The west needs a much broader strategy to constrain Iran, one that neither ignores Africa nor takes its myriad governments for granted.

The fall of Kismayo could herald the collapse of the group’s quasi-state, but it may also serve to strengthen more radical factions within the terrorist group that prefer to focus on regional and global jihad.

Only Mugabe and his friends benefit from Zimbabwe’s diamond wealth.

The Kimberly Process has become a whitewash; Roger Bate reports from Africa.

Introduction

For a bankrupt country in the middle of hyperinflation, the discovery of a major diamond deposit in Zimbabwe in June 2006 should have been good news. Instead it has provided sustenance to a volatile and violent political elite that suppresses the majority. The power sharing/coalition government in Zimbabwe came into...

President Obama is right to send troops to advise African forces going after the leader of the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda.

The recent kidnapping of a handicapped French woman from a Kenyan resort, initially attributed to Somali pirates, was the second such kidnapping in a month. Kenyan authorities now blame al-Shabab, the Somali terrorist group affiliated with al Qaeda. Why should we treat the growing menace of Somali piracy differently from terrorism?

Denial of access by al Shabaab militants, and in some cases by other armed militias, is the single greatest obstacle to the provision of humanitarian assistance in Somalia.

As famine spreads in Somalia, it is more important than ever to ensure that food aid reaches the starving. It's unlikely that the US military, haunted by the memory of Black Hawk Down, will step in. And as long as supply chains are easily looted, hundreds of thousands of Somalis will continue to starve while al Qaeda-linked militants perpetuate conflict and instability in the country.

As the international community and the US discovered in the early 1990s, getting humanitarian aid to needy Somalis is not an apolitical undertaking. It may not even be possible without being drawn into conflict in the Horn of Africa once again.