New security challenges in the Indian Ocean:
Instigators, flows and factors of instability

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By Jérôme Lauseig CEAN/IEP, Bordeaux, France

Published in African Security Review Vol 8 No 1, 1999

The evolution of the concept of security brought about by the recent transformation of the international order shows a definite break from the earlier Cold War definition. This break is particularly obvious when considering the extent of threats to security, identifying the object of security and considering the management of the means to challenge contemporary threats to security.

Until the beginning of the 1990s, the concept of ‘security’ was geared towards the state and its sovereignty. The strategic competition between the two superpowers, mutual dissuasion, the equilibrium of the powers or the threat of nuclear war were the major considerations in a country’s security policy. According to Gervais and Roussel,¹ these policies were based on three assumptions:

Security problems result from the activities of other states, mainly at military level.



State security interests are fundamentally the same as public interests.



The means of dealing with security threats are essentially military and must therefore be managed on a national basis, whether through unilateral measures or through intergovernmental co-operation agreements.

The Realist school fully shared this state-centric approach. Thus, for Aron,² the different examples of confrontation could be categorised into a war typology: interstate (between states), suprastate (which has as its objective, origin or consequence, the removal of a political interest group and the formation of a higher entity), and intrastate (which aims to maintain or alter a political entity).

The changes that occurred with the end of communism in Eastern Europe have considerably overturned the order of priorities. Security policies are now increasingly directed towards security threats which go beyond boundaries and which take on a multidimensional aspect. These new dangers are no longer necessarily aimed at the state, and their manifestations are difficult to predict — a situation which contributes to increased levels of uncertainty in the new international order.³ The range of new challenges which governments must face include:

population management (i.e. refugees, illegal immigrants);

the development of black markets (frontier trafficking, parallel economy, war economy);

currency flows linked to illicit trafficking;

violence brought about by firearms proliferation or drug consumption;

terrorism and ethnic conflicts;

violations of human rights;

the deterioration of the environment; and

endemic poverty.

Such a widening of the scope and nature of security threats has caused specialists to multiply the criteria in the inventory of forms of confrontation and means of violence. Thus, in addition to interstate and world wars, Caplow and Hicks include in their writing, wars between powerful individuals (e.g. criminal organisations’ leaders), a popular armed insurrection or rebellion against the state, guerrilla wars, civil wars which bring a society’s political or other kinds of divisions into play, and wars of religion.⁴

Although there is no consensus concerning the type and extent of security changes brought about by the end of the Cold War,⁵ a series of theoretical works on the notion of ‘security’ deserves, nonetheless, to be highlighted. Authors such as James Rosenau,⁶ Ken Booth⁷ or Barry Buzan⁸ propose breaking away from state-centric assumptions and try to measure the conceptual concequences of separating state security from public security (for individuals or groups). At the conceptual level, this change shows an important qualitative development, since the notion of security, thus defined, accommodates individuals and communities, which are then placed at the centre of priorities. This widened definition modifies the security aim itself, going beyond the national framework, to include regional and international frameworks, and to convey questions which, previously, pertained exclusively to governments. Since the aim of this article is to analyse changes to security and with it, threats to security in the Indian Ocean region, an attempt will be made to evaluate the opportunity and the operational value of the widened definition of security by asking three questions:

Which threat(s) do bordering states’ security policies aim to oppose?

On whom must these policies concentrate (the state, individuals, or groups)?

hat means are available to oppose the identified threats?

Globally, the end of the Cold War has decreased classic military confrontations around the Indian Ocean. Generally, wars no longer result from imbalances and contests of power between states, but rather from the consequences of their weakness.⁹ The word ‘war’ itself is often avoided, having been replaced by ‘armed conflict’ or ‘crisis’, which are less formal.¹⁰ An overview of the crises and conflicts involving countries along the coast of East Africa seems to confirm this statement. Only old international disputes persist: France, in particular, with Mauritius on the subject of Tromelin Island; with Madagascar regarding the Eparses Islands in the Mozambique Channel; the Comoros concerning Mayotte Island; and the United Kingdom with Mauritius on the subject of the Chagos Archipelago.¹¹

