Thirtieth Anniversary of Sinai’s Liberation Marked by Libyan Arms, Bedouin Militancy and a Growing Rift with Israel

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Andrew McGregor

May 18, 2012

Though Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula has just marked its 30th anniversary of liberation from Israeli occupation, the region is perhaps less integrated with the rest of the Egyptian state now than at any time since the Camp David Accords returned sovereignty of the Sinai to Cairo. An influx of arms from Libya and elsewhere is fuelling a growing insurgency amongst an alienated and disenfranchised population and deteriorating relations between Egypt and Israel are threatening to once more make the Sinai borderlands a battleground between these regional rivals.

The Sinai: Northern Deserts and Southern Mountains

Egyptian security authorities blame most of the scores of attacks on police since the January 25, 2011 Egyptian uprising on Gaza-based Palestinian militant groups such as Jaljalat, Jaysh al-Islam, Izz al-Din al–Qassam and the local al-Qaeda in the Sinai Peninsula (Egypt Independent, May 1).  [1] However, while radical Islamism and close ties to Palestinian militants in Gaza play an important role in the unrest, there is little question that the core of the Sinai insurgency consists of armed Bedouin who exist largely on the fringes of Egypt’s Nile and Delta-based society.

Law enforcement has declined in the Sinai to the point that the police exist mainly to protect police installations that increasingly resemble improvised fortresses protected by large sand berms and steel walls to repel RPG attacks. The security situation is not helped by continuing protests against the military government by disgruntled police across Egypt, including in the towns of the northern Sinai. The Bedouin tribesmen have little fear of government authorities – security checkpoints are routinely attacked and security men and soldiers assassinated.

The Bedouin Factor

Tribal chiefs have issued demands for the establishment of a free trade zone and open passage for trade between Gaza and the Sinai, a move that would provide much needed employment and opportunity for local tribesmen, but which is unlikely to ever receive the necessary approval of Israel (MENA, April 21). It is estimated that 90% of the Bedouin population is unemployed and prevented by law from seeking employment in either the security services or the resorts of southern Sinai. The Bedouin are demanding the right to participate in the local security apparatus, but the idea has met resistance in Cairo where lingering questions about Bedouin loyalty to the state have deterred providing the Bedouin with modern arms and training. The release of Bedouin prisoners seized before last year’s Egyptian Revolution and the right to own land are also high on the Bedouin agenda.

The military government used the Liberation Day holiday to announce the commitment of $66 million to development projects in the northern Sinai, the largest project involving an upgrade to the port at al-Arish (Ahram Online, April 25). Further agreements to initiate a labor-intensive extension of water supply lines in north and south Sinai were signed the next day (Bikya Masr [Cairo], April 26). However, there is little chance of significant progress being made until after Egypt’s presidential elections, a multi-staged process which will begin on May 23.

The Sinai as Election Issue

As the elections approach, it has become clear that local issues in the Sinai have become irretrievably interwoven with Egypt’s changing relationship with Israel, as revealed by an examination of the platforms of several leading candidates:

  • Moderate Islamist candidate Muhammad Salim al-Awa has called for negotiations with Israel to amend the Camp David treaty in areas “that go against Egypt’s interests, like dividing the Sinai into three demilitarized zones, allowing Israelis into the Sinai without visas and other privileges given to Israel that should stop immediately” (Al-Ahram Weekly, May 10-16).
  • Amr Moussa, a secular candidate and former chairman of the Arab League, has called for a new agreement with Israel for the export of Egyptian natural gas across the Sinai based on current global market prices, adding that Israel must abandon its “policy of intransigence, threatening, [development of] settlements, occupation and [allow] the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state” (Business Today Egypt, May 8).  Moussa has promised to restore stability in the peninsula, end the marginalization of the Bedouin tribes and overturn the prohibition against Bedouin owning land in the Sinai (Ahram Online, April 21).
  • Neo-Nasserist candidate Hamdeen Sabahi (Karame Party) has promised to create a new local police force that is in tune with the rights and traditions of the Bedouin as part of an effort to turn the Sinai into “a paradise.” Nonetheless, his recent visit to the peninsula was cut short after receiving threats on his life from a Salafist group in the northern Sinai town of Shaykh Zuwayid despite promising to release all Bedouin political prisoners and suspected militants without conditions if elected (Ahram Online, April 21; April 29)
  • Muhammad Mursi, the head of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party, has called for urban development in the Sinai and the resettlement of millions of Egyptians in the sparsely inhabited region as Egypt’s population surges towards the 90 million mark, far more than can be comfortably supported in the Delta region and the slim fertile strip along the Nile (Ahram Online, April 29). A message from Muslim Brotherhood leader Muhammad Badi on April 26 said that the Mubarak regime had persecuted the Bedouin as criminals when they were, in fact “patriotic citizens.” Badi added that a mass transfer of Egyptians to the Sinai from other parts of Egypt would “frustrate Zionist ambitions to seize Sinai once again” (EgyptWindow.net, April 27).

However, these pledges have had only limited resonance with the Sinai Bedouin.  As North Sinai Bedouin writer Ashraf Ayoub put it, “Sinai doesn’t need promises – what it really needs is reconciliation between the locals of Sinai and the rest of Egypt which looks at them like foreigners who plot against the country. We are more than a group of people who live in a strategic location” (Ahram Online, April 29).

In the meantime there is growing evidence that Libya’s looted armories are now being used to equip militants in the Sinai much as they have provided modern weaponry to militants in parts of North and West Africa. Egyptian security forces reported the seizure on May 10 of a large quantity of weapons being transferred to the Sinai for use against Egyptian security forces by a convoy heading east from the Mediterranean port city of Mersa Matruh. Among the weapons were 50 surface-to-surface rockets, 17 grenade-launchers, seven assault rifles, a mortar and a large quantity of ammunition. The three smugglers arrested were reported to be Sinai Bedouin (Daily Star [Beirut], May 10; AP, May 10).

Israeli authorities announced on April 5 that one or two rockets possibly of Libyan origin had been fired at the Israeli Red Sea port of Eilat from the Egyptian Sinai, though Egyptian spokesmen claimed Israel was only “spreading rumors” (Al-Quds al-Arabi, April 7; NOW Lebanon, April 10; AP, May 10). Israel is preparing to link Eilat to an early-warning system in anticipation of further rocket attacks from Egypt.

Israel sees the hand of Shiite Iran behind the turmoil in the Sunni Sinai. According to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: “The Sinai is turning into a kind of “Wild West” which … terror groups from Hamas, Islamic Jihad and al-Qaeda, with the aid of Iran, are using to smuggle arms, to bring in arms, to mount attacks against Israel” (Voice of Israel Network B, April 24). Egyptian security sources are reported to have expressed their own suspicions of Iranian funding for weapons transfers from Libya to Sinai, though Iran has denied any such activities (al-Sharq al-Awsat, May 8). Egypt and Iran have not had diplomatic relations since Egypt’s recognition of Israel in 1980, though efforts have been underway to re-establish relations since the overthrow of Mubarak.

Severing Israel’s Natural Gas Supply

A persistent irritant in Egyptian-Israeli relations are the long-term contracts for the supply of Egyptian natural gas to Israel at below market rates negotiated by corrupt businessmen within the inner circle of former president Hosni Mubarak. With the pipeline to Israel having been blown by Sinai-based militants 14 times since Mubarak was deposed in January 2011, Egypt finally announced on April 23 that the natural gas agreement had been scrapped. The pipeline, which has not been operational since March 5, was last bombed on April 9 when militants mistakenly believed it had been returned to use after noting the Interior Ministry had sent some 2,000 Special Forces officers to guard it (Ma’an News Agency, April 9; April 15). A dispute over missing payments appears to have been the main cause for the termination of the contract.

An official in Egypt’s oil ministry commented: “It was a popular demand to call off this treaty, as we export gas to [Israel] cheaper than market prices… Their error was not to pay on time, and we have taken the opportunity to stop this shameful deal” (Bikya Masr [Cairo], April 23).

According to an official of the East Mediterranean Gas Company (EMG), Egypt has the right “to cancel its contract with the company as… [Israel] has not paid its commitments for several months…” (al-Hayat, April 29). EMG was founded by fugitive financier Hussein Salim, a former crony of Mubarak. However, international shareholders in the EMG are trying to paint the cancellation as a political move as the basis for an $8 billion lawsuit (Ahram Online, May 3). A statement from the shareholders claims that the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (ENGH) failed to protect the pipeline, though the latter describes the repeated bombings of the pipeline as a force majeure situation and insists that it was non-payment for gas received that led to the cancellation of further shipments in line with the terms of the contract (al-Hayat, April 27).

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has tried to downplay suggestions that Egypt’s cancellation was a form of aggression against Israel by confirming the decision was part of a “legal-commercial dispute” that would not have long-lasting effects due to the development of natural gas resources in the Mediterranean that would make Israel “a major exporter of natural gas in the world” (Voice of Israel Network B, April 24).

A Greater Threat to Israel than Iran?

Israeli foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman recently described Egypt as “more troubling than the Iranian issue” and advised Prime Minister Netanyahu to move three to four divisions up to the Sinai border, complaining that the seven Egyptian battalions currently operating in the Sinai “aren’t carrying out real antiterrorism activities” (Ma’ariv [Tel Aviv], April 22). Though offered several opportunities to do so, Lieberman has not backed away from his assessment that Egypt will commit a major violation of the 1979 peace treaty after the upcoming presidential election in order to unite the nation around a common enemy.

The publication of Lieberman’s remarks was followed by an immediate request by Egypt’s foreign minister Muhammad Kamel Amr for “clarification” on their accuracy (Ahram Online, April 24). Lieberman’sassertion was also challenged by Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak: “The Iranian threat is a threat with existential potential. At the moment this is not the case [with Egypt]…” (Globes Online [Rishon Le-Zion], April 25).

Israel’s Counterterrorism Bureau  issued a warning on April 21 for all Israelis in the Sinai to leave the region and return to Israel after it claimed to have determined that terrorists were planning an attack against resorts in the southern Sinai that are highly popular with Israeli tourists (Ahram Online, April 21). However, the warnings appear to have had little resonance with Israeli holiday-makers in search of a cheap vacation, with border authorities reporting more Israelis entering Egypt than leaving and resort owners in South Sinai reporting that most hotels were fully booked (Jerusalem Post, April 23). South Sinai Governor Major General Khalid Fouda suggested that Israel spread rumors of imminent terrorist attacks whenever Egypt’s tourism industry showed signs of recovery from the low point reached during the 2011 revolution (Ahram Online, April 21).

