Senegal Is On The Brink: The IMF, The World Bank, And The Debt Crisis That Imperils West Africa

BY HANNAH NRAE ARMSTRONG AND JOHN MCINTIRE

W est Africa is reeling. Over the past five years, coups have racked Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, and the juntas now in charge are dismantling the countries’ institutions. Even as they repress their subjects, they are losing territory to emboldened insurgents. And as these insurgent groups become more entrenched in the central Sahel, they are beginning to threaten the coastal states of Benin, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, and Togo.

But amid this upheaval, Senegal remains a democracy in which strong institutions mostly govern capably. The country possesses skilled civil servants with track records of transparent, efficient fiscal management. In 2024, Senegal faced a severe political crisis when the outgoing administration resisted leaving power, but an independent Constitutional Council and an engaged civil society prevented an unconstitutional postponement of elections. Senegal is essentially the only major country in Francophone West Africa whose government remains accountable to its citizens; its stability telegraphs to its neighbors that democratic rule is both desirable and achievable.

Now, however, Senegal is grappling with its own existential threat. On a single day in February 2025, the country went from being considered one of Africa’s most stable economies to one of its most vulnerable after the discovery that President Diomaye Faye’s predecessor, Macky Sall, had hidden extensive debt. The country’s debt-to-GDP ratio has since soared from under 75 percent to over 132 percent. Amid a recent fallout between the country’s top two political leaders, Senegal is attempting to negotiate a new program with the International Monetary Fund. Without help, Senegal could default.

A little support in the form of debt relief from the IMF and the World Bank would quickly help restore balance. A punishing debt burden, on the other hand, would sap resources for badly needed public services, infrastructure, and economic development initiatives. Beyond weakening Senegal’s governing capabilities, such an outcome would create new political and security vulnerabilities throughout West Africa at precisely the moment when Russia is trying to exploit disorder to recruit new proxies.

HIDDEN FIGURES

Over the past five years, military regimes seized power in the central Sahel states, Côte d’Ivoire elected an 83-year-old fourth-term president who banned opposition candidates from running, and Togo pushed through constitutional reforms to keep a two-decade-old dynasty in power. But Senegal managed to remain stable and accountable. In 2024, civil society actors and an independent judiciary drew on what the political scientists Ibrahima Fall and Catherine Lena Kelly describe as Senegal’s democratic “muscle memory”—decades of mobilizing to defend checks and balances—to ensure elections proceeded on schedule. A duo of youthful reformers (Faye and the fiery Ousmane Sanko, who now serves as speaker of the National Assembly) defeated Sall’s handpicked candidate in a decisive first-round victory.

And until February 2025, Senegal’s economic outlook was mostly sunny, having enjoyed a strong recovery after the COVID pandemic. In recent decades, Senegal has expanded access to quality public services, closed the gender gap in school enrollment, and significantly reduced infant mortality rates. New hydrocarbon projects were expected to allow for increased government investments in roads, energy, and water.

But when Faye took over from Sall, his government commissioned an independent audit of state finances to establish the extent of Senegal’s public debt amid rumors of anomalies. The audit’s findings, published on February 12, 2025, came as a shock: they revealed an estimated $7 billion to $13 billion in unreported debt incurred between 2019 and 2023. It became clear that over the course of his second term, Sall had significantly boosted government borrowing and spending as he pursued an unconstitutional third term, all while intentionally misreporting debt figures in legally mandated public accounting to Senegal’s parliament.

The huge debt had gone unnoticed because Senegal’s presidency and finance ministry had hidden it from the National Assembly, the IMF, and the World Bank by keeping unrecorded loans off the books. But the latter two institutions played a role in the accrual of the illegal debt. Since the 1990s, the IMF and the World Bank have been long-term development partners for Senegal, making substantial technical and financial commitments intended to promote growth and reduce poverty. The most recent were a $1.8 billion loan package from the IMF and $300 million in budget support from the World Bank. At that point, these institutions had enough material evidence to discern anomalies, yet they kept financing Sall’s government.

Under Senegal’s program with the IMF, the multilateral lender would have had full electronic access to the government’s fiscal and financial data, enabling it to closely monitor financial activity. Senegalese authorities were required to provide electronic reporting every three to six months, often giving the IMF more detailed oversight of the government’s finances than the country’s own parliament enjoys. Such a discrepancy is reprehensible but by no means unusual. Members of parliament and ministry officials across Africa often appeal to World Bank officials for more detailed information about government finances than their own finance ministry provides.

Red flags appeared in Senegal’s reporting to the IMF as early as June 2021, according to IMF biannual reviews that showed that Dakar had requested modifying performance criteria regarding borrowing and fiscal balance; one review in June 2022 even waived the performance criteria altogether. By the summer of 2023, as Sall faced growing public demands that he step down when his term ended, the IMF would already have flagged serious reporting inconsistencies. But despite the IMF’s substantial access to Senegalese records (and, no doubt, misled by reporting that mixed legitimate data with alleged falsifications and significant omissions), the IMF and the World Bank gave Senegal extra money in 2023: in May, the World Bank greenlighted an extra $300 million in budget support to maintain essential public services, and in June, the IMF approved a new $1.8 billion loan package for Dakar, disbursing $279 million immediately.

Sall likely used the June 2023 disbursement as implicit collateral to convince other lenders, such as the West African Economic and Monetary Union’s regional debt market, to keep loaning him more money. Senegalese authorities submitted internal documents to the IMF in the second half of 2023 that clearly showed overborrowing. In its public December 2023 program review, the IMF identified that a financing “shift” had occurred in Senegal between 2023 and 2024, but it claimed the shift constituted “a debt management operation with no material impact” on Senegal’s debt level.

At best, the IMF failed to carry out the supervision that is essential to its role. At worst, it was pressured to ramp up lending to try to help Sall stay in power. There is some evidence for the latter in the highly anomalous way that the IMF’s reporting acknowledged and rationalized overfinancing, tarting it up as “precautionary liquidity buffers.” Western partners, and France in particular, certainly had reasons for preferring Sall over Faye and Sonko. Sall was a solid Western ally, whereas Faye and Sonko were campaigning on a sovereigntist platform and threatening to leave the French-backed regional currency. At a time when France was rapidly losing African allies to Russia, keeping Senegal close would have been a strong priority.

A DEBT BOMB DETONATES

The IMF and the World Bank are pushing Dakar for talks about restructuring. Yet they have not undertaken efforts to adjust Senegal’s debt service payments or investigate their own roles in exacerbating the crisis; they have merely asked Senegal to create a unified debt directorate and are waiting for the credit crunch to force it to the table. Meanwhile, Sall’s successors, Faye and Sonko, have been harshly punished for the sins of his regime. Senegal’s mushrooming debt problem has hovered over their administration, compelling them to abandon promises to lower electricity and fuel prices, freeze funding for dozens of planned infrastructure projects, impose austerity measures (such as reducing health-care spending by nearly 20 percent), and scramble for new financing.

Worse, the debt crisis has driven a wedge between the reformist duo. Sonko has taken a sovereigntist line and advocated against restructuring the debt (without laying out a convincing alternative), while Faye has preferred to negotiate with the IMF. In May, this dispute blew up their alliance. Faye sacked Sonko from his prime minister role; Sonko resumed his parliamentary seat and was elected the body’s president, with 132 out of 165 members of parliament voting for him. The resulting institutional crisis has pitted Senegal’s executive against its legislature. The latter has the authority to block any budget legislation or debt-restructuring framework that the presidency tries to pass. Sonko warned in June that even if Senegal enters “a crisis involving the dissolution of parliament … there will never be an agreement with the IMF.”