Since the beginning of the 1990s, what could be called the end of ideological confrontations, especially in Southern Africa, has been witnessed for reasons which differ perceptibly according to the countries in question. The successful outcome of the independence struggles of the African National Congress (ANC) and the South West African People’s Organisation (SWAPO), whose armaments were provided by India and China to counteract white imperialism, ended this type of Afro-Asian military solidarity. The end of the civil war in Mozambique, as well as the decrease in the intensity of the civil war in Angola show the characteristics of the trend towards peace. It appears that the loss of military assistance from former Eastern bloc countries has accelerated the cooling of old ideological antagonisms which were used for political struggles between those in power and their armed opposition.¹²

Increasingly, crises resulting in acts of violence are internal, as is the case in East Africa: the implosion of Somalia with the de facto creation of Somaliland; claims from Zanzibar for independence; or, more recently, the secession of Anjouan and Moheli in the Comoros. Low intensity internal conflicts also affect the countries on the eastern reaches of the Indian Ocean: Indonesia, with the Liberation Front of Xenana Gusmao (who has been imprisoned since 1992) in East Timor; or Sri Lanka, with the secessionist rebellion of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in the east and north of Sri Lanka.

However, intrastate conflicts do not signify the end of interstate confrontations — a situation exemplified by Eritrea and Yemen over the Hanish Islands in the Red Sea. On widening the area of investigation, it is clear that the Persian Gulf region, or India and Pakistan, demonstrates the persistence of traditional types of conflict. Furthermore, ideological and religious factors cannot be eliminated from those affecting regional instability, although they often have only localised consequences. In Africa, Sudan carried out its terrorist activities¹³ with the financial help of billionaires from the Arab Peninsula.¹⁴ Pakistan (or rather, certain religious groups supported by the government) is back in the limelight on the regional and international stage, with Islamic issues that leave Iran behind.

Nor are the effects of Islamic influence on the Muslim community in South Africa insignificant.¹⁵ Nevertheless, if Pakistan undeniably appears to have a vocational influence on Muslim populations, it does so as a matter of priority towards the continent (Kashmir, Afghanistan, the Muslim republics of the former Soviet Union), and not towards countries bordering the Indian Ocean.

On the whole, the changes which have occurred on the regional scene are not as much qualitative (the nature of instability factors) as quantitative (the proliferation and accumulation of methods of confrontation). Contrary to most Western countries — where the perception of threats has shifted from threats against the state to threats against individuals, in the absence of military danger and an acknowledged enemy — the persistence of significant danger on the borders of Indian Ocean countries still prevents most from reducing the importance of their defence policy. Fear of China, disputes concerning the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, Indo-Pakistani rivalry in South Asia and the Iraqi ambitions of supremacy in the Persian Gulf deprive these governments of the luxury of reducing the amounts spent on the military defence of their territory. Only South Africa and Australia (which has no proximate rival) have been able to concentrate in greater depth on the implementation of a security policy of which the object is no longer the state, but the individual.

If it is accepted that the state remains the originator of security policies, the way in which these policies are manifested will vary by country and situation. Risks and threats are found outside as well as inside a state and their origins are often linked. In an open country, where ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ tend to be entangled, it is an absolute necessity to assign the same consideration to vulnerability as one gives to effective dangers — indeed, the consequences incurred by the bankruptcy of certain states may be more dangerous than a classic military confrontation.¹⁶

The relative reduction of the risks of direct military confrontation does not mean the disappearance of instability. Rather, instability has taken on different forms, which are internationally less visible, but more deadly for the civil population, and which affect the stability of state structures. Indeed, not only the so-called ‘low intensity’¹⁷ conflicts are subject to renewed outbreaks with increasing intensity, but the security of the state and its citizens has become increasingly difficult to control because of the overlapping of the traditional differentiation between military, political, economic and social dimensions. States encounter contradictory objectives for the adjustment of their economies, for political stabilisation and for the re-establishment of effective territorial control. While states are confined by their difficulty to arbitrate between the expectations of their populations and the constraints of international interdependence, they constantly have to face friction and interference regarding what is within their competence where security is concerned, and a wide variety of international processes which infringe on their prerogatives.¹⁸

