标签： Africa

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Nearly 30 years after one of the worst mass atrocities of the 20th century, the key Rwandan genocide suspect Félicien Kabuga has died in UN custody while being treated at a hospital in The Hague, the United Nations’ judicial body confirmed Saturday. He was 91.

Kabuga, one of the most high-profile figures accused of orchestrating the 1994 Rwandan genocide, faced charges including genocide, incitement to genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, extermination, murder, and persecution. He long maintained a not guilty plea to all counts, and never lived to see a final ruling on the accusations against him.

The 1994 Rwandan genocide was sparked after the downing of a plane carrying then-Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana, an ethnic Hutu, over the capital Kigali on April 6 that year. Kabuga had close personal ties to the Habyarimana administration — his daughter is married to the late president’s son — and prosecutors alleged he used his wealth and influence to fund and incite the 100-day campaign of violence that killed an estimated 800,000 mostly Tutsi people.

For decades, Kabuga evaded capture after the genocide ended. A global arrest warrant was issued for him in 2013, paired with a $5 million reward for information leading to his arrest. He was finally taken into custody in France in 2020, and his long-awaited trial before the UN International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) got underway in 2022.

The trial process ground to a halt in 2023, when IRMCT judges ruled Kabuga was unfit to continue proceedings due to a diagnosis of advanced dementia. The court outlined a revised process that would allow evidence to be presented to establish the facts of the case, but ruled out the possibility of a criminal conviction or sentencing if he was found responsible. Following the ruling, Kabuga remained in UN detention while diplomats negotiated over a potential transfer to a third country that would accept him for provisional release; Rwanda had offered to take him back, but his legal team stated Kabuga refused repatriation over fears of mistreatment.

The court’s decision to halt the trial triggered widespread anger among Rwandan genocide survivors, who argued that Kabuga’s alleged role in the mass killings demanded a full trial and the maximum possible penalty, which would have been life imprisonment if he was convicted.

In its official statement Saturday, the IRMCT confirmed that Kabuga died while receiving hospital care in The Hague, and that the medical unit of the UN Detention Unit was notified immediately of his death. An official investigation has been launched to document and clarify the full circumstances surrounding his death, the mechanism added.

In a landmark counterterrorism strike that marks a sharp escalation in military cooperation between the United States and Nigeria, a top-tier Islamic State commander has been killed in a targeted early-morning operation in Nigeria’s restive northeastern region, former U.S. President Donald Trump and Nigerian military officials have confirmed.

The operation, carried out in the early hours of Saturday in the Lake Chad Basin — a long-held militant stronghold where the Boko Haram insurgency and its offshoot, the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), have waged a deadly uprising for over 15 years — targeted Abu Bakr al-Mainuki, a founding senior leader of ISWAP who climbed the ranks to become one of the highest-profile global terrorists in the Islamic State network.

Born in 1982 in the village of Mainok in Nigeria’s Borno State, the epicenter of the region’s decade-long insurgency, al-Mainuki rose to prominence after ISWAP split from the original Boko Haram faction in 2016. He served as deputy to former ISWAP leader Abu Musab al-Barnawi, who was reported killed in 2021, and oversaw three critical pillars of the group’s activities: operational planning, media outreach, financial networks, and weapons development. The U.S. State Department officially designated al-Mainuki as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist in 2023, and both Trump and Nigerian military officials confirm he had recently been appointed to the role of Head of the General Directorate of States, placing him second-in-command within the global Islamic State hierarchy. This claim has been met with skepticism from some independent security analysts, however.

Nigerian government and military officials have emphasized that the successful strike was only possible through a newly revitalized bilateral security partnership with the U.S. The collaboration comes after relations between the two nations hit a historic low last year, when Trump publicly accused Nigeria’s government of overseeing a “Christian genocide” — a claim Nigerian authorities repeatedly and firmly denied. After months of diplomatic engagement to repair ties, military cooperation resumed: the U.S. deployed additional troops to Nigeria in February, following a U.S. airstrike targeting IS positions in December 2023. While U.S. troops have long been limited to advisory and training roles in Nigeria, analysts note this joint operational strike signals a new, more active phase of partnership.

The Lake Chad Basin, a resource-rich region spanning four countries, has long been a safe haven for extremist groups, whose dense forests and remote cross-border terrain provide ideal cover to avoid military detection. Groups operating in the area fund their violent activities through illegal taxation of local communities, and Nigerian security forces have long struggled with critical capability gaps to effectively root out insurgents in the hard-to-access region. “This would demonstrate to militants that American-Nigerian counterterrorism cooperation has really picked up,” explained Bulama Burkati, a leading security analyst focused on sub-Saharan Africa. “We know the Nigerian forces lack the basic capacity to fight violent extremist groups, especially in places like the Lake Chad region, which is densely forested.”

