ACAS Bulletin

Contents: Introduction: Securitizing the Sahara by Jacob Mundy • From GSPC to AQIM: The evolution of an Algerian islamist terrorist group into an Al-Qa'ida Affiliate and its implications for the Sahara-Sahel region by Stephen Harmon • War on 'terror': Africom, the kleptocratic state and under-class militancy in West Africa-Nigeria by Caroline Ifeka • Counterterrorism and democracy promotion in the Sahel under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama from September 11, 2001, to the Nigerien Coup of February 2010 by Alex Thurston • Western Sahara and the United States' geographical imaginings by Konstantina Isidoros • The Western Sahara conflict: regional and international repercussions by Yahia H Zoubir • Sahelian blowback: what's happening in Mali? by Vijay Prashad • All quiet on the West Africa front: terrorism, tourism and poverty in Mauritania by Anne E. McDougall • The origins of AFRICOM: the Obama administration, the Sahara-Sahel and US Militarization of Africa by Stephen Chan, Daniel Volman and Jeremy Keenan • The newsletter discusses the Pan-Sahel Initiative (PSI), the Trans-Saharan Counterterrorism Initiative (TSCTI), Trans-Saharan Counter Terrorism Partnership (TSCTP), the State Department, counterinsurgency, the Pentagon, the East Africa Regional Strategic Initiative, the Horn, deserts, 'Islamist' groups, the International Crisis Group, the Salafi Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC, Groupe salafiste pour la prédication et le combat), al-Qa'idah, Osama bin Laden, al-Qa'idah in the Islamic Maghrib (AQMI, Al-Qaida au Maghreb islamique, AQIM), the Defense Department, the International Crisis Group, the Sahara-Sahel, drug smuggling, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Antonio Maria Costa, Oxfam, the Zinder and Maradi regions, the US Marine Corps, the Sahara desert, The New York Times, Predator drone strikes, scholars of terrorist studies, Joseba Zulaika, the South African Institute of International Affairs, Boko Haram, AFRICOM (Africa Command), Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, UN Development Program (UNDP), uranium mines, Tim Scarneccia, the Département du Renseignement et de la Sécurité (DRS, Department of Intelligence and Security), the Front de libération nationale (FLN, National Liberation Front), Mohammad Ahmad Ben Bella, President Houari Boumedienne, the Mouvement islamique armée (MIA, Armed Islamic Movement), Mustafa Bouyali, Chadli Bendjedid, Front islamique du salut (FIS, Islamic Salvation Front), Qari Said, Ayman al-Zawahiri's Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ), the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), Hassan Hattab, Shaykh Abou al-Baraa, Saïfi/El-Para, the Chadian Movement for Democracy and Justice (MDJT), President Idriss Déby, President Maaouya Ould Taya, smuggling, arms cigarettes, Mourad Si Ahmed (a.k.a. Djafar al-Afghani), jihad, Operation Flintlock, the Department of State, USAID, General William "Kip" Ward, the Bush administration, Ould Taya, strategic resources, oil, bauxite, uranium, subterranean water, NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization), ECOWAS, the EU (European Union), ethnicity, Islamic reformism, International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the World Trade Organization, militarization, the Niger Delta, Royal Dutch Shell, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, ExxonMobil, ChevronTexaco, Shar'ia law, Sunni congregations, the Middle East, North African Maghrib, oil, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), Bayelsa state, Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, narco-trafficking, guns, minerals, fossil fuel, kleptocracy, the military, repression, vigilantism, the Ijaw, the Tuareg, Obasanjo, Nigerian Police, the Kano insurrection, Islamic fundamentalist organizations, Muslim youth, violent events, President George W. Bush, Barack Obama, he Global War on Terror, Darfur, Susan Rice, the Clinton White House, Peace Corps volunteers, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi, the United Nations General Assembly, journalists, Ali Saibou, the Economic Community of West Africa States (ECOWAS), Christopher Leggett, the Frente Popular de Liberación de Saguía el Hamra y Río de Oro (Frente Polisario, Polisario Front), National Intelligence Council estimates, , the República Árabe Saharaui Democrática (RASD), the European Strategic Intelligence and Security Center (ESISC), the Moroccan American Center for Policy (MACP), MINURSO (United Nations Mission for the Referendum In Western Sahara), autonomy, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, self-determination, Christopher Ross, Ban Ki-moon, Foreign Direct Investments in Morocco, and Hillary Clinton. [Note: This issue was published electronically and not printed on paper.]