BEVERLY HILLS, August 06, (THEWILL) – The United States Africa Command, AFRICOM has alerted Nigeria and its neighbours that the Islamic State and Al-Qaida terror groups are expanding and penetrating the region after their displacement in Syria and Iraq.
Commander of the US Special Operations Command, Africa, Maj. Gen. Davin Anderson, who disclosed the development during a virtual media briefing with journalists on Tuesday, said the terrorist groups are aggressively regrouping in the region and using clandestine strategies to further expand their foothold in the continent without drawing attention.
Nigeria, Chad and Cameroon have been battling the Boko Haram, a group which has received support from both the Islamic State and Al-Qaida.
Anderson said Al-Qaida had expanded in Mali and had moved into northern Burkina Faso, where they attacked infrastructure, took out local governance and security forces, and are now controlling the local economy and exerting control over the population.
“We are seeing them continuing to move further south in Burkina Faso towards those littoral nations in the Gulf of Guinea and also further west towards Senegal and West Africa. So that’s a concern to us as we watch them continue to move throughout the region,” he said.
He stated that Nigeria and other nations battling terrorists should provide leadership in the war against terrorism in order to attract meaningful partnership with the United States and other Western nations. He said in view of the nature of terrorism and its resilient pattern, it was not appropriate to say that terrorists are defeated.
He said the right approach was to exploit the weaknesses of the insurgents.
Anderson explained: “I think there are two factors in that. One, each government has to focus on this and provide that focus for international partners to engage with. The other partner– the other part of this is we can’t underestimate the threat these violent extremist organisations pose.
“We, as a community of international nations, keep thinking we have defeated them or we have put them on their back foot and that they’re just moments from disintegration. I think after 20 years we have seen they are very resilient organisations that, although small, they’re able to leverage social media and other forms of media to have an outsized voice and that they continue to recruit and they continue to find opportunities.
“The United States has engaged with Nigeria and continues to engage with them in Intel sharing and in understanding what these violent extremists are doing and that has been absolutely critical to their engagements up in the Borno State and into an emerging area of North-west Nigeria that we’re seeing al-Qaida starting to make some inroads in.”
He stressed the need for intelligence sharing, adding that it, “we stay fully engaged with the Government of Nigeria to provide them an understanding of what these terrorists are doing, what Boko Haram is doing, what ISIS-West Africa is doing, and how ISIS and Al-Qaida are looking to expand further south into the littoral areas.”
“We see them come back into Africa and engage more in Africa, we see them exploit other grievances and other divides.
“So we see them being very resilient, creative, and flexible. So I’d ask all of the partners, all of our partners, not to underestimate the threat and not to underestimate what they’re capable of doing and that they are very patient and that they are willing to look for opportunities as they emerge.
“You can’t just say ‘we’ve defeated them,’ you have to continue to address weaknesses and places where these terrorist groups can– that they can exploit.
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