Al-Shabaab Opens a New Front in Puntland

Posted on May 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

May 30, 2015

While the success of Somali government and African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) offensives against al-Shabaab insurgent formations in central and southern Somalia is welcome, it has unfortunately resulted in the migration of beleaguered al-Shabaab fighters to the northern Somalia region of Puntland, an area offering superb refuges in rough terrain with only a lightly-armed paramilitary to defend the region, which has only been lightly touched until the last year by the fighting with al-Shabaab in the rest of Somalia.

Puntland’s Galgala Hills

Puntland emerged as an autonomous region in 1998 in an effort to separate the largely peaceful north from the political chaos consuming central and southern Somalia at the time. Though it acts largely independently of the central government in Mogadishu, Puntland is normally a strong supporter of a federal Somali state with many powers devolved to regional administrations. The region has a population of roughly 4 million, at least half of whom continue to pursue nomadic lifestyles.

Al-Shabaab fighters have been reported pouring into the Galgala Hills, a remote region of Puntland 50 kilometers east of Bossaso (Puntland’s major port and commercial center) that has been the subject of a struggle for control between the Majerteen and Warsangali clans. The region was cleared of Shabaab-sympathetic insurgents with great effort last year but remains attractive to al-Shabaab as it sits outside the mandated range of African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) operations in Somalia, though a UN spokesman has promised the organization is considering an expansion of its operational area (Reuters, May 7).

In the meantime, al-Shabaab maintains a persistent presence in the rocky hill country After a week of heavy fighting in January, Puntland’s security authorities announced the capture of the last al-Shabaab camp in the Galgala region, the death of 20 militants and the capture of two al-Shabaab commanders (Horseed Media, January 7, 2015). Yet a little more than a month later, authorities were announcing a successful battle in the same region that killed 16 al-Shabaab militants (Horseed Media, February 14, 2015; Garowe Online, February 14, 2015). Al-Shabaab gunmen and terrorists are using the hills as a base for attacks on Bossaso and, more recently, the Puntland capital of Garowe:

On February 7, al-Shabaab gunmen in four cars attacked a military post in Bossaso, sparking a three-hour gunfight that left a number of terrorists and security personnel dead (Horseed Media, February 8, 2015).
On April 5, gunmen attacked a security checkpoint near the Hotell Yasmin in the heart of Bossaso. Two militants and a soldier were killed (Somaliland Sun, April 6).
On April 18, three al-Shabaab fighters attacked the Balade police station in Bossaso with RPGs. It was the second such assault on the Balade station in two months (Garowe Online, April 18, 2015).
On April 20, a suicide bombing on a UNICEF vehicle killed four foreign UNICEF workers and two Somali security guards while sending a further six (including an American) to a Garowe hospital. It was the first such attack in Garowe, which is otherwise enjoying a wave of development. Following the attack, al-Shabaab spokesman Ali Mohamud Rageh vowed that his movement would continue its strikes against US agencies, accusing the UN of facilitating the “invasion” of Somalia and promising UN staff would “taste our bullets” (Horseed Media, April 23, 2015).
On May 5, al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for a grenade-tossing attack on a police post in the port of Bossaso and a larger attack using RPGs and heavy machineguns against another police post at Yalho on the outskirts of Bossaso (Horseed Media, May 5, 2015). The latter post was briefly taken and three policemen killed before security forces retook it in a counterattack (Reuters, May 5, 2015).

Members of Puntland’s parliament have also been targeted in a broader campaign of assassinations similar to those carried out previously by al-Shabaab in southern Somalia. MP Adan Haji Hussein was killed in April while the latest such death was that of MP Saeed Nur Dirir, a close ally of Puntland’s president, Abdiweli Mohamed Ali ”Gaas” (Garowe Online, May 8, 2015).

Armed Federalism: Troops of the Puntland Defense Force on Patrol in Mogadishu

The political chaos in Yemen, a short distance from Puntland, is also complicating Puntland’s security situation, with refugees, arms, escaped prisoners and possibly even fighters making the short trip by boat across the Gulf of Aden to Puntland. Some 2,000 refugees have arrived in northern Somalia so far, though UN experts expect as many as 100,000 more in the next few months, a number that simply cannot be accommodated by northern Somalia’s meagre resources. Beside fears that militants might use the exodus to infiltrate Somalia, the fighting in Yemen has collapsed markets for Puntland goods there, including markets for the all-important fish industry (Raxanreeb, April 19, 2015).

Puntland authorities have lately the appearance of using a firm hand in dealing with al-Shabaab terrorists – in mid-March, three men suspected of planning and carrying out terrorist attacks in Puntland were executed by firing squad only days after a quick trial (Horseed Media, March 16, 2015). According to sources in Puntland, the three were among dozens of al-Shabaab suspects who have been handed death penalties, life imprisonment or lesser terms (Garowe Online, March 16, 2015). However, a report by the UN’s Monitoring Group on Eritrea and Somalia issued last October raised serious questions regarding the determination of the Puntland regime to address the al-Shabaab threat. The report notes the impediments thrown up by the administration (particularly the office of the president) to UN efforts to investigate the growth in al-Shabaab activity in Puntland, suggesting that this “is indicative of its unwillingness to robustly address the threat of al-Shabaab.”^{^[1]} The report further suggested the government of President Abdiweli Mohamed Ali had adopted a “catch and release” policy respecting al-Shabaab suspects, allowed the infiltration of its security services and had even intervened in the prosecution and detention of al-Shabaab members.^{^[2]}

On February 22, deputy commander-in-chief of police Mohiyadin Ahmed Aw-Musse was sacked by the Puntland president after expressing his fury with the quick release of al-Shabaab members collected in a security sweep, some of whom were allegedly freed by presidential decree. Having been the target of al-Shabaab assassins only two weeks before in an attack that killed two of his bodyguards, Aw-Musse’s displeasure with such policies was understandable. Puntland Intelligence Agency (PIA) director Abdi Hassan Hussein was also fired on February 22 (Garowe Online, February 22, 2015).

Most of the counter-terrorism work in Puntland is handled by the American-trained Puntland Intelligence Agency (PIA), formerly the Puntland Intelligence Service (PIS). Puntland also relies on a frontier paramilitary of roughly 7,000 men known as the Puntland Dervish Force, some of whom have received training in Uganda. Regular payment of security forces remains a problem, leading to frequent strikes by police and troops (Garowe Online, January 26, 2015). Despite these problems, Puntland has agreed to commit 3,000 of its troops to the growing Somali National Army (Reuters, May 7, 2015).

Puntland Security Forces in the Galgala Hills

Some of the arms used by al-Shabaab appear to be imported through the Berbera port in neighboring Somaliland (a self-declared but unrecognized independent state), a traffic that Somaliland officials claim to be trying to stop, though Puntland officials routinely accuse Somaliland (with whom they are engaged in a bitter and long-standing territorial dispute in the Sanoog-Sool-Cayn region) of supporting al-Shabaab (Raxanreeb, January 30, 2015). Though several top al-Shabaab leaders have hailed from Somaliland in recent years, no evidence has been produced that these leaders have or had any connection to Somaliland authorities. According to the chairman of Kulmiye, the ruling party in Somaliland, Puntland accuses Somaliland of supporting terrorism “only to conceal its [own] security failures” (Somaliland Sun, February 21, 2015).

PROJECTIONS

The obsession of Puntland’s authorities with Somaliland hinders the development of accurate intelligence regarding al-Shabaab’s true aims and activities, while accusing Somaliland of backing al-Shabaab prevents the resolution of the territorial dispute between the neighboring administrations. Puntland intelligence assessments tend to be heavily clouded by dislike of the Somaliland leadership.

Bossaso, due to its importance as a port with connections to Yemen and its proximity to militant bases in the Galgala Hills, will continue to experience a high degree of insecurity until superior military forces can undertake clearing operations in the region while securing entry points, a considerable but not unsurmountable task with some foreign logistical, surveillance and intelligence assistance. If al-Shabaab’s shift north is to be halted, close cooperation will be required between the security forces of Mogadishu and Garowe, cooperation that is threatened by yet another territorial dispute in Puntland’s southern Mudug region, where authorities are working to form a new federal state in combination with the neighboring Galgudud region (a stronghold of the Sufi militia Ahlu Sunnah wa’l-Jama’a), a process strongly opposed by the Puntland government and even by many residents of the Mudug region.

Notes

[1] United Nations Security Council, Letter dated 10 October 2014 from the Chair of the Security Council Committee pursuant to resolutions 751 (1992)and 1907 (2009) concerning Somalia and Eritrea addressed to the President of the Security Council. October 13, 2014, http://www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/S_2014_726.pdf

[2] Ibid, pp. 69-74.

French Foreign Legion Operation in the Strategic Passe de Salvador

Posted on May 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

Tips and Trends: The AIS African Security Report, May 2015

The Passe de Salvador runs past the northwest side of north-eastern Niger’s Plateau du Manguéni, near the frontier between Libya, Algeria and the Agadez region of Niger. On the Niger side, the pass connects to the smugglers’ route running across the Ténéré du Tafassâsset desert parallel to the Algerian border in northern Niger, a route used by veteran Algerian jihadist Mokhtar Belmokhtar when he withdrew his forces from northern Mali to southern Libya in early 2013. The Passe de Salvador has traditionally been controlled by Adrar Tuareg centered on the south-western Libyan town of Ubari, unlike the Passe de Toummo on the southern side of the Plateau du Manguéni, which is controlled by the Tuareg’s traditional nomad rivals, the Tubu, who operate on both sides of the Libya-Niger border.

Passe de Salvador, top left; Fort Madama, bottom right.

The 2e Régiment étranger de parachutistes (2e REP) was originally raised from Foreign Legion troops in 1948 for use in the French colonies of Indochina. Few members of the regiment survived the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954 (in which the “paras” played a prominent role) and the subsequent imprisonment of the survivors by the Viet Minh. Since then, the rebuilt airborne unit has served on numerous operations in the Balkans, Afghanistan and across a host of Middle Eastern and African countries. Now based in Corsica, 2e REP is likely to be the first unit deployed in foreign operations as the lead unit of France’s Rapid Reaction Corps and is kept at a stage of alertness that allows it deploy within 24 hours of receiving orders.

