HAVANA, Cuba – In a sharp rebuke of United States policy this Thursday, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez has levied serious accusations that Washington is coercing and extorting Latin American nations into scrapping long-standing contracts for Cuban medical professionals, a key economic lifeline for the island communist state. The verbal assault comes on the heels of a string of withdrawals from the Cuban medical program by four regional nations – Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, and Guyana – moves that Rodriguez frames as the end result of sustained US pressure on countries seeking closer alignment with the administration of former US President Donald Trump. For more than six decades, Cuba’s international medical brigade program has stood as both a point of national pride and a critical source of foreign revenue, generating billions of dollars for the Cuban economy each year. But the program has faced sustained criticism from Washington, which claims the Cuban government engages in forced labor by requiring medical workers to turn over large portions of their salaries to the state – an assertion Rodriguez calls a baseless falsehood. With Cuba already grappling with the imminent threat of total economic collapse, worsened by a decades-long US energy blockade that has gutted access to critical fuel and infrastructure, the loss of this major income stream represents a substantial new blow to the island’s fragile economic standing. “The US Government is persecuting, pressuring and extorting other governments to end the presence of Cuban Medical Brigades in various countries, under false pretenses,” Rodriguez wrote in a post on social platform X. Official Cuban data shows that as of 2025, roughly 24,000 Cuban doctors, nurses, and other trained healthcare workers were deployed to serve communities across 56 countries worldwide, a program that has long provided affordable medical access to low and middle-income nations around the globe while propping up Cuba’s struggling domestic economy. Rodriguez emphasized that the US campaign is not just a political attack on Havana, but a move that cuts off critical healthcare access to vulnerable populations across the developing world, all as part of a broader effort to fully strangle Cuba’s already reeling economy.
分类： world
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Venezuela police clash with protesters demanding salary rises
CARACAS, VENEZUELA – Thousands of Venezuelan demonstrators marching to the Miraflores Presidential Palace to demand urgent salary and pension hikes were dispersed with tear gas by riot police on Thursday, according to on-the-ground reporting from Agence France-Presse correspondents. The demonstration, the largest show of public dissent in the country since August 2024, marks a clear shift in the national mood: the pervasive climate of fear that gripped Venezuelan society during ousted former president Nicolas Maduro’s regime is steadily receding, allowing long-simmering frustrations over economic hardship to boil over into open protest.
As protesters advanced through downtown Caracas, crowds chanted “Yes, we can!” to amplify their demands for living wages, calling for increases to base pay that has remained stagnant since 2022 and left millions struggling to cover basic needs. When demonstrators drew within just a few blocks of the presidential compound, dozens of helmeted, shield-bearing riot police deployed tear gas to halt their advance. The resulting melee left one protester with a deep arm gash after being struck by a stray rock, AFP confirmed.
The confrontation lays bare mounting public anger at acting President Delcy Rodriguez, who replaced hardline socialist Maduro following his capture by U.S. forces in a January 3 raid. Rodriguez, who was endorsed by former U.S. President Donald Trump to take power in exchange for granting Washington access to Venezuela’s vast oil reserves, has faced growing criticism for failing to address the country’s devastating cost-of-living crisis. On Wednesday, the interim leader appeared on national television to announce a scheduled wage increase would go into effect May 1, but offered no details on the size of the hike – a move that left many Venezuelans furious.
Venezuela’s current monthly minimum wage stands at just 130 bolivars, equal to roughly $0.27 USD. By comparison, the United Nations’ daily poverty threshold of $3 USD works out to a monthly minimum of $90, meaning Venezuela’s base wage is more than 330 times lower than the global poverty line. Unions and workers across the country have long decried the current pay as “starvation wages”, a label echoed by demonstrators on Thursday.
Jesus Godoy, a retired public servant with more than two decades of state service, showed AFP reporters two 100-bolivar notes in his pocket – totaling just 40 U.S. cents. “I don’t even have enough for a packet of flour,” he said, echoing a widespread sentiment of resentment toward the country’s ruling class. “Government officials drive around in huge SUVs with full time bodyguards, while ordinary Venezuelans are left to suffer.”
