Russian mercenaries may be poised for further expansion in Africa’s strategically important Sahel region after the latest coup d’etat in the region, western officials and analysts fear.
Ibrahim Traoré, a 34-year-old army captain, took power in Burkina Faso on Friday, overthrowing Lt Col Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba, whom he accused of failing to effectively counter rising violence by Islamic extremists in the unstable and poverty-stricken country.
The international community widely condemned the ousting of Damiba, who himself overthrew the country’s democratically elected president in January.
Traoré has now promised to commit “all fighting forces to refocus on the security issue and the restoration of the integrity of [the country’s] territory”.
Many believe Traoré is likely to invite assistance from Moscow to boost the country’s flailing struggle against Islamic extremists, which has forced 2 million people to flee their homes and killed thousands.
Over the weekend, hundreds of protesters, some waving Russian flags, lit fires, tore down barbed wire and threw stones at the French embassy in the capital, Ouagadougou, and attacked a French cultural centre in the city of Bobo-Dioulasso.
The coup comes amid a new push by Russia to win influence and gain access to valuable raw materials in sub-Saharan Africa in recent months, after years of careful if opportunistic efforts across the continent.
Some of the efforts are led by paramilitaries from the Wagner group, a complex of companies linked to the Kremlin and founded by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Russian businessman and close ally of Putin.
Prigozhin was reported to have praised the new takeover in Burkina Faso in a statement on Saturday, calling Traoré “a truly courageous son of the motherland”.
Wagner is already present in at least six other African countries, while Russian influence operations have been reported in many more.
Moscow’s campaign has achieved significant success, with expansion often following the coming to power in unstable but resource-rich countries of factions with a history of preferring Russia to historic partners from the west.
Far from draining resources to Europe, the war in Ukraine appears to have intensified Moscow’s campaign in Africa with evidence of new and extensive activity. Operations across the Sahel in particular have been increased.
In July, Gen Stephen Townsend, the outgoing commander of the US Africa Command, told reporters that though Wagner had reduced the size of its deployment in Libya in order “to move … operatives to fight in Ukraine”, the group had not done the same in Mali, where Wagner was thought to have about 700 fighters.
“They appear to be leaning into Mali as much as they have been throughout,” Townsend said.
Wagner was hired by the new regime in Mali last year to fight Islamist extremists after a second coup nine months after the August 2020 overthrow of its president. Relations with Paris have deteriorated sharply and a substantial French counter-insurgency in Mali has since been wound down and violence has intensified.
In Sudan, where Wagner has been involved in an extensive gold mining operation for several years, Russian civilian and military aircraft have increased the frequency of their flight rotations. Several planes have been spotted making weekly trips to an airstrip north-west of the city of Omdurman, sometimes carrying senior Russian military officers. Up to five were landing at the facility in a single day earlier this year.
The ground for new deployments of Wagner fighters has often been prepared elsewhere in Africa by comprehensive campaigns over months, sometimes years, involving both social media and street protests.
On Monday, a Reuters reporter saw a group burning a French flag just hours after the coup in Burkina Faso, while placards read: “Together we say no to France. Shit to France!”
Armel Kabore, a coup supporter, told Reuters: “Today, Burkinabe people are asking for Russia’s support to accompany them in this fierce struggle that has been imposed on us.”
Alassane Thiemtore, who was among the protesters, said they wanted “cooperation with Russia … [and] the departure of Damiba and France”.
At least three separate videos shared online at the weekend showed soldiers riding armoured vehicles and waving Russian flags, while the crowds chanted: “Russia! Russia!”
One western official, based in the Sahel, told the Guardian that Damiba, the ousted president, had initially promised senior soldiers he would seek assistance from Russia but then decided against it once in power.
“It might have been bringing in advisers, or weapons, or Wagner, or whatever, but it didn’t happen and that was one of the things that wound up his critics in the armed forces,” the official said.
In recent days, some of Traoré’s supporters have openly called for Burkina Faso to replace formerly close ties with France with a new alliance with Russia.
“One point of contention that has divided the MPSR [junta], the army and indeed the population for months is the choice of international partners,” said Constantin Gouvy, a Burkina Faso researcher at Clingendael, the Netherlands Institute of International Relations.
“Damiba was leaning toward France, but we might see the MPSR more actively exploring alternatives from now on, with Turkey or Russia for example,” Gouvy added.
Burkina Faso has been a focus of growing expansion by groups linked to al-Qaida and Islamic State, after violence that began in neighbouring Mali in 2012 spread to other countries south of the Sahara.
Earlier this year, investigators from the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab found that pro-Russian content had spread on West African social media platforms in the months before the January 2022 military coup in Burkina Faso and that online support for Moscow had steadily increased since. Several sites were highly critical of France and called for Russian intervention.
