French President Emmanuel Macron lunches with French troops during his visit to France's Barkhane counter-terrorism operation in Africa's Sahel region in Gao, northern Mali, 19 May 2017, his first trip outside Europe since his inauguration on 14 May 2017. Pool/Press Association. All rights reserved.The Sahel region took centre stage last week as African leaders met at the regional Dakar International Forum on Peace and Security to discuss growing lawlessness along its arc. Consequently, Senegalese President Macky Sall on Monday called for a unified, comprehensive military response that leaves no room for Africa’s terror groups to hide. While such a response has been welcomed with open arms, concerns have been expressed over the possible sidelining of human rights. Fears abound that without adequate safeguards, any new military intervention will only worsen the bloodshed.
It is not difficult to see why a military option has so much appeal as the best approach to resolve the security issues in an increasingly volatile region. Since Libya descended into civil war in 2011, Islamists have overrun parts of northern Mali to the east, and Boko Haram has been persistent in its efforts to secure a foothold at the heart of the region in northern Nigeria. To the south, militants threaten the Sahel from Congo, Central African Republic and South Sudan. At the same time, partially as a result of the militants’ advances, a humanitarian crisis is unfolding. This year, at least 11 million are facing a major food crisis. The UN has called for efforts to break the cycle of food crises, citing land degradation, population displacement, and ongoing political instability as the pillars of Sahel’s hardship. This year, at least 11 million are facing a major food crisis.
The Dakar peace forum comes on the heels of the launch of the G5 Sahel force in July, a military initiative working across Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger to root out jihadist groups in the region. The newest joint international force in the world, the G5 Sahel envisions up to 5,000 military, police and civilian troops by March 2018. As part of a greater strategic push for intensified cooperation with the Sahel zone, the EU pledged to support the force with $50 million in funding. Brussels hopes that the migration streams from the region will be reduced when the underlying causes for regional instability are assertively tackled. Added to the 4,000 French troops already deployed across the Sahel, one could be optimistic about the force’s capacity to target and eliminate terrorist hotspots across the Sahel.
