George urges seizure of Sudan generals assets
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George urges seizure of Sudan generals assets
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Re: George urges seizure of Sudan generals assets
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George Clooney: How Congress Can Help Stop the Killing in Sudan
The U.S. has tools to combat corruption and human rights abuses in Sudan. It’s time to use them.
By GEORGE CLOONEY and JOHN PRENDERGAST
June 11, 2019
George Clooney and John Prendergast are Co-Founders of The Sentry ([You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] which follows the dirty money connected to African war criminals and transnational war profiteers and seeks to shut those benefiting from violence out of the international financial system.
Traveling throughout the Sudanese region of Darfur and neighboring refugee camps during the mid-2000s, we saw firsthand evidence of the monster the Sudanese regime had built to carry out a genocide. The government organized, armed and deployed militias, known then as the “Janjaweed,” alongside the regular army as the primary instruments of its killing machine. Ethnic cleansing and mass rape were the Janjaweed’s weapons of choice.
Fast forward to the present: Massive peaceful protests that erupted throughout Sudan in mid-December led to the removal in April of Sudan’s 30-year dictator, Omar al-Bashir. In May, the protesters’ leadership and the military leaders who assumed power after the coup reached a tentative deal to establish civilian rule in the country, agreeing on a three-year transition to democratic elections and granting power to civilian-controlled institutions. Massive peaceful protests continued during and after the negotiations, as demonstrators kept pushing to dismantle the violent, undemocratic kleptocratic system built up during al-Bashir’s reign.
But there was one big problem with the deal. The big losers in such an arrangement would be al-Bashir’s allied generals, who had looted the country with impunity for 30 years, and the Janjaweed militias, who would no longer have free, lawless rein in their areas of deployment.
As a result, on June 3, Sudanese security forces spearheaded by the Janjaweed attacked a major protester encampment. Now known by the deceptively anodyne term “Rapid Support Forces,” the Janjaweed militias over the last few days have killed more than 100 unarmed protesters, dumping many bodies in the Nile River, as well as raping, whipping and robbing Sudanese civilians throughout Khartoum. Hundreds more are missing and feared dead. Janjaweed have raided several hospitals and assaulted medical staff. Internet and phone networks are blocked to limit communication. The regime’s military leaders cancelled the agreements it had reached with the protesters and instead called for quick elections that they will surely rig in their favor.
If this sounds like another hopeless African crisis, it isn’t. Sudan is a country that has unified Republicans and Democrats in Congress and successive administrations in Washington in defense of human rights and peace. Much more can be done now by the current Congress and the Trump administration—as well as allies in Europe and Africa—to create consequences for the leaders of the regime and the Janjaweed destroying and looting the country.
In 2016, the U.S. Congress passed an incredibly effective new tool to combat corruption and human rights abuses: the Global Magnitsky Act, which allows the U.S. government to sanction human rights offenders and corrupt officials worldwide. Now, the leadership of both the House and Senate foreign affairs committees can formally request the Trump administration to sanction a list of Sudanese regime officials and their commercial accomplices who are most responsible for ongoing violence and state looting, starting with Janjaweed leader Lieutenant General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, the vice chair of the current military regime. And instead of just sanctioning one or two officials individually, the Global Magnitsky authorities allow for the use of network sanctions, in which an entire network involved in human rights abuses and/or mass corruption can be sanctioned with much greater impact.
The Trump administration could build major leverage if it deployed available but unused policy tools. In addition to the Global Magnitsky network sanctions, the Treasury Department could issue an anti-money laundering advisory to thousands of banks around the world to be on the lookout for illicit financial flows that have come out of Sudan during the last year as the economy has imploded and the political crisis has escalated. Our own initiative, The Sentry, is gathering evidence on some of this illegal activity, but if the Treasury Department issued one of these advisories, as it has regarding Venezuela and Ukraine, it would suddenly enlist bank compliance officers globally in the search for stolen assets that are being laundered through the international financial system.