While some public sector workers can earn up to $150 USD per month when including government-issued bonuses, that sum is still a fraction of the $645 USD that independent economic estimates calculate a Venezuelan family needs to cover basic food costs alone, amid annual inflation that has surged past 600%. Protesters are clear in their demands: they want increases to the stagnant baseline salary, not just one-off adjustments to bonuses that have been raised repeatedly while base pay remains frozen.
“We are demanding a living wage now, because what Delcy Rodriguez said last night is a joke,” said 65-year-old retiree Mariela Diaz, summing up the crowd’s frustration.
Rodriguez has defended her approach, framing a gradual, “responsible” wage increase as necessary to avoid triggering a further spike in already sky-high inflation. Since taking office in January, the former vice president has rolled out a series of major economic reforms and issued an amnesty for political prisoners, moves made under pressure from Washington to roll back Maduro-era repression. But as Venezuelans continue to struggle to afford daily essentials like food and medicine, public patience is wearing thin.
On Thursday, as the protest unfolded in Caracas, Rodriguez was abroad in Grenada – a small Caribbean nation northeast of Venezuela – for her first international trip as head of state, according to broadcast footage from Venezuelan state television.
Thursday’s demonstration marks a turning point for dissent in Venezuela. For two years, following harsh successive crackdowns on opposition voices under Maduro, most Venezuelans avoided open protest. The 2024 August demonstrations, which erupted after Maduro’s disputed claim of victory in that year’s presidential election, were brutally put down by security forces. Thursday’s gathering of 2,000 demonstrators signals a growing willingness among Venezuelans to openly push for change, even after years of repression. -
Nieuwe aanvallen in Golfregio ondanks afgesproken staakt-het-vuren tussen VS en Iran
Just days after a landmark two-week ceasefire agreement was reached between the United States and Iran, the fragile truce in the Persian Gulf region has been shaken by a wave of coordinated drone and missile attacks targeting three Gulf monarchies. The United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, and Bahrain have all confirmed that the incoming strikes originated from Iranian territory, marking a sharp escalation that tests regional and international hopes for de-escalation.
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Miami woman killed in hit targeting Trinidadian businessman
The idyllic Caribbean vacation destination of Sint Maarten has been rocked by a brutal premeditated double shooting that left a 29-year-old American tourist dead alongside a local businessman authorities believe was the intended target of the attack.
Denisha Delancy, a Miami native who had traveled to the island to celebrate her birthday with her sister and a group of friends, became an unintended casualty of the targeted plot on March 2. The young woman had spent her trip relaxing on Sint Maarten’s famous beaches and exploring the island’s vibrant nightlife before the violent tragedy unfolded, just after she and 44-year-old Trinidadian businessman Quincy Damon Sylvester left a popular local nightclub.
As the pair pulled away in their vehicle on Arlet Peters Road, unidentified attackers ambushed them, opening fire on the car. Both Delancy and Sylvester were killed instantly, and first responders pronounced both dead at the scene shortly after arriving.
Investigators from Sint Maarten’s Major Crimes Team have since pieced together key details of the attack, drawing on surveillance footage captured from the nightclub. The video clearly shows multiple unknown individuals monitoring Sylvester’s movements in the hours leading up to the shooting, confirming the assault was carefully pre-planned. Law enforcement officials confirmed Delancy had no known connections to criminal activity, leading them to conclude she was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, caught in the crossfire of an attack meant solely for Sylvester. Public records identify Sylvester as the owner of a local PVC pipe business.
Two days after the shooting, on March 4, authorities took one suspect into custody: a Trinidadian national identified only by the initials A.H. But the investigation remains far from closed, as the primary perpetrator and other co-conspirators believed to be involved in the plot are still at large. The case also underwent an official reclassification by the Major Crimes Team, which initially misidentified the incident as a traffic collision before upgrading it to a double homicide as evidence emerged.
Investigators are now urging any members of the public who visited the area on the night of the attack, or who have any information related to the suspects or the planning of the shooting, to contact law enforcement immediately to help move the case forward.
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Dominica government and UNLIREC host senior-level inter-agency roundtable to strengthen firearms regulation and public safety
Against a backdrop of growing regional concern over illicit weapons trafficking and violent crime, the Commonwealth of Dominica is set to convene a landmark three-day inter-agency roundtable from April 8 to 10, 2026, focused on cracking down on illegal firearms and the armed violence they fuel. The event, organized by Dominica’s Ministry of National Security and Legal Affairs in partnership with the United Nations Regional Centre for Peace, Disarmament and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean (UNLIREC) and the CARICOM Implementation Agency for Crime and Security (CARICOM IMPACS), brings together a cross-sector coalition of senior stakeholders to align national action with regional safety goals.
