Target Mauritania?
US involvement and threats to peace in Mauritania

The turbulent political landscape of Mauritania is now being further destabilised by the Obama administration's prosecution of the 'war on terror' begun by Bush, says Jeff Shantz.

MAURITANIA, a mainly desert nation in North Africa that straddles black and Arab Africa, recently entered a period of growing possibilities for petrodollar revenues from offshore oil.  It is a place that has garnered very little international attention until recently.  Culturally and politically, but not geographically, it is considered part of the Middle East and the Arab world.  Yet, at the same time it is one of the most pro-Western and pro-Israeli Arab regimes and is viewed as vulnerable to attacks by Arab nationalist and Islamist forces. 

Since 2001 the country has been a centrepiece for the US administration's prosecution of the 'war on terror' in the region, an approach initiated under George W Bush and continued under the young Barack Obama regime.  Despite the election of Obama in 2008, the US government continues to view Mauritania as an area of great economic and political interest.  Washington, which has historically given the area little regard, views the entire Sahel region as a large ungoverned, mysterious wasteland and, thus, a haven for terrorism (Fellows, 2005).  It is in this highly charged and rather skewed context that political turmoil and threats to peace in Mauritania must be approached.

Coups and counter-coups

The country, which has never experienced democratic governance, has been marked by numerous coups and counter-coups since gaining independence in 1960.  In 1975 Mauritania joined with Morocco in an effort to annex and divide Sahara (now Western Sahara), a territory coveted by Mauritania since 1960, whose people were engaged in a liberation struggle against Spanish control.  The weakness of the Mauritanian army led to a number of severe reversals in the face of resistance from fighters with Sahara's Polisario Front.  Mauritania's ill-fated involvement in the Western Sahara war of independence brought economic turmoil and left the country partially occupied by Moroccan troops.  Amid opposition calls to withdraw from the war with Sahara, a popular uprising, which included mass political demonstrations and street fighting, brought successive governments to crisis.

Over the course of a six-year period beginning in 1978 Mauritania was subjected to five coups.  The 1978 coup finally ended the reign of the country's first post-independence president, Ould Daddah.  In January 1980 his successor as head of state, Ould Louly, was removed and replaced by Ould Haidalla, who had been responsible for Mauritania officially recognising Polisario. Only four years later, claiming dissatisfaction with the government's economic policies amid continuing conditions of economic crisis and decline, the army staged another coup deposing Haidalla and installing Maaouya Ould Taya as president.

An attempted coup on 16 March 1981 was linked to Moroccan interests, leading to a severance of ties between the two countries.  Following that failed coup Mauritania shifted alliances towards Algeria which responded by providing military training and armaments.

A coup attempt by the Forces de Liberation Africaine de Mauritanie (FLAM), an organisation of black African nationalists, was put down at the end of 1987.  By April of 1989 violent conflicts within Mauritania between African Mauritanians and Arabs and Berbers supported by the army had contributed to the eruption of a violent border dispute with Senegal.  The conflict had a disastrous impact on both countries, the consequences of which are still evident in the situation of Mauritanian refugees and asylum seekers in Senegal.

In June 2003 Ould Taya survived a coup attempt and went on to win re-election in November.  The 2003 attempt led to several days of street fighting in the capital, with insurgents gaining control of some government buildings.  Taya's main challenger in that election, Haidalla, who rejected the results, was then arrested and charged with coup plotting.  His trial resulted in a conviction and a sentence that included a five-year suspended jail term and a prohibition against running in elections.

During the first week of August 2005, Ould Taya was overthrown in another coup.  The bloodless coup took place while Taya was attending the funeral of King Fahd in Saudi Arabia.  Upon being ousted Taya took residence in the Republic of Niger while planning his response.  After a moment of hesitation he asserted his claim to the presidency and ordered officers and soldiers of the armed forces to put an end to their aspirations of power.

Of the 17 army officers behind the coup, all but one were colonels, the highest rank in Mauritania's armed forces.  The group named Colonel Ely Ould Mohamed Vall as president of the military council that assumed power, identifying themselves as the Military Council for Justice and Democracy.  Vall, 55, who participated in the 1984 coup that brought Taya to power, had served as national security chief since 1987 and was a part of Taya's inner circle for more than two decades.

In the weeks following the coup, the council moved to build on the support that greeted it at home while also looking to calm international critics, promising to hold a referendum on changes to the constitution within one year and legislative elections within two years.  A civilian Prime Minister, Sidi Mohamed Ould Boubacar, was selected by the council to head a caretaker government.  The council also promised opposition leaders that none of its 17 members, nor anyone serving in the caretaker government, would stand as candidates in the elections.   

