“Whenever we see a presence of mercenaries in an armed conflict, we see that armed conflict is more intense in combat, and it’s very likely going to last longer.” – Jelena Aparac 

In this article, we are sharing the show notes and the full transcript of the Fifth Episode of our Mobilising Men for Feminist Peace podcast.

Our guests are:

• Jelena Aparac,  the former member and Chair-Rapporteur of the UN Working Group on the use of mercenaries.

• Emadeddin Badi, an independent consultant on governance, post-conflict stabilisation, hybrid security structures and peacebuilding, and a fellow at the Atlantic Council
• Philip Obaji, an award-winning investigative journalist from Nigeria, documenting human rights abuses and exploitation by Russian paramilitaries deployed in West and Central Africa

Welcome to Mobilising Men for Feminist Peace, a podcast from WILPF, the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, in which we uncover the transformative power of feminist peace and explore how men can be active proponents of achieving gender equality and peace.

In this clip, Jelena Aparac,  is the former member and Chair-Rapporteur of the UN Working Group on the use of mercenaries, tells us about the nature of mercenaries.

Episode script

Between allure and need: Mercenaries in the Sahel

Reem Abbas: [00:00:00] A deadly once every 200 years heatwave due to climate change. Almost half a million people displaced due to flooding. Contested relationships with former colonial powers. Some of the poorest states in the world, military coup after military coup. From Burkina Faso and Mali to Niger last year. Almost half of all death from terrorism, worldwide. The Sahel region, extending from Senegal to Sudan, faces some of the harshest challenges in the world all at once. 

Dean Peacock: And thriving among all these shocks and contributing to them are mercenaries like the Russian Wagner Group. Mercenaries, also known as hired guns, are soldiers or former soldiers being paid to fight in a foreign country.

In this episode, we’re delving into new proxy wars being fought in the Sahel region and the militarisation of society brought about by these mercenaries. [00:01:00] Welcome to the Mobilising Men for Feminist Peace podcast, where we journey into the intersection of masculinities, violence, and feminist solutions.

I’m Dean Peacock, Project Director of the Mobilising Men for Feminist Peace Initiative at the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, the oldest women’s peacebuilding organisation in the world. 

Reem Abbas: And I am Reem Abbas, communications coordinator of the MMFP program. The root of the challenges the Sahel region faces are varied and deep.

From artificial borders drawn by former colonial powers, to foreign aid and military support that too often supports autocratic regimes and military repression. And a complex environment disrupted by climate change. It is easy to see why these issues are so robust and why even after a decade-long intervention, international actors failed in stabilising the region.

Dean Peacock: And behind the numbers, [00:02:00] there are people who can’t feed themselves and their families. Who are forcefully displaced and experience violence every day. And it’s in this incredibly unstable situation that mercenary groups are thriving. Both governments and opposition groups deploy them to fight. The Wagner Group helps Russia cement its influence and mercenaries are now reportedly being used in the fight against terrorism 

Reem Abbas: In this episode, we’re joined by Jelena Aparac, Emadeddin Badi and Philip Obaji. 

Jelena is the former chair of the UN working group on mercenaries and has done a lot of research on human rights abuses committed by the Wagner group in the Central African Republic, among other places. Emadeddin is a scholar in conflict and development, specialising in Libya and has been a consultant for a range of international organisations for the past decade. He’s also currently a senior fellow with the [00:03:00] Middle East programs at the Atlantic Council. 

Philip is an investigative journalist from Nigeria who has documented up to a hundred human rights abuses and exploitation by Russian paramilitaries deployed in West and Central Africa. He has also spent the last decade uncovering trafficking of refugees in West and Central Africa.

I started by asking Gelena about who mercenaries are and whose interests they serve. 

Jelena Aparac: Mercenaries are one of the oldest jobs in the world. If I can say it, mercenaries are as old as war itself. And you can even see that it’s not a new phenomenon because there are actually three legal definitions by international law. 

Today, there are more or less the same. There are a few, uh, uh, elements that differentiate three definitions, but at least we have three legal definitions at international level. And mercenaries are considered to be combatants who [00:04:00] fight on behalf of a party to the conflict in order to gain some profits for themselves.

There are six criterias in the complex legal definitions and they all have to be met. If one is missing, we cannot qualify a person mercenaries. And that is a bit of a problem of a definition today of the mercenarisms, even the new ways they operate and they exist around the world. But basically it is reduced to the fact that a foreigner and in some instances, even a national can participate in support of a party to the conflict. And one of the characteristics of mercenarism is for the money. So they have to gain something. They have to have a financial gain. It’s not ideological reason to combat. Why do states use them or non state actors and we see the the increase of clients, as [00:05:00] we would call them, they support their efforts in armed conflicts.

So whenever we see a presence of mercenaries or even private military and security companies in an armed conflict, we see that armed conflict is more intense in combat, and it’s very likely going to last longer. Because specifically those actors provide this military support that parties to the conflict need and they have the interest for the conflict to go on because they receive financial gain in return.

Reem Abbas: Philip, so at the heart of the conflict in the Sahel, which you cover extensively, we are seeing mercenaries and a lot of mercenaries. Why are mercenaries becoming so central to how conflicts are fought in the region? 

