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Electric Wrigglies posted:On my facebook are posts saying that the brand new 76 series Toyotas that are common to these attacks on Burkinabe forces is supplied by the French. It is a common local belief that Trump being illegally kicked from power in the US is a disaster for the Burkina people and part of the reason for the terrorist's success. That sounds like quite the conspiracy theory. Those sentences together are a layered onion of conspiracy theories, really, which I guess is fitting for any type of "information" coming out of Facebook posts. I mean "the French are supplying insurgents with weapons and trucks so that they can harass the government we are propping up, so that the government we are propping up keeps us in the country" is really ... war novel type stuff. Vvvv: oh for sure. See: ISIS in 2014. See: Taliban in 2021. I doubt it but it’s certainly possible they are provided by France, but in a roundabout way through corruption and theft. I was reading that as meaning Facebook algorithms were promoting the idea they *directly* were supplying jihadists with technicals. Saladman fucked around with this message at 22:35 on Jan 24, 2023 |
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Jan 24, 2023 17:57
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On the other hand: 'foreign power supplying equipment which ends up being used by baddies" is quite common. What would be interesting to know here is if France does indeed supply that truck to Burkina Faso, and also what militias they support. If info isn't available for Burkina Faso then looking at neighboring countries where France is also Hector involved could provide clues.
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Jan 24, 2023 21:29
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https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/least-34-killed-clashes-somaliland-two-doctors-public-hospital-2023-02-06/ Clashes between Separatists and unionists kill 34 in northern Somalia PawParole fucked around with this message at 22:37 on Feb 6, 2023 |
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Feb 6, 2023 22:29
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Evidently Russian Foreign Minister is in Mauritania for a visit. My Mauritanian workmate doesn't think Mauritania will go for Russian support like the other Sahel nations have. It has had better success keeping the arms and incursions limited by patroling the vast desert border with camels and V8 petrol land cruisers.
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Feb 7, 2023 13:07
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does russia do literally anything nonmilitary in africa? i haven't seen any FDI by them whatsoever, they don't even loan shark like the chinese
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Feb 7, 2023 16:53
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KOTEX GOD OF BLOOD posted:does russia do literally anything nonmilitary in africa? i haven't seen any FDI by them whatsoever, they don't even loan shark like the chinese This is a good question
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Feb 7, 2023 19:43
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They were going for the cultural victory when I was in Dakar in November
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Feb 7, 2023 19:53
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KOTEX GOD OF BLOOD posted:does russia do literally anything nonmilitary in africa? i haven't seen any FDI by them whatsoever, they don't even loan shark like the chinese Non-military like what? Chinese loans aren’t loan-sharking, they’re mostly written off at this point. They’re more like the Japanese white elephant investments in the 70’s in Southern Asia. Far more important is private trade between China and Africa. It’s way easier to import or get a visa to China (or Turkey it’s major competitor) than it is to america.
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Feb 7, 2023 21:05
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So the Burkina Faso army withdrew and regrouped before pushing back into the north but got ambushed and have fallen back. They are not saying that they have lost the area but will need to collect significant forces before having another go. The French special forces element that was still in Ouagadougou departed Sunday. Médecins Sans Frontières ceased operations the end of last week. In words quoted in international news - "Walking with Russia is not a sin ... Russia is the solution," said 58-year-old protester Amadé Compaoré.
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Feb 20, 2023 09:30
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that surname must be a weird coincidence!
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Feb 20, 2023 10:48
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PawParole posted:Non-military like what?
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Feb 21, 2023 14:57
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Nigerian election results are pretty much in. Bola Tinubu wins, runner ups both declare fraud on election. Cute infographic from Al-Jazeera for this: 
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Mar 1, 2023 07:13
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lmfao i hate this and also it's probably accurate-ish the elections sucked but tinubu received about 40% of the vote and won which is about what i expected. i honestly don't believe he got the required 25% in two thirds of the states though
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Mar 1, 2023 07:29
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The NZZ (Zürich newspaper) has an article from a reporter who got around in Tigray recently, in English: https://www.nzz.ch/english/the-guns...term=2023-03-09 Nothing too new, but now corroboration of all the information that had gradually leaked out over the last couple years. A guide we had in Hawzen survived the war and messaged me on WhatsApp for the first time since the war started. I hadn’t messaged him since we left Ethiopia in Feb 2020; he contacted me out of the blue. Looks like they’ve been set back a generation - something my guide in Lalibela who I had kept in contact with before and after as he was a cool guy also said. That timeline is probably an exaggeration for Lalibela, but probably accurate for Tigray.
