Tag: Chad

French military bases in Africa will now self-identify as schools

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Emmanuel Macron wants to rebrand Paris’ presence in its former colonies as cultural and economic projects

French military bases in Africa will now self-identify as schools

Related:

Macron: ‘New era’ in economic, military strategy in Africa

Monday’s speech came at a time when France’s influence on the continent is facing its biggest challenges in decades. Growing anti-French sentiment has led to street protests in several West and North African countries.

In addition, historical economic ties that France had with the region are under pressure from the growing commercial presence of Russia, China and Turkey.

Macron acknowledged that Africa now is a “field of competition” and urged French businesses to “wake up” and get involved in the fight.

In the past year, French troops had to withdraw from Mali, which turned instead to private Russian military contractors of the Wagner group, and most recently from Burkina Faso, which also appears to increasingly look towards Moscow.

Ethiopia blocks social media amid Orthodox church tensions

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Ethiopia blocks social media amid Orthodox church tensions:

The religious crisis erupted last month after a group of rebellious ethnic Oromo archbishops formed a breakaway group called the Holy Synod of Oromia in defiance of the church’s highest body or the synod.

The splinter group accuses the church of “maintaining a system of linguistic and cultural hegemony in which congregations in Oromia are not served in their native languages“, an allegation the church denies.

H/T: Ethiopian PM Abiy Ahmed suspends American big tech

Related:

The Lingering Danger of Google & Facebook

Another schism?! Is the Holy Synod of Oromia supported by the US?! TBD, soon.

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On the first results of the US-Africa Leaders Summit

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

The world press is actively discussing the results of the first US-Africa Leaders Summit since 2014, held on December 13-15 in Washington.

At first glance this event may seem successful. The forum was attended by delegations from 49 countries plus the African Union and the permanent secretariat of the African Continental Free Trade Area. Only the leaders of those countries that were not invited because of their “non-compliance with democratic standards” (Guinea, Mali, Sudan, Burkina Faso, Eritrea) were not in attendance. It should be noted that the leader of Chad, who also came to power in an unconstitutional way, was at the summit. Apparently, his “authoritarianism” did not interfere with US principles since the country is close in its political positions to the West, primarily to France.

On the first results of the US-Africa Leaders Summit (archived)

UN adopts resolution on Syrian, Palestinian sovereignty over natural resources in Israeli-occupied territories

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) has adopted a resolution declaring that Syrians and Palestinians have sovereignty over their natural resources in the Israeli-occupied tracts of land in the strategic Golan Heights and the West Bank, including East al-Quds.

UN adopts resolution on Syrian, Palestinian sovereignty over natural resources in Israeli-occupied territories

Ukraine: A War To Save The Rules-Based International Order?

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Washington’s Fraudulent, Rules-Based International Order: Among the many deceptive arguments that Joe Biden’s administration has made about the Ukraine war is that Russia’s invasion is an attack of unprecedented severity on the liberal, “rules-based international order” established at the end of World War II. That allegation has been a constant theme of administration officials and their allies in the news media and the foreign policy blob. Proponents argue that the war is a global existential struggle between order and chaos, free societies and unprincipled aggressors. Biden has stated the thesis succinctly that the Ukraine war is nothing less than “a battle between democracy and autocracy, between liberty and repression, between a rules‐based order and one governed by brute force.”

Ukraine: A War To Save The Rules-Based International Order?

Pentagon, NATO expand military dominance in Africa

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Tunisia, Mauritania and Algeria have been members of NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue military partnership since 1994. No sooner did the Soviet Union dissolve in 1991 than the U.S. moved to expand NATO globally, including forging individual partnerships with the fifteen new nations emerging from the former USSR, three of whom (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) were brought into NATO in 2004.
Chad and Niger have hosted multinational military forces from several NATO nations in recent years; Senegal, Ghana and Nigeria are increasingly participating in Africa Command/NATO exercises, including Senegal in the 2021 (last held) U.S./NATO Sea Breeze war games in Ukraine and the Black Sea. Libya was bombed by NATO for over six months in 2011 and immediately afterward was touted as a prospective member of the Mediterranean Dialogue. It’s now effectively under military occupation by NATO powerhouse Turkey.
U.S. Africa Command and NATO, essentially coterminous, have effected the military integration of most all nations on the continent under mechanisms such as the African Standby Force and the Africa Partnership Station and regular military exercises like African Lion, Operation Flintlock, Obangame Express and Phoenix Express. The NATO Response Force was inaugurated in 2006 with massive military drills in the African nation of Cabo Verde.

Pentagon, NATO expand military dominance in Africa