In a world where helicopter-borne air assault operations have largely replaced airborne operations and there is criticism in some Western nations that paratroopers are expensive and little-used, France continues to be an exponent of airborne operations, though it has not carried out such an operation during hostilities for over 35 years (the last being at Kolwezi, Zaïre, in 1978). Since that time, two French airborne divisions have been reduced to a single brigade, the 11^e Brigade Parachutiste, consisting of roughly 8500 men organized into eight regiments, only one of which is composed of Legionnaires. Participation in hard fighting in Afghanistan helped sharpen the combat skills of the 11th Brigade and other French military units. [1]

2e REP arrived in northern Mali from a French base in Côte d’Ivoire in dramatic fashion on January 28, 2013 with a parachute drop of a company-size unit into the region just north of Timbuktu to cut off retreating jihadists being pushed north by French armor, marine infantry and Chadian forces during Operation Serval (in the event, no jihadists were encountered by the 2e REP). [2] An unidentified French Special Forces unit (possibly elements of the Commando parachutiste de l’air n°10 (CPA 10 – No. 10 Air Parachute Commando) carried out another drop on northern Mali’s Tessalit Airport on the evening of February 7, 2013 as part of a complex land-air operation involving Chadian troops and helicopter-borne French troops of the 1^er régiment de chasseurs parachutistes (1^er RCP) and the 21e Régiment d’Infanterie de Marine (21e RIMa – actually a light armored unit despite its name) as well as elements of other units formed into a combined-arms tactical battle group (L’Express, February 21, 2013). [3] Since then, 2e REP has continued operations in northern Mali as part of France’s military strategy for northern Africa, Operation Barkhane.

Operation Kunama II

In mid-April, perhaps as much in an attempt to engage in high-level training in oppressive conditions as from operational concerns, 2e REP made a daring night jump into the unfamiliar terrain of the Salvador Pass linking Libya to Niger, a desolate but strategically important site frequently used by Saharan smugglers, terrorists and insurgents. [4] There are unconfirmed reports that French Special Forces were inserted into the Pass in the early days of Operation Serval and even mounted cross-border operations against jihadists who had fled to the ungoverned regions of south-western Libya.

Rather than drop the paras into the Pass itself, it was decided to land them on the adjacent Manguéni Plateau five kilometers from the Pass. There they were met by their operational partners, 50 men of the much lower-budget Nigerien Army who were forced to drive rather than fly to the rendezvous. Food and water were supplied to the French troops on pallets dropped by C-130 cargo aircraft.

After consolidating control of the Salvador Pass, the French and Nigerien troops left on a long and challenging drive to the old colonial-era Legion fort at Madama on the Djado Plateau, near which French forces set up a forward operating base and airstrip in October 2014. The fort still has a garrison of Nigerien troops tasked with controlling the smuggling and trafficking routes that run through the area, some of which are used by al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and the related al-Murabitoun.

French Legionnaires and Nigerien Troops at Fort Madama

The drive to Fort Madama exposed some weaknesses in the six-wheeled Panhard ERC 90 Sagaie armored all-terrain vehicles used by the French in northern Mali, as they began to quickly break down in the harsh conditions and terrain; according to the unit’s colonel, “Our vehicles are designed for Europe. Here, we are left with temperatures rising to 40-45 degrees maybe even 50 degrees. Our tanks are not designed for that and also suffer from the sand. It creeps everywhere and everything deteriorates” (RFI, April 23, 2015).

While no contact was made with jihadist forces or the region’s elusive smugglers during Operation Kunama II, it provided necessary field experience, training opportunities and logistical support practice for French military forces in some of the world’s most hostile terrain. Though jihadist activities were not interrupted by the operation, it nevertheless sent a clear signal to jihadis and smugglers alike that powerful French forces can be deployed in the Niger-Libya border region within hours if the presence of armed groups in the area is detected by French Harfang drones based in the Nigerien capital of Niamey.

Notes

Pp. 38-39, http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR700/RR770/RAND_RR770.pdf
Footage of the drop shot from a Harfang drone can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ElySEd8MOw . Footage of an airdrop of heavy equipment the next day at Timbuktu Airport by the 17^e Régiment du Génie Parachutiste (17^e RGP – 17th Parachute Engineer Regiment) can be viewed at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8vDElXEMWw
These improvised formations with integrated fire support are known in the French Army as Groupement tactique interarmes (GTIA). French troops typically train and operate in such formations.
Video of 2^e REP in the Passe de Salvador can be seen at: https://www.youtube.com/user/FORCESFRANCAISES

Two Months to War? The Return of RENAMO

Posted on May 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

From Tips and Trends: The AIS African Security Report, May 2015

Over two decades after the end of the Cold War, nearly all the African guerrilla movements of that era have perished, been absorbed or made the transition to political party. Mozambique’s Resistência Nacional Moçambicana (RENAMO) is one of the few such movements to have never tasted power yet still retain an active armed (albeit aged) wing. Mozambique’s vast size, poverty and inefficient security forces allow a few hundred armed men to apply a disproportionate degree of pressure on the governing party, RENAMO’s long-time rival the Frente de Libertação de Moçambique (FRELIMO). FRELIMO has ruled Mozambique without interruption since independence from Portugal in 1975.

Independence was followed by a 16-year civil war that ended in 1992. Portugal’s African colonies were notorious for their general disregard for projects such as education, development and the creation of a political and judicial infrastructure that had any other purpose than the furtherance of Portuguese interests. The civil war destroyed the nation’s economy and it was generally assumed that what had long been interpreted as a proxy conflict (RENAMO/the West vs. FRELIMO/the Communist bloc) would quickly collapse as in so many other places. While RENAMO did make the transition to opposition political party, the disarmament and integration process was never completed, leaving RENAMO with an armed wing able to apply political pressure on authorities in Maputo, the capital. Many of the RENAMO fighters are now in their forties and fifties and are growing impatient with the inability of movement leaders to take power and reward their loyalty. From April 2013 to July 2014 there were small-scale clashes between RENAMO fighters and government forces in Sofala province as well as blockades of roads and rail-lines before a ceasefire agreement led to a commitment from RENAMO to contest October 2014 elections.

Suddenly, however, Mozambique’s future looks a little brighter, due to evidence that the nation may be sitting on important offshore and inland energy reserves. Exploration in the Rovuma Basin off the coast of northern Mozambique’s Cabo Degado province (a FRELIMO stronghold) has yielded exciting results, with speculation that desperately poor Mozambique could become one of the world’s top three producers of liquefied natural gas (LNG). Italy’s Eni SpA and the American Anadarko Petroleum Corporation are prepared to take the finds into production, though political instability could force a revision in plans.

The current crisis in Mozambique began, oddly enough, with RENAMO leader Afonso Dhlakama’s surprisingly successful showing in last October’s general election. While still losing the national vote to FRELIMO’s candidate, former defense minister Filipe Jacinto Nyusi, RENAMO improved its share of the national vote from 17% in 2009 (the last general election) to 37% overall despite numerous irregularities in the voting process. The expected negative influence of several years of clashes with the ruling party and the national army did not appear to shape the vote significantly, partly because FRELIMO was viewed as having started the confrontations and because RENAMO restricted its armed opposition to attacks on military personnel rather than the civilian population (Africasacountry.com, November 5, 2014). The unpopularity of FRELIMO’s cronyism and high unemployment rates for graduates has enabled RENAMO to begin drawing support from younger voters, even in FRELIMO strongholds like Maputo.

An Aging Movement: RENAMO guerrillas in the field

Nonetheless, RENAMO rejected the election results as tainted and its MPs refused to attend parliament until a “gentleman’s agreement” was forged between Nyusi and Dhlakama that specified Dhlakama’s demand for autonomous RENAMO administrations in the six north and central provinces that voted in a majority for RENAMO would be considered in parliament (the six provinces claimed by RENAMO include Sofala, Manica, Tete, Zambezia, Nampula and Niassa).When the RENAMO-sponsored bill to create autonomous regions finally came up in parliament on April 30, it was quickly and decisively defeated by the FRELIMO majority (APA, May 1, 2015).

Eduardo Namburete, head of external relations for RENAMO, said the movement felt the ruling party had not honored the spirit of the agreement by treating it seriously and issued a deliberately ambiguous warning in response:

To our surprise, the ruling party in parliament did not even consider discussing this bill. They just voted it out… In our view what was defeated was not RENAMO, what was defeated was the will of the people… We are not proposing war. People are taking our stance very wrongly. But we are saying we are not just going to cross our hands and wait and just watch things happening. Of course the ultimate decision will be the people’s decision. If the people decide that they don’t want a FRELIMO government in those provinces where RENAMO won, then the people will take that decision (VOA, May 6, 2015).

Dhlakama has since given Nyusi and FRELIMO a two-month deadline to reconsider their position or face unspecified consequences.

The FRELIMO leader has suggested opposition to his plan emanates from a “radical” faction within FRELIMO (LUSA, April 27, 2015). The opposition leader is under pressure within his party after RENAMO has failed in every multi-party election since they were introduced in 1994. Patience is running out, and Dhlakama appears to view the autonomous provinces proposal as his party’s best chance at getting their hands on the levers of power. So far, the RENAMO leader is trying to give the impression he does not accept failure as an option: “I, Dhlakama, shall form a government by force, even if I have to use a Plan B to reach power without FRELIMO’s approval” (AIM, April 7, 2015).

FRELIMO still appears to be willing to used its armed wing to apply pressure on the national government – in recent weeks RENAMO gunmen have been observed moving south from their bases in Sofala Province into the pro-FRELIMO southern provinces of Gaza and Inhambane, even attacking an FADM position in strength in the Guija district of Gaza in early April (AIM, April 3, 2015). RENAMO also threatened to create a new general staff headquarters in central Sofala, a RENAMO stronghold and the center of the movement’s 2013-14 insurrection (AIM, April 6, 2015).

The Armed Forces

The Mozambique Armed Defense Forces (Forcas Armadas de Defesa de Moçambique – FADM) was formed in 1994 and was intended to incorporate fighters from both FRELIMO and RENAMO. The armed forces continue to be undermanned with an estimated strength of 13,000 (the post-civil war army was intended to have 24,000). This is due to several factors, including the underfunding of the military, poor pay and career prospects and a failure to attract ex-RENAMO fighters. The military is possibly better known for corruption and indiscipline than for fighting prowess and most of its equipment is unserviceable due to lack of maintenance. So little progress has been made on the integration of RENAMO personnel into the armed forces that an international team of observers tasked with monitoring the process has largely dissolved as there was nothing to observe (AIM, April 6, 2015). Talks between FRELIMO and RENAMO have ground to a standstill after over 100 largely fruitless sessions. One of the major problems facing FADM Chief of General Staff General Graca Thomas Chongo is the question of whether former RENAMO fighters in the FADM are willing to confront their former comrades in the event of an internal conflict.