Analysts widely frame al-Mainuki’s death as a historic turning point for Nigeria’s 15-year counterinsurgency campaign. He is the most senior militant leader ever killed by Nigerian security forces; previously, most top extremist figures died as a result of internal factional fighting between competing militant groups. While the targeted strike is expected to significantly disrupt ISWAP’s operations across West Africa in the short term, by upending the group’s financial networks, recruitment pipelines, and attack planning, analysts warn that sustained precision operations will be required to cement long-term gains.

Nigeria continues to grapple with a sprawling, multifaceted security crisis that has reshaped life across much of the country’s north. Beyond jihadi insurgent groups including Boko Haram, ISWAP, and the newer Lakurawa network, the country also faces a surge in organised criminal activity centered on kidnapping for ransom. Since the Boko Haram insurgency first began in 2009, United Nations data confirms more than tens of thousands of people have been killed in attacks, and millions more have been displaced from their homes across the country.

A high-stakes joint counterterrorism operation conducted by Nigerian and U.S. military forces has resulted in the death of one of the Islamic State (IS) group’s most senior global commanders, Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, Nigerian President Bola Tinubu has officially confirmed.

In an official statement announcing the success of the mission, Tinubu emphasized that the operation marked a major milestone in the two nations’ deepening counterextremism partnership. “Our determined Nigerian Armed Forces, working closely with the Armed Forces of the United States, conducted a daring joint operation that dealt a heavy blow to the ranks of the Islamic State,” the president said.

The operation was first disclosed by U.S. President Donald Trump, who identified al-Minuki as the second-highest-ranking leader in the global ISIS network. Washington had officially designated al-Minuki as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist back in 2023, recognizing his outsize role in orchestrating violence across the African continent and beyond. Taking to his platform Truth Social, Trump praised the mission as flawlessly executed, calling the eliminated commander “the most active terrorist in the world.”

According to details released by Nigerian authorities, the precision strike that killed al-Minuki targeted his compound in the volatile Lake Chad Basin, where he was hiding alongside several of his top lieutenants. All of the senior IS figures in the compound were killed in the operation.

Nigeria’s military confirmed that the successful mission was directly enabled by a recently established strategic counterterrorism partnership and expanded intelligence-sharing framework between Abuja and Washington. Military officials outlined al-Minuki’s rapid rise through the IS ranks: he was most recently promoted to the position of Head of the General Directorate of States, placing him among the core leadership of the global extremist organization.

Prior to his promotion to the global IS hierarchy, al-Minuki oversaw all IS-affiliated operations across the Sahel region and West Africa. Under his leadership, the group carried out dozens of deadly attacks targeting civilian populations, vulnerable minority communities, and local security infrastructure.

Nigerian military investigators have also linked al-Minuki to one of the most high-profile extremist kidnaps in the country’s recent history: the 2018 abduction of more than 100 schoolgirls from a boarding school in Dapchi, northeastern Nigeria, which was carried out by Boko Haram, the extremist faction that al-Minuki once served as a senior commander before pledging allegiance to IS in 2015. Earlier in his militant career, military spokesperson Samali Uba confirmed al-Minuki facilitated the movement of extremist fighters to Libya to support IS operations across North Africa.

Trump framed al-Minuki’s death as a devastating blow to both IS’s African networks and its global operational infrastructure, noting that the strike has disrupted key terrorist funding channels and fractured the group’s command structure. The U.S. president extended his gratitude to Nigeria’s government for its close collaboration, adding that al-Minuki “will no longer terrorize the people of Africa or help plan operations to target Americans.”

The successful operation comes as part of a growing trend of deepened military cooperation between Nigeria and the United States, as Nigeria escalates its years-long campaign to root out extremist violence across the country’s northern and northeastern regions. Just weeks prior to this strike, in April, IS claimed responsibility for a mass shooting at a football pitch in northeastern Nigeria’s Adamawa State that left at least 29 people dead. Late last year, during the Christmas holiday period, the two countries carried out another joint airstrike targeting IS-affiliated groups in Sokoto State, demonstrating the consistent momentum of their counterterrorism partnership.

In a targeted joint operation conducted Friday in Nigeria’s volatile Lake Chad Basin, U.S. and Nigerian security forces have eliminated Abu Bakr al-Mainuki, one of the highest-ranking leaders of the Islamic State West African Province (ISWAP), U.S. President Donald Trump announced in a late-night social media post. While Trump’s announcement offered few immediate operational details, it marked a major milestone in counterterrorism efforts across the Sahel region, where IS-affiliated militants have expanded their influence in recent years.

