The historic meeting in between the president of Chad and Vladimir Putin in Moscow outlines new contours of Russian-African future
In many ways, the Russia-Africa Summit that was held in July 2023 is going on to this day. Since that event, the leaders of three African countries – South Sudan, Equatorial Guinea and, this week, Chad – have visited Moscow. This does not include other high-level African delegations – for example, just a few days earlier, a delegation from Niger, headed by the Prime Minister, visited Moscow. These visits are happening in light of the growing trade turnover between Russia and Africa, as well as other structural changes in Moscow’s ‘Africa policy.’
Chad and Russia
The visit by President of Chad Mahamat Deby is quite significant. This is one of his first foreign visits after the relative stabilization of the political situation there last month. The central authorities and one of the main opposition groups, Les Transformateurs, had managed to reach a consensus and formed an inclusive government, in the process launching a transitional period. A constitutional referendum has also been held.
Secondly, Chad is a relatively new partner for Russia in Africa. During negotiations, it was mentioned that this was the first visit of the President of Chad to Moscow since 1968 (Chad gained independence in 1960) – and that’s not a coincidence. Up to this point, contacts between Russia and Chad on both the political and economical levels had been limited to one-time deals in the field of military-technical cooperation.
In recent years, Russia has been increasingly interacting with “non-traditional” partners in Africa – ie, those countries with which the USSR did not develop an active partnership for various reasons (including political and ideological ones), and where the ‘Soviet legacy’ was not as strong as in Algeria, Egypt, Ethiopia, Angola, and so on.
Thirdly, Chad is located in an important geographical zone. It is a link between West Africa and Sudan, and then the Horn of Africa; and between North Africa and Tropical Africa – in fact, ancient trade routes pass through the territory of Chad. This ‘crossroads’ location comes with certain opportunities, but also carries risks since the country’s security directly depends on the situation in neighboring countries and regions.
A question of security
Currently, there’s a lot of unrest around Chad. To the west lies Niger, where a coup d’état took place last July and where terrorist groups remain active. To the southwest, in the Lake Chad basin, are the headquarters of Boko Haram – one of the deadliest terrorist groups. To its north Chad is bordered by Libya and, to the south, by the Central African Republic (CAR). In these countries, internal conflicts are currently frozen but can resume at any moment. Finally, to its east lies Sudan, where a full-scale civil war began last April. This conflict may spread to Darfur, a region in eastern Sudan on the border with Chad. Incidentally, Russia managed to establish rather close security contacts with almost all of Chad’s neighbors, so regional security was an important topic during the negotiations.
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