The 2005 coup happened in a context in which Mauritania had turned increasingly towards the West in the face of alleged threats from al-Qaeda-linked militants.  Taya's government had long attempted to contain opponents by accusing them of training with al-Qaeda-linked insurgents in Algeria.  Within days of its takeover the Military Council for Justice and Democracy released 21 Islamic activists who had been imprisoned by Taya for their alleged connections with an Algeria-based movement allied to al-Qaeda, the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC).

As leader of a country in which the vast majority of the population is Muslim, Taya had charted a contested course in allying Mauritania with the United States in the war on terror as well as opening full diplomatic relations with Israel in 1999.  This made Mauritania one of only three members of the Arab League to establish diplomatic ties with Israel.  These moves had been strongly condemned by Islamist leaders who mobilised opposition to Taya.

International responses initially condemned the coup, with statements against the unconstitutional seizure of power coming from Nigeria, the African Union, Britain, speaking on behalf of the European Union as its then president, and the United Nations.  The US called explicitly for a return to the established government of President Taya.

Despite claims by Taya's government that Mauritania was a multi-party democracy which had approved a constitution instituting political pluralism and a multi-party system, the reality was that the elections of 1992, 1997 and 2003 occurred amid allegations of corruption and electoral fraud.  In each case Taya won re-election.

Immediately following announcement of the coup, hundreds of people took to the streets in Mauritania's capital, Nouakchott, to express their support for Taya's removal.  Taya's Social Democratic Republican Party ( PRDS) even issued a statement backing the programme put forward by the Military Council for Justice and Democracy. 

On 6 August 2008, Mauritania experienced yet another coup as the man responsible for launching the coup against Taya, General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, finally assumed direct control of the country.  This most recent coup, which overthrew President Sidi Mohamed Ould Cheikh Abdallahi and Prime Minister Yahya Ould Ahmed Waghf, occurred mere hours after the president attempted to terminate his top military guards (Azikiwe, 2008).

Economic and political mismanagement

The factors that have served to encourage the development of political opposition groups are many, both political and economic.  Economic and political mismanagement under various regimes have left the country with numerous problems including famine.  A country whose economy has been based historically upon agriculture and fishing, Mauritania's vital agricultural and mining sectors have been brought to near-ruin.  According to a report by the human rights monitor FEWSNET, Mauritania imports around 70% of its food supply (Azikiwe, 2008).  The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has predicted that Mauritania is likely to experience growing levels of hunger and malnutrition as a result of rising global prices of food and fuel (Azikiwe, 2008).

In terms of politics, the corruption and violence of the political elites have given rise to widespread public dissatisfaction, if not open dissent.  This has been exacerbated by the cessation of the limited democratisation policies of the early 1990s.  An additional factor has been the state's maintenance of its racist and exclusionary policies towards the Haratines, the people confined to a slave stratum.  The ruling groups have historically been composed of an Arab elite from the north that proffers a version of Islam in which the enslavement of blacks is interpreted as being legitimised by the Koran. Thus human slavery has persisted in Mauritania as it has to a greater or lesser extent in Mali, Niger, Chad and especially the Sudan.

Politically, Taya's government carried out a systematic policy to eliminate the small minority of black Sonninkes, forcing many to flee the country.  This policy eventually led the US to suspend aid to Mauritania in 1993.  This has not meant, however, that successive American regimes, well aware of the potential resource wealth, have not taken  substantial steps to gain influence within the country and to encourage economic and political policies favourable to their needs.

If the political conditions, including a lack of democracy and authoritarian rule by elite cliques, are conducive to the emergence and growth of oppositional ideas, including political Islam, social conditions also prepare the ground for dissatisfaction and dissent. Half the population is under the age of 17.  More than half are without jobs.  Many young men have been forced, for economic reasons, to leave their home communities and travel to urban centres in search of employment. Separated from their social support networks, oftentimes isolated and enduring economic pressures, many find that religious organisations are the only ones that can meet their needs for community and solidarity.  Alarmist commentators have taken this uncritically to mean that they are turning to militant fundamentalists, including al-Qaeda recruiters.

Underlining the implications of the recent coups, in potentially broader geopolitical terms, is the fact that Mauritania holds potentially vast offshore oil and natural gas reserves which have yet to be exploited.  The 2005 coup occurred only months before Mauritania was about to start producing approximately 75,000 barrels of crude oil per day from its offshore Chinguetti field in early 2006. The Chinguetti and Tiof fields are expected to produce millions of barrels of oil in the not-distant future.  Western oil and gas corporations are looking to make Mauritania an important focus of their long-term investment plans. This means that Mauritania will be an increasingly significant area for the strategic and security interests of not only the corporations but Western governments as well. 

