标签： Africa

N’DJAMENA, Chad – Amid spiraling gang-driven instability in Haiti, the Central African nation of Chad has formally announced plans to deploy 1,500 troops to the Caribbean country, joining the United Nations-endorsed multinational security mission tasked with quelling rampant organized violence, according to a formal correspondence from Chadian President Mahamat Déby Itno addressed to the national legislature.

The president’s letter, delivered to sitting lawmakers on Monday, outlined that the deployment will be structured as two full battalions, each composed of 750 military personnel. The mission is scheduled to kick off this month and will run for an initial 12-month mandate, a response to an official request extended by the United Nations to boost the struggling anti-gang operation.

Notably, a forward contingent of 400 Chadian soldiers has already been deployed to Haiti for the mission. President Déby emphasized that the deployment represents a point of national honor for Chad and its professional defense and security forces, who are stepping in to address a pressing global security crisis.

This new contribution from Chad comes against a years-long backdrop of catastrophic insecurity that has crippled Haiti’s governing institutions. Last year, the UN Security Council greenlit an expansion of the Kenya-led multinational operation, officially dubbed the Gang Suppression Force, boosting its authorized troop strength from an initial 2,500 personnel to 5,500. The resolution also granted the expanded force new authority that its predecessor lacked: the power to arrest suspected gang members, a critical upgrade for targeting organized criminal groups.

The original 2023 mission, led primarily by Kenyan police, was severely undermined from its launch by persistent shortfalls in both personnel and funding, leaving it unable to reverse the gang’s rapid territorial gains. Today, powerful and well-armed violent gangs control up to 90 percent of Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital, along with large swathes of the country’s central agricultural region.

The crisis has already claimed countless lives and destabilized the country at the highest levels: in 2021, a team of armed assassins killed former Haitian President Jovenel Moïse in a brazen attack inside his private residence. Just last month, the security situation deteriorated further when one of Haiti’s most powerful criminal groups, the Gran Grif gang, launched a fresh large-scale assault on the central town of Petite-Rivière de l’Artibonite. Local human rights organizations confirm the attack left at least 30 people dead and dozens more unaccounted for, underscoring the urgent need for expanded international support to restore order.

After wrapping up earlier stops across four African nations, Pope Leo XIV touched down in Equatorial Guinea on Tuesday for the closing leg of his first papal visit to the continent — a stop widely framed as the most diplomatically sensitive challenge of his early tenure leading the global Catholic Church.

Nestled on Central Africa’s west coast, this former Spanish colony has been under the uninterrupted rule of 83-year-old President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo since he seized power in a 1979 coup. Today, Obiang stands as Africa’s longest-serving incumbent head of state, and his administration has faced decades of global scrutiny over systemic authoritarian rule and widespread graft.

Equatorial Guinea’s economic trajectory shifted dramatically in the mid-1990s, when large offshore oil reserves were discovered. Data from the African Development Bank shows oil now makes up nearly half the country’s total gross domestic product and accounts for more than 90% of its export revenue. Despite this resource wealth, however, more than half of Equatorial Guinea’s 1.9 million residents live below the poverty line. Human rights organizations including Human Rights Watch, as well as ongoing court proceedings in France and Spain, have documented how the vast majority of oil revenues have been siphoned off to enrich Obiang’s ruling family rather than lifting living standards for the general population.

From the start of his maiden African pilgrimage, Pope Leo has made clear he has no intention of softening his rhetoric on global inequality and graft. His earlier stop in Cameroon offered a clear preview of what observers can expect during his time in Equatorial Guinea. Last week in Cameroon’s capital Yaounde, the pope met with 93-year-old President Paul Biya — the world’s oldest sitting head of state, who has held power since 1982 and faces identical accusations of authoritarianism. Standing beside Biya in the presidential palace during his arrival address, Leo did not hold back.

“In order for peace and justice to prevail, the chains of corruption — which disfigure authority and strip it of its credibility — must be broken,” the pope stated. “Hearts must be set free from an idolatrous thirst for profit.”