Two years into Sudan’s devastating civil conflict between the national military and the rival Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group, experts and international monitors warn that remotely piloted drones have emerged as the single deadliest threat to non-combatant populations, with foreign powers continuing to funnel advanced drone technology to both warring sides despite widespread humanitarian outcry.

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk confirmed this week that armed drones are responsible for more than 80% of all conflict-related civilian deaths in Sudan, with at least 880 civilians killed by drone strikes between January and April 2025 alone. Most of these fatalities have been concentrated in Sudan’s central Kordofan region, but deadly drone attacks have spread across seven provinces in recent weeks, targeting vulnerable populations and critical civilian infrastructure.

The Sudanese conflict, which erupted in April 2023, has already claimed at least 59,000 lives, displaced 13 million people, and pushed large swathes of the country into catastrophic famine conditions. Data collected by the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) underscores the rapidly growing toll of drone warfare: between 2024 and 2025, drone-related fatalities surged 600%, while the number of drone attacks jumped 81%, leaving 2,670 people dead across both combatant and civilian groups in 2025.

Unlike the early months of the war, when drone use was limited to the Sudanese military, the RSF has rapidly expanded its drone capabilities over the past 12 months, using the technology to enable offensive operations in contested territory including the North Darfur capital el-Fasher. In the 2024 capture of el-Fasher, RSF drones employed a coordinated “hunter-killer” strategy that targeted civilians attempting to send distress signals, shutting down communications and trapping populations in densely populated areas before launching strikes. United Nations experts have already labeled the violence in el-Fasher as carrying the “hallmarks of genocide,” with at least 6,000 people killed over three days of fighting. Nathaniel Raymond, executive director of the Humanitarian Research Lab at the Yale School of Public Health, noted that the RSF could not have seized the city without its advanced external drone support.

Worryingly, both warring parties have systematically targeted protected civilian infrastructure in their drone strikes, including hospitals, dams, schools, public markets, and displacement camps. In one high-profile incident last year, a drone strike on Al Daein Teaching Hospital in East Darfur killed at least 64 civilians. While the Sudanese military officially denied responsibility for the attack, two anonymous military officials later confirmed the strike had targeted an adjacent police station. Recent on-the-ground reports also document 26 civilian deaths in drone strikes across South and North Kordofan in early May, more than 70 civilian fatalities in Kordofan strikes earlier this year, and 36 people killed in nine separate drone attacks on civilian vehicles over a 10-day period in May 2025. Sudanese human rights group Emergency Lawyers has warned that many drones deployed by both sides are equipped with advanced visual target identification technology, raising the disturbing possibility that attacks on civilians are deliberate, not accidental.

Multiple independent analysts confirm that neither Sudanese warring party produces its own advanced drones, relying entirely on foreign suppliers to build up their strike capabilities. ACLED’s latest assessment confirms the Sudanese military receives drone technology from Turkey, Russia, Iran, and Egypt, while the RSF obtains drones through transnational smuggling networks linked to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), with transit routes running through Ethiopia, Chad, and Libya. Research from The Soufan Center notes that both sides are actively competing to acquire newer, more sophisticated drone models primarily manufactured in China, with satellite imagery from Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab confirming the RSF operates Chinese-built CH-95 and FH-95 drones – large systems comparable in size to small manned aircraft. The UAE has repeatedly denied supplying drones to the RSF, while Ethiopia has also rejected Sudanese government accusations that it facilitated recent RSF drone strikes on Khartoum International Airport and other capital-area targets. Gabriella Tejeda, a research associate at The Soufan Center, however, notes that the allegations are not unfounded, given Ethiopia’s close strategic partnership with the UAE and clear shared interest in shaping the outcome of the Sudanese conflict.

Jalale Getachew Birru, ACLED’s senior East Africa analyst, explained that drones have transformed the trajectory of the Sudanese civil war, acting as a “force multiplier” that allows both sides to expand strikes into densely populated residential areas, secure contested territory, disrupt enemy mobilization, and spread widespread insecurity across rival-held regions. The proliferation of foreign-supplied drones has not only driven a catastrophic rise in civilian deaths, experts warn, but has also complicated international peace efforts and stoked fears that the conflict could escalate into a full-blown regional proxy war. With foreign backers continuing to invest in military capabilities and both warring parties ramping up their battle tempo, analysts say there is little indication either side is willing to pursue a negotiated end to the conflict.