PROJECTIONS

In the current political-economic climate, RENAMO’s ability to muster external support for a wide-scale rebellion has been severely downgraded. Despite its weaknesses, FRELIMO has succeeded in making the jump from communist-allied Cold War pariah to a reliable partner for Western investors, particularly in the emerging and promising energy sector. In the event of open conflict with RENAMO, FRELIMO might conceivably attract foreign military support (arms, equipment, logistical support, intelligence, etc.) but would far more likely be encouraged to find a negotiated solution with foreign diplomatic support. Mozambique’s ports are essential to the prosperity of its land-locked neighbors, making it likely that Maputo would face intense pressure from the 14 other members of the South African Development Community (SADC) to do whatever is necessary to ensure the security of transport routes cutting through Mozambique.

Neither the government nor RENAMO has the strength and firepower that would necessarily encourage them to engage in a prolonged test of arms. RENAMO’s demands are unconstitutional and the institutionalization of another level of government outside the control of the national ruling party would do much to discourage new foreign investment or the development of Mozambique’s promising energy sector. While RENAMO does not have the strength to rule in the six provinces “by force,” as it has promised, it does have the potential to create economic havoc by cutting roads and other transportation routes. In this scenario, some form of international intervention (diplomatic, economic or military) should be expected before Mozambique’s political paralysis is allowed to disrupt the economic life of the entire southern region.

The Battle for Tripoli: Can it bring Libya’s Civil War to an End?

Posted on May 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

Tips and Trends: The AIS African Security Report

May 30, 2015

Armed groups supportive of Libya’s internationally recognized House of Representatives (HoR) government in Tobruk are slowly closing in on positions around Tripoli defended by armed groups supportive of the Tripoli-based General National Congress (GNC), an Islamist-dominated rival government formed by parliamentarians who did not accept the results of Libya’s June 2014 elections. However, real military progress is still impeded by factionalism and tribalism in the pro-HoR Operation Karama (“Dignity”) military coalition that opposes the Islamist and pro-GNC militias gathered under the Fajr Libya (“Libya Dawn”) umbrella.

The military pressure on Tripoli appeared to be working in terms of eliciting a more conciliatory approach from the GNC to a UN-recommended unity government (Anadolu Agency, April 17; April 18, 2015). However, hardliners in the GNC seem to have come out on top after quickly rejecting a UN peace plan that was eight months in the works but heavily favored the HoR in its details. Part of the plan called for the replacement of local militias by Libyan National Army (LNA) units currently under the command of General Khalifa Haftar, who is widely distrusted in Tripoli.

The HoR launched an offensive designed to retake Tripoli in mid-March. By April 3, pro-government forces were struggling to take control of Aziziya, 35 kilometers south-west of Tripoli (AFP, April 3, 2015). LNA forces under the command of Colonel Idris Madi (the commander of LNA operations in western Libya) claimed to have taken Aziziya by April 5, with the LNA’s use of superior French-made guided missiles cited as playing a major role in the victory (Middle East Eye, April 5, 2015).

Fighting Southwest of Tripoli

Fighting inside Tripoli proper began in mid-April in two anti-Libya Dawn districts, the central Fashloum district and the eastern suburb of Tajura. The HoR claimed that authorities in Tripoli were using power and water cuts to pressure the residents of the two districts (Reuters, April 18, 2015; AFP, April 18, 2015). A pro-HoR rising in Fashloum lasted several days before it was smashed by Libya Dawn forces. Abdullah Sassi, the leader of the rising and commander of Tajura’s 101 Brigade, was captured and apparently killed – photos of a bloodied and seemingly lifeless Sassi with Libya Dawn slogans and insults such as “Dog of Karama” crudely written on his face with markers appeared widely on social media, though Libya Dawn leaders later claimed he was still alive and had simply had a “fit” (Libya Herald, April 19, 2015). A Twitter message allegedly sent by Sassi on April 19 accused General Haftar, Colonel Madi and the Zintanis of having “duped” the Tajurans by failing to provide promised military support.^{^[1]}

The central district of Fashloum endured three days of fighting in which Libya Dawn forces emerged victorious after destroying much of the district. According to GNC Interior Minister Muhammad Shayter, the destruction of Fashloum was the responsibility of supporters of the HoR: “In the Fashloum district, murderers and criminals who support [LNA commander General Khalifa] Haftar and Operation Dignity closed roads and started shooting workers and simple people, including revolutionaries” (Middle East Eye, April 23, 2015).

With Tripoli’s International Airport out of action since July 2014, control of Tripoli’s Mitiga International Airport, a former airbase lying between the city center and Tajura, has become of major importance for the continued existence of the GNC and Libya Dawn. It was struck by a mortar on April 3 and was the target of an airstrike by LNA forces on April 15, though, typically, little damage was done by the airstrike. The airport has been used by Libya Dawn to launch its own (generally ineffective) airstrikes on LNA targets, including an April 15 airstrike on a military base in Tajura, east of Tripoli (for Libya’s “air war,” see Tips and Trends for March, 2015).

The Role of the Warshefana

A surprising development in the struggle for the capital was the withdrawal of the Misratan pro-Libya Dawn Halboos Brigade from western Tripoli sometime between April 22 and April 25 after reaching an agreement with Warshefana elders, a move that angered the brigade’s Libya Dawn allies in Janzur, the Mobile Forces and the Janzur Knights militias. Once the Misratan forces had pulled out of the region south-west of Tripoli, Warshefana militias assisted by pro-HoR militias from Zintan began to make solid gains, working themselves closer to the western Tripoli suburb of Janzur. The Warshefana generally occupy the region south of Tripoli and are regularly identified by their rivals as having pro-Qaddafist tendencies. The Misratans may have decided to focus on defeating the Islamic State extremists with which it is clashing in both Misrata and in Sirte, east of Tripoli (Reuters, March 25, 2015).

Warshefana military leader General Omar Tantoush had earlier announced “all of Warshefana and the surrounding villages will be under official Army control and the capital’s city center will be only 13 kilometers [away] with all of the main entry points surrounded.”^{^[2]} However, Tantoush has stated that his forces have no intention of entering the capital and seek only to consolidate control over traditional Warshefana territory (which could include Janzur) (Libya Herald, April 29, 2015). On April 29, armed men kidnapped Tantoush’s cousin Mohamed Tantoush in Tripoli as retaliation for Warshefana advances (Libya Herald, April 29, 2015).

For now, the offensive seems to have slowed; further progress into Janzur will likely be met by heavy resistance from Libya Dawn-allied militias still occupying the district (Libya Herald, April 30, 2015). Warshefana militias may decide to postpone an attack on Janzur until it can be mounted as part of a broader offensive on the Tripoli region coordinated with the Libyan National Army (LNA) and its allies. The LNA is also active in the Warshefana region, advancing on Tripoli’s international airport and fighting battles for control of the coastal highway between Zawia and Tripoli (Libya Dawn, April 22, 2015). Control of the road means control of petroleum supplies to the capital, where power cuts are already common due to the Warshefana clashes. Water is also in short supply since the power cuts have affected the pumps on the Man-Made River that supplies water to Tripoli. In the meantime, Warshefana elders appear to have had several successes in negotiating the withdrawal of various Libya Dawn militias from Warshefana communities.

Bombing Damage inside Tripoli’s al-Quds Mosque (Reuters/Ismail Zitouny)

The Role of Islamist Extremists

Islamist extremists seeking to disrupt ongoing Libyan peace negotiations in Morocco are now targeting foreign embassies in Tripoli, though most missions are empty due to the instability in Tripoli:

The Islamic State organization used social media to claim responsibility for an attack by gunmen on the South Korean embassy that killed two Libyan security guards (Reuters, April 12, 2015).
The Islamic State organization used Twitter to claim responsibility for an April 13 bombing of the Moroccan embassy (AP, April 13, 2015).
Social media accounts again claimed responsibility for the bombing of the Spanish embassy on April 20 (Reuters, April 20, 2015; IBT, April 21, 2015).

Earlier this year, Islamic State militants carried out bomb attacks on the Iranian and Algerian embassies. Islamists are also believed to be responsible for the bombing of Tripoli’s al-Quds Mosque, a leading place of worship for Tripoli’s many Sufi Muslims, whose religious sites are frequently targeted by Salafist extremists (Andolu Ajansi, April 23, 2015).

PROJECTIONS

The threat of urban warfare and its attendant civilian suffering and damage to buildings and infrastructure is becoming particularly acute in Tripoli, one of the world’s oldest cities, founded by Phoenician traders in the 7^th century BC to take advantage of its natural harbor. With clashes already breaking out in the city center, public life and the local economy are both suffering from bombings, blockades and roaming gangs of masked gunmen seeking out opponents of Libya Dawn.

For Libya Dawn, the successful defense of Tripoli is an imperative. While keeping control of the city will not ensure Libya Dawn’s eventual victory on the national stage, its loss is a virtual guarantee of the collapse of the GNC and the dispersion or surrender of Libya Dawn militias, some of which might decide coming to a negotiated arrangement with the LNA/HoR that will allow them to retain their arms and some continued measure of self-importance would be the best way to survive. While sparing Tripoli, such an arrangement will only postpone an eventual reckoning between the emerging LNA and the unruly but well-armed militias. Integration of most Libya Dawn fighters in a unified LNA seems unlikely due to the polarizing presence of LNA commander-in-chief Khalifa Haftar, who is commonly described by Libya Dawn commanders as “a terrorist.”

Notes

[1] https://twitter.com/Liberty4Libya/status/589870760942051328

[2] https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?id=1649305608630612&story_fbid=1664134897147683 (April 15, 2015).

Why is the Ugandan Military Still in South Sudan?

Posted on May 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

May 30, 2015

A full year after the planned departure date of the Uganda People’s Defence Force (UPDF) from its military intervention in South Sudan, the Ugandan military presence in South Sudan is growing in size and cost.

Though the Uganda government recently announced $5.4 million in funding for its military operations in South Sudan, the true costs of the mission are obscured by conflicting claims from Kampala and the South Sudanese capital of Juba. While Juba has insisted it is paying the cost of the deployment (which has prevented the overthrow of the Dinka-dominated South Sudan government of President Salva Kiir Mayardit by Nuer-dominated rebel groups), Ugandan MPs claim figures related to the South Sudan deployment have not been made available to the parliamentary defense committee responsible for approving them and demand to know who is funding the Ugandan military operations. In response, Ugandan Defense Minister Crispus Kiyonga said providing such details would endanger the lives of Ugandan troops in South Sudan, though he did not specify exactly how that would occur (Uganda Radio Network, April 24, 2015; Observer [Kampala], April 27, 2015).

