Cape Town — The activities in Africa of Russia's Wagner Group, the private paramilitary group which deploys mercenaries to support the Kremlin's foreign policy objectives, are coming under increased American scrutiny as the United States, Russia and China compete for strategic advantage on the continent.
The intensified focus on Wagner in Africa has been reflected recently in the expansion of U.S. sanctions on the group, and in a presentation to the Armed Services Committee of the U.S. Senate by the head of the military command which oversees U.S. relations with Africa's defence forces.
Previous coverage of new sanctions imposed by the U.S. Treasury Department on January 26 has been dominated by Wagner's involvement in the Ukraine war, which heightened the profile of the group controlled by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a businessman alleged to have close ties with President Vladimir Putin.
But a substantial part of the sanctions announcement identified Wagner companies and personnel operating in the Central African Republic (CAR), including Valery Zakharov, a Russian national named as having served as national security advisor to CAR's President Faustin-Archange Touadéra.
Declaring Wagner "a significant transnational criminal organization", the Treasury Department accused Wagner personnel of engaging in "an ongoing pattern of serious criminal activity, including mass executions, rape, child abductions, and physical abuse in the Central African Republic and Mali".
" Moreover," it added, "the Wagner Group controls numerous gold and diamond mines in CAR, while raiding and plundering others."
When General Michael E. Langley, commander of the United States Africa Command, appeared before the Senate Armed Services Committee on March 16, he was at pains to emphasise – as does the U.S. State Department, which oversees diplomatic relations with foreign countries – that the U.S. government does not expect African nations to choose between the U.S., Russia and China in conducting their foreign relations.
Using the acronym by which the U.S. describes his command, Langley said: "USAFRICOM does not offer any nation an 'us-or-them' ultimatum." But he made clear in his presentation to the senators on March 16 that the U.S. regarded both Russia and China as "strategic competitors" to the United States in Africa.
Speaking against the backdrop of the Ukraine war, and widespread publicity given to the Wagner Group's forces in the country, Langley took a hard line on Russia.
" As a producer of food, fossil fuels, and military hardware, Russia has the opportunity to join with the international community in helping African nations overcome terrorism and poverty," he told the Senate committee. "Instead, the Kremlin tramples African interests by leveraging Wagner... to aggravate weak governance and feed instability. The Kremlin's motives are power and profit."
Branding Africa as now being the "epicenter of international terrorism", Langley said the coalition of al Qaeda-aligned groups in West Africa known as Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims, or JNIM) is "wreaking havoc" as it expands beyond Mali and Burkina Faso: "Wagner's draconian operations with its partner in Mali both add to the human cost of terrorism and create more openings for terrorist groups."
Governments in both the CAR and Mali have been repeatedly overthrown in coups d'etat since 2020. Langley implicitly criticised restrictions on U.S. military contacts with regimes brought to power by military coups, which he said forced the new regimes to rely increasingly on Wagner. "Although well intended," he said, "U.S. coup restrictions can inadvertently incentivize the most at-risk African countries to dig themselves deeper into the mire of militancy and corruption."
Widening his attack on Russia, Langley referred to Wagner's support of the Libyan National Army, based in the east of the country, which seeks to overthrow the Government of National Accord based in the capital, Tripoli.
"Wagner exploits political fractures in Libya, where Russia seeks to threaten NATO's southern flank," the general said. "Wagner benefits from Libya's fragmentation, and its interference in parts of Libya risks hindering efforts to form the unified national government and security forces that the Libyan people want and deserve."
He concluded: "Wagner lacks accountability to the rule of law and norms of ethics and human rights, making them a deceptively attractive option for some regimes. Wagner's short-term promises can be enticing, but the long-term outcome for African clients are nations mired in corruption and crime that stunt economic growth.
"Wagner's financial price tag is exorbitant. The full Wagner bill is even worse: the failure of government institutions, the withdrawal of stalwart security allies, the extraction of mineral wealth, and long-term resource concessions and debt that chips away at Africans' future."
General Langley's tone on China was notably softer than that on Russia.
China's "deep and diverse investment" in Africa is "a mixed bag", he said. "The PRC (People's Republic of China) is on the continent to stay, and they fill a role in Africa's modernization. USAFRICOM does not seek to block the benefits that the PRC can bring to the continent's nations."
Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters
Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox
He said the military base established by the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) in Djibouti in the Horn of Africa, and plans to add more bases, especially in West Africa, posed "a marginal threat" to American interests. "In the event of armed conflict, however, the PRC may leverage its expanded military footprint to project power against the United States, our allies, or global commerce."
He also criticised illegal and unregulated Chinese fishing off African coastlines and accused Chinese interests of "irresponsible mining and harvesting operations that ignore sustainability and shun local stakeholders and job seekers".
Summing up a U.S. view on China, he added: "The long term outcomes of PRC activity in Africa will be an uneven mix of much-needed infrastructure, equipment, and trade alongside depleted natural resources, polluted ecosystems, corruption and deficient military hardware."
- The Russian news agency, Tass, has reported Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov as responding to the Treasury Department charges against Wagner by accusing the U.S. of "demonizing" the group. "That... sounds fairly unsubstantiated," he said of the accusations. "No proof, no evidence, nothing has been presented to the public. That significantly devalues the meaning of the statements that come out of Washington."
