Mali’s military government on Sunday said that it would quit a West African security force after it was blocked from assuming the presidency of the regional group.
The country’s departure from the G5 Sahel security force deepens its isolation after its neighbors hit it with sanctions in January over perceived foot-dragging in restoring civilian rule.
Mali’s diplomatic relations with Western allies, including former colonial power France, have also deteriorated, especially over its rapprochement with Russia.
Photo: AFP
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres earlier this month said that political instability and human rights violations in Mali and Burkina Faso were undermining operations against militants in the Sahel region, and called for returning power to civilians as soon as possible.
However, Mali’s junta said that it has been a victim of politicking.
“The government of Mali is deciding to withdraw from all the organs and bodies of the G5 Sahel, including the joint force” fighting the extremists, Bamako announced in a statement.
“The opposition of some G5 Sahel member states to Mali’s presidency is linked to maneuvers by a state outside the region aiming desperately to isolate Mali,” it added, without naming the country.
The G5 Sahel, which also includes Mauritania, Chad, Burkina Faso and Niger, launched in 2014, with a security force against extremists added in 2017.
The heads of states in the group were supposed to assemble in Bamako in February to see Mali assume the G5 presidency, but nearly four months later, the meeting “has still not taken place,” the junta said.
Mali is struggling under sanctions imposed by other West African countries over the military’s decision to retain power following multiple coups.
The junta has opted for a two-year transition, while the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is pushing for a maximum of 16 months.
The military initially seized control in August 2020 as the country’s decade-long insurgency inflicted a spiraling death toll and forced hundreds of thousands to flee their homes.
A second de facto coup occurred in May last year, when Colonel Assimi Goita pushed out an interim civilian government and took over the presidency.
The violence gripping Mali since 2012 has involved attacks by extremists linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group, but also an assortment of self-declared militias and bandits.
In a report to the UN Security Council on Wednesday, Guterres said that Mali’s vague transition timeline was hampering the G5 force’s ability to function.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not