Most people will be aware that Irish troops are being sent to Africa as part of an EU 'peace-keeping' mission to Chad and Central African Republic (CAR), but many will be relatively unaware of the background to the conflict and the reasons for the mission. Chad and Central African Republic are both resource rich (oil, gold and uranium in Chad, gold, diamonds and uranium in CAR) but economically underdeveloped former colonies of France.

Every so often the newspapers fill with stories of a crisis in some third world country. We see pictures on our screens of gunmen, starvation and suffering; inevitably we hear calls for humanitarian intervention. Over the summer, we were told of a crisis in Liberia. A brutal civil war, a corrupt leader, child soldiers, starving civilians: it seemed that the whole world was crying out for intervention by the US or UN.

We traveled in Africa for just over a year and, whenever possible, tried to meet with anarchists in the countries we visited. In Africa the organised anarchist movement is quite young, starting with the formation of the Workers Solidary Federation in South Africa in 1995. Unfortunately due to internal problems this organisation disbanded about 2 years ago. The people we met from the old WSF were now involved in anarchist publishing organisations as well as being heavily involved in struggles such as the anti-privatisation forum. They hope one day to reform the WSF.

Few people would associate anarchism with Africa. However, it is certainly beginning to take root in there. This book is written by two members of the Awareness League, a 1000-strong anarcho-syndicalist organisation in Nigeria. Starting with a good introduction to anarchism, the authors outline its relationship with Africa in an attempt to "enrich anarchism and anarchist principles with an African perspective and to carve a place for Africa within the framework of the worldwide anarchist movement".

The WSM has always said socialists should not support any intervention by the UN anywhere. What is currently happening in Bosnia and Rwanda demonstrates the reasons why we should not call on the UN to intervene.

In Europe most people have favoured intervention from an early period in ex-Yugoslavia. Initially this would have been in the support of Croatia, now it would be for Bosnia. Yet despite the popular acclaim such intervention would receive (in its early days), it has not happened. Why? Because our rulers have decided it is not in their interests to do so.