According to an official press statement from the security ministry, the roundtable forms a core part of Dominica’s sustained commitment to advancing the Caribbean Firearms Roadmap, a coordinated regional framework that targets illicit weapons flows, cuts rates of violent crime, and uplifts public safety standards across all Caribbean nations. Unlike isolated policy efforts, this gathering is designed to break down bureaucratic silos, bringing high-level representatives from sectors as diverse as national policing, justice administration, foreign affairs, gender equity, and performance monitoring and evaluation to the same table.
Over the course of the three-day program, attendees will engage in a structured schedule of cross-national policy exchanges, technical deep dives, and collaborative working sessions. The agenda is tailored to three core outcomes: strengthening institutional coordination across domestic agencies, shoring up national firearms control regulatory frameworks, and accelerating implementation of Dominica’s National Action Plan, which was developed under the umbrella of the Caribbean Firearms Roadmap.
Key discussion topics will span the full lifecycle of illicit weapons in the region: tracing the routes of cross-border firearms trafficking, updating national legislative measures to close regulatory gaps, enhancing systems for weapons marking and traceability, improving secure storage and management of authorized firearms and ammunition, preventing legal weapons from being diverted to black markets, and leveraging data-driven insights to guide more effective policy decision-making.
Beyond advancing domestic policy, the roundtable also functions as a strategic platform to deepen partnership between national Dominican authorities, regional bodies like UNLIREC and CARICOM IMPACS, and broader international partners. Organizers have emphasized the need for a unified, whole-of-government approach to tackle the transnational challenge of illicit firearms, a problem that cannot be resolved by any single agency or nation acting alone.
Funding for the initiative has been provided by the Government of the United States of America, enabling the convening of cross-sector stakeholders and the delivery of technical programming for the event. Opening remarks will be delivered by Dominica’s Minister for National Security and Legal Affairs, Honourable Rayburn Blackmoore, alongside senior officials from the Dominican government and leadership representatives from both CARICOM IMPACS and UNLIREC.
By the close of the three-day roundtable, participants are expected to reach consensus on priority national action items, define clear roles for local civil society organizations in supporting firearms control efforts, and map out opportunities for long-term technical assistance. The overarching end goal of all discussions is to advance safer communities and support inclusive, sustainable development across Dominica.
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UK–Caribbean Partnership on Clean Energy
For most people, the Caribbean is synonymous with idyllic postcard vistas: golden sun stretching over turquoise coastlines, mist-wreathed lush mountains, and steady trade winds that cut through tropical heat. What fewer recognize is that these very natural features — sun, wind, tidal water, and geothermal heat — add up to an underutilized global renewable energy powerhouse, waiting to be activated.
The United Kingdom, through its Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, has emerged as a key strategic partner to Caribbean nations, working to unlock this latent potential and convert abundant natural assets into reliable, affordable clean energy that can drive inclusive, resilient, long-term sustainable growth across the region.
The resource potential is staggering. Multiple Caribbean islands have the natural capacity to generate 100% of their domestic energy needs from renewables, with surplus production to export clean power to neighboring countries. Some regional economies could even go a step further, converting excess renewable electricity into transportable low-carbon fuels including green hydrogen, ammonia, and methanol for global markets.
Despite this extraordinary natural advantage, the region remains overwhelmingly dependent on fossil fuels. Data shows that roughly 87% of the energy mix across the Caribbean Community (Caricom) still comes from carbon-intensive fossil sources, a legacy that has driven cripplingly high energy costs for households. On average, Caribbean families pay between two and three times more for electricity than households in most other regions, and this dependence on imported fossil fuels has created systemic economic vulnerability, ballooned public debt burdens, and left the region chronically energy insecure.
The UK has positioned itself as a long-term partner in Caricom’s clean energy transition, having committed $39 billion in funding to regional energy initiatives since 2015. To date, UK support has spanned a wide range of critical projects: advancing geothermal resource development, rolling out large-scale solar photovoltaic installations, funding energy efficiency retrofits for public buildings, delivering technical training programs to build local capacity across the Eastern Caribbean, and laying critical early groundwork for a regional offshore wind energy market.
