ADF

Chad’s intervention in northern Mali offers lessons in resolve and sacrifice ADF STAFF A column of about 100 Chadian light vehicles, mostly Toyota Land Cruisers, left Chad’s capital, N’Djamena on January 20, 2013. The convoy curled around the Lake Chad basin before reaching the border with Niger. Days earlier, nearly 200 armored vehicles, including 90 Eland armored cars and 17 BMP tanks, were airlifted to Niger’s capital, Niamey. At the Niger border-crossing, Brig. Gen. Abdraman Youssouf Mery, commander of Chad’s elite groupement speciale anti-terroriste (SATG), halted the convoy and gathered his officers around him. “We are going outside of our borders now,”…

Lion Rouge Launches a New Era in U.S.-DRC Cooperation ADF STAFF The Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (FARDC) and the United States teamed up in September 2013 to conduct Lion Rouge. The 26-day military cooperation event brought together 225 FARDC officers and more than 40 U.S. personnel. One of Lion Rouge’s goals was to consolidate multiple security-related training events that previously took place across the DRC, in order to maximize resources and synchronize efforts. Organizers chose the Kitona Air Base (BAKI) as a focal point for the training because of its location — near where the…

Countering extremism online requires credibility and persistence ADF STAFF It is a heated battle in which emotions run high and shots fly back and forth. But in this confrontation, participants use words instead of weapons, and they are limited to 140 characters per volley. For several years, Maj. Emmanuel Chirchir, a public affairs officer for the Kenya Defence Forces, has been fighting an informational war on Twitter with the terrorist group al-Shabaab. He uses the social media site to antagonize his opponents, to correct misinformation and, most important, to speak directly to civilians, keeping them informed about the fighting on the…

ADF STAFF The wide, languid Niger River is Africa’s third-longest at 4,200 kilometers. It stretches in a boomerang shape from Guinea up as far north as Timbuktu, Mali, before dipping southward through Niamey, Niger, and ending in the Atlantic Ocean. Although the river is too shallow in many places for large boat traffic, small-scale merchants have used it as a commercial highway for centuries. An observer who stands on its banks in Niamey, Niger, at the right time of day will see boaters wielding long, thin paddles as they glide along in dugouts loaded with squash, fish or other goods.…

Charities and Nonprofits Can Be Co-opted to Fund Terrorism, So Vigilance and Monitoring Are Crucial ADF STAFF About 10:30 a.m. Nairobi time on August 7, 1998, a truck loaded with more than 900 kilograms of TNT trundled up to the back entrance of the U.S. Embassy in Kenya. Seconds later, the truck exploded, damaging the embassy, destroying the Ufundi Cooperative House nearby, and ravaging the Cooperative Bank building. The explosion killed 213 people and wounded thousands, with hundreds of them maimed or blinded. Minutes later, a bomb detonated outside the U.S. Embassy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. That explosion killed 11 and…

Early Warning Systems Help with Alerts, Defections These days, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) can scarcely make a move without it being documented and passed on. Consider these incidents: January 10, 2014 – A 38-year-old LRA soldier who spent 20 years in captivity defects in Djemah in the Central African Republic (CAR) after walking six days in the bush. He had listened to radio broadcasts urging LRA members to give up their arms. February 9, 2014 – After hearing defection messages over helicopter speakers, four Ugandan LRA soldiers defect to security forces. They had been in captivity for 12 years. March 1,…

Africa’s Police Are on the Front Lines of the Fight Against Extremism ADF STAFF Photos by Reuters Fighting terror goes beyond military confrontations and high-profile missions like special forces raids to free hostages. The day-to-day work of dismantling terror networks is much more mundane. It involves traffic stops, passport verification, community outreach and intelligence gathering. Often police with deep knowledge of their communities are in the best position to accomplish the work. This is especially true in large, diverse metropolitan areas. But not all police departments have embraced counterterror work or have been trained to do so. Research by security experts…

After Setbacks in Somalia, al-Shabaab Militants Stage High-Profile Attacks in Neighboring Countries ADF STAFF As al-Shabaab terrorists stalked through Nairobi’s Westgate Shopping Mall, Faith Wambua and her two children lay still. The mother was sprawled face down on a tiled floor next to her 9-year-old daughter, Sy, and 21-month-old son, Ty. Wambua grabbed a shard of broken glass and held it out to her son, who is fascinated by — and a little scared of — insects, saying: “ ‘Look, dudu’ — dudu is a Swahili word for an insect. I said: ‘Ty, look. Dudu is coming to bite you.’…

REUTERS The 2013 winner of the Tour de France, Chris Froome, says Kenya has a rich pool of endurance athletes and that the next great cyclist is out there somewhere. Kenyan-born Froome said his country’s success in middle- and long-distance running shows that the East African nation is awash with gifted athletes capable of competing in the world’s toughest endurance races. “It seems that there is so much talent here,” Froome told reporters in Nairobi as he sat next to Kenyan rider David Kinjah, who was his childhood mentor. “You just have to look at the natural ability of runners…

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE A long-awaited film on the life of anti-apartheid hero Nelson Mandela premiered in his native South Africa on November 3, 2013, stirring emotional memories of the country’s turbulent history. The film opened a month before Mandela died at age 95. The movie Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, largely based on his autobiography of the same title, traces the life of the revered leader from his childhood in the rural Eastern Cape to his election as the country’s first black president in 1994. After spending 27 years in prison for activism against the racist regime, he preached equality and…