Algeria Continues to Lead Africa in Arms Spending, Morocco in Second Place

Rabat – Algeria continues to top the list in terms of military spending, which rose by 11% in 2025 against 6.6% in Morocco.

A new report from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said Algeria’s military spending reached $25.4 billion last year, making it the largest spender on the continent.

“At 25 per cent, Algeria’s military expenditure as a share of government spending was the second largest globally after Ukraine,” the report added.

Morocco, meanwhile, is the second-largest spender in Africa, with the report attributing military spending to the “long-standing tensions between the two countries.”

“Military spending by North African countries totalled $35.0 billion in 2025, which was 9.3 per cent more than in 2024 and 67 per cent more than in 2016,” the report said.

The US tops the global running, with $954 billion, followed by China ($336 billion), Russia ($190 billion), Germany ($114 billion) and India ($91.1 billion).

Algeria is among the top 15, ranking 20th globally.

The US has long been Morocco’s largest arms supplier. Algeria’s arms purchase, however, is mostly from Russia, a situation that has sparked international concerns,  especially in the US.

In 2022,  a group of US senators called for the immediate sanctioning of Algeria over its arms deal with Russia.

“Any country continuing to support Russia as it relates to its conflict in Ukraine right now, its unjust and its unlawful infringement on Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, would be deeply problematic,” said Vedant Petal, the then-US State Department Principal Deputy Spokesperson.

Current Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, who was the vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI), argued that the Algerian purchase of Russian weapons violated the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA).

The act of CAATSA enables Washington to sanction any party that has “engaged in significant transactions with representatives of the defense or intelligence sectors of the government of the Russian Federation.”

About 27 Republican and Democratic Senators have also called for the immediate sanctioning of the Algerian regime, citing the $7 billion allocated for purchasing Russian arms in 2021.

In a letter addressed to the Secretary of State, the senators stressed that the military transfer made Algeria the 3rd largest recipient of Russian arms in the world.

“The United States needs to send a clear message to the world that the support of Vladimir Putin and his regime’s barbaric war efforts will not be tolerated,” the bipartisan senators said.  

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