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Mar 9, 2023 10:35
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https://mobile.twitter.com/sajid_nadeem78/status/1643932461208940544 https://mobile.twitter.com/sajid_nadeem78/status/1644075038709014538 Idiot restarted the civil war. He’s Nobel-Peace-Prize-Maxxing
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Apr 7, 2023 11:17
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https://mobile.twitter.com/sajid_nadeem78/status/1644741296718790657 https://mobile.twitter.com/sajid_nadeem78/status/1644421133373149184 https://twitter.com/Harmuema/status/1644683638607343619 Seems like the civil war is kicking off again
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Apr 8, 2023 21:11
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Sudan is falling apart https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/1648664007018946562
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Apr 19, 2023 13:36
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Anyone out there capable of giving us a breakdown on what's going on in Sudan, and why?
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Apr 19, 2023 16:57
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I can take a terrible crack at it from a friend who works for USAID: The fighting is between the formal Sudanese Army, who're running a military dictatorship since they overthrew previous Sudanese dictator Al-Bashir back in 2019, and the Rapid Support Forces, who grew out of the janjaweed militia famous for the ongoing genocide in Darfur. Sudan has been in transition since 2019 and it's increasingly clear that the military doesn't plan on giving up power to a democratic government. The military is also heavily involved in the economy and corruption in general. They have international backers in countries like Saudi Arabia, where Sudanese mercenaries are doing a lot of fighting as part of their war with Yemen, and Russia, who haven't met an anti-American authoritarian they didn't want to support. The Rapid Support Forces, as mentioned, grew out of the janjaweed militia, who're basically a subset of Arabic-speaking nomadic camel herders in the Darfur region that clashed with the sedentary population and had government backing. They're responsible for, in addition to the Darfur Genocide, other war crimes in Yemen and Libya and the occasional massacre of protesters since 2019. They're a distinct power bloc from the Khartoum-based Sudanese and come from a group generally looked down upon by the central government (but has been militarized and armed to help in internal power struggles). The crux of the conflict was a military plan to integrate the RSF into the armed forces proper, which would take away a lot of the personal control and autonomy that they have. Their leader, Hemedti, runs it as a personal militia and also owns all the gold mines in Darfur. All of that power is going to start to go away. They wanted a much longer timeline for integration (i.e. never) and when the central government didn't budge they coincidentally had a bunch of troops in Khartoum and across the country already engaged in suppressing protesters that they appear to have used to launch an attempted coup. This has shut down travel and aid, which is bad because Sudan is a net food importer and basically already on the verge of being a failed state.
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Apr 19, 2023 18:20
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Thanks a bunch for the clarification. It really seems like there is a lot going on in Africa more and more. Really wish I was more knowledgeable about the continent so I could try and contribute to this thread because I really feel it should be much more active than it actually is. I get all the focus on Ukraine etc. but really Africa no only is always going on somewhere but it's becoming more and more of a focal point in our progressively more multi-polar world.
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Apr 19, 2023 20:56
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Is it more of a focal point? The outside world still views it largely as a backwards place. A place to extract resources from, a place for big companies to do business, maybe host a military base. Not a place of equals though, not a place to be respected. The internal conflicts of the continent I think are still mostly that, internal. The Ukrainian war has involved much of the rest of the world. But wars in Ethiopia, Congo and now Sudan struggle to attract outside attention. I think eventually this will change but it will take some country or region in Africa to become a lot more rich/organized/militarily strong. With rapid economic growth that could happen pretty quickly but I don't think we're there yet.
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Apr 19, 2023 21:12
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DeliciousPatriotism posted:Thanks a bunch for the clarification. The Economist is pretty much the only major international English language outlet that regularly reports news from on-the-ground-reporting in Africa, especially sub-Saharan Africa. It has a few articles in it every week, same as its coverage for Latin America or non-China Asia. Jeune Afrique does an OK job reporting for Africa as well, you can Google Translate from French. But yeah, it's definitely geopolitically less relevant, especially for people living in Western/Western-aligned countries. Ukraine also gets more attention because it is (a) reporters are actually able to access it and locals are able to transmit news (unlike e.g. Ethiopia) and (b) you are living in a Western country that has more proximal cultural ties with Ukraine than it does with Ethiopia. Presumably if the SA forums were dominated by Kenyans, we'd have a more discussion threads about Somalia and fewer about Ukraine.
