The Senegalese government deployed a special counterterrorism unit, created, equipped, and trained with funding from the European Union, to violently suppress recent pro-democracy protests, a joint investigation between Al Jazeera and porCausa Foundation reveals.
Since 2021, the trial of popular and controversial opposition leader Ousmane Sonko has led to demonstrations across the West African nation, in which dozens have been killed. Al Jazeera and porCausa obtained visual evidence, Spanish government contracts, a confidential evaluation report, and testimonies from multiple sources suggesting that the EU-funded Rapid Action Surveillance and Intervention Group, also known as GAR-SI, was used to violently crush those protests.
In one video, security personnel in the same type of armoured vehicles the EU bought for GAR-SI Senegal are seen firing tear gas at a protest caravan organised by Sonko last May. Al Jazeera verified that the incident happened in the southern Senegalese village of Mampatim, about 50km (31 miles) from Kolda, in the Casamance region.
The EU-funded elite units were instead meant to be based in Senegal’s border areas with Mali to fight cross-border crime.
Elite unit
GAR-SI Sahel was a regional project lasting between 2016 and 2023 and funded with 74 million euros ($81.3m) from the EU’s Emergency Trust Fund for Africa (EUTF for Africa), a pot of development funding dedicated to addressing the root causes of migration in Africa.
The programme was implemented by the International and Ibero-American Foundation for Administration and Public Policies (FIIAPP), a development agency belonging to Spain’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. GAR-SI units were created across the region, in countries like Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger and Senegal, “as a prerequisite for their sustainable socio-economic development”.
The Senegalese 300-strong unit, created in 2017, cost more than 7 million euros ($7.6m at the current exchange rate) and was aimed at creating a special intervention unit in the town of Kidira, on the border of Mali, to protect Senegal from potential incursions by armed groups and cross-border crimes, including migrant smuggling.
Modelled after Spanish units that fought against the separatist movement Basque Homeland and Liberty, also known by the Spanish initials ETA, GAR-SI Senegal has received technical training and mentoring from the Spanish Civil Guard as well as French, Italian and Portuguese security forces.
After the completion of the project, at the request of all stakeholders, the EU delegation in Senegal continued with a second phase using another funding mechanism, according to one Spanish and one Senegalese police source familiar with the matter. About 4.5 million euros ($4.9m) was earmarked for a second 250-strong GAR-SI Senegal unit near the town of Saraya, close to the border with Guinea and Mali.
A second unit was also created in Mali but for other countries, especially Chad, the project was considered to be a “failure”, according to the former Senegalese police official, who said the EU lost money by paying for equipment that was not appropriate for use.
‘A serious allegation’
An analysis of the vehicles captured in the Mampatim video shows that they fit with the URO SUV Vamtac ST5, a Spanish model made by Galicia-based heavy-duty manufacturer Urovesa. The same car model was delivered in the presence of the EU ambassador to Senegal in April 2019 as part of an aid package to increase GAR-SI Senegal’s capabilities to fight cross-border crime. The unit also received drones, sixteen 4×4 Toyota pick-up vehicles, an ambulance, 12 motorcycles, and four trucks, but it is unclear whether these were also deployed during the protests.
Internal FIIAPP contracts seen by Al Jazeera and porCausa also mention Vamtac armoured vehicles gifted to the Senegalese gendarmerie as part of the GAR-SI project in 2022.
The resources, initially provided for the crime unit, were de facto integrated into the territorial commands and used by Senegalese security forces, according to a Spanish police source working in Senegal.
A former senior Senegalese police officer also confirmed the use of the GAR-SI unit during pro-democracy protests in Senegal. When shown the evidence, human rights groups were alarmed.
“These units seem to be used to repress human rights instead of fighting terrorism or surveilling the border,” said Ousmane Diallo, a researcher with Amnesty International’s West and Central Africa bureau. “It’s a serious allegation as the Senegalese gendarmerie has been involved in repressing human rights and the right to protest since 2021.”
— With files from Global AFP and The British Press
