Established in 2015, the Flintlock programme counts greater than 400 service members from 10 African companions and allied companions.
The annual United States-led counterterrorism coaching programme for African forces has kicked off in Ivory Coast as West Africa faces the rising menace of armed teams’ assaults amid French forces’ withdrawal.
Also referred to as Flintlock, the programme which includes greater than 400 service members from 10 African companions and allied nations, started on Sunday. It’s the US Africa Command’s largest annual operations train.
The objective is “to strengthen the power of key accomplice nations within the area to counter violent extremist organizations, collaborate throughout borders and supply safety for the individuals of Africa”, AFRICOM’s web site says.
The operation has been held yearly since its inception in 2005. This yr, collaborating nations embody Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana and Niger, joined by Western nations reminiscent of Canada, France, the Netherlands and the UK. It ends on February 28.
Noticeably absent are safety forces from Mali and Burkina Faso, two nations the place the army has seized energy previously 18 months.
The army coaching comes because the Sahel area is struggling to comprise assaults from armed teams which were roaming largely Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso since 2015.
Since then, the area has skilled common bouts of violence. Teams affiliated with the Macina Liberation Entrance (FLM) and the Islamic State of the Higher Sahara (ISGS) have been accountable for almost all of the assaults, in line with the Africa Middle for Strategic Research. Figures from its 2021 report (PDF) present that the two,005 violent occasions noticed for the yr signify a 70 % improve over the earlier yr.
However as violence spreads past the Sahel area, coastal nations reminiscent of Benin and Ivory Coast, comparatively unscathed by the safety disaster affecting their northern neighbours, are experiencing a surge in assaults.
To additional heighten tensions, France, which established a army presence in Mali in 2013, has determined to withdraw its forces and switch them to Niger. The choice got here amid growing fashionable discontent over France’s presence within the area.