On June 9, the Taliban announced a three-day ceasefire with Afghan forces (Pajhwok, June 9).  This was the first time since the group was ousted from power in November 2001 that the Taliban has called for a ceasefire.  Since then, although violence on the ground... MORE

The recent Battle of Darzab saw the Afghan Taliban inflict a crushing defeat on Islamic State-Khurasan, at least in Afghanistan’s Jowzjan province. Clashes between the two militant groups started in mid-July and concluded in the first week of August. The Central Asian faction of IS-K... MORE

In late October, Turkish military forces conducted a series of cross-border artillery strikes against the positions of the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) coalition in and around the northeastern Syrian city of Kobani (Kurdistan 24 [Erbil], November 9; The National [Abu Dhabi], October 31). Turkish... MORE

Introduction In recent years, the role of Libya’s local militias—which emerged immediately after the eruption of the revolution in 2011—grew exponentially. Created in many cases as revolutionary or neighborhood defense groups, their economic power and territorial presence have increased sharply over the years, particularly after... MORE

Turkey has begun to pay benefits to the families of Syrian armed opposition fighters who were killed or wounded fighting alongside Turkish forces during the August 2016 Operation Euphrates Shield and the March 2018 Operation Olive Branch. These operations were conducted against the ethnic Kurdish-majority... MORE

The Maldivian government has engaged in an effort to restrain radicalized youths from joining jihadists groups in Syria and Iraq. Despite these efforts, the total number of Maldivians fighting in the Syrian civil war has reached 61. According to the island nation’s National Counter Terrorism... MORE

Low-intensity conflicts can be among the most resistant to resolution. A case in point is the 36-year separatist struggle in Casamance, the southern region of Senegal. While the conflict has veered between ceasefires and flare-ups, one man, Salif Sadio, has dedicated himself to keeping the... MORE

On September 25, the Tripoli Security Directorate announced the end of fighting in the Libyan capital Tripoli (Libya Observer, Sept 26, 2018). This declaration comes after almost a month of fierce clashes that left around 117 people dead and 560 others wounded (Libya Observer, Sept... MORE

The sudden rise of Islamic State’s Khurasan Chapter (IS-K, or Waliyat-e-Khurasan) in September 2014 took the security policymakers of Pakistan and Afghanistan by surprise. The global Islamist terrorist organization was able to find immediate support from local and regional Islamist terrorist groups operating in the... MORE

The jihadist group Anṣar al-Muslimin fi Bilad al-Sudan (Ansaru) broke away from Boko Haram in a formal announcement through fliers dropped in Kano, Nigeria in January 2012 (Vanguard, February 1, 2012). However, Ansaru’s founder, the long-time Nigerian al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) kidnapper, Khalid... MORE