As Senegal’s executive and parliamentary branches remain in a deadlock, the country’s debt continues to grow and the options to address it narrow. The deadlock, however, also reflects the strength and independence of Senegalese institutions, which are nourished by a steady stream of inclusive debate. It highlights the health of a democracy that has been revitalized by a new generation’s participation.

As the leaders of neighboring countries insist that authoritarian rule is necessary to stabilize their countries, Senegal’s democracy stands as a vital rebuttal and applies positive pressure on the citizens and leaders of those countries to seek similar freedoms. Exiled West African civil society leaders often travel to Dakar to pursue graduate degrees, investigate and prepare reports on human rights abuses, and convene conferences on civil liberties. And at a time when West Africa’s rural areas are experiencing deepening abuse and neglect, it is worth noting that these freedoms extend well beyond Senegal’s capital. A few years ago, when Malians and Senegalese people living along the Falémé River mobilized to protest its devastation by gold mining practices, the state responses could not have been more different. Malian forces, siding with miners, beat and detained activists, while Senegal’s Faye issued a decree suspending all mining within 550 yards of the river.

WIN-WIN SOLUTION

Senegal is left with two ugly options: borrow more on worse terms to service its debt or restructure under a new IMF program. Faye is under significant pressure from Sonko’s legislature and the public not to pursue restructuring: the term has acquired a stink, with Sonko calling it a “disgrace.” Restructuring would likely entail highly unpopular measures such as removing fuel subsidies and lowering teachers’ salaries. For many Senegalese people, restructuring recalls the catastrophic structural adjustment programs the IMF imposed on their country in the 1980s and 1990s, which crimped the government’s autonomy and led to cuts in key sectors such as health and education without meaningfully freeing Senegal from cycles of debt and dependence. But in late June, Sonko softened his opposition to restructuring, likely to pave the way for a presidential bid by opening the door for a painful restructuring that will inevitably make Faye look bad.

If Senegal does not restructure its loans, its colossal and criminally acquired debt could crush the economy. Some public salaries are already in arrears, and pensions and energy subsidies could soon face cuts, events that could spark riots and wider unrest. And if the institutional deadlock persists, it could start to erode Senegalese democracy. The IMF already bears some responsibility for the crisis. And now its official insistence on full repayment to creditors is putting Senegal’s macroeconomic stability at risk and undermining the government’s ability to provide health care and education, transition from agriculture to manufacturing, and invest in much-needed public infrastructure.

To pull Senegal back from the brink, Washington should push the IMF and the World Bank to take a significant haircut. Between 2027 and 2031, Senegal is due to pay principal, interest, and fees on its IMF debt amounting to about $891 million; it will owe the World Bank roughly $1.37 billion in debt service over the same period. Taken together, these figures neatly parallel the $2 billion that these institutions lent Senegal in 2023, when it should have been abundantly clear not to. Relief on the approximately $2 billion owed to the IMF and the World Bank could reduce the country’s total external debt service by 16 percent, leaving it with still considerable yet more manageable payments.

The IMF and the World Bank should cancel these payments. These institutions’ principal shareholders, especially Washington and Paris, should urge them to support cancellation and bring other shareholders such as Beijing on board. The IMF and the World Bank likely believe that new oil revenue and increased fiscal pressure (that is, higher taxes and lower fuel subsidies) will allow Senegal to continue to service its debt. They are wrong. Over the past three years, oil revenue has proved disappointing, and much of it may already have been pledged as future sales. Revenues from sharply raising taxes and lowering subsidies will destabilize the country.

Although board members may argue that debt relief sets a bad precedent, the IMF and the World Bank have already helped Argentina on a much bigger scale, and in 2004, the two organizations’ HIPC debt relief initiative, aimed at helping heavily indebted poor countries, granted extensive forgiveness to reduce debt burdens to sustainable levels in Senegal. Canceling Senegal’s debt service would entail trivial losses for these international institutions, which—unlike Senegal—can seek special replenishment from other sources. Beyond assisting Dakar, this relief would benefit Paris and Beijing, its two largest bilateral creditors, by allowing the country to make good on its payments to them. And Paris has an interest in stabilizing Senegal’s debt to prevent a wider contagion. Senegal’s debt crisis threatens the larger regional economic bloc, the West African Economic and Monetary Union, whose shared currency is guaranteed by the French Treasury.

Breathing room would allow Senegal’s leaders to get back to governing and shore up stability in a region that badly needs it. It would also help the IMF and the World Bank retain their reputation for integrity at a moment when such institutions are viewed with increasing skepticism.

Dakar must also launch an investigation into the Senegalese actors responsible for the illegal debt. So far, Faye has declined to do so, likely because he worries his government may have to expose or prosecute political figures whose support he will need in the future. To incentivize Senegal to investigate its own institutions, significant debt relief from international organizations could be made contingent on a public investigation into the illegal debt to ensure a crisis like this cannot happen again and make the country’s institutions even more accountable.

El-Ghassim Wane, a former senior African Union adviser from the Sahel steeped in how good governance helps ward off conflict, noted to us that “the cost of supporting a country that has remained committed to constitutional governance and democratic principles is far lower than the cost of managing instability once it takes hold.” Debt forgiveness would help protect Senegal’s achievements; without it, the country risks falling into a debt trap for years, if not decades. And the region will lose its democratic anchor.

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Why The ‘Streets Of Minneapolis’ Have Echoed With Public Support – Unlike The Campus Of Kent State In 1970

Ohio National Guardsmen on the Kent State University campus prepare to disperse student protesters on May 4, 1970. Troops later opened fire on students, killing four. Howard Ruffner/Getty Images

BY GREGORY P. MAGARIAN

THOMAS AND KAROLE GREEN

PROFESSOR OF LAW, WASHINGTON 

UNIVERSITY IN ST. LOUIS

The president announces an aggressive, controversial policy. Large groups of protesters take to the streets. Government agents open fire and kill protesters.

All of these events, familiar from Minneapolis in 2026, also played out at Ohio’s Kent State University in 1970. In my academic writing about the First Amendment, I have described Kent State as a key moment when the government silenced free speech.

In Minneapolis, free speech has weathered the crisis better, as seen in the protests themselves, the public’s responses – and even the protest songs the two events inspired.

Protests and shootings, then and now

In 1970, President Richard Nixon announced he had expanded the Vietnam War by bombing Cambodia. Student anti-war protests, already fervent, intensified.

In Ohio, Gov. James Rhodes deployed the National Guard to quell protests at Kent State University. Monday, May 4, saw a large midday protest on the main campus commons. Students exercised their First Amendment rights by chanting and shouting at the Guard troops, who dispersed protesters with tear gas before regrouping on a nearby hill.

With the nearest remaining protesters 20 yards from the Guard troops and most more than 60 yards away, 28 guardsmen inexplicably fired on students, killing four students and wounding nine others.

After the killings, the government sought to shift blame to the slain students. Nixon stated: “When dissent turns to violence, it invites tragedy.”

Minneapolis in 2026 presents vivid parallels.

As part of a sweeping campaign to deport undocumented immigrants, President Donald Trump in early January 2026 deployed armed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection agents to Minneapolis.

With the nearest remaining protesters 20 yards from the Guard troops and most more than 60 yards away, 28 guardsmen inexplicably fired on students, killing four students and wounding nine others.

After the killings, the government sought to shift blame to the slain students. Nixon stated: “When dissent turns to violence, it invites tragedy.”

Minneapolis in 2026 presents vivid parallels.

As part of a sweeping campaign to deport undocumented immigrants, President Donald Trump in early January 2026 deployed armed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection agents to Minneapolis.

