ADF

ADF STAFF Photos by: AFP/GETTY IMAGES fter Twitter deleted a post by Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari in 2021, Nigeria shut down access to the country’s most popular social media site for seven months. “The loss was humongous,” Nigerian blogger and social media expert J.J. Omojuwa told ADF. “You got an awakening that this can happen anywhere.” Internet analyst NetBlocks estimated that the blackout cost Nigerians up to $1.6 billion in lost business. It also disrupted vital COVID-19 information that the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control published on the platform. Human rights groups condemned the blackout as a violation of Nigerians’…

ADF STAFF Those committed to defending their nations know they also must be prepared to help those who serve alongside them. When battlefield casualties occur, quick action can be the difference between life and death. In November 2021, Soldiers with the Armed Forces of Mauritania worked with U.S. Army Special Forces instructors during Joint Combined Exchange Training. Here, a Mauritanian Soldier fits a tourniquet around the leg of a colleague during a simulated casualty drill. Soldiers also practiced moving the wounded to safety on stretchers across the desert landscape. The joint training covered other essential skills, such as close-quarters battles,…

BY CYRIL ZENDA Talakufa Mudzikiti thought that the 1979 cease-fire ending Zimbabwe’s 15-year war would make it safe to search for his family’s lost cattle. It would end up being a costly adventure that he now regrets. As he wandered the forests near Dumisa village in southeastern Zimbabwe, he stepped on an anti-personnel mine that blew off his left leg. “My life was destroyed that day … all my dreams were shattered,” he said. Mudzikiti, now 70, is not alone in suffering from the legacy of land mines used in armed conflict. Mudzikiti and his fellow villagers are among more…

ADF STAFF Small clouds of red dust rose from the Russian mercenaries’ truck as they rode into the heart of Bambari, promising food to the hungry. In the sweltering heat, dozens lined up along an earthen road in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) fourth-largest city. Instead of food, they were given handmade signs and ordered at gunpoint to protest MINUSCA, the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the CAR, demanding that the U.N. leave the city it liberated from rebels in late 2020. It didn’t add up for Nigerian journalist Philip Obaji Jr., who has reported extensively on the infamous Russian…

ADF STAFF Cheap, widely available drone technology has the potential to revolutionize medicine delivery, crop treatment and surveillance across Africa. But where innovators see an opportunity to improve lives, extremist groups see a chance to destroy them. In the Middle East, terror groups have begun weaponizing off-the-shelf drones to attack civilian and military targets. Now, experts are warning, that deadly tactic could be coming to Africa. “For $2,000 you can breach any fence in the world,” Dedrone CEO Aaditya Devarakonda said, describing drones to Forbes magazine. “It’s the most asymmetric threat out there.” Dedrone secures airspace to protect organizations from…

ADF STAFF More than 30 websites in Mozambique, including the Defense Ministry’s, went down February 21, 2022, after being targeted by hackers. An image of a man wearing a headscarf and holding a machine gun appeared on the site along with the words “hacked by Yemeni hackers.” The targets included the portals of the national disaster management, roads administration and water agencies, as well as the Defense Ministry and the National Institute of Land Transport. Officials said there was no loss of information or leak of citizens’ personal data but noted that it was the country’s first cyberattack of that…

REUTERS In a tin shed off the backstreets of Kinshasa, the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) capital, a barefoot 61-year-old Jean-Luther Misoko Nzalayala, known as Socklo, hacks with a machete at a lump of wood that is starting to resemble the neck of a guitar. Later, he hammers bits of white plastic from a chair into it as inlay to help guide players around the fretboard, and he uses threads of motorcycle brake cable as strings. For more than 40 years, the self-taught instrument-maker has used a variety of recycled materials and local hardwoods to create guitars. Socklo’s passion…

REUTERS Somali artisan Muse Mohamud Olosow carefully sorts through a huge pile of camel bones discarded by a slaughterhouse in Mogadishu, selecting pieces that he will carve into jewelry and ornate beads used by fellow Muslims while reciting prayers.     To Olosow’s knowledge, he is one of just four artisans in his country of 16 million people who work with camel bones. In 1978, in one of Somalia’s many periods of war and turmoil, gunmen killed dozens of craftsmen in Mogadishu and another town, he said. For years, he carved his bones secretly at home and then took them…

ADF STAFF Tunisian tennis player Ons Jabeur got the world’s attention when she won the French Open junior title in 2011. Now, she says, tennis is more than just a sport for her. Her home country has little in the way of tennis infrastructure and no established path for players to become professionals. Jabeur says she wants to change that. “I don’t play for myself anymore. I play for my country, my continent, my region,” Jabeur told The National, a United Arab Emirates newspaper. “Tennis for me is not just a sport. I try to set an example for people…

DEFENCEWEB Piracy and armed robbery at sea dropped to their lowest levels in 18 years in 2021. The International Maritime Bureau (IMB) is crediting “vigorous action” by authorities in protecting seafarers. In 2021, the IMB Piracy Reporting Centre received reports of 132 incidents of piracy and armed robbery against ships. There were 115 vessels boarded, 11 attempted attacks, five vessels fired on and one vessel hijacked. The Gulf of Guinea remained the world’s piracy hot spot. IMB Director Michael Howlett welcomed the reduction in incidents while urging coastal states to stay attuned to the risk and “robustly” address crime in…