More than nine years after being considered “saviors” in Mali in the face of the presence of jihadist groups, French soldiers completed their withdrawal from the country this Monday (15), in a bitter climate, with the colonels in power and under command. growing hostility from the public.
“At 13:00 today (Paris time), the last detachment of the Barkhane force, located on the territory of Mali, crossed the border between Mali and Niger. This came from the Gao desert operational platform transferred to the Mali armed forces this morning”, the French army said that this “big military logistics struggle” He announced that he was “pleasantly and safely undertaken”.
This withdrawal, ordered by President Emmanuel Macron on February 17, puts an end to nearly a decade of French military intervention in Mali, possibly the last engagement of this magnitude in a long time.
Macron salutes the soldiers
In a press statement, the head of state welcomed the efforts of French soldiers, who “fought armed terrorist groups for nine years on their territory” and 59 of them “paid with their lives”.
“Their sacrifices remind us that our soldiers have preserved Mali’s unity during these years, prevented the establishment of a regional caliphate and fought against terrorist groups that attacked the local population and threatened Europe,” Macron stresses.
He added that its effectiveness has been “proven throughout all these years and up to the last few days by neutralizing most of the leaders of the hierarchy of terrorist groups in the Sahel.”
In a veiled critique of the two blows to his fiscal authorities, Macron reiterates his desire to “continue this commitment alongside all states that choose to fight terrorism and to stability and coexistence among communities” in West Africa.
Operation Serval, launched in January 2013 against jihadist groups that conquered the north of the country and threatened to advance to the capital, Bamako, was successful with Operation Barkhane in August 2014, targeting jihadists dispersed in the Sahel-Saharan. Up to 5,500 men on the field in 2020.
This withdrawal by France comes to an end in nearly a year that has been in an increasingly strained relationship between Paris and the ruling colonels in Bamako since the coup against President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita in August 2020.
“Neocolonial Stance”
Heading towards Russia, the colonels – even guaranteeing the services of the Russian paramilitary group Wagner, according to Paris and the UN – broke defense agreements with France and its European partners in May after blocking Operation Barkhane for months.
Government spokesman Colonel Abdoulaye Maiga said Bamako, who denied appealing to Wagner, scolded the French president in July for his “neo-colonial stance” and accused him of inciting ethnic hatred for his criticism of the Malian army.
He was reacting to Macron’s comments that “the elections held by the Mali junta today and its de facto complicity with the Wagner militia are particularly ineffective in the fight against terrorism, which is no longer its target.”
In Mali, according to experts, France found itself caught between a political logic that dictated its exit as quickly as possible and, on the contrary, a logic of military efficiency that encouraged it to stay until the local armies came to power.
“After Afghanistan, we know that a foreign operation with many Western powers on the ground won’t last forever,” he said. AFP Alain Antil, a Sahel expert at the French Institute of International Affairs a few months ago, stressed the “limits” of “large operations” with “a lot of men, a lot of presence on the ground and a lot of political visibility”.
(with information from AFP)
source: Noticias
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