Many residents protested, exercising their First Amendment rights by using smartphones and whistles to record and call out what they saw as ICE and CBP abuses. On Jan. 7, 2026, an ICE agent shot and killed activist Renee Good in her car. On Jan. 24, two CBP agents shot and killed protester Alex Pretti on the street.

The government sought to blame Good and Pretti for their own killings.

Different public reactions

After Kent State, amid bitter conservative opposition to student protesters, most Americans blamed the fallen students for their deaths. When students in New York City protested the Kent State shootings, construction workers attacked and beat the students in what became known as the “hard hat riot.” Afterward, Nixon hosted construction union leaders at the White House, where they gave him an honorary hard hat.

In contrast, most Americans believe the Trump administration has used excessive force in Minneapolis. Majorities both oppose the federal agents’ actions against protesters and approve of protesting and recording the agents.

The public response to Minneapolis has made a difference. The Trump administration has announced an end to its immigration crackdown in the Twin Cities. Trump has backed off attacks on Good and Pretti. Congressional opposition to ICE funding has grown. Overall public support for Trump and his policies has fallen.

Free speech in protests, recordings and songs

What has caused people to view the killings in Minneapolis so differently from Kent State? One big factor, I believe, is how free speech has shaped the public response.

The Minneapolis protests themselves have sent the public a more focused message than what emerged from the student protests against the Vietnam War.

Anti-war protests in 1970 targeted military action on the other side of the world. Organizers had to plan and coordinate through in-person meetings and word of mouth. Student protesters needed the institutional news media to convey their views to the public.

In contrast, the anti-ICE protests in Minneapolis target government action at the protesters’ doorsteps. Organizers can use local networks and social media to plan, coordinate and communicate directly with the public. The protests have succeeded in deepening public opposition to ICE.

In addition, the American people have witnessed the Minneapolis shootings.

Kent State produced a famous photograph of a surviving student’s anguish but only hazy, chaotic video of the shootings.

In contrast, widely circulated video evidence showed the Minneapolis killings in horrifying detail. Within days of each shooting, news organizations had compiled detailed visual timelines, often based on recordings by protesters and observers, that sharply contradicted government accounts of what happened to Good and Pretti.

Finally, consider two popular protest songs that emerged from Kent State and Minneapolis: Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s “Ohio” and Bruce Springsteen’s “Streets of Minneapolis.”

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young recorded, pressed and released “Ohio” with remarkable speed for 1970. The vinyl single reached record stores and radio stations on June 4, a month after the Kent State shootings. The song peaked at No. 14 on the Billboard chart two months later.

Neil Young’s lyrics described the Kent State events in mythic terms, warning of “tin soldiers” and telling young Americans: “We’re finally on our own.” Young did not describe the shootings in detail. The song does not name Kent State, the National Guard or the fallen students. Instead, it presents the events as symbolic of a broader generational conflict over the Vietnam War.

Springsteen released “Streets of Minneapolis” on Jan. 28, 2026 – just four days after CBP agents killed Pretti. Two days later, the song topped streaming charts worldwide.

The internet and social media let Springsteen document Minneapolis, almost in real time, for a mass audience. Springsteen’s lyrics balance symbolism with specificity, naming not just “King Trump” but also victims Pretti and Good, key Trump officials Stephen Miller and Kristi Noem, main Minneapolis artery Nicollet Avenue, and the protesters’ “whistles and phones,” before fading on a chant of “ICE out!”

Critics offer compelling arguments that 21st-century mass communication degrades social relationships, elections and culture. In Minneapolis, disinformation has muddied crucial facts about the protests and killings.

At the same time, Minneapolis has shown how networked communication can promote free speech. Through focused protests, recordings of government action, and viral popular culture, today’s public can get fuller, clearer information to help critically assess government actions.

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The Forgotten Victims Of The Conflict In The Western DRC

M23 fighters walk down a street in Bukavu. (Photo: AFP)

BY COLIN DELFOSSE

In western Democratic Republic of Congo, clashes between the Teke and Yaka communities have spiraled into violence carried out by Mobondo militias. Deployed in 2022, the Congolese army is now struggling to protect civilians in a conflict that has largely gone unnoticed.

Along the strip of asphalt stretching 150 kilometers west toward the Congolese capital, the red berets of Colonel Matambwe march through the small town of Bankana with local youth. The health march was organized "against tribalism and to encourage dialogue between civilians and the military," explained the officer from the Republican Guard – the elite unit in charge of protecting President Félix Tshisekedi.

Since March, fighting has lessened in this region, torn apart by three years of violence between the Teke and Yaka communities. The Congolese armed forces, which were deployed in 2022 to contain the attacks, have been ordered to stop pursuing the Mobondo, grassroots militias mainly recruiting from the Yaka community, who are responsible for attacks on civilians. Yet this conflict, fueled by customary disputes and responsible for several hundred deaths, is far from being resolved.

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South Africa In World War 3

BY VINESH SELVAN

IN RECENT years, we have seen periodic global conflicts, with the potential of triggering the start of World War 3. One of the most notable conflicts was between Russia and Ukraine, which started in 2014 and escalated in 2022. Russia made military advances to achieve political gain, while Ukraine, with a smaller military force, conjured international support to counter the invasion.

The West offered support in the form of supply of arms and munitions, intelligence and military training to civilian volunteers through private military contractors. During the escalation of the war in 2022, a few South Africans of Indian origin were studying in Ukraine fell part of the fleeing masses into neighbouring Poland.

Another notable and more recent conflict, was between India and Pakistan. A conflict where each country, became a proxy to test global player’s military hardware head-to-head. While both countries have been involved in a long-standing conflict, since the India-Pakistan partition. The recent conflict has been a focus on the use of drones and other airborne attacks, to get the other to expose their air defence systems along its border region. In the event of a full-scale war, knowing the enemy’s air defence systems locations would place one at an advantage in terms of air superiority.

Needless to say, the propaganda machines also kicked into gear, driving patriotism towards each nationality, with the incitement of the layman into much of the social media propaganda war. Sadly, extremist from both sides have settled in South Africa, sowing division within our local Indian community, with the hope of driving their foreign-based political agenda. This conflict was quickly defused with the intervention of the United States for a ceasefire agreement.

The current conflict between Iran and Israel has placed global powers on the edge as these 2 nuclear-armed countries attack each other with ballistic missiles. With each regional conflict, we see global players changing sides and forming new coalitions, with each conflict depending on the country’s political narrative.

One needs to examine the driving forces behind these conflicts, identify the global architects, and understand their economic and political agendas. Most global political leaders get elected into office, backed by big businesses to advance their economic interests; this is visible from a historical and present-day perspective. Since the early 16th century, the British had aspirations to expand their empire for economic gain and, as a result, had a huge part to play in the India-Pakistan division and the creation of Israel that led to the Palestine and Israel conflict. The British were responsible for creating a homeland for European Jews in Palestine at the end of World War 1.

The Jews were persecuted in Europe, and without the consultation of the Palestinian people, the British created a homeland and mass-migrated them into Palestine. Note: Palestine prior to World War 1 consisted of Jews, Christians and Muslims who cohabited in relative harmony in the region before Britain's interference. The British have also failed to address the global displacement of Indians under indentured labour. Today Indians in all post-colonial countries struggle as minorities, as they are seen as soft targets and become victims of race-based riots. Indo-Guyanese experienced rioting in 1962; Indo-Fijians suffered violence and unrest as large numbers of Indians were attacked in 1987; and the South Africans of Indian origin suffered violence in 3 riots, namely in the 1949 and 1985 Inanda riots and the latest in the KZN 2021 riots.