While some countries are unable to ensure effective control over ‘grey territories’ within their boundaries, they are also unable to enforce peace or, at least, to guarantee a minimum of security for their citizens in the rest of the country. Violence against individuals is becoming commonplace in parallel with the lack of efficiency on the part of the legal system and the police forces. The South African example of high levels of crime and violence is often quoted. Nevertheless, such violence occurs essentially within specific areas of large towns and cities.¹⁹ Furthermore, despite statistics on crime or thefts involving violence, the South African situation seems to be only transitory, in that the difficulties in transforming laws and the police force are more to blame than any delinquency on the part of the state. However, the long term consequences that crime and violence have on state structures should not be neglected. Viewed in an extreme light, a situation in which there is a lack of state control brings about behaviour which is comparable to what can be found in a country at war — absence of government, the development of a market for private security, organised gangs, the spread of increasingly sophisticated weapons, and the occurrence of unpunished acts of violence.

Accelerated internationalisation and criminalisation of trade flows constitute another factor of instability in the Indian Ocean, as in other regions.²⁰ The difficult economic situation encountered by African, South Asian and South-East Asian countries undergoing structural rearrangement — as they are having to privatise and open their economies — acts as a catalyst for the criminalisation of trade, as well as the increase in instability. Weapons and drug trafficking,²¹ which may foster chronic instability, head this list. Such trafficking has taken on dimensions which are cause for particular concern in grey territories not under state control.

Thus, for instance, the open-door policy and the economic liberalisation process launched in 1991 in India²² — which is marked, in particular, by a privatisation process and by membership of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) since April 1994 — favoured the penetration of drug traffic networks into the country. India is vulnerable to such activities due to its geographic position, including its common borders with Pakistan and Burma. Since the opening of the borders to legal importation, the smuggling of gold and electronic items has become less profitable. The druglords, who are well-established in the economic capital of India-Mumbai (formerly Bombay) have developed their activities further. According to the Indian Narcotic Control Bureau (INCB), the city is not merely an important drug transit centre. Pakistani laboratories which convert morphine into heroin, and well-established mandrax producing laboratories are increasing in numbers in Mumbai. These activities are promoted by the influx of money from the boom of informal activities. Numerous laboratories were dismantled in the Maharashtra Province (of which Mumbai is the capital), as well as in neighbouring Gujarat Province (bordering on Pakistan) where many pharmaceutical plants have been established. Often, when these firms are in financial difficulty, they are taken over by criminal organisations in order to produce mandrax intended for the African market.

Drug trafficking (and the laundering of drug money) accounts for what is by far the most important category of illicit trade flows in the Indian Ocean. Heroin comes from India, the United Arab Emirates, Thailand or Burma and is transited across African countries such as Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi or Zambia. Hashish produced in Pakistan is apparently transited across Kenya. Finally, mandrax, produced in India, is exported to Nigeria, Mozambique, Zambia and South Africa, to be consumed locally or to be sent on to Europe and the United States. Any endeavour to establish a security policy should be based on the essential fact that the Golden Crescent countries, from Iran to Pakistan, and the four Golden Triangle countries (Burma, Thailand, Laos and the Chinese Yunnan), are implicated in most drug trafficking which transits across or which ends in Africa. The arrival of narcotics in a territory forces public and private institutions to confront the surge of monetary flows which they cannot control, and especially to confront the emergence of conflicts over their appropriation. The advent of narcotics traffickers on the political scene is another critical consequence of the expansion of the drug trade.

While not as extensive, the trade in illicit weapons is also ongoing in the Indian Ocean region. Suppliers change, but the recipients are frequently countries which are under United Nations arms embargoes. In addition, stocks of surplus weapons have accumulated in African countries after the termination of conflicts (for example in Somalia, Angola and Mozambique)²³ and constitute supplies for other incipient or current conflicts across the continent. Illegal weapons, imported from beyond the continent, come essentially from Eastern Europe (especially Bulgaria), Russia and China, and are generally exported to governments or belligerent factions. Certain regions can be used, at times, as transit points in response to the demand for weapons, making use of a variety of fraudulent methods. In this way, the port of Dar Es Salaam could have been used from the end of 1994 to September 1996, according to Human Rights Watch, as a transit point for weapons and ammunition deliveries from the China North Industries Corporation (NORINCO),²⁴ which were dispatched by the Chinese Tanzanian Joint Shipping Company and were intended for Burundian factions,²⁵ when Uganda was in fact indicated to be the final destination as stated on the end user certificates.