Philip Obaji: Well, first of all, we have to realise that every warring party seeks advantage when it comes to fighting wars.

And, you know, [00:06:00] they see an advantage coming from when they hire mercenaries. Let me, you know, come to Nigeria, the country where I live in, for example, when the Boko Haram insurgency became very difficult for the government to handle, they had to seek help from mercenaries from Russia and South Africa, because they needed to get that extra advantage over Boko Haram.

And to a greater extent it worked for the Nigerian government, because some of the gains they had in the Northeast of the country was with the help of, you know, the mercenaries that they had hired. And we’re seeing the same currently in countries like the Central African Republic, where the government engaged the Wagner group to help, you know, keep rebels at bay.

And most of the gains that the government would say they have had is as a result of, you know, the efforts of these Russian mercenaries, even though they have done so, [00:07:00] you know, in very, very brutal ways. But yes, mercenaries sort of give advantage to whichever warden faction in the Sahel. 

Reem Abbas: Emadeddin, you’ve done a lot of work, you know, in Libya on the protracted conflict there and mercenaries were a big part of the protracted conflict in Libya.

So they had a role in the early days of the conflict and they became engaged in active combat in, you know, around 2019 during the foil takeover of Tripoli. How did they become involved in the conflict and how did this change the dynamics of the conflict? 

Emadeddin Badi: So, uh, on the Libya side, obviously, initially, the presence of mercenaries was driven by sort of the collapse of the Gaddafi regime in 2011.

So the period, sort of, of instability in 2011, but also the period that followed created a security vacuum and lucrative opportunities for a lot [00:08:00] of the regional, let’s say, groups that were willing to offer their services to various Libyan factions, not just the Gaddafi regime as such, but even the factions that jockeyed over power in the years that followed.

Overall, I would say that mercenaries in general were drawn into Libya by a combination of sort of economic opportunity and the strategic sort of interests or networks of their leaders. And gradually and increasingly the influence of foreign states seeking to kind of leverage mercenaries as part of their objectives, either in Libya or in their, or in other countries. So this has made kind of the role of mercenaries pivotal in, in conflict dynamics and has also challenged, very much challenged actually, peace building efforts in Libya as such. 

In terms of the different factions that are involved in Libya, I would say, for instance, the more recently introduced group of mercenaries, those [00:09:00] being Syrians and Russians that you’re probably referring to when it comes to 2019 are quite different to the sub-Saharan African mercenaries that have been, I would say, in and out of Libya from 2011 to 2019, and which operate quite differently.

So there you’re talking about structures that are a bit more horizontal, smaller units that follow individual commanders and whose alignment within Libya is not ideological, it’s purely opportunistic. Whereas when we’re talking about the Syrian mercenaries that were brought in by Turkey, and also the, The Wagner Group recently rebranded Africa Corps, there it follows a bit more the geopolitical jockeying between Turkey and Russia, so yeah. 

Jelena Aparac: I would just like to clarify the distinction between mercenaries and private military and security companies, because I think it’s extremely important in terms of contracts, recruitment, and legality. Mercenaries are basically illegal activities, and under [00:10:00] some instruments, they’re even criminal activities.

And so very often contracting mercenaries is something that is not perceived as a positive and it’s also not necessarily legal. While at the same time we assist in increasing of private military and security companies that started to appear first around Africa during the independence movements and then very strongly during the war in Yugoslavia during the 90s, and they actually affirmed their presence

with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in early 2000. And what happened with private military and security companies, that in these early stages they were called corporate mercenaries. The difference between them and mercenaries is that private military and security companies, and I would call them PNCs in short, [00:11:00] are legal commercial entities.

So while the logics may be behind, behind maybe the same, the difference in legality is not. So PMCs are actually legal, commercial structures. So today, what we actually see around conflicts is more the presence of PMCs rather than mercenaries. And this is why states do not hesitate to contract them because these actors, PMCs, are legal.

Reem Abbas: Is this why in the literature, Blackwater is described as contractors while Wagner is described as mercenaries? And how does the, the terminologies, um, how are they used for legitimacy and for political reasons sometimes, or is it a legal term? 

Jelena Aparac: For private military and security companies, there are no legal definitions at the moment at the international level.

Although there is an intergovernmental working group on PMCs that is currently discussing [00:12:00] potential instrument, and we are not yet sure whether it’s going to be legally binding or not. But the goal, the objective of discussion is to create a framework, some kind of legal framework, be that binding or non binding, for private military and security companies, which means that there is a general recognition that these actors are in reality legal.

They are present, they have a variety of clients, and they operate, uh, uh, across different sectors. Migration, we’ve done the report on presence of PMCs in migrant detention and border management in extractive industry. There is no extractive industry today that does not recruit PMCs, uh, humanitarian actions, UN entities around the world and states.

So we are quite far from the Blackwater case that we’ve seen in the early 2000s. Now, when we talk about Blackwater as PMC, it’s simple. Blackwater was a legally registered company where [00:13:00] certain crucial information appear in the register, in the commercial register, so we can identify who is the CEO, who is the responsible.