One standout success story of this partnership is the geothermal development project in Dominica, where UK de-risking funding covered the high upfront costs of exploratory drilling, giving private sector investors the confidence to commit to the project. After years of coordinated collaboration between the Dominican government, UK development teams, and multiple partner organizations, the country is set to commission the first utility-scale geothermal plant in the English-speaking Caribbean in April 2026. The plant is expected to deliver transformative change for Dominica’s economy and energy security, and UK teams are now working to replicate this success with ongoing geothermal projects in Grenada and St. Lucia.
Additional UK-backed projects have already delivered tangible benefits across the region. In St. Vincent and the Grenadines, support for energy-efficient street lighting and a new solar photovoltaic plant at the country’s international airport has saved the government millions of dollars in energy costs and cut hundreds of tonnes of annual carbon dioxide emissions. Early work to map offshore wind potential across the Caribbean, while still in its early stages, is already showing significant promise for large-scale future development.
Even with these wins, the road to full energy transition remains uneven. Back in 2013, Caricom set an ambitious regional target of reaching 47% renewable electricity generation by 2027. As of 2023, the region has only hit roughly 13% renewable penetration, meaning the pace of transition will need to accelerate dramatically to meet the 2027 goal.
Progress has also been highly uneven across member states: a small number of leading countries have made meaningful strides in scaling solar, wind, and geothermal capacity, while many others have lagged far behind. As a region of mostly Small Island Developing States (SIDS), the Caribbean faces structural barriers that have slowed deployment: small, constrained national grid sizes, prohibitive upfront capital costs, limited local technical capacity, and fragmented national markets that make it impossible to capture economies of scale. Many countries also lack the modernized grid infrastructure and updated regulatory frameworks required to integrate variable solar and wind generation into existing energy systems.
Despite these challenges, the region is now at a defining moment of opportunity, with clear, actionable solutions ready to be deployed. Regional pooled procurement and aggregated project pipelines can drive down per-unit costs and attract large-scale global institutional investors. Modernizing outdated grid infrastructure and updating regulatory frameworks can clear the way for greater private sector participation. Blended finance and concessional lending can help governments overcome the steep upfront costs that have blocked large projects to date. And investing in local engineering and technical training can ensure that transition projects deliver long-term, sustainable benefits for local communities.
All the natural resources the Caribbean needs to become a global clean energy leader are already within its borders, and experts say there is no time to delay. With decisive national action, coordinated regional leadership, and strategic international partnerships, the region can turn its natural abundance into universal energy security, lower household electricity bills, and a more climate-resilient future for all Caribbean people.
The UK has reaffirmed its commitment to standing with the Caribbean through this transition. Via the Global Clean Power Alliance, the UK and regional partners have agreed to a concrete 2026–2028 Caribbean action plan, which will provide on-demand access to UK private sector capital and technical expertise to address key barriers and attract the billions in investment needed to scale up clean energy deployment across the region.
The resources are here. The moment for action is now.
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Half of Haiti’s Gangs Made Up of Children
As a multinational security force approved by the United Nations begins deploying to Haiti to crack down on rampant gang violence, a devastating new statistic has emerged that lays bare the scale of the country’s humanitarian and security crisis: children now account for roughly 50 percent of all members of armed gangs across the nation.
Data compiled by monitoring groups shows that at least 302 minors were recruited by gangs in 2024 alone, and the vast majority of these underage recruits are thrust directly into frontline combat roles. The newly arriving UN-authorized Gang Suppression Force (GSF) is set to eventually field up to 5,500 personnel, with a core mandate to support overstretched Haitian national police in retaking territory controlled by armed groups.
UNICEF’s latest assessment reveals that gang recruitment of children skyrocketed by 200 percent in 2025, a surge driven by three overlapping root causes: widespread systemic poverty, mass youth homelessness, and coordinated social media campaigns that deliberately glorify gang culture to lure vulnerable young people. Many children are enticed into joining with basic promises of regular meals, safe shelter, and steady cash payments. Others face forced conscription at the hands of gang recruiters, and some are even handed over to gangs by families pushed to desperation by extreme economic hardship. UN field research found that payments to families or child recruits themselves range from $100 to $700, depending on the dangerousness of the role the child is expected to fill.