In early April, Ugandan government of President Yoweri Museveni came under criticism from John Ken-Lukyamuzi, the leader of the opposition Conservative Party, who claimed the Ugandan military mission in South Sudan “grossly violates international law.” The opposition leader cited a number of other problems with the mission:

The actual deployment came before it was approved by a January 14, 2014 parliamentary vote;
The mission’s extent has vastly exceeded the Ugandan government’s original declared intention to evacuate Ugandan citizens and protect the airport and presidential palace in Juba;
No documentation of a formal invitation for Ugandan troops from the South Sudanese government has been provided despite a request from parliament;
It is unclear who is paying for the UPDF’s presence in South Sudan (Observer [Kampala], April 9, 2015).

The Ugandan deployment was soon opposed by the other seven members of the regional trade bloc, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) who have continued without success to urge President Museveni to withdraw his forces and allow a political settlement to take shape.^{^[1]} Both the rebels and the United States have also called for a full withdrawal of foreign troops from South Sudan. Instead, South Sudanese media noted a major increase in the numbers of UPDF troops deployed in the region in February, 2015, claiming the size of the force had grown from 3,000 to 7,000 (Sudan Tribune, February 11, 2015; Uganda Radio Network, February 11, 2015).

Uganda Chief of Defense Forces Katumba Wamala and Brigadier Kayanja Muhanga in Bor, 2014. Kayanja commands Ugandan forces in South Sudan. He is the former deputy commander of Ugandan forces in Somalia and is currently commander of the UPDF’s 4^th Division.

The UPDF, which has received extensive American training through its participation in the African Union Mission in Somalia and the anti-Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) Operation Lightning Thunder, consists of five divisions with one armored brigade and one brigade of artillery. President Museveni restructured Uganda’s Special Forces (including the Presidential Guard Brigade) into a new unit, the Special Forces Command (SFC), under the leadership of his son Brigadier Muhoozi Kainerugaba in 2012.^{^[2]} The move solidified Muhoozi’s meteoric rise through the ranks of the UPDF and gave him full control of well-trained and armed troops responsible for the security of all oil installations and important government facilities. According to Fungaroo Kaps Hassan, the opposition’s shadow minister of defense, “Muhoozi is the de-facto army commander… Museveni has personalised the army… He calls it his army and has put Muhoozi in-charge, which is why you see Muhoozi posturing, going to Somalia doing things that should be done by his seniors” (Independent [Kampala], February 1, 2015).

Juba’s reliance on the UPDF comes despite massive defense spending by the young state; a report released last week by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) revealed a steady rise in South Sudan’s military spending from $982m in 2013 to $1.08bn in 2014, making it the biggest spender in the region. As a non-diversified petro-state, South Sudan is almost entirely dependent upon oil revenues in a stagnant market while still devoting an astonishing 60% of its net income on the military (Sudan Tribune, April 26, 2015; East African [Nairobi], April 25, 2015). Insecurity in South Sudan has immediate economic effects on Uganda – South Sudan is Uganda’s most important export market.

South Sudan

PROJECTIONS

The danger of Uganda’s deployment and the risk it may ignite a wider conflict was displayed in March, when Sudan’s state news agency reported the massing of 16,000 Ugandan troops along the border with (north) Sudan (SUNA, March 2, 2015). With Khartoum ready to act after receiving this alarming report, UPDF spokesmen were forced to issue quick denials to prevent an outbreak of hostilities between Sudan and Uganda, which have been fighting a proxy war for regional dominance for years at the expense of the region’s civilian population.

Juba is on the verge of economic collapse and cannot sustain its all-consuming defense budget, particularly as it comes at the expense of nearly all other forms of development and government services. No amount of defense spending will heal the political rift between Dinkas and Nuer (not to even mention the numerous other tribal rivalries that have spilled over into open conflict as a result of the current rebellion). Declining oil prices and interruptions in oil delivery through northern pipelines are placing financial strains on the Salva Kiir government.

Uganda will eventually present Juba with its bill for preserving the existing government; in earlier Ugandan interventions in the Democrat Republic of the Congo (DRC), these frequently took the form of concessions in resource-rich areas for leading Ugandan officers and friends of the Museveni regime. With discussions ongoing regarding a joint Ugandan-South Sudanese pipeline through Kenya to the Indian Ocean that would allow South Sudan to avoid Khartoum’s prohibitive transfer fees, Kampala may be looking to claim a share of South Sudan’s oil production, further assisting Uganda’s efforts to become a regional economic and military player in east Africa. This would also have the benefit of providing an additional pool of patronage funds to ease the political transformation from President Museveni to his son.

With a strong degree of opposition to such a move even within the UPDF (where Muhoozi is unpopular), Museveni’s efforts to turn Uganda’s single most important institution, its military, into a personal army loyal to the president alone may ultimately backfire, particularly at a time when similar efforts to extend presidential terms beyond constitutional limits or to create family dynasties in supposedly democratic systems are meeting heated opposition in many other African nations. Officers of the UPDF are forbidden from engaging in politics while serving; Museveni routinely denies UPDF officers who wish to enter opposition politics permission to resign their commissions, effectively bottling up opposition while simultaneously and inadvertently ensuring it has access to arms. Several senior officers who have managed to retire now figure in the leadership of several opposition parties despite starting out as Museveni loyalists during their military careers. President Museveni continues to surround himself with long-time loyalists in the upper ranks of the UPDF, but loyalty to Museveni does not necessarily extend to Muhoozi, who is viewed within the military as an arrogant upstart whose promotions have come at the expense of more senior and capable officers. The establishment of Uganda’s Special Forces Command as an army within an army under Muhoozi’s personal control is no doubt a response to this situation intended to guarantee a family dynasty in the president’s office, whether by acclaim or by force.

[1] Besides Uganda and South Sudan, IGAD includes Djibouti, Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia, Eritrea and Kenya.

[2] Not to be confused with Ugandan land forces commander Major General David Muhoozi.

Are Sudanese Arms Reaching Libyan Islamists through Kufra Oasis?

Posted on April 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

From Tips and Trends: The AIS African Security Report

Aberfoyle International Security, April 2015

Once again, Khartoum has been accused of supplying arms and transport to Islamist militias in the ongoing struggle between rival Libyan pro-Islamist and pro-secular governments based in Tripoli and Tobruck respectively. The latest accusations by a spokesman for the Libyan army claim that Sudan sent a convoy of 70 trucks of ammunition and 60 SUVs carrying Misratan Islamist fighters through Darfur and across Libya’s southern border to take the strategic south-east Libyan desert community of Kufra (Asharq al-Awsat, March 7, 2015). However, Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) spokesman Colonel al-Sawarmi Khalid Sa’ad insisted that foreign militants had no presence in Darfur while Egyptian military intelligence said it had no information regarding the passage of such a large convoy close to the border it shares with Libya and Sudan (Sudan Tribune, March 7, 2015; SUNA, March 7, 2015).

Kufra, the pre-colonial headquarters of the Libyan Sanusiya Order that led resistance to Italian, French and British imperialists, consists of a 50km by 20km basin containing a town and a half dozen oases. Sand seas on both sides of the basin force all traffic coming north from Sudan to pass through the region, giving it strategic importance. Kufra is inhabited mainly by local Tubu tribesmen and their rivals, the Zuwaya (or Zwai) Arabs that seized the region from the Teda Tubu in 1840. The two communities have clashed repeatedly since the collapse of the Qaddafi regime, requiring deployments of northern government-allied militias to restore order. In May 2014, Tubu leaders denied bringing Sudanese Tubu mercenaries north via the route to Kufra to help establish an ethnic-Tubu state in south-east Libya (al-Jazeera, May 9 2014).

Sudanese authorities have a special dislike of the new commander-in-chief of the Libyan National Army (LNA), General Khalifa Haftar, who is regarded in Khartoum as an agent of American influence in Libya due to his long-standing ties to the CIA and as an enemy of the Islamist movement due to his close relationship with Egyptian president Abd al-Fatah al-Sisi, whose hard-line on the Egyptian Brotherhood has led to the loss of hundreds of lives. Haftar has likewise accused Sudan (along with Chad and Egypt) of infiltrating armed Islamists into Libya and has expressed his dislike of Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir (Washington Post, May 21, 2014).

Jabal Uwaynat: Where Three Borders Meet

LNA officials have made it clear they regard they regard the Sudanese regime as one dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood and thus ready to aid the Muslim Brotherhood elements based in Benghazi (the Sudanese regime is in many ways a collaborative effort between the Sudanese military and various Islamist factions, including some former and current members of Sudan’s independent branch of the Brotherhood, popularly known in Sudan as the Ikhwan [brothers]). In response, Khartoum has emphasized the indigenous nature of its own Islamist movement while distancing the regime from the Egyptian Brotherhood and its Gulf-state counterparts. The Haftar-aligned commander of the Libyan Air Force, Brigadier General Saqr Jeroshi, is a major proponent of the Sudanese arms to Libyan Islamists scenario, describing it as a “hellish” scheme overseen by Ahmed al-Zaway, a Libyan Muslim Brother with alleged tribal links in the Sudan (Sudan Tribune, September 7, 2014).

In June 2014, Khartoum declined to comment on reports the Sudanese capital had been visited by veteran jihadist Abd al-Hakim Belhaj, the Tripoli-based leader of the Libyan al-Watan Party. These reports were soon followed by accusations from Haftar’s LNA that Sudan was using its air force to deliver Qatari arms to Belhaj’s fighters (Youm al-Sabaa [Cairo], June 6; Sudan Tribune, June 6, 2014).

Libyan authorities were reported to have seized a Sudanese military plane carrying ammunition during a refuelling stop in Kufra on the way to Tripoli’s Matiga Airport in September 2014, a story that originated with a Haftar-supported Libyan satellite TV channel and soon gained currency in government quarters, with LNA spokesmen going on to accuse Khartoum violating Libya’s “national sovereignty” by flying military supplies to “terrorist groups” (al-Jazeeea, September 8, 2014). Sudan claimed the incident was a “misunderstanding,” saying that the plane had only carried equipment needed by the joint Libyan-Sudanese border force tasked with tackling cross-border smuggling and human trafficking. This explanation proved unacceptable and an international spat followed, with Sudan demanding an apology and the Libyan government reportedly expelling the Sudanese military attaché (Sudan Tribune, September 7, 2014).