Members of the largely Bedouin “Sinai Revolutionaries Movement” attempted to strike a symbolic blow against Israel on Liberation Day by planning to paint an Israeli memorial in the Sinai to ten Israeli soldiers killed in a helicopter crash during the Israeli occupation with the Egyptian colors (al-Youm al-Saba’a [Cairo], April 25).  The effort was prevented by Egyptian security forces who are obliged to protect the memorial under the terms of the Camp David agreement. Israel in turn maintains a memorial to fallen Egyptian troops in the Negev Desert. A spokesman for the northern Sinai tribes, Abd al-Mun’im al-Rifa’i, said the people of the Sinai reject this provision of the treaty and cited a “need to demolish the rock [i.e. the memorial in the form of a large rock] because it stands as a provocation” to the Sinai tribes who “do not want any memorial for the Zionist entity on their land” (al-Hayat, April 27). The movement cites Israel’s reluctance to agree to a greater Egyptian security presence in the Sinai as a principal cause of the region’s instability (Ma’an News Agency [Bethlehem], April 12). Annex 1 of the Camp David Accords divides the Sinai Peninsula into four zones running roughly north-south (“Zones A to D”), with the Egyptian security presence in each zone decreasing as they grow closer to the Israeli border. Any change to these deployments must be made with the agreement of the Israeli government, severely limiting Cairo’s ability to meet security challenges in the Sinai.

A state-controlled Egyptian media source suggested it was time to “change the rules of the game” imposed on Egypt by the Camp David agreement:

It is no longer acceptable to tolerate tipping the balances of power in favor of the Israeli enemy. It is no longer possible to submit to conditions of capitulation that undermine Egypt’s sovereignty or allow its resources to be stolen. It is no longer possible to be tolerant with Israel’s conspiracies against Egypt’s interests in the waters of the Nile (al-Akhbar, April 29).

In an effort to permanently cut off Hamas-governed Gaza from Egypt, Israel is constructing a new security barrier along its border with Sinai that is expected to be finished later this year. The new fence will be five meters high, covered in barbed wire and augmented by dozens of radar installations. 120 km have been finished so far, with work continuing on a further 100 km (Jerusalem Post, April 25). After five failed attempts, the new fence was successfully breached by Bedouin smugglers using hydraulic tools in early May, though the infiltrators were quickly caught by the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) (Arutz Sheva [Tel Aviv], May 2; Times of Israel, May 2).

Israel is also increasing its military presence along the border. The IDF’s 80th “Edom” Division has experienced significant upgrades since it was redeployed along the Sinai border following cross-border attacks last August (Ma’ariv [Tel Aviv], April 6). In addition, the IDF announced call up orders for an additional six battalions to man the Sinai and Syrian borders on May 3 (Arutz Sheva [Tel Aviv], May 3).

Last month, Egypt’s Second Army commenced Nasr-7, one of the largest live-fire exercises carried out in years in the Sinai. The commander of the Second Army, Major General Muhammad Farid Hijazi, announced that the Egyptian military was fully capable of defending the Sinai against attacks from any quarter (MENA, April 23). Field Marshal Muhammad Hussein Tantawi, the head of Egypt’s military government, adopted a belligerent tone during the exercise, telling troops of the Second Army: “We will break the legs of anyone who dares to come near to the borders” (Ahram Online, April 23).

International Peacekeepers under Pressure

Attempting to ensure that the security provisions of the Camp David agreement are maintained is the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO), consisting of some 1400 soldiers and civilians from 12 nations, including 800 Americans operating as a sub-unit known as “Task Force Sinai.”

With the parties of the 1978 peace treaty having failed to obtain backing for a UN peacekeeping force, the MFO was created in 1981 as an alternative, equipped with a mandate to supervise the security provisions of the treaty and to use its influence to prevent treaty violations. Financing for the force is divided three ways between the United States, Israel and Egypt.The MFO deployment began on April 25, 1982, as Israel withdrew from the Sinai and returned sovereignty to Egypt. Increasingly, however, the MFO is finding its ability to carry out its mission restricted by growing levels of militancy in the Sinai.

In mid-March, some 300 Bedouin armed with automatic rifles surrounded a MFO base holding hundreds of U.S., Colombian and Uruguayan troops to pressure Cairo to release five tribesmen facing possible sentences of death or life in prison for their alleged role in the 2005 bombings of the Sharm al-Shaykh resort in southern Sinai (Ahram Online, March 15). On May 7, ten Fijian soldiers belonging to the MFO were kidnapped along the Auja-Arish highway in northern Sinai by Bedouin demanding the release of several tribesmen from prison. The Fijians were released later that day following negotiations with Egyptian authorities in which the kidnappers were assure their demands would be met (Ahram Online [Cairo], May 7; AFP, May 7).

Conclusion

While Egyptian relations with Israel continue to cool, the interim military government in Cairo has no wish to become involved at this point in a military confrontation with Israel sparked by the activities of militant groups in the Sinai. While Field Marshal Tantawi talks tough about defending Egypt’s borders, he and the rest of the military command are aware that even defensive clashes with the IDF could jeopardize ongoing U.S. funding of the Egyptian military, particularly in a sensitive election year in the United States. At the same time, Israeli demands for greater security in the peninsula cannot be met without revisions to those parts of the Camp David treaty governing the number of troops and types of military equipment that can be deployed there. Most important, however, is the need to address the long-standing grievances of the indigenous Bedouin population who find themselves unhappily trapped on a traditional Egyptian-Israeli battleground while held in suspicion by both parties. In the absence of meaningful efforts to resolve their economic and social issues, the Bedouin will continue to find themselves attracted to militancy, a situation that has the potential of igniting a new Middle Eastern conflict.

Note

1. For al-Qaeda in the Sinai Peninsula, see Andrew McGregor, Jamestown Foundation Hot Issue, “Has al-Qaeda Opened a New Chapter in the Sinai Peninsula?,” August 17, 2011, http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews[tt_news]=38332

This article first appeared in the May 18, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

 

North African Salafists Turn on Sufi Shrines in Mali

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Andrew McGregor

May 18, 2012

The Salafist war on the physical legacy of Sufi Islam has opened a new front in the northern Malian city of Timbuktu, home to a number of ancient mosques and the famous tombs of 333 Islamic “saints.”

Tomb of Sidi Mahmud Ben Amar, Timbuktu

The May 5 attack on the tomb of Sidi Mahmud Ben Amar (1463-1548) confirmed the fears of many in Mali that the Salafist Ansar al-Din occupiers of Timbuktu would turn their energies towards the destruction of the city’s religious heritage. The attackers prevented worshippers from approaching the tomb before tearing off its doors, breaking windows and setting flammable portions on fire. One man who attempted to stop the destruction was bound and forced into a car (al-Jazeera, May 7). The men were reported to have told shocked onlookers: “What you are doing is haram! [forbidden]. Ask God directly [for intervention] rather than the dead.” Before leaving they promised to destroy other tombs in the city (Reuters, May 5). An Ansar al-Din spokesman described the leader of the attack as a “new member” of the group (a Mauritanian according to some sources) and suggested that his actions would be investigated (al-Jazeera, May 7).

Sidi Mahmud Ben Amar (1463-1548) was from a family of Godala Berbers from the Atlantic coast of Mauritania. He achieved fame as a qadi (Islamic judge) and his tomb in Mauritania became a major site of pilgrimage after his death. Sidi Mahmud was attributed with many miracles during his lifetime and his descendants were renowned as Islamic scholars, especially his nephew Ahmad Baba al-Doudani, whose tomb is one of the most important Islamic sites in Timbuktu. Sidi Mahmud’s tomb is classified as a UNESCO world heritage site, one of 16 such sites in Timbuktu. Mali’s military government responded to the unprecedented attack by issuing a statement on national television that condemned “in the strongest terms this unspeakable act in the name of Islam, a religion of tolerance and respect for human dignity” (Reuters, May 5).

A local official told the French press that the Salafists have promised to destroy other tombs as well as take possession of the collection of manuscripts accumulated during the city’s days as Africa’s most famous center of learning (AFP, May 6). Many of the estimated 100,000 invaluable mediaeval manuscripts kept in Timbuktu are reported to have been removed to private homes for safekeeping until the Salafist occupation of the city ends (Asia Times, May 9). Written both in Arabic and Fulani, the manuscripts cover aspects of science, the arts and theology.

Though many commentators refer to Sufi Islam as the “peaceful, moderate and mystical” face of Islam, it was in fact the Sufist trend that was the greatest proponent of armed jihad before the 20th century, particularly in the Sudanic belt of Africa. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, however, it is the Salafist trend that has become most closely identified with jihad through its resurrection of the thought of Shaykh Ibn Taymiyya (1263-1328).

Shaykh ZuwayidRemains of the Shrine of Shaykh Zuwayid after its Destruction (Reuters/Asmaa Waguih)

The attack in Timbuktu is just part of a growing trend towards the Salafist destruction of Sufi shrines and monuments:

  • In the Sinai, the shrine of Shaykh Zuwayid in the town named for him was destroyed by a bomb in May, 2011 by Salafists opposed to the Sufi rituals carried out there (Ahram Online, May 14). [1] Shaykh Zuwayid came to Egypt with the army of ‘Amr ibn al-‘As, a companion of the Prophet Muhammad who conquered Egypt for Islam in 640 C.E. and built the first mosque in Africa.
  • Elsewhere in Egypt, some 20 Sufi shrines have been attacked by Salafists since the January 25, 2011 revolution. The assaults on Egypt’s religious heritage have led Sufi leaders to threaten counter-attacks, raising the possibility of a sectarian conflict within Egypt (Egypt Independent, May 17; al-Masry al-Youm [Cairo], March 30, 2011).
  • In the North African Spanish enclave of Ceuta, Salafists recently burned down a shrine containing images of Islamic saints from the region (El Pais, April 26).
  • In Somalia, the militant Salafist al-Shabaab movement has attacked Sufi shrines in Mogadishu and elsewhere, throwing the human remains of Islamic saints into the street while promising to continue “until we eradicate the culture of worshiping graves” (AFP, March 26, 2010). The campaign has spurred recruitment by al-Shabaab’s Sufi opponents in the Ahl al-Sunna wa’l-Jama’a militia.
  • In Libya, the fall of Mu’ammar Qaddafi was followed by Salafist attacks on Sufi shrines in and around Tripoli that the Salafists claimed were being used for “black magic” (AP, October 13, 2011). Some of the attackers were reported to have come from Egypt for the purpose of destroying Sufi tombs.
  • Earlier this month the Nowshera district tomb of Pashtun poet and former leader of the Awami National Party Ajmal Khattak was destroyed by a bomb planted by Pakistani Salafists (Associated Press of Pakistan, May 11; Dawn [Karachi], May 9). Salafists have carried out a broad campaign of destruction of Sufi shrines in Pakistan, often killing scores of worshippers in the process.

Note

1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWLf84dIn_o

This article first appeared in the May 18, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Destroying Mecca: An Idea Whose Time has Come and Gone?

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Andrew McGregor

May 18, 2012

The United States military came under fire earlier this month when it was revealed that a course taught at the Joint Forces Staff College in Norfolk, Virginia advocated a “total war” against Islam using tactics similar to the fire-bombing of Dresden or the nuclear devastation of Hiroshima against the holy cities of Mecca and Medina (Wired.com, May 10). After the content of the course was made public, it was condemned at the highest levels of the U.S. military as “totally objectionable” and “against [American] values.”