Freezing and seizing some of those assets—and blocking some of these officials from the international financial system—would be a major and unutilized point of leverage for peace and human rights. Diplomats file in and out of Khartoum, cajoling regime leaders into returning to the previous deal for a transition to civilian, democratic rule. But given the support the regime enjoys from Gulf states, Russia and China, it will take more than words to alter this deadly equation. By creating significant financial consequences for regime leaders and their commercial collaborators, diplomats from Africa, Europe and the United States will be able to to influence the cost-benefit calculus of Khartoum’s generals, who until now have looted and killed for three decades with total impunity. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Tibor Nagy will be in Khartoum this week, and his diplomatic entreaties will fall on deaf ears if not backed by the unique power that U.S. Treasury Department actions can have over the kind of illicit financial activity that Sudan’s leaders have been engaged in for years.
This regime got away scot-free in committing genocide in Darfur and devastating the people of the now-independent South Sudan for decades. Al-Bashir might be out of power, but the same regime still rules, and the same Janjaweed militias are still committing atrocities. Today, the U.S. Congress and Executive Branch—along with the African Union and European Union—have a second chance to create serious consequences for serious crimes and to invest in high-level diplomacy to bring civilian rule to Sudan. There are plenty of reasons to do so. Resolving Sudan’s current crisis would prevent an escalation in the flow of refugees from Sudan, address the persecution of Christians and other religious minorities, counter the activity of extremist organizations supported by the al-Bashir regime—and prevent another round of mass atrocities in a country whose suffering has few parallels globally.
George Clooney: How Congress Can Help Stop the Killing in Sudan
The U.S. has tools to combat corruption and human rights abuses in Sudan. It’s time to use them.
By GEORGE CLOONEY and JOHN PRENDERGAST
June 11, 2019
George Clooney and John Prendergast are Co-Founders of The Sentry ([You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] which follows the dirty money connected to African war criminals and transnational war profiteers and seeks to shut those benefiting from violence out of the international financial system.
Traveling throughout the Sudanese region of Darfur and neighboring refugee camps during the mid-2000s, we saw firsthand evidence of the monster the Sudanese regime had built to carry out a genocide. The government organized, armed and deployed militias, known then as the “Janjaweed,” alongside the regular army as the primary instruments of its killing machine. Ethnic cleansing and mass rape were the Janjaweed’s weapons of choice.
Fast forward to the present: Massive peaceful protests that erupted throughout Sudan in mid-December led to the removal in April of Sudan’s 30-year dictator, Omar al-Bashir. In May, the protesters’ leadership and the military leaders who assumed power after the coup reached a tentative deal to establish civilian rule in the country, agreeing on a three-year transition to democratic elections and granting power to civilian-controlled institutions. Massive peaceful protests continued during and after the negotiations, as demonstrators kept pushing to dismantle the violent, undemocratic kleptocratic system built up during al-Bashir’s reign.
But there was one big problem with the deal. The big losers in such an arrangement would be al-Bashir’s allied generals, who had looted the country with impunity for 30 years, and the Janjaweed militias, who would no longer have free, lawless rein in their areas of deployment.
As a result, on June 3, Sudanese security forces spearheaded by the Janjaweed attacked a major protester encampment. Now known by the deceptively anodyne term “Rapid Support Forces,” the Janjaweed militias over the last few days have killed more than 100 unarmed protesters, dumping many bodies in the Nile River, as well as raping, whipping and robbing Sudanese civilians throughout Khartoum. Hundreds more are missing and feared dead. Janjaweed have raided several hospitals and assaulted medical staff. Internet and phone networks are blocked to limit communication. The regime’s military leaders cancelled the agreements it had reached with the protesters and instead called for quick elections that they will surely rig in their favor.
If this sounds like another hopeless African crisis, it isn’t. Sudan is a country that has unified Republicans and Democrats in Congress and successive administrations in Washington in defense of human rights and peace. Much more can be done now by the current Congress and the Trump administration—as well as allies in Europe and Africa—to create consequences for the leaders of the regime and the Janjaweed destroying and looting the country.
In 2016, the U.S. Congress passed an incredibly effective new tool to combat corruption and human rights abuses: the Global Magnitsky Act, which allows the U.S. government to sanction human rights offenders and corrupt officials worldwide. Now, the leadership of both the House and Senate foreign affairs committees can formally request the Trump administration to sanction a list of Sudanese regime officials and their commercial accomplices who are most responsible for ongoing violence and state looting, starting with Janjaweed leader Lieutenant General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, the vice chair of the current military regime. And instead of just sanctioning one or two officials individually, the Global Magnitsky authorities allow for the use of network sanctions, in which an entire network involved in human rights abuses and/or mass corruption can be sanctioned with much greater impact.
