Russia has been recruiting fighters illegally from various African countries, including Kenya, Botswana and South Africa. The Kenyans have had enough and are going to confront them.
Kenya was vocally pro-Ukraine when the war broke out, and used their temporary seat on the UN Security Council to deliver a fairly eloquent condemnation of the war that undermined the anti-imperial and the ethnonationalist justifications of the war. Despite this, the Kenyan foreign minister describes relations with Russia as having been warm generally.
This development is interesting because it drives Kenya further into the Western sphere of orbit, fragmented as that may be. To give you an idea, consider the following. Kenya was declared a major non-NATO ally of the U.S. under Joe Biden. Their Christian evangelical President describes Israel as “a friend”. And the major foreign visits (out of Africa) by Kenyan leaders that I remember from the last few years were to the EU (Germany in particular).
Kenya is an important country. It is probably the better electoral democracy in a bad region which is autocratizing even more and destabilising – Uganda, Tanzania, eastern Congo, Rwanda… It’s northern neighbour is Somalia, and Kenya has skin in the game in stabilising there – they have been victimised by terrorists from Somalia in the past, and sent troops into Somalia too. Ethiopia is a major player in the northern/horn part of East Africa, but doesn’t have a port. Nor does oil rich South Sudan. Kenya does, and the Chinese were involved in a project to develop a railway serving the region.
It’s a swing state and possibly a leverage point on the continent, and one which is already moving away from the China-Russia orbit. The EU and its liberal partners should embrace Kenya and drive a deeper wedge between Kenya and Russia/China.
This is relevant to this sub because it covers a meaningful geopolitical development of a regionally critical country in an unstable region with some modest impact on global shipping, a large share of the African population, and access to a war-torn but resource rich sub-region.
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Russia has been recruiting fighters illegally from various African countries, including Kenya, Botswana and South Africa. The Kenyans have had enough and are going to confront them.
Kenya was vocally pro-Ukraine when the war broke out, and used their temporary seat on the UN Security Council to deliver a fairly eloquent condemnation of the war that undermined the anti-imperial and the ethnonationalist justifications of the war. Despite this, the Kenyan foreign minister describes relations with Russia as having been warm generally.
This development is interesting because it drives Kenya further into the Western sphere of orbit, fragmented as that may be. To give you an idea, consider the following. Kenya was declared a major non-NATO ally of the U.S. under Joe Biden. Their Christian evangelical President describes Israel as “a friend”. And the major foreign visits (out of Africa) by Kenyan leaders that I remember from the last few years were to the EU (Germany in particular).
Kenya is an important country. It is probably the better electoral democracy in a bad region which is autocratizing even more and destabilising – Uganda, Tanzania, eastern Congo, Rwanda… It’s northern neighbour is Somalia, and Kenya has skin in the game in stabilising there – they have been victimised by terrorists from Somalia in the past, and sent troops into Somalia too. Ethiopia is a major player in the northern/horn part of East Africa, but doesn’t have a port. Nor does oil rich South Sudan. Kenya does, and the Chinese were involved in a project to develop a railway serving the region.
It’s a swing state and possibly a leverage point on the continent, and one which is already moving away from the China-Russia orbit. The EU and its liberal partners should embrace Kenya and drive a deeper wedge between Kenya and Russia/China.
This is relevant to this sub because it covers a meaningful geopolitical development of a regionally critical country in an unstable region with some modest impact on global shipping, a large share of the African population, and access to a war-torn but resource rich sub-region.