Teodorin Obiang’s free ride is over. The son of the Equatorian dictator has had some of his wealth seized by the US government on suspicion of money laundering. For more on Equatorial Guinea read Ian Birrell‘s piece at the Guardian here.

Check out the Peter Gastrow Report on Transnational Organized Crime and State Erosion in Kenya. The juicy bits are between pages 47-50. The thick and thin of it is that very senior Kenyan politicians are implicated. For a related earlier post on drug trafficking click here.

Smith at African Confidential discusses the Kenyan involvement in Somalia, with an added section on the complexity of the intervention. He also raises questions about the link between al-Shabab and piracy and touches a bit on why the organization could yet find a fertile ground for recruitment on the Kenyan coast.