标签： Africa

CAPE TOWN, South Africa – As anti-immigrant demonstrations and anti-foreigner sentiment spread across Africa’s most industrialized economy, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has pledged to address widespread public concerns over unauthorized migration, following multiple reports of targeted xenophobic violence that have drawn condemnation from neighboring nations. In a nationally televised address dedicated exclusively to the escalating crisis, Ramaphosa acknowledged the deep social and economic tensions that have pushed migration to the top of the national political agenda, a moment that comes after protest groups demanding stricter border controls issued a June 30 deadline for all undocumented foreign nationals to leave the country and formally requested negotiations with the sitting government.

South Africa carries a long, painful history of violence rooted in anti-migrant anger, most infamously a 2008 wave of xenophobic assaults that left more than 60 foreign-born residents dead, according to documentation from international human rights organizations. In recent months, organizations calling for a sweeping government crackdown on unauthorized immigration have gained significant public traction through a rolling series of nationwide protests, framing the presence of undocumented migrants as a direct strain on South Africa’s already struggling public systems. Protesters argue that unauthorized workers are worsening the country’s already record-breaking unemployment rate, which already sits at cripplingly high levels, while adding unmanageable pressure to overburdened public health and education services that struggle to serve South Africa’s 62 million citizens.

In his address, Ramaphosa conceded that the frustrations driving these protests hold legitimate weight. “Many South Africans are raising difficult but legitimate questions,” he stated. “These concerns are real. They deserve to be heard, and they deserve to be addressed.” But the president drew a clear line between public grievance and vigilantism, emphasizing that the government would not tolerate private groups taking enforcement of immigration law into their own hands. “Only authorized government officials can act against violations of our law,” he added, issuing a warning that a number of activist groups were deliberately inciting social unrest and stoking intercommunal tension.

There are currently no official government statistics quantifying the total number of undocumented migrants residing in South Africa, but independent estimates place the population between 2 million and 5 million. For decades, South Africa’s status as the most economically developed nation in Southern Africa has made it a magnet for migrant workers fleeing economic instability and political unrest across the continent, with large migrant communities hailing from neighboring states including Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Lesotho, as well as further afield nations such as Nigeria, Ghana, Malawi and Ethiopia.

In recent weeks, multiple source countries have spoken out after confirming their citizens have been targeted in violent xenophobic attacks. Last month, Ghana completed the repatriation of roughly 300 of its citizens from South Africa, and announced it would offer additional voluntary return trips for any Ghanaian nationals facing threats to their safety. Earlier this week, the Mozambican government confirmed that five of its citizens were killed in suspected xenophobic attacks in Mossel Bay, a coastal town on South Africa’s southern shore.

Since South Africa’s current coalition government took office in 2024, immigration policy has been a central priority for the administration. Government data shows that more than 100,000 undocumented migrants have been deported over the past two years, and Ramaphosa confirmed Sunday that border enforcement officials turned away roughly 450,000 people attempting to cross into South Africa without valid documentation over the past 12 months. The president admitted that South Africa’s previous migration management framework suffered from critical “weaknesses,” and pledged that the current government would take “decisive” action to reform the system. Even as he promised action, Ramaphosa issued a national appeal for unity, urging South Africans not to turn against one another amid the ongoing debate over migration policy.

A large group of captives held by Boko Haram jihadists in Nigeria’s northeastern Borno State has been freed from a remote mountain stronghold, ending months of harsh captivity, though conflicting accounts have emerged over who is responsible for the operation.

The hostages, most residents of the majority-Muslim Ngoshe community near the Cameroon border, were abducted in early March as locals gathered to break their daily Ramadan fast. The Nigerian military confirms at least 360 people were rescued, while a local youth organization, the Borno South Youth Initiative, puts the total number of freed captives at 416.