Corruption is also a potent threat to the stability of states, and its growth is further encouraged in countries where it is traditionally widespread. Economically and politically, the functioning of states is affected by corruption which brings on deviations comparable to those observed in Latin America at the beginning of the 1980s.²⁶ In South Africa, drug traffickers had infiltrated the government and police ranks since 1995. In some cases, police, officers and other officers of the public forces went beyond simple assistance to drug traffickers by becoming actively involved.²⁷ In Tanzania, according to a police report covering the first nine months of 1997, the state lost 13 billion shillings (close to US $21 million) through embezzlement by government services, state companies or agricultural co-operatives. This represents a four-fold increase in the amount embezzled during the same period in 1996.²⁸ Such corrupt practices often permeate a country, resulting in activities implicating state officials at the highest level. The level of increased collaboration between Asian countries, such as Malaysia,²⁹ and African countries in the last five years is not without consequences, not the least of which is the reinforcement of practices which are more or less questionable.

Crime syndicates³⁰ constitute the best illustration of the multiplicity and interpenetration of repertoires of violence. As factors of instability themselves, engendered by a climate of instability, crime syndicates combine all the manifestations of modern violence (drugs, weapons, corruption, prostitution, theft and murder) and allow for a detailed synthesis of the threats which bear down on the state and individuals.

Rather than a well-defined enemy, countries must now face criminal gangs, networks of traffickers involved in weapons, drugs, currencies, cattle and stolen vehicles, and in illegal immigration and money laundering. The level of sophistication of these organisations varies considerably and extends from local gangs to élite groups operating on an international level. The roots of these organisations are also varied: they can originate among diasporas (Nigerian,³¹ Indo-Pakistani or Chinese) and thus only be a marginal fringe of trading networks; they can rely on well-established mafia-related networks such as the Italian Mafia in Australia³² and the Seychelles;³³ they can come from the Triads of the Far East via their South-East Asian relay sites; more recently, they can come from former East European countries and Russia;³⁴ or from the South American drug rings. They all have one thing in common: they are groups which have organisations at their disposal which use sophisticated methods and which do not hesitate to use violence. They have a well-established hierarchy, with its own internal promotion system, and have national and international connections with other members or related organisations. These criminal networks set themselves up as alternative systems to the state and end up assuming the role of economic opponents. Their activities are facilitated by the fact that the target countries are vulnerable. The more the state is falling apart, or restructuring, the less it can resist, and the more easily criminal organisations can operate. Furthermore, countries which are in need of revenue or are in the process of deregulating markets, considerably facilitate the implantation or growth of criminal networks. Finally, (and the list is not exhaustive), whether or not states have security policies focused on these organisations (whose efficiency depends on political choices, on the means implemented and on the good functioning of executive organisms such as police forces and the law) and their activities, these policies contribute directly to reduce or increase the level of vulnerability. Interests pursued by states and mafia-related networks are often concurrent, and confrontations are increasingly frequent. These networks behave as pressure groups would, but their pressures are illegitimate³⁵ and illegal (corruption, intimidation, blackmail), even criminal (bomb scares, kidnappings, murders). It would not be an exaggeration to state that gangs instigate wars, in certain countries, with a view to silencing those state officials who might be so bold as to counter their plans.³⁶

Nevertheless, it would be a mistake to believe that crime syndicates seek to destroy state structures, even as they set themselves up as opponents and as the effects of their practices weaken the state. In the same way as a parasite, criminal organisations depend upon their host, and a dying host has no purpose. On the contrary, a relatively dynamic economy, as well as an efficient, but corruptible administration, guarantee prosperity. Ensuring the state’s participation definitely costs less than creating and maintaining structures to protect their activities.³⁷

In the same way, one should not conclude too easily that the fundamental factors raised previously (weakness of the state and the worldwide expansion of criminalisation) and their consequences (drugs, weapons, corruption, crime syndicates) form a system, in so far as the presence of certain criteria does not necessarily imply the presence of other criteria. Indeed, certain countries which experience state and social crises simultaneously are spared from criminal organisations taking root, despite chronic instability. The case of Madagascar, which has known political and social instability, highwaymen, cattle theft and crop theft (looting vanilla plantations) for many years, falls into this category.³⁸ In fact, the economic substratum (banking system, internal market) and the possibilities for geographic influence (communication infrastructure, diversified and important transport networks) are more important than the state’s measure of weakness. For this reason, South Africa or the Seychelles are considered more favourable locations by criminal organisations than other less geographically favoured neighbours.

