The leaders of the West African Organization, with the support of France, chose the path of escalation by closing the border with Mali and imposing a trade and financial embargo, as well as freezing its assets in West African banks, after the junta announced the postponement of the presidential and legislative elections they promised on February 27 to return civilians to power.
In turn, Paris did not ease the pressure, as it announced that Air France, on Wednesday, January 12, would suspend its flights to and from Mali until further notice. While France holds the rotating presidency of the European Union, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian confirmed that the 27 countries are also preparing a series of measures.
In an immediate response to this new development, the head of the ruling military junta in Mali, Colonel Asimi Gueta, in a speech broadcast on state television, regretted the illegal, illegal and inhuman nature of certain decisions, but stressed that Mali remained open to dialogue with the Economic Community of West African States To find a consensus between the highest interests of the Malian people and respect for the fundamental principles of the organization.
“Illegal” penalties
The head of the European Institute for Security and Orientalism, Emmanuel Dupuy, agrees with this proposition, as he believes that these “sanctions do not fully fit the terms of the Abuja Agreement” that established the Economic Community of West African States in 1975. These sanctions result from the group’s “political agenda” as well as It is subject to “external influence from countries that want to punish the military authority in Mali”.
He explains: “First, the agreement did not mention in any clause the possibilities of closing the borders with a country belonging to the group. Secondly, Guinea Conakry is not interested in applying sanctions because it was excluded from voting. Third, a number of heads of state of the group considered these sanctions harsh, among them Nigeria. Guinea-Bissau, Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana, and these sanctions showed the great gap between the desires and inclinations of the peoples of African countries and their leaders.
On the other hand, he affirms that the current government’s position with the severe sanctions that have been taken against it may change and its handling becomes flexible. Although the decision to postpone the elections was not a unilateral decision by the military council, but rather in agreement with the financial political bloc. But this matter, according to Debuy, does not satisfy the military authority, which could have been more flexible and suggest an acceptable election date and benefit from the Libyan experience in this regard.
France loses its position on the coast
In response to the call of the ruling military junta, thousands demonstrated in the capital, Bamako, and other cities like Timbuktu and Bogoni, against the sanctions and mounting international pressure to proceed with a rapid transfer of power to elected civilians.
Social networks also circulated pictures of Malian demonstrators carrying slogans calling for the exit of French forces from the country.
This raises the concerns of the head of the European Institute for Security and Orientalism, who acknowledges that France’s image has been shaken in the region in light of the continuing demonstrations organized against its military presence in Burkina Faso, Niger and Mali. What does not guarantee the return line is what he called “France’s exaggeration in its focus on the military regime in Mali compared to the rest of European countries.”
He adds, “At the present time, there is no specific strategy for France in Mali, there is a complete absence of political dialogue between the two parties. A desire to internationalize pressure and bring Europe into the problem. This is an unsuccessful solution, because it puts Western countries in the face of the Malian authorities. It is also with By imposing the new sanctions, the military was able to strengthen its legitimacy among the Malian people.”
He continued, “When France decided to review its military presence in Mali on June 10, 2021, it was trying to move its military apparatus outside the Malian borders, but this does not mean that it will leave the Sahel region, but rather it only wants to strengthen its presence in Niger and save what can be saved in Burkina Faso, as By the end of 2023, it will keep only 1,000 military personnel in Mali out of 3,000.”
Russia benefits from a French vacuum
According to Depuy, “Russia will fill the vacuum left by France. This clear decline in the French role in the G5 Sahel countries coincides with the growing sense among the peoples of the region of rejecting the French and Franco-Popian military presence that is settling in the African political bloc. All of these reasons give legitimacy to the presence of the Russian “Wagner Group” in Mali.
This is also confirmed by the deals concluded between the two countries. A Russian cargo plane carried four combat helicopters from Russia to Mali last October at the request of the Malian authorities as part of what the Bamako government described as a commercial deal with Russia. Moscow also signed other military agreements with a number of the group’s countries, the last of which was with Mauritania on June 24.
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