While the advocacy of such tactics in the “War on Terror” has become a mainstay on the websites of anti-Islamic extremists, it has also occasionally penetrated the American political mainstream, most notably when Republican Representative Tom Tancredo advocated the destruction of the holy cities in 2005 with the following justification: “When we bombed Hiroshima, when we bombed Dresden, we punished a lot of people who were not necessarily [guilty]. Not every German was a member of the Nazi Party. You do things in war that are ugly” (CNN, July 22, 2005; see also WFLA-AM, July 15, 2005 and AP, July 18, 2005 for similar remarks).

The idea of destroying Islam’s holy cities is not a new one, however, and the most serious threats to their existence have actually come at the hands of fellow Muslims. In 930 C.E. a radical Isma’ili sect known as the Qarmatians based in the eastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula attacked Mecca, causing widespread destruction before stealing the Black Stone of the Ka’aba, a pre-Islamic relic that survived the iconoclasm of the Prophet to become a highly revered element of the pilgrimage to Mecca. The Black Stone was eventually ransomed at a great price, but was returned broken into seven pieces. 

AfonsoAfonso de Albuquerque

In the early 16th century Portugal, then a world power, embarked on an aggressive campaign against the Muslim world for control of global maritime trade routes. The fighting was vicious, without quarter and marked by frequent atrocities. The Mamluk empire of Egypt and Syria stood to lose much by Portuguese re-routing of the spice trade but the Mamluks had no navy and little experience in naval matters; most Mamluks, in fact, could only be persuaded to board a ship by coercion or compulsion. To avoid an unfamiliar and expensive naval conflict, the Mamluk Sultan Qansuh al-Ghawri sent monks from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem to the Pope in Rome to warn him that if he did not persuade the Portuguese to back down, Qansuh would order the destruction of all the Christian sites in the Holy Land. The threat had little impact, as the Portuguese reminded the Pope that pilgrimage to these sites was a major source of revenue for the Mamluks and Qansuh was therefore unlikely to pursue their destruction. In the end Qansuh was forced to build and man a navy with help from the Ottomans and the Venetians to battle the Portuguese in the Indian Ocean. Afonso de Albuquerque, a veteran of the brutal Portuguese campaigns in Morocco and a pathological enemy of Muslims everywhere was sent to establish Portuguese supremacy in the Indian Ocean and Red Sea, where he turned Qansuh’s threats around by suggesting the destruction of the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina as well as stealing the body of the Prophet Muhammad. Fortunately for the Muslims, de Albuquerque was unable to carry out his plans, though he did apply fire and sword to expand the new Portuguese Empire as far as the island of Timor in Southeast Asia.

The real destruction of Mecca began with its conquest by the 18th century Islamic reformer Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab (1703-87). Al-Wahhab believed the pure monotheism of Islam had been corrupted through the introduction of bid’a (innovation) and shirk (polytheism), which the Wahhabis saw expressed in the saint worship and religious ritual they believed had no basis in the Islam of the Prophet and his immediate successors (the Salaf). His success as a religious reformer accelerated after he formed an alliance with the ruler of the Najd region of Arabia, Muhammad ibn Sa’ud. The new movement destroyed the holy places of Shi’a Islam in Karbala in 1802 and then turned their attention the next year to the holy cities of the Hijaz, Mecca and Medina. The destruction of many of the tombs, mosques and mausoleums of holy men in Mecca, the conversion of the Baqi’ (graveyard of the earliest generations of Muslims) into a garbage dump and the desecration of the Prophet’s tomb in Medina (which they intended to demolish) was a humiliation to the Ottomans, who turned to their Viceroy in Egypt, Muhammad ‘Ali, to drive the Wahhabists (as they came to be called, though they themselves rejected the term) from the holy cities, which were retaken in 1812. The Egyptian campaign against the Wahhabis continued until their near total destruction in 1818, after which their leader, ‘Abdullah ibn Sa’ud, was sent to Istanbul, where his head was crushed in a vice after refusing to recant the teachings of al-Wahhab.

Old Mecca: The 1780 Ottoman Castle at top left was demolished in 2002 and the hill leveled.

However, the Wahhabi/Sa’udi alliance was far from finished, and once again the Bedouin tribesmen of the Najd took the holy cities in 1925 under the leadership of ‘Abdulaziz ibn Sa’ud. The movement promptly began demolishing the extensive Ottoman reconstruction of various holy sites, including mosques and tombs honoring members of the Prophet’s family.

In the last 20 years the Saudis have applied Wahhabi principles in destroying most of the remaining historical-religious legacy of the two holy cities in the name of expanding facilities for the ever-growing number of pilgrims, despite frequent protests from Muslims across the world. [1] In 1998 the tomb of the Prophet’s mother was bulldozed and the remains set afire with gasoline. Mosques have been dynamited and leveled to make room for parking lots and banking machines while archaeological remains have been bulldozed into oblivion. The Mecca home of the Prophet’s first wife Khadijah was replaced by a public toilet for pilgrims (Independent, September 24, 2011). Even the tomb of the Prophet in Medina and his birthplace in Mecca are once more scheduled for demolition. Most of the old city of Mecca has now been obliterated to make room for luxury hotels, shopping malls and banking towers, while the billion dollar expansion of the Grand Mosque in Mecca has wiped out most of the remaining portions of the historic mosque, which were found offensive by Saudi clerics.

The Ka’aba Overshadowed by Modern Mecca

In reality, the destruction of the religious legacy of the Islamic Holy Cities, with the exception of the Ka’aba and the tomb of Muhammad (whose ultimate fate is still unsure) has been largely accomplished by their self-proclaimed protectors, the Sa’udi royal family, with the approval of the Saudi religious establishment. Even the most rabid Islamophobe would now find little to destroy that could be authentically described as “Islamic” in these new cities of glass and steel towers built on the bulldozed heritage of Islam. 

Note

1. See Irfan Ahmed, “The Destruction of the Holy Sites in Mecca and Medina, Islamica Magazine 15, http://islamicamagazine.com/?p=424.

This article first appeared in the May 18, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Military Coup Brings Guinea-Bissau to Narco-State Status

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Andrew McGregor

May 4, 2012

The leaders of the April 12 military coup in the West African nation of Guinea-Bissau have claimed they were forced to act in the perpetually unstable and impoverished nation by the alleged threat posed to the Guinea-Bissau military by an Angolan military mission. However, a closer examination of events reveals darker motives related to Guinea-Bissau’s emergence as a prime transit point for the shipment of South American narcotics to European markets.

Soldiers of the Guinea-Bissau Military

The coup came at an inopportune time, just as the nation’s harvest of cashew nuts, its leading cash crop, was about to go to market. Infrastructure was slowly improving and there were a number of other positive indicators that have now been reversed by political instability. Guinea-Bissau is a religiously and ethnically diverse country of Sunni Muslims, traditional animists and Roman Catholics belonging to five major tribal groups and a handful of minor groups.

Events were set in motion by the death earlier this year of President Malam Bacai Sanha following a long illness. According to the Guinea-Bissau constitution, the Speaker of the National Assembly, Raimundo Pereira, was sworn in as acting president until elections could be held. However, when Prime Minister Carlos Gomes Junior took 49% of the vote in the first round of the elections on March 18, his potential opponent in the second round,Kumba Yala (with close ties to the military), joined the other four candidates of the first round in seeking an annulment of the vote. Gomes was unable to establish cooperation with Balanta tribesmen in the military leadership, who see their kinsman Kumba Yala as their leader (All Africa, April 23). When Kumba Yala was elected president in 2000, he quickly elevated many members of his Balanta tribe to top positions in the government and military. However, when the powerful General Anusmane Mané refused to accept a senior post in Yala’s government he was assassinated by the president’s men.

Gomes was the candidate of the African Party for the Independence of Guinea Bissau and Cape Verde (PAIGC), established in 1956 by revolutionary Amilcar Cabral, who overthrew the Portuguese colonial administration with the help of Cuba and the Eastern Bloc in 1973. The nation was founded in bloodshed as the PAIGC massacred all those who had fought in the Portuguese colonial forces and Cabral himself was assassinated shortly after the Portuguese withdrawal. Since 1998 alone, Guinea-Bissau’s military has mounted four coups, engaged in a civil war and assassinated a host of national leaders, including President João Bernardo Vieira in2009,effectively stymying any efforts at national development.

Raimundo and Gomes were both arrested by the self-titled “Military Command,” though the junta maintained it was acting only in reaction to the presence of foreign [i.e. Angolan] troops in Guinea-Bissau. The Military Command is led by Army chief-of-staff General Antonio Indjai. After roughly two weeks of detention, Raimundo and Gomes were released on April 27 and allowed to leave for Côte d’Ivoire (AFP, April 27). In an April 13 communiqué the coup leaders declared they had taken action to prevent the planned “annihilation” of the armed forces and the murder of General Indjai(IRIN, April 23). By happy coincidence the coup also brought an abrupt end to inquiries into the military-linked political assassinations of 2009 and further military indiscipline in December, 2011. [1] 

To aid in sweeping reforms of Guinea-Bissau’s security forces (including the retirement of many leading officers) the PAIGC sought assistance from Angola, another former Portuguese colony. Angola has invested oil revenues in a number of important economic projects in Guinea-Bissau, including bauxite mining, banking, oil production and the construction of a new deep-water port (Executive Analysis Ltd. via All Africa, April 17).

The result was the deployment in March, 2011 of the Angolan Technical Military and Security Mission in Guinea Bissau (MISSANG-GB), which began a three-phase operation in Guinea-Bissau with the training of 400 men in police and military procedures (O Pais Online [Luanda], April 20). The Angolan mission was deployed with the approval of the Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa (CPLP- Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries), a Lusophone version of the British Commonwealth or the French Francophonie.

Luanda had already announced two days before the coup that MISSANG would be withdrawn, but this did not appear to satisfy the putschists, who may have used the mission’s presence to justify their coup. Accusations that MISSANG was being supplied with heavy weaponry from Angola was not denied by Angolan deputy defense minister General Salviano Sequira “Kianda,” who noted that “Personnel training could not be done with sticks and toys. We have to bring arms, fighting techniques and artillery” (O Pais Online [Luanda], April 28). Though the Angolans have demanded security guarantees during the withdrawal, Colonel Correia de Barros of the Angolan Center for Strategic Studies has noted that “Any attack on the forces of MISSANG [will] have consequences mainly for the armed forces of Guinea-Bissau” (O Pais Online [Luanda], April 20). 

Trafficking of narcotics from South America through Guinea-Bissau to Europe began in earnest in 2005 and has been elevated to a point where the nation risks becoming a failed “narco-state.” Control of the nation’s narcotics trade is behind much of the struggle for control of the security services in Guinea-Bissau. Army chief-of-staff General Batista Tagme Na Waie (a Balanta tribesman) was reported to have been killed by a bomb in March, 2009 a week after discovering 200 kg of cocaine stashed in a hanger belonging to the general staff. The next day a group of soldiers beat and killed President João Bernardo Vieira in his home in what appeared to be a revenge attack (AFP, March 6, 2009). Vieira had himself initially taken power in a 1980 coup.