The focus on political Islam in Mauritania, by local and external governments, must be understood in this context. Similarly one must be cautious not to accept uncritically assessments, by either Western regimes or the Mauritanian government, that seek to associate political Islam with terrorism in an attempt to discredit protest and resistance movements of Mauritanian citizens, especially non-elites.

Opposition

Since the invasion of Iraq, domestic critics of the government have become increasingly vocal.  Opposition has emerged over both government domestic policy and foreign affairs.

In August 2005 the US military concluded a major training operation in the Sahel region.  Operation Flintlock 2005 involved approximately 1,000 US personnel and armed forces from seven countries in what was called a counter-terrorism training operation (Fellows, 2005). The operation was described by US officials as the largest American exercise in Africa since World War Two.  The operation followed a fictional scenario in which a terrorist group was pursued across national borders from Mauritania, through Mali, Niger and Chad.

The operation started only days after 15 Mauritanian soldiers were killed in an attack on an army base at the north-eastern border with Mali and Algeria.  Responsibility for that attack was claimed by the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat or GSPC, a group that is suspected of having links with al-Qaeda (Fellows, 2005). In a website statement GSPC claimed they 'planned an ambush for the Mauritanian apostate and puppet army, destroying seven vehicles and many members of Satan's army' (Fellows, 2005).  GSPC, which was formed in 1998 and was active during Algeria's seven-year civil war, is estimated to have as many as 4,000 members.

Other observers, including many in the region, however, are sceptical.  In their view the Algerian government has long used the threat of GSPC as a way to lure the US into the region.  According to Jeremy Keenan, a UK expert on the Sahara, many in the region believe that GSPC is really only a pseudonym for the Algerian security services (Fellows, 2005).  The Algerian government has used the supposed threat of terrorism as a way to secure previously withheld military materials from the US.  US Ambassador Richard Roth in Senegal has confirmed that the US and Algeria have been cooperating on military and intelligence issues for several years.  Critics point out further that the attack on the military base in Mauritania was the most significant case used to justify the Flintlock operation.  They also note that the real GSPC would never have attacked Mauritanian interests since Mauritania has provided a refuge for members escaping the Algerian forces.

Still others believe a splinter group of GSPC may have emerged motivated by broader interests than simply regime change in Algeria.  Moussa Ould Ham, editor of an independent newspaper in Mauritania, Le Calame, suggests: 'Wherever the Americans are, whether it's Iraq or wherever, an Islamic resistance rises up, and perhaps it's this Islamic resistance that we are seeing appearing in Mauritania today' (Fellows, 2005).  

In 2006, the government alerted troops for possible operations on the frontier with Mali, following reports of clashes in northern Mali between Touareg tribesmen and local villagers. The Mauritanian government had long sought to stop the movement of Touareg refugees from Mali into Mauritania where more than 35,000 Touareg refugees had already arrived.   As a pretext for halting the entrance of refugees into Mauritania, the government argued that the defeated Algerian Salafist movement, a violent Islamist sect, has had influence among the Touareg.

As a result of this claim, several countries in the region, including Mauritania and Mali, have concluded 'hot pursuit' agreements.  The result of the pursuits led to dozens of arrests and turned up a few supporters of Islamic political radicalism from Algeria. According to authorities, several major terror attacks were planned, including kidnapping foreigners and attacks on security forces.  It was also claimed that some of those interrogated admitted to longtime involvement in Islamic terrorism, dating as far back as the 1998 bombings of US embassies in East Africa.  There has been no independent confirmation of these claims, however, and many are sceptical of government claims given the stated desire of authorities to enhance relations with the US government and its aims under the 'war on terror'.

On Christmas Eve 2007, four members of a French family visiting Mauritania as tourists were robbed and killed as they picnicked outside the town of Aleg, a small town 150 miles east of the capital, Nouakchott.  Mauritania's Minister of the Interior, Yall Zakaria Alassane, wasted little time in declaring the killings the actions of a terrorist sleeper cell.  The public prosecutor's office in Nouakchott issued a statement claiming that the attack was carried out by three known members of a regional al-Qaeda terrorist network based in Algeria. The Mauritanian government's hunt for the three men expanded into neighbouring Senegal and helicopters were deployed to patrol the border region. One immediate result of the attack was the cancelling of the world-famous Dakar Rally road race which was set to pass through Mauritania only two weeks thereafter.