Normally, some information should be public, and there are certain ways to impose at least domestic regulation to this legally registered commercial entity. If you talk about Wagner as an example of mercenarism, what appears very important in the case of Wagner is that they don’t have any legal structure, so they don’t exist legally.

So it’s really difficult, uh, at least it was in the early stages, now we know quite more about, about Wagner, but in the, in the early years, it was difficult to see who would be the CEO or the main responsible person who would give the orders, who would gain profit from Wagner operations. What is actually the profit from Wagner operation?

Is it just financial? Or [00:14:00] is it, uh, geostrategical profit and influence, which appeared to be the case as well. And Wagner was actually used to create this plausible deniability, as we used to say, that Russia is actually implicated in the armed conflicts, and that Russia is behind Wagner. So the whole idea of Wagner mercenarism is to hide their existence and to really create a kind of a wall between them and the state, the Russian state, that uses them, uh, in different operations across the world.

Reem Abbas: Philip, let’s zoom into the role of Wagner and the role in Africa. How did they cement themselves into political and security spheres and became so integrated into the security sector in different countries? 

Philip Obaji: Well, they haven’t, you know, been very, well, let’s say accurate everywhere, so to speak. The Central African Republic will be one country where, you [00:15:00] know, Wagner, you know, really became exactly what you, you’re trying to describe them.

It was about what they could offer to these governments and also what the government’s could offer them. If you look at the CAR, by CAR I’m referring to the Central African Republic. If you look at the Central African Republic, you know, critically, you will discover that the situation in the country is a very peculiar one.

Now, the country descended into civil war in 2013. And then shortly after, they went under a United Nations embargo, arms embargo, so they couldn’t buy arms from overseas. And when the current president, uh, Touadéra took office, he needed help. He only had the capital Bangui under government control. 

So then he ran to Moscow and demanded assistance. First of all, in getting the UN Security Council to lift the arms embargo imposed on the country. And you do know that [00:16:00] in getting this solution, there’s something you have to give away. When Moscow agreed to, first of all, assist with having the arms embargo lifted, they also thought about getting mercenaries on the ground to help fight, you know, against these rebels.

But this was never going to come free, and Moscow needed something in return, and which was the opportunity to to take control of, you know, the CRA, and their resources. So in this situation, it was very difficult for the government because the only help that we’ll get at that at a time was from Russia.

And that was how Moscow saw an opportunity to get embedded, not just, you know, in the country’s security systems, but also building something out of the country economically. And then you look at Mali. The other country where you have Russian boots on the ground, from the Wagner group. This is a country that is currently under military rule and under [00:17:00] many sanctions from the regional ECOWAS body to the African Union.

So they don’t have too many friends and Russia saw it as an opportunity to get involved and, you know, do business, so to speak. So yes, the situation, the political climate in areas where, in countries where the Wagner group is active, really gives some kind of leverage to Wagner, because it is not a normal situation in this country. 

Military ruling Mali and then also some sort of political instability in the Central African Republic actually give, you know, the Wagner group the opportunity to do exactly what they’re doing in these two countries. And we’ve seen them in the past in Madagascar, in the way they have been involved in the Central African Republic and Mali.

We saw Wagner mercenaires also active in Mozambique a few years ago, where they helped the Mozambican armed forces fight the Islamic state, central African province in the [00:18:00] country. And then obviously Emad knows this very well, that the Wagner group were active in Libya, you know, very active at some point.

So yes, political situations in this country, the instability in these countries and the desperation by the government in these countries to do business with someone, to have new friends, have actually played into the hands of the Wagner group. 

Reem Abbas: Just to kind of, you know, reflect on what you just said, you, you’re basically talking about that the mercenaries are basically attracted and they flourish, you know, in countries that are very volatile, economically, politically, generally military dictatorships.

And when the government doesn’t have a lot of like, in a way, internal legitimacy. So they try to, to do business with groups that can kind of bring them this, uh, some economic interest, and then they can find some legitimacy through this economic interests. So I’m also wondering if, if Emadeddin, you can reflect on this issue because you talked about also the reasons why some of [00:19:00] the groups made their way to Libya, you know, through during the war, but also through different, uh, foreign countries, you know, or foreign countries that were meddling in the Libyan conflict. So what happened after that? Once they were there, what kind of economic structures did they build? What kind of interest did they have that continue to kind of ensure that they remain there? 

Emadeddin Badi: Yes. So when it, when it comes to the Wagner group in particular, I think we’ve seen a shift over the years.

So the Wagner group initially it’s involvement in Libya circa 2017-2019 was not explicitly in the military combat realm. It was mainly there to support the Libyan Arab armed forces in a, in a, let’s say, ad hoc fashion, help refurbish some of the Soviet era equipment and stockpiles that Khalifa Haftar had, uh, had control over, but that the LAF or the Libyan Arab Armed Forces did not have the expertise to [00:20:00] maintain as such.

So they played a more technical role then. Then 2019 came and they got involved explicitly in combat operations because Khalifa Haftar lacked military forces on the ground. So there they leveraged sort of their experience in the combat realm, which is superior to that of the average Libyan rebel, I would say, or Libyan soldier. And they proved to be a quite an important force driving his offensive on, on Tripoli. 