While Equatorial Guinea is officially designated a secular state, it is one of the most overwhelmingly Catholic nations in Africa, with roughly 75% of its population identifying as Catholic, and the Church holds a central role in the country’s political and social fabric. Tutu Alicante, a U.S.-based human rights activist who leads the advocacy group EG Justice, explains that Church leadership is deeply intertwined with Obiang’s government. “Part of it is the fear the government has instilled in everyone, including the church, and part of it is the monetary gains that the church derives from this government,” Alicante noted.

The Vatican’s approach to engaging with the regime is nuanced, explained the Rev. Fortunatus Nwachukwu, the second-highest ranking official in the Holy See’s missionary evangelization department. “Should the church go to war against the government? Surely no. Should the church swallow everything as if it were normal? No. The church has to continue preaching justice, always in defense of life, human dignity and the common good,” he said.

Beyond systemic corruption, Equatorial Guinea’s government regularly faces allegations of routine harassment, arbitrary arrest and intimidation targeting political opposition figures, dissident critics and independent journalists. On Transparency International’s annual Corruption Perceptions Index, the country has consistently ranked among the bottom 10 out of all nations surveyed. Samuel Kaninda, Transparency International’s regional advisor for Africa, acknowledged that the Obiang administration has taken tentative steps in recent years to address public anger over graft, including passing a national anti-corruption law and moving to establish a dedicated anti-corruption commission. However, Kaninda stressed that these reforms will only deliver tangible change if the commission is granted full independence to investigate corrupt officials and the national judiciary operates free from political interference.

Kaninda said he holds cautious optimism about the papal visit, noting that even when authoritarian leaders attempt to frame papal trips as an endorsement of their rule, history shows these visits ultimately benefit ordinary citizens. “The risk is there, but at the same time, we see more of the opportunity to shed more light on a lot more that is happening there,” he said, adding that the high-profile visit could lift hopes among Equatorial Guinea’s population and draw global attention to the country’s unaddressed human rights and governance failures.

For many local residents, the visit has already delivered tangible, small-scale benefits: Equatorial Guinean seamstress Tumi Carine says she has seen a surge in orders for garments printed with Pope Leo’s image. “The coming of the pope brought us many customers,” Carine said. “We are really grateful for the coming of the pope, so, we are really happy.”

This is the first papal visit to Equatorial Guinea since Pope St. John Paul II traveled to the country in 1982. Pope Leo faces a packed schedule during his two-day trip: after arriving and holding an initial meeting with Obiang, he will deliver addresses to government leaders and diplomatic representatives, followed by a speech at the country’s national university. He will also celebrate multiple public Masses, visit a psychiatric hospital and a local prison, and meet with young people and their families. Before departing on Thursday, he will travel to the city of Bata to lay prayers at a memorial for the more than 100 people killed in a 2021 explosion at a nearby military barracks, which investigators blamed on grossly negligent handling of dynamite stored in a facility located close to residential neighborhoods.

A joint military mission carried out by Ugandan and Congolese forces has secured the release of more than 200 civilian captives held by the Islamic State-linked Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda’s military has confirmed.

The operation targeted a fortified militant encampment controlled by the ADF, an insurgent group with roots tracing back to 1990s Uganda, formed by dissidents opposed to the Ugandan government’s treatment of Muslim communities. After being driven out of Uganda by national forces decades ago, the remaining ADF fighters re-established their base across the border in eastern DRC, where they have built a brutal reputation for widespread violence, kidnappings, and killings. Among the freed hostages were multiple children, including a 14-year-old girl, according to an official statement from Uganda’s military.

While details of when and where the captives were abducted remain undisclosed, survivors reported being held in appalling conditions, including persistent food shortages, forced labor, and harsh punishment for any disobedience. Many of the rescued civilians were found in fragile health, with widespread reports of malaria, respiratory complications, and extreme exhaustion among the group.

“You are not under detention. You are victims of abduction, and we shall ensure you are handed over to the relevant authorities so you can reunite with your families,” Maj Gen Stephen Mugerwa, commander of the joint Uganda-DRC mission, told the freed captives, per the official statement.

