The European Union Mission in Chad : EUFOR Tchad/RCA (original) (raw)

Chad in its Regional Environment: Political Alliances and ad hoc Military Coalitions

Friedrich Ebert Stiftung , 2021

Chad is faced with an unstable regional security environment. The chaos in Libya post-2011, the fall of President Omar al-Bashir in Sudan in 2019, the ongoing instability in the Central African Republic (CAR) and the presence of Boko Haram and its affiliates in the Lake Chad Basin are among the uncertainties Chad is grappling with. However, in the space of a decade, Idriss Déby has managed to turn the insecurity at his borders into an asset. This study focuses on a subject that has not been widely addressed, namely the way Chad has positioned itself as a regional player through a combination of political alliances and ad hoc military coalitions. Indeed, to tackle the security challenges at its borders, Chad has a wide range of options to choose from, including the collective security systems of the United Nations, the African Union (AU), regional organisations and ad hoc coalitions. One of the questions this study aims to answer is what factors have influenced Chad’s choice to become systematically involved in regional military operations.

Chad: Democratisation Challenges and Limits of International Intervention

2008

International interventions in Chad, such as the European Eufor Chad, must address structural problems linked to governance and democracy by helping Chadian political actors to reform the country’s social contract instead of focusing on preserving stability and, thus, becoming part of the problem and not of the solution. At the beginning of February 2008 a coalition of armed movements launched an attack on the Chadian capital N’Djamena from their Sudanese base and almost toppled the government of President Deby. The spectacular rebel offensive did not only take the Chadian government by surprise but also put the French military under enormous pressure. Their initial hesitation to support the Chadian army according to bilateral military agreements between the two countries was due to their concern not to jeopardise the neutrality of the Eufor, the European Force that, by that time, was supposed to be deployed in eastern Chad and the Central African Republic. Finally, backed by strong...

The European Union’s “Comprehensive Approach” in Chad: Securitisation and/or Compartmentalisation?

The European Union (EU) aims for a comprehensive approach to security in developing countries. As a result, attempts have been made to enhance the nexus between the EU’s security policy and other policy areas, particularly development, humanitarian assistance, and democratic governance. This article analyses the EU’s comprehensive approach in the case of Chad, focusing on two questions. First, has the EU’s comprehensive approach been able to supersede the compartmentalisation of the EU’s political system? Second, has it led to the securitisation of non-security policy areas? These questions are answered by investigating the nexus between the EU’s security, democracy, development and humanitarian aid policies in Chad from 2006 onwards. This analysis confirms the compartmentalisation scenario, especially regarding development and humanitarian aid where the relation with security policies was at times openly conflicting. While the EU’s democracy promotion policies are found to be securitised, this is not the case for development and humanitarian aid.

Invitation Withdrawn: Humanitarian Action, UN Peacekeeping and State Sovereignty in Chad

Disasters, 2013

This paper looks at the three-way relationship between the Government of Chad, humanitarians, and the United Nations Mission in the Central African Republic and Chad (MINURCAT) from 2004 until June 2011. Chad was never comfortable with the international presence of either humanitarians or peacekeepers and asserted its sovereignty increasingly during this period. MINURCAT was deployed in 2008 to protect humanitarian workers and to facilitate the provision of humanitarian assistance in eastern Chad. This association between the UN mission and humanitarian agencies contributed to making the latter the target of repressive practices by the government, such as the imposition of armed escorts. Facing a steep learning curve, Chad and its state officials gradually appropriated the discourse of the humanitarian and international community and ultimately, in 2010, requested the departure of MINURCAT, claiming that they could meet the protection needs of vulnerable populations in eastern Chad on their own.

Chad at war: France short-term solution

Nowadays Chad is becoming increasingly relevant as a security partner for the West and for France in particular. Despite the increased influence in the African geopolitical scenario, it is difficult to fully understand the country’s objectives and how it manages to achieve them. Indeed, a close study of Chad’s history and political environment shows the impact of how the idea on the use of force as a regulator of social and power issues on the country strategy, which is based on military activism In brief, in Chadians’ psychology there is an almost complete absence of the concept of “soft power”.

The paradox of petrodollar development: Chad's military diplomacy in regional and global security

This paper examines the Chadian government’s overwhelming preoccupation with state security, rather than individual security, as evidenced by its huge expenditure on arms rather than on poverty-alleviating development projects following the unprecedented influx of petrodollars in the years since production began in 2003. This overemphasis on state security demonstrates a mismatch between the availability of natural resource wealth and ongoing low levels of socioeconomic development in Chad. The country has instead used its enormous oil wealth to boost its standing in the turbulent Central African and Sahelian regions where terrorism is rife. The country’s international diplomacy, which consists of deploying its well-equipped military in international peacekeeping missions and in the fight against terrorism, is a strategy of achieving international recognition while simultaneously diverting the international community’s attention from the country’s democracy deficit and poor human rights record. Internally, authoritarianism and political instability are accompanied by conflict, poverty and underdevelopment, which in turn perpetuate the challenges facing the country.