However, they were still subservient to broader Russian geopolitical objectives in that sense. So yes, they were opportunistic, but they had to bear in mind that Putin’s wills obviously superseded their own whims. Then the relationship shifted with what happened in Ukraine afterwards, and the souring of the relationship between Prigozhin and Putin that eventually led to Prigozhin’s demise.

And [00:21:00] over time, you’ve seen that The Wagner Group, which had, after 2020, operated, let’s say, or focused to a certain extent on establishing a quasi autonomous presence in Libya through which it could expand in Africa. After Prigozhin’s death, what the Russian state and explicitly its Ministry of Defense has been doing is bringing The Wagner Group into the fold, moving from a quasi autonomous model to a more centrally controlled model for this mercenary group.

I think they are still not at the stage where they would like to formalise this as an arm of the Russian state because operating as sort of a private military contractor has legal benefits. You can operate in this kind of grey area of international law, but also grey area in the realm of diplomacy and foreign relations.

So it’s a lot more useful to have the kind of Africa Corps [00:22:00] as, as a missionary entity, let’s say of the ministry of defence. But you’re really seeing that the ministry of defence is actually investing in centrally controlling this force and also expanding, at least in Libya, its areas of control. So recently, this year, actually only a couple of months ago, we’ve seen a new influx of weapons equipment that are meant to buttress not just the forces presence in Libya, but also potentially support the expansion of the group, in other sub Saharan African theaters, notably those in kind of the south of Libya. So we’re talking here explicitly about Sudan, Chad, and potentially Niger. 

Reem Abbas: You just said something very interesting, Emad, about the impact basically on Wagner after it went rogue, after its head went rogue last year. It’s interesting to see also because in a way during, you know, the period before [00:23:00] its founder was, um, I don’t know if the right word is, is liquidated or he was, uh, he mysteriously died in a, in a plane accident.

But in our research, we also saw that during that time they were becoming more autonomous from Moscow and they were building their own logistical infrastructure. So is this also a risk where it could become independent again and it could go rogue again and it could become kind of an entity that is independent from the, from the Russian state, but continues to kind of have a strong presence in different places in Africa.

Do you see this happening? 

Emadeddin Badi: This is also a question I personally asked myself looking at The Wagner Group as such. My personal assessment is that The Wagner Group as such is still significantly dependent on MOD controlled supply lines, for instance, via Syria, etc. Prigozhin had a certain role to play as a figure [00:24:00] within the Russian state that allowed him a certain latitude, creating alternative supply lines or more individually controlled kind of supply lines through which he could fund the Africa Corps and go on these ventures himself or with, with a group of, uh, with a group of officers that were ideologically tied to him.

But I do think that what we’ve seen in the recent months is a, is essentially a recalibration on the Russian MOD side. And their assessment is okay, we need to retake control over this entire operation. And the best way to do that is first of all, do direct engagements with the entities locally that are hosting The Wagner Group as such.

So you’ve seen engagement of the Russian states, for instance, in Libya with, with Khalifa Haftar, etc. You’ve seen engagements with Chad’s Deby. You’ve seen engagements with [00:25:00] the Nigerian authorities, etc. And then the other facet of the coin is also engagements with the Wagner personnel as such presenting them with economic incentives, essentially to bring them back to the fault of an MOD centrally controlled authority, which is what the Africa Corps essentially is. 

So I don’t think that on the long run, they’ll be able to operate completely independently, but obviously residually speaking, there are probably individuals that were closer to Prigozhin than they were to Putin.

But I don’t think that any, at the moment at least that I can think of, is able to pick up the pieces and restart the operation because we also don’t have, but we also have to forget that it wasn’t just Prigozhin that died mysteriously. It was also a substantial number of the cadre, mid level leadership of Wagner that also died with him.

Reem Abbas: We talked [00:26:00] a lot about, uh, you know, the Russian influence, but, uh, I think we’re all interested to explore France and its role in the region. I’m curious to know, and I think a lot of the listeners are curious to know about the growing anti-France, uh, you know, movement in the Sahel. Is this movement organic or is it orchestrated?

And how is, you know, Wagner or how is Russia through Wagner influencing this movement? Philip? 

Philip Obaji: Well, that’s very interesting because, um, last year I spent some time in some Francophone African countries, you know, in Togo and in Burkina Faso trying to investigate, um, disinformation spread by Russian trolls.

Well, to answer your question, Reem, I think it’s a combination of both, you know, the anti French sentiments. It’s both organic and inorganic, so to speak. There are many trolls in Francophone [00:27:00] Africa that are really spreading anti, you know, French rhetoric. And that is really getting into mainstream life.

And there are many people who have picked up, you know, this hatred for France based on what they have read in the newspapers or what videos they have watched online or what have you. Because from my findings last year, I did realise that there are quite a number of trolls being sponsored by, by Russia. And targeting France as a country.

But also before then you had already begun, we had already begun to see some kind of, you know, resentment towards France in the sense that the French had been involved in most countries in West Africa for decades. And even when jihadist insurgency, you know, began to grow in some countries, you know, in the region, the French got involved, but we didn’t see so much of, we didn’t see results, so to speak, in terms of efforts to [00:28:00] fight against jihadist insurgency. 

