With the gaze of much of the world fixed on the carnage unfolding in Gaza, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin continues to expand his country’s reach in Africa.
Russia, in the form of the private military contractor (PMC) Wagner, has been a growing presence in Libya since at least 2018, when the group was first reported to be training troops under renegade military commander Khalifa Haftar, leader of the Libyan National Army, forces belonging to the eastern of the country’s two parliaments.
But, following the death of Wagner’s founder and former Putin ally Yevgeny Prigozhin, after his failed coup in Russia last year, the fate of the paramilitary force in Libya and Africa seemed uncertain.
Russia operates several PMCs. However, none is said to be as close to the Kremlin or to have been deployed as extensively as that founded by Prigozhin. At little cost to the Kremlin, Wagner has gained Russia financial, military and political influence across swaths of Libya and Africa.
Given the stakes, the Kremlin was never likely to disband Wagner, despite its active rebellion last year. Instead, following Prigozhin’s much-predicted demise, his commercial and military interests were divided between Russia’s various intelligence services, a report by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) released this week claims.
Like other PMCs, like the United States’ Constellis (formerly Blackwater), Wagner allowed its government to operate in overseas conflicts at arm’s length: projecting power while maintaining a degree of deniability. That distance also allows PMCs to operate outside the typical bounds of state warfare, engaging in campaigns of terror and disinformation in a way that conventional forces cannot.
Command of Wagner’s overseas presence has been assigned to Russia’s military intelligence (GRU), specifically General Andrei Averyanov. Through a series of intermediate PMCs like Convoy, established in Russian-occupied Crimea in 2022, and Redut, active in Ukraine, but established in 2008 to protect Russian commercial interests, maintaining legal deniability, Wagner’s Ukrainian operation is being retitled the Volunteer Corps, with other operations becoming the Expeditionary Corps.
That its ambition remained undimmed was evidenced by its initial instruction to build a fighting force across Africa of some 40,000 contractors – since reduced to 20,000 but far larger than its current footprint.
Some measure of General Averyanov’s intent can perhaps be gained from looking at past command of Unit 29155, the wing of Russian military intelligence reported to be responsible for overseeing foreign assassinations and destabilising European countries.
African dreams
Africa, one of the richest continents in terms of minerals and energy, is undergoing a “youth boom” that stands to change the demographics of the world.
Within Africa, Libya boasts the largest oil reserves and gold deposits estimated to rank among the world’s top 50. In addition, its geographic location, linking Niger, Chad and Sudan to North Africa and Europe, makes it of vital strategic importance.
Already Averyanov has been busy, travelling to meet with Field Marshall Haftar in September of last year, followed by trips to Mali, Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic (CAR) and Niger.
In all cases, the offer was largely the same: resources for security.
Only in Libya did that rubric break. Russia’s lucrative oil extraction plants operate under the auspices of Libya’s other, internationally recognised government in Tripoli, meaning Haftar and his allies, claimed by the US Department of Defence to include the United Arab Emirates, would have to pay for the Expeditionary Corps’ deployment themselves.
“Haftar needs Wagner,” Tarek Megerisi, a senior fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations said, using the better-known name for the group. “Furthermore, while he’s hosting them in Libya, [Wagner] can use its position to prop up operations in Syria, Sudan and elsewhere.
“It’s a network,” he continued, citing reports. “It’s not just military support, either. They’re using their position in eastern Libya to transport [illegal narcotic] Captagon from Syria, shift gold to evade sanctions, as well as help traffic migrants from southern Africa and as far away as Bangladesh.
“Libya is a hugely profitable area for Wagner,” he said.
Presence
By current estimates, the Expeditionary Corps is thought to have some 800 contractors deployed in Libya, with a further 4,600 dispersed across sub-Saharan Africa. In addition to its fighters, the Expeditionary Corps maintains three air bases – one in the oil basin of Sirte, one in al-Jufra in the interior, and one in Brak al-Shati – which analysts say allows both groups, (Haftar’s Libyan National Army and the PMC) to move goods between allies in Sudan and other sub-Saharan locations.
In addition to its presence on the ground,talks are under way to give Russian warships docking rights at the port of Tobruk in exchange for air defence systems and training for LNA pilots.
“The Central and Eastern Mediterranean is an incredibly important area for Europe and, by extension, NATO,” Ivan Klyszcz, an authority on Russian foreign policy at the International Centre for Defence and Security at Tallinn, said. “Russia already has a Mediterranean port at Tartous in Syria, a port at Tobruk would deepen that presence and potentially bring them into competition with Europe, not least the British, who maintain a large naval presence at Cyprus.”
