Mass atrocities, forced displacement, public executions: terror. It has been a fact of life in parts of Africa’s Sahel region since extremists gained a foothold in Mali in 2012 and then spread their reach beyond its borders.

Despite efforts by regional security forces and global partners, the violence shows no sign of stopping. By the end of 2021, there was an 18 per cent increase in violent events and a 14 per cent decrease in fatalities compared to the record-setting violence of 2020 in the Sahel, according to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), which documents violence across the globe.

Much of the violence was attributed to the al-Qaida-affiliated Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) coalition of militant Islamist groups, including the Macina Liberation Front (FLM), which originated in central Mali. The Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) also is active.

Fatalities linked to JNIM in 2021 were expected to increase over 2020. By the end of June 2021, reported fatalities attributed to FLM through battles with security forces and other militant groups already had passed their 2020 level and were on track to double.

In Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, military pressure had forced ISGS and JNIM from some areas, but the groups continued committing atrocities in more remote locations, sometimes spilling into neighboring countries and occasionally battling each other.

Other terrorist groups operating in the Sahel include Ansar al-Dine, established in 2011 by Iyad Ag Ghali, the central leader of the 1990 rebellion in Mali, and Ansaroul Islam, considered Burkina Faso’s first Islamist terror group.

The number of militants killed in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger during offensive military operations from early 2020 through mid-June 2021 was estimated at more than 1,400, according to ACLED.

Insurgencies often thrive in areas of political upheaval. This has been the case in Mali where, in June 2021, the country experienced its second military coup in nine months. Repeated JNIM and ISGS attacks on Malian forces through the first half of the year only made the country’s security situation worse.

The first half of 2021 was deadly for Malian forces. JNIM killed 10 Soldiers in February during an ambush in the southern-central town of Boni, and ISGS attacked a convoy in the eastern town of Tessit in March, killing at least 33 troops.

In December 2020, a European effort called Task Force Takuba arrived in northern Mali with the first troops coming from France and Estonia; Czech and Swedish forces arrived soon thereafter, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.

French President Emmanuel Macron in July 2021 announced that he would end Operation Barkhane, which began after France initiated a military intervention in 2013. Macron also closed three military bases in Mali and reduced by half the number of French troops in the Sahel.

Other international security operations in Mali since 2013 include the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in Mali, which has supported political processes and performed security-related duties, and the European Union Training Mission Mali (EUTM), which works to strengthen the Malian Armed Forces.

By October 2021, Mali reportedly was close to reaching a deal that would deploy 1,000 members of Russia’s Wagner Group to the country to counter terrorism and insecurity. The notoriously brutal mercenaries operate in several countries on the continent and have a track record of human rights abuses and self-enrichment.

In Niger, the Tillabéri region continued to be a hot spot for attacks by ISGS, JNIM and armed bandits.

In January 2021, jihadist gunmen killed 100 people in Tchoma Bangou and Zaroumadareye. The villages are about 120 kilometres north of Niger’s capital, Niamey, in the Tillabéri region that borders Mali and Burkina Faso.

In a public meeting of federal, regional and local leaders in the town of Ouallam, Gen. Mahamadou Abou Tarka said Tillabéri’s border with Mali allows extremists virtually unfettered access to the region.

“The difficulties of guaranteeing peace in an area like that of northern Tillabéri comes from the fact that it is a border area open to Mali, where the government has unfortunately disappeared,” said Tarka, who serves as president of Niger’s High Authority for the Consolidation of Peace. “We must seek them out, pursue them relentlessly in their base in Mali, annihilate them, deny them the ground.”

To win this battle against extremism, he said, the military, local leadership and the public must work hand in hand.

“The armed forces need the knowledge that the administration has of communities,” he said. “Consultation between the military and the governor, between the military and the prefects, must be permanent.”

ISGS is by far the most active terrorist group in Niger. In the first half of 2021, the number of people ISGS killed accounted for 66 per cent of all deaths from organised political violence and about 79 per cent of the fatalities from violence targeting civilians, according to ACLED.

ISGS also has left a trail of devastation in Burkina Faso, where the terrorists are known to cut off the hands of suspected thieves, perform public executions and recruit children. Since 2018, the country has experienced a sharp increase in attacks against security forces and civilians.

On June 4, 2021, gunmen, mostly children ages 12 to 14, raided the village of Solhan in northeast Burkina Faso, killing more than 160 people and burning homes.

Fighting between ISGS and JNIM, along with the efforts of French and G5 Sahel Joint Force security forces, has weakened ISGS in the country’s Sahel, Centre-Nord and Est regions. The group has switched operations to the Seno province in southern Burkina Faso and the eastern Oudalan province.

JNIM attempts to maintain compliance and regulate social conduct through less deadly means, including intimidation through threats, beatings and kidnappings in areas the group controls, according to ACLED.

In November 2020, however, JNIM responded to the deployment of troops in the northeastern town of Mansila by imposing an embargo on the town and placing improvised explosive devices along surrounding roads.

Through the first half of 2021, extremist groups killed 66 volunteer militiamen, and, in November, an attack near a gold mine in Inata killed 49 military police.

As of May 2021, more than 1.1 million Burkinabe civilians were internally displaced, compared with 560,000 at the beginning of 2020, according to the US Agency for International Development.

• A Tell report