The British have failed to take responsibility for Indians who were displaced by indentured labour by making provision for a homeland to accommodate these marginalised and discriminated communities. An application was submitted to the British High Commission on the 20th of February 2023 by a small group of activists to address the matter, but they opted to ignore the application. The hope is to move these small displaced communities into a single region, where they will become a sizable community within the nation’s population and no longer become targets of unrest and violence.

Today much of the conflict in and around the Middle East region is driven by access to oil reserves, where the incitement of war destroys democracies to replace governments with puppets to gain access to natural resources. The greatest curse to the Middle East is its oil reserves. Warfare has changed drastically since the last world war. With advanced technology weapons systems, precise target strikes, and the availability of large defence budgets, global leaders exercise their might on smaller divided nations with rich natural resources.

A World War 3 will see a significantly higher displacement of people globally and mass destruction with major cities being destroyed.Another threat factor to consider is operatives who opted to settle in foreign countries as migrants during peace times. Most countries have taken advantage of this opportunity to station covert operatives to gather intelligence and establish structures within potential enemy countries. This network will destabilise and carry out acts of sabotage during an armed conflict. With the number of countries possessing nuclear weapons, a nuclear war will have a detrimental effect ecologically on the earth and on humanity as compared to previous world wars.

After a nuclear explosive has been detonated, the presence of radioactivity remains in the region for decades, impacting humans, animals and the environment, as seen with Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Chernobyl disaster in Russia that took place about 40 years ago still poses a radioactive threat to the environment. While South Africa is neither a nuclear threat nor has distinctive long-term enemies with nuclear arms, it’s unlikely for the country to suffer a nuclear attack or be a region for World War conflict, but battlefields changes as wars progresses. What poses a concern if a nuclear war breaks out, is a possible influx of refugees into South Africa escaping disaster from their conflict regions.

Our challenge would be dealing with victims exposed to radioactive material wanting to enter the country. We can expect various documented and undocumented means by air, sea or by simple border crossings to reach our shores. These refugees are most likely to head towards major cosmopolitan areas, thereby increasing the probability of contaminating large masses of the local populace.

South Africa will have to have a military contingency plan in place under the South African National Defence Force and exercise a high alert in terms of border control at the outbreak of the war. Establishing refugee camps in remote parts of the country is necessary to quarantine and prevent further contamination. The big question is? Does South Africa have the defence budget or the intellectual capabilities to counter such a threat?

Vinesh Selvan is a military historian and a former Soldier of the South African National Defence Force. He also served as business development executive within the South African Arms Industry. Selvan is currently documenting the military participation of Indians in South Africa spanning from the Anglo-Boer War to present day.

From Kent State To Los Angeles, Using Armed Forces To Police Civilians Is A High-Risk Strategy

Smoke and tear gas surround a protester in Los Angeles on June 7, 2025, amid confrontations between immigration rights advocates and law enforcement personnel. Taurat Hossain/Anadolu via Getty Images

BY BRIAN VANDEMARK

PROFESSOR OF HISTORY,

US NAVAL ACADEMY

Responding to street protests in Los Angeles against federal immigration enforcement raids, President Donald Trump ordered 2,000 soldiers from the California National Guard into the city on June 7, 2025, to protect agents carrying out the raids. Trump also authorized the Pentagon to dispatch regular U.S. troops “as necessary” to support the California National Guard.

The president’s orders did not specify rules of engagement about when and how force could be used. California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who did not request the National Guard and asserted it was not needed, criticized the president’s decision as “inflammatory” and warned it “will only escalate tensions.”

I am a historian who has written several books about the Vietnam War, one of the most divisive episodes in our nation’s past. My recent book, “Kent State: An American Tragedy,” examines a historic clash on May 4, 1970, between anti-war protesters and National Guard troops at Kent State University in Ohio.

The confrontation escalated into violence: troops opened fire on the demonstrators, killing four students and wounding nine others, including one who was paralyzed for life.

In my view, dispatching California National Guard troops against civilian protesters in Los Angeles chillingly echoes decisions and actions that led to the tragic Kent State shooting. Some active-duty units, as well as National Guard troops, are better prepared today than in 1970 to respond to riots and violent protests – but the vast majority of their training and their primary mission remains to fight, to kill, and to win wars.

Federalizing the Guard

The National Guard is a force of state militias under the command of governors. It can be federalized by the president during times of national emergency, or for deployment on combat missions overseas. Guardsmen train for one weekend per month and two weeks every summer.

Typically, the Guard has been deployed to deal with natural disasters and support local police responses to urban unrest. Examples include riots in Detroit in 1967, Washington DC in 1968, Los Angeles in 1965 and 1992, and Minneapolis and other cities in 2020 after the death of George Floyd.

Presidents rarely deploy National Guard troops without state governors’ consent. The main modern exceptions occurred in the 1950s and 1960s during the Civil Rights Movement, when Southern governors defied federal court orders to desegregate schools in Arkansas, Mississippi and Alabama. In each case, the federal government sent troops to protect Black students from crowds of white protesters.

The 1807 Insurrection Act grants presidents authority to use active-duty troops or National Guard forces to restore order within the United States. President Trump did not invoke the Insurrection Act. Instead, he relied on Section 12406 of Title 10 of the U.S. Code, a narrower federal statute that allows the president to mobilize the National Guard in situations including “rebellion or danger of a rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States.”

Trump did not limit his order to Los Angeles. He authorized armed forces to protect immigration enforcement operations at any “locations where protests against these functions are occurring or are likely to occur.”

The standoff at Kent State

The war in Vietnam had grown increasingly unpopular by early 1970, but protests intensified on April 30 when President Richard Nixon authorized expanding the conflict into Cambodia. At Kent State, after a noontime anti-war rally on campus on May 1, alcohol-fueled students harassed passing motorists in town and smashed storefront windows that night. On May 2, anti-war protesters set fire to the building where military officers trained Kent State students enrolled in the armed forces’ Reserve Officer Training Corps program.

In response, Republican Governor Jim Rhodes dispatched National Guard troops, against the advice of university and many local officials, who understood the mood in the town of Kent and on campus far better than Rhodes did. County prosecutor Ron Kane had vehemently warned Rhodes that deploying the National Guard could spark conflict and lead to fatalities.

Nonetheless, Rhodes – who was trailing in an impending Republican primary for a U.S. Senate seat – struck the pose of a take-charge leader who wasn’t going to be pushed around by a long-haired rabble. “We’re going to put a stop to this!” he shouted, pounding the table at a press conference in Kent on May 3.

Hundreds of National Guard troops were deployed across town and on campus. University officials announced that further rallies were banned. Nonetheless, on May 4, some 2,000 to 3,000 students gathered on the campus Commons for another anti-war rally. They were met by 96 National Guardsmen, led by eight officers.

There was confrontation in the air as student anger over Nixon’s expansion of the war blended with resentment over the Guard’s presence. Protesters chanted antiwar slogans, shouted epithets at the Guardsmen and made obscene gestures.

‘Fire in the air!’

The Guardsmen sent to Kent State had no training in de-escalating tension or minimizing the use of force. Nonetheless, their commanding officer that day, Ohio Army National Guard Assistant Adjutant General Robert Canterbury, decided to use them to break up what the Department of Justice later deemed a legal assembly.

In my view, it was a reckless judgment that inflamed an already volatile situation. Students started showering the greatly outnumbered Guardsmen with rocks and other objects. In violation of Ohio Army National Guard regulations, Canterbury neglected to warn the students that he had ordered Guardsmens’ rifles loaded with live ammunition.