The Trump administration could build major leverage if it deployed available but unused policy tools. In addition to the Global Magnitsky network sanctions, the Treasury Department could issue an anti-money laundering advisory to thousands of banks around the world to be on the lookout for illicit financial flows that have come out of Sudan during the last year as the economy has imploded and the political crisis has escalated. Our own initiative, The Sentry, is gathering evidence on some of this illegal activity, but if the Treasury Department issued one of these advisories, as it has regarding Venezuela and Ukraine, it would suddenly enlist bank compliance officers globally in the search for stolen assets that are being laundered through the international financial system.
Freezing and seizing some of those assets—and blocking some of these officials from the international financial system—would be a major and unutilized point of leverage for peace and human rights. Diplomats file in and out of Khartoum, cajoling regime leaders into returning to the previous deal for a transition to civilian, democratic rule. But given the support the regime enjoys from Gulf states, Russia and China, it will take more than words to alter this deadly equation. By creating significant financial consequences for regime leaders and their commercial collaborators, diplomats from Africa, Europe and the United States will be able to to influence the cost-benefit calculus of Khartoum’s generals, who until now have looted and killed for three decades with total impunity. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Tibor Nagy will be in Khartoum this week, and his diplomatic entreaties will fall on deaf ears if not backed by the unique power that U.S. Treasury Department actions can have over the kind of illicit financial activity that Sudan’s leaders have been engaged in for years.
This regime got away scot-free in committing genocide in Darfur and devastating the people of the now-independent South Sudan for decades. Al-Bashir might be out of power, but the same regime still rules, and the same Janjaweed militias are still committing atrocities. Today, the U.S. Congress and Executive Branch—along with the African Union and European Union—have a second chance to create serious consequences for serious crimes and to invest in high-level diplomacy to bring civilian rule to Sudan. There are plenty of reasons to do so. Resolving Sudan’s current crisis would prevent an escalation in the flow of refugees from Sudan, address the persecution of Christians and other religious minorities, counter the activity of extremist organizations supported by the al-Bashir regime—and prevent another round of mass atrocities in a country whose suffering has few parallels globally.
carolhathaway- Achieving total Clooney-dom
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Join date : 2015-03-24
Re: George urges seizure of Sudan generals assets
Thanks, PAN, for the article.
It's pretty amazing!
It's pretty amazing!
carolhathaway- Achieving total Clooney-dom
- Posts : 2919
Join date : 2015-03-24
Re: George urges seizure of Sudan generals assets
Well, they're right, aren't they? And there has to be a sense of urgency, because this lot are already pretty close to the doorstep! If not already over the threshold (see bottom of article)
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party animal - not!- George Clooney fan forever!
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Re: George urges seizure of Sudan generals assets
[size=41]Leaked documents reveal Russian effort to exert influence in Africa
Illustration: Guardian Design[/size]
Exclusive: Kremlin ally Yevgeny Prigozhin leading push to turn continent into strategic hub, documents show
by Luke Harding and Jason Burke
Tue 11 Jun 2019 07.30 EDTLast modified on Tue 11 Jun 2019 12.05 EDT
Russia is seeking to bolster its presence in at least 13 countries across Africaby building relations with existing rulers, striking military deals, and grooming a new generation of “leaders” and undercover “agents”, leaked documents reveal.
The mission to increase Russian influence on the continent is being led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a businessman based in St Petersburg who is a close ally of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. One aim is to “strong-arm” the US and the former colonial powers the UK and France out of the region. Another is to see off “pro-western” uprisings, the documents say.
In 2018 the US special counsel Robert Mueller indicted Prigozhin, who is known as “Putin’s chef” because of his Kremlin catering contracts. According to Mueller, his troll factory ran an extensive social media campaign in 2016 to help elect Donald Trump. The Wagner group – a private military contractor linked to Prigozhin – has supplied mercenaries to fight in Ukraine and Syria.
The documents show the scale of Prigozhin-linked recent operations in Africa, and Moscow’s ambition to turn the region into a strategic hub. Multiple firms linked to the oligarch, including Wagner, are known by employees as the “Company”. Its activities are coordinated with senior officials inside Russia’s foreign and defence ministries, the documents suggest.