The market for insecurity develops constantly, and commensurate with it, the market for private security. The resort to specialised service companies is not only a logical consequence of the fact that states acknowledge their own lack of power in being able to control illicit trade, but is also another illustration of the ‘deregulation’ of violence. These companies encroach upon the prerogatives of states which are supposed to hold the legitimate monopoly on violence. They take advantage of judicial deficiencies, or of the laissez-faire attitude of governments which have to manage sensitive political transitions (the end of a civil war, radical change of regime) and which are preoccupied by the reintegration of the most radical groups into society (for example, guerrillas or élite troops). Two types of security companies can be found: those involved in the privatisation of security and the other in the privatisation of war, depending on whether they have a local or international influence and on their means.

The proliferation of criminal organisations, criminal trade and private security companies, forces the states concerned to develop concrete solutions in order to maintain their supremacy in the provision of security to their populations. Indeed, the implementation of a judicial apparatus and the training and co-ordination of police forces are time consuming and costly, but necessary to gain the effective control of borders and gangs or criminal syndicates.³⁹ If these conditions are necessary, they are, however, not sufficient: how can a single state, especially when it is vulnerable, find answers to international threats? To face such threats, there are two possibilities: calling on the help of a sufficiently powerful state, or engaging in co-operation with other Indian Ocean or subregional countries.

The designation of a regional leader or hegemon who would agree to look after its neighbours is one option. In the western part of the Indian Ocean, in the eyes of international opinion, only South Africa seems capable of performing the role of a bastion of stability and security, with its influence reaching out from Southern Africa to the rest of the African continent. Recently, Mozambique and Tanzania have asked South Africa to assume the supervision of their coasts. Whether or not the South African government is willing or able to do this remains to be seen.

Other potential regional leaders also do not seem in a hurry to become the responsible caretaker of regional security in their region or subregion: India, which has an adequate fleet at its disposal, focuses all its power on Pakistan and China, and Australia remains subject to Pacific tropism, although it has undertaken a ‘look West’ policy.

For want of a regional leader to control security, resorting to co-operation between states seems to be the most adequate solution in an attempt to face, on an equal basis, these new security risks. Nevertheless, if changing to a regional level of management in the fight against instigators of insecurity, illegal trade flows and other factors seems obvious, there is nothing obvious or easy about its implementation.

In addition to a thirty year-old effort to make the Indian Ocean a zone of peace, and one free of external powers and nuclear weapons, the other large-scale project undertaken in the oceanic region is that of the Indian Ocean Rim Association for Regional Co-operation (IOR-ARC). Its constitution was accepted by the fourteen member countries in March 1997, in Port Louis, Mauritius. The first structures and regulations of the project, which were decided upon in March 1995 by the seven founding countries, did not include matters of security or politics (at least in the early days), but favoured an exclusively economic approach. Indeed, economic co-operation and the development of exchanges within the area can be seen as factors of prosperity and stability, but assuming that such co-operation will indeed be fruitful, it cannot bring answers to the security threats faced by member countries.

The lack of institutional initiatives needed to harmonise both politics and the security measures of the countries bordering the Indian Ocean in order to undertake a more adequate fight against the new types of insecurity, results partly from self-interest. The involvement of the drug-producing countries in most trade ending in or crossing Africa seems to hinder any hope of managing this plague in an area as large as the Indian Ocean region.

For want of solutions on a regional scale, subregional initiatives are given preference. Where the fight against factors of instability, which are linked to illicit trafficking, seems unlikely in South-East Asia, efforts to combat illicit trade and trafficking are seemingly taking hold in Africa. The development and multiplication of criminal organisations are rather recent phenomena in Africa. Their emergence on the continent does not carry as much importance or influence as in Asia (or South America).