The Economic Community of West African States(ECOWAS) has decided to deploy an intervention force of 500 to 600 men under the command of Colonel-Major Barro Gnibanga of Burkina Faso. The mission will be tasked with facilitating the departure of MISSANG, maintaining security during the transition process and preparing conditions for the reform of Guinea-Bissau’s security forces (Diário de Notícias Globo [Lisbon], April 28).

There are suspicions in Angola that ECOWAS is determined to undermine the CPLP nations’ traditional ties with Guinea-Bissau by using the military intervention to support the installation of pro-ECOWAS individuals in senior positions of the government and security services (O Pais [Luanda], April 20).  The military junta in Bissau has issued a statement that the arrival of foreign troops in Guinea-Bissau would be regarded as an invasion and resisted by the military (VOA, April 20).

However, not all the Angolan troops may be on their way back to Luanda. The CPLP has suggested that some of the Angolans might be incorporated into the ECOWAS mission after taking into account “the experience of MISSANG on the ground” in Guinea-Bissau (O Pais Online [Luanda], April 20). French foreign minister Alain Juppé has indicated that France could provide the ECOWAS mission with “logistical, material or intelligence support” (AFP, April 27).

Although the latest coup has been bloodless so far, there are reports that PAIGC MPs and party officials have been arrested in significant numbers. There are fears that a military intervention could produce violent resistance and possibly launch the beleaguered nation into a new civil war.

Politics in Guinea-Bissau resembles a gangland struggle for supremacy, a view that has been given added credence by the emergence of the nation as a major transshipment point for narcotics. The coup appears to have been designed to prevent any meaningful reform of the security services that would inhibit the existing military leadership from continuing to enrich themselves through the facilitation and protection of narcotics traffickers.

Note

1. Report of the Chairperson of the AU Commission, Jean Ping, on the Situations in Guinea Bissau, Mali and between the Sudan and South Sudan, delivered to the AU Peace and Security Council, April 24, 2012.

This article first appeared in the May 4, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Uyghur Militants Respond to New Chinese List of “Terrorists”

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Andrew McGregor

May 4, 2012

The Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP) released a response in late April to the latest list of Uyghur “terrorists” prepared by China’s Ministry of Public Security. The TIP communiqué was entitled “A Statement Regarding the Declaration of a ‘Terrorists’ List for the Third Time by the Chinese Government” (Islam Awazi, April 23).

Seal of the Turkistan Islamic Party

The Chinese list of six suspects, complete with descriptions, aliases and photos, is consistent with previous Chinese statements that describe Uyghur militants as members of the now defunct Eastern Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM) rather than members of the TIP. [1] Leading the list of suspects is Nurmemet Memetmin, who is described as the “commander of the ETIM.” [2] According to the Chinese list, Memetmin was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment in a “South Asian country,” (i.e. Pakistan, which is always described this way in statements with possible implications for Chinese-Pakistani relations), but had escaped in 2006 to take up the planning of new attacks against China, including the July 30-31, 2011 attacks on civilians in Kashgar allegedly led by the late Memtieli Tiliwaldi (see Terrorism Monitor, April 26).

The TIP used the statement to reject their categorization as “terrorists” by the Chinese Ministry of Public Security:

No doubt those who were accused of terrorism by the oppressive Chinese government are the martyrs who died in the torture chambers defending their religion, honor, and all their rights deprived by the aggressive Chinese…

Let everyone know that the jihad in Turkistan is not a terrorist act but rather it is an aqida [belief] and religious obligation and responsibility that is laid on our shoulders because of the aggressions of the Chinese against us… It is a legitimate right for the Muslims of Eastern Turkistan and it is prohibited for any person to describe it by another name.

The Uyghur Islamists see in the latest list an effort to create divisions within the Islamic community in Xinjiang:

The purpose of the Chinese government in [making] these lists is to cut the link between the mujahideen and the Muslims morally and materially, and safeguard its rule in Eastern Turkistan, but how could they do that, since our proud Muslim Turkistani people, who have intelligence and foresight, knows the cunning of communist China and the extent of its crimes?

The TIP concluded their statement with a call to the international Muslim community to “answer the call to jihad and join the ranks of the mujahideen” in the struggle against the “atheist communist government of China.”

China’s Ministry of Public Security also announced that the suspects’ funds and assets would be frozen, though this was likely to be little more than a formality given the unlikelihood any of the six have funds or investments of any significance in Chinese financial institutions. 

Given the arms used in many of the attacks recently attributed by China to the ETIM (knives, agricultural implements, etc.) and the apparent lack of planning or coordination in these attacks, the remark of a Ministry of Public Security spokesman that the ETIM was “the most direct and real safety threat that China faces” can only be interpreted as an indication that Beijing believes there are no other significant threats to China’s security (Xinhua, April 6).  Nonetheless, a spokesman for China’s foreign ministry, Hong Lei, did not refrain from suggesting the Uyghur militants posed a major international threat: “The evidence is incontrovertible that this organization’s violent terror activities seriously threaten not only China’s national security, but also the peace and tranquility of the region and the world” (Reuters, April 6).

Meanwhile two Uyghur prisoners in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp have been freed after ten years imprisonment without charges and four years after a U.S. court ordered their release. China has demanded their extradition though the United States, which has determined Uyghur prisoners will suffer persecution at Chinese hands, has banned the prisoners’ entry to U.S. soil. The Uyghurs will thus be settled in a willing third party nation, in this case El Salvador, following earlier resettlement of released Uyghur prisoners in small nations such as Switzerland, Bermuda, Albania and Palau (Reuters, April 20).

Notes

1. For the list, see: The Ministry of Public Security of the People’s Republic of China, April 6, 2012,  http://www.mps.gov.cn/n16/n1237/n1342/n803715/3197850.html. For an earlier list, see Terrorism Focus Brief, October 20, 2008.

2. Other transliterations of the name from the Chinese version of the Uyghur name include Memtimin Memet,Memetiming Memeti and Nurmamat Maimaitimin.

This article first appeared in the May 4, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Fulani Rebellion in the Central African Republic

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Andrew McGregor

Aberfoyle International Security

May 1, 2012

Growing violence between cattle herders and farmers in Africa’s sub-Saharan Sahel belt has fuelled militancy among the cattle-herding Fulani people, many of whom are beginning to form armed groups to defend their self-declared interests. The Fulani, most of whom are nomadic or semi-nomadic, are found in a wide sub-Saharan belt stretching from Guinea-Conakry and Mauritania in West Africa to Sudan, Cameroon and the Central African Republic to the east. The Fulani use a Niger-Congo language known variously as Pulaar or Fulfulde. Due to their wide dispersion across Africa, the Fulani are known by many names, including Fula, Fulbe and Peul.

A Fulani Herdsman (BBC)

The Fulani’s pursuit of a pastoral lifestyle at a time of increasing environmental pressures has frequently brought them into conflict with more sedentary communities. In northern Mali the Fulani herdsmen are often in conflict with the Tuareg and Arab nomads of the region and are closely associated with the Ganda Koy/Ganda Iso “self-defense” militias. In Sudan, President Omar al-Bashir has suggested that the long-standing Fulani community is composed of West Africans who have no right to vote in Sudan (Sudan Tribune, November 1, 2008).

In northern Ghana, the Fulani herders are regarded as foreign intruders who abduct women, engage in unregulated cross-border trade and destroy local agriculture. Northern farmers have appealed to the government for help in eliminating the “menace of alien Fulani herdsmen,” though they are not beyond taking matters into their own hands; in early January there were reports that local residents had burned down the shelters of over 100 Fulani families and looted all their cattle (Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, January 11, 2012; GhanaWeb, April 14, 2012).

In Nigeria the Fulani became closely tied to the Hausa following the invasion of the Hausa lands by Uthman Dan Fodio’s Fulani jihadists in 1804-1810. They are thus known as the Hausa-Fulani today, and represent nearly 30% of the population in Nigeria. Clashes between sedentary agricultural communities and the Fulani have become common (especially in those Nigerian states bordering Cameroon) as the Fulani have begun moving their herds into territories out of the traditional range of the herders. The situation closely resembles the movement of Arab herders in Darfur into agricultural lands maintained by indigenous African tribes that helped spark the Darfur crisis in 2003:

  • In Nigeria’s Nasarawa State, some 18 people were killed in recent clashes between local residents and gunmen reported to be well-armed Fulani tribesmen dressed entirely in black, though the State’s governor expressed doubt over the participation of the Fulani in the attacks (Nigerian Tribune, April 7, 2012).
  • In Benue State, over 3,600 Fulani nomads were forced to take refuge in temporary IDP camps in neighboring Cross River State after a series of clashes with local farmers. However, new problems arose when Fulani cattle began grazing on farmland in Cross River State (Nigerian Tribune, April 11, 2012; The Nation [Lagos], April 11, 2012).
  • Six villages were reported to have been razed by men believed to be Fulani raiders in Taraba State on April 4. A small patrol of soldiers from the 93rd Battalion engaged a large body of raiders in the early hours of the morning, suffering the loss of two soldiers (Nation [Lagos], April 5, 2012; Leadership [Lagos], April 5, 2012).

The great Fulani jihad leaders of the 19th century appear to have provided the inspiration for a recently formed offshoot of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) known as Jamaat Tawhid wa’l-Jihad fi Garbi Afriqiya (Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa – MUJWA). With a leadership consisting of West African Muslims rather than North African Arabs, the movement has cited the examples of ‘Uthman Dan Fodio, al-Hajj ‘Umar Tal and Amadou Cheikou, whose massive armies fought animists, fellow Muslims and Christian imperialists alike to form their own short-lived empires in West Africa.

“General” Abdel Kader Baba Laddé

Operating from deep in the ungoverned bush of the northern part of the Central African Republic (CAR), a poorly educated Fulani tribesman from southern Chad leads a rebel movement of several hundred men that claims to be both a Fulani self-defense militia and an armed movement set on bringing democracy to Chad and the CAR. Led by the self-appointed “General” Abdel Kader Baba Laddé, the Front Populaire pour le Redressement (FPR) is regarded by many as little more than a bandit group with a political veneer despite its broad ambitions.

“General” Abdel Kader Baba Laddé

The 42-year-old Baba Laddé hails from the Mayo-Kebbi region of southwestern Chad, near the borders with Cameroon and Nigeria. A former non-commissioned officer in the Chadian army, Baba Laddé promoted himself to the rank of general after leaving the army and forming a rebel group to overthrow the government of President Idris Déby. Baba Laddé is not a man of minor ambitions, however, and in addition to overthrowing the leader of Chad he also proclaims his desire to unite all members of the scattered Fulani tribe from Mauritania to the Sudan (Jeune Afrique, December 26, 2011).

