As if it were a delayed Christmas present, last December 26 Israel recognized Somaliland, a territory in East Africa, as an independent state. It was what Somaliland had pursued for more than three decades, since it separated Financial Times in mid-March. in mid-March the president of Somaliland, Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi.Somaliland is a few kilometers from Yemen, where the Houthis, a Shiite group opposed to Israel and supported by Iran in the so-called Axis of Resistance, operate. In statements to Bloomberg, two Somaliland officials confirmed the rumors: the territory will allow Israel to gather information about the Houthis and carry out operations against them. A local politician linked to the presidency did not rule out, in the same article, that Israel could establish a base there. This position on the Red Sea is also key due to the proximity of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, the entry point for ships heading for the Suez Canal. Any blockade of this point would force ships sailing between Asia and Europe to go around southern Africa, which would contribute to inflation in Europe. As we have seen in the Strait of Hormuz, the power gained from controlling such areas is invaluable. Israel is making a move against its enemies, and Somaliland finally has the recognition it needed. In return, it risks the element that has made it an exception: peace.

Senegal caught the attention of many international media outlets when, a few days ago, its Parliament approved toughening penalties against homosexuality. If it was already punishable by 5 years in prison before, the punishment will now be 10 years and economic fines that can reach up to 15,000 euros – in a country where per capita GDP does not reach 1,800 dollars annually—. The news has allowed a portrayal of the European right and left, who have interpreted it based on usual prejudices. The right has spread this news as a definitive demonstration to reach a pre-cooked conclusion: the prevailing homophobia in Senegalese society forces us to prevent the entry of people from this country, and they forget that one does not need to go to West Africa to find homophobia. The left has shirked responsibility or has blamed the situation on the homophobia legally imposed during the French colonial period in the country. This last argument has a reasonable starting point: it was the colonial powers that, horrified by the pagan customs of many Africans in the sexual field, applied legal codes based on the homophobia of the time, building arguments around Christian morality. Nevertheless, the argument becomes ridiculous precisely because it ignores the desires of a good part of Senegalese society, 66 years after independence: both in the ranks of the current government, of anti-colonialist pan-Africanist ideology, and in the previous government, closer to Paris, the fight against homosexuality has been a constant in the recent history of the country. both in the ranks of the current government, of anti-colonialist pan-Africanist ideology, and in the previous government, closer to Paris, the fight against homosexuality has been a constant in the recent history of the country. If they had wanted to eliminate homophobic laws, they would have already done so. They have never been further from that. Of the 138 deputies who voted to punish homosexuality, 135 voted in favor and 3 abstained. No one voted against it. The Islamic associations that had promoted the proposal in the streets had been campaigning since 2020. The dominant message in Senegal and other countries in the region is that homosexuality is a Western import, and that local cultures must be protected from this foreign contamination. A step forward

The will to protect Senegalese culture contrasts with the travel companions of the movements that have promoted the initiative: according to Reuters, ultraconservatives from the United States have coordinated with the network of Senegalese associations that have promoted the hardening of the law. In the name of protecting Africans from external influences, the deputies of the sovereignist Senegalese government are joining forces with Christian extremists who are testing in Africa what they would like to do one day in the United States. These coincidences should alert us: those of us who believe that democratic laws and individual freedoms are above sacred books are, globally, increasingly in the minority. Senegal faces in 2026 a critical year in which it will have great difficulty paying its debt. The persecution of homosexuals, in this context, is a sovereignist victory sovereignist against Westerners alongside an economic defeat: faced with the impossibility of fulfilling its program, the Senegalese government offers its citizens a scapegoat that will barely offer temporary relief: Senegal will apply extremely harsh austerity measures and most Senegalese will live worse – and Senegalese homosexuals, even worse than the rest.

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For the past few months, journalist Núria Vilà Coma and I have been conducting an investigation into how the energy transition is affecting two African countries: Senegal and Guinea. Guinea is the world's leading producer of bauxite and has the largest reserves of this mineral. Bauxite is first transformed into alumina, and then into aluminum, which allows for a significant increase in value: when it is aluminum, a strong and lightweight material, it is worth thirty times more than bauxite. Because the price is so low—a kilo of bauxite cost between 6 and 8 euro cents last year—Guinea increases its revenue by multiplying its production—it now produces ten times more than it did thirty years ago.

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2026 has begun with news that will surely be among the most important of the year when December arrives. Aware that our attention spans are short, world leaders are fighting to capture headlines that are becoming increasingly fleeting. The big winner in this game is the President of the United States, Donald Trump. The EU, Canada, and the United Kingdom, faced with the collapse of the order in which they had operated for decades, They react by announcing trade agreements with IndiaMercosur and China.

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The decisive goal in the men's Africa Cup of Nations could be scored by a boy born in Terrassa: Ismael Saibari. This Sunday night, Senegal and Morocco will play a first-ever final in this competition, which began in 1957 when only three countries were independent. Today, as then, the Africa Cup of Nations serves to illustrate what is happening on the continent.

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"I used to be a ship's captain, now I'm a truck driver." This statement The video of Isa, one of the occupants of the B9 high school in Badalona, ​​on TV3, has gone largely unnoticed amidst the media frenzy following the eviction of 400 people from this Catalan city. The reactions on social media to Isa's video are the usual ones: some argue that we can't possibly address all the world's misery; others, that we need to have compassion and sensitivity towards the vulnerable. Ironically, the progressive position reinforces the far-right narrative: when faced with the proposal to be charitable hosts, more and more people are responding—with increasing vehemence—that they won't. Both positions tend to ignore the root causes of migration. Isa, a former Senegalese fisherman, is the clearest example of a problem that has accelerated on the coasts of West Africa over the last ten years: the processing of fish into fishmeal for export, from which we benefit—and consume.

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The Guinean engineer Amílcar Cabral, one of Africa's most important anti-colonial leaders, confessed in his biography that as a child his mind was so steeped in colonialism that he felt Portuguese. Within a few years, he became one of the continent's most renowned revolutionaries: he led the independence movement of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde against Portugal, and was assassinated a year before the definitive recognition of independence in 1974. His writings and speeches have become legendary. One of them stated that to convince peasants to join the guerrillas, people didn't need to hear grand theories, but rather the promise of a better life.

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