In March 2011 the EU adopted a comprehensive strategy for the Sahel to address the key security and development challenges in the region. The Action Plan to implement the strategy was adopted in April 2015 and was updated in June 2016. The EU’s Sahel strategy has reached many results, such as training local troops in counter-terrorism, focusing on local government capacity building, and investing in development. Nevertheless, it has not been able to totally address Sahel’s radicalization issues, political instability, and the sore points of governance. The August 2020 coup in Mali was one example of a much bigger issue of the inability of local governments to provide security and stability to their countries.
Instability in the Sahel has great implications for the security of the EU. An unstable Sahel means an unstable southern EU border, a radicalization and extremism hot-bed in EU’s neighborhood, increased migration flows from the region to the EU, and increased illicit trafficking. The Sahel is proving to be one of the most important regions for European security and the EU’s counter-terrorism efforts.
This event aims to bring light to this subject. It will discuss the EU’s Strategy for the Sahel: its successes and/or failures to address terrorism and instability in the region and what a renewed and updated action plan would have to entail in order to address these issues better.
Speakers:
Dr. Fidelis Etah Ewane, Senior Planning, Evaluation and Reporting Officer, Regional Advisory and Coordination Cell of the EU in the Sahel
Delina Goxho, Independent Security Expert on remote warfare, security force assistance, and the Sahel. PhD Candidate at Scuola Normale Superiore.
Moderator:
Marija Sulce, Deputy Director of Security & Defence, YPFP Brussels
For more details, please contact Marija Sulce at marija.sulce@ypfp.org