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Mali’s elephants, Africa’s northernmost herd and adapted to life in the country’s harsh desert, were in desperate need of protection. The animals live in an unforgiving landscape southeast of Timbuktu, enduring sandstorms and blistering temperatures. To survive, they trek in search of food and water across what is thought to be the biggest migratory range of their species, more than 12,400 square miles. But it wasn’t only climate change endangering the elephants. It was also poachers. They were being slaughtered in staggering numbers as ivory traffickers took advantage of a security vacuum in the region, with 163 killed since 2012,...

Economy Of Force The recent deaths of 4 US Army Special Forces Soldiers in Niger have prompted questioning, some legitimate and some merely political posturing. Two articles, one in The American Conservative (What Are US forces Doing in Niger Anyway?) and the other in Politico (Niger Attack Fuels New Push for War Vote) ask two very cogent questions: “Why are we there?” and “What is Congress’ role?” The purpose of this article isn’t to focus on the hypocrisy of these questions coming at this time. However, I would be remiss if I failed to point out that this particular mission...

Richards Murphy writes that Boko Haram is the brainchild of some powerful interests targeting the untapped natural resources in Northern NigeriaThe curse of natural resources is apparently real or more accurately, cursed interests in resource exploration are real. This evil often goes about masked as something less sinister. Take for instance the insanity that is todayÂ’s Afghanistan, which began in a fashion not too different from what Boko Haram is acting out in Nigeria today. Somewhere in the convoluted mix of transitions and mishmash of Mujahedeen, Taliban and al-Qaeda was UNOCAL, an oil multinational and its effort to construct pipelines...

Three U.S. Army Special Forces soldiers were killed and two others were wounded Wednesday in an ambush in the west African country of Niger. U.S. Africa Command confirmed that a joint patrol of Green Berets and Nigerien soliders was attacked in the southwestern part of Niger, near the border with Mali. Officials told Fox News that between eight and 10 troops were part of the patrol.

Mali’s gold exports are falling, and new discoveries aren’t enough to make up for the loss of its giant legacy mines, where production is already dead or winding down, and the fate of one of the biggest of them all—Sadiola—now hangs in the balance.

Full Title.................BREAKING NEWS: Holiday hotspot in Mali is stormed by gunman who have 'taken hostages in resort popular with Western tourists'.........An African holiday resort popular with Western tourists has reportedly been stormed by gunmen. Malian troops and soldiers from France's Bakhane counter-terrorist force headed to the Le Campement facility, on the edge of Bamako, where smoke was also seen billowed high into the air. It is not yet known if there are any casualties from the incident.

Alleged mastermind of Ivorian resort attack arrested, says RFI © Issouf Sanogo, AFP | Police officials conduct investigations in Grand Bassam, Ivory Coast, on March 14, 2016, a day after a deadly jihadist attack. Text by Leela JACINTO Latest update : 2017-01-12 The alleged mastermind of a deadly March 2016 attack on an Ivory Coast resort has been arrested in neighbouring Mali in a joint operation coordinated by French special forces, according to Ivorian sources. Mimi Ould Baba Ould El Mokhtar -- also known as Mimi Ould Baba Ould Cheikh – was arrested near the town of Gossi in northern...

Let Africa Sink Kim du Toit May 26, 2002 When it comes to any analysis of the problems facing Africa, Western society, and particularly people from the United States, encounter a logical disconnect that makes clear analysis impossible. That disconnect is the way life is regarded in the West (it's precious, must be protected at all costs etc.), compared to the way life, and death, are regarded in Africa. Let me try to quantify this statement. In Africa, life is cheap. There are so many ways to die in Africa that death is far more commonplace than in the West....

For most Americans, the battle in Mali with militant Islamist terrorists is as an obscure and peripheral sideshow in the Global War on Terror. However, the UN peacekeepers and French troops deployed there know the Mali sideshow is most deadly. StrategyPage.com recently reported that Mali is now the most physically dangerous UN peacekeeping mission, exceeding the risks UN peacekeepers confront in eastern Congo, South Sudan, Sudan's Darfur region and in Lebanon. Since 2013, 81 UN peacekeepers have been killed in Mali. The UN Interim Force in Lebanon peacekeeping mission operates next door to Syria's chaotic civil war, and some analysts...

Green cards, or Lawful Permanent Residency, puts immigrants on the path to citizenship and allows for lifetime residency, federal benefits, and work authorization. Included in the totals are refugees, who are required to apply for a green card after one year of residency in the U.S. Unlike other types of immigrants, refugees are immediately eligible for welfare benefits including Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF), food stamps, and Medicaid Green Card Totals, FY09-FY14: Pakistan (102K), Iraq (102K), Bangladesh (90K), Iran (85K), Egypt (56K), Somalia (37K), Uzbekistan (30K), Turkey (26K), Morocco (25K), Jordan (25K), Albania (24K), Afghanistan (21K), Lebanon (20K), Yemen...

