West Africa’s roads are more than trade routes. They have become the front lines of the region’s expanding wars.
In Burkina Faso, a 2022 terrorist ambush on a 200-vehicle convoy near Djibo killed dozens and triggered political turmoil that culminated in a military coup. Farther east, in Nigeria’s Borno State, militants have used land mines and improvised explosive devices to cripple the Maiduguri-Monguno highway, cutting off markets and forcing civilians into “super camps” for protection.
Across Mali’s Mopti region, terrorists have destroyed bridges to isolate entire towns. Most recently, insurgents in the Sikasso region destroyed a convoy of about 50 fuel tankers that had crossed into the country from Côte d’Ivoire.
These incidents reveal a growing truth: West Africa’s transport infrastructure has become a target and a weapon. New research of more than 58,000 violent events recorded by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data project across 17 countries shows that nearly two-thirds of all attacks occur within a kilometer of a road. The analysis underscores the degree to which controlling roads now defines controlling territory.
Roads are the arteries of the state. They carry goods, troops and influence. But in much of the Sahel and its coastal periphery, poor road conditions and sparse networks have turned mobility into a dangerous gamble.
Violence is most intense along major corridors that link fragile capitals to remote frontiers. In Mali, the 640-kilometer highway connecting Mopti and Gao is the Sahel’s deadliest route, scarred by more than 400 violent incidents since 2012.
Researchers found that violence decreases sharply with distance from the road network: 65% of violent incidents take place within 1 kilometer of a road, but only 4% occur farther than 10 kilometers away.
Security forces and civilians alike must use the same narrow transport corridors to move people and supplies. Terrorists exploit this predictability, launching ambushes or planting explosives on the few paved routes available. Meanwhile, states rely on these same corridors to reassert control, creating a deadly feedback loop.
The geography of violence also is changing. During earlier stages of the region’s insurgencies, attacks clustered around cities and main highways. But as terrorist groups expanded, they began to strike deeper into rural areas.
In 2011, when urban violence reached its peak in West Africa, nearly 90% of all attacks were within 1 kilometer of a road. By 2024, that figure had fallen by nearly a third. This “ruralization” of conflict has terrorist and rebel groups seeking refuge and support in remote communities far from the reach of central governments.
The siege of Djibo in northern Burkina Faso is an example. From 2020 to 2024, terrorists surrounded the town, cutting all major road access and preventing food or medical supplies from arriving except by air. Hundreds of civilians died, and the town’s isolation fueled political unrest that destabilized the country’s leadership. With only a few viable roads linking major towns, a single blockade or destroyed bridge can isolate entire regions.
For terrorists, roads are more than targets. They also are tools of control. In much of the Sahel, armed groups erect checkpoints to tax traders and monitor population movements. A single roadblock can become a miniature customs post, a propaganda site or an ambush point.
At times, terrorist groups destroy bridges and culverts to isolate communities or punish populations viewed as cooperating with the state. In central Mali, two bridges destroyed in mid-2021 cut off entire villages between Mopti and Bandiagara for more than a year, forcing the United Nations to fund emergency reconstruction. The new bridges were not completed until December 2022.
These destructive acts underscore the symbolic and strategic power of transport infrastructure. Control over who can move, where and at what cost has become a central element of political authority in the region’s wars.
Improving security in West Africa will require investing not only in troops, but in transport. Expanding and maintaining road networks could reduce isolation, facilitate trade, and allow faster military and humanitarian responses. As the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Sahel and West Africa Club notes, the lack of accessible transport remains one of the biggest obstacles to security and development.
About the authors: Steven Radil is an international security consultant and the principal of GeoPublic Analytics, LLC; Olivier Walther is an associate professor at the University of Florida’s Department of Geography; and Alexander Thurston is an associate professor at the University of Cincinnati’s School of Public and International Affairs. Their full article on this topic will appear in ADF’s V19N2 edition in 2026.