Southern Africa is particularly dynamic in this domain, with the existence of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and bilateral initiatives among members. Indeed, security-related issues are taking on increasing importance in these objectives, although SADC members’ objectives have been dominated by economic issues since 1992. Promotion of regional co-operation is assumed by the Inter-State Defence and Security Committee (ISDSC) and its three subcommissions on Defence, Public Security and State Security. The creation of the Southern African Regional Police Chiefs Co-operation Organisation (SARPCCO) in August 1995, which includes eleven countries, is a direct result of the subcommission on Public Security of the ISDSC. The fact that a subregional Interpol office was established in Harare in 1995 and that the South African Police Service (SAPS) was re-admitted in 1993 to the international structure of Interpol, contribute actively to this subregional co-operation. Thus, joint operations have been conducted between South African and Mozambican police forces to destroy weapons caches. Although implementation difficulties are experienced in Southern Africa, this region can be proud of being one of the rare examples of co-operation in matters of security by countries around the Indian Ocean, which has gone beyond the simple stage of declaring its intentions and beginning to respond to the new threats to security and development in the subregion.

Although Southern Africa tries its best to adequately confront the new forms of insecurity, the way ahead will be long and difficult. The two other levels of action (regional and international) should not be disregarded, in spite of the fact that their initiatives are less widely supported.

The Indian Ocean region and the Indian Ocean Rim could play a more important role in the future: on the side of trading activities, an exercise in mutual exchange, such as the implementation of a customs information network based on the commercial databank which is currently being realised, could constitute an efficient tool against illicit trade flows.

A regional organism does exist: the Indian Ocean Criminal Police Organisation, whose structure could be reinforced and whose areas of investigation could be broadened. The pursued aims do not seem contradictory to those adopted by the member countries, since they tend towards an improvement in the quality of the intra-zone exchanges, as well as towards the well-being of its inhabitants.

The extent and object of security policies, without any doubt, have evolved considerably since the last decade. Based on the Indian Ocean region, the transformations of the concept of security and of the forms of development of instability have been briefly analysed. It follows from this analysis that the evolution of the perception of security threats has been significant, given the complex nature of the ‘new’ protagonists and their operating methods within the new international environment.

Nevertheless, contrary to most Western countries from which the concept of security is very often derived, bordering countries do not rule out the presence of an acknowledged military danger, and consequently, the replacement of defence policies by security policies is only partial. Thus, new threats are added to the existing threats. while old threats tend to have been substituted by new ones in the West.

The transition from traditional security to co-operative security is considered an important element of modern security policies by Western policy-makers. Of necessity, the countries of the Indian Ocean have increasingly focused on regional or subregional co-operation, experiencing both positive and negative results. The main obstacle to the methods which are employed in the process — inspired by the concept of co-operative security and supposed to be the most suited in the fight against the new types and instigators of violence — emanates from the nature of the threats to security, of which the crucial factor is very often the state’s legitimacy itself. The result is the shifting of the responsibility for security from the state to the individual. But having established that the weakness of the state is one of the main foundations of the injuries to the physical integrity of individuals, it seems difficult to structure a more appropriate approach to security policy that would avoid the impasses and misinterpretations generated by tables of analyses or imported conceptual documents which are prescribed at all costs. The policy and perceptions of security in India are not those of Madagascar, just as those of South Africa are not those of Indonesia, or even of the United States, France or Canada. The fact remains, that what is essential is an appropriate response to the security challenges of the region and an evaluation of the situation by governments in order to equip themselves with more adequate means to ensure the safety of their citizenry.

This is a revised version of a paper presented at the conference on Controlling Small Arms Proliferation and Reversing Cultures of Violence in Africa and the Indian Ocean, Institute for Security Studies, St Denis, Reunion. April 1998.

M Gervais & S Roussel, De la securité de l’Etat a celle de l ‘individu: I’évolution du concept de securité au Canada (1990-1996), Revue Etudes Internationales, 29(1), Institut Quebecois des Hautes Etudes Internationales, Presses universitaires de Laval, Quebec, March 1998, pp. 25-52.



R Aron, Paixe et guerres entre les nations, Calmann-Levy, Paris, 1968, p. 794.



Hence the neo-realists’ works which oppose an ordered system with an anarchical international system.



The same reproach has been formulated with respect to J B Duroselle, Tout empire perira, Theorie des relations internationales, Armand Colin, Paris, 1992, p. 346. The author combines different criteria, such as the intensity of wars, the civil or external character of the wars, their length, their extent (numbers of players and the regional or worldwide character of wars), and finally the types of wars (classic, revolutionary or subversive wars).



