Ousmane Mossa from the Desert Blues band Tamikrest, carrying his guitar, a symbol of the Azawad and Tuareg freedom struggle, adorns the cover. of “Red Sahara”
“Red Sahara” or “Sahara Rouge” is the title of the new book by Alissa Descotes-Toyosaki folling her magnificient book “La Caravanière” – The Caravan, which takes us into the endless and harsh but also beautiful Sahara desert to follow the Tuaregs on their journey through the salt caravans.
“Sahara Rouge” reflects a cruel reality that has transformed the once borderless home of nomadic peoples in the great Sahara and the Sahel into a battlefield where the people living there are paying the price. Victims of expulsion, the scorched earth policy and genocide by those who wants to steal their land and its natural resources.
RED SAHARA
“I followed the tracks of thousands of camels that pass and repass the same paths. Then times changed, I became a reporter, and I encountered other tracks in the desert, brought by uranium mining in Niger.
The radioactivity carried by the winds had seeped like dust into the tents, the wells, the earth, contaminating the milk, the grass, the water. I had first encountered this wind laden with radioactive particles in Fukushima. I had breathed it countless times before understanding its harmfulness and its origin.
So I spent years tracking traces of uranium. Curiously, I was following footprints Invisible, yet impossible to remove. Their lifespan exceeded human comprehension: two billion years.
Now, I watch the desert through the window of an armed pickup truck. I’m merely driving through it, like a minefield, dodging the tracks of tanks, bullets, and bombs. In the distance, toward the beloved Adagh Mountains, the black flag flutters.
I often think back to the caravans. They always guide the solitary traveler like me who has followed in their footsteps so many times; they are like an anchor in this life where I have found myself in devastated lands I didn’t want to see.”
Alissa Descotes-Toyosaki
The book is on pre sale on Amazon fr. and will be available in main bookstores in France from March 9 th. There´s also an audio book recorded with Alissas voice which will be available on Audible.
Azawad Support Group
01-03-26