Jeremy Keenan

Terror in the Sahara: the implications of US imperialism for North & West Africa

Whichever way one looks at it, the Sahara has now become an extremely dangerous place. If one believes all that has been said and written on events in the Sahara by US and other (notably Algerian) military intelligence and associated government agencies and the media since early 2003, then the Sahara-Sahel region of Africa has become a front line in the ‘War on Terror’. If that is the case, the inability of the security forces to apprehend the key terrorists, notably the GSPC (Groupe Salafiste pour la Pre´dication et le Combat) under the leadership of their supposed emir Abderrezak Lamari (aka Amari Saifi but generally known as El Para after his stint as a parachutist in the Algerian army), would suggest that the current US administration and its military, which now has special forces and ‘contractors’ fanned out across the region and whose intelligence and operational services have the region under more or less total satellite, air and ground surveillance, is remarkably inept – something which should no longer surprise us in the light of their debacles in Afghanistan and Iraq. If, on the other hand, and as now seems increasingly likely, the Sahara has been made the arena of an elaborate intelligence deception, then the danger to the local populations and the security threat presented by the seemingly inevitable ‘blowback’ from this operation to other regions, notably West Africa, North Africa and Europe itself, is probably even greater.

Security & insecurity in North Africa

The article analyses the North African security situation over the last 15 or so years, but especially since the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington, which provided the pre-emptive basis for the launch of Washingtons global ‘War on Terror’. The article explains how and why the US, in collaboration with its lead ally in the region, Algeria, and with the cognisance of France and other European powers, duplicitously fabricated a new front in the ‘war on terror’ across the Sahara and Sahel, bringing an entirely new dimension to the nature and meaning of ‘terrorism’ in North Africa. Far from furthering political stability, security and democracy, as the Bush administration has proclaimed, Washingtons attempt to establish itself as the elite power in the region has taken North Africa and most of the Sahel into a dangerous spiral of increased authoritarianism and repression, increased regional instability and insecurity, increased popular resentment of both Washington and the regimes of the region and the increased threat of militant extremism. The article shows how the US has not been able to get its own way willy-nilly in the region, but has instead found itself running up against a whole raft of pressures and conflicts, many of its own making, which reflect both existing and new forms of political opposition and organisation. In focusing on labour and resource issues, especially those connected with oil and gas production, the article highlights the links between abundant oil, rents and the aggrandizement of the authoritarian state at the expense of autonomous civil society. The article concludes by suggesting that the US is unable to maintain its power and position in North Africa as a result of what is turning into a classic case of imperial over-reach.

Uranium Goes Critical in Niger: Tuareg RebellionsThreaten Sahelian Conflagration

The article analyses the causes and implications of the ongoing Tuareg rebellions in Niger and Mali. While the larger and more widespread rebellion in Niger is generally attributed to the Niger Tuaregs demands for a greater and more equitable share of the countrys uranium revenues, the article reveals that both rebellions, while centering on grievances associated with marginalisation, indigenous land rights and the exploitation of mineral resources, are far more complex. Other key elements are the continuing impact on the region of the global war on terror; competing imperialisms and sub‐imperialisms; the associated interests of multinational mining companies; environmental threats and the interests of international drug‐traffickers. The article also details the human rights abuses inflicted on the civilian populations in both Niger and Mali by the recently US‐trained militaries.

Waging war on terror: The implications of America's ‘New Imperialism’ for Saharan peoples

This article explains how and why the US administration and its allies in the region, notably Algeria, launched a new Saharan-Sahelian front in the global ‘war on terror’ in 2002–03. It argues that the justification for launching and maintaining this front was based on a massive deception involving the fabrication of ‘terrorist incidents’ in the Sahara by the military intelligence services of the countries involved. The deception, while beneficial to Algerias authoritarian and military-backed regime, was designed primarily to create the ideological conditions for the expansion of US imperialist interests in Africa, notably the securing of US strategic national resources. The article follows the course of this ‘war’ in the Sahara-Sahel from its inception in 2002–03 until the present. In so doing it examines the nature of ‘intelligence’, the role of the media in perpetrating the deception and the wider implications of the ‘war’ for the peoples of the regions that have been most involved.

The lesser gods of the Sahara

Abstract Following a highly publicised expedition in the 1950s, the Tassili-n-Ajjer mountains of the Central Sahara (Algeria) were presented to the world as ‘the greatest museum of prehistoric art in the whole world’. Many of the claims of the expeditions leader, Henri Lhote, were misleading. A number of the paintings were faked, and the copying process was fraught with errors. The ‘discovery’ can only be understood within the political and cultural context of the time, namely the Algerian Revolution, Frances attempt to partition Algeria, and the prevailing views of the Abbé Breuil, the archadvocate of foreign influence in African rock art. The expeditions methods caused extensive damage to the rock art while the accompanying looting of cultural objects effectively sterilized the archaeological landscape. Any restitution process must necessarily include a full recognition of what was done and the inappropriateness of those values.

The lesser gods of the Sahara: social change and contested terrain amongst the Tuareg of Algeria

1. From Tit (1902) to Tahilahi (2002) - A Reconsideration of the Impact of and Resistance to French Pacification and Colonial Rule by the Tuareg of Algeria (the Northern Tuareg) 2. Ethnicity, Regionalism and Political Stability in Algerias Grand Sud 3. Dressing for the Occasion - Changes in the Symbolic Meanings of the Tuareg Veil 4. The End of the Matriline? The Changing Roles of Women and Descent amongst the Algerian Tuareg 5. The Last Nomads - Nomadism among the Tuareg of Ahaggar (Algerian Sahara) 6. The Lesser Gods of the Sahara 7. Contested Terrain - The Threat of Mass Tourism to the Environment and Cultural Heritage of Algerias Saharan Regions

North Africa: Power, politics & promise

It is six years since this journal dedicated an issue to power and politics in North Africa. Number 82 in 1999 explored the significance of North Africa which is often seen to be different from the rest of the continent and also why the region is integral to it. It looked at themes of economic reform, stalled political liberalisation and failed transition to independence for Western Sahara. Many of the contemporary themes most pressing for peoples in North Africa remain the same. There have also been several alarming new developments notably around issues of labour, security and resources. In short, imperialist aggression and militarisation that we have witnessed in Iraq is also evident in its accelerated build-up in North Africa stretching from Western Sahara east to Djibouti.

Funerary Monuments and Horse Paintings: A Preliminary Report on the Archaeology of a Site in the Tagant Region of South East Mauritania - Near Dhar Tichitt

A preliminary expedition to record new rock art sites in the Tagant region of the Mauritanian Sahara led to the (re)discovery of previously unpublished stone-walled habitation and what are thought to be rectangular funerary monuments, built substantially and in profusion along the length of the sandstone ridge, Guilemsi. Paintings in cliffs below the top of the ridge depict antelope, giraffe, cattle and mounted horses, as well as camels, handprints and Tifinagh inscriptions. This article reports the findings at this site, and looks briefly at the possible authorship of the paintings and the culture of stone-walling. Some of the horse paintings are ‘bi-triangular’, and bear a striking resemblance to those photographed by two of us (Coulson and Campbell) some 3,500 km further east in Chad.