Ranking Member of Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has blamed the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s (NATO) intervention in Libya for the increasing terrorism attacks and ousting of constitutionally elected governments across the African continent.
According to Mr. Ablakwa, the former Libyan leader, Col Muammar Gaddafi’s demise marked the genesis of military coups and terrorist attacks in Africa.
“It was a very senseless invasion. Asking me, absolutely unnecessary which unleashed all the terrorism we are seeing now and even coming down south affecting Mali, Burkina Faso which put Ghana even under threat because of the senseless Libya invasion, “he said on Good Morning Ghana on Metro TV on Friday, August 11.
Mr. Ablakwa said despite all negative assertions held about the late Libyan leader, he had control and brought stability to that region.
“Taking him out and killing him in that gruesome manner has just opened a can of total chaos and destabilization. Now looking at Chad, Burkina Faso, all the neighbors of Niger then remember also that the is the real threat of these foreign interests in Niger,” he said.
Despite hundreds of foreign troops in the subregions trying to combat terrorism, the North Tongu MP said foreign forces remain unpopular and Africans see them as threats.
“A lot of African people are wary of any external aggressions they don’t want to see these countries intervene any longer, and even in these countries their recent records don’t give their own people, parliaments confidence we have seen what happened in Afghanistan, how the American experiment failed and appeared that the talismans chased them out really re-established their dominance in that country,” he stated.
Killing of Gaddafi
Muammar Gaddafi was assassinated on October 20, 2011, following the Battle of Sirte. Muammar Gaddafi, Libya’s overthrown leader, was discovered west of Sirte after his convoys were struck by NATO aircraft as part of the NATO military intervention in Libya in 2011.
He was eventually apprehended and killed by National Transitional Council (NTC) forces.
The NTC initially claimed Gaddafi died as a result of injuries incurred during a confrontation with loyalist forces attempting to liberate him, however, a video of his final moments shows rebel fighters assaulting him and one of them sodomizing him with a bayonet before shooting him numerous times.
The assassination of Gaddafi was condemned as a violation of international law.
Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch demanded an impartial autopsy as well as a probe into Gaddafi’s death.
Terrorism in Africa
The Sahel region in sub-Saharan Africa is now the epicenter of terrorism,’ according to the 2023 Global Terrorism Index
Fatalities in terrorist attacks in Africa’s Sahel region have surged by over 2,000% over the past 15 years, according to the report.
“The Sahel region in sub-Saharan Africa is now the epicenter of terrorism … accounting for more terrorism deaths in 2022 than both South Asia and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) combined,” said the 2023 Global Terrorism Index published by the Australia-based Institute for Economics and Peace.
“Across the Sahel, 22,074 people were killed in 6,408 terror attacks between 2007 and 2022,” the report said.
The region was the most impacted area of the world, representing 43% of global terrorism deaths, a staggering spike from just 1% in 2007, it added.
Four of the 10 countries most affected by terrorism last year were in the Sahel region, according to the report, which analyzed terror attacks in 163 countries worldwide.
One of them was Burkina Faso, where terrorism deaths climbed from 759 to 1,135, the largest global increase.
Burkina Faso now ranks second on the list of countries most impacted by terrorism, behind just Afghanistan, the report said.
Mali was ranked fourth, Nigeria stood eighth, and Niger was at 10th spot on the latest index.
By: Edem Etsa Dorvlo | Metrotvonline.com | Ghana
