Washington is sending a pretty blunt warning to Algeria.
Senior US officials say that rep well say reports sorry that Alger has bought Russian fighter jets and is now negotiating for even more could trigger American sanctions.
That warning came straight from the State Department during a Senate hearing focused on counterterrorism in North Africa, where officials reminded lawmakers that under US law, major arms deals with Russia can activate sanctions which are meant to punish America’s adversaries.
Now, according to senators, Algeria may be turning to Moscow because US made aircraft take too long to deliver.
But Washington has made clear that that excuse may not matter.
So the question now is how serious this standoff could become and what it means for regional stability.
Well, joining us now from Rabbat, Morocco is Dr.Muhammad Chatau.
He’s a political analyst and senior professor at the University of Rabbat.
How significant is Algeria’s military relationship with Russia? And is this jet purchase a strategic shift or is it just business as usual in your opinion? Well, Algeria has been building up the military for the last 25 years with Russian weapons.
uh it’s using the oil money to buy billions of dollars of weapons and the latest aircraft is obviously a threat not to Morocco but also to all the uh countries of the region and the as well because we’re not talking about one country but about the whole region.
Algeria is always thinking of kind of leadership of kind of in the area and wants to have a strong army and uh it is building a strong army and the Russians are helping obviously uh to sell these latest aircraft which are for attacking not for defending and that proved to be a big threat to the whole region.
Dr.
To how significant is Algeria’s military relationship with Russia and is this purchase a strategic shift or you know I guess my question would be is if the US does move forward with these sanctions what real impact would that ultimately have on Algeria’s economy.
Al uh Algeria has as I said been buying weaponry from Russia for a long period of time since its independence and it has built incredible army with incredible weaponry uh which are threat to the whole region.
Now, if uh the United States uses sanctions, I don’t think that will change much because Algeria has the oil, has the petrol dollars, and it can use that petrol dollars to buy more weaponry and to threaten more countries in the region.
So, uh for the moment, I don’t think the sanctions uh will work uh at least in the short run.
Maybe in the long run as uh Algeria, a lot of people are believing that Algeria will be running out of cash in the next five years as the production of oil will be going down.
At that moment, I think uh sanctions will be buying in on Algeria and Algeria will be thinking more in terms of buying food for its population rather than buying Russian weaponry uh to be the leader of the region as they believe in their military uh you know philosophy.
Right.
Well, you know, I’d like to thank you so much for joining us and also wish you a happy birthday.
I understand that it’s your birthday today and you took time out of your very special day to join us and and give us the breakdown on this.
Thank you very much.
Thank you so much, doctor.
Very much.
[laughter] Take care.
Thank