In an official statement, military spokesperson Lieutenant-Colonel Haruna M Sani framed the operation as one of the most ambitious hostage rescues the Nigerian armed forces have carried out in the northeast. The weeks-long mission, built on detailed intelligence, struck the Boko Haram hideout in the Mandara Mountains under cover of darkness, catching the insurgents off guard. Facing the rapid, overwhelming force of advancing troops, Sani said many fighters fled into the surrounding rugged terrain and others surrendered without resistance.

However, local community groups have pushed back against the military’s account. Samaila Kaigama, president of the Borno South Youth Alliance (Bosaya), said his organization spent weeks negotiating with Boko Haram to secure an unconditional release, and accused government forces of trying to take credit for work led by local mediators. In a public Facebook video, Kaigama criticized “government boys” for claiming glory for the community-led effort.

According to Nigerian authorities, all freed hostages have received initial medical screenings, and are receiving ongoing care after their ordeal. Tragically, two young infants did not survive the harsh conditions of their prolonged captivity, dying from exhaustion exacerbated by the mountainous terrain, Daniel Bwala, special adviser to Nigerian President Bola Tinubu, confirmed in a post on X.

The release comes at a time when the Tinubu administration faces growing public backlash over soaring insecurity across the country. The presidency has publicly commended the military for the operation, and local officials have stated that work is underway to secure the Ngoshe area so that the freed captives can return to their homes and farms. Officials also noted that a small number of abductees are believed to have escaped into Cameroon during the operation, and cross-border efforts are ongoing to bring them home safely. On Sunday, the Nigerian military released photos and videos showing the freed hostages resting under trees overnight following their rescue, matching images posted to the official Nigerian Army social media channel.

Mass kidnapping has become an endemic tactic for armed groups across Nigeria in recent years, with criminal and insurgent factions targeting soft, high-vulnerability locations including remote villages, schools, churches and mosques to generate revenue through ransom payments. While Nigerian law bans the payment of ransoms to abductors, analysts confirm that payments from desperate hostage families, intermediaries, and in some cases state officials have continued, directly fueling the cycle of abductions across the country.

The 2014 kidnapping of 276 schoolgirls from the northeastern village of Chibok remains one of Boko Haram’s most notorious attacks, with roughly 90 girls still missing after more than a decade. During the group’s insurgency, captives were often forced into sexual slavery, domestic servitude, or coerced into serving as suicide bombers.

Boko Haram first launched its armed campaign to establish an Islamic state across northern Nigeria in 2009. While the group no longer controls the large swathes of territory it held at the height of its power in the early 2010s, it and its splinter factions (including the Islamic State West Africa Province) retain the capability to carry out regular attacks and kidnappings across the country’s northeast.

Nigeria has received international support to counter ongoing insurgency and kidnapping threats. Earlier in 2024, a small contingent of U.S. military personnel deployed to the country to train local armed forces and provide intelligence support. Just last month, Nigerian and U.S. forces announced they had carried out a joint operation that killed a senior Islamic State leader in the region. Nigeria’s security challenges remain multifaceted, overlapping threats that include Islamist insurgency, criminal kidnapping gangs, intercommunal land clashes, and separatist unrest in the country’s south.

ABUJA, Nigeria – In a significant blow to jihadist insurgency in Nigeria’s restive northeast, the Nigerian Army announced Sunday that it has freed 360 people held captive by the militant group Boko Haram in southern Borno State. The liberation operation targeted the Mandara Mountains, a rugged terrain long recognized as one of the extremist organization’s key entrenched strongholds.

Among the freed hostages were dozens of children, all abducted from scattered civilian communities across Borno State, according to an official statement from the military. Army spokesperson Haruna Sani confirmed that two infants died from exhaustion after the rescue, their health already broken by the harsh conditions of prolonged captivity and the difficult crossing of mountainous terrain during extraction efforts.

“All remaining rescued abductees have been successfully evacuated to secured locations, where they are receiving urgent medical care and targeted humanitarian support,” Sani said, framing the operation as a major operational victory that delivers a crippling blow to the terrorist network.

