President fights for his life
Tunis, June 27, 2019 - Double suicide attacks shook Tunisia's capital Thursday, even as the country was plunged into uncertainty with the hospitalisation of President Beji Caid Essebsi who was said to be in "critical condition". The violence revived fears for the...
Sahel: Two gendarmes killed in terror attack in Burkina Faso
Ouagadougou, June 25, 2019 - A "terrorist attack" left two gendarmes dead and one seriously wounded in the north of Burkina Faso where jihadist violence has raged since 2015, the national police said Tuesday. The attack occurred Monday in the Arbinda region, where a...
Egypt: Another terror attack in Egypt’s North Sinai
Cairo, June 26, 2019 - Seven police officers have been killed in a jihadist attack in restive North Sinai, Egypt's interior ministry said Wednesday. The attack near the regional capital El-Arish targeted an "assembly centre" for police, according to the ministry. Four...
Sahel: 18 insurgents killed in Niger’s Tongo Tongo area over a ten-day campaign
Niamey, June 20, 2019 - Eighteen members of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara were killed in a joint operation by US, French and Niger troops near Niger's border with Mali, the defence ministry said Tuesday. The June 8-18 operation took place "in the northern...
The Libyan civil war: no break for Tripoli
Tripoli, June 20, 2019 - Libyan strongman Khalifa Haftar has vowed to press ahead with an offensive to seize Tripoli, dismissing a political initiative by the head of the internationally recognised government. Haftar's self-styled Libyan National Army, which holds...
Libya: Three wounded in air raid on site operated by Mellitah Oil & Gas Company
Tripoli, June 19, 2019 - Libya's National Oil Company deplored an air raid that on Tuesday evening destroyed a warehouse operated by a subsidiary and wounded three personnel near Tripoli. "A warehouse owned by subsidiary Mellitah Oil & Gas Company (MOG) was...
Sahel: Mali’s ethnic Dogon people under attack
June 18, 2019 - Thirty-eight people (updated to 41) were killed and many others wounded in attacks on two ethnic Dogon villages in central Mali, the government said Tuesday, in the latest in a cycle of violence in the volatile Sahel country. No group immediately...
Sahel: Three security personnel killed in new violence in Mali
Bamako, June 17, 2019 - Two Malian gendarmes were killed by a mine explosion outside a military base and a soldier died in an ambush in the north of the country, the armed forces said on Monday. Since French troops helped force out jihadists in 2013, parts of northern...
Sahel: Insurgents attack village in Burkina Faso, kill 19
June 10, 2019 - Nineteen people died in an attack on a village in the troubled north of Burkina Faso, a security source said Monday. "Several dozen armed men carried out an attack on the district of Arbinda, shooting several people dead," a local official told AFP,...
Sahel: Three killed by French troops in Mali, locals say the victims were civilians, demand justice
Brief: MEA Risk LLC | 10 June 2019: On 8 June, in Raz El Ma area of Timbuktu, French forces of Operation Barkhane raided a suspicious vehicle. Three people, a father and two sons, were killed. According to a community leader, the people killed were just ordinary...