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Apr 20, 2023 15:01
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Saladman posted:The Economist is pretty much the only major international English language outlet that regularly reports news from on-the-ground-reporting in Africa, especially sub-Saharan Africa. It has a few articles in it every week, same as its coverage for Latin America or non-China Asia. Jeune Afrique does an OK job reporting for Africa as well, you can Google Translate from French.
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Apr 23, 2023 17:17
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Does anyone have a good rundown concerning what exactly is happening in Niger and the surrounding countries of Mali and Burkina Faso, I'm seeing the coup in Niger being reported as a strike against French imperialism in Africa with solidarity from other countries that also want to break free, but other reports saying its just a run of the mill coup being supported by similar military dictatorships without much legitimacy and comments that its been fomented by Russia. Is there some kind of halfway position between both these narratives or something completely different to do with internal Niger politics that doesn't meaningfully relate to what's going on in Europe?
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Aug 1, 2023 18:46
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EDIT: no posts in the thread for 3 months, and then someone ninjas me just as I was writing one. Since the coup last week, France has begun evacuating its citizens from Niger and has cut off aid. Niger is responding by banning Uranium exports to France. I agree that military govts in Burkino Faso, Mali and Guinea seem emboldened by the collapse of French neoimperial influence in the region in recent years, and with the public traction appeals to anti-French/Western sentiment are getting. I wouldn't exactly call them nice people themselves though. They are coming out very vocally over the prospect of any ECOWAS action against the new Nigerien regime, declaring that "military intervention against Niger will be considered equivalent to a declaration of war against Burkina Faso and Mali". Here's hoping things don't deteriorate even further. 
Tigey fucked around with this message at 18:57 on Aug 1, 2023 |
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Aug 1, 2023 18:55
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On a slightly more fun note, there also seems to be some excitement in Burkino Faso, with President Traoré getting a heroes reception on returning from the Russia-Africa Summit. Some useful idiots have also been posting copy-pasted claims that Burkino Faso has also banned Uranium exports to France and the US. https://twitter.com/jacksonhinklle/status/1686125766340132867 Unlike major Uranium producer Niger, Burkino Faso has no Uranium reserves, mines or exports...
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Aug 1, 2023 18:55
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ECOWAS threatening military action is interesting. The group has intervened in the region several times before in response to coups. However, there have been several coups in the region in the last three years. Plus most of these countries are already fighting rebellions and/or rampant banditry/lawlessness. It's hard for me to picture Nigeria sending and effective force to Niger when they can't control multiple parts of their own country. Maybe ECOWAS is trying to get France or the US to do some of the heavy lifting for them.
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Aug 1, 2023 19:55
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yeah they haven't done military action since the Gambia in 2016 so this seems sudden to me, especially with a much bigger country like Niger. imo it's more likely the US and France goading ECOWAS instead of the other way around
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Aug 1, 2023 21:53
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Yeah you're probably right on that Is either France or the US in good enough shape to consider an intervention? I think the US is busy enough with Ukraine/Russia. This is more of France's thing, not sure about their capabilities or appetite these days.
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Aug 3, 2023 01:25
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Count Roland posted:Is either France or the US in good enough shape to consider an intervention? I think the US is busy enough with Ukraine/Russia. This is more of France's thing, not sure about their capabilities or appetite these days. I doubt either cares enough to commit to a full scale invasion which is it what it would take. If a civil war or genocide ensues maybe there will be a call to do something on humanitarian grounds but I doubt anyone wants to do anything unilaterally.
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Aug 3, 2023 02:27
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France is obviously unhappy about its dramatic loss of influence in the region in recent years (my heart bleeds for them), but like Owling Howl says, without there being a public pretext like a genocide (well, one that captures public attention) my guess is they will swallow it, albeit making a lot of noise and threats in the short term. The mood in the country and region is very anti-French right now and them intervening would be massively inflammatory and draw in other countries. I don't see any real upsides for France. I suspect that Uranium exports will probably resume after a while (I think this is the first time they have ever been cut off?), as its such a major source of revenue for Niger that they can't afford to do without.