The effect of the diffusion of the concept of security was to emphasise dissension among specialists and mediators involved in establishing criteria, norms and means suitable to ensure the adequate application of security policies.



James Rosenau tried to define a new type of player in international relations, in the same way one defines a state or a regime. He distinguishes three types of individual players: the citizen, the politically liable individual and the private player whose initiatives influence the international stage. J N Roseneau, Turbulence in World Politics: A Theory of Change and Continuity, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1990.



K Booth, Security and Emancipation, Review of International Studies, 17(4), October 1991, pp. 313-326.



B Buzan, Rethinking Security after the Cold War, Co-operation and Conflict, 32(1), March 1997, pp. 5-28; B. Buzan, People, States and Fear: An Agenda for International Security Studies in the Post-Cold War Era, Harvester-Wheatsheaf, New York, 1991.



Of 44 major armed conflicts recorded in 1995, none were considered to be ‘interstate’.



F Mayor, La paix, demain?, Flammarion, Paris, April 1995, pp. 61 -63.



On this subject, one should read the many works written or supervised by Olivier Gohin and Pierre Maurice in the framework of CERIGOI or ORIHS, in particular, the articles of the ORIHS conference on Mayotte, published in 1992, as well as those of Andre Oraison, lecturer in Law at the Université de la Reunion, in Saint-Denis, who specialises in island-related issues and in problems concerning the Indian Ocean South-West islands.



An exception may be Iran which has made a return to the African stage since 1996. Iranian diplomacy is particularly active. Many diplomatic tours have taken place: President Rafsandjani in September 1996; Mr Velayati in March and July 1997; Mr Kharazi in November 1997. Mediations are initiated: Uganda/Sudan; proposals during the Zairian crisis. Intensification of high level diplomatic exchanges (ministers) has also taken place and diplomatic representations have increased (Uganda, Togo and maybe Benin). Iran held the OCI summit in December 1997, which crowned the nation’s efforts and opened up new doors, especially economic ones.



The assassination of President Sadat by members of a minor political group to which Sudan gave asylum, as well as the failed assassination attempt on President Moubarak in Addis Ababa in June 1995, illustrate the activities led by Omar El Bechir’s regime and by Hassan al Tourabi’s National Islamic Front. In other respects, Sudan benefits from a certain pre-eminence in the minds of various armed Islamic movements found in East and North Africa: Al ittihad al islami in Somalia, Djiha eritrea in Eritrea, the Islamic movements from the Oroma country and from Ogaden in Ethiopia, and the Egyptian and Algerian Islamics turned quite naturally to the country they thought would help them in their fight.



The Alliance Nationale Democratique comprises a conglomerate of movements opposing General El Bechir’s regime.



The implication of the South Africans who have studied in Pakistan, in the World Trade Centre in 1993, or the appearance of Bahat, a South African Islamic movement with close relations to Pakistan, are often mentioned.



W Zartman (ed.), Collapsed States: The Disintegration and the Resurrection of Legitimate Authority, Lynne Rienner, Boulder Colorado, 1995, pp. 1-11.



For most, due to armed rebellions operating on the territory, often with the support (financial, or small military presence) of regional or international players. These situations, allowing the creation of conflicts, tend to be generalised in Africa and are long lasting in South-East Asia (i.e. East Timor, Sri Lanka, Cambodia).



P Hassner, Nouvelles perspectives de la securité internationale, Quelle securité?, UNESCO, Paris, October 1997, pp. l7-21; paper from the conference Vers une culture de la paix, UNESCO, Paris, September 1995.



See, for example, La loi des gangs metis du Cap, Le Monde, 18 April 1998, p. 13.



In Africa, criminal networks fight against the authorities in most cases; in certain Asian countries (for example, Burma), as well as in South American countries (Colombia), they are closely linked to the powers in place, or worse even, the power itself organises illicit trade. To understand the conditions which have brought about the rise of such a phenomenon in Africa — the decomposition of the state and of its relation to the borders and to the territory, or the implementation of alternative territorial network layouts; see D Bach (ed.), Regionalisation, mondialisation et fragmentation en Afrique subsaharienne, Karthala, Paris, 1998, p. 319.



B Adam, Les transferts d’armes vers les pays africains: quel control?, Conflits en Afrique: Analyses des crises et pistes pour une prevention, 215-217, GRIP publications, Brussels, 1997, pp. 101-130.



