Seventeenth Global Studies Conference

Abstract

An Islamic insurgency is plaguing the Central Sahel. From the most recently published GTD data, Mali has experienced a total of 1006 incidents; and 67 percent of the incidents are classified as terrorism, 31 percent as insurgent attacks, one percent as criminal acts, and one percent as attacks targeting state actors. Islamic militants are responsible for 50 percent of the attacks, while 40 percent of them were conducted by unknown operatives. The remaining 10 percent were conducted by non-state armed actors. In Burkina Faso, there are a total of 444 incidents. Seventy-eight percent of the attacks are classified as terrorism, 21.6 percent as insurgent attacks, and less than one percent (.4) as criminal incidents. Fifty-eight percent of the incidents are conducted by unknown operatives, forty-one percent by Islamic militants, and the remaining one percent by ethnic extremists, vigilantes, and criminal outfits. Niger saw a total of 220 attacks, with 67 percent classified as terrorism, 31 percent as insurgent attacks, one percent as intra/inter-group conflicts, and one percent as criminal acts. Sixty-six percent of those incidents are conducted by Islamist extremists, twenty-four percent by unknown assailants, and twenty percent by separatists, nationalists, and dissidents. This study uses a mixed methods approach to examine two key questions, namely is there a correlation between irregular migratory patterns; or, do the human insecurities plaguing the countries account for the migratory outflows in the Central Sahel?