![[Img #74661]](https://thelatestnews.world/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/The-power-of-ultrasound-150x150.jpg)
RFI airs a series of episodes on Russia’s influence on the African continent. At the end of 2017, taking advantage of the departure of the French military, Russia established itself in the Central African Republic. The Wagner paramilitary group intervened to protect the fragile regime of President Faustin-Archange Touadéra and quickly made the country its private preserve, although Yevgeny Prigozhin’s recent coup against Moscow could reshuffle the cards. Here is a retrospective of the Russian presence in the Central African Republic.
First modification:
3 min
By Frank Alexandre
In his July 13, 2016 speech to the French military gathered at the Hôtel de Brienne on the eve of Bastille Day, President François Hollande announced the end of France’s military intervention in the Central African Republic. “We have managed to avert the risk of disintegration of this country. This success has led us to hand over the baton to the international community and the Central African authorities”, announced the head of state, adding: “Next October, Jean-Yves Le Drian, Defense Minister, will therefore travel to the Central African Republic to officially declare the end of the Sangaris operation.”
The announcement of France’s military withdrawal was an opportunity for Moscow, which wanted to increase its influence in Africa. Thierry Vircoulon, a researcher at the French Institute for International Relations (Ifri), recalls that the Kremlin has been offering Bangui a comprehensive security package since 2017: “The issue of arms delivery was the gateway for Moscow, since the Republic Central Africa was under a UN embargo.”
“A very poor assessment of Russian policy by Paris”
For the Central African Armed Forces (FACA) to receive weapons, they needed the agreement of the Security Council. “It was then that Russia intervened and, as a member of the Security Council, obtained an exemption for this delivery of weapons,” explains the researcher, who points out that with this delivery of weapons logically came the question of training: “Then the instructors arrived Wagner. It was a package: weapons and training.”
read alsoRussian influence in Africa, first episode: the Soviet legacy
The arrival of the Russians in the Central African Republic is all the more direct since, in 2018, Paris, within the framework of its security architecture, advocated reaching out to Moscow. “There was a very bad evaluation of Russian policy,” explains Thierry Vircoulon, for whom “it is clear that French diplomacy wanted to maintain a space for dialogue with the Russians, without realizing that the Russians were not interested in dialogue.”
The researcher points out that Paris was also involved at the time in Mali with the Barkhane operation, so it did not want to be in charge of two missions at the same time. According to him, France “sacrificed the Central African Republic to the operation in Mali.”
“They have failed to pacify the Central African Republic”
Five years after their arrival, the Russians have turned the Central African Republic into an economic preserve, without fully honoring the initially proposed security contract.
“They have only partially fulfilled it,” explains Vircoulon, “to the extent that, with the deployment of 1,500 men by the Wagner paramilitary group, they have only managed to secure the capital, Bangui, and a certain number of provincial capitals.”
The investigator acknowledges that Wagner’s mercenaries have also managed to train and equip certain battalions of the Central African army. “But they have not been able to pacify the Central African Republic and ensure that the armed groups in the jungle are completely defeated and disappear,” he stresses. Since the end of 2021, Wagner’s mercenaries have been harassed by several of these armed groups in the savannah.
Will Wagner’s group remain in the Central African Republic or will President Faustin-Archange Touadéra seek other sources of support? A few days before the second Russia-Africa Summit in Saint Petersburg, all options are on the table.