As tension mounted, Canterbury failed to adequately supervise his increasingly fearful troops – a cardinal responsibility of the commanding officer on the scene. This fundamental failure of leadership increased confusion and resulted in a breakdown of fire control discipline – officers’ responsibility to maintain tight control over their troops’ discharge of weapons.

When protesters neared the Guardsmen, platoon sergeant Mathew McManus shouted “Fire in the air!” in a desperate attempt to prevent bloodshed. McManus intended for troops to shoot above the students’ heads to warn them off. But some Guardsmen, wearing gas masks that made it hard to hear amid the noise and confusion, only heard or reacted to the first word of McManus’ order, and fired at the students.

The troops had not been trained to fire warning shots, which was contrary to National Guard regulations. And McManus had no authority to issue an order to fire if officers were nearby, as they were.

Many National Guardsmen who were at Kent State on May 4 later questioned why they had been deployed there. “Loaded rifles and fixed bayonets are pretty harsh solutions for students exercising free speech on an American campus,” one of them told an oral history interviewer. Another plaintively asked me in a 2023 interview, “Why would you put soldiers trained to kill on a university campus to serve a police function?”

A fighting force

National Guard equipment and training have improved significantly in the decades since Kent State. But Guardsmen are still military troops who are fundamentally trained to fight, not to control crowds.

In 2020, then-National Guard Bureau Chief General Joseph Lengyel told reporters that “the civil unrest mission is one of the most difficult and dangerous missions … in our domestic portfolio.”

In my view, the tragedy of Kent State shows how critical it is for authorities to be thoughtful in responding to protests, and extremely cautious in deploying military troops to deal with them. The application of force is inherently unpredictable, often uncontrollable, and can lead to fatal mistakes and lasting human suffering. And while protests sometimes break rules, they may not be disruptive or harmful enough to merit responding with force.

Aggressive displays of force, in fact, can heighten tensions and worsen situations. Conversely, research shows that if protesters perceive authorities are acting with restraint and treating them with respect, they are more likely to remain nonviolent. The shooting at Kent State demonstrated that using military force in these situations is an option fraught with grave risks.

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BOOK REVIEW: A Personal Ad Saved His Father From The Nazis. That Was Just The Start.

At age 11, the author’s father fled Austria and, thanks to an ad in The Manchester Guardian, found a foster home in Wales.Credit...via Julian Borger

BY SYLVIA BROWNRIGG

In October 1938, soon after Robert Borger arrived at the Welsh home of his new foster parents, a teacher friend of theirs offered to take the 11-year-old refugee for a walk. “He went along, pale and trembling,” his son Julian Borger writes, reconstructing his father’s early days in Britain after a fraught exit from Austria. Robert Borger admitted later that he had been sure the man intended to kill him.

His foster parents, the Bingleys, removed their teakettle’s whistle, as the sound reminded Bobby of the violent mobs of SA Brownshirts and Hitler Youth who had recently chased him through Vienna’s streets. Borger’s riveting book is filled with such vivid details, as he recounts seven Jewish children’s escapes from Austria after the Anschluss, “the original catastrophe” in their lives, when Hitler’s troops marched into their country and were met with ecstatic crowds welcoming the new regime. Through painstaking research the author, a Guardian writer and editor, has traced the paths of his young subjects, whose parents placed ads in the same paper, then called The Manchester Guardian, in the hopes of finding British sponsors.

Borger’s book has a personal angle. It was only in 2021 that, seeking to explore his father’s history, he first read the following words in the Aug. 3, 1938, archive: “I Seek a kind person who will educate my intelligent Boy, aged 11, Viennese of good family. Borger, 5/12 Hintzerstrasse, Vienna 3.”

The tragedy that opens Borger’s narrative is not, however, Kristallnacht or Robert’s own father being sent to Dachau; it is, rather, Robert’s death by suicide in 1983.

As Julian and his family reel, it falls to him as the eldest sibling to make some of the necessary calls. When he reaches Nans Bingley, who continued to be “a kind, calm, grandmotherly presence” in their lives, her response is stark: “Robert was the Nazis’ last victim. They got him in the end.”

Decades later, the author recalls that perceptive remark as he uncovers episodes from Robert’s early years, the Nazi theft of his father’s successful business and Robert’s subsequent train departure with his mother, who found a position in England as a domestic servant.

Borger’s painstaking search for others listed in the ads leads him to correspondents in Israel and California, New York and the Netherlands. Folding in these other experiences, largely gleaned from exchanges with the survivors’ children, broadens and deepens Borger’s poignant account.

These heartbreaking ads — “FERVENT prayer in great distress. Who would give a Home to a grammar school scholar aged 13: healthy, clever, very musical” — appeared amid the mundane surround of a daily newspaper. Like all the ads, a Boy called Fred’s “was on the second page, alongside the listener’s guide to radio programs, which that day included some new film music by Arthur Bliss.” (This was before the lifesaving Kindertransport, started in November 1938; throughout “I Seek a Kind Person,” the reader is reminded of an earlier Britain, which took to its post-imperial heart the mission of rescuing at least some asylum seekers.)

Each harrowing story has its own specific surprises of circumstance or geography. We’re taken as far afield as Shanghai, the outpost of resilient Jewish refugees who established a “Little Vienna” loosely governed by the Japanese, until the Nazis arrived to turn the place into a ghetto.

There are those whose ads did not yield placements, but who were able to attain a visa for the United States. One teenager named Gertrude, who was passed repeatedly among foster families in Britain, later wrote agonizingly about “a slow orphanhood,” the period of uncertain years during which she hoped to be reunited with her beloved parents. Their deaths were confirmed only at war’s end, when Gertrude received a letter from the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Encountering Holocaust stories, we never lose the primal shock of the before scenes of normalcy and thriving, contrasted with the after of danger, threat, flight, loss. Perhaps this form crystallizes how possible such catastrophic change always is; certainly it is employed by countless dramas, including Tom Stoppard’s play “Leopoldstadt,” whose Viennese characters and their fates have several echoes in these pages.

Julian Borger’s haunting, revelatory book exists in the shadow of a parent who, like many survivors, spoke little about his past. Part of Borger’s task is to illuminate that anguishing tension between forgetting and remembering.

As Gertrude, who later became Yehudith and moved to Israel, expressed it in a line Borger uses as his epigraph: “I feel as though half of me is fighting the other half by trying to forget, rather than remember, and I realize that is probably what I have been doing all my life.”

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Congo Names Third American In A Foiled Coup Plot As Mourners Gather In Utah To Remember Plot Leader

Congolese security forces secure the streets of Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, on Sunday May 19, 2024, after Congo’s army said it has “foiled a coup” and arrested the perpetrators, including several foreigners, following a shootout between armed men in military uniform and guards of a close ally of Congo’s president that left three people dead in the capital, Kinshasa. (AP Photo/Samy Ntumba Shambuyi)

BY JESSICA DONATI, HANNAH SCHOENBAUM AND MICHAEL BIESECKER

Congo’s army spokesman on Tuesday released the name of the third American involved a foiled coup plot in Kinshasa, while family members in Utah gathered to mourn Christian Malanga, the eccentric leader of the brazen and ill-fated attack targeting the presidential palace over the weekend.

Brig. Gen. Sylvain Ekenge told The Associated Press the third American was Taylor Thomson. It wasn’t immediately clear whether Thomson was among those arrested or killed on Sunday morning following the attack on the palace and another on the residence of a close ally of President Felix Tshisekedi.

Malanga, described as a naturalized American by Ekenge, was killed in a shootout at the palace after resisting arrest. The State Department said it could not confirm Malanga was a U.S. citizen. The other two confirmed Americans involved were a convicted marijuana trafficker, Benjamin Reuben Zalman-Polun, and Malanga’s 21-year-old son, Marcel.

