{"id":7914,"date":"2019-02-10T15:31:44","date_gmt":"2019-02-10T07:31:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.namnewsnetwork.org\/?p=7914"},"modified":"2019-02-10T15:31:46","modified_gmt":"2019-02-10T07:31:46","slug":"sahel-islamist-groups-networking-skills-growing-security-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/?p=7914","title":{"rendered":"Sahel Islamist groups&#8217; networking skills growing &#8211; Security report"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>MUNICH (Germany), Feb 10 (NNN-AGENCIES) &#8212; A surge in violent attacks linked to Islamist groups in West Africa\u2019s Sahel region reflects their growing capabilities and networking abilities, according to an international security conference report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Three-quarters of battles with state security forces during 2018 were initiated by the groups, it said, according to extracts from the report, prepared for the annual Munich Security Conference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It cited African Center for Strategic Studies data showing fatalities linked to Islamist militant activity more than doubled from 2017 to 1,082.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There was also a growing \u201csecurity traffic jam\u201d of military forces in the area including a United Nations mission, France\u2019s Operation Barkhane, four European Union military and police training missions, and the G5 regional partnership established in 2015.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Security challenges include the area\u2019s vast size, human trafficking, climate change and rapid population growth, the report said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The violence in the Sahel region, a semi-arid band below the Sahara, has also alarmed Germany and the United States, who have sent thousands of troops there to counter al Qaeda and Daesh-linked groups.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The report is due to be published on Monday. The Conference will bring together more than 600 government leaders and other decision-makers on Feb 15-17. &#8212; NNN-AGENCIES<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MUNICH (Germany), Feb 10 (NNN-AGENCIES) &#8212; A surge in violent attacks linked to Islamist groups in West Africa\u2019s Sahel region reflects their growing capabilities and networking abilities, according to an international security conference report. Three-quarters of battles with state security forces during 2018 were initiated by the groups, it said, according to extracts from the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[213],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7914"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7914\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}