However, Khartoum pointed out that no communications were received regarding this expulsion and noted that the attaché was in Khartoum at the time and had since returned to Tripoli. The Sudanese government further produced documentation and a recording of the plane’s radio exchange with the tower at Kufra Airport showing that the end destination of the flight was Kufra, not Tripoli. The story received a final blow when Lieutenant Sulayman Hamid Hassan, the Libyan commander of the joint Libyan-Sudanese border force, confirmed sending a request to Khartoum for “ammunition, arms, an ambulance, a water tanker and fuel” for the force and stated that the plane’s cargo had been unloaded in Kufra in the full view of local officials and national security personnel. These observations were confirmed by a letter from the Libyan Minister of Defence (Sudan Vision, September 28, 2014; Sudan Tribune, September 7, 2014). The joint border patrols were established by an August 9, 2012 bilateral protocol and play an important role in intercepting human-smuggling operations despite underfunding and political chaos in Libya.

After Qaddafi’s Libya used the Kufra to Darfur route to supply anti-Khartoum rebels of the Darfur-based Justice and Equality Movement (which nearly toppled the regime in 2006), Khartoum is wary of militants of any stripe using the traditional desert route to infiltrate the Sudan or supply Darfur-based insurgents. In the midst of Libya’s anti-Qaddafi rebellion, a Sudanese column was reported to have crossed into Libya to briefly seize Kufra and its nearby military base to secure its northern border (Telegraph, July 1, 2011).

The route passing from Sudan into Kufra has a history as an arms conduit, being used in World War One in largely unsuccessful attempts to supply the Sultan of Darfur in his battle against the British-led Egyptian Army, and again in World War Two, when the route was heavily used by the British-led Sudan Defence Force (SDF) to supply the Free French garrison in Kufra after the French combined with the British Long-Range Desert Group (LRDG) to expel the Italian garrison in 1941. [1] Besides commercial traffic, the route is now most commonly used by smugglers and human-traffickers shipping refugees to the Libyan coast for onward transport to Europe. In the meantime, while unverified reports abound of Sudanese arms shipments to Libya’s Islamists, most of these claims appear to originate with Khalifa Haftar’s LNA, no friends of the Bashir regime in Khartoum.

Note

For SDF activities on the route in WWII, see “The Kufra Convoys,” http://www.fjexpeditions.com/frameset/convoys.htm

Designed to Fail: The Congolese Army’s Sham Offensive against FDLR Rebels

Posted on April 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

From Tips and Trends: The AIS African Security Report

Aberfoyle International Security, April 2015

Despite positive reports from the Ministry of Defence, the Congolese Army’s offensive against Hutu rebels of the Forces Démocratiques de Libération du Rwanda (FDLR) in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is yielding little in the way of tangible results.

FARDC Tank on Operations in the Eastern Congo

Operation Sokolo II was launched in South Kivu province on February 24, 2015, with the Forces Armées de la République Démocratique du Congo (FARDC) deploying troops into the highlands of South Kivu near Uvira. Further deployments were made in North Kivu two days later. FARDC forces carrying out the offensive consist of three regiments with a total strength of approximately 7500 men. So far, the campaign has resulted in the death of only 13 FDLR insurgents, while a recent FDLR ambush in North Kivu killed ten Congolese soldiers, including two colonels (Reuters, April 8, 2015).

FARDC’s command has reported the capture of several dozen villages, but in many places in North Kivu there is no apparent movement by the Congolese army and unit commanders in the region have not received orders to engage the rebels (Reuters, March 22, 2015). Despite inflicting a small number of casualties on FDLR personnel, all indications suggest that most of the movement has melted into the region’s dense forests to outwait the offensive, knowing that FARDC is incapable of a prolonged field operation and has failed to arrange for sufficient numbers of troops to occupy those towns taken from the FDLR. Already there are reports that FARDC is forced to withdraw to larger centers at night, leaving FDLR the freedom to resupply themselves by night and remind locals of where true power lies in the region (Reuters, March 22, 2015).

Operation Sokolo II was intended to be a joint effort between FARDC and better equipped UN peacekeepers operating in the Congo, but the DRC government’s insistence that two Congolese generals suspected of various war crimes be included in the operation’s command structure led to a UN decision to withdraw from the offensive.

The FDLR

The FDLR was formed in September 2000 from the remains of earlier Hutu militant movements, including the Interahamwe organization responsible for the 1994 genocide of Rwandan Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus. By this point, twenty years later, few members of the FDLR outside the leadership played any role in the Rwandan genocide. As of December 2009, Major General Sylvestre Mudacumara was the FDLR’s overall military commander. Mudacumara, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes, has a rival within the leadership in Victor Byiringiro, who has a greater interest in a political resolution with Rwanda (African Arguments, March 2, 2015).

Based in North Kivu, the FDLR cannot easily be brought to battle – it typically chooses a time and place of its own, prefers guerrilla-style strikes to conventional tactics and is highly integrated with the local population. Congolese Chief of General Staff of the Army, General Didier Etumba, estimates the FDLR’s strength as consisting of a maximum of 1400 fighters (Radio Okapi [Kinshasha], January 29, 2015). A recent report from the Enough Project summed up the strategy used by the FDLR:

The FDLR’s current strategy is consistent with its long-time pattern of responding to military pressure. In this pattern, the group promises to disarm and reiterates its political aspirations for recognition as a Rwandan opposition group. The FDLR then uses any reprieve to regroup by building military alliances and increasing economic activity and recruitment. [1]

The FDLR has been relatively inactive in the last year, though keeping a low profile might be part of an effort to avoid the fate of the rebel M-23 organization (a.k.a. the Revolutionary Army of the Congo), which was eliminated by joint FARDC-MONUSCO operation in November 2013. Under an agreement supervised by regional organizations (including the International Conference for the Great Lakes Region and the Community of States of Southern Africa), the FDLR had pledged to conduct a voluntary demobilization and disarmament by January 2, 2015, but the small number of old and sick men who surrendered and the insignificant number of weapons that came with them was judged insufficient to mark compliance, thus opening the way for offensive operations against the remainder of the movement.

The Kivu region is rich in gold and minerals used in consumer electronics such as wolframite, coltan and cassiterite, though the 2012 implementation of the U.S. Dodd-Frank Act has made it more difficult for rebel groups to profit from the sale of the last three minerals (gold is nearly untraceable and finds ready buyers everywhere) (Mail & Guardian [Johannesburg], November 18, 2014). However, like al-Shabaab in Somalia, the FDLR has turned to the environmentally harmful but lucrative charcoal trade as its greatest source of financing.

In the midst of the offensive, Major Zitunga Seraphin, the FDLR’s spokesman for international affairs, told a gathering of journalists that his movement has several demands for the FDLR’s peaceful return to Rwanda. These included justice for all Rwandan citizens and a willingness by the international community to look beyond the crimes of the Hutu to recognize those crimes allegedly committed by Rwanda’s ruling party, the Front Patriotique Rwandais (FPR) (La Rédaction [Kinshasha], March 6, 2015).

MONUSCO

On March 26, the UN Security Council voted to extend the mandate of the Mission de l’Organisation des Nations unies pour la stabilisation en République démocratique du Congo (MONUSCO – United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo) to March 31, 2016. The mission began its work in the DRC in 1999.

India is the largest contributor of the 30 nations that have sent troops to the 20,000 man MONUSCO force; other leading contributors include Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Egypt, Pakistan, South Africa, Tanzania and Uruguay. Indian troops have been accused of abuses towards the civilian population as well as conducting illicit commercial exchanges with the FDLR. MONUSCO’s most capable component is its Force Intervention Brigade (FIB), formed by 3,000 elite troops from Tanzania, Malawi and South Africa. It is likely that the FIB’s impending deployment against the FDLR prompted that group’s sham surrender prior to the January 2, 2015 deadline as a means of buying time or discouraging an offensive by UN units. MONUSCO forces in the Congo come under the military command of Brazilian General Carlos Alberto dos Santo Cruz.

UN support for a successful operation is indispensable to the logistics and transport-challenged FARDC forces, as is MONUSCO’s ability to provide surveillance from drones and tactical support from South African Rooivalk attack helicopters. Without such support, even unilateral successes by FARDC will ultimately prove unsustainable in the medium to long-term. The Congolese government has suggested that MONUSCO can run its own operation against the FDLR if it wishes.

FARDC

The Congolese Army consists of 14 brigades of fighters from various pro and anti-government factions that were integrated into the regular army after undoing a process known as brassage (“mixing”).

As in many African countries, the DRC’s regular forces are ill-paid and poorly supplied, with available resources devoted mainly to the Republican Guard (personally loyal to the president) to deter efforts at mounting a military coup d’état. Indiscipline and poor maintenance of arms and equipment are among FARDC’s weaknesses. Logistics is an especially weak component of the FARDC, so the more efficient logistical services of the UN mission will be well missed as the Congolese troops move further into the contested regions of North and South Kivu.

There are many FARDC officers for whom the elimination of the FDLR would mark the end of a profitable collaboration based on poaching, ivory, timber, cannabis (chanvre) and the illegal extraction of gold and other minerals from the Kivu region. Arms and intelligence have in turn flowed from FARDC to the Hutu rebels. According to a MONUSCO report to UN headquarters in New York, the FDLR makes over $70 million annually by doing business with FARDC commanders and implementing illegal taxation. According to the report, the wives of senior FARDC officers acted as trading agents, while their husbands handled the transport of goods in and out of the region (News of Rwanda [Kigali], August 28, 2014; Mail & Guardian [Johannesburg], November 18, 2014). It should be noted that the contacts that ultimately led to such collaboration were forged when the weak Congolese Army was compelled to seek allies in the border region in the face of repeated Rwandan incursions

Collaboration with the FDLR and other rebel movements in the Kivu region goes to the highest ranks of the Congolese Army. Major General Gabriel Amisi Kumba (a.k.a. Tango-Four) recently returned to duty after serving a two-year suspension that followed charges he was selling arms to militant groups in the eastern DRC (Radio Okapi [Kinshasha], August 6, 2014). General Amisi’s rehabilitation has taken place despite further charges that he oversaw the Kinsangani massacre of 2002 and later withdrew a superior FARDC force from the eastern city of Goma in November 2012, allowing the much smaller rebel M-23 movement to take the strategic city without a fight. [2]

Much of the military’s poor performance in northeast Congo to date has been due to the failure of officials in Kinshasha to see that the troops are paid on a regular basis. In 2009, the Rwandan military cooperated with FARDC in an offensive targeting the FDLR inside the Congo. Operation Umoja Wetu (“Our Unity”) was judged a partial success, but left 900,000 people displaced and 1,000 dead. According to Zeno Mutimara, the chairman of the Rwandan Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, MONUSCO has done nothing since it arrived in the DRC. Mutimara suggested regional military cooperation (as in 2009) would produce better results than reliance on international peacekeepers: “Umoja Wetu is better than the idea that Monusco will do anything. The biggest threat of the FDLR is the spread of genocide ideology; we have to deal with that, we should take responsibility for our own issues” (New Times [Kigali], March 28, 2015).