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Yevgeny Prigozhin in Vladivostok in 2016. Photograph: Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images
Putin showed little interest in Africa in the 2000s. But western sanctions imposed in 2014 over the annexation of Crimea have driven Moscow to seek new geopolitical friends and business opportunities.
Russia has a military presence and peacekeeping mission in Central African Republic. CAR is described as “strategically important” and a “buffer zone between the Muslim north and Christian south”. It allows Moscow to expand “across the continent”, and Russian companies to strike lucrative mineral deals, the documents say.
On 24 May the Kremlin announced it was dispatching a team of army specialists to the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo. According to Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s press spokesman, they will service Russian-made military equipment. So far Moscow has signed military cooperation deals with about 20 African states.
Five days later the Kremlin said it would host the first ever Russia-Africa summit in October in the Black Sea resort of Sochi. Putin and Egypt’s president, Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, will chair the event. About 50 African leaders are due to attend. The aim is to foster political, economic and cultural cooperation.
The leaked documents were obtained by the Dossier Center, an investigative unit based in London. The centre is funded by Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the Russian businessman and exiled Kremlin critic.
Prigozhin has been approached for comment. He has previously denied any links to the troll factory and has said of Wagner that it does not exist. Putin has previously said that entities linked to Prigozhin do not constitute the Russian state.
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Congolese soldiers on patrol in Beni, North Kivu province, DRC. Russia says it sent specialists to the country last month. Photograph: Hugh Kinsella Cunningham/EPA
A map from December 2018 seen by the Guardian shows the level of cooperation between the “Company” and African governments, country by country. Symbols indicate military, political and economic ties, police training, media and humanitarian projects, and “rivalry with France”. Five is the highest level; one is the lowest.
The closest relations are with CAR, Sudan and Madagascar – all put at five. Libya, Zimbabwe and South Africa are listed as four, according to the map, with South Sudan at three, and DRC, Chad and Zambia at two.
Other documents cite Uganda, Equatorial Guinea and Mali as “countries where we plan to work”. Libya and Ethiopia are flagged as nations “where cooperation is possible”. The Kremlin has recently stepped up its ground operation in Libya. Last November the Libyan commander Khalifa Haftar travelled to Moscow and met the defence minister, Sergei Shoigu. Prigozhin was spotted at the talks. Egypt is described as “traditionally supportive”.
The graphic gives an overview of “Company” activities and achievements. It claims credit in CAR for getting of rid of politicians who are “orientated to France”, including national assembly representatives and the foreign minister. This appears to be Charles-Armel Doubane, sacked in December. It has “strengthened” the army and set up newspapers and a radio station. Russia is an “83% friend”, it says.
In Madagascar the new president, Andry Rajoelina, won election with “the Company’s support”, the map says. Russia “produced and distributed the island’s biggest newspaper, with 2 million copies a month”, it adds. Rajoelina denies receiving assistance.
Another key territory is Sudan. Last year Russian specialists drew up a programme of political and economic reform, designed to keep President Omar al-Bashir in power. It included a plan to smear anti-government protesters, apparently copy-pasted from tactics used at home against the anti-Putin opposition. (One memo mistakenly says “Russia” instead of “Sudan”.)
One ploy was to use fake news and videos to portray demonstrators in Khartoum and other Sudanese cities as “anti-Islam”, “pro-Israel” and “pro-LGBT”. The government was told to increase the price of newsprint – to make it harder for critics to get their message out – and to discover “foreigners” at anti-government rallies.
In a leaked letter Prigozhin wrote to Bashir complaining that the president had not actually followed through on the advice. Prigozhin mentioned “lack of activity” by the Sudanese government and its “extremely cautious position”.
The military deposed Bashir in April in a coup. Last week Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces opened fire on pro-democracy protesters, killing over a hundred. The Russian advisers had urged Sudan’s military council to suppress the activists with “minimal but acceptable loss of life”, one former regime source told CNN.
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Sudan security forces are deployed around Khartoum’s army headquarters on 3 June. Photograph: Ashraf Shazly/AFP/Getty Images
Meanwhile, Moscow is keen to exploit a long-running territorial dispute inComoros, the documents say. France directly controls one out of four of the Indian Ocean islands, Mayotte. In 2018 Prigozhin employees flew to Comoros via Belarus. Their objective was to test if “political technologies” might be used to inflame the row between Paris and the Comoros government.
