“The initial 14 [deportees] were brought to Ghana on Sept. 6,” lead lawyer Oliver Barker-Vormawor explained to media outlets. “Three were deported [from Ghana] that night. Eleven were held in military detention. Out of that 11, 10 were deported with the matter in court, and eight of them are in Togo.”

The deportations arose from a “third country deportation” agreement between the US and Ghana earlier this year. Ghana’s parliamentary minority bloc has now called for its suspension, as leaders claim the government entered into the agreement without proper legislative approval. Samuel Abu Jinapor, a ranking member of the Foreign Affairs Committee in Ghana’s Parliament, argued:

The government’s conduct in operationalizing the agreement with the United States without parliamentary ratification is a direct constitutional violation of Article 75 and an affront to the authority of the [Ghanan] Supreme Court. It is therefore deeply concerning that the government continues to operationalize the agreement despite this flagrant operational breach.

Ghana’s Foreign Minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa told local media that the decision to enter into the agreement was not a signal of support for the US administration, but rather a decision “grounded purely on humanitarian principle and Pan-African empathy.” However, reports have claimed that Ablakwa and President John Mahama may also be motivated by the hope that the White House will lift travel restrictions on Ghanaians entering the US as consideration for the agreement.

After initial pushback from federal courts, in July the US Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to enter into third-country deportation agreements with multiple nations, including Costa Rica, El Salvador, Mexico, Panama, Eswatini, Rwanda, South Sudan and Uganda. International organizations have warned that the policy risks great harm to individuals, and skirts government accountability.

The West African deportees also filed a lawsuit in the US courts last month, asserting that they were taken from an immigration facility, shackled, placed in straitjackets, and flown to Ghana in a cargo plane without meaningful notice or hearing.

From JURIST, Oct. 7. Used with permission.

Photo: Venezuelan deportees in Honduras. Credit: ICE via Wikimedia Commons

The move came at the request of Senegalese President Bassirou Diomaye Faye. In a November 2024 interview with Le Monde, he called the presence of French soldiers in Senegal “an anomaly,” asking: “What country can have foreign troops on its soil and still claim independence?”

French Gen. Pascal Ianni described the handover as inaugurating a new stage in the partnership between French and Senegalese forces. He stated: “It is part of France’s decision to end permanent military bases in West and Central Africa, and responds to the Senegalese authorities’ desire to no longer host permanent foreign forces on their territory.”

Unlike in other West African countries, where French forces were expelled amid political tumult, Senegal’s withdrawal process was peaceful and coordinated. The development concludes France’s phased military exit from the country that began in 2022, a period that has also seen withdrawals from Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Chad and Gabon. Analysts view this as part of France’s broader re-orientation away from traditional “Françafrique” military footprint and toward more flexible, sovereignty-respecting partnerships.

France will retain only limited regional engagement—focused on training, intelligence, and responding to specific requests—and now maintains no permanent bases on mainland Africa, aside from its sizable presence in Djibouti and a smaller footprint in Gabon.

From JURIST, July 19. Used with permission.

Image: Wikimedia Commons

The current war between Israel and Hamas has lasted over 40 days, killing more than 11,000 Palestinians and 1,200 Israelis, mostly civilians. UN Secretary-General António Guterres has called for a humanitarian ceasefire and measures to prevent further atrocities.

From Jurist, Nov. 19. Used with permission.

Notes: As accusations of genocide mount against Israel, it continues to reject the authority of the International Criminal Court.

Bolivia cut off diplomatic relations with Israel Oct. 31. Bolivia previously broke ties with Israel in 2009 under President Evo Morales in protest of Israel’s actions in Gaza. In 2020, right-wing President Jeanine Áñez re-established ties. (The Hill)

António Guterres came under harsh criticism from Israel after saying Oct. 24: “It is important to…recognize the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum. The Palestinian people have been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation.” (The Guardian)

Photo: OSeveno/WikiMedia

Production by Chris Rywalt

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Image: OUP

The troops were never “brought home”; they were redeployed to neighboring Djibouti and Kenya, and sent back in to Somalia as mandated by contingency. The new press release said Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby “told reporters the Department recognizes that al-Shabab has increased in strength and so poses a heightened threat. The existing model of US assistance moving into and out of the country as needed, he said, is inefficient.”

Trump had removed some 700 troops from Somalia. So the new force is somewhat reduced—but, by comparison, not exactly “small.”

Even if the announcement doesn’t mean very much, it is being met with some trepidation by human rights advocates. “US officials should be very clear on how their forces will avoid harming Somali civilians during military operations,” said Laetitia Bader, Horn of Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “They will need to work closely with Somali and African Union authorities to avoid repeating past laws of war violations and promptly and appropriately respond to civilian loss.”

The US has been involved in military operations against al-Shabaab and predecessor insurgent groups since at least 2007. Since 2017, US air-strikes in Somalia have increased significantly.