See Inde: I’ouverture economique dope les trafics, La Depeche Internationale des Drogues, 61, OGD, Paris, November 1996, p. 8.



In Mozambique, out of 10 million weapons, only 200 000 have been collected (but not destroyed), according to the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research, Managing Peace Processes: The Issues, UNIDIR, 96/46, New York and Geneva, 1996.



The Chinese weapon firms China North industries Corporation (CNIC), China National Aero-Technology Import and Export Corporation (CNATIEC), Polytechnologies or Xinxing are the most well-established firms in Africa.



Human Rights Watch, Burundi — Trafics d’armes et aides militaires, December 1997, p. 60 (published in the GRIP reports in March 1997).



D Pecaut, Reflexions sur la violence en Colombie, in F Heritier, De la violence, Opus, Paris, September 1996, pp. 223-271. This case study deals with the advent of drug traffickers in the field of politics, as well as with the heterogeneity of the dimensions of violence brought about by the emergence of illicit monetary flows and by the conflicts created from their appropriation.



S Baynham, Narco-trafficking, in Africa, African Security Review, 4(6), 1995, p. 33.



Tanzania: Detournement a la hausse, Lettre de l’Ocean Indien, 801, 28 February 1998, p. 3.



See Malaisie: Afrique: offensive de charme, Africa Confidential, 273, 6 January 1997, pp. 4-6.



See P Williams, Transnational Organised Crime and National and International Security: a global assessment, in V Gamba (ed.), Society Under Siege: Crime, Violence and Illegal Weapons, Institute for Security Studies, Halfway House, 1997, pp. 11-41.



M Shaw, The Growing Threat of Nigerian Organised Crime in South Africa, SA Exclusive, November 1996.



See D Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1996.



To recall the practices applied in this country, see S Ellis, Africa and International Corruption: The Strange Case of South Africa and Seychelles, African Affairs, 95, 1996.



See J S Herr, Russia, Geopolitics and Crime, Conflict Research Centre, 49, February 1995; G Turbiville, Organised Crime and The Russian Armed Forces, Transnational Organised Crime, 1(4), Winter 1995, pp. 57-104.



The case of the Seychelles is well acknowledged. Passports from the Seychelles are sold at the Seychelles Economic Commission based in Hong Kong, for the price of US $25 000. Officially, this programme has been conceived in order to attract investors to the islands. Russian and Chinese investors seem to benefit from the scheme: their new nationality facilitates their travelling. If, as in the case of the Seychelles, welcoming and laundering money from all over the region have become a flourishing business, other countries, due to their financial difficulties, have to be less fastidious, in particular with investment funds. Thus, Mozambique is also looking to become a receiving end for capital which comes from the Portuguese-speaking Chinese community (the ‘Macaistas’), who might be concerned when Macao is due for retrocession to China. A bilateral agreement protecting investments was signed on 6 November 1997. Such a strategy exposes Mozambique to a risk: the Chinese mafia of Macao, which operates around casinos, could flourish in the country.



ln 1995, Tokyo Sexwale, then Premier of Gauteng in South Africa, came short of being assassinated when he denounced the rise of drug trafficking in his province. In Mozambique, many assassinations have occurred in 1997 alone, including the death of the director of La Policia de Investigaçao Criminal de Maputo, of Justice Graça Simango, who was working on corruption linked to the clandestine sale of military equipment to South Africa, or by the attempt on the life of Deputy Attorney General Afonso Antunes, who was investigating drug-related problems. See Mozambique: la justice malmenee, Lettre de l’Ocean Indien, 792, 20 December 1997, p. 4.



M Shaw, Organised Crime in Post-Apartheid South Africa, ISS Papers, 28, Institute for Security Studies, Halfway House, January 1998, p. 6.



See F Raison-Jourde, Introduction, Politique Africaine, 52, CEAN, Karthala, Paris, June 1994; as well as the various works of ORSTOM on Madagascar, in particular those of M Fauroux on the Sakalave country and on the Morondava region.



See M Shaw, Privatising Crime Control in South Africa’s Security Industry, in M Shaw, Partners in Crime? Crime Political Transition and Changing Forms of Policing Control, Centre for Policy Studies, Johannesburg, 1995.