“General” Laddé’s lightly armed militia was unable to maintain a presence in Chad in the face of a government offensive in 2008 and crossed the border into the northern regions of the CAR, a lawless area that has become home to all manner of bandits, rebels and coupeurs de routes (highwaymen).  Baba Laddé eventually made his headquarters in the market town of Kaga-Bondoro, 245 km north of the capital of Bangui. Lying just south of the border with Chad, the wilds of the Ubangi-Shari region (as the CAR was known during the French colonial period) have traditionally provided shelter to a variety of Chadian renegades. Parts of this region were severely depopulated by slavers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a calamity from which the area has never completely recovered.

A recent petition of leading citizens of the affected areas demanding government action against the “exactions” of Baba Laddé and his inclusion in an international list of war criminals cited various crimes carried out by the FPR, including looting, rape, mutilation, the displacement of thousands of people, the assassination of international aid staff and the kidnapping of children for use as child-soldiers. The movement has also been accused of being sympathetic to the goals of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). [1]

The Central African Republic

Baba Laddé’s sympathizers suggest that, unlike the other marauding rebel/bandit groups in the CAR, the FPR is popular with local people due to its dedication to peace and security but has fallen victim to a malevolent press allegedly in the pay of CAR President François Bozize that hold Baba Laddé “responsible for all the ills of the CAR.” [2] When asked to respond to claims that the “General” was keeping order in the areas under his control, the President replied: “But who authorized him to do so? Who asked him?” (Jeune Afrique, February 9). In reality the FPR raises much of its funds by “taxing” Fulani herders driving their cattle through the northern CAR (Centrafrique-Presse, December 19, 2011). Extortion of local communities, cattle theft and revenues from raiding provide most of the rest (IRIN, January 12, 2012). As well as recruiting from the Fulani community, the FPR welcomes local bandits and former members of the dozen or so rebel movements operating in the northern CAR. Weapons are acquired from across the Sudan border in Darfur, where they are found in abundance after years of warfare. N’Djamena has tried to avoid giving the FPR any political legitimacy – the Chadian Ministry of Information and Communications recently asserted that there are no Chadian rebels in the CAR, only “criminals and zaraguinas [highway robbers]” (AFP, February 14, 2012).

Deportation to Chad

In September, 2009 Baba Laddé agreed to talks with Chadian government representatives in Bangui under the mediation of the CAR government. The FPR leader appeared ready to sign on to the Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration process (DDR) process already signed on to by a number of rebel movements, but first demanded a personal apology from the Chadian president to Mbororo (the Fulani sub-group to which he belongs) cattle herders for attacks allegedly carried out by Chadian military forces. Baba Laddé also suggested it “would be judicious” for the Chadian president to provide the FPR with logistics, food and financial compensation to prepare the group for their return to Chad (Le Confident [Bangui], September 22, 2009). Supposedly under the protection of MICOPAX peacekeepers during negotiations in the CAR capital, the FPR leader disappeared on October 9, 2009 on his way to the CAR Defense Ministry. [3]

Angered by clashes between the FPR and Chadian forces along the CAR’s northern border, the CAR government had apparently decided to solve the Baba Laddé’ problem by quietly extraditing him to Chad in an operation allegedly planned by Colonel Mila Allafi Tanga, the Chadian military attaché at the Chadian Embassy in Bangui (Centrafrique-Presse, December 19, 2011, Le Confident [Bangui], October 13, 2012; October 15, 2012; October 22, 2012). MICOPAX claimed it had no involvement in the abduction and extradition and later sent a mission to N’Djamena to ascertain his location and condition (Le Confident [Bangui], November 15).

The Front Islamique Tchadien (FIT – Chadian Islamic Front), an insurgent group that also promotes Fulani solidarity, threatened to launch a jihad against Bangui unless Baba Laddé was released (L’Hirondelle [Bangui], October 13, 2009; for FIT, see Terrorism Focus Brief, July 16, 2008). FIT also claims to have sent some of its members to the CAR to organize “vigilante” groups amongst the Chadian herders “under threat” in the northern CAR. [4]

In November, 2009 panic was created in the Kaga Bandoro region when the FPR was attacked by Jean-Jacques Démafouth’s Armée Populaire pour la Restauration de la Démocratie (APRD), a much stronger militia whose area of operations overlaps that of the FPR in the Kaga-Bondoro region (Le Confident [Bangui], November 3, 2009). The APRD has since declared that it would only join the DDR process if the FPR returned to Chad (IRIN, January 12, 2012).

Baba Laddé was not seen again until August, 2010 when he surfaced in Cameroon, claiming to have escaped ten months of torture in N’Djamena. Baba Laddé then disappeared again in November, 2010, turning up in the CAR in January, 2011 (AFP, April 19, 2011).

The CAR – A Permanent State of Instability

A CAR-based UN representative, Margaret Vogt, told the UN Security Council last December that the CAR was “on the brink of disaster” due to its inability to find $22 million to pursue the DDR process. Vogt also demanded that Baba Laddé be held accountable for his human rights violations against the people of the CAR (UN News Center, December 14, 2011). It has been alleged locally that Baba Laddé has supporters within the CAR government, most notably Minister for Livestock Youssoufa Yerima Mandjo, a fellow Fulani (Centrafrique-Presse, December 19, 2011; January 6, 2012).

Baba Laddé signed a peace agreement with Chadian representatives in Bangui on June 13, 2011, telling national radio: “I think we have put a final end to the hostilities” (AFP, June 14, 2011). However, by this time it appeared that Baba Laddé had begun to lose interest in Chad as expanding his influence in the CAR became more appealing than a return to his homeland (Centrafrique Matin [Bangui], December 23, 2011).

Abdoulaye Miskine (3rd from left) with FDPC fighters  (FDPC/AFP)

Baba Laddé’s forces clashed in January, 2012 with the Front Démocratique du People Centrafricaine (FDPC) led by Abdoulaye Miskine (real name Martin Koumta-Madji), another Chadian adventurer who once provided security for former CAR President Ange-Felix Patassé, overthrown in 2003 by Bozizé, his former army chief-of-staff.  In November, 2008 Miskine’s men ambushed a Forces Armées Centrafricaines (FACA) patrol, killing nine soldiers.  President Bozizé has close ties with the Déby regime and came to power with the assistance of the Chadian military. Chadians are well represented in the Garde Républicaine (responsible for the president’s security), the only reasonably equipped branch of the security forces. The Guard is otherwise made up of members of Bozizé’s Gbaya tribe, who protect the president from the army, which is largely composed of members of the Yakoma tribe. Since the army is only sporadically paid and is generally alienated from its own commanders, it tends to act as yet another predatory force rather than a savior when dealing with civilians outside the capital, the only region that can honestly be said to be under FACA’s control. France maintains a small garrison of 150 to 200 men in Bangui that can be quickly supplemented by the Force d’Action Rapide to protect French citizens and interests in times of crisis.

Chad and the CAR began joint operations against the FPR in the region north of Kaga Bandaro in late January (Journal de Bangui, January 24, 2012). Chadian helicopters worked in concert with ground forces of both nations in attempting a pincer movement to trap and eliminate Baba Laddé’s group, though this strategy appears to have failed due to the movement’s habit of dispersing itself in small groups of fighters over a large area. Nonetheless, heavy fighting was reported and the joint forces claimed to have smashed the FPR’s command post north of Kaga Bandaro (AFP, January 26, 2012; Journal de Bangui, January 30, 2012).

Fulani Herdsmen Are Typically Armed These Days

In response to the joint offensive against the FPR, Laddé declared that he considered the CAR’s position to be “a declaration of war by [President] François Bozizé” and announced the formation of a new anti-Bozizé political movement, the Parti Pour la Justice et le Développement (PJD), with a military wing going by the name of the Forces Armées Révolutionnaires de Centrafrique (FARCA) (RFI, January 28, 2012). According to the founding communiqué, PJD-FARCA was in discussions with three other movements to overthrow the Bozizé “dictatorship,” these being the aforementioned APRD, the Convention des Patriotes pour la Justice et al Paix (CPJP) and the Union des Forces pour la Démocratie et le Rassemblement (UFDR). Some of these groups, however, have signed a ceasefire agreement with Bangui and none have reported forming an alliance with the FPR or PJD-FARCA.

The statement also called on all members of the Central African armed forces to desert and join FARCA (Le Jour [Conakry], January 27, 2012). In one of his grander moments, Baba Laddé also suggested an alliance between the Fulani, the Tuareg, the ethnic-Somali rebels of Ethiopia’s Ogaden region, the Sahrawi Polisario and al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) (Jeune Afrique, December 26, 2011). On February 14, the FPR announced it had captured 27 FACA soldiers and added that it was sending a detachment of FPR fighters to reinforce rebel groups in the mainly Tubu Tibesti region of northern Chad, though there is no evidence this actually happened. [5]

In Defense of Rebellion

On March 12, Baba Laddé issued an extraordinary “Appeal to the Defenders of Human Rights,” a document that revealed much of the inflated self-view of the “General,” beginning with the regal tone of the opening line: “I am the General Baba Laddé and I have decided to take up my pen to inform the world of two very important things.” [6] Laddé continued with an appeal for human rights organizations to secure the release of the “many members of my family and families of my fighters” who were arrested in the CAR and Chad. Baba Laddé then announced that the FPR and PJF-FARCA have decided to launch a call for peace negotiations under the auspices of the UN. The proposed international peace conference would gather representatives of “the CAR, Chad, all political and military movements of Chad and Central Africa, the legal opposition parties, representatives of neighboring states of both countries, including Libya, Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, South Sudan and Sudan, as well as representatives of states conducting military operations in both countries: France, the United States and Uganda.” Representative of Darfur’s Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) and the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) could also attend, provided the latter dismissed Joseph Kony and other leaders wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC). Baba Laddé warned his movement “will be obliged to resume the armed struggle to establish democracy” in Chad and the CAR should it not receive a positive reply to this proposal by May 1.

Baba Laddé was also disturbed by remarks made in a March 2012 interview by former Burundian president and current African Union mediator Pierre Buyoya, who expressed surprise that a well-known “bandit and coupeur de route” like Baba Laddé now had political policies and suggested that the FPR leader might be manipulated by external forces (Jeune Afrique, March 16, 2012). In his response, Baba Laddé asked if “a Black, an African cannot have political ideas without being manipulated by an external power? Or is this [just] Chadians or Fulani who cannot have an opinion? Or is it because I’m not from a middle-class [background] and have not done studies abroad? And yes, a poor Chadian Fulani may have a political opinion” (Press-FPR, March 21, 2012).

