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From the Maghreb, Morocco and Algeria’s rivalry deepens while NGOs suspend cooperation with Libya’s coastguard over EU-backed human rights abuses. From Eastern Europe, the Kremlin dismisses talk of a Lavrov–Putin rift as Russian forces seize ground in Zaporizhia following Ukraine’s withdrawal. 

Across Africa, new research finds that armed drones are reshaping regional conflicts but rarely altering their outcomes — instead amplifying civilian suffering.

This, and more, below ⤵️

Top 5 Stories

1️⃣ 🇻🇪 🇺🇸 🇬🇧 US aircraft carrier enters Caribbean as UK suspends intelligence sharing over strikes: The Pentagon’s largest warship, the USS Gerald R Ford, has entered Latin American waters amid escalating U.S.–Venezuela tensions, marking the region’s biggest U.S. naval deployment since the 1989 Panama invasion. The move coincides with Britain’s suspension of intelligence sharing on suspected drug-trafficking vessels, over fears U.S. forces are using shared data to carry out unlawful maritime killings. 

2️⃣ 🇵🇰 🇦🇫 Pakistan declares ‘state of war’ after TPP bombing in Islamabad: A suicide blast outside Islamabad’s district courts killed at least 12 people and wounded 27, in an attack claimed by the Pakistan Taliban (TTP). Defence Minister Khawaja Asif warned that Pakistan was now in a “state of war,” as peace talks with the Afghan Taliban falter and cross-border terrorism escalates across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.

3️⃣ 🇺🇦 🇷🇺 Ukraine retreats from Zaporizhia villages as Russian forces advance: Ukraine’s military chief admitted that battlefield conditions have “significantly worsened” in the southern Zaporizhia region, where Ukrainian troops withdrew from five villages after relentless Russian shelling and assaults. Moscow claims further gains in Pokrovsk and Kupiansk, advancing under fog and using superior manpower and drones to overwhelm Ukrainian defences. 

4️⃣ 🇮🇶 Record early turnout in Iraq highlights growing distrust ahead of parliamentary elections: Iraq’s electoral commission reported an unprecedented 82% turnout among security personnel and displaced voters in early parliamentary balloting, but officials’ refusal to release results has fuelled suspicions of manipulation. Monitors have cited thousands of voting violations and arrests for alleged vote-buying, while cleric Muqtada al-Sadr urged supporters to boycott or spoil ballots to protest corruption. 

5️⃣ 🇦🇺 🇮🇩 Australia and Indonesia finalise landmark defence treaty: Australia and Indonesia are preparing to sign a landmark defence treaty that deepens military cooperation and establishes regular high-level consultations on security threats. Framed as a new era in bilateral ties, the deal reflects growing alignment between Jakarta and Canberra over regional stability.

Major Story

🇸🇩 🇪🇹 🇲🇱 🇳🇪 ARMED DRONES RESHAPE AFRICAN CONFLICTS BUT SELDOM CHANGE STRATEGIC OUTCOMES

Over the past decade armed drones have moved from niche technology to a common feature of modern battlefields, sold abroad by manufacturers in Turkey, China and Iran and adopted across Africa. Their appeal is straightforward: remotely piloted aircraft promise persistent surveillance and the ability to strike without putting pilots at risk, at a fraction of the cost of manned combat aircraft. Conflicts from Sudan to the Sahel and Ethiopia have shown both the tactical utility of these systems and their limits — lethal in isolated strikes, but seldom decisive in protracted, geographically complex wars.

Operational limits in African theatres

Drones such as Turkey’s Bayraktar TB2 have proved attractive because they are relatively cheap, proven in combat elsewhere, and easier to operate than legacy platforms. Yet their effectiveness depends on a cluster of supporting conditions that are often absent across Sub-Saharan battlefields: forward bases and logistic chains to extend range, resilient communications and ground-control infrastructure, well-trained crews, reliable maintenance, and complementary intelligence. Large distances, hostile weather, dense canopy and rugged terrain blunt sensor performance and limit persistence. Without integrated air defences or sufficient numbers and support, drones can loiter and strike, but cannot substitute for air superiority or ground forces tasked with holding terrain.

Civilian risk and governance shortfalls

When operator skill, targeting discipline or intelligence quality falter, the humanitarian cost can be high. Misidentification, poor coordinates or inadequate safeguards have produced mass-casualty mistakes, turning precision tools into instruments of tragedy. The diffusion of drone technology to non-state actors further complicates accountability and escalation dynamics, while the absence of coherent regulation in many states leaves a governance vacuum around lethal remote warfare.

Implications

Lasting utility requires investment well beyond procurement: hardened basing and communications, rigorous operator training, maintenance networks, and disciplined targeting procedures. Equally important are counter-drone capabilities — sensors, jammers and doctrine — to protect critical assets. As African states and militias alike acquire these systems, the balance will shift from an early technological edge toward a contested, more evenly matched aerial domain, with dire consequences for civilian protection.

Other News

1️⃣ 🇲🇦 🇩🇿 Morocco and Algeria’s power struggle intensifies: Morocco and Algeria’s rivalry is widening as both pursue competing models of regional leadership. Rabat has leveraged its emergence as a trade and energy hub to win powerful allies for its Western Sahara autonomy plan, reshaping Europe’s traditional neutrality. Algeria, meanwhile, faces waning influence, strained ties with Sahel neighbours, and limited success in forging new regional partnerships, leaving it increasingly sidelined in a geopolitical landscape where momentum now firmly favours Rabat.

2️⃣ 🇱🇾 🇪🇺 🇺🇳 NGOs cut ties with Libya’s coastguard amid EU-backed abuses: More than a dozen humanitarian rescue groups operating in the Mediterranean have severed communication with Libya’s EU-funded coastguard, accusing it of violently intercepting asylum seekers and returning them to camps notorious for torture and forced labour. Citing UN findings that Libyan detention centres amount to “crimes against humanity,” the groups announced the creation of a new coalition to document abuses and defend human rights at sea. 

3️⃣ 🇷🇺 Kremlin denies rift as Lavrov’s absence fuels speculation: Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s unexplained absence from a key Kremlin meeting and exclusion from Russia’s G20 delegation have ignited rumours of a rift with President Vladimir Putin. While the Kremlin insists Lavrov remains in good standing, observers note his influence has waned sharply, as Russia’s diplomacy grows increasingly insular.

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