To Counter Russian Invasion, Kyiv Seeking to Expand Influence in Africa

Executive Summary:

• Since Moscow invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Kyiv has been working to counter Russian influence in Africa and expand its own by doubling its embassies on the continent and increasing aid.
• Most African countries remain neutral because Ukraine is a major grain supplier. However, Ukraine has lost ground in others due to what some in Africa believe and what Russian propaganda insists are its ties to former imperial powers.
• The outcome of this struggle remains uncertain, but Africa has become an important front in the war, which Moscow and Kyiv have decided is critical despite few in the West recognizing its significance.

Even before Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his expanded invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Moscow was working hard to expand its influence in Africa both to counter the West and to gain access to the immense natural resources there. That involved both the use of private military companies (PMCs) such as Wagner to support favored regimes and the promotion of the Russian Orthodox Church across the continent, efforts that have been sometimes successful and sometimes abject failures (see EDM, April 30, 2018, February 3, 2022). Since the war began in earnest, Russia has stepped up these efforts to ensure that African countries do not oppose Moscow’s aggression at the United Nations and elsewhere and do not decide to reduce Russian influence in African capitals and Russian access to raw materials (see EDM, July 31, 2023, January 31). This Russian effort has been widely covered in the West, prompting at least one analyst, London-based Vladimir Pastukhov, to suggest that consolidating influence in Africa has become an even more important strategic goal than victory in Ukraine for the Kremlin (Window on Eurasia, July 4).  

Ukraine’s newly expanded efforts to counter Russia’s moves, which build on Kyiv’s links to Africa built over the last several decades, have received far less attention almost everywhere except in Moscow. These efforts reflect three major considerations in the Ukrainian capital. First, Ukraine has been alarmed that only 19 of the 54 African countries in the United Nations have consistently supported Ukraine at the United Nations as far as the war is concerned. The rest have generally accepted Moscow’s version of events because of their memories of Soviet support for the decolonization effort there decades ago. Second, Ukraine is worried about Russian efforts to disrupt the flow of Ukrainian grain to Africa, a major source of income for Kyiv, whose loss it can ill afford. Third, Kyiv believes it is critical to show that it is allied with Western countries in Africa to receive more support from them on the battlefield. To those ends, Kyiv has sent a series of increasingly senior diplomatic missions to Africa and doubled its diplomatic presence from 11 embassies at the end of 2021 to missions in 22 states, giving it a direct diplomatic connection in these countries (Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, accessed September 10). Previously, its diplomatic ties with most African countries had been via their embassies in the Russian capital. Kyiv now plans to open still more in the coming year, giving it representation in Africa rivaling that of Russia, which has 40 diplomatic missions on the continent (DW, December 30, 2022; Izvestiya, July 26, 2023; NV.ua, August 17, 2023; Aydınlık, June 4).

Perhaps equally important, Kyiv has worked hard to keep grain flowing from its ports to Africa. It recognizes that its grain deliveries are an important reason behind the decision of most African countries to maintain at least neutrality in the war between Russia and Ukraine and that additional supplies of grain can help tip the balance against Moscow and in Kyiv’s favor, especially as the food situation in many parts of Africa becomes more critical (Meduza, June 15). Those Ukrainian calculations about Africa are another reason Moscow has worked so hard to interrupt flows of Ukrainian grain to the continent, a reason often neglected in discussions of that issue. In a related development, Ukraine has also reached out to African countries to expand bilateral economic ties into new sectors (Kyiv School of Economics, March 30, 2023).   

Ukraine’s increasing involvement in providing security assistance to African countries is even more important on this new political front in the conflict between Ukraine and Russia. Before 2022, Ukrainian military personnel had played an increasingly prominent role in UN-sanctioned peacekeeping missions in Africa and elsewhere, winning plaudits from the countries involved and most outsiders (Militarnyi, March 8, 2022). Ukraine has continued to supply such forces since 2022. In addition, it has also provided military support to governments and movements in Africa that find themselves threatened by Russian PMCs like the Wagner Group. This is something that has sparked enormous criticism in some African countries and Moscow, claiming that such Ukrainian forces are now nothing more than agents of former colonial powers such as France and the United Kingdom. Last month, this criticism led three African countries—the Ivory Coast, Mali, and Niger—to break diplomatic relations with Kyiv (RT; Lenta, August 16, 2023; RITM Eurasia, December 25, 2023; Fond Strategicheskoi Kul’tury, September 7).

Moscow-based analysts are delighted that its propaganda about the role Ukrainian forces are playing in Africa appears to be working and are celebrating the fact that these three states have broken diplomatic relations with Kyiv. These same analysts, however, see this as only the first victory in a battle that Moscow is intent on continuing. In an essay published earlier this week, Moscow commentator Yegor Volkov argued that Ukraine has a wide range of goals in Africa and that the Kremlin must be prepared to combat each of them with all the means at its disposal lest Kyiv turn the tide there and as a result the tide of the war more generally (Fond Strategicheskoi Kul’tury, September 7). Among Kyiv’s goals, he says, are the strengthening of relations with its existing allies to form part of the burgeoning anti-Russian alliance the West has created; interference with all Russian activities in Africa by the new Ukrainian missions there; gaining access to Soviet-era weapons still on the ground in some African countries so that it can deploy them against Russian forces in “the special military operation” in Ukraine; and undermining the statehood of Russian allies in Africa by organizing various kinds of corruption, including the sale of Ukrainian passports. These are widely preferred in Africa to Russian passports because they provide easier access to more countries around the world. This list will likely inform Moscow’s strategy and tactics against Ukraine in Africa in the coming months. 

Given the increasing ways in which the conflict on the Russian-Ukrainian border is so closely tied with the one between Russian and Ukrainian interests in Africa, those in the West who want to see Ukraine win in the former must take steps to ensure that Ukraine wins in the latter. Failing to do so could deliver Russia an undeserved victory and Ukraine a tragic defeat. The stakes are simply too high to ignore.