So there are some people who really got tired of the French involvement and presence in these countries in the region. But to some extent, to a very good extent, we have seen how much of this disinformation that is being peddled by these Russian trolls have swayed many people in Francophone West Africa. So it is a combination of both and the impact is huge, yes. 

Reem Abbas: So Emad, I’m putting the same question to you, you know, asking if this, uh, movement is organic or if it’s orchestrated and have you through your research seen examples of, you know, Wagner, or the footprints of Wagner, if I may say. Have you seen the footprints of Wagner on this, um, very mass anti France movement that we have seen over the last few years?

Emadeddin Badi: Yeah, I, I do think that there is a large organic element to the [00:29:00] anti French sort of sentiment in Sub Saharan Africa. In Libya, obviously, we’re, it’s not a Francophone country. But even in Libya, public perceptions of France from 2011 to now shifted significantly, I would say, by way of public opinion because of France being a bit of an outlier within the European Union.

Buttressing and supporting Khalifa Haftar in Eastern Libya, sometimes in contravention of the UN arms embargo. We’ve had a few scandals here and there, a few covert missions that were revealed due to accidents. The downing of a helicopter, I believe in 2016, revealed that the French were involved in, in, in supporting Khalifa Haftar in Benghazi.

Then also in 2019, uh, I believe US made Javelins were captured in a forward base that Khalifa Haftar had used for his operation in Western Libya. And it was revealed that [00:30:00] those, uh, Javelin missiles were French and that France had sent troops kind of embedded with Khalifa Haftar’s troops in, in, in, uh, Western Libya.

So over time, I would say from 2011, where kind of France was, France was leading the charge, let’s say against Gaddafi to now supporting a figure that, uh, arguably to many people remind them of Gaddafi. You’ve seen public perceptions of France shift, and I do think the French kind of foreign policy apparatus tends to be a little oblivious to how people generally feel, not just in Libya, but also in sub Saharan Africa.

So they tend to go for the kind of misdirect of saying that this is lead or spearheaded by Russia in this case, which I don’t think is fully true. They may capitalise on it in different ways, they may amplify, but I do [00:31:00] think there’s a large organic, let’s say movement to it. 

Reem Abbas: Jelena, I want to go to the, um, to the, to really just reflect on what you, what what you said, and ask about accountability.

Who holds mercenaries accountable? Where are they held accountable in what, uh, jurisdiction, basically. 

Jelena Aparac: Ooh, this is a very, uh, very complex, uh, issue accountability. Well, let me come to the simple version of the accountability first. The accountability for mercenaries it’s almost inexistent.

We have had very few cases of mercenaries being called accountable for the very fact that they were acting as mercenaries. Now, one of the definitions does not criminalise mercenary activities. It just says a person who is participating as a mercenary does not have the right to POW, a prisoner of war status, and the privilege that are attached to it.[00:32:00] 

But other two instruments do criminalise and they’re not very strongly ratified by states. Is it really relevant? Um, I’m not really sure. I think what would be important is really to persecute persons for crimes they commit while they’re exercising mercenary activities. For example, if mercenary person commits a rape or a pillage, a war crime, then it’s important to hold them accountable for those crimes, and that’s also what might be more interesting for victims if we placer ourself from the victim’s point of view. 

When we talk about private military and security companies which are legal entities, as you know, and I just said, it’s much easier to, to potentially identify the responsible person because we can identify the CEO and there is, you know, the whole structure should be quite [00:33:00] transparent and the client should be identifiable, uh, the way they operate. 

All this would lead potentially to stronger accountability regime. However, this is not the case. Until today, we only had one case and that is effectively the Blackwater, as you mentioned at the beginning of this podcast. We had four condemnation of four members of the Blackwater for the shooting at, uh, uh, Nisur Square in Iraq.

And they were pardoned by, uh, former president of the U. S., uh, Mr. Donald Trump. And that was the only case we’ve had, which is why the working group at that time reacted very strongly, because it really, as the only case that we had, it undermines the whole accountability regime. And it sends very strong message that if you are operating as a member of private military and security company, you and you commit crimes, well, you know, you benefit the impunity.

That was [00:34:00] really not a positive development for the accountability for PMCs. There is another case ongoing and potentially a few in other jurisdictions, but it remains to be seen how they’re gonna be, uh, developed. Which countries? It’s difficult to say because if you look at a home state where they’re operating, it’s usually the state where there is an armed conflict and judicial system is weakened by the armed conflict or does not have the means or there is no political will to prosecute.

Whereas if you look at the home state of the nationality of mercenaries or PMCs, Then again, it’s very complicated because it would require judicial cooperation between those two states to investigate. And it’s difficult if you’re on the other side of the world to investigate crimes that take place in an armed conflict that’s on a whole different side of the world.

So, uh, judicial cooperation and, and, uh, law enforcement [00:35:00] cooperation would be necessary, but not always easy to implement for various reasons. So the accountability regime is still very, very, uh, weak regretfully. 

Reem Abbas: Is it fair to say that accountability is also part of the reason why we’re seeing more basically utilisation of mercenaries?

And um, if you can also let us know how mercenaries are also connected to larger international and regional interests based on the patterns that you have seen in different countries. 