Authorities were still trying to untangle how Marcel Malanga went from playing high school football in Utah to allegedly trying to unseat the leader of one of Africa’s largest countries.

“My son is innocent,” his mother, Brittney Sawyer, wrote in an email to The Associated Press on Monday, declining to elaborate.

Sawyer had regularly posted proud family photos on social media, including one in December showing Marcel, a young sister and a toddler hugging in matching Christmas pajamas. In 2020, she posted photos of Marcel lifting weights and dancing during COVID lockdown.

In a Facebook post early Monday, Sawyer angrily wrote that her son had followed his father. “This was an innocent boy following his father. I’m so tired of all the videos being posted all over and being sent to me. God will take care of you people!”

One video that circulated on social media over the weekend showed her son alongside a bloodied white man, whose identity was unclear, both covered in dust and surrounded by Congolese soldiers. Marcel has his hands raised and a frightened look on his face.

On Monday, at the West Jordan home of Malanga’s mother, Chantal Malanga, relatives gathered to mourn the deceased leader. A steady flow of friends dropped by with plates of food and to offer condolences.

Sydney, a cousin of Christian Malanga’s who answered the door, told AP the family was feeling “heartbroken” and “so raw” after learning of his death. They were discussing plans for a possible funeral in Utah, she said, without giving further details.

It wasn’t clear how Malanga had recruited the other Americans for his ill-fated attack on the Congolese state. His connection to Zalman-Polun, who in 2015 pleaded guilty to trafficking marijuana, appeared to be through a gold mining company that was set up in Mozambique in 2022, according to an official journal published by Mozambique’s government, and a report by Africa Intelligence newsletter.

American businessman Cole Ducey, also named as an official in the mining company in the Mozambique journal, said he met Christian Malanga when the two were introduced by a mutual acquaintance a few years ago and briefly explored investing together in mining concessions in Mozambique. Ducey said he also met Zalman-Polun, whom Malanga had met in Washington, D.C.

Ducey said they never discussed the political situation in Congo or Malanga’s desire to be part of the government there. Ducey said he eventually decided not to go into business with the two men.

“We simply viewed a couple mining concessions in Mozambique,” Ducey said of Malanga. “I didn’t know him very well but from what I gathered he wasn’t very intelligent.”

He said he had no contact with Malanga and Zalman-Polun in about two years and was shocked to read about their alleged involvement in a violent coup attempt.

“I had nothing to do with this and was not involved in any way,” said Ducey, who was in Eswatini on Monday, referring to reports in the Congolese media naming him among the attackers.

The alleged coup attempt began at the Kinshasa residence of Vital Kamerhe, a federal legislator and a candidate for speaker of the National Assembly of Congo. His guards killed the attackers, officials said.

Malanga, meanwhile, was live-streaming video from the presidential palace in which he is seen surrounded by several people in military uniforms wandering around in the middle of the night. He was later killed while resisting arrest, Congolese authorities said.

Congo officials have not commented on how the attackers were able to get inside.

Dino Mahtani, who worked in Congo for years as a journalist and then a political adviser to the U.N. between 2015-18, told the AP that Malanga had likely been tricked or betrayed.

“Its really difficult to imagine how 20, 30 guys thought that by storming the presidential palace when nobody is around at 4 a.m. in the morning could somehow take over the Congolese state,” he said. “It could be external plotters, but given his previous close relationship with at least one of Tshiskedi’s current military commanders, there’s some chance the plot was known about internally.”

Donari reported from Dakar, Senegal; Schoenbaum from West Jordan, Utah; and Biesecker from Washington.

“Peace Is Only Possible Based On justice”

Ukranian soldiers ride in APC in Donetsk region, Ukraine, Thursday, Oct. 20, 2022. (AP Photo/LIBKOS)

BY TAMARA ZLOBINA

Emmaus is an international solidarity movement founded in Paris in 1949 by Abbe Pierre to combat poverty and homelessness. Since 1971, regional and national initiatives have been unified into the main organisation, Emmaus International, representing 350 groups in 37 countries and providing a range of charitable services. In Ukraine, the community “Emmaus-Oselya” has been operating since 2003. The Emmaus movement advocates for the values of social justice, mutual aid, ecology and pacifism.

A just peace

A quote from Abbe Pierre, the founder of the Emmaus movement, states, “Any victory achieved in war is a defeat, and the only true value is peace. We must always stand against injustice and not accept peace established after the weakest has been devoured by their stronger neighbour (on the streets or between nations).”

This is a good starting point for this conversation.

It emphasises that peace is only possible based on justice. This idea also allows us to recognise that the absence of war does not necessarily equate to peace, and active measures are needed to protect the affected and establish justice.

Unfortunately, I did not see this understanding in the first months of the full-scale Russian invasion. On the contrary, I observed many abstract pacifist slogans like “we are against war, both sides should stop,” and “a bad peace is better than a good war.” From these slogans, demands emerged not to provide weapons to Ukraine because, supposedly, weapons would escalate the conflict. This position caused irreparable harm to the people in Ukraine. The fact that Ukrainians had to spend months convincing other countries of their right to self-defence, begging and waiting for the weapons needed for self-defence, led to deaths, the capture of significant territories, and terror against the occupied population. Delays in the supply of weapons allowed the Russian army to fortify its positions and deploy unprecedented minefields, which now require huge resources and, most importantly, human lives to storm.

Such abstract pacifism surprised and saddened everyone in Ukraine. A war initiated by an aggressive invader will not stop because of a beautiful slogan on a poster. Just like in the case of a criminal who attacks with the intent to rob in the street, a polite remark like “excuse me, sir, but I believe you are doing something wrong,” will not stop the robbery. There must be levers of influence on the perpetrator, and these levers of influence must be very serious – weapons for self-defence, a legal system, sanctions. In the case of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we see that on the international level, we have not yet learned how to protect peace, law and justice as effectively as we combat crime within our own countries.

Self-defence is feminist

The flaws of abstract pacifism and a lack of understanding of the imperialist nature of the Russian state have given rise to a feminist manifesto against the war, which has outraged Ukrainian feminists and demonstrated a number of issues. This manifesto was created by western feminists in cooperation with Russian feminists, but Ukrainian feminists – those who were attacked and who suffered – were not invited to contribute to this text. The authors did not even attempt to understand the position of Ukrainian feminists. The manifesto also called for not providing weapons to Ukraine.

In response, Ukrainian feminists created the “Right to Resist” manifesto, in which they described the flaws of a superficial and abstract pacifist approach. Firstly, Ukrainian feminists emphasised that this approach equates the aggressor with the victim. In the case of imperialistic aggression, the call for “both sides to cease the conflict” is similar to asking both the attacker and the victim in the case of rape to “stop the assault and restore peace”. This equivalence contradicts the principle of justice, as eloquently expressed by Abbe Pierre, and it is undeniable that victims have the right to resist violence committed against them. In the early days of the full-scale invasion, Ukrainian women were surprised that there were people in the world, including feminists with pacifist positions, who needed to be convinced that Ukraine had the right to defend itself.

The calls not to provide weapons, expressed from feminist pacifist positions, although probably not intended, amounted to a refusal to show solidarity. Ukrainian feminists, as a group, are particularly vulnerable to Russian attacks. At the beginning of the invasion, British intelligence published data indicating that the Russian occupiers had lists of activists who would be eliminated after the capture of Kyiv. Women’s rights activists reasonably suspected that they could be on these lists because the Russian regime perceives human rights as a threat. Subsequently, female activists of women’s organisations were persecuted in the occupied territories.