Other suggestions in the documents include trans-African road and rail-building schemes. A railway could be built linking Dakar in Senegal with Port Sudan in Sudan, along the “old hajj [pilgrimage] route”. A separate 2,300-mile (3,700km) toll road was proposed connecting Port Sudan with Douala in Cameroon. Neither has so far happened.
A plan to revive “pan-African consciousness” appears closely modelled on the idea of Russkiy Mir, or Russian world. The concept has become fashionable under Putin and signifies Russian power and culture extended beyond current borders.
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Read more
One working paper is titled “African world”. It calls for a developing “African self-identity”. It recommends collecting a database of Africans living in the US and Europe, which might be used to groom “future leaders” and “agents of influence”. The eventual goal is a “loyal chain of representatives across African territory”, the March 2018 paper says.
More immediate practical measures include setting up Russian-controlled non-governmental organisations in African states and organising local meetings.
It is unclear how many Prigozhin initiatives have actually gone forward. There is evidence that media projects mentioned in the documents are now up and running – albeit with marginal impact. They include a website, Africa Daily Voice, with its HQ in Morocco, and a French-language news service, Afrique Panorama, based in Madagascar’s capital Antananarivo.
Russian operatives also offer thoughts on global politics. One policy paper, titled “Russian influence in Africa”, says Moscow needs to find “reliable partners among African states” and should establish military bases.[/size][/size]
Illustration: Guardian Design[/size]
Exclusive: Kremlin ally Yevgeny Prigozhin leading push to turn continent into strategic hub, documents show
by Luke Harding and Jason Burke
Tue 11 Jun 2019 07.30 EDTLast modified on Tue 11 Jun 2019 12.05 EDT
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Russia is seeking to bolster its presence in at least 13 countries across Africaby building relations with existing rulers, striking military deals, and grooming a new generation of “leaders” and undercover “agents”, leaked documents reveal.
The mission to increase Russian influence on the continent is being led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a businessman based in St Petersburg who is a close ally of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. One aim is to “strong-arm” the US and the former colonial powers the UK and France out of the region. Another is to see off “pro-western” uprisings, the documents say.
In 2018 the US special counsel Robert Mueller indicted Prigozhin, who is known as “Putin’s chef” because of his Kremlin catering contracts. According to Mueller, his troll factory ran an extensive social media campaign in 2016 to help elect Donald Trump. The Wagner group – a private military contractor linked to Prigozhin – has supplied mercenaries to fight in Ukraine and Syria.
The documents show the scale of Prigozhin-linked recent operations in Africa, and Moscow’s ambition to turn the region into a strategic hub. Multiple firms linked to the oligarch, including Wagner, are known by employees as the “Company”. Its activities are coordinated with senior officials inside Russia’s foreign and defence ministries, the documents suggest.
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Yevgeny Prigozhin in Vladivostok in 2016. Photograph: Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images
Putin showed little interest in Africa in the 2000s. But western sanctions imposed in 2014 over the annexation of Crimea have driven Moscow to seek new geopolitical friends and business opportunities.
Russia has a military presence and peacekeeping mission in Central African Republic. CAR is described as “strategically important” and a “buffer zone between the Muslim north and Christian south”. It allows Moscow to expand “across the continent”, and Russian companies to strike lucrative mineral deals, the documents say.
On 24 May the Kremlin announced it was dispatching a team of army specialists to the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo. According to Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s press spokesman, they will service Russian-made military equipment. So far Moscow has signed military cooperation deals with about 20 African states.
Five days later the Kremlin said it would host the first ever Russia-Africa summit in October in the Black Sea resort of Sochi. Putin and Egypt’s president, Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, will chair the event. About 50 African leaders are due to attend. The aim is to foster political, economic and cultural cooperation.
The leaked documents were obtained by the Dossier Center, an investigative unit based in London. The centre is funded by Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the Russian businessman and exiled Kremlin critic.
Prigozhin has been approached for comment. He has previously denied any links to the troll factory and has said of Wagner that it does not exist. Putin has previously said that entities linked to Prigozhin do not constitute the Russian state.
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Congolese soldiers on patrol in Beni, North Kivu province, DRC. Russia says it sent specialists to the country last month. Photograph: Hugh Kinsella Cunningham/EPA
A map from December 2018 seen by the Guardian shows the level of cooperation between the “Company” and African governments, country by country. Symbols indicate military, political and economic ties, police training, media and humanitarian projects, and “rivalry with France”. Five is the highest level; one is the lowest.
