By John Sunday Ojo, Samuel Oyewole & Folahanmi Aina

Nigeria has confronted several security conundrums in recent years, including armed banditry, which poses a severe threat to the north-west and the entire nation. North-west Nigeria has been hit by an unprecedented wave of kidnappings, maiming, killings, population displacements, cattle rustling, and disruption of socio-economic activities due to the rise of armed bandits in the region. These events have created a climate of uncertainty that has become a cause for concern for the government and the citizenry. Relying on secondary sources of data, this article examines the causes, manifestations, and dimensions of armed banditry in north-west Nigeria, and its security implications. It provides a survey of both the visible and less-visible actors in the conflict. The article argues that armed banditry in the north-west and other parts of Nigeria transcends pastoralist insurgency, as evident in the dominant narratives, considering the multiplicity of complexly connected causal factors, actors, manifestations, and dimensions that are present in the threats posed by this development. The article also shows the negative impacts of armed banditry on human and national security in the region.

Democracy and Security, Volume 19, 2023 - Issue 4

y Fawzi Banao, Bertrand Laporte

The actions of terrorist groups destabilize border states and economies. The presence of mining activities, such as gold extraction, favors the illicit export of this ore to finance terrorist groups. Using COMTRADE data, we estimate gold customs fraud with mirror analysis (gold export missing) for 50 African countries between 2000 and 2019. We use ordinary least squares, two-stage least squares, generalized method of moments, and local impulse strategy in our empirical strategies to estimate the impact of terrorism on gold customs fraud. Our results suggest that states affected by terrorism must pay more attention to the trafficking of gold, as this is a valued mineral for terrorist groups. The response to conflict with terrorist groups cannot be solely military. The State must necessarily get the various state services to work together, particularly the army, the police, and customs. The institutionalization of this cooperation remains a real challenge for these states. Regarding customs administration efficiency, data analysis is at the core of customs modernization programs. Only internal and external trade data have been used in risk management systems. Cooperation with the armed forces must allow the acquisition of tools and skills to analyze other data sources, such as satellite data. Customs could then carry out all of its missions at the borders: collecting duties and taxes but also protecting the local/border economy and cutting off the funding sources for terrorist groups.

Clermont-Ferrand, France Centre d’Études et de Recherches sur le Développement International, 2022. 27p.

Juan Diego Cárdenas - Javier Lizcano Villalba - Lara Susana Loaiza - Laura Alonso , etc.

There were always going to be dissident elements from the FARC, from those who were unconvinced by the peace deal or simply refused to consider it. However, the ex-FARC mafia is now growing at such a rate that Colombia’s entire peace process is at risk. Almost every peace process has had combatants who refuse to give up their arms. There was no reason that the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia – FARC) should be any different. Looking abroad first, the Northern Ireland peace process saw the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA, more commonly known as the IRA) reach the “Good Friday Agreement” with the British government in April 1998. It did not take long for the “Continuity IRA” and the “Real IRA,” which has now morphed into the “New IRA,” to appear. But while a series of bombs have been set off and some isolated killings have taken place, Irish dissident groups have been unable to win any significant support or rebuild the military capacity of the PIRA. …

Washington, DC: Insight Crime, 2019. 72p.

By Louise I. Shelley Dr.; John T. Picarelli; Allison Irby; Douglas M. Hart; Patricia A. Craig-Hart; Phil Williams Dr.; Steven Simon; Nabi Abdullaev; Bartosz Stanislawski; Laura Covill

The report presents three case studies of regions that are hospitable to transnational crime-terrorism interactions: Chechnya; the Black Sea region; and the tri-border area of Paraguay, Brazil, and Argentina. The analysis of links between criminal and terrorist groups in these areas used a military intelligence method called "intelligence preparation of the battlefield," which involves the identification of areas where terrorism and organized crime are most likely to interact. Such areas are expressed not only in geographic terms but also conceptual terms; for example, the analysis identifies the way groups organize themselves, communicate, use technology, deploy their members, and share cultural affinities. Within each of these areas, investigators can identify indicators that suggest whether or not cooperation between specific terrorist and criminal groups are likely to occur. The general principle that previous research in this domain has developed is that terrorist and criminal groups have links via methods but not motives. This report concludes that although the motives of terrorists and organized criminals are most often different, the links that separate such groups are growing increasingly complex, such that the separation of motives is no longer unequivocal. This study identifies an evolutionary pattern whereby the sharing of methods leads to more intimate connections within a short time. Factors that influence this evolution are failed states, war-torn regions, and alliances developed in penal institutions and urban neighborhoods. The central recommendation is to incorporate crime analysis in the intelligence analysis of terrorism.

Washington, DC: U.S. National Institute of Justice, 2005. 115p.