That the Expeditionary Corps could increase its footfall to 20,000, referenced in the RUSI report and widely discussed by military bloggers, already appears to be within sight.
“That doesn’t sound unachievable, if you consider where they are now,” Jalel Harchaoui of RUSI said. “After all, we’re not talking about purely Russian recruitment, so much as ongoing recruitment across Africa,” he said, recalling Wagner’s transplanting of fighters from Syria to Libya in 2020.
“Eventually, what we may be seeing is a PMC where local troops from one African state can be deployed to another, where they’ll be free to operate to whatever rules they see fit. For instance, in one state, it could simply be a case of providing security to a head of government or a facility. In another, they may be called upon to resort to rape, torture and anti-personnel mines.
“The business model allows them to accomplish all of this, to build alliances … at little cost to what is, at the end of the day, Russia’s relatively small economy,” he said.
End game
However, while a significant player, Wagner is far from alone in a shifting and occasionally crowded Libyan battleground. In addition to the Tripoli-allied militias are the Turkish forces who allied with local commanders to counter and repel the Wagner-backed Haftar, when he attempted to take and hold the capital in 2020 and end the political deadlock in his favour.
Moreover, with Russia’s extensive investment in Libyan energy protected and governed by the Turks’ allies in Tripoli, there are no guarantees that Moscow’s alliance with Haftar may not also fall victim to the cold pragmatism that has been constant amid the chaos in Libya since its revolution.
“There is nothing to suggest that Russia is pledged to Haftar,” Klyszcz continued, “Haftar is important because of where he is, not who he is. It’s as much a marriage of convenience as it is anything else,” he said.
“Likewise with Turkey. There is nothing to suggest that the PMC can’t cooperate with Turkey, as they have in other parts of the world.
“You need to remember that Russia is engaged upon a global strategy with regional implications,” Klszcz said. “Putin’s intention is to create a multipolar world, with India and China all exerting power, rather than just the West as we have at present,” he said.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says it’s “disgraceful and demeaning” that a Halifax-area school would request that service members not wear military uniforms to its Remembrance Day ceremony.
Houston’s comments were part of a chorus of criticism levelled at the school — Sackville Heights Elementary — whose administration decided to back away from the plan after the outcry.
A November newsletter from the school in Middle Sackville, N.S., invited Armed Forces members to attend its ceremony but asked that all attendees arrive in civilian attire to “maintain a welcoming environment for all.”
Houston, who is currently running for re-election, accused the school’s leaders of “disgracing themselves while demeaning the people who protect our country” in a post on the social media platform X Thursday night.
“If the people behind this decision had a shred of the courage that our veterans have, this cowardly and insulting idea would have been rejected immediately,” Houston’s post read. There were also several calls for resignations within the school’s administration attached to Houston’s post.
In an email to families Thursday night, the school’s principal, Rachael Webster, apologized and welcomed military family members to attend “in the attire that makes them most comfortable.”
“I recognize this request has caused harm and I am deeply sorry,” Webster’s email read, adding later that the school has the “utmost respect for what the uniform represents.”
Webster said the initial request was out of concern for some students who come from countries experiencing conflict and who she said expressed discomfort with images of war, including military uniforms.
Her email said any students who have concerns about seeing Armed Forces members in uniform can be accommodated in a way that makes them feel safe, but she provided no further details in the message.
Webster did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At a news conference Friday, Houston said he’s glad the initial request was reversed but said he is still concerned.
“I can’t actually fathom how a decision like that was made,” Houston told reporters Friday, adding that he grew up moving between military bases around the country while his father was in the Armed Forces.
“My story of growing up in a military family is not unique in our province. The tradition of service is something so many of us share,” he said.
“Saying ‘lest we forget’ is a solemn promise to the fallen. It’s our commitment to those that continue to serve and our commitment that we will pass on our respects to the next generation.”
Liberal Leader Zach Churchill also said he’s happy with the school’s decision to allow uniformed Armed Forces members to attend the ceremony, but he said he didn’t think it was fair to question the intentions of those behind the original decision.
“We need to have them (uniforms) on display at Remembrance Day,” he said. “Not only are we celebrating (veterans) … we’re also commemorating our dead who gave the greatest sacrifice for our country and for the freedoms we have.”
NDP Leader Claudia Chender said that while Remembrance Day is an important occasion to honour veterans and current service members’ sacrifices, she said she hopes Houston wasn’t taking advantage of the decision to “play politics with this solemn occasion for his own political gain.”