Somalia’s new president, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, welcomed the decision to return US troops to the country. His election, one day before the Pentagon announcement, was looked to as resolving the country’s long political crisis. But he had been president during a previous crisis-wracked administration from 2012 to 2017, when he had faced widespread calls for his resignation. And he has not been elected by a popular vote (due to lack of effective government control over most of the country), but by the parliament. And the parliamentarians themselves are less elected than appointed by clan elders—and then only in those parts of the country where the government has enough control to hold some semblance of polls. As VoA states: “The distribution of power in Somalia is on a clan-based system locally known as the 4.5 system, where majority clans are allocated majority seats in parliament while the smaller clans, grouped together, get the remainder.”

Photo: Patrick Crosley/USMC via CommonDreams

The violence in Djibouti comes days after the US Navy convened 15-nation military maneuvers in the country’s waters, ostensibly designed to help East African nations in fighting piracy, drug trafficking and illegal fishing. The two-week Cutlass Express 2021 exercise includes maritime forces from Djibouti, Somalia, Sudan, Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique, Madagascar, the Comoros, Mauritius, and Seychelles as well as India and the United Kingdom. (Stars & Stripes)

Map: ISS Africa

Two weeks earlier, on Nov. 30, Somalia ordered the expulsion of Kenya’s ambassador, accusing Nairobi of interfering in the electoral process in Jubaland, an autonomous region along the Kenyan border. Kenya maintains a military force of some 3,500 troops in Jubaland, where elections last year solidified the rule of the incumbent regional president, Ahmed Madobe, who is harshly at odds with Mogadishu.

National parliamentary elections in Somalia are to begin in the coming weeks, with a presidential vote to follow in early 2021. The campaign has heated up in recent weeks as candidates have accused President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed, who took office in 2017, of trying to cling to power by using the intelligence services to control the electoral process.

Somalia has sent a formal letter of complaint about Kenya to the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), the East African regional bloc. An IGAD summit to address the matter is to be held this weekend in Djibouti. (NYT, AFP, Al Jazeera, Al Jazeera, The Standard, The Standard, Nairobi)

Map: African Executive

The Danaab or Lightning Brigade, an elite force of Somali commandos trained by the US, will continue to carry out operations against al-Shaabab—and a contingent of Pentagon military advisors will be staying behind to oversee them. The US will also presumably continue to carry out air-strikes in their support from bases in neighboring countries.

In through the out door?
And the troops now to be withdrawn are not, for the most part, coming back to the United States—but will be stationed just outside Somalia’s borders, ready to go back in as circumstances mandate. The Pentagon statement said only some of the forces slated for withdrawal “may be reassigned outside of East Africa.” Those remaining “will be repositioned from Somalia into neighboring countries in order to allow cross-border operations by both US and partner forces to maintain pressure against Violent Extremist Organizations operating in Somalia.” Although the statement did not name the neighboring countries, they are presumably Kenya and Djibouti.

Drones not coming home
Drone strikes in Somalia are also to continue, we may more than safely assume. In the first seven months of the Trump administration alone, the US carried out more air-strikes (either by drone or warplane) than took place under the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations combined. Human rights groups have accused the US of acknowledging only a fraction of the civilian casualties from those strikes. Amnesty International has accused the administration of portraying civilian deaths from these raids as successful hits on militants, and of refusing to offer compensation to the survivors. (Vox)

Privatized warfare
Working closely with the Danaab Birgade and helping to oversee the operation of drones out of Somalia’s Baledogle airfield is a team of private security contractors from Bancroft Global Development, a DC-based nonprofit. While these contractors provide logistical support to the US military forces stationed at Baledogle, the company also as a for-profit arm, Bancroft Global Investments, which is also active in Somalia. This is a separate legal entity that shares leadership with the nonprofit, and has become one of Somalia’s largest real estate investors and developers. (Radio.com, Military Times)

Image: Lockheed Martin

While the 80% turnout and 12-point margin against independence led some observers to declare a decisive victory for the loyalist movement, the future of the archipelago is still uncertain. French law allows for the possibility of a second and third referendum if the first results in a vote against independence. To organize another referendum, pro-independence groups would have to secure the support of one third of the membership of the New Caledonian Congress, who could then petition the High Commissioner. Such a petition may be submitted as early as six months from the date of the first referendum.

France seized control of present-day New Caledonia in 1853. Initially establishing a penal colony on the islands, it later claimed New Caledonia as an overseas territory. The islands are home to approximately 270,000 people, an estimated 40 percent of whom are members of the indigenous Kanak community.

From Jurist, Nov. 5. Used with permission.

Note: The New Caledonia independence vote was the fruit of a 1988 peace accord with the armed Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS). However, the referendum was repeatedly postponed amid controversies over whether only native residents or also French colonists and their descendants would get to vote. Under terms of the 1998 Noumea Accord, only French colonists and their descendants already in the territory by that point would be able to vote. The Accord also called for a devolution of power to the territory. The indigenous Kanaks now represent only 40% of the territory's population. A Yes vote would have made New Caledonia the first French territory to gain independence since Djibouti (1977) and Vanuatu (1980). New Caledonia is represented in the French parliament by two deputies and two senators. It nonetheless remains one of the UN's 17 "non-self-governing territories." (BBC News, AFP)

Photo: NurPhoto/Getty via SBS News