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Aug 3, 2023 12:01
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I think a big part of it is that coup leaders really did think that they were getting insufficient funds from their respective central governments (the coup leaders assuming it is all being stolen, which at least some is) and they could do better. They take over (often using the rallying cry of casting off the colonisers) and find that their respective central governments really ARE operating on shoestring budgets propped up by aid. Hence why the comments implying that the coup should be able to take over and still receive French aid. They have made promises to the populace that they will finally take ISIS seriously and improve fuel and food prices. It doesn't help the local tax base that they give mines to Wagner to pay for arms and merc support and empower externally supported artisanal miners to hinder productive industrial mining which is gutting one of their few sources of forex. For motivation of why Wagner is there, I think a big part of it is Russia making GBS threads in France's cheerios while also gaining access to more gold (and maybe cut off France from one of its sources of Uramium).
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Aug 3, 2023 13:28
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tinubu's deadline of a week has passed and ecowas hasn't done anything
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Aug 3, 2023 15:05
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To put some numbers here, Niger has a GDP of ~$13 billion and 24 million people. Their national budget is $5.5 billion, of which ~250 million is military spending, and 40% of that budget comes from external aid and financing. Losing out on Western security and financial aid is going to mean big compromises.
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Aug 3, 2023 15:17
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Morrow posted:To put some numbers here, Niger has a GDP of ~$13 billion and 24 million people. Their national budget is $5.5 billion, of which ~250 million is military spending, and 40% of that budget comes from external aid and financing. Losing out on Western security and financial aid is going to mean big compromises. possibly! do we know if france was paying market prices for uranium or would niger maybe get a better deal opening up to more buyers? vv that's fair, mining is a much smaller section of the economy than i pictured i say swears online fucked around with this message at 15:47 on Aug 3, 2023 |
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Aug 3, 2023 15:31
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Mining only makes up 3% of the economy (albeit 40% of exports) so they're unlikely to make up the difference. Fundamentally Niger is just a big (geographically) country that doesn't have a lot of wealth with which to fund state building or security. Absent western aid it'll probably follow the same route as neighboring Mali. https://africacenter.org/spotlight/mali-catastrophe-accelerating-under-junta-rule/
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Aug 3, 2023 15:40
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I know that rising inflation, the ongoing islamist insurgencies, etc, are probably bigger factors, but I do wonder whether the drawn out demise of the West Africa CFA Franc has anything to do with the what's happened in Burkina Faso, Mali and now Niger. I mean its still in use (no sign of the long awaited Eco yet, and I'd be surprised if Nigeria ever adopts it), but the countries still using it are no longer required to hold half their foreign reserves in the French Treasury (  ) any more. Its a lot easier to throw off the French yolk when they're not holding half your money hostage
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Aug 3, 2023 16:29
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Tigey posted:Its a lot easier to throw off the French Yeah I doubt freedom or self-determination is a priority to the military juntas and it doesn't seem like they particularly care about having the funds to feed people. I'm not really clear on what France is doing in the region today. I understand the historical context which is reason enough in itself for many to not want them there and if that's a priority for people then they should boot them out. That's fine - go for it. But what level of control does France exert there now and in what ways is it harming people?
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Aug 3, 2023 17:05
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Owling Howl posted:Yeah I doubt freedom or self-determination is a priority to the military juntas and it doesn't seem like they particularly care about having the funds to feed people. I'm curious about this too. Militarily at least France fights, and gets others to fight, islamist militants in the region. This carries with it the standard civilian casualties, cosying up to brutal local militias, and general lawlessness that comes from distant powers being involved in local power struggles. But the junta is saying they'll keep doing all this. They cite the fight v islamist groups as a reason for their coup. So... I don't actually know what the grievances are against France, specifically. Aside from colonizer = bad, which is fine, but loses some oomph when you go to Wagner instead.
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Aug 3, 2023 18:18
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Burkinabe's generally believe the French are the ones funding ISIS, supplying new Toyota utes, motorbikes and arms. In Cote D'Ivoire the French are hated for being involved in the civil war and still having an outsize opinion, if not influence in the nation. In Senegal, it used to be way less acrimonious as the Senegalese are proud of Landing Senghor and his balancing relationships with the formal colonial power and maintaining their own path (which was very leftist at the time but avoided both the anti-west theme of a lot of ex-colonial nations and the ire of the US for being leftist) However, France has been blamed by the opposition for allowing Macky Sall to stay in power so long. Still way more positive than Cote D'Ivoire though.
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Aug 4, 2023 08:28
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