Africa Archive

The announcement this week of a Somali terror suspect’s transfer to U.S. federal court came just after reports of the U.S. drone war’s expansion into Somalia. Both developments highlight the growing U.S. counterterrorism interest in Somalia and raise questions about how it might be expected to impact the country’s 20-year-old civil war. “American strategy in Somalia has not always matched up with the reality on the ground, and at the moment the reality is shifting very quickly there,” says David Axe, an independent correspondent and World Politics Review contributor who has reported from Somalia. A leading concern for the U.S. […]

An ongoing effort by the Central African Republic to disarm rebel groups highlights the prominent role that disarming former combatants plays in peace agreements. In an email interview, Robert Muggah, research director of the Small Arms Survey and a research fellow at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, discussed the process of disarmament, demobilization and reintegration. WPR: How significant are disarmament initiatives in post-conflict scenarios, and are there any scenarios in which they are counterproductive? Robert Muggah: Disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) is currently a fixture of the stabilization and peacebuilding landscape. The vast majority of the roughly […]

South Korean President Lee Myung-bak is currently on a three-country tour of Africa. In an email interview, Gabriel Jonsson, an associate professor of Korean studies at Stockholm University, discussed trade and diplomatic relations between South Korea and Africa. WPR: What is the recent history of South Korea’s diplomatic relations with Africa? Gabriel Jonsson: Although South Korea began to establish diplomatic relations with African countries starting in the early 1960s, relations with Africa have been less active than with any other continent. In 2006, President Roh Mu-hyon became the first South Korean head of state to visit Africa since 1982. Roh […]

In Senegal, popular anger over chronic electricity shortages and the autocratic behavior of octogenarian President Abdoulaye Wade have produced several waves of protest since last summer. The same anger flared again on June 23, when protesters took to the streets to denounce Wade’s plans to amend the constitution and lower the threshold necessary to win in the first round of next February’s presidential election. Shaken, Wade backed down from what was widely perceived as a power grab. The protesters’ triumph does not mark the end of the conflict, however: Wade still intends to run for a third term, and protests […]

A stalemate has set in between President Barack Obama and the U.S. Congress over the president’s authority to initiate and continue combat operations against Libya. This should surprise no one. The limits on the president’s constitutional authority to wage war are as uncertain today as they were when the Constitution was ratified. Complicating this uncertainty is that pesky law passed by Congress in 1973 over President Richard Nixon’s veto: the War Powers Resolution (WPR). Enacted in response to the widespread belief that it had become far too easy for a president to commit the nation to war, the WPR sought […]

This week, Alain Le Roy, U.N. undersecretary-general for peacekeeping operations, announced that he will stand down in August. Known as a generous man with a healthy distaste for the U.N.’s bureaucratic politics, the former French diplomat will have served for three years. Over that time, he has helped navigate U.N. operations through tough times, from a disaster in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to an unlikely success in Côte d’Ivoire. When Le Roy joined Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s team in the summer of 2008, he faced multiple bureaucratic and operational challenges. His predecessor, Jean-Marie Guéhenno, had worked with Kofi […]