At an air base in Bamako, Mali's military ruler Gen. Assimi Goita presided over a ceremony Dec. 21 marking the launch of a unified force for three Sahel states to fight the rising tide of jihadist insurgency across their borders. The move comes after the three countries—Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, all now ruled by military juntas [17]—collectively withdrew from the West African regional bloc ECOWAS to form their own Alliance of Sahel States (AES [18]). Burkina Faso's ruler, Gen. Daouda Traoré, was named to head the force, which will maintain a command base in Niamey, Niger's capital.
This new breakaway bloc has deepening ties [21] to Russia, which maintains paramilitary forces [19] in the AES countries under the rubric of the Wagner Group or Africa Corps. These forces are increasingly accused of atrocities, with Malian refugees in Mauritania reporting rapes, beheadings and mutiliation of civilians at the hands of Russian mercenaries. The Africa Report [22] online publication recently said it had "infiltrated" the Wagner-linked Telegram channel, finding 322 videos and 647 photographs of atrocities, including severed heads and gouged-out eyes, and posts "laced with racism." (AfricaNews [23], BBC News [24], LAT [25], The Telegraph [26])
Alarmingly, these atrocity reports come just as the AES has collectively withdrawn [21] from the International Criminal Court.
