Burkina Faso

ADF STAFF The rise of ethnic militias in recent years threatens conflict-ridden western Niger, near the tri-border area with Burkina Faso and Mali. Two groups in particular, the garde nomade, a group of former Tuareg rebels integrated…

ADF STAFF In September, terrorists fired three rockets at a ferry on the Niger River, killing 49 people. Witnesses said the victims, all civilians, drowned or were burned to death. The terrorists reportedly were members of the…

ADF STAFF The vicious cycle of conflict and hunger continues in some of Africa’s war-torn regions. Nowhere was it worse in 2023 than in Burkina Faso, Mali, Somalia and South Sudan. They are the only countries in the world designated as…

ADF STAFF Just 2,700 kilometers separate northeastern Brazil from the western coast of Africa. Traffickers use this proximity to move cocaine, hashish and heroin through West African ports on to destinations all over the world. Drugs…

ADF STAFF Two Malian Army aircraft came under gunfire from rebels in mid-August when they landed at a United Nations Multidimensional Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) camp in Tessalit. While the Malian Army said the attack…

ADF STAFF Seven Nigerien Soldiers died during a late September battle with hundreds of insurgents on motorbikes in Kandadji, a southwestern Nigerien town near the tri-border area with Burkina Faso and Mali. Five more Soldiers died in…

ADF STAFF Mali’s ruling junta took power in 2021 proclaiming that it would do what previous leaders had not: put an end to extremist terror in the country. Two years later, the junta has little to show for its efforts and has begun to…

ADF STAFF Kibsa Ouedraogo is chief of Noaka, a community in north-central Burkina Faso that is surrounded by artisanal gold mines that have become magnets for terrorists. “The terrorists hear that this site or that one is thriving with…

ADF STAFF New research shows that Burkina Faso’s security situation has worsened dramatically one year after the first of its two military coups. Since the coups that brought Capt. Ibrahim Traoré to power in October 2022, deaths from…

ADF STAFF On the border of Benin and Burkina Faso, the disputed Kourou-Koualou area hosts a wide-ranging market of illicit activities that fuel insecurity and help extremism spread south from the Sahel. Like its neighbors along the Gulf…