Furthermore, the Putin regime positions itself as hypermasculine and patriarchal, contrasting itself with the “decadent” liberal West, where feminists and LGBT+ individuals have “destroyed” family values.

Russia’s war against Ukraine has been ongoing since 2014, and during this time, the experiences of Ukrainian feminists did not receive much attention from international colleagues. In the first months of the full-scale invasion, it was noticeable that western researchers used stereotypes and templates when discussing Ukraine, and even repeated Russian propaganda about the prevalence of far-right groups in Ukraine. While in the Ukrainian parliament, there is not a single far-right party, and there are no right-wing parties, in contrast to many Western European countries, where far-right groups gain a significant percentage of votes in parliamentary and presidential elections.

Over the past ten years, Ukrainian feminists have been working in a country at war. Contrary to Russia, there has been no masculinisation and conservative turn in Ukraine. On the contrary, the women’s movement has achieved many successes – political quotas have been introduced, the status of women in the military has changed, a gendered approach is being applied in various spheres of state policy, and gender equality and non-discrimination are gaining more popularity in Ukrainian society. Until 2022, feminist marches and LGBT+ pride events were regularly held in various cities.

Feminists have also found the strength to criticise militarisation and pointed out that military relationships should not be transferred to civilian life, or that gender-based violence by military personnel should not be justified. They have created programmes for the rehabilitation of veterans and founded a movement of women veterans.

The position of mainstream feminism in Ukraine has not changed since 2014 and is clearly expressed in the “Right to Resist” manifesto. Regarding domestic policy, there are reservations about the masculinisation of the public space – for example, the reduced representation of female experts in the media. The military has the greatest symbolic capital, and although there are around 50,000 women in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, they are still a minority. This may influence the political representation of women in the future.

At present, feminists and civil society are effectively countering conservative gender rhetoric, and there are many initiatives to combat sexism and gender-based violence.

Furthermore, feminists are resisting conservatism with weapons in hand. One such example is Lesya Ganzha, who was the editor of the media outlet “Women Are 50 per cent of Ukraine’s Success.” At the start of the full-scale invasion, Lesya joined the Armed Forces of Ukraine as a volunteer and learned to operate drones.

All that has been mentioned above forms the basis for a peace appeal initiated by Ukrainian feminists. Firstly, it involves the principle of “nothing about us without us,” calling for respect and support of Ukraine’s right to armed self-defence and emphasising that peace without justice is a false reconciliation. The absence of war in such a case will lead to repression in the occupied territories. The Ukrainian initiators of this appeal also stress the need to search for new ways to fight for peace and create new international instruments, as the existing ones, as we have seen, are not working effectively.

How to support Ukrainian civil society in a way that promotes non-violence and peace?

First and foremost, it is important to acknowledge the difference in the positions of Ukrainian society compared to societies in countries where there is no ongoing armed conflict. The task of Ukrainian society is to survive while it is being brutally and literally attacked, whereas the task of societies in areas without direct warfare is to develop new tools, measures and political approaches that lead to non-violence and peace.

Therefore, I will outline several practical ways to help Ukrainians survive, so they can collectively work on new international instruments. Some of these methods might also provide ideas for effective policies of non-violence and peace.

Weapons and ammunition

Ukraine is facing a country much larger in terms of territory, resources and population. The most valuable and irreplaceable resource that Ukraine is losing in this war is its people. The foundation of the Ukrainian army currently consists of former civilians. These are people like the feminist Lesya Ganzha, who joined the army, and Professor Fedir Shandor from Uzhhorod University, who delivered lectures to students from the trenches. These are members of the Emmaus community in Lviv. These are Ukrainian writers, musicians, programmers, lawyers, people who are not military professionals but are forced to defend their land. These individuals are dying en masse due to a lack of weapons, tactical medicine and protective gear.

Often, I see that people abroad are willing to donate for humanitarian needs but avoid contributing to the needs of the Ukrainian army, even for essential protective gear such as body armour and tactical medical supplies because they believe it is money spent on war. Therefore, I would like to emphasise again that the Ukrainian army is made up of civilians. Ukrainian philosophers, researchers, political scientists, who should be seeking new policies for peace and non-violence, need to survive first to be able to do that.

Resist the temptation of appeasement

In today’s world, public sentiment, which influences the actions of politicians, is highly dependent on media images. War photos are horrifying, and there may be a temptation to say that anything is better than this.

Once, I overheard a conversation between strangers discussing that if Ukraine really wanted peace, it should give the occupied territories to Russia. However, the territories are not just empty land; they are inhabited by people. What is happening to these people under occupation is horrifying. Structural violence is much less visible than a bombed-out building. Incidents of rape, torture, abductions, forced erasure of identity, child abductions and lawlessness are rampant on the occupied territories.

Let me share just one story of a civilian woman who was taken captive. After the occupation of Luhansk, Russian military personnel came to her and her elderly neighbour, demanding that they give up their apartments and move to communal housing. The women refused. Sometime later, the police came to “search” the property, planted drugs in their apartments, and sentenced both women to 12 years in prison, confiscating their apartments. The woman had to serve her sentence, endure torture and was finally able to inform the Ukrainian authorities about her situation. She was eventually exchanged and liberated in Ukraine.

This is just one known story, and there are thousands of unknown stories. I urge you to remember these stories.

Whose war is this? Language matters

When the full-scale invasion began, the headlines in the world’s media were talking about a “conflict in Ukraine”, “war in Ukraine” and the “Ukrainian war”. Earlier, media reports referred to the “conflict in Donbas” and “war in Georgia”. Before that, there was the “war in Ichkeria”, “war in Transnistria” and “war in Abkhazia”.

These headlines might make the world seem like a terrible place where wars and “internal conflicts” occasionally erupt. However, do these conflicts simply happen on their own?

In all these wars, there is one initiating country, and that is Russia. If it had been consistently named in the headlines over the past thirty years, there might be fewer people who believe that Russia is a good alternative to US imperialism.

Now the correct term “Russia’s wars” is gaining traction. It encompasses not only Russia’s invasions of neighbouring countries but also the actions of the Russian military in Asia, such as in Syria, as well as in Africa, like Mali and the Central African Republic. This highlights more clearly that modern Russia is an imperialist, militaristic and aggressive state that poses a threat to peace on a global scale.

“Business as usual” – one of the reasons for the war

One of the reasons for the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022 was the effective bribery of European economic and political elites by Russia. For example, after the war began in 2014, Germany actively pursued policies to increase its consumption of cheap Russian gas. Russia armed itself and prepared for war with the money it earned from energy sales. In February 2022, European capitalists and the politicians serving them expected Ukraine to fall in three days, so they could “accept reality”, as they put it, and continue to do profitable business with Russia.

However, this did not happen, and Ukraine has been resisting aggressive pressure for two years. Even with sanctions in place, many global companies have not left the Russian market and continue to work there, paying taxes that indirectly fund the war. For example, in 2022, the Austrian Raiffeisen Bank paid 559 million euros in taxes, which could buy 95 Kalibr missiles used to shell Ukrainian cities.

It is essential to check if the clothing you wear and the food you eat are not produced by companies that continue to pay taxes in Russia. The issue is not limited to Russia; businesses with links to other totalitarian countries, such as China, pose similar threats.

Democracy – the foundation of peace

Democracy and the rule of law are the foundations of lasting peace. Uncompromisingly advocating for democracy in your own and other countries is another way to fight for peace. For example, in 2020, mass protests against the dictator Lukashenka in Belarus were brutally suppressed. Neither European countries nor, unfortunately, Ukraine supported them sufficiently, as they feared angering Putin.