The raid on the ADF camp also left multiple militant fighters dead and resulted in the seizure of a large weapons cache, the military confirmed. No details have been released about potential casualties among the joint Ugandan and Congolese force.

The ADF has operated out of remote areas of eastern DRC for more than 20 years. Group leader Musa Seka Baluku first pledged allegiance to the Islamic State in 2016, and IS formally recognized the ADF’s activity in the region in 2019. After years of limited overt operations inside Uganda, the group has been linked to a string of high-profile attacks in the country in recent years, including 2021 suicide bombings in the capital Kampala and a 2023 attack on a school in western Uganda.

In eastern DRC, however, the ADF’s campaign of violence against civilians has reached staggering levels. A 2024 analysis by BBC Monitoring found the group responsible for more than half of all civilian deaths in the conflict-plagued eastern region. Late last year, a senior researcher with global human rights group Amnesty International described the frequency of ADF abductions and killings as “alarming,” noting that women and girls captured by the group are systematically exploited as sexual slaves.

“Men, women and children told me how they ran for their lives as fighters armed with blades and guns descended on their villages. Released hostages talked of agonizing spells – sometimes months and years – spent in captivity, practically starved and forced to do various tasks in ADF camps,” Rawya Rageh, Amnesty International’s researcher, reported.

Uganda first deployed its troops to eastern DRC in 2021 to target ADF strongholds as part of the joint offensive with Congolese forces, a campaign launched to eliminate the militant group from its regional bases. Despite repeated military operations, the ADF has continued to carry out frequent attacks on civilian and military targets across the region, leaving thousands displaced and dead.

As Sudan’s devastating civil conflict stretches into its fourth year of brutal fighting, a high-ranking commander from the country’s powerful Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has announced his defection to the national army, a shift that Sudan’s top military leadership has framed as an opening for reconciliation and national rebuilding.

Army chief and Sovereign Council chair Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan formally welcomed Maj. Gen. al-Nour Ahmed Adam — widely known by the alias al-Qubba — in a meeting held Sunday in Sudan’s Northern province, which shares a border with Egypt. The country’s ruling transitional body publicly shared video footage of the meeting across its social media channels, confirming the defection that was first reported earlier this month. Local Sudanese media outlets have confirmed that Adam fled RSF-held territory in the Darfur region alongside dozens of armed fighters and military equipment to cross into government-controlled areas.

According to independent regional publication *Sudan Tribune*, the commander’s departure stemmed from internal leadership disputes within the RSF. Tensions boiled over after the paramilitary group captured el-Fasher in October 2024 — the last remaining army stronghold in the entire Darfur region — but failed to appoint Adam to the top military commander post for North Darfur province, a position he had reportedly expected. The RSF has so far declined to issue any public statement addressing Adam’s defection.

Burhan emphasized in an official statement following the meeting that Sudan’s military remains open to reconciliation for combatants willing to lay down their weapons and join efforts to rebuild the war-torn nation. “Doors are open to all those who lay down arms and join the path of national reconstruction,” Burhan said.

Adam’s defection marks one of the most high-profile departures from the RSF’s ranks since full-scale conflict erupted in April 2023. He is not the first senior RSF commander to switch allegiances in the past year: earlier in 2024, Abu Aqla Kaikel, leader of the Sudan Shield Forces, also left the RSF after the Sudanese Army retook control of the strategic central province of Gezira, a key agricultural and population hub.

The current conflict grew out of a years-long unresolved power struggle between the Sudanese Army, led by Burhan, and the RSF, a paramilitary force that evolved from the country’s former janjaweed militias tied to decades of conflict in Darfur. Fighting first broke out in the capital Khartoum before spreading across the vast northeast African nation, triggering one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises in modern history.

Data from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), a U.S.-based conflict monitoring organization, records at least 59,000 confirmed deaths from the war to date. The group has repeatedly warned that the actual death toll is almost certainly far higher, as widespread insecurity, collapsed healthcare infrastructure, and limited access to conflict zones make accurate casualty reporting nearly impossible.