The animosities toward the French abroad among Nigeriens have been widely reported. But history is only part of the story, and not the largest part. Those who led the coup in Niger are facing forward, not backwards.
Rather than send troops in response to the coup, France and the U.S. seem to favor a “Rwanda” type solution applied in Mozambique, writes Vijay Prashad. Only this time ECOWAS would apply force.
France and the U.S. have been blindsided by popular support for Niger’s coup, as the trend towards multipolarity emboldens Africans to confront neo-colonial exploitation, writes M.K. Bhadrakumar.
Bruised in Africa, Macron is looking for a chance to hit back at Russia in its own backyard in the Caucasus and Central Asia. But he’s punching way above his weight, writes M.K. Bhadrakumar.
The Sahel coups are against conditions of life afflicting most of the region’s people, writes Vijay Prashad — conditions created by theft of sovereignty by multinationals and the old colonial ruler.
Despite all the talk of trade, Vijay Prashad says the real focus of the G5 Sahel was always going to be security.
Danny Sjursen says it is no accident that some 60 percent of the coups in Africa over the last half century occurred in former French colonies.
Nick Turse reports on a humanitarian catastrophe that has only begun to unfold and has already uprooted more people than during all of World War II.
Issa Sikiti da Silva reports on the struggles for many in the Sahel, the area between the Sahara in the north and the Sudanian Savanna in the south where temperatures are rising faster than anywhere else on Earth.