Nigeria has grappled with a worsening, multi-layered security crisis for more than a decade, particularly across its northern regions. Long-standing insurgency by Boko Haram and its splinter faction, the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) – which pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group – has been compounded by widespread kidnappings for ransom, illegal mining operations, and attacks on civilian communities by armed gangs that have stretched state security resources thin.

Just one month prior, Nigerian forces partnered with the United States military to carry out a joint offensive that killed 175 ISWAP fighters, marking another high-profile win against the insurgency. Data from the United Nations estimates that more than 10 years of extremist unrest in northeast Nigeria has killed thousands of civilians and displaced millions more from their homes.

Despite repeated public pledges from President Bola Tinubu’s administration to curb insecurity and protect Nigerian citizens, independent security analysts continue to argue that the federal government has fallen short of deploying the resources and strategic action needed to resolve the long-running crisis.

Nearly 20 years after Somalia’s capital Mogadishu was plunged into a new chapter of brutal civil conflict, 34-year-old shopkeeper Yusuf Ali still carries the unspoken psychological scars of his experience as a child combatant. While the city’s physical landscape has slowly rebuilt in recent years, almost no formal support exists for survivors like Ali, who carry intergenerational trauma from decades of near-constant war.

Ali’s story is rooted in decades of instability that began long before he picked up a weapon. When former President Siad Barre’s regime collapsed in 1991, Somalia fractured into chaotic clan warfare that left the country without a functional central government. Just one year after Ali was born, his father was killed in the 1993 Battle of Mogadishu, the infamous clash that saw Somali fighters down two U.S. Black Hawk helicopters and kill 18 American service members. Growing up fatherless in the impoverished northern Mogadishu district of Huriwaa, Ali was shaped by the violence that surrounded him from childhood.

A turning point came in June 2006, when the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC), a coalition of Sharia courts, seized control of Mogadishu and brought a fleeting period of stability after years of clan conflict. For Western policymakers, however, the UIC marked the first major advance of political Islam in Africa after the September 11, 2001 al-Qaeda attacks on the U.S. Washington accused the group of having ties to al-Qaeda, and viewed its rise as a direct security threat. The UIC’s youth military wing, al-Shabab, would go on to become one of the globe’s most persistent militant insurgent groups.

Six months after the UIC took power, a U.S.-backed Ethiopian military invasion launched to oust the Islamist government, with American drones providing surveillance and air support. The invasion was deeply unpopular across Somalia, sparking a fierce armed resistance that united al-Shabab and a coalition of insurgent splinter groups called the Muqawama, or Resistance. By the spring of 2007, heavy fighting had intensified, with artillery and air strikes targeting densely populated civilian neighborhoods suspected of sheltering insurgents.

Ali recalls the night a barrage of shells hit his neighborhood, striking a nearby home and killing a young girl around his age. “Our house shook and I felt like the soil under my feet had moved. I’ve seen death, but nothing prepared me for that night,” he told reporters. His family fled to Elasha Biyaha, a sprawling informal settlement northwest of Mogadishu that became a refuge for hundreds of thousands of displaced civilians.

In the displacement camp, anti-invasion rhetoric from local mosque sermons fired up young people, who were told to defend their country from what were labeled “Gaalo” – the Somali term for non-Muslim infidels. Drawn by the call to resistance, 16-year-old Ali joined the Muqawama, where former army commanders trained him in small arms and hit-and-run ambush tactics. He soon found himself back on the streets of Mogadishu, fighting unpaid in brutal urban combat against Ethiopian troops and allied soldiers from the U.N.-recognized transitional Somali government.

“Street by street, from windows and doorways, we were firing on Ethiopian soldiers and the Somali soldiers with them,” Ali said. “It was either killed or be killed – and this was a cause we were willing to die for.” For two years, much of Mogadishu was reduced to rubble, as all warring parties faced growing international accusations of war crimes. Growing international pressure eventually forced Ethiopian troops to withdraw in 2009, but the Islamist movement fractured into competing factions, with former allies turning on one another.