The closest relations are with CAR, Sudan and Madagascar – all put at five. Libya, Zimbabwe and South Africa are listed as four, according to the map, with South Sudan at three, and DRC, Chad and Zambia at two.
Other documents cite Uganda, Equatorial Guinea and Mali as “countries where we plan to work”. Libya and Ethiopia are flagged as nations “where cooperation is possible”. The Kremlin has recently stepped up its ground operation in Libya. Last November the Libyan commander Khalifa Haftar travelled to Moscow and met the defence minister, Sergei Shoigu. Prigozhin was spotted at the talks. Egypt is described as “traditionally supportive”.
The graphic gives an overview of “Company” activities and achievements. It claims credit in CAR for getting of rid of politicians who are “orientated to France”, including national assembly representatives and the foreign minister. This appears to be Charles-Armel Doubane, sacked in December. It has “strengthened” the army and set up newspapers and a radio station. Russia is an “83% friend”, it says.
In Madagascar the new president, Andry Rajoelina, won election with “the Company’s support”, the map says. Russia “produced and distributed the island’s biggest newspaper, with 2 million copies a month”, it adds. Rajoelina denies receiving assistance.
Another key territory is Sudan. Last year Russian specialists drew up a programme of political and economic reform, designed to keep President Omar al-Bashir in power. It included a plan to smear anti-government protesters, apparently copy-pasted from tactics used at home against the anti-Putin opposition. (One memo mistakenly says “Russia” instead of “Sudan”.)
One ploy was to use fake news and videos to portray demonstrators in Khartoum and other Sudanese cities as “anti-Islam”, “pro-Israel” and “pro-LGBT”. The government was told to increase the price of newsprint – to make it harder for critics to get their message out – and to discover “foreigners” at anti-government rallies.
In a leaked letter Prigozhin wrote to Bashir complaining that the president had not actually followed through on the advice. Prigozhin mentioned “lack of activity” by the Sudanese government and its “extremely cautious position”.
The military deposed Bashir in April in a coup. Last week Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces opened fire on pro-democracy protesters, killing over a hundred. The Russian advisers had urged Sudan’s military council to suppress the activists with “minimal but acceptable loss of life”, one former regime source told CNN.
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Sudan security forces are deployed around Khartoum’s army headquarters on 3 June. Photograph: Ashraf Shazly/AFP/Getty Images
Meanwhile, Moscow is keen to exploit a long-running territorial dispute inComoros, the documents say. France directly controls one out of four of the Indian Ocean islands, Mayotte. In 2018 Prigozhin employees flew to Comoros via Belarus. Their objective was to test if “political technologies” might be used to inflame the row between Paris and the Comoros government.
Other suggestions in the documents include trans-African road and rail-building schemes. A railway could be built linking Dakar in Senegal with Port Sudan in Sudan, along the “old hajj [pilgrimage] route”. A separate 2,300-mile (3,700km) toll road was proposed connecting Port Sudan with Douala in Cameroon. Neither has so far happened.
A plan to revive “pan-African consciousness” appears closely modelled on the idea of Russkiy Mir, or Russian world. The concept has become fashionable under Putin and signifies Russian power and culture extended beyond current borders.
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[size=16]Documents suggest Russian plan to sway South Africa election
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One working paper is titled “African world”. It calls for a developing “African self-identity”. It recommends collecting a database of Africans living in the US and Europe, which might be used to groom “future leaders” and “agents of influence”. The eventual goal is a “loyal chain of representatives across African territory”, the March 2018 paper says.
More immediate practical measures include setting up Russian-controlled non-governmental organisations in African states and organising local meetings.
It is unclear how many Prigozhin initiatives have actually gone forward. There is evidence that media projects mentioned in the documents are now up and running – albeit with marginal impact. They include a website, Africa Daily Voice, with its HQ in Morocco, and a French-language news service, Afrique Panorama, based in Madagascar’s capital Antananarivo.
Russian operatives also offer thoughts on global politics. One policy paper, titled “Russian influence in Africa”, says Moscow needs to find “reliable partners among African states” and should establish military bases.[/size][/size]
annemarie- Over the Clooney moon
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