Africa

Human rights crisis deepens under Sahel juntas

Two attacks on “defenseless civilian populations” along Niger’s border with Burkina Faso left some 40 dead, authorities said. Niamey’s defense ministry said 21 were killed in Libiri village and 18 in Kokorou, both in Tillabéri region. The statement blamed “criminals,” but the borderlands are a stronghold of jihadist insurgents. An even worse attack was reported days earlier, but is being denied by Niger’s ruling junta. Authorities suspended the operations of the BBC in Niger after it reported that jihadists had killed 90 soldiers and upwards of 40 civilians at Chatoumane, also in Tillabéri. According to the monitor Armed Conflict Location & Event Data (ACLED), at least 1,500 have been killed in jihadist attacks in Niger in the past year—more than double the 650 killed from July 2022 to July 2023. Human Rights Watch meanwhile released a report detailing killings of civilians and other serious abuses committed by Mali’s armed forces in collaboration with Russian mercenaries of the Africa Corps following the withdrawal of a UN peacekeeping mission last year. (Map: Wikivoyage)

Africa

Sudan: worst humanitarian crisis ever recorded

The International Rescue Committee declared that Sudan is currently experiencing the worst humanitarian crisis ever recorded. The report states that approximately 30.4 million people—over half of Sudan’s population—are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance, a staggering figure that accounts for 10% of all people globally requiring aid, despite Sudan representing less than 1% of the world’s population. Health services have been critically impacted, with more than 70% of healthcare facilities nonfunctional and widespread outbreaks of diseases like cholera and malaria threatening already vulnerable populations.(Map: PCL)

Africa

Russia vetoes UN resolution on Sudan ceasefire

Russia vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution aimed at protecting civilians in Sudan amid the country’s ongoing conflict. The resolution, which called on the warring factions to cease hostilities and engage in dialogue in good faith, was blocked despite widespread support—including from China, which frequently votes in a bloc with Russia. Introduced by the United Kingdom and Sierra Leone, the draft resolution demanded that the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF) honor and fully implement their pledges in the “Declaration of Commitment to Protect the Civilians of Sudan,” which was signed by both sides in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in May 2023. Russia said the resolution did not sufficiently respect Sudan’s sovereignty in justifying its veto, which was assailed by international human rights organizations. Sudan’s government rejected the resolution for failing to condemn the United Arab Emirates for backing the RSF—an accusation the UAE has consistently denied. (Photo: Roman Deckert via Wikimedia Commons)

Africa

Sudan war drives continued refugee exodus: UN

The war in Sudan is driving continued refugee flight, leading to a deepening humanitarian crisis in the greater region, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reported. The agency said that more than 3 million people have fled Sudan, seeking safety in neighboring countries, since the war began in April 2023. The refugees are faced with challenges of food shortages and continued rights violations such as killings, sexual violence and looting, as well as natural disasters such as flooding. In October, around 60,000 Sudanese escaping the escalated fighting in Darfur arrived in Chad, which is facing a resource shortage due to its increasing refugee population, now at over 1.1 million. The refugees there face an overwhelmed healthcare system, scarce food, and no education for their children who have already been out of school for two years. (Map: PCL)

Africa

Chad: military base overrun by Boko Haram faction

President Mahamat Déby has vowed vengeance for an attack by jihadists on an army base in Chad’s Lake region that killed at least 40 soldiers. The insurgents who managed to overrun the base are likely to be from Boko Haram’s “Bakura” faction, which is concentrated in the northern part of the region, on the Niger-Chad border. They’ve been involved in a long-running battle for supremacy in the region with the rival Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP). Their commander, Ibrahim Bakura Doro, has resisted both peace overtures and demands for assimilation by the larger ISWAP group. The night-time attack on the Barkaram base, in which weapons and equipment were captured, follows a military sweep through the region by a joint force of Nigerian, Cameroonian and Chadian troops—which at the time was proclaimed a success. (Photo of Chadian troops via Presidency of Chad/Facebook)

Africa

New atrocities by RSF reported in Sudan’s Gezira

Brutal attacks by the Rapid Support Forces on villages and towns in Sudan’s Gezira state, south of Khartoum, have displaced around 120,000 people over the past two weeks, resembling the kind of violence used by the paramilitary group in the Darfur region beginning last year. The attacks were triggered by the defection to the army of the RSF’s top commander in Gezira, Abu Aqla Kayka; villages under his control were reportedly targeted. The UN said the attacks left at least 124 people dead and resulted in more than 27 women and girls being raped, though these numbers are likely a massive undercount given survivor testimonies, activist reports, and videos that show rows of bodies wrapped in shrouds. The attacks are among the worst to take place in Gezira since the RSF took over the state in December 2023. The state is considered the country’s breadbasket, but farmers have been forced to flee and cropland has been deliberately burnt. (Map: Sudan War Monitor)

