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In Gambia, following the death of two Senegalese soldiers and the disappearance of 9 others in clashes in the south of the country, many questions remain unanswered. According to the staff in Dakar, the attackers were on board a truck transporting wood. A highly coveted natural resource in the region.
With our correspondent in Banjul, Milan Berckmans
The traffickers call it “ the ivory of the forest “, rosewood is a rare tree particularly in demand in China, cut illegally in Casamance and which transits through the port of Banjul, once more illegally.
And yet, in 2017, Senegal and Gambia both signed an international treaty for the protection of this wood when it was recognized as being “endangered”.
But on the one hand the rebels of the MFDC, the Casamance independence movement, have made it their main source of income. And on the other: the Gambian authorities continue to issue transit licenses to timber transporters, as explained by Omar Malmo Junior, of the Gambian NGO Green up, active in reforestation.
It must be said that this business pays off big: according to a BBC survey in 2020, the country had exported $300 million worth of this wood over six years. A lucrative market which is at the heart of the tensions observed in recent days on the border between Gambia and Casamance.
► Read also : Gambia: death of two Senegalese soldiers of the ECOWAS force in an attack
According to the Senegalese general staff, the research “ continue in southern Gambia to try to find the 9 soldiers who have been missing since Monday, January 24.