Only four days after the French tourists were killed, another attack left four Mauritanian soldiers dead near the country's northern border.  A military unit near the tiny El-Ghallawiya military base, in an area that is sparsely populated, attempted to intercept two vehicles driving through the desert.  Fleeing pursuit, occupants of the vehicles opened fire on the soldiers, killing four and taking their weapons.  The government again proclaimed through the Ministry of the Interior that the attack was the act of terrorists.  They expressed concern that the attacks took place in the same area in which the 15 soldiers were killed two years previously, supposedly by GSPC.

On the evening of 1 February  2008, machine-gun fire was directed against the facade of the Israeli embassy in Nouakchott.  The attack was quickly attributed to Islamic militants by the Mauritanian and American governments. While no one was injured in the attack, it raised additional alarm about the possibilities of further, more deadly, attacks. 

While such acts of violence have been relatively rare in Mauritania, some have taken the events of 2007 and 2008 to suggest that a significant socio-political shift is happening in the country.  The recent attacks are taken to signal a shift in the activities of opposition groups towards more militant action. Local journalist Salem Bokari suggests: 'Something is sure, this is the beginning of something.  This is the beginning of a very big challenge for Mauritanian security and armed services' (Schwarz, 2007).  The American government quickly took the opportunity to frame the attacks as further proof that al-Qaeda's Maghreb branch, known as al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, poses a growing and increasingly violent presence in Mauritania.

US influence

The American government has a particular interest in heightening anxieties over  political Islam in Mauritania.  The country was viewed as an important regional ally in the Bush administration's 'war on terror'. Mauritania is a key part of the $500 million Trans-Sahara Counter Terrorism Initiative, an undertaking that has required some justification, both globally and domestically within the US.

With the Bush government's declaration of war against Islamic movements  around  the  world  following 9/11, Mauritania became a focal point in Washington's attempts to establish a military foundation in North Africa.  As one commentator suggests: 'The US sees Mauritania as a bulwark against the encroachment southward of al-Qaeda-linked militants in North Africa.  It has sent dozens of troops to train Mauritania's military units in its far northern deserts, but it suspended those programmes in response to the coup' (Azikiwe, 2008).  Charles Wald, the US general responsible for opening the Sahara as a front in the 'war on terror', argues: 'We've already had terrorism in the Sahel, it's a matter of how bad it could get' (Fellows, 2005).

Despite the tangential relationship between at least one suspect in recent attacks and an al-Qaeda training camp in Algeria, the broad claims of the US government regarding the growth of terrorism in Mauritania represent a dramatic overstatement.  None of the evidence suggests that Mauritania is on the brink of opening a new front in global terrorism.  It is as likely that the attack on the tourists was a robbery as any specifically political act.  Similarly there is nothing to suggest that the attack on the Israeli embassy was more than straightforward anti-Semitism.  Notably, prior to these most recent potential cases the last major incidence of non-elite political violence dated to almost three years previously when the 15 Mauritanian soldiers were killed in an attack in the northeast of the country.  As Keenan suggests: 'The myth of al-Qaeda is important because it is used to justify western security and immigration policy in the region' (Flynn, 2008). Keenan goes on to note: 'The point is, myths can become real things' (Flynn, 2008).

Notably, the factions of Islamic activists are not monolithic.  They are engaged in struggles within each faction as well as among the different factions.  'Far from being a fixed ideological monolith existing outside history and in opposition to modernity and democracy, Islamism does not and cannot constitute a single coherent entity because different historical, cultural and social contexts and realities make for different Islamisms' (Boukhars, 2005). The overarching concern shared by each is an opposition to the authoritarianism of the state in Mauritania and its unilateralism within Mauritanian society.  As well, there is concern over the state's uncritical acceptance of US policy, especially with regard to attempts to militarise the region. The outcome of these struggles, however, may well determine the direction of Mauritanian society and the country's relations with the West.                   

Jeff Shantz is a longtime community and labour organiser in Canada. For years he has hosted the Anti-Poverty Report on community radio. He currently teaches community advocacy, human rights and corporate crime at Kwantlen Polytechnic University in British Columbia. His work against corporate crimes has exposed Canadian resource operations in Africa.

References

Azikiwe, Abayomi. 2008. 'Mauritania Coup: Anti-Terrorism and Political Instability.'          Workers World. August 18.

Boukhars, Anouar. 2005. 'The Challenge of Radical Islam in Mauritania.' Terrorism Monitor. 3(19). October 7.

Fellows, Catherine. 2005. 'US Targets Sahara "Terrorist Haven".' BBC News. August 8.

Flynn, Daniel. 2008. 'Gunmen Attack Israel Embassy in Mauritania, Three Hurt.' Reuters. February 1.

Schwarz, Naomi. 2007. 'New Attack in Mauritania Raises Fears of Terrorism.' VOA News. December 28.

*Third World Resurgence No. 233, January 2010, pp 26-30