ADF

ADF STAFF African Air Force leaders came away with a spirit of cooperation and a greater understanding of other countries’ capabilities after attending the 11th annual African Air Chiefs Symposium (AACS). Thirty-two air chiefs and senior officials attended the five-day-event that ended January 28 in Kigali, Rwanda. The Rwanda Defence Force (RDF) and U.S. Air Forces Africa co-hosted the event. The theme of the symposium was “strategic airlift,” which is particularly relevant as countries look for ways to transport troops, equipment and humanitarian assistance to the places where they are needed most. “Strategic airlift is critical to our operations both…

ADF STAFF The attackers came in six wooden canoes. One with a small motor towed the rest. In the fading light of dusk, they reached Matemo Island just off the coast of northern Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado province. The attackers killed at least two villagers, burned down dozens of homes, and looted shops for food and medicine throughout the night of February 1. Well aware that the closest military position was about 10 kilometers south in the district capital, Ibo Island, they shouted at each other to “do it quickly before the pigs [the military] and their helpers arrive,” according to…

ADF STAFF Joseph Fofana, a 36-year-old fisherman in Sierra Leone, recalled a time when he could see large fish breaking the water from the docks at Tombo, a coastal fishing village. Those days are long past. According to Fofana and other fishermen interviewed by The Guardian newspaper, a steep decline in fish stocks has left the nets of local fishermen as empty as their stomachs and wallets. Fofana earns about 50,000 leone (less than $4.50) for working 14-hour days at sea. “This is the only job we can do,” Fofana told The Guardian. “It’s not my choice. God carried me…

ADF STAFF China is promoting its traditional medicine to African consumers, a situation that critics say is increasing pressure on wildlife already threatened by high demand in Asia. The growth in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) in Africa runs parallel with the growth in China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The Belt and Road TCM Development Plan calls for building TCM centers worldwide. In recent years, Chinese TCM producers have begun setting up manufacturing operations in Africa to get around export restrictions on some animal parts, according to a report by London-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA). Expanding TCM in Africa increases…

ADF STAFF As debts mount in many African countries, civil society groups are calling for greater transparency so citizens can track exactly how public money is spent. One example of this is Kenya, where authorities are refusing to reveal the conditions of the Chinese loan that funded the country’s $4.7 billion Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) between Mombasa and Naivasha. They say confidentiality clauses block them from making loan details public. That answer was insufficient for civil society advocates Khelef Khalifa and Wanjiru Gikonyo, who sued the government to get access to all railway project documents through the country’s Access to…

ADF STAFF It’s impossible to say how many lives might have been saved when five people connected to a branch of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) were arrested last year in Ghana, Senegal and Tanzania. The five were recruited by the Quds Force, an IRGC arm, which has a growing presence on the continent. The people were suspected of planning attacks against businesspeople and tourists on safari. Authorities reported the arrests in November, although it was unclear when the arrests were made. It was the second time in 2021 that Iranian terror plots were thwarted in Africa with help…

ADF STAFF A three-month investigation by the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF) has found that 90% of fishing vessels operating in Ghana are owned by Chinese companies. The EJF, a nongovernmental organization that tracks environmental issues, blames the depletion of fish stocks in Ghana on Chinese trawlers, the owners of which use complex schemes to create front companies in the country. The EJF based its investigation on interviews with fisheries experts and analyzing company records and financial documents. Ghana’s small pelagic fish populations, such as sardinella, have dropped 80% in the past two decades. One species, sardinella aurita, is fully collapsed.…

ADF STAFF Amid the many challenges of rooting out Islamist extremists from the dense forests of northeastern Mozambique lies another issue — how to sustain the joint military effort. In addition to the Armed Defense Forces of Mozambique (FADM), military forces from the region and Rwanda were deployed in 2021 to the restive province of Cabo Delgado, where extremist insurgents have been terrorizing civilians for several years. Since 2017, at least 3,600 people in the province have been killed by terrorists and more than 820,000 have fled their homes. Progress has been made on the ground against Ansar al-Sunna, which…

ADF STAFF As a Christian pastor roamed his fields outside Nova Zambézia village in Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado province on December 15, insurgents surprised him and his wife. The terrorists accosted him, killed him and severed his head. Then, they handed his head to his wife. They ordered her to carry it to village police with a message: “While you are walking on tarred roads, real men are in the woods,” according to an area source. The woman arrived at the District Command of the Police of the Republic of Mozambique carrying her husband’s head in a bag, according to Mozambican…

ADF STAFF West African officials are saying that the scourge of illegal fishing can only be addressed with a regionally united front. They are calling for greater cooperation on fisheries management, patrols and enforcement in the Gulf of Guinea. Amadou Tall, leader of an Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) program to enhance fisheries governance in West Africa, made a plea for greater cooperation in December at the end of an annual conference of the Fisheries Committee for the West Central Gulf of Guinea (FCWC). Cooperation in combating illegal, unregulated and unreported (IUU) fishing would reduce maritime security costs if…