Operation Sokolo II

Regarding the contentious participation of Congolese Generals Bruno Mandevu and Sikabwe Fall in the current operation, a UN spokesman maintained “the clear point is that in accordance with our human rights due diligence policy, we cannot extend the support if we believe that support will contribute to a course of action in which human rights will be violated” (Inner City Press, March 20, 2015). Nonetheless, despite allegations of war crimes, the two generals were given exemptions to the policy during earlier operations against the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). DRC officials maintain that they are not aware of human rights violations by the two generals and have not received documentation of such violations from the UN, even though the UN insists the exemptions could not be renewed due to the failure of Congolese authorities to investigate the allegations (Medafricatimes.com, February 24, 2015; Reuters, March 26, 2015). The allegations include crimes such as rape and summary executions. After the UN withdrew its support for the operation, DRC government spokesmen maintained that it had only chosen its best officers to lead the operation against the FDLR (BBC, March 11, 2015). DRC Information Minister Lambert Mende recently characterized the UN’s decision to withhold support as an “attempt to transform our country into a colony” (VOA, March 30, 2015).

Kinshasha’s attitude on the matter suggests a provocative intent; the Kabila government is seeking a cut of 6,000 troops from the 20,000 man force, effective immediately, followed by a complete withdrawal in the near future, possibly before Kabila seeks a third (and so far unconstitutional) presidential term in elections scheduled for November 2016. The UN Security Council responded on March 26 by agreeing to cut 2,000 troops from the force while renewing MONUSCO’s mandate to March 2016. Despite the lackluster performance of FARDC, the DRC’s Foreign Minister Raymond Tshibanda insists that his nation is ready to take “full responsibility for its own security” (AFP, March 26, 2015).

While the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan government appears determined to eliminate the threat from unreformed genocidaires, the presence of the FDLR and similar Hutu formations across the border justifies the ongoing political domination of Rwanda by its Tutsi minority (15% of the population) and the government’s use of anti-genocide laws to suppress dissent. Maintaining the status quo also prevents or at least postpones any power-sharing initiatives designed to re-integrate the Hutu refugee community living in the DRC. The continued existence of internal enemies like the FDLR provides Kinshasha a useful excuse for its mismanagement of the economy and the evaporation of state revenues by a deeply corrupt regime, though it also invites occasional sovereignty-threatening incursions by foreign militaries, especially that of Rwanda. In the meantime, Rwanda’s justice system has been aggressively pursuing prosecutions against dozens of individuals accused of facilitating the importation of arms into Rwanda for use by the FDLR, with sentences ranging from 10 years to life (Reuters, March 13, 2015).

FDLR rebels were spotted moving through South Kivu’s Itombwe forest on March 16, 2015 (Radio Okapi [Kinshasha], March 17, 2015). Elsewhere, FARDC has reported seizing a FDLR base in Virunga National Park (Medafricatimes, March 10), an environmentally important region of 7800 square kilometers that has suffered greatly from becoming a refuge for all manner of regional militant groups. Large swathes of the park’s forest disappear every day as militants turn wood to charcoal for sale in nearby markets.

The light resistance encountered by FARDC, its own minimal casualties, the relatively low number of civilians displaced by the current operation and FARDC’s apparent inability to draw the enemy to battle or eliminate or capture any of its command structure suggests that Operation Sokola II may be little more than a politically inspired exercise designed to demonstrate the DRC’s ability to mount a counter-insurgency operation on its own and thus encourage greater and faster drawdowns of MONUSCO personnel. The lack of resistance may indicate that the FDLR understands the operation’s sham nature, and thus merely has to wait it out before re-assuming control of the region and resuming the commercial operations that support it (likely including those carried out in cooperation with FARDC). Unfortunately, the reoccupation of villages now in the hand of FARDC will prove to be a disaster for their residents, who will inevitably be accused of cooperation with government forces regardless of their innocence.

Projections

Without UN support, there is a certain inevitability regarding the ultimate failure of FARDC’s campaign against deeply-rooted Hutu militants, though there are a number of possible scenarios:

The FDLR may be counted upon to do their best to avoid battle at this time. Kinshasha’s expectations of an early and complete withdrawal of UN forces works in the FDLR’s favor and would significantly reduce the military threat to the movement, which has settled somewhat comfortably in the North and South Kivu regions. Remaining in Kivu is a positive alternative to possible repercussions if members of the movement are expelled to Rwanda.
Despite best intentions on the part of both FARDC and the FDLR, there is always a significant danger of escalation whenever two bodies of undisciplined and heavily armed troops are operating in close proximity. Should Sokola II turn into a real battle with units of the FDLR or any of the other militant groups operating in the same region, there is the very real possibility of FARDC being embarrassed in the field through loss of ground and/or heavy casualties. If FARDC commanders conclude such losses are the result of insufficient support from the Kabila government, they might turn against Kabila, or at the very least oppose his future presidential aspirations.
While the UN has said it will remain in the DRC until successful operations have lowered the threat level to civilian populations, there may be those in the UN and its financial backers that will welcome the apparent snub from Kinshasha as proof there is little point in continuing to maintain the expensive peacekeeping mission in the Congo, currently the world’s largest.

Notes

“How to Dismantle a Deadly Militia: Seven non-military tactics to help end the FDLR threat in the Congo,” The Enough Project, November 2014, http://www.enoughproject.org/files/FDLRReport-HowToDismantleADeadlyMilitia-EnoughProject-Nov2014.pdf
Jean-Jacques Wondo Omanyundu: “Who’s who: Le Général Amisi ‘Tango Four,’ le boucher de l’Est du Congo,” Desc-Wondo, October 3, 2014, http://desc-wondo.org/whos-who-le-general-amisi-tango-four-le-boucher-du-kivu-jj-wondo/

Mokhtar Belmokhtar’s al-Murabitun Movement Introduces Urban Terrorist Tactics to Raise Ethnic Tensions in Mali

Posted on April 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

From Tips and Trends: The AIS African Security Report

Aberfoyle International Security, April 2015

A brutal March 7 attack on night-club goers in the heart of Mali’s national capital of Bamako using machine-guns and grenades announced the arrival of the bitter fight for control of northern Mali in a region traditionally untouched by the ongoing struggle. Eight people were wounded in the attack and five killed, including three Malians, one Belgian and one French citizen.

La Terrasse night-club, the scene of the attack, is located in the midst of the Hippodrome district of central Bamako, a hub for expatriates and westernized Malian youth who congregate in the districts’ many cafés, restaurants and nightclubs, many of them Lebanese-owned. Like many of its neighbors, La Terrasse is a known gathering place for Malian prostitutes and Western expatriates.

Credit for the attack was claimed by terrorist group al-Murabitun in a 90 second Arabic language audiotape sent to Mauritanian newspaper al-Akhbar: “We claim the last operation in Bamako led by the valiant fighters of al-Murabitoun to retaliate against the miscreant West that insulted and mocked our Prophet and [for the death of] our brother, Ahmed al-Tilemsi” (al-Akhbar [Nouakchott], March 7, 2015). Al-Tilemsi was killed by French Special Forces in the Gao region of northern Mali on December 11, 2014. Ten other jihadists were killed in the raid and three captured.

Al-Murabitun (The Sentinels) was formed in August 2013 through a merger of the Movement for Unity and Justice in West Africa (MUJWA) and veteran terrorist Mokhtar Belmokhtar’s Katibat al-Mulathameen (“Veiled Brigade”; also operating under the name al-Mua’qi’oon Biddam – “Those who Signed in Blood Brigade”). Al-Murabitun is now led by its founder, Mokhtar Belmokhtar (a.k.a. Khalid Abu al-Abbas). Though Belmokhtar was believed to be the power behind the new group from the beginning, its first official leader was Abu Bakr al-Masri, a veteran Egyptian militant who was killed by French Special Forces in April 2014.

A week after the attack, Malian Special Forces announced they had killed a grenade-throwing accomplice in the attack during a two-hour gun-battle that began during a raid on a residence in Magnambougou, a crowded working-class area of Bamako. A large cache of arms and ammunition was also seized. Identity cards on the body identified the “light-skinned” suspect as Mohamed Tanirou Cissé, a native of Bourem in the Gao region of northern Mali (Nouvelle République, March 13, 2015; AFP, March 13, 2015). Three other suspects have been identified and arrested, including a transport agent working the Gao to Bamako line who arranged the transport of the attackers to Bamako, and a pair of Songhai shop-keeping brothers from Bourem who are alleged to have provided the terrorists accommodation in the capital (L’Essor [Bamako], March 20, 2015). The principal assailant remains missing.

Ahmed al-Tilemsi

The individual named in the Murabitun statement was Ahmed al-Tilemsi (a.k.a. Abd al-Rahman Ould Amar), a Lamhar Arab from the Gao region with a reputation as a businessman who was not averse to drug-trafficking. Before the 2012 rebellion al-Tilemsi may have been associated with Colonel Abd al-Rahman Ould Meydou’s pro-government Arab militia, but had clearly sided with MUJWA by the time the radical Islamist movement occupied Gao. Though some have suggested his allegiance may have had more to do with protecting his business interests than with ideology, other sources claim he was a dedicated jihadist who held the position of MUJWA military chief in the Gao region. Most observers agree that al-Tilemsi became known as a major financier for MUJWA (RFI, December 11, 2014; Jeune Afrique, July 27, 2012).

Al-Tilemsi’s name was frequently connected to northern Mali’s lucrative kidnapping business, conducted primarily by Islamist extremists who often used local Arab businessmen as go-betweens in arranging the payment of ransoms (RFI, December 11, 2014).

All-Murabitun’s message also claimed responsibility for an assassination attempt against the nation’s highest-ranking Arab soldier “for his involvement in the war against the mujahidin” (al-Akhbar [Nouakchott], March 7, 2015).

