August 11, 2011
The Middle East Institute
Abstract:
This Policy Brief examines the real and imagined influence of al-Qa‘ida in North Africa and the Sahel. Despite a perception of the transnationalization of terrorist movements in North Africa under al-Qa‘ida’s banner, robust evidence of an effective al-Qa‘ida’s expansion in the Maghreb and the Sahara/Sahel region remains elusive at best. Rather, doubts about al-Qa‘ida’s actual threat and the efficacy of international response in the context of pervasive state failure in the Sahel raise questions regarding the policy objectives of US-led counter-terrorism in the region....
July 29, 2011
The United Nations Monitoring Group
Abstract:
It would be hard to conceive of two States that offer greater contrasts than
Somalia and Eritrea: the former, a collapsed State for over two decades, with no
functional national institutions; the latter, possessing the most highly centralized,
militarized and authoritarian system of government on the African continent. From a
sanctions monitoring perspective, however, the two countries present very similar
challenges: in both cases, power is concentrated in the hands of individuals rather
than institutions and is exercised through largely informal and often illicit networks
of political and financial control. Leaders in both countries often depend more
heavily on political and economic support from foreign Governments and diaspora
networks than from the populations within their own borders. And both countries —
in very different ways — serve as platforms for foreign armed groups that represent a
grave and increasingly urgent threat to peace and security in the Horn and East
Africa region.
More than half of Somali territory is controlled by responsible, comparatively
stable authorities that have demonstrated, to varying degrees, their capacity to
provide relative peace and security to their populations. Without exception, the
administrations of Somaliland, Puntland, Gaalmudug, and “Himan iyo Heeb”
evolved independently of centralized State-building initiatives, from painstaking,
organic local political processes. Much of Galguduud region is controlled by anti-Al-
Shabaab clan militias loosely unified under the umbrella of Ahlu Sunna wal Jama’a
(ASWJ), but lacks a functional authority. Consolidation of and cooperation between
such entities represents the single most effective strategy for countering threats like
extremism and piracy, while expanding peace and security in Somalia....
May 18, 2011
Nordic Africa Institute // Nordiska Afrikainstitutet
Abstract:
This Policy Note focuses on the gendered consequences of the militarisation of the Horn of Africa. Despite being in different ‘moments’ of conflict, the countries of this region share features of extreme social, economic and political violence, which impact negatively on their citizens. Protracted refugee and refugee-like conditions, extreme disinvestment in social programmes, increasing militarisation and political repression adversely affect women, thereby further entrenching gender disparities. Concerted national and international efforts and resources should support local democratic initiatives to find political solutions to these protracted conflicts and advance the struggle against sexual and gender-based violence and discrimination....
March 28, 2011
Nordic Africa Institute // Nordiska Afrikainstitutet
Abstract:
Somalia has engendered the policy debate on the extent of the spread of transnational Islamist Jihadist groups in the Horn of Africa (HOA) and their consequences for peace and security across the region. These concerns are justified given the emergence since the late 1980s of extremist groups such as the Eritrean Islamic Jihad Movement and the Somali Jihadist Islamist groups of the likes of Al-Ittihad, the Islamic Courts Union and currently Al Shabab. The leaders and fighters of these groups relocated to the HOA after the defeat of the Taliban following the 2001 US invasion of Afghanistan. The operations of these transnational Islamist groups within and across the countries of the Horn pose serious challenges to the region and beyond....
March 21, 2011
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
Abstract:
This paper analyses Israel's response to a recent influx of African asylum seekers, a phenomenon whose nature and scale are unprecedented in Israel's history. It addresses three intertwined questions. What are the discursive challenges to the construction of an Israeli refugee regime? What dynamics foster their development? And how can those challenges be explained and deconstructed?
The paper consists of two parts. The first provides a historical overview that aims to situate the influx within a regional geo-political context. The second suggests a threefold evaluative typology of discourses; security, ethnonationalism and the gravity of the holocaust – societal pillars which critically influence both the state and the asylum seekers.
By critically presenting the evolution of Israel's responses to the influx, it argues that a pattern of 'ordered disorder' governs a spectrum of rejectionist responses, underpinned by the fundamental role of the 'asylum-migration nexus'. The ordered disorder also explains the degree of accommodating measures, provided by all actors. The disordered relationship between the nation-state and the asylum seekers becomes the Israeli "national order of things" (Malkki 1995a)....
Eritrea 
