IntelBrief: A New Treaty Among African Juntas Amid Deteriorating Security

Bottom Line Up Front

• While Mail’s security situation is worsening, its junta government has had success in expelling French troops and UN peacekeepers and has set up a new alliance with neighboring juntas.
• The defense treaty between Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger announced over the weekend indicates that the junta’s political survival, and not counterterrorism, is driving decision-making.
• Bamako and Ouagadougou’s brutal military campaigns against jihadi factions are not bearing fruit, while the human rights abuses committed by security forces, local militias, and Wagner mercenaries are fueling jihadi recruitments.
• Amid Africa’s political turmoil and untenable military pressure in the Levant, jihadi leadership sees an opportunity to enhance its interests in the Sahel, Nigeria, Congo, and Somalia.