“I hope Tim Houston reached out to the principal of the school before making a public statement,” she said in a statement.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
REGINA – Saskatchewan Opposition NDP Leader Carla Beck says she wants to prove to residents her party is the government in waiting as she heads into the incoming legislative session.
Beck held her first caucus meeting with 27 members, nearly double than what she had before the Oct. 28 election but short of the 31 required to form a majority in the 61-seat legislature.
She says her priorities will be health care and cost-of-living issues.
Beck says people need affordability help right now and will press Premier Scott Moe’s Saskatchewan Party government to cut the gas tax and the provincial sales tax on children’s clothing and some grocery items.
Beck’s NDP is Saskatchewan’s largest Opposition in nearly two decades after sweeping Regina and winning all but one seat in Saskatoon.
The Saskatchewan Party won 34 seats, retaining its hold on all of the rural ridings and smaller cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia‘s growing population was the subject of debate on Day 12 of the provincial election campaign, with Liberal Leader Zach Churchill arguing immigration levels must be reduced until the province can provide enough housing and health-care services.
Churchill said Thursday a plan by the incumbent Progressive Conservatives to double the province’s population to two million people by the year 2060 is unrealistic and unsustainable.
“That’s a big leap and it’s making life harder for people who live here, (including ) young people looking for a place to live and seniors looking to downsize,” he told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
Anticipating that his call for less immigration might provoke protests from the immigrant community, Churchill was careful to note that he is among the third generation of a family that moved to Nova Scotia from Lebanon.
“I know the value of immigration, the importance of it to our province. We have been built on the backs of an immigrant population. But we just need to do it in a responsible way.”
The Liberal leader said Tim Houston’s Tories, who are seeking a second term in office, have made a mistake by exceeding immigration targets set by the province’s Department of Labour and Immigration. Churchill said a Liberal government would abide by the department’s targets.
In the most recent fiscal year, the government welcomed almost 12,000 immigrants through its nominee program, exceeding the department’s limit by more than 4,000, he said. The numbers aren’t huge, but the increase won’t help ease the province’s shortages in housing and doctors, and the increased strain on its infrastructure, including roads, schools and cellphone networks, Churchill said.
“(The Immigration Department) has done the hard work on this,” he said. “They know where the labour gaps are, and they know what growth is sustainable.”
In response, Houston said his commitment to double the population was a “stretch goal.” And he said the province had long struggled with a declining population before that trend was recently reversed.
“The only immigration that can come into this province at this time is if they are a skilled trade worker or a health-care worker,” Houston said. “The population has grown by two per cent a year, actually quite similar growth to what we experienced under the Liberal government before us.”
Still, Houston said he’s heard Nova Scotians’ concerns about population growth, and he then pivoted to criticize Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for trying to send 6,000 asylum seekers to Nova Scotia, an assertion the federal government has denied.
Churchill said Houston’s claim about asylum seekers was shameful.
“It’s smoke and mirrors,” the Liberal leader said. “He is overshooting his own department’s numbers for sustainable population growth and yet he is trying to blame this on asylum seekers … who aren’t even here.”
In September, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said there is no plan to send any asylum seekers to the province without compensation or the consent of the premier. He said the 6,000 number was an “aspirational” figure based on models that reflect each province’s population.
In Halifax, NDP Leader Claudia Chender said it’s clear Nova Scotia needs more doctors, nurses and skilled trades people.
“Immigration has been and always will be a part of the Nova Scotia story, but we need to build as we grow,” Chender said. “This is why we have been pushing the Houston government to build more affordable housing.”
Chender was in a Halifax cafe on Thursday when she promised her party would remove the province’s portion of the harmonized sales tax from all grocery, cellphone and internet bills if elected to govern on Nov. 26. The tax would also be removed from the sale and installation of heat pumps.
“Our focus is on helping people to afford their lives,” Chender told reporters. “We know there are certain things that you can’t live without: food, internet and a phone …. So we know this will have the single biggest impact.”
The party estimates the measure would save the average Nova Scotia family about $1,300 a year.
“That’s a lot more than a one or two per cent HST cut,” Chender said, referring to the Progressive Conservative pledge to reduce the tax by one percentage point and the Liberal promise to trim it by two percentage points.
Elsewhere on the campaign trail, Houston announced that a Progressive Conservative government would make parking free at all Nova Scotia hospitals and health-care centres. The promise was also made by the Liberals in their election platform released Monday.
“Free parking may not seem like a big deal to some, but … the parking, especially for people working at the facilities, can add up to hundreds of dollars,” the premier told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