General Mohamed Abd al-Rahman Ould Meydou

In the course of the January 26 assassination attempt on General Mohamed Abd al-Rahman Ould Meydou outside his home in Bamako’s city center, the general encountered two turbaned men on a motorcycle outside his home. The assailants opened fire, wounding him in the head, hand and leg before leaving him for dead (L’Indépendant [Bamako], January 28, 2015). Ould Meydou was reported to have received threats days before the attack warning him to change his loyalties or he would be shot (L’Indépendant [Bamako], January 28, 2015).

Along with his Tuareg counterpart, General al-Hajj ag Gamou, Meydou played a vital role in the fighting of 2008’s Operationn Djiguitougou, which used Tuareg and Arab militias to drive Tuareg rebels under the command of the late Ibrahim ag Bahanga out of northern Mali. Colonels during the latest northern rebellion, both men were raised to the rank of Brigadier General in late 2013 in recognition of their vital contributions in restoring government authority in northern Mali. The men are, respectively, the highest-ranking Arab and Tuareg officers in the Malian Army.

Meydou was the target of an ambush directed at eliminating his leadership while travelling between Kidal and the northern garrison town of Aguel Hoc in 2012 but succeeded in escaping with his life. Ag Gamou escaped similar attempts by pretending to join the Islamist insurgents before passing into neighboring Niger with his roughly 400 man force intact. From there, he was able to return to the north in January 2013 alongside a column of Nigerien, Chadian and French forces.

During the operation to retake northern Mali from the Islamist coalition, Ould Meydou led a largely Bérabiche Arab Timbuktu-based militia that co-operated with Malian regular forces in Gao led by Colonel Didier Dacko. Now a Brigadier, Dacko is known as a capable and respected officer who opposes the reintegration of rebels into the regular army as part of any negotiated settlement. The strategy has failed several times, with some officers such as Colonel Hassan ag Fagaga (the current MNLA military chief) shuttling back and forth between the Army and rebel formations.

Projections

The attack on La Terrasse and the attempted assassination of General Ould Meydou mark the introduction of urban terrorism to Bamako, which has escaped such activity during all the rebellions and disturbances since independence. Like Somalia’s al-Shabaab, al-Murabitun’s ability to operate in northern Mali is now somewhat restricted by a major international military presence. Following al-Shabaab’s lead, al-Murabitun appears to be shifting to attacks against soft targets in the national capital.
Though Bamako is roughly 450 kilometers from the nearest point in northern Mali, the group may be able to draw on the capital’s small population of Arabs and Tuareg for recruits, though the size of this population is somewhat diminished since riots targeted light-skinned northerners in Bamako in 2012. In the Terrasse bombing, security reports indicate the operation was the work of a mixed cell of northerners and northern-origin residents of Bamako.
There is a significant danger that further incidents of urban terrorism may provoke even more serious revenge attacks against innocent northerners living in the capital. Besides the larger objectives of forcing a withdrawal of international (especially French) forces and a return to Islamist rule in the north, al-Murabitun’s latest strikes are destined to increase ethnic tensions within Mali that could derail the ever precarious peace talks ongoing in Algiers.

UNAMID to Shut Down Peacekeeping Operations in Darfur as Khartoum Expands Oil Exploration: What Now?

Posted on April 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

From Tips and Trends: The AIS African Security Report

Aberfoyle International Security, April 2015

With plans to boost production in its hard-pressed oil sector, Sudan is looking to establish full control over northern Darfur, where new exploration and drilling projects are planned to help replace the oil production lost in the 2010 separation of oil-rich South Sudan, which represented nearly 75% of Sudan’s pre-separation output. There are hopes for new development in northern Darfur’s Block 12A concession, worked by Saudi Arabia’s al-Qahtani company, and Block 14, where South Africa’s PetroSA has engaged in exploration work in the desolate regions near Sudan’s northern borders with Libya and Egypt (Middle East Eye, March 20, 2015). The Sudanese Ministry of Oil also expects to bring new wells in eastern Darfur’s Abu Karinka region into production later this year (Radio Dabanga, February 17, 2015). As continued rebel activity in Darfur threatens new government revenue streams, Khartoum is eager to consolidate full control over the unsettled region and eliminate international meddling in what the regime considers an internal matter. To this end, Khartoum is seeking the withdrawal of the United Nations–African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID), a large, expensive and relatively ineffectual peacekeeping mission that the regime nonetheless regards as an irritant in its efforts to reshape Darfur’s ethnic composition.

A working group of Sudanese, United Nations and African Union representatives met on March 17 to begin drawing up a strategy for UNAMID’s eventual withdrawal from Darfur. [1]The group, acting under pressure from Khartoum for a speedy withdrawal, will present a report to the UN Security Council by the end of May.

UNAMID, self-described as a “joint hybrid” operation involving UN and African Union forces, conducts its affairs under a UN Charter Chapter VII mandate which allows for armed measures to protect civilians as well as “such action by air, sea or land forces as may be necessary to maintain or restore international peace and security.” [2]

Impetus for the withdrawal was provided by a late 2014 dispute between Khartoum and UNAMID over the latter’s demands for a transparent investigation into reports of mass-rape by Sudanese security forces in the town of Tabit. The UN claimed its own initial investigation was hampered by a massive military and police presence in the town focused on intimidating witnesses. In yet another display of the acrobatic approach to logic his regime has become famous for, President Omar Bashir claimed that the mass rapes proved “UNAMID has failed to protect civilians and [has] instead become protector to the rebels” (Sudan Tribune, December 1, 2014). By February, Khartoum was demanding the complete withdrawal of UNAMID (Sudan Tribune, February 19, 2015).

After the Congo-based MONUSCO (see Congo article in this issue), UNAMID is the world’s second largest peacekeeping force with an annual budget in excess of $1.3 billion. The UN is not against at least making the forcer leaner and more effective – a recent internal review of UNAMID activities concluded that many of the units serving in the peacekeeping force were incompetent and should be sent home (Reuters, March 11, 2015).

The Rebellion Twelve Years On

Though the pace is slower, the rebellion in Darfur against the central government continues. The Sudan Liberation Movement faction led by Abd al-Wahid al-Nur (SLM-AW) claimed to have taken the SAF garrison at Rokoro in central Darfur on March 13, seizing large quantities of arms and war materiel after killing 58 militiamen and SAF personnel (Radio Dabanga, March 13, 2015). While raids of this type continue, the leadership of an ever-proliferating number of new rebel movements continue to flirt with the regime, accepting integration into government security forces at one moment, and deserting to resume rebellion in the next. Many of these acronym movements seek nothing more than favorable concessions and/or salaries from the central government in exchange for laying down arms. A long string of government settlements with these minor movements has done little to restore security in Darfur so long as the major non-signatory movements (such as the Zaghawa-led Justice and Equality Movement [JEM], the Sudan Liberation Army- Minni Minawi [SLA-MM – largely Zaghawa] and the SLA-AW [largely Fur]) cannot be enticed to reach an agreement with the regime in Khartoum, which is deeply distrusted by the major movements.

Three reports presented to the UN Security Council on March 18 by Hervé Ladsous, the UN under-secretary-general for peacekeeping operations, suggested that the security situation in Darfur is actually deteriorating due to “the ongoing Government of Sudan and the Rapid Support Forces’ military offensive.” [3] Noting that government forces had weakened the rebel formations in Darfur, Ladsous also noted that this success had come at the cost of a rate of displacement that was now higher than at any previous time since the rebellion began in 2003 (Radio Dabanga, March 18, 2015). Meanwhile, security issues remain unaddressed, with government troops and militiamen continuing to commit gang-rapes of “non-Arab” women and girls across Darfur. While senior officers routinely maintain they are searching for the culprits, these searches apparently do not extend to government barracks.

An Epidemic of Tribal Warfare

Beyond the ongoing conflict between various rebel movements and government troops and/or allied militias (now in its 12^th year), Darfur now finds itself caught up in a plague of tribal conflicts, often encouraged by local and central government authorities.

Arab Rizeigat and Fellata clashed in southern Darfur last year after Rizeigat tribesmen prevented Fellata (the Kanuri term by which members of the Fulani/Peul ethnic group are known in Darfur) livestock traders from crossing their lands (Radio Dabanga, October 1, 2014).

In recent weeks, dozens have been killed or wounded in clashes between the Fellata and the Salamat, a nomadic group claiming Arab heritage, many of whom were encouraged by Khartoum to migrate into Darfur from their homes in Chad and northeast Niger to occupy lands from which Black Africans had been expelled by the paramilitary Janjawid and elements of the Sudanese Army. As is often the case, the spark behind the conflict was relatively trivial (the theft of some cows, not an unknown occurrence in Darfur), but the proliferation of modern firearms in the highly racialized atmosphere promoted by the regime of President Omar al-Bashir now tends to turn every minor conflict into a series of massacres and counter-massacres. Matters are complicated by a government-encouraged turn away from elders’ councils and other traditional and moderating forms of influence in the so-called “Arab” tribes of Darfur in favor of younger leaders eager to nourish more direct ties to Khartoum in return for arms, cash and the influence these commodities wield in their communities.

On March 26, the Darfur Bar Association summed up the dangers of this policy in a statement calling on authorities to cease the distribution of arms and its politicization of the tribal system:

By arming certain tribesmen, distributing military uniforms and four-wheel drive vehicles among them, and letting them assault, rob, and terrorize innocent civilians with impunity, the regime affirms that it has withdrawn its responsibility, and pushes the people to take up arms themselves in response (Radio Dabanga, March 26, 2015).

A recent conflict in East Darfur between the Ma’alia and the Rizeigat (both “Arab” groups – it is often difficult to visually distinguish between Darfur “Arabs” and “Black Africans”) that killed over 500 people and displaced another 55,0000 brought criticism of the inability of the tribes’ traditional leadership to end the conflict from President Bashir (Sudan Tribune, March 19, 2014), who conveniently overlooked his own government’s role in undermining the influence of the region’s traditional leaders. There are also serious clashes at the northern Darfur goldmines of Jabal Amir between the Rizeigat and the Arab Bani Hussein. Nearly 800 people were killed at the mines in early 2013 alone.

