Jihadist violence in the Sahel region is spreading to countries along Africa’s western coast, the global conflict monitoring group ACLED said on Thursday.
A trio of Sahel countries – Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger – have been battling long-running jihadist insurgencies by groups affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State movement.
The countries’ military juntas are struggling to contain the advance of jihadists, who are increasingly threatening neighboring countries on the West African coast.
In its conflict watchlist for 2026, ACLED noted the “consolidation of a new front line in the Benin, Niger, and Nigeria borderlands, which is now strategically important for both Sahelian and Nigerian militant groups.”
The Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM) and the Islamic State – Sahel Province (ISSP) have “entrenched their presence in this tri-border area, transforming it into a conflict hotspot with implications for both the Sahel and coastal West Africa,” it said.
The NGO noted that Sahelian and Nigerian jihadists are gradually merging into a “single, interconnected conflict environment stretching from Mali to western Nigeria.”
Northern Benin, bordering Burkina Faso, Niger, and Nigeria, experienced its “deadliest year on record,” with nearly 70 percent more deaths than in the first 11 months of 2024.
According to ACLED, “political violence” also killed more than 10,000 people in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger in 2025.
Jihadist armed groups have escalated their campaigns in the central Sahel this year, throwing the stability of the region’s military juntas into doubt, the NGO said.
In Mali, jihadists launched a fuel blockade in September, attacking fuel convoys from neighboring countries for weeks. That was followed by violence in the country’s south and west, which reached “the highest monthly levels since ACLED began recording data in 1997.”
ACLED also pointed to “kidnapping campaigns targeting foreigners” by JNIM and ISSP, driving a record increase in Mali and Niger this year.