International humanitarian organizations have issued urgent warnings that the expansion of security operations against gangs will likely lead to underage recruits being deliberately pushed to the frontlines by gang leaders, putting thousands of children at immediate risk of death or serious injury. Human rights experts have also raised grave alarms about the treatment of detained children with alleged gang ties, documenting that dozens of minors accused of gang affiliation have been extrajudicially killed since 2022.
In response to the crisis, UNICEF is calling on Haitian authorities and deploying GSF personnel to adhere to a UN-endorsed handover protocol that requires any captured or surrendered underage recruits to be transferred to child welfare agencies, rather than being detained or punished like adult criminal combatants. The agency notes that its existing community-based reintegration program has already supported more than 500 former child gang recruits to transition back to peaceful civilian life, offering a proven model for addressing the crisis if supported by international and local stakeholders.
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Trump Says “A Whole Civilization Will Die Tonight”
On April 7, 2026, a sharp escalation of tensions between the United States and Iran sent shockwaves across global geopolitics and energy markets, after sitting U.S. President Donald Trump issued an unprecedented, catastrophic threat to wipe out Iran’s entire civilization if Tehran did not reopen the blocked Strait of Hormuz by 8 p.m. Eastern Standard Time that same day.
In a public post shared to his social media platform Truth Social on Tuesday, Trump issued a dire warning: “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will.” This chilling statement followed escalating rhetoric Trump delivered a day earlier at a White House press briefing, where he told reporters that Iran could be completely “taken out in one night.” He doubled down on existing threats that he would order strikes on Iranian energy infrastructure and key river crossings if the strategic waterway remained closed to international traffic.
Trump also claimed credit for a previous strike that took out one of Iran’s tallest bridges, a critical transit link that connected two major Iranian cities, an attack carried out last Thursday, though independent confirmation of the strike’s attribution has not yet been released.
Iran’s response came swiftly from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy, which declared Monday that the Strait of Hormuz will never return to its pre-crisis status of unrestricted access for U.S. vessels and Washington’s allied military and commercial shipping.
The 21-mile-wide waterway is one of the world’s most critical chokepoints for global energy trade, with approximately 20% of all globally traded crude oil passing through its waters every day. The ongoing closure has already triggered immediate volatility in global energy markets, pushing fuel prices sharply upward in every region. Even in Belize, a small Central American nation thousands of miles from the Persian Gulf, consumers saw their third fuel price hike of the month on Easter Sunday, a tangible sign of the conflict’s global ripple effects.
In recent weeks, a number of Asian nations have moved to negotiate separate arrangements to secure safe passage for their commercial vessels through the strait. Pakistan, India, and the Philippines have all finalized bilateral agreements with Iran to allow their ships to transit the waterway, while China has publicly confirmed that its commercial vessels continue to use the channel amid the standoff.
As of Tuesday morning local time, no diplomatic agreement had been reached between the U.S. and Iran to de-escalate the crisis, and there was no path toward an immediate ceasefire or de-escalation in sight.
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Boat carrying cow and babies: 11 migrants charged
A major maritime interception off the coast of Erin, Trinidad and Tobago has led to criminal charges against 11 Venezuelan migrants caught entering the country illegally, in the latest high-profile border enforcement action highlighting the country’s ongoing challenges with unauthorized migration. The accused, ranging in age from 19 to 44, include eight men and three women, who were taken into custody during a coordinated operation on Friday. Of the 11, nine face a single charge of illegal entry, while two additional defendants face the extra allegation of aiding and abetting the unauthorized crossing, according to official details.
The operation unfolded after Trinidad and Tobago’s Radar Center detected the suspicious vessel and relayed real-time information to the Trinidad and Tobago Coast Guard’s mother ship, which dispatched teams to intercept the craft. Shortly after 1 a.m. that same day, the Coast Guard intercepted the boat carrying a total of 13 Venezuelan nationals in a fishing zone near Erin — the two additional people on board were infants aged one year and two months old, who have not been charged in the case.
Beyond the human passengers, law enforcement officials also discovered a number of unusual contraband items aboard the intercepted vessel: a live black cow, plus large stockpiles of cheese, alcohol and sausage. This seizure of unregulated food and livestock echoes a similar incident from earlier this March, when local police arrested two other undocumented Venezuelan migrants in Santa Flora during a routine traffic stop. That case also resulted in seizures of uncustomed goods, including alcoholic beverages, pepper sauce, clothing, footwear and a container of cheese.
