The agency revealed that in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, cases of recruitment and use of children in armed groups along with killings and maiming increased by more than 130 per cent between the two time periods. Protect the vulnerable Gilles Fagninou, UNICEF’s regional director for West and Central Asia, underscored the need to curb…
In this feature, part of a series exploring trafficking in the Sahel, UN News focuses on the illicit drug trade. According to a new report from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), drug trafficking in the Sahel continues to hinder security, economic development and the rule of law while jeopardising public health. “Drug trafficking is…
The spillover will be devastating for both peace and stability in a region already experiencing political instability, climate extremes, food and water insecurity, and economic decline, the agency warned. Growing crisis “We are increasingly concerned about an overflow from the security crisis in the Sahel into coastal countries – particularly the Gulf of Guinea,” said…
The PBC, an intergovernmental advisory body launched in 2006, plays a crucial role in supporting peace efforts in conflict-affected countries. Consisting of 31 Member States elected from the General Assembly, the Security Council, and the Economic and Social Council, it brings together top donors and troop-contributing countries. Ambassador Ivan Šimonović of Croatia, Commission Chair, cited the…
In this feature, part of a series exploring trafficking in the Sahel, UN News focuses on migrant smuggling. Migrant smugglers have been reaping rich dividends over the past decade in the Sahel, where armed violence, terrorist attacks, and climate shocks have displaced three million people and triggered growing numbers of others to flee, according to a…
In this feature, part of a series exploring the fight against trafficking in the Sahel, UN News focuses on the illegal arms trade that is fuelling conflict and terrorism. In the Sahel, home to 300 million people, it’s a buyer’s market for guns. Insurgency and banditry plague the region, rooted in, among other things, endemic…
In this feature, part of a series exploring the fight against trafficking in the Sahel, UN News focuses on the illegal fuel trade in the region. Transported by criminal networks and taxed by terrorist groups, illegal fuel flows along four major routes snaking across the Sahel towards ready buyers, siphoning millions from nations on the…
This feature, which focuses on the illegal trade in substandard and fake medicines, is part of a UN News series exploring the fight against trafficking in the Sahel. From ineffective hand sanitizer to fake antimalarial pills, an illicit trade that grew during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 is being meticulously dismantled by the UN and…
In the first of a series of features exploring the fight against trafficking in the Sahel, UN News takes a closer look at what’s behind the growth of the phenomenon. A tangled trafficking web has been woven across the Sahel, which spans almost 6,000 kilometres from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea, and is…
“Non-State armed groups continue to carry out large-scale attacks against civilian and military targets and engage in clashes over access to resources, territorial control and influence,” said Martha Ama Akyaa Pobee, UN Assistant Secretary-General for Africa, part of the political and peacebuilding affairs department, and UN Peace Operations. The Council was meeting to assess the…