Was this the right political decision? We can now see that it was not, just as buying Russian gas after 2014 was a mistake. If Belarus had become a democracy in 2022, the full-scale invasion of Ukraine might not have happened at all.

Nothing about us without us

The best way to support Ukrainian civil society is to listen to how Ukrainians themselves define peace, support their vision, and spread it. The Ukrainian Manifesto for Sustainable Peace includes points like “Accountability for War”, based on holding aggressors accountable for their crimes and demanding compensation for damages, and “Ensuring Sustainable Peace”, which calls for changes in international organisations, decolonisation and the disarmament of Russia.

Finally, I want to emphasise that peace and democracy are not a culture or heritage to be preserved. They are the result of political action, daily reinvention and a constant struggle. Peace and democracy cannot be inherited. If one falls into this illusion, one may quickly find themself under the rule of a populist, corrupt regime, as we are witnessing in some Western European countries, with war knocking on the door.

This speech was delivered at the assembly of the international Emmaus movement in Iași, Romania in October 2023.

Tamara Zlobina is a Ukrainian public intellectual that has published a number of articles on gender equality. She holds a PhD in Philosophy from the National Institute for Strategic Studies in Kyiv. Since 2016 Tamara has been the leader of the Gender in Detail project, a unique expert resource with a primary focus on advocating for women’s and LGBTQ+ rights, while promoting gender equality in Ukraine. She is also the author of the concepts “gender decay” and “gender eclecticism,” which describe the current gender regime in Ukraine.

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BIDEN FACES NIGERIA CRISIS

President Joe Biden. Image: The White House

BY DANIEL VOLMAN

President Biden faces three simultaneous crises in his policy toward Nigeria in the aftermath of the elections on February 25, when 24 million Nigerians voted in national elections. Now, following the election of Bola Tinubu as president, they are all coming to a head.

First, Washington’s efforts to get the previous government of Muhammadu Buhari to end or reduce official corruption in Nigeria, to end or reduce state violence against civilians (especially women and children) and non-violent demonstrators, to contain or defeat jihadi insurgencies, and to reform the economy completely failed.

Second, the government’s conduct of the February election, the violence that occurred during the polling, and the associated currency crisis, only made the situation worse.

Third, members of Congress are stepping up their efforts to block future U.S. arms deliveries to Nigeria.

The February elections came during a continuing struggle to contain the insurgencies of Boko Harum (which has affiliated with al-Qaeda) and the Islamic State in West Africa (which is a branch of the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq). All three serious contenders represented different elements of Nigeria’s notoriously corrupt political elite, and less than a third of the registered voter thought there was any actual point in going to the polls.

The victor, Bola Tinubu, was handpicked by Buhari, the army general who led a military coup in 1983 and headed a military dictatorship that lasted two years before Buhari as overthrown in another coup (elected president in 2015, he was completing his second and last term). Although the vote count reported was probably the most honest and valid of any of the country’s elections, they were challenged in the courts. The courts upheld the results and Tinubu was inaugurated on May 29, 2023.

Over the past six years, United States has sold more than $1.6 billion worth of weaponry and other military equipment to Nigeria ($593 million for 12 A-29 Super Tucano counter-insurgency aircraft and $1 billion for 12 AH-1Z Cobra helicopter gunships). In 2015, the Obama administration agreed to sell 12 A-29 Super Tucano counter-insurgency aircraft to Nigeria. Congress was officially notified of the deal by the Trump administration in 2017 and the warplanes were delivered by the Biden administration in 2021.

“I would also like to thank you again through—thank the Government of the U.S. for the cooperation on security, which has been very important to us,’ Nigerian Vice President Yemi Osinbajo told U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken at the Aso Rock Presidential Villa in Abuja during Blinken’s 2021 visit to Nigeria. “The Super Tucanos have been delivered, and of course,” he added, “we’re looking forward to the [attack] helicopters as well.”

As Nigerian Foreign Minister Geoffry Onyeama put it, the Biden administration has been “supportive in the security area, provided a Super Tucano aircraft.” And while “we have a slight issue with some attack helicopters,” he declared, “that’s more on the legislative side and not on the executive side.”

In his response, Secretary Blinken made no mention of U.S. arms sales to Nigeria. However, Blinken did assert that the United States did “very much appreciate as well the security cooperation that we’re developing and making sure that we do it in a comprehensive way that puts our concerns about people first and foremost in what we’re doing.”

But events in Nigeria have provoked increasing resistance from U.S. legislators to the sale of combat aircraft to Nigeria and have put the helicopter gunship deal in jeopardy. In 2017, Senators Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Rand Paul (R-KY), both members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, released a letter to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson urging that the sale of the A-29s be postponed until Nigeria demonstrated progress in investigating several incidents in which its security forces had killed hundreds of civilians.

“We believe proceeding without any clear indication of progress from the Nigerian government on the protection of human rights and enforcement of accountability would run contrary to our national security objectives,” they declared. However, Congress took no action during the 30-day period legally mandated for it to review the sale. A State Department official then confirmed that the arms deal “has completed the congressional notification process, and we are currently working to finalize the proposed sale with the Nigerian government.”

In July 2021, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and House Foreign Affairs Committee put a hold on the sale of helicopter gunships in response to the massacre of peaceful protesters at a demonstration against the Special Anti-Robbery Squad in Lagos in October 2020. In April 2022, the Biden administration announced that it would ignore congressional concerns and approve the sale on the dubious grounds that “the proposed sale will support the foreign policy goals and national security objectives of the United States by improving the security of a strategic partner in Sub-Saharan Africa.”

The sale of 12 AH-1Z helicopter gunships has proven even more contentious, particularly since the Republican Party won control of the House of Representatives in the 2022 midterm elections.

In December 2022, Reuters published two reports on its investigation of major human rights violations by the Nigerian military. In the first, it reported that Nigerian security forces have murdered thousands of children captured during military operations against jihadi insurgents. Babies, infants, and young children were executed because they were believed to be child soldiers or the children of insurgents. In the second, it reported that since at least 2013, the Nigerian military had conducted a secret, systematic, and illegal abortion program that ended at least 10,000 pregnancies among women and girls. Many of them had been kidnapped and raped by jihadi insurgents.

In reaction, Senator Jim Risch (R-ID), the ranking Republican member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, wrote to Secretary Blinken to request a review of U.S. security assistance to Nigeria. Risch also called for the State Department to examine the potential use of American sanctions against Nigeria for its violence against women and children.

In February 2023, two members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Representatives Sara Jacobs (D-CA) and Chris Smith (R-NJ), sent a letter to President Biden calling on him to cancel the sale and review U.S. security assistance and cooperation programs in Nigeria. As they pointed out, “the assistance we have provided has done little to stem the conflict—in fact, insecurity has worsened from the abuses committed by Nigerian forces.”

Therefore, they concluded, “we believe continuing to move forward with the nearly $1 billion arms sale would be highly inappropriate and we urge the Administration to rescind it. Given the recent reporting of Nigeria’s previously unknown mass forced abortion program—which allegedly ended at least 10,000 pregnancies—and the targeting of potentially thousands of children, we also urge a review of security assistance and cooperation programs in Nigeria.”

The Biden administration’s dilemma is not balancing human rights and security considerations. U.S. security assistance and America’s complicity in the Nigerian government’s human rights violations fuel the insurgencies and boost public support for them. At the very least, the Biden administration should postpone the delivery of the helicopter gunships until it can provide Congress with credible and conclusive evidence that the Nigerian government has reduced official corruption and human rights violations by its security forces.

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