In the same statement, Baba Laddé then went on to describe his “political discourse,” a far-ranging Qaddafi-esque platform that included democracy for Chad and the CAR, the abandonment of a “genocide” against Nigerians under the guise of fighting Boko Haram, peace negotiations between all parties in Mali, justice for “atrocities” against the Fulani in Guinea-Conakry, equality between blacks and Moors in Mauritania and between Arabs and Tubu in Libya, condemnation of the “crimes” of Bashar Assad, Vladimir Putin and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Syria, support for the independence of the Angolan province of Cabinda, an end to torture in Ethiopia and a request for Israel to cease bombing in Gaza. The FPR commander went on to express his wish to fight Joseph Kony’s LRA (which operates in the southern CAR), an oft-expressed desire that is never transformed into action but serves to deflect attention from the activities of his own men in the northern CAR. Baba Laddé wrapped up his message by informing his opponents that: “Despite the threats, the FPR and the PJD will continue to fight the dictatorship of Déby and Bozizé. And if you want peace, you must negotiate with us, the lower people.”

Notes

1    “Collectif á Lingbi Awe Baba Laddé Tous Contre les Exactions de Baba Ladde en Centrafrique,” January 5, 2012, published by Centrafrique Press, January 16, 2012.

2      http://makaila.over-blog.com/article-bozize-et-deby-ont-conspire-contre-le-fpr-il-va-de-notre-interet-de-tendre-la-main-aux-groupes-reb-98342951.html.

3        The Mission de consolidation de la paix en République Centrafricaine (MICOPAX) is a peacekeeping operation led by the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), formed by Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, the CAR, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Congo-Brazzaville and São Tomé and Príncipe. With a strength of just over 500 troops and training from French military advisers, MICOPAX attempts to restore security to regions of the northwest CAR plagued by roving zaraguinas.

4       “Protégeons les tchadiens en RCA,” April 10, 2010. http://frontislamiquetchadien.blogspot.ca/2010/04/protegeons-les-tchadiens-en-rca.html ,

5       Press Release, PJD-FARCA, Cellule de Communication du Front Populaire pour le Redressement (FPR), ChariNews, February 14, 2012.

6.       http://makaila.over-blog.com/article-rca-tchad-l-appel-du-general-baba-ladde-101447598.html

Border Clashes Shut Down Oil Production as the Two Sudans Prepare for New Round of War

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Andrew McGregor

April 19, 2012

In response to South Sudan’s surprise occupation of its northern neighbor’s most productive oilfields, Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir announced on April 12 that South Sudan had “chosen the path of war” (Sudan Tribune, April 12).

Heglig MapWith the support of the United States, South Sudan declared its independence in July 2011 without having first reached an agreement with Khartoum on vital issues such as oil revenues, transfer fees and border demarcation. Juba’s occupation of the Heglig field goes well beyond applying pressure on Khartoum; it deprives its northern neighbor of revenues, foreign currency reserves and fuel. It also places an already unpopular regime in a corner from which it may feel it necessary to return to a state of war for its own survival. Khartoum might be able to buy peace with Juba and the return of Heglig by looking favorably on Southern claims in other border disputes, but this would be a humiliating response by a military/Islamist regime that cannot afford to show any weakness. In the meantime, the Sudanese pound is rapidly dropping in real value and lineups for petroleum products are growing longer by the day.  However, South Sudan, which possesses no refineries, is also suffering a rapid decline in the value of its currency and is running short of hard-currency reserves needed to purchase refined petroleum products, much of these reserves having already been spent on Juba’s massive re-armament program and expansion of its military.

Chinese-made APCs in Mombasa Port awaiting shipment to South Sudan

The South Sudan maintains that Heglig was part of the southern region according to administrative divisions existing at the time of independence in 1956 and now appears to be rejecting a 2009 ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague that Heglig lies inside the northern Sudan rather than the South. The Heglig oil fields, which are in gradual decline but still provide over half of Sudan’s remaining oil production, are operated by the Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Co. (GNPOC), a Chinese, Malaysian, Indian and Sudanese consortium. China, a major arms supplier for Khartoum, is reported to be shipping arms and other equipment to South Sudan through the Kenyan port of Mombasa (Nairobi Star, April 8).

The occupation of Heglig is the latest stage in a growing battle over Sudan’s oil wealth. Khartoum lost roughly 75%of its oil production with the separation of the South Sudan, where most of the oil is found. However, the only outlet for this oil is via pipeline through the north to Port Sudan, which gave Khartoum the idea of replacing its lost revenues by charging transfer fees of $36 per barrel rather than the going international rate of $1 per barrel as well as siphoning off significant amounts of southern oil for its own use. Juba turned off the taps in January in protest even though oil exports account for 98% of South Sudan’s budget (see Terrorism Monitor, March 22). Khartoum has not backed down on the transfer fees, so Juba has apparently decided that if South Sudan must do without oil, so must Sudan.

South Sudan’s information minister has indicated a withdrawal of Khartoum’s forces from the disputed Abyei region would be among the conditions required for a South Sudanese pullout from Heglig (al-Jazeera, April 12; for Abyei see Terrorism Monitor Brief, May 27, 2011). On March 15, South Sudan President Salva Kiir told an audience in Wau that border demarcation cannot begin until Khartoum acknowledges the Abyei region belongs to South Sudan. [1] President Kiir has been unresponsive to international pleas to pull his forces back, complaining that he has been unable to sleep because of telephone calls from international leaders: “The UN secretary-general [called] yesterday; he gave me an order… to immediately withdraw from Heglig. I said, “I’m not under your command” (al-Jazeera, April 12; Sudan Tribune, April 12).

The Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) maintains their advance into Heglig came in response to an incursion into the oilfields of South Sudan’s Unity State with two brigades of Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) regulars, 16 tanks and various pro-Khartoum militias. The SAF were defeated by the SPLA’s 4th Division under General James Gatduel Gatluak and pursued as far as Heglig, where they have remained (Sudan Tribune, April 11). Sudanese forces are reported to be moving on Heglig gradually, with SAF spokesmen citing delays caused by mines laid by South Sudanese troops (Sudan Tribune, April 15).  

Sudan’s military maintains that the SPLA were joined in the April 10 attack on Heglig by fighters belonging to Darfur’s Justice and Equality Movement (JEM). An AFP reporter said they had observed dead bodies in Heglig bearing JEM insignia and two destroyed land cruisers with JEM emblems. JEM denied the allegations, providing the unlikely suggestion that the SAF may have dressed their own dead in JEM uniforms (AFP, March 28). In June, 2011 the Darfur-based rebels claimed to have carried out a long-distance raid on the Heglig Airport.

The SPLA claims to have shot down one of Khartoum’s Russian-built Mig-29 fighter jets during an April 6 air raid in the Heglig region, though this was denied by an SAF spokesman (al-Jazeera, April 6). According to South Sudanese intelligence and other sources, Mig-29 air strikes targeted a strategic bridge in Abiem-nhom County in Unity State, a target at Ajakkuac in Warrap State and the main bridge in Bentiu (capital of Unity State), killing five people and wounding five others (Sudan Tribune, April 11; April 14; April 15). The SPLA does not yet possess a combat-capable air force, but is believed to have plans to develop an air arm for their military.

Sudan’s defense minister, Abd al-Rahim Muhammad Hussein, says the SPLA offensive is part of a cooperative effort with components of the recently formed Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF) to occupy Heglig and the South Kordofan capital of Kadugli (Sudan Tribune, April 11; for the SRF, see Terrorism Monitor, November 11, 2011). The SRF includes JEM and the SPLA-North, which operates in Sudan’s South Kordofan and Blue Nile States. Hussein said SPLA-North forces in South Kordofan consist of 22 battalions of 500 men each, while JEM and Darfur’s Sudan Liberation Movement – Minni Minnawi (SLM-MM) have a combined 125 Land Cruisers across the South Sudan border in Bahr al-Ghazal preparing to launch cross-border attacks (Sudan Tribune, April 11). While the deployment of large numbers of Darfur rebels in the border region of South Sudan cannot be confirmed, it is consistent with Khartoum’s claims of greater cooperation between the rebels and the SPLA over the last year. If JEM actually was involved in the attack on Heglig, it would be the first sign that the SRF alliance was becoming a military reality with the support of Juba.

Note

1. “The Crisis in Abyei,” The Sudan Human Security Baseline Assessment Project, Small Arms Survey, March 28, 2012, http://www.smallarmssurveysudan.org/facts-figures-abyei.php

This article was first published in the April 19, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

New Yemeni Resolve to Defeat al-Qaeda Bearing Results in Lawdar

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Andrew McGregor

April 19, 2012

The battle for southern Yemen has intensified since the succession of Abd Rabu Mansur al-Hadi to the Yemen presidency and his subsequent vow to suppress the Islamist insurgency. The latest battleground in this struggle is the strategically located city of Lawdar in Abyan Governorate, where local volunteers bought time for state security forces in rebuffing an attempt by al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and their Ansar al-Shari’a allies to take the city and expand their occupation zone in Abyan.

Loyalist Tribal Fighters in Lawdar

The battle in Lawdar comes at a time when the Yemeni armed forces are still badly divided and in the opening stages of major reforms and changes in the leadership, which is dominated by members of ex-president Ali Abdullah Salih’s family. State forces engaged in the battle in Lawdar include the 111th Infantry Brigade and the 26th Republican Guard Brigade (al-Mu’tamar [Sana’a], April 14). The locally raised People’s Defense Committees (PDC) have played a vital role in the battle, despite having no formal military training. Some of the ex-president’s relatives have proven dangerously reluctant to relinquish their posts – Yemen’s main airport was recently closed for a day after Yemen’s Air Force commander, Muhammad Salih al-Ahmar (a half-brother of the ex-president) responded to his dismissal by shelling the airport before surrounding it with loyal tribesmen and military personnel (Yemen Times, April 7; Marib Press, April 9). An attempt to assess the combat-readiness of the Republican Guard was derailed by its commander, Ahmad Ali Abdallah Salih, the eldest son of the ex-president, who submitted a report containing “major errors and inaccurate numbers” (al-Ahali [Sana’a], April 14; al-Jumhuriyah [Ta’izz], April 15). The ex-president’s nephew, Tariq Muhammad Abdallah Salih, has refused to hand over command of the 3rd Republican Guard Brigade (Akhbar al-Yawm [Sana’a], April 10). The new president has come under fierce attacks from local media outlets still loyal to the ex-president’s family that oppose the dismissal of family members from top posts in the military and security services (al-Ahali [Sana’a], April 14).

The battle began on April 9 when Ansar al-Shari’a attacked the military barracks near the power station on the outskirts of Lawdar and seized a large variety of weapons that would be used in their attempt to take the city, including tanks, anti-aircraft guns, artillery and missile launchers (Ma’rib Press, April 10). The Yemeni Army initially withdrew, but the defense of the city was quickly taken by local youth and other civilians using their personal weapons, mainly AK-47s (al-Sharq al-Awsat, April 10).

AQAP in LawdarAl-Qaeda Forces in Lawdar

Yemeni fighter-jets were also active in striking militant training camps and other positions held by the Islamists in Abyan, though Ansar al-Shari’a claims U.S. drones have been responsible for some of the targeted attacks from the air (Akhbar al-Yawm, April 5; Reuters, April 16).