Jelena Aparac: Definitely, one of the reasons why mercenaries are being used by various actors is the issue of accountability. To create this plausible deniability and to keep them far away from states that actually recruit them or other non state clients and to let them do the operations that otherwise normal, uh, legal armed forces of countries are not allowed to [00:36:00] do because formal armed forces still have official trainings and they have to respect international humanitarian law and rules of armed conflict. 

So yes, mercenaries are definitely used to avoid being linked to the client, but also to, uh, conduct operations that otherwise would not be legal by armed forces.

But there is another element that we are seeing, and this is a very interesting, uh, new development. Some armed forces of certain states are not strong enough. They don’t have strong military capacity to fight, and yet they are facing, uh, security threats, and they need either training or support, uh, weapons, and so they would use mercenaries or even legal companies such as private military and security companies, but they don’t have the money to pay them.[00:37:00] 

So what we are seeing now, and it’s increasingly present in the countries that are rich in natural resources, in exchange of money, those countries are would give them the contracts to, uh, concessions for exploitation of natural resources. And that is quite a recent phenomena where those mercenary groups or private military and security companies are now, uh, being, uh, paid through concession contracts and actually have access to exploit natural resources.

And we see that that element gives them even more power, uh, more economical power, but also political power to influence different situations domestically or regionally and internationally. And this is not a small issue. If you look at the the actual situation, [00:38:00] geopolitical situation around the world and the need to access natural resources, we see that this is only going to grow.

And the competition for natural resources will also happen through the use of mercenaries, mercenary related actors and private military insecurity companies. And that accountability is going to be, uh, even more difficult to establish. 

Reem Abbas: This is a quite concerning trend, actually, and Emad one of the reasons why mercenaries are brought in, you know, especially in the Sahel region is to fight terror groups.

Can you reflect on the use of mercenary groups to fight ISIS as in the case of Libya and also other extremist groups in the region, as Africa is more and more becoming one of the major battlefields for terror groups? 

Emadeddin Badi: Yeah, I do think it’s a policy that is fraught with, with challenges and sort of presents a mixed picture.

Obviously in, in [00:39:00] Libya, mercenaries did not play an explicitly kind of counter terrorism role. We see this more in, in, in other theatres, but in general, they’re employed because of their combat experience, their readiness to engage in sort of high risk areas where, where conventional forces might be less willing or able to operate. They fill a security vacuum or a gap in kind of military expertise.

But, on the flip side, it comes at a controversial impact and a long term consequence, which is generally a loss of sovereignty, first of all. And then, as Philip pointed out, it has geopolitical implications and that these mercenaries generally are used by states that can use them as leverage afterwards.

So you’re seeing this explicitly, for instance, in the Central African Republic, where in Track 2, Track 3, decision making, even if Wagner or not explicitly there at the kind of state leadership level [00:40:00] in Track 2, when you’re engaging with officials, generally Wagner are sometimes, at least based on my knowledge, they’re in the room at times negotiating things that relate normally to CAR’s national security with Libyan officials.

And that also brings us to another kind of facet of things, which is the broader great power competition. And when Russian mercenaries are involved in a lot of the African theatres, the United States is using that sort of as a rational at times for their engagement or for their counter engagement.

So in some cases, the explicit goal of US involvement becomes not stabilising the country where they’re engaged, but actually countering Russian influence. And that’s a bit of a counterproductive dynamic when you’re looking at things like peace building, like reforming the security sector, like ushering in a kind of democratic process and some in a lot of these countries.

So yeah, it [00:41:00] has, I would say more cons than pros, but they are obviously used for sometimes purposes like, like CT, so they may have their short term benefits. 

Reem Abbas: I want to ask you about the impact on the society, I mean, with the growing number of mercenary groups and the growing influence of Wagner and other groups.

For Philip, if you can talk to us a little about what is driving this recruitment, and in a way, through all of this, are we seeing voices against this recruitment? Are we seeing voices advocating for peace and trying to limit recruitment into armed groups and mercenary groups? 

Philip Obaji: Oh, yes. Well, economic incentives is really more of the reason, especially in a country like the Central African Republic.

It’s less about, you know, concepts and ideologies. People are more interested in exactly how they can survive and, you know, how they can take care of even their families. Because you look at [00:42:00] the number of people who work for The Wagner Group in the Central African Republic, you find out that many of them, uh, people who have families, not all of them though, there’s still quite a number of single men who really play some kind of role for The Wagner group.

By the way, these people are known as the Black Russians. That’s the name, you know, given to the local recruits in the Central African Republic. And in the beginning, the incentive was that, um, what the Russians actually promised, um, people who decide to pitch tent with them was that they were not going to be targeted by what is the Wagner forces or the Central African armed forces, because before now, like I said earlier, the war was fought mostly between the Central African forces in conjunction with Russian paramilitaries against the rebels, [00:43:00] especially the Union for Peace rebel group. 

So now The Wagner Group said, well, if you are going to pitch tent with us, you won’t become a target, you get some bits of allowances and then also some sort of training, you know, to places like Russia.