Ali found himself at a crossroads. Disillusioned by the infighting, and urged by his family to build a new life, he was smuggled across the border to South Africa to live with an uncle, where he worked in his uncle’s shop for five years. A wave of deadly xenophobic attacks targeting foreign-owned businesses eventually drove him back to Mogadishu in the early 2010s.

When Ali returned, he found a capital that had made tangible progress: a functioning international airport, paved roads, new restaurants, and street lighting that made once-dangerous neighborhoods safe after dark. But political instability remained rampant. Al-Shabab had reemerged as a powerful hardline militant group controlling large swathes of rural southern Somalia, where it imposed a strict interpretation of Sharia law, banned music, and enforced restrictive gendered dress codes. The group maintained a sprawling network of spies within Mogadishu, carrying out regular targeted assassinations of government officials and international workers. “No-one trusted each other. No-one dared to speak about politics publicly. Your own neighbours could be spying on you and you wouldn’t even know it,” Ali said.

Today, Ali is married with a 4-year-old son, and runs his own shop in his childhood neighborhood of Huriwaa, once a major al-Shabab stronghold. But reminders of his time as a child soldier are everywhere. He still passes the homes where he fired weapons during street battles, and wonders if the current residents know of the blood that was once shed there. He has never received any form of counseling or mental health support for his trauma – and he is far from alone. Many other former child soldiers he knows have developed drug addictions to cope with their pain, with no access to treatment.

“In Somalia, we don’t talk about our problems,” Ali explained. “I try to find peace through prayer. We pray and keep things to ourselves. This is the culture here and is the reason why many people are hurting but most don’t realise it.”

Human rights experts warn that widespread untreated trauma is a silent, pervasive crisis across Somalia. “The normalisation of violence in some areas means that trauma often goes unrecognised and untreated, making it a silent but pervasive crisis,” said Ilyas Adam, a human rights legal consultant with the Coalition of Somali Human Rights Defenders. “When trauma is normalised, oftentimes individuals do not recognise their need for help. Complicating matters are the cultural barriers, where mental health is not openly discussed.” Adam noted that untreated post-traumatic stress disorder can have long-term debilitating impacts, including chronic mental illness, social exclusion, stigma, and an increased risk that survivors will be re-recruited into armed groups.

Global health data confirms Somalia’s catastrophic lack of mental health infrastructure. A 2021 World Health Organization report found that community-based mental health services were almost non-existent across the country, and as of 2023, the entire nation of 18 million people had just 82 trained mental health professionals.

Worse still, the recruitment of child soldiers continues across Somalia decades after Ali first took up arms. The United Nations recorded more than 2,800 cases of child recruitment by armed groups between 2021 and 2024. While the vast majority of these cases are attributed to al-Shabab, the U.N. also documented 101 cases of recruitment by Somali government forces. Mursal Khalif, a member of parliament and head of the Ministry of Defence’s Child Protection Unit, said anti-recruitment efforts still face resistance, with some Somalis viewing such initiatives as a foreign “Western agenda.” Still, Khalif noted that slow progress is being made, including new vocational training programs designed to help former child soldiers build sustainable livelihoods.

In Ali’s home neighborhood of Huriwaa, however, almost no support services have reached residents. Government officials and international aid workers rarely enter the area, and only do so under heavy armed security. Every evening, as the call to prayer rings out from the local mosque – the site of a 2008 Ethiopian raid that abducted 41 children suspected of being insurgent trainees – Ali is reminded of the cycle of violence that has defined his entire life. Even now, two decades after the 2006 invasion, conflict continues: just this week, government forces and opposition fighters exchanged gunfire in Mogadishu during a dispute over delayed national elections, and more foreign countries have troops deployed in Somalia than at any point in the past 30 years. “The fighting is still ongoing, people are suffering and two decades later, more countries than ever before have troops deployed in Somalia,” Ali observed.