ADF

The photos displayed for the gathering of military leaders were alarming. One showed a still from a TikTok video claiming that French fighter jets had bombed the Ivoirian Air Force. Another post declared that Côte d’Ivoire’s chief of army staff had died. Both were lies. “As you can see, he is not dead,” Maj. Guéable Hervé Zeni of Côte d’Ivoire said, gesturing to his commander, who was seated in the audience at the African Land Forces Summit. “He is here with us.” As chief of the Cyber Defense Office of the Armed Forces of Côte d’Ivoire, Zeni leads a team…

Burkina Faso’s leader appeared in a music video with global superstar Beyoncé. Or did he? In fact, the video, which included the song lyrics, “God protect Ibrahim Traoré in the battle for the people’s path, breaking the chains of the empire’s grip,” is just one of hundreds of fakes littering social media sites across the region, according to the BBC. The reach of these videos, known as deepfakes, spans the continent from Ghana to Kenya. They promote Traoré, a military junta captain who took control of the nation in a 2022 coup, as a model of leadership and a hero…

Li Song portrayed herself as a legitimate businesswoman in Zimbabwe, but that portrayal masked a dark reality. Authorities say the woman now known as the “Ivory Queen” or “Cyanide Queen” led a wildlife poaching ring that captured African elephants and shipped them to China. Last year, she was arrested and charged with fraud, perjury and illegally sending foreign money to Chinese accounts. Song, 53, was accused of importing 40 tons of sodium cyanide and hydrated lime from Mauritius to her company, DGL9 Investments, to avoid paying an excise tax. This violated health and environmental laws and public safety protocols. She…

A kamikaze drone attack on Sudan’s wartime capital, Port Sudan, in early May threatens to turn Sudan’s 3-year-old conflict into a broader regional war, according to a Sudanese official. The attack has implications for Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, which support opposing sides in the conflict. “Until recently, this conflict could be described as a proxy war [between Turkey and the UAE]. However, it has taken a dangerous turn, verging on a regional war, with the UAE’s barely concealed direct intervention,” Babikir Elamin, Sudan’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, recently told the U.K. parliament. The fighting that began in…

The Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) group has launched at least 12 attacks on military bases and infrastructure across northeast Nigeria since March. The brazen attacks that employ drones carrying grenades and bombs placed near roads and bridges are alarming observers. The attacks are also evidence of a terror group with significant sources of funding. The terror group has moved beyond collecting ransoms and taxes. It has transformed parts of northeastern Nigeria into a conflict-driven economy through a complex blend of taxation, extortion, smuggling and ideological justification, HumAngle reported. ISWAP has turned to the dark web to generate revenue by exploiting the…

Terrorist groups such as Boko Haram and al-Shabaab have long had a simple philosophy for controlling the people they can’t win over: Take away their food. For years, their attacks against markets, supply sources and farmers have reduced food availability. They have contaminated and destroyed farmland in ways that make it unusable for years. In a 2025 study, researchers Simone Papale and Emanuele Castelli quoted a farmer in Somalia as saying, “wherever al-Shabaab goes, drought follows.” Warfare and terrorist violence always have been linked to food security problems, starvation and famine. Terrorism can cause food disruptions, undermining production systems and…

The military government of Niger has terminated its intelligence cooperation with Russia and Turkey, saying the surveillance systems and related personnel failed to live up to expectations. Niger’s General Directorate of Documentation and External Security was particularly upset with the quality of telephone communications interceptions, according to Military Africa. Niger instead turned to a Moroccan company specializing in digital intelligence. That deal soured quickly when Niger learned that the company had an indirect connection with France. Since the July 2023 military coup that ousted President Mohamed Bazoum, the Niger junta’s foreign policy has excluded traditional Western partners. Since that time,…

The people posing as job recruiters promised lucrative work in Canada, but their victims soon found themselves held against their will in Côte d’Ivoire and forced to lure new victims into the trap. In all, 33 people from Benin, Burkina Faso, Ghana and Togo were tricked into paying as much as $9,000 each to fake recruiters in a human trafficking operation that investigators described as a pyramid scheme. Victims were held in abusive conditions in Abidjan, where their traffickers forced them to post pictures of themselves on social media accounts in luxury hotels and similar glamorous settings to lure others…

The Ghana Armed Forces on May 8 received 14 Puma M36 Mk3 Armored Personnel Carriers from the United States government amid rising security threats from the Sahel. The mine-resistant, ambush-protected carriers, or APCs, were delivered to the Burma Camp in Accra and are worth more than $6 million. Edward Omane Boamah, Ghana’s minister for defense, was grateful for the donation, which he called “generous and strategic.” “This occasion is not just a symbol of the enduring partnership between our two countries,” Boamah said in a report by Ghanaian news website MyJoyOnline. “It is a tangible expression of our shared commitment…

The trial of six people, including a member of a notorious Mexican drug cartel, in a Kenyan court is highlighting the changing nature and corrosive influence of the illicit drug business in East Africa. Kenyan authorities arrested the six last year during a raid on a makeshift methamphetamine lab in the countryside near Namanga, a community on the border with Tanzania. Among those arrested were three Kenyans, two Nigerians and Israel Alvarado, who law enforcement authorities say is a member of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, one of Mexico’s most dangerous criminal organizations. The Namanga lab was the first confirmed…