Radicalisation

The G5 Sahel was created in 2014 with the aim of uniting and co-ordinating actions to fight terrorism in the five countries it brings together, namely Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, Mauritania and Chad. Since then, the United Nations has worked with the security alliance to co-ordinate economic and social development programs, as well as a unified response in terms of security and the fight against terrorist and criminal groups operating in the region.

More than 30 people are reported killed on Monday (3 May) in an attack by a jihadist-inspired militia in the east of Burkina Faso, in Africa's troubled Sahel Region.

TASS news agency reported on Friday that "The Federal Security Service in the Kemerovo and Novosibirsk Regions, in co-operation with the Federal Service of the National Guard Troops, has suppressed the activities of a cell of the international terrorist organisation Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami". 

In Jalalabad, three women who worked for Enikas TV aged between 18 and 20 had died, and a fourth was critically injured, after being shot on their way home from work, Afghan officials have said. The three women dubbed dramas from Turkey and India into Afghanistan’s local languages of Dari and Pashtu.

Despite the deployment of the G5 force with the backing of France, the Sahel region continues to suffer from regular jihadist attacks. Although France and its allies participated in the G5 summit last week, they appeared to be pursuing diverging courses of action for combating threats from insurgents. 

Last year, 72 terrorism-related crimes were foiled in Russia, 25% more than in 2019, President Putin told the FSB.  Experts stress that extremist activity remains one of major challenges for the post-Soviet states. Bur Russians seem unclear who is friend and who is foe in their war on terror.