Escalating attacks by the “Arab” Ziyadiya against the indigenous Black African Berti in March began to look more like an attempt to eliminate the Berti rather than merely punish them for an alleged breach of a truce between the two groups earlier this year. Local and largely Ziyadiya units of the paramilitary Border Guards and the Central Reserve Force (popularly known as “Abu Tira”) have joined Ziyadiya tribesmen in large-scale attacks on Berti in the Melllit region, north of the Darfur capital of al-Fashir. A string of assaults by gunmen and paramilitary forces equipped with Russian-made 108mm DShK “Dushka” machine guns and mortars culminated with the massacre of over 40 civilians in villages near Mellit on March 28 (Radio Dabanga, March 22, 2015; March 29, 2015). The raids, which killed over 80 Berti in March alone, have been accompanied by widespread looting, rustling and destruction of property.

Osman Muhammad Yusuf Kibir

North Darfur governor Osman Muhammad Yusuf Kibir, a Berti member of the ruling National Congress Party (NCP), has been accused by his rivals of using his office to strengthen the position of his own tribe and forming a Berti militia (Sudan Tribune, September 17, 2013).

Former Janjawid leader and arch-rival to Kibir, Shaykh Musa Hilal (an Umjallul/ Mahamid Arab and a member of parliament for the ruling National Congress Party [NCP – al-Mu’tamar al-Watani]), incited an Arab militia in-training with a 2013 speech describing the Berti as led by “a bastard slave” (i.e. Governor Kibir) and knowing “only how to cook watermelons” (Sudan Tribune, September 15, 2013). Hilal now poses as an opponent of the “corrupt regime” in Khartoum as the leader of al-Sahwa [Awakening] Revolutionary Council, which declared in late February that it would boycott this month’s elections (Radio Dabanga, January 13, 2015; February 25, 2015). It appears, however, that Musa Hilal’s main differences are with Governor Kibir rather than al-Bashir, who has traditionally acted as Hilal’s sponsor and guardian.

Nonetheless, a March 17 statement from al-Sahwa condemned Khartoum’s tribal policy in Darfur: “The regime still indulges in reckless policies towards this crisis in the country as it still incites and scatters the seeds of discord among the Arab and non-Arab tribes in Darfur” (Sudan Vision, March 19, 2015). Al-Sahwa controls territory and communities in the western part of Northern Darfur, where it has set up its own administrations.

The regime has tried to downplay the eruption of tribal violence in Darfur as a “normal” condition. In mid-March, Hassan Hamid Hassan, the Sudanese deputy ambassador to the UN, told the UN Security Council that “tribal violence in Darfur is as old as Darfur itself. We cannot condition the withdrawal, the exit of the [UNAMID] mission, on these phenomena which are as ancient as Darfur itself” (Reuters, March 17, 2015).

Conclusion

Some 770 UNAMID staff were scheduled to be cut from the mission’s strength by the end of March 2015, as part of a restructuring prior to eventual withdrawal (Radio Dabanga, March 1, 2015). General elections in Sudan on April 13 are fully expected to return the ruling NCP to power, providing it a self-confirmed mandate to restore order and expand economic development, even if it comes at the expense of the 2.5 million Darfuris who remain displaced. While UNAMID does not have much in the way of accomplishments to justify the loss of over 200 peacekeepers since it began operations, it has nevertheless provided the international community with eyes and ears in turbulent Darfur. The racialization of communities once known for cooperative and generally harmonious relations by the Arab-supremacists within the NCP government cannot be quickly undone, and with the proliferation of all types of small-arms in the region, growing ethnic and tribal conflicts now threaten to supplant the multi-headed rebellion as Darfur’s greatest security threat. UNAMID may be characterized as a costly failure, but its absence will still be deeply felt by Darfur’s civilian population, much of which can expect further displacement through government “pacification” campaigns led by ill-disciplined paramilitaries.

The Divided Leadership of Northern Mali’s Arab Community: A Profile of the Mouvement Arabe de l’Azawad (MAA)

Posted on April 30, 2015 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

From Tips and Trends: The AIS African Security Report

Aberfoyle International Security, April 2015

Despite their small numbers, northern Mali’s Arab population maintains a high degree of influence in the region’s social, religious and political life since their gradual arrival through the 17^th to 19^th centuries.

The Arab community of northern Mali is composed of three main groups:

The Bérabiche moved into northern Mali in the early 17^th century and established an important commercial center at Timbuktu. Before the Islamist occupation of the north in 2012, some members of the tribe played an important role in guiding al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) smuggling convoys through the north. In some cases, AQIM leaders and fighters married into the Bérabiche.
The Kounta are part of a large confederation of religious clans found across West Africa. Claiming a common 15^th century ancestor, their religious authority is tightly tied to their importance in the Qadariya Sufi order in West Africa. Once wealthy through commerce and the payment of tribute by lesser Arab groups, a changing social order has presented the group with new challenges. Some Kounta sought new revenues through engagement in narcotics smuggling, though this has damaged their religious status in the north. Kounta relations with the Tuareg are complicated, while struggles for control of northern Mali’s smuggling routes have brought the Kounta into conflict with the Bérabiche and Tilemsi Arabs.
The Tilemsi Arabs (a.k.a. Tangara) arrived in the Tilemsi Valley region of Gao from Mauritania in the 19th century in response to a call for aid from the Kounta, to which they were once subordinate. Their position close to the Algerian border allowed the group to profit sufficiently to allow them to stop paying tribute to the Kounta over a decade ago. However, their smuggling activities brought them into close contact with AQIM, the result being the growth of religious extremism in the community.

Sidi Brahim Ould Sidati

The original Mouvement Arabe de l’Azawad (MAA – Arab Movement of Azawad) was created in late 2012 as a reorganization of the short-lived Front de libération nationale de l’Azawad (FNLA). The movement was designed initially as an Arab self-defense group with an interest in autonomy but not independence for the north or the implementation of Shari’a in the region. Azawad is the local name for northern Mali.

Since then, however, the MAA has split into two factions – one in favor of greater autonomy within a united Mali, the other taking a harder line on independence for the north. The pro-Bamako faction of the MAA is led by Professor Ahmed Sidi Ould Mohamed and is largely based in the Gao region with a military base at Inafarak (near the Algerian border), while the dissident or separatist faction is led by Sidi Brahim Ould Sidati and suspected narco-traffickers Dina Ould Aya (or Daya) and Mohamed Ould Aweynat, amongst others. Both men are subject to international arrest warrants for their alleged roles in narco-trafficking (L’Indépendant [Bamako], May 28, 2014). The military chief of the dissenting MAA is Colonel Hussein Ould al-Moctar “Goulam,” a defector from the Malian Army. This faction is based in the Timbuktu region.

Both factions of the MAA include former members of the Islamist Movement for Unity and Justice in West Africa (MUJWA) that joined AQIM and Ansar al-Din in briefly ruling northern Mali after expelling government forces and defeating the rebel Mouvement National pour la liberation de l’Azawad (MNLA). A pro-government militia, the Groupe Autodéfense Touareg Imghad et Alliés (GATIA) helpfully claims that the former MUJWA fighters in the pro-Bamako MAA simply joined the Islamists to provide security for their community during the Islamist occupation (Le Monde, February 11, 2015). The mainstream MAA is dominated by members of the Lamhar clan, a group whose recent prosperity and large new homes in Gao are attributed to their prominent role in moving drug shipments through northern Mali. Some reports have characterized the split in the MAA as being directly related to a struggle for control of drug-trafficking routes through northern Mali (L’Informateur [Bamako], May 28, 2014).

With their intimate knowledge of the Malian Arab community and the lands in which they dwell, a loyalist Arab movement is a natural threat to the operations of jihadists in northern Mali. It is not surprising, then, that Mokhtar Belmokhtar’s al-Murabitun organization issued a threat against the loyalist MAA and the independence-minded but officially secular and largely Tuareg MNLA on April 8, citing their alleged loyalty to the French (MaliActu.Info, April 8, 2015).

Yoro Ould Daha (a.k.a. Sid’Amar Ould Daha), one of the leaders of the pro-Bamako faction of the MAA, typifies the kind of political confusion and pliability that hinders the arrival of a negotiated settlement in the north and frustrates foreign supporters of Malian democracy. Ould Daha came to prominence as the MUJWA chief of security during the Islamist occupation of northern Mali, but now insists he and his movement are now seeking a unified nation with its capital in Bamako. Widely regarded as a major drug trafficker with a reputation for brutality gained during his time as security chief for MUJWA-occupied Gao, Ould Daha was arrested by French forces in Gao in July 2014 and turned over to Malian authorities, but was released only days later, though not before accusing the French military of supporting his enemies in the separatist MNLA (Le Témoin [Bamako], August 12, 2014; MaliWeb, August 2, 2014; RFI, September 8, 2014). The loyalist MAA’s chief of military staff, Colonel al-Oumarani Baba Ahmed Ould Ali, resigned from the movement in mid-March, citing internal reasons related to the loyalist alliance (L’Indicateur du Renouveau [Bamako], March 19, 2015).

At present, armed groups active in northern Mali include the following:

1/ Coordination des Mouvements et Front patriotique de résistance (CM-FPR, incorporating the largely Songhai Ganda Koy and Ganda Iso militias) On June 24, 2014, this coalition allied itself with GATIA and the loyalist faction of the MAA. The movement seeks self-determination for the north, but exists mainly to resist Tuareg domination of the north.

2/ Le Haut Conseil pour l’unité de l’Azawad (HCUA – Viewed as the voice of the Ifoghas Tuareg of Kidal, the HCUA includes many former members of the now dormant Ansar al-Din Islamist movement led by Iyad ag Ghali).

3/ Coalition pour le Peuple de l’Azawad (CPA – allied with Ganda Iso) The CPA was created from a split in the MNLA and seeks federalism rather than independence. Largely Tuareg, but claims membership from the Arab, Songhai and Peul/Fulani communities of the north.

4/ Mouvement Arabe de l’Azawad (MAA – both pro and anti-Bamako factions use the same name despite the split). Both factions of the MAA include many former members of MUJWA.

5/ Mouvement National pour la liberation de l’Azawad (MNLA) A largely Tuareg movement seeking an independent northern Mali. The Kel Idnan and Taghat Mellit Tuareg are well represented in the movement.

6/ Mouvement Populaire pour le Salut de l’Azawad (MPSA) The Arab MPSA is the result of a split in the MAA, with MPSA dissidents claiming they wanted to remove themselves from the influence of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) (Anadolu Agency, August 31, 2014). The group seeks self-determination for the north rather than independence but does not appear to be very influential.

7/ Groupe Autodéfense Touareg Imghad et Alliés (GATIA). This pro-government group is closely tied to the Malian Army and is led by General al-Hajj ag-Gamou. It consists largely of Imghad Tuareg but also includes a number of allied Arab fighters.