Dozens of militants were reported killed, including two senior commanders, in an April 11 operation to clear Islamist checkpoints from the highway outside of Lawdar. The Defense Ministry said that Saudis, Somalis and Pakistanis were among those killed (26September.net, April 11; Saba [Sana’a], April 11).

Pro-government forces claimed on April 13 to have arrested two al-Qaeda leaders, Jalal al-Saydi and Abd al-Ra’uf Nasir, though the latter’s family has denied the report (al-Mu’tamar, April 13; al-Masdar [Sana’a], April 14). Nasir was reported to have been seized by members of the Lawdar Youths Gathering, a local militia formed to defend the city (al-Sharq al-Awsat, April 15).  Two senior al-Qaeda militants, Akram al-Hafizah and Ahmad Darawish, were reported killed on April 11 (al-Mu’tamar, April 11; Yemen Post, April 12). Yemen’s Defense Ministry has also reported the death of Ansar al-Shari’a leader Ra’id al-Sa’id in Zinjibar, which is still held by the movement (Yemen Post, April 15; for Zinjibar see Terrorism Monitor, August 12, 2011).

Two hundred men of Yemen’s American-trained Counter Terrorism Unit (CTU) arrived in Abyan on April 14 to join the battle against the Islamist militants for the first time.  Under the command of the ex-president’s relatives, this elite unit was withdrawn from counterterrorist operations in the provinces and deployed as a presidential guard in Sana’a last year after anti-government protests began (Yemen Times, April 16).

Arriving with the CTU was the new Abyan governor, Jamal al-Aqil, whose motorcade came under fire on his way to meet with local military commanders and leaders of the popular committees. Like al-Aqil, both President al-Hadi and Defense Minister Major General Muhammad Nasir Ali are from Abyan, which encourages those hoping for a greater government focus on reversing the successes the militants have achieved there during Yemen’s political turmoil.

As the militants begin to crumble under military pressure in Abyan, AQAP has intensified its campaign of suicide bombings in Abyan and elsewhere in Yemen (AFP, April 6). Nonetheless, the battle for Lawdar is a major propaganda blow for the Islamist militants, who rather than being met as liberators, were instead repulsed by Lawdar’s residents in league with military forces loyal to the new regime. If al-Hadi can unify the military (still no easy task) and maintain the momentum established at the battle for Lawdar, this may be remembered as the moment when the tide turned against AQAP and its allies in Yemen.

This article was originally published in the April 19, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

“The Sons of the Land”: Tribal Challengees to the Tuareg Conquest of Northern Mali

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Andrew McGregor

April 19, 2012

After the last month’s shocking developments in Mali, including a military coup, the collapse of the national security forces, the conquest of northern Mali by Tuareg rebels and the emergence of an Islamist group with apparent ties to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), the land-locked African nation has entered into a tense stand-off in which next steps are being planned by all parties.  Even as the military staff of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) form plans for a possible military intervention and neighboring Algeria places a reinforced garrison and substantial air elements on high alert at their military base in the southern oasis of Tamanrasset, the most immediate source of further conflict may be Arab and African tribal militias unwilling to accept Tuareg dominance in northern Mali.

Ganda Koy

The most prominent of these militias is known as Ganda Iso (“Sons of the Land”), the successor to an earlier group notorious for its attacks on civilians known as Ganda Koy (“Lords of the Land”).  According to Seydou Cissé, regarded as the “founding father” of Ganda Iso, the earlier Ganda Koy movement was formed over 1994-1995 by Imam Muhammad n’Tissa Maiga to resist attacks on the sedentary and semi-nomadic population (largely black African Songhai and Peul/Fulani) from bandits and lighter-skinned nomads (primarily the Tuareg, Arabs and Mauritanians, collectively and commonly referred to in Mali as “the whites”).

After its formation, Ganda Koy engaged in brutal attacks on the lighter-skinned peoples of northern Mali in a conflict that became racially and ethnically defined. Ganda Koy’s most notorious operation involved a massacre of 53 Mauritanians and Tuareg marabouts (holy men) of the Kel Essouk clan near Gao in 1994. The militia was alleged to have received support and funding from the Malian army and was composed largely of former Malian soldiers, many of whom were granted an amnesty and reabsorbed into the military when the movement was officially dissolved in March, 1996 (Jeune Afrique, September 24, 2008). In reality, however, the movement had merely entered a dormant phase and has since been resurrected in one form or another whenever tensions rise between the rival communities of northern Mali.

General Amadou Baba Touré

Ganda Koy was effectively disrupted by then-Colonel Amadou Baba Touré, who succeeded in infiltrating the movement with his own agents so that their every move was known in advance. The Colonel also harassed the leadership of the movement, including Cissé, with short periods of detention without charge. Cissé attempted to convince Colonel Touré that Ganda Koy was not engaged in an ethnic struggle, but the continued pressure from security forces split the movement (L’Indépendant [Bamako], August 12, 2010; Mali Demain [Bamako], September 26, 2008). 

Efforts by Ganda Koy in 2008 to enter the political process were rebuffed by the Malian establishment. Refusal to hear Ganda Koy grievances led to threats from the movement that they would resume their military activities (Nouvelle Liberation [Bamako], November 19, 2008; Le Tambour [Bamako], November 25, 2008).

A Ganda Koy unit believed to be largely Fulani in origin attacked a military camp at Ouattagouna in Gao region in March 2011. The attack closely followed the arrest of a Ganda Koy commander, Aliou Amadou (a.k.a. Sadjo), on charges of possessing illegal weapons (22 Septembre [Bamako], March 25). When the president of the Ganda Koy movement, Colonel Abdoulaye Maiga, did not appear for a press conference in July, 2011 it was believed that his absence was due to pressure from the military (22 Septembre [Bamako], July 4, 2011).

A statement attributed to Ganda Koy was issued in December 2011, in which the movement declared it was reactivating its armed units in Mali as of December 11 to counter Tuareg fighters returning from Libya with their arms and called on Songhai and Fulani members of the Malian military to join the fighting units of Ganda Koy as soon as possible (Le Politicien [Bamako], December 16, 2011).

Ganda Iso

Seydou Cissé says he formed Ganda Iso in 2009 in the interests of “maintaining social stability in the region” and ensuring there would be justice rather than immunity for malefactors: “We had no choice in creating the Ganda Iso. Each community had its own militia. And to be feared and dreaded, we needed to have our own militia” (L’Indépendant [Bamako], August 12, 2010).

Sergeant Amadou Diallo, a Peul/Fulani, was appointed head of the military arm of the movement with responsibility for training recruits, while Seydou Cissé was to be the civilian head of the political movement. This arrangement fell apart after Sergeant Diallo conducted a broad daylight massacre of four Tuareg civilians in the village of Hourala on the weekly market day, bringing swift retaliation from armed Tuareg (Mali Demain [Bamako], September 5, 2008; Nouvelle Liberation [Bamako], September 9, 2008).  At this point Cissé says he realized Diallo had “deviated from our goal” and “deflected our plans.” Though Ganda Iso was blamed for this attack, Cissé claims it was the result of Diallo allying himself with the Tolobé Peul/Fulani of Niger, whom Cissé described as “great bandits.” When Cissé was called to account by then Malian president Ahmadou Toumani Touré, he told the president he was only seeking respect for his people and asked for the transfer of his nemesis, Colonel Ahmadou Baba Touré. A split followed between Diallo and the civilian leadership of the movement; according to Cissé:“Sergeant Diallo did not understand our struggle. While we are fighting for the security of the area, he was fighting for his own account. In a document that the State Security gave me, Ahmadou Diallo required as a condition of peace that the state gives him 30 million FCFA [West African CFA Francs], a villa and a car” (L’Indépendant [Bamako], August 12, 2010). An ex-member of Ganda Iso echoed this evaluation: “The movement of Diallo is not a product of the Ganda Koy. It pursues the unsatisfied plan of a man who manipulates his brothers to try to intimidate the Malian nation in the sole goal of making money” (Nouvelle Liberation [Bamako], September 26, 2008).

Ansongo District of Gao Region, Mali

Ganda Iso’s September, 2008 killing of the four Tuareg civilians was variously reported to have occurred in reaction to the murder of an elderly Peul man by an armed group in Tin Hamma or as the result of damage to Peul herds during a May 12 attack by Imghad Tuareg on a Malian gendarmerie base in Ansongo (L’Essor [Bamako], October 7). [1] It is uncertain whether the Ganda Iso killers were aware that three of their Imghad victims were also cousins of Colonel al-Hajj Gamou, the powerful leader of a loyalist Imghad Tuareg militia, but a reported call from Diallo after the killings to the office of the Malian president complaining that Colonel Gamou’s militia was harassing Peul/Fulanis in the Ansongo region suggests that this had a role in the selection of targets. However, making a personal enemy of one of the most effective and occasionally ruthless desert fighters in northern Mali was ultimately a poor decision and Diallo soon had new complaints that Gamou had buried many of Diallo’s relatives up to their neck in holes in the desert. [2]

On the night of September 14, 2008 a gun battle broke out in Gao when one of Colonel Gamou’s patrols surprised a group of Ganda Iso (possibly led personally by Ahmadou Diallo) allegedly caught in the midst of an assassination attempt on Muhammad ag Mahmud Akiline, the director of Mali’s Agency for Northern Development (Nouvelle Liberation [Bamako], September 16, 2008; L’Indépendant [Bamako], September 18, 2008). While the Army was busy arresting some 30 suspected members of Ganda Iso and hunting down the movement’s leadership, its communications branch was simultaneously denying the presence of any militias in Mali, insisting the Army’s deployment in Gao was intended only to “prevent people from creating a mess” (Le Republicain [Bamako], September 24, 2008). 

Colonel Gamou retaliated against Ganda Iso in a September 16, 2008 attack on Fafa, Ahmadou Diallo’s hometown in the movement’s Ansongo district stronghold (Nouvelle Liberation [Bamako], September 19, 2008). The raid yielded a large store of guns, grenades and mortars, but many of the movement’s supporters claimed they could not understand why security forces were focused on a “self-defense” unit rather than rebels and brigands in northern Mali (L’Indépendant [Bamako], September 19).

Security sweeps arrested dozens more members and Ahmadou Diallo fled to neighboring Niger, where he was arrested only days later and extradited to Mali, where he was soon released “on the sly” by his friends in the government (Radio France Internationale, September 27, 2008; Info-Matin [Bamako], June 15, 2009).

Ganda Iso was far from finished, however, and on January 1, 2009 members of the movement hurled hand grenades at the homes of three prominent Imghad Tuareg leaders in Timbucktu, including Muhammad ag Mahmud Akiline, who had escaped an earlier Ganda Iso assassination attempt in September, 2008. General Ahmadou Baba Touré claimed that the grenade-throwers were among those arrested in the September, 2008 security sweep and later released. [3] In June, 2009, an armed group believed to be Peul/Fulani members of Ganda Iso attacked a Tuareg camp in Tessit, part of the Ansongo district of Gao Region, killing six Tuareg (Info Matin [Bamako], June 15, 2009). It was reported by some sources that the murderers were the same as those suspected in the September 2008 killing of four Tuareg civilians (Info-Matin [Bamako], June 16, 2009).

