Sahel Regional Security Crisis
The Sahel crisis is a regional phenomenon rather than a single conflict — a belt of intersecting jihadist insurgencies, military coups, governance failures, and humanitarian emergencies stretching from Mauritania to Chad. JNIM and ISGS operate across borders. Three coup states (Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger) have formed the Alliance of Sahel States and expelled Western forces. The entire coastal West Africa region (Ghana, Togo, Benin, Côte d'Ivoire, Senegal) faces active spillover risk.
Persistence drivers
Why this conflict persists
The regional crisis is self-reinforcing: each country's instability exports insurgents and refugees to neighbors; governance failures are structural across the region; climate change reduces agricultural livelihoods; and the expulsion of French/Western forces has not been replaced with equivalent capability.
Human and economic impact
Displacement, fatalities, and economic pressure
This dossier includes static summary fields plus linked live conflict tables where the export found related rows.
Outlook
Risk and spillover assessment
Related dossiers