Three years after the notorious mutiny by the Wagner Group and the death of its founder, Russian mercenaries have fully returned to their original task: spreading the Kremlin’s influence across the African continent.
With Iran's hardliners facing the war they had long prepared for, they now face increasing divisions on what the goals of the conflict are, and how it should end.
🔎What we're monitoring this week:
▸ 🇮🇷 Continued Iran and U.S. fighting point to broader war
▸ 🇱🇾🇹🇳 Heatwaves and power outages plague North Africa
▸ 🇳🇮 No more elections in Nicaragua
▸ 🇮🇳 Cockroach
SANAD's operation marks a milestone in the country's efforts to improve transparency, strengthen financial governance, and attract international capital.
The high-profile arrests of Iraqi political and energy officials drew international attention and fuelled claims that Baghad was targeting Iranian influence. However, the situation is more nuanced than it appears, and reveals Iraq's continuing political complexity.
For the second time this year, the Malian military faced a major assault by a coalition of Tuareg separatists and al-Qaeda jihadist forces in the vast desert expanses of the north. Is Mali on track to become the first Sahel state to fall to resurgent jihadism?
For decades, Western militaries assumed that better technology would outweigh greater numbers. The wars in Ukraine and Iran suggest that assumption is no longer safe.
