ADF

Villagers gathered for evening prayers at the mosque in Manda, Niger, on June 20. Soon after, the killers arrived. Terrorists affiliated with the Islamic State group (IS) slaughtered 70 worshippers at the mosque. The handful of survivors lived by playing dead among their fellow worshippers’ bodies. “There were bodies everywhere, one on top of the other,” one woman, whose three sons died in the attack, told Human Rights Watch (HRW). The attack was part of escalating violence that has killed nearly 1,700 Nigeriens since military leaders overthrew President Mahmoud Bazoum in 2023. Terrorists have killed more than 130 people since…

The International Conference of Ombuds Institutions for the Armed Forces (ICOAF) was held in Africa for the first time. The host was South Africa, the only country on the continent with a military ombudsman. Establishing the South African Military Ombud (SAMO) and contributing to global collaboration on military accountability are points of great pride in the South African National Defence Force (SANDF), which models the principle of African solutions to African security challenges by running a robust operation. In opening the conference, South African Minister of Defence and Military Veterans Angie Motshekga reaffirmed the government’s commitment to independent oversight of…

The Central African Republic is in the middle of a tug of war between two Russian mercenary groups. The Wagner Group has operated in the CAR since 2018 and remained active in the country after the 2023 death of its leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin. However, Russia’s defense ministry has pressured the country to replace Wagner with the Kremlin’s Africa Corps, which operates under the Russian defense ministry. A CAR military official said that Russia demanded that the country cover Africa Corps personnel costs and also pay millions of dollars to Moscow. “But authorities in Bangui said they are unable to pay…

International observers are accusing the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) of using banned chemical weapons against the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) based, in part, on recent video evidence from a 2024 attack on a military base and oil refinery north of Khartoum. RSF fighters occupied the base in Garri and the nearby al-Jaili oil refinery at the time of the September 2024 battle with the SAF. At the time of the battle, the RSF had held the oil refinery since April 2023. The SAF recaptured it in January 2025. Video and images posted to social media about the time of…

A new diagnostic laboratory will help Sierra Leone strengthen its response to parasitic diseases that affect the country. Government authorities received the new National Parasitic Diseases Laboratory and Training Center in late September during a handover ceremony in Freetown. The new laboratory is the latest installment in Sierra Leone’s ongoing $108 million public health partnership with the United States and U.S. Africa Command. During the handover, U.S. Embassy Chargé d’Affaires Jared Yancey said the partnership between Sierra Leone and the U.S. reduced malaria prevalence among children under 5 in Sierra Leone from 40% in 2016 to 22% in 2021. Built…

Tensions are rising in the Horn of Africa as Ethiopia accused neighboring Eritrea of “actively preparing to wage war.” In a letter addressed to United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, Ethiopian Foreign Minister Gedion Timothewos said Eritrea is “funding, mobilizing, and directing” armed groups inside Ethiopia including the Fano, an ethnically Amhara militia. Gedion also accused the Red Sea nation of collaborating with a hardline faction of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) to fuel violence in northern Ethiopia. He warned that if it continues, Ethiopia’s military will have no choice but to respond. “The Ethiopian [National] Defence Force has adopted…

In August, authorities in Niger claimed to have killed Bakura Doro, the leader of Boko Haram, in a drone strike on his headquarters on an island in Lake Chad. Boko Haram has denied Niger’s claim. The attack on Doro’s headquarters came at a time when Nigeria’s oldest terrorist group appears to be reemerging after years of decline following fights over territory with its regional rival, the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP). The fighting dramatically reduced Boko Haram’s presence in the region. In recent months, however, Boko Haram terrorists have carried out deadly attacks on communities in northeastern Nigeria and…

Jingjing Zhang is a lawyer and environmental activist who has fought Chinese companies that pollute for decades. Her work has brought her to many countries, where she says her native China is using a hazardous development model: Pollute now, get rich and attempt to clean up later. In May, she visited Zambia to advise villagers whose lives were devastated when a toxic waste spill from a Chinese copper mine caused one of the country’s worst ecological disasters. “Companies have a field day when they come here,” Andrew Kombe, a Zambian lawyer who is representing villagers, told Zhang, according to Inside…

Allied Democratic Forces terrorists are capitalizing on chaos in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo as security forces focus on the deadly, northward-advancing M23 rebel group. The Allied Democratic Forces has exploited battles between the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (FARDC) and M23 to expand its own operations, which include attacks on civilians and security services. This year, the M23 advanced north to the town of Lubero in the North Kivu province, where both groups had been active but in different areas. “What followed is illustrative of the risk of escalating insecurity through overlapping violence,”…

A surge in gun violence is sweeping across Ghana, with reported incidents more than tripling between the first and second quarters of 2025. In response, Ghanaian authorities are calling for tighter regulations for guns and gun makers. “The rising number of gun-related incidents and the types of weapons identified at crime scenes paint an alarming picture which demands an all-inclusive approach and a robust and more effective legal framework on arms,” Ghana’s National Commission on Small Arms and Light Weapons wrote in a recent statement. The commission reported 54 gun-related incidents in the second quarter compared to 15 in the…