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Russia has noticeably intensified its diplomatic relationship with French-speaking Africa after the second Russia-Africa summit in St. Petersburg. It has focused on dealing with growing French neo-colonialism which obstructs Russia's desire to expand geopolitical and military influence especially in West African region. The republics of Burkina Faso, Chad, Niger and Mali have come under the stringent control of Kremlin, as leaders frequently shuttle between their capitals and Moscow.
Analysis indicates that Moscow's geopolitical and military inroads is steadily gaining unshakeable grounds. It has tightened its hold across the Sahel-Saharan part of Africa and strategically extending such militarized influence towards to the Gulf coastal West Africa. As well-shown, the Francophones are exhausted of France's exploitative approach and desperately for an alternative to building a more fairer and a more mutual economic relations.
Policy experts and researchers have widely written in their published papers about (i) Russia's alleged involvement in the political changes in these French colonies with the fractured economy and (ii) the fact that the region constitutes a nutritious breeding field for armed Islamic jihadist groups, demonstrates Russia's first drastic step towards combating terrorism and ultimately penetrating into the entire G5 Sahel in West Africa.
Despite this widely published allegation of determining political directions, Moscow officially said it was rather seriously concerned about the economic under-developments and the deepening instability as well as the impoverished population in the region. Moscow has showered humanitarian assistance, described as 'delivery at no-cost' and intended to ensure food security during the fourth quarter 2023, on these countries.
While updating the implications of this 'free food' as its strategic part of the soft-power, Burkina Faso, Chad, Niger and Mali have battered their natural resources, in exchange for creating military bases in the respective territories. Russian state-owned arms trader Rosoboronexport, as part of signed military-technical agreements, has delivered Russian-made combat and transport helicopters, armoured personnel carriers, small arms and ammunition to these Sahel-Saharan African countries, the Vedomosti newspaper reported.
Oleg Ozerov, Ambassador-at-Large at the Russian Foreign Ministry, Head of the Secretariat of the Russia-Africa Partnership Forum, spoke in an interview with RIA Novosti and explicitly pointed to the fact that Russia has no military bases nor military troops in Africa. 'We don't have a military presence there. There are appeals to...