Africa

Sudan: Fur leaders reject RSF-backed ’emirate’

Leaders and activists from the Fur people in Sudan’s Central Darfur state voiced their rejection of the Rapid Support Forces’ establishment of a new “emirate” in the ethnicity’s traditional territory for an Arab group that has migrated from the neighboring Central African Republic. They warned of an agenda of demographic change and the empowerment of outside groups at the expense of the indigenous population. The response came after platforms affiliated with the RSF published a video of a celebration held by a group called “Awlad Baraka & Mubarak,” marking the establishment of the “emirate.” RSF Brig. Gen. Mohamed Adam Bangoz addressed the event. (Map via Radio Tamazuj)

Africa

UK offers new ‘detention facility’ to Diego Garcia detainees

With conditions among the asylum seekers on Diego Garcia growing dire and the island set to be ceded to Mauritius, the UK is under pressure to relocate the 56 Sri Lankan asylum seekers stranded there, plus eight receiving medical treatment in Rwanda. The British government has offered to transfer 36 of them to a UN-run transit center in Romania. After six months there, if they do not accept repatriation or re-settlement in another country, they will be accepted to the UK. However, lawyers are trying to have the group brought to the UK directly, arguing that forcing them to spend six months in a Romanian “detention facility” would “cause them to suffer further avoidable harm.” The Romania plan has also upset the 28 men who did not receive the offer and have been told they will stay on the island indefinitely if they do not accept repatriation. At least two began a hunger strike in protest. (Photo via TNH)

Africa

Rwanda, DRC at odds over M23 deal

Prospects for quelling the renewed M23 insurgency in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo have hit a snag after more recriminations between the Congolese government and Rwanda, which is supporting the rebels with troops and weapons. The two countries participated in talks in late August as part of a long-running Angolan meditation effort, but disagreements have since arisen. Kigali charges that Kinshasa refused to sign a deal that would have seen Rwanda withdraw from the DRC after Congolese efforts to neutralize the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a DRC-based militia founded by exiled Rwandan Hutus behind the 1994 genocide against Tutsis. The M23 conflict reignited in late 2021, and has displaced around 1.7 million people, according to the UN. (Photo of M23 fighters: MONUSCO Photos via Wikimedia Commons)

Africa

UK to transfer sovereignty of Chagos Islands to Mauritius

The UK announced that it will transfer sovereignty over the Chagos Islands, now ruled as the British Indian Ocean Territory, to Mauritius after more than two centuries of control. A joint statement issued by UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and his Mauritian counterpart Pravind Jugnauth hails the accord as an “historic political agreement on the exercise of sovereignty over the Chagos Archipelago.” The UK-US military base on the archipelago’s principal island of Diego Garcia will remain operational for an initial period of 99 years to ensure its continued “vital role in regional and global security.” The UK will be “authorised to exercise the sovereign rights of Mauritius” on Diego Garcia. The decision follows two years of negotiations over the future of the islands between the two nations. (Map: Republic of Mauritius)

Planet Watch

Storms and floods kill hundreds around the globe

Typhoons, storms and flooding have killed hundreds and left millions homeless across four continents in recent days. More than 600 people—mostly in Vietnam and Burma—died whenSuper Typhoon Yagi, one of the strongest typhoons to hit Southeast Asia in decades, tore through the region, triggering landslides. In China, Typhoon Bebinca battered the commercial capital, Shanghai, forcing more than 400,000 people to evacuate. In Europe, at least 23 people died when Storm Boris dumped five times September’s average rainfall in a single week. In the United States, parts of North and South Carolina recorded 45 centimeters of rain in 12 hours—a statistic so rare it’s considered a once-in-a-thousand-year event. Inevitably, the wild weather has been devastating for more vulnerable countries. In conflict-affected northeastern Nigeria, half of the city of Maiduguri is under water after a local dam overflowed following torrential rains; recently emptied displacement camps are being used to shelter the homeless. In neighboring Chad, meanwhile, flooding has killed more than 340 people in the country’s south. (Photo: CounterVortex)

Africa

Mali: jihadist militants attack Bamako

The al-Qaeda-linked JNIM group carried out a major attack in Mali’s capital, Bamako, with reports suggesting that up to 70 people were killed and hundreds more wounded. Jihadist fighters attacked the city’s airport—damaging a plane used by the World Food Program—and stormed a military police school. JNIM only makes rare forays into Bamako, and may be sending a message to the ruling junta that it remains a potent force despite operations launched against it. (Map: PCL)