And that, at the beginning, really drove, you know, some of these rebels from the UPC to pitch in tents with, with the Wagner group, yeah. So, was basically, you know, economically driven and yes, it’s of great concern to many people, especially campaigners, human rights campaigners, because the level of human rights abuse in the Central African Republic, by The Wagner Group is huge and many people from lawyers the human rights activists, and even the United Nations have been trying to see how they can talk young men against getting involved. But it’s very, very difficult in a region where access is very, you know, hard to go by. [00:44:00] So most of these areas where this recruitment taking place are areas where either the UPC rebel group controls or areas where, you know, the Russian mercenaries are actually very visible.

So it’s really, really, really hard to pass these messages across because of the volatile nature of these places. That’s pretty much in the Central African Republic where we have seen recruitment take place. I’m not sure what happens in Mali because information is very difficult to come by. 

Reem Abbas: Before we go to Emad, I’m wondering, Philip, have you seen women also getting recruited or are they basically also part of the picture?

Philip Obaji: Well, I haven’t seen, you know, or heard any situation where women are recruited directly. But what I do know about from interviewing some of these, uh, Black Russians who I spoke to about a year ago is that some of them do involve, usually get their maybe wives or daughters involved in the sense that they act as [00:45:00] informants.

They could just go outside or go to an area where maybe the UPC rebels may be active and then try to see what they do and then share this information with their husbands who in turn will share with them, you know, their Russian colleagues or with the Central African armed forces. So usually that’s what happens, but I am not aware of any of direct recruitment of women by the Wagner. Except for the fact that, you know, some of them work as informants for their husbands who already have pitched tents with the Russians. 

Reem Abbas: Emad, if we can go back to you and you can tell us about the impact on, you know, the society, the countries where you work, and especially on the Libyan society. So many, you know, men also getting recruited into the groups and so many men coming from other countries to Libya as part of these groups.

How is this impacting the Libyan society? What is the impact on women? 

Emadeddin Badi: I would put this sort of under the broader phenomena, let’s call it, of like the militarisation of [00:46:00] society, so the militarisation of Libyan society here specifically. In terms of Libyan men being involved with mercenary groups, I’ve only heard kind of or had anecdotal evidence of some Libyan personnel, for instance, being deployed with Wagner to the Central African Republic.

And here it’s just one or two cases that I heard of nothing, uh, nothing on like an institutional scale, however, in terms of kind of the militarisation of Libyan society and the pull and push factors into armed groups, not necessarily mercenary groups, that has a lot of implications. It manifests itself because of limited economic opportunity, a sort of deteriorating societal environment.

And you find yourself drawn into the sort of world of armed groups and that has implications. You lose human capital for, for Libya as a country. The sort of norms of society, I think morph over time, [00:47:00] particularly as the conflicts protracts itself. So you see kind of manifestations of the violence become more and more overt and more and more, unfortunately, normalised. That has also implications, obviously, obviously on political stability, because it strengthens the hold of not just mercenary groups, but on also armed groups on kind of the political sector as such. And you end up in a stage where it’s not just predation by these groups on the state, but almost state capture, which I think is unfortunately the stage that we’re at in, in Libya right now.

And this is also a self reinforcing cycle. So, as the kind of mercenary groups become, and mercenary unarmed groups become more and more entrenched in kind of, Libyan society, they create a sort of self sustaining cycle of kind of recruitment and then conflict, etc. So there’s a generational element here that that might affect us in unfortunately the long run.

[00:48:00] On women in particular, what we have seen is kind of gender norms, uh, unfortunately, that armed groups said have to be sort of I will say respected or violently unfortunately enforced in some cases and some communities try to challenge that by women doing themselves sometimes, challenging those norms by doing sometimes jobs or taking on some tasks that in some cases they wouldn’t have done before. I would say that that’s the result, for instance, of economic sort of stress. And that’s something that I’ve seen across the region, not just, not just in Libya, and it’s not a direct result of conflict itself. 

Reem Abbas: Jelena, what are the gender dimensions of the conflict?

And how are women impacted by the presence of mercenaries? What happens to women? Are they recruited by mercenaries as much as men, for example? What is the impact of [00:49:00] mercenaries on the social fabric? 

Jelena Aparac: So the gender dimension is very important. And there are two different dimensions when we talk about the gender in, uh, use of mercenaries or private military and security companies. One is internal dimension, internal to the recruitment process within those groups themselves. This is a very man centered world. Men are being recruited. It’s mostly men who are running the operations and therefore there is no female workers within even the companies that are legally registered.

Or if there are, those roles are very limited and they are not operational on the ground. Meaning participating indirectly in hostilities or operating very closely to armed actors. External dimension is even more catastrophic in reality because the impact of [00:50:00] those actors, mercenaries and PMCs, is always negative on women.

And, and, young women and children, uh, in particular in, especially in the armed conflict, because they are very often victims of sexual and gender based violence. We’ve seen the cases of rape, even on children. And it is difficult for, for victims of sexual violence. to bring the cases against those actors, especially if there is a criminal element to the category specifically as mercenaries.

What I mean by that is a victim cannot differentiate whether the perpetrator is part of the armed group, armed forces, mercenary, or PMC. For them, it’s a man who is wearing a uniform. This is, very important for us because at some point we tried to raise this in several cases that we were monitoring and we couldn’t, [00:51:00] we knew there were cases of rape, but we couldn’t find the victims that were able to identify specifically that those who raped them are indeed mercenaries or, uh, members of the private military and security companies.