US Ambassador Robert Ford resigned from his State Department post a month ago, after a long and difficult time as the envoy to Syria. Ford showed great personal courage in his service while Bashar al-Assad instigated attacks on Western embassies and eventually provoked a massive civil war which has turned into a regional threat, thanks to the collapse of his power in large regions of Syria. The collapse of American policy in Syria over the past year was presumed to have prompted Ford’s departure, which he confirms with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour in an interview today.This is interesting for more...

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee says he wasn't trying to lump President Obama together with Islamic terrorists by saying the president wants Americans to "memorize a Koran verse." "Heavens, no," the GOP presidential contender said on CNN's "State of the Union" when asked by the moderator whether that was his intention. Huckabee said he rather intended to make his point that Obama isn't showing enough anger toward the Islamic State after its recent attacks in Paris and Mali. "I'm simply pointing out the irony," Huckabee said. "This president has shown more intensity of anger toward Republicans than toward ISIS ......

http://www.allenbwest.com/2015/11/folks-we-have-two-options-in-the-fight-against-islamic-jihadism/ Article by Allen West: "...I think its time we get the language correct: theres nothing radical about this, its just plain Islamic terrorism and jihadism. We need leaders who are students of history and comprehend the various phases of Islam: First Mecca, Medina, Second Mecca and the global jihad. Those who continue to drone on about the peaceful Islam must come to realize that period is whats called the First Mecca phase (peaceful phase) and lasted just over 10 years, 610-622 AD...."

Anita Datar, 41, perished in the Mali hotel siege on Friday. She's the only American known to have died in the attack. A former Peace Corp worker in Senegal, Datar was in Mali on an international development project. The casualty hit home for Clinton, the Democratic presidential front-runner and senator from New York for eight years. "I knew Anita as the loving mother of a wonderful seven-year old boy and the former partner of David Garten, one of my senior policy advisors in the Senate," Clinton said in a statement ... Datar is among the at least 19 victims of...

When she was in her early 20s, Anita Datar spent two years in Africa, serving as a Peace Corps volunteer in Senegal. She was on the continent again, this time in Mali, on Friday, when gunmen seized a luxury hotel and killed at least 20 people. Datar, a 41-year-old international development worker from Takoma Park, Md., is the only American known to have died in the attack.

Special Terrorism UPDATE!!! 8 AM EST THIS SATURDAY (11/21) MORNING! Topics to be addressed: -The Mali terror attacks -Putin's trip to Tehran on Monday - what will be discussed? -Speaking of Syrian refugees ... what about our broken immigration system and two open borders? -The Schengen Agreement null and void across European Union & Obama's undermining of U.S. and international security ... Call-in #: 855-853-5227 You can listen to USA Transnational Report live on JJ McCartney's Nightside Radio Studios and on Red State Talk Radio. You can subscribe to USA Transnational Report podcast on iTunes here. You can also subscribe...

Three years before masked gunmen stormed a hotel in the capital of Mali, killing at least 27 people early Friday morning, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney was mocked by certain media figures for warning about the spread of terrorist activity in the small West African country. During the final 2012 presidential debate, which focused on foreign policy, Romney cautioned that instability in the Middle East had given way to the rise of terrorist influences in several key countries, including Libya, Syria and Mali. -snip But for some in media, the longstanding tradition of administrations trading information with presidential candidates apparently...

Radison Blu hotel under attack by jihadists armed with AK-47s and hand grenades in Malian capital of Bamako Up to 10 gunmen have taken dozens of hostages inside the Radisson hotel while 80 people have escaped unharmed Gunmen spoke in English and tested hostages' knowledge of the Koran before allowing Muslim hostages to leave Pentagon confirms that all 22 American nationals were rescued and unhurt following the hotel crisis US Special Forces led elite operation to clear the building one floor at a time amid deadly hostage crisis At least 27 people have been killed including a Belgian diplomat and...

At least 27 people were reported dead on Friday after Malian commandos stormed a luxury hotel in the capital Bamako with at least 170 people inside, many of them foreigners, that had been seized by Islamist gunmen. The former French colony has been battling Islamist rebels for several years, and the jihadist group Al Mourabitoun, allied to al Qaeda and based in the deserts of northern Mali, claimed responsibility for the attack in a tweet. By late afternoon, ministerial adviser Amadou Sangho told the French television station BFMTV that no more hostages were being held. But a U.N. official said...

Gunmen went on a shooting rampage at the luxury Radisson Blu hotel in Mali's capital Bamako on Friday, seizing 170 guests and staff in an ongoing hostage-taking, the hotel chain said. Automatic weapons fire could be heard from outside the 190-room hotel in the city-centre, where security forces have set up a security cordon, an AFP journalist said.Malian soldiers, police and special forces were on the scene as a security perimeter was set up, along with members of the UN's MINUSMA peacekeeping force in Mali and the French troops fighting jihadists in west Africa under Operation Barkhane.The Rezidor Hotel Group,...