This coming Thursday, October 9, at Casa África, we will listen to experts to try to understand where the Sahel is heading and what role Spain can play in such a complex and convulsive moment.
The Sahel, our vital southern border, that vast space that crosses Africa from the Red Sea to the Atlantic Ocean, is at a critical juncture that we can no longer ignore. This is something I have been read countless times before, but I continue to be surprised by the number of people, friends and acquaintances, who ask me with curiosity what is happening that the Sahel is being mentioned so often and is creeping into the international concerns of an increasingly complex and convulsive world.
Over the past five years, I have devoted more than fifty articles and papers, now compiled in a monograph, to analysing the Sahel. In them, one can follow to some extent the evolution of a region in permanent crisis, a crisis that always seems to have the capacity to reinvent itself and worsen day by day. We are talking about the fact that the region geographically closest to our Canary Islands currently accounts for more than half of the world's deaths from terrorism.
A space that is worth as much for the natural wealth it contains as for the wealth it allows to circulate (from human trafficking to drugs and arms) and which has also become a test bed, a laboratory for the new global geopolitics, where various actors, starting with Russia, are taking advantage of the rumblings of military coups d'état and the withdrawal of Western missions to occupy a space that now offers an unsettling silence. Because, I insist, the risks are growing at great speed: instability is growing and expanding, approaching the coastal countries of the Gulf of Guinea, whose Atlantic coastline is of such great interest to us from the Canary Islands archipelago.
Jihadist violence, moreover, has become more sophisticated and lethal. Groups such as JNIM (linked to Al Qaeda) and the Islamic State in the Sahel no longer only use motorbikes to spread terror in remote villages - a weapon so effective in such a porous region that articles have been written explaining that being a motorcyclist in the region is now a cause for suspicion - but have added drones to their arsenal, emulating regular armies and challenging the technological superiority of states.
The strategy of the JNIM terrorist group in Mali, for example, has just mutated into what some describe as a kind of jihad on the economy: start laying siege to cities by cutting off communication routes and fuel transports, thus seeking to economically suffocate millions of people and bring to its knees the government of the military junta, unable to control the jihadist expansion even with the support of the Russians. In essence, what I want to tell you is that, although they do not appear in the media we usually consume, events are happening in the Sahel that should concern us, many of them, and they are happening one after the other very quickly.
This is not only from a security perspective, but also from a political one. The military juntas of Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, together in the so-called Association of Sahel States (AES), have already led to the disappearance of the so-called G-5 Sahel group of countries and have also reduced the capacity for unified action and influence of ECOWAS, the Economic Community of West African States, which used to be made up of 15 countries and now numbers only 12.
The three countries with coup juntas, in their quest for consolidation, have already severed virtually all ties with EU countries, taking controversial and difficult to understand decisions, such as the recent withdrawal from the Rome Statute (i.e. withdrawal from the International Criminal Court), which represents a radical break with international mechanisms of justice and human rights protection.
His argument was that the ICC was “an instrument of neo-colonial repression that focuses exclusively on Africa”. The decision follows a trend of other highly controversial and certainly undemocratic measures: in Mali, for example, a law was passed at the end of 2024 that punishes both homosexual acts and their public advocacy with prison sentences. Another Malian measure put an end to all political parties and organisations in the country last May.
From a geopolitical perspective, Russia has played a strong role in the region, taking over from the state through the so-called Africa Corps what was previously ‘outsourced’ to the Wagner Group. The collaboration is military, economic and closely linked to each country's strategic resources. There have even been announcements of future nuclear power plant projects using Russian technology, and there is clear evidence of powerful Russian disinformation campaigns to deepen and increase the already evident anti-Western sentiment among the youth. Russia is undoubtedly the main partner of the Alliance of Sahel States.
But it is not just the Russians. Turkey, for example, has made significant inroads through its active defence industry, selling drones and armoured vehicles to the Juntas.
Interest, moreover, also comes from the north. For example, both Morocco and Algeria, the two North African powers, are competing with each other to position themselves as allies in order to provide an outlet to the sea for their goods and minerals. Some, the Moroccans, call it the Atlantic Initiative, while others, the Algerians, offer a trans-Saharan highway. The Gulf monarchies (the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, etc.) have also taken positions and are pursuing their interests. Just last week, I was telling you about Sudan's gold and how it all goes to Dubai. Some of this gold is also Malian and Burkinabe.
The questions about the Sahel are no longer about whether it will affect us, but about understanding how it is already affecting us. But to act, we must first understand. And to understand, it is essential to listen to those who know the reality on the ground best.
That's why this coming Thursday, 9 October, at 9 a.m. at Casa Africa, With the support of the Ministry of Defence through a subsidy that we have been receiving for years, we will open the doors of the Auditorium to celebrate a new edition of the 1TP5Africa Security Days News.
We will have the privilege of having the direct perspective of Maman Sidikou, former African Union High Representative for the Sahel and former Executive Secretary of the G-5 Sahel. Beforehand, we will also listen to the analysis of the current situation and the impressions of a Spaniard, Ambassador Ángel Losada, who was the European Union's special ambassador for the Sahel, and who we had several times at Casa África.
In addition, in a round table discussion moderated by our team, we will have two leading Spanish military experts: the Colonel Jesús Díez Alcalde, of the Army Operations Command, and the Lieutenant Colonel Francisco José Parellada García, We will discuss with them the role that Spain can and should play in this new scenario. With them we will analyse the role that Spain can and should play in this new scenario: how to maintain ties with a region so vital to our security without legitimising non-democratic regimes; what lessons have we learned from our missions on the ground?
This day is a unique opportunity to listen, ask questions and understand from top-level experts and protagonists. For those who are unable to join us in person, the event will be streamed live via our YouTube channel.
It is an ideal occasion to listen, to ask questions and to understand. The future of the Sahel is also our future. Because, as I pointed out in the headline, the situation is so complex that it is not clear to me that we are paying enough attention to what is happening on our southern border. And the importance of the events that are taking place.