They would say, yes, a man who raped me is a man who’s wearing a uniform, but which uniform, uh, who do they, which party do they belong to? That was extremely difficult for victims, understandably, of course. Um, but it does complicate the, the, the work of investigation and identifying the, the specific perpetrator.

So the gender dimension is really, uh, important and, and victims are always mostly women, although not only, but we’ve seen those also in the cases of, uh, migrant detention and, uh, border management where children and minors, were the victims of violence by private security companies that were guarding the, the migrant detention [00:52:00] centers.

So the gender dimension seems to be extremely important in all elements. And what is very much related to the gender dimension is that even in the cases where we have legal frameworks at the domestic level, often those legal frameworks do not have the gender dimension, because it just doesn’t seem relevant to many lawmakers.

So we have been working as a working group on the use of mercenaries, the working group, very big consultations in 2019, and we issued the report on gender. And, um, it was striking to which extent, uh, we struggled to get any information. Uh, there is no statistics. There is no, uh, data that would be, uh, differentiated by gender.

It just isn’t there. So it’s, it makes it difficult to measure the real gender impact in particular on women. 

Reem Abbas: So, the [00:53:00] mercenaries, they come in and they recruit, you know, from the local community and then, you know, they leave, you know, eventually. What is the impact after that? You have men from the local community likely, who are now likely trained and they have guns.

What kind of patterns do you see happening in countries that had, um, some kind of mercenary activities? 

Jelena Aparac: We have seen in the last few years, men who have the experience in fighting in different armed conflicts being used, recruited in one conflict and then transferred to another conflict when the hostilities would take place, then from there to another conflict.

So if we don’t address properly, at the end of the hostilities, the security sector reform and disarmament of all combatants, including external combatants that come from abroad to fight in the country, what we will see is multiplication of combatants at the international market, that [00:54:00] will go from one conflict to another.

And we can ask ourselves what is going to happen with all the combatants that we see right now fighting in Ukraine and where are they going to end up after the war ends in Ukraine. That is the first negative, uh, and very problematic impact. The second impact is, as you rightly pointed out, the arms.

Whenever we have an armed conflict, there is a lot of, lot of arms being sent, shipped to the, to the parties, to the conflict. When the war ends, this arms is circulating again, sometimes through legal avenues, but mostly through black markets around the world. And if you don’t have the legislations that are in place that would control the arms and how they need to be stocked after the conflict, then arms circulate.

Reem Abbas: And, um, I want to ask you about the future of mercenaries in your opinion, [00:55:00] based on all the research that you have done. Is there a way out of this militarisation, even though, you know, we’re seeing more states getting weaker. And like you said, the competition for natural resources is also driving this kind of militarisation.

So what is the way out of this, if I may ask? 

Jelena Aparac: There is no way out of it, unfortunately. I think the trend is well established and it’s growing so that it’s extremely difficult to put an end to it at this point. What is important at this stage is to really try to find to establish a legal framework that would control how it grows the phenomena, that states still have some kind of control over these actors and that there is effective accountability for the crimes that they commit.

And including, you know, when, when you recruit, uh, at least private military and security companies and those legally registered actors, that there are certain minimum standards [00:56:00] that those companies have to have before they access the, the contracts. And that’s in particular, uh, you know, human rights standards, uh, respective international humanitarian law, when they operate in the context of armed conflict and always, of course, the gender dimension. Whether they are, uh, they are recruiting, female workers or when they’re whenever they operate around women, human rights defenders, women, environmental defenders, or women indigenous groups, when, when they’re in places where they operate.

I’m afraid the only way to move forward is to have a legally binding framework. 

Reem Abbas: I really want to thank you for your time again, I know you’re quite busy, but thank you for making the time to join us today. 

Emadeddin Badi: Thank you so much. 

Jelena Aparac: Thank you so much and thank you for inviting me.

Reem Abbas: Thank you again to Jelena Abarac, Emadeddin Badi, and Philip Obaji for [00:57:00] joining us for this episode. 

Dean Peacock: Today, we learned how the political, economic, and environmental situation in the Sahel region is the perfect breeding ground for mercenary groups to flourish.

Reem Abbas: That the proxy war Russia and the Western fighting in the region can stand in the way of peace efforts as their focus on countering each other’s influence rather than stabilising the countries they are involved in.

Dean Peacock: And that a lack of data makes it really difficult to understand the full impact mercenaries and these conflicts have on women and gender.

But as society militarises, gender norms become more strict and the enforcement of these norms, all the more violent. 

Reem Abbas: Thank you for listening to another episode of the Mobilising Men for Feminist Peace podcast. You can find all the resources and bibliography for this episode on our website and in the show notes.

Join us next time for part two in our discussion about [00:58:00] mercenaries, this time focusing on the MENA region.

If you would like to support the work of WILPF, consider reading our publications and following our social media channels at WILPF. I am Reem Abbas. 

Dean Peacock: And I’m Dean Peacock, and you’ve been listening to the Mobilising Men for Feminist Peace podcast from WILPF.