Local media outlet the Express attempted to secure comment from Minister of National Security Roger Alexander on the string of recent unauthorized migrant arrests, but as of publication has not received a response. In an official public statement regarding the 11 charged migrants, the Trinidad and Tobago Police Service (TTPS) confirmed that it is maintaining close coordinated work with multiple relevant government stakeholders to strengthen border security and crack down on repeated incidents of illegal entry.
The TTPS also issued a public reminder in its release: assisting or facilitating any form of illegal entry into Trinidad and Tobago qualifies as a serious criminal offense under the country’s laws, and any individuals found to be involved in such activity will face full prosecution and legal consequences.
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Gunmen kill 60 in northwest Nigeria—humanitarian groups
In a devastating wave of violence that has underscored Nigeria’s deepening insecurity crisis in its predominantly Muslim northern region, armed gunmen have killed no fewer than 60 civilians across a series of remote rural villages in two neighboring northwestern states this week, local religious leaders and humanitarian organizations confirmed Wednesday in statements to Agence France-Presse.
The coordinated assaults targeted at least 10 settlements spread across Kebbi and Niger states, according to regional clergymen and a detailed humanitarian situation report reviewed by AFP. The document, which draws on testimony from three on-the-ground humanitarian sources including a local medical facility and a community advocacy group, records 20 fatalities from a Tuesday strike on Erena, a community located in Niger state’s Shiroro local government area.
A separate classified military security assessment identifies the perpetrators of the Erena attack as well-armed bandits who launched a direct incursion on a local military outpost. Regional police have verified the assault, adding that three additional members of the local security ecosystem — two volunteer vigilante fighters and a driver assigned to the joint security task force — were also killed in the clash.
Shiroro district has long been a hotspot for persistent violence, terrorized repeatedly by both local criminal gangs known locally as bandits and transnational jihadist insurgent networks. In recent years, security analysts have documented a growing trend of collaboration between these two groups, whose joint raiding campaigns have displaced tens of thousands of residents across northwest Nigeria.
In neighboring Kebbi state, one anonymous clergy member — who requested anonymity out of concern for his personal safety — confirmed an initial death toll of 24, but added that updated witness reports put the actual number of fatalities above 40. A second senior Christian leader in the region corroborated this estimate, placing the Kebbi death toll at approximately 40.
Speaking to AFP, the first clergy member described a campaign of indiscriminate violence that spared no group: “They killed everybody in sight, they killed Christians, Muslims and traditional worshippers. They killed indiscriminately.” The attackers burned down religious sites of both Christian and Muslim communities, slaughtered livestock including sheep and cattle, and destroyed stored food reserves, he added. The incursion unfolded over three straight days of rampage, with gunmen systematically combing the surrounding brush where residents typically flee to hide during attacks.
“They comb the surrounding bushes where villagers would ordinarily hide during attacks and hunt around for those who were hiding in the bush and shoot them down,” he said. “They were not leaving anything, they were not taking anything. They were there to kill and destroy.”
More than 500 displaced residents have fled the affected villages to take shelter in churches and public schools in Kebbi’s Yauri town, and the security situation remains so precarious that families cannot return to their homes to recover and bury their dead, the clergy member added.
No insurgent group has yet claimed responsibility for the coordinated attacks, but Kebbi state police have pinned the blame on a local jihadist cell known as the Mahmuda group, which operates across the northwest region. The cell is affiliated with Mahmud al-Nigeri, a senior commander in the Ansaru jihadist network. Ansaru split from the notorious Boko Haram insurgent group more than a decade ago and has since aligned itself with Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQMI), a regional branch of al-Qaeda.
Kebbi state, which shares international borders with Benin and Niger, has seen a sharp uptick in jihadist attacks since 2025, according to regional security data. Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), a leading independent conflict monitoring organization, has recorded a major recent surge in violence across northwest Nigeria carried out by insurgent groups aligned with both al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. Like other northern Nigerian states, Kebbi faces a dual security threat: both transnational jihadist insurgency and banditry, criminal gangs that raid villages, seize residents and hold them for ransom.