After talks with the government, a demobilization and disarmament “peace flame” ceremony for Ganda Iso was held in 2010, emulating an earlier and better-known “peace flame” commemorating the Tuareg demobilization and disarmament following the 1996 rebellion. The event was widely regarded as a failure in which old and obsolete weapons were turned in for public incineration before an audience that included neither senior members of government nor the military leader of Ganda Iso, Ahmadou Diallo (22 Septembre [Bamako], August 9, 2010).

Ganda Iso in the Current Conflict

There have been reports that the post-coup Malian military has resumed its old patronage of the “Ganda” movements by providing food and military equipment to 1,000 members of Ganda Iso and Ganda Koy (Le Combat [Bamako], March 28). Ganda Iso clashed with the independence-seeking Mouvement National de Libération de l’Azawad (MNLA) in mid-March, reportedly killing six rebels and wounding seven others. The MNLA attacked a Ganda Iso training camp in the Ansongo district in retaliation on March 15, suffering the loss of al-Her ag Ekaratane, a deserter from the Malian Army and the former chief of the camel corps in Ansango (L’Indépendant [Bamako], March 20; 22 Septembre [Bamako], March 19). Ganda Iso fighters gathered at Gao are reported to have melted away when combined MNLA/Ansar al-Din forces approached.

The MNLA has maintained from the beginning of the rebellion that the movement brings the various peoples of northern Mali together in pursuit of an independent state of “Azawad,” including the Kel-Tamashek (the Tuareg self-name), the Songhai, the Peul/Fulani, the Arabs and the “Moors” (Mauritanians). In practice, however, there has been little evidence that any of the non-Tuareg communities are represented in the MNLA in any significant numbers.

Ahmadou Diallo appears to have shared the concerns of the military coup leaders over the handling of Tuareg rebels by the Bamako politicians, telling an interviewer in 2008 that Bamako’s response to Tuareg rebellions in the north was “too politicized.” According to Diallo, “The military had the means and the weapons to fight dissidents and bandits in the north, but had its hands tied and was forced to follow orders” (Le Temoin du Nord [Bamako], October 17, 2008). Though this may have been true at the time (as the 2009 defeat of Tuareg rebel leader Ibrahim ag Bahanga attests), this was no longer the situation when the Tuareg began the new rebellion last January, wielding firepower superior to that of the Malian Army courtesy of the looted armories of Libya.

Diallo is reported to have met his end in a battle with MNLA rebels in the Ansongo district on March 25 (Reuters, March 25; L’Essor [Bamako], March 28). A Bamako report that honored this “outstanding” warrior claimed that Diallo’s death had dealt a serious blow to the morale of Ganda Iso and its civilian supporters (Le Combat [Bamako], March 28). It is for now unclear who might succeed Diallo as military leader of the movement.

In the meantime, a somewhat less aggressive and more diverse alternative to Ganda Iso may have emerged in the north. On April 4, the newly formed Coalition of People from North Mali brought together a variety of former politicians and administrators from the northern provinces under the chairmanship of former Prime Minister and Gao native Ousmane Issoufi Maigi (2004-2007). The Coalition urged soldiers and civilians to prepare for a liberation struggle and there are reports that the recruitment of volunteers has begun, possibly with an eye to opening a corridor for humanitarian aid as severe food shortages loom in the north (L’Essor [Bamako], April 7; Le Républicain [Bamako], April 6).

Pro-Government Tuareg Militias

After the current rebellion began on January 17, there were early reports of victories by Colonel Gamou’s pro-government Tuareg militia, followed by the surprising news in late March that this arch-loyalist had defected to the MNLA. However, when Colonel Gamou arrived in neighboring Niger in early April he admitted that his defection was only a ruse following the collapse of the Malian Army in the north, one that enabled him to shift 500 men and dozens of combat vehicles through rebel lines to safety without losses. For now his men have been disarmed and Gamou and his leading officers moved to Niamey (Radio France Internationale, April 6). In the event of an ECOWAS intervention, they would likely be returned to the field. There are other Tuareg, particularly of the Imghad, who want no part of the MNLA or the Ansar al-Din, but organized resistance in the current circumstances would be difficult. Many who oppose the rebels have simply fled across the borders until a safe return is possible.

The Arab Militias

Though Ganda Iso may treat the Arabs and Tuareg as a common enemy, there are in fact enormous differences between the two communities exacerbated by a traditional lack of trust and the recent introduction into northern Mali of the largely Arab al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb movement (AQIM). AQIM’s apparent alliance with the newly-formed Salafist-Jihadist Ansar al-Din group under the command of veteran Tuareg militant Iyad ag Ghali has only complicated affairs.

After the Malian Army fled Timbuktu, the strong Arab trading community in that city formed its own resistance group of several hundred men to combat Tuareg rule, the Front de Libération Nationale d’Azawad (FLNA).  According to the movement’s secretary-general, Muhammad Lamine Sidad, the Arabs “have our own interests to defend – a return to peace and economic stability” (Reuters, April 9). Unable to match the firepower of the rebels, the Arab militia has decamped to the outskirts of Timbuktu, waiting for an opportunity to expel the Tuareg. 

The pro-government Bérabiche Arab militia led by Colonel Muhammad Ould Meidou appears to have ceased operations in northern Mali for the present, though there are reports of a new Bérabiche militia in training (Le Combat [Bamako], January 31). The Bérabiche have often turned to self-defense militias in the past and it is possible that Mali’s Kounta and Telemsi Arabs may do the same now if it is the only alternative to Tuareg rule.

Conclusion

Many Malians believe that Ganda Koy and its successor Ganda Iso enjoy a certain immunity in their relationship with Mali’s security forces as a means of applying pressure on the nation’s northern communities. A 2009 U.S. Embassy cable noted that Bamako’s “catch and release policy” regarding Ganda Iso suspects “does not seem to have helped matters” [4] With the looming possibility of a clash between nationalist and Islamist Tuareg in northern Mali (with the latter possibly receiving support from AQIM), there is a growing likelihood that Arab and African-based “self-defense” militias may take advantage of such an opportunity to try and reverse the recent Tuareg gains in the region. A descent into tribal and ethnic warfare in northern Mali would be sure to devastate an already marginal region for years to come.

Notes

1.  Wikileaks: U.S. Embassy Bamako cable 08BAMAKO778, September 9, 2008.

2. Ibid

3. Wikileaks: U.S. Embassy Bamako cable 09BAMAKO3, January 5, 2009.

4. Ibid

This article was originally published in the April 19, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

Is a Military Intervention Possible in Mali?

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Andrew McGregor

April 5, 2012

As the political and military situation deteriorates in Mali following a poorly-planned coup by junior officers and the subsequent occupation of nearly all northern Mali by Tuareg rebels and various tribal allies there is increasing discussion of the possibility of a military intervention to restore order and prevent Mali’s unrest from spilling over its borders.

The most likely source of a military intervention would be the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and its military arm, the ECOWAS Monitoring Group (ECOMOG).

ECOWAS has put 2,000 troops on standby (Le Proces Verbal [Bamako], April 2). The military chiefs-of-staff of the ECOWAS states are meeting in the Ivoirian capital of Abidjan on April 5 to discuss the creation of an intervention force (AFP, April 3).

The African Union has endorsed the ECOWAS decision to activate the planning process for a possible deployment of a brigade of troops to “protect the unity and territorial integrity of Mali” (PANA Online [Dakar], April 4). In the meantime ECOWAS has instituted a comprehensive embargo on the Malian regime. According to the ECOWAS chairman, Côte d’Ivoire president Alassane Dramane Ouattara: “All the diplomatic, economic, and financial measures are applicable as of today and will be lifted only when the constitutional order is actually restored” (L’Essor [Bamako], April 4).

The ECOWAS chairman has stated that several West African states have already pledged troops for an intervention force, adding that: “We would like to ensure the integrity of Malian territory. We shall use all means at our disposal to stop this rebellion, and to restore Mali’s territorial integrity. It is the sub-region’s duty” (Le Patriote [Abidjan], April 2).

Hajj ag GamouColonel al-Hajj ag Gamou (Jeune Afrique)

Junta leader Captain Amadou Haya Sanogo announced the restoration of the 1992 Constitution on April 2, but so far this appears to be an attempt to mollify international opposition rather than return Mali to its democratic course (L’Indicateur du Renouveau [Bamako], April 2; L’Essor [Bamako], April 2). In an especially troubling development for the coup leaders, Colonel al-Hajj ag Gamou, the military chief-of-staff in Kidal region and a highly capable leader of a pro-government Tuareg militia, has declared his allegiance to the MNLA rebels (L’Indicateur du Renouveau [Bamako], April 2). The rebels appear to have already seized large stockpiles of arms from captured garrisons in the north.

ECOWAS is demanding a return to constitutional order and a transfer of power to the Speaker of Parliament, Professor Dioncounda Traore, in accordance with article 36 of the Malian constitution. For now, however, there is every sign that the junta plans to remain in power. Despite the crisis in the north, the military junta in Bamako is insisting on going ahead with prosecutions of President Amadou Toumani Touré and other leading political figures on charges of treason and corruption.

ECOMOG has been involved in three previous military interventions with varying degrees of success – Liberia in 1990, Sierra Leone in 1997 and Guinea-Bissau in 1999. [1] There was also a brief ECOWAS deployment in Liberia in 2003. In the past, ECOMOG has been dominated by Nigeria’s military, the largest and most powerful in the region, usually in partnership with the militaries of other Anglophone West African nations. An intervention in Mali, a Francophone state and former French colony, would require larger participation from West African Francophone states, probably with Senegal in the lead.

With Mali increasingly isolated financially and diplomatically and a growing rift between Tuareg rebels of the Mouvement National de Libération de l’Azawad (MNLA) and the Islamist rebels of Iyad ag Ghali’s Ansar al-Din movement, there seems little possibility of an internal solution being found for Mali’s difficulties in the near future.

Despite pursuing an alarmist interpretation of the Malian crisis in which al-Qaeda controls the rebels and is planning an invasion of southern Mali to implement a Shari’a state, French foreign minister Alain Juppe has said there is no possibility that France would intervene directly in Mali, though it could provide logistical support to an ECOWAS force. Juppe has also urged a greater role for Algeria, which is constitutionally prohibited from participating in military interventions outside its borders (AFP, April 3). France maintains garrisons in Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire, but according to Juppe, “We can help with logistics or training but there is no question of putting French soldiers on Malian soil” (AFP, April 2). Washington has supported ECOWAS interventions in the past and may also provide logistical support in the event of a military intervention in Mali.

Note

1. See Andrew McGregor, “Quagmire in West Africa: Nigerian Peacekeeping in Sierra Leone (1997-1998),” International Journal 54(3), Summer 1999, pp. 482-50,   https://www.aberfoylesecurity.com/?p=1449

This article was originally published in the April 5, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.