The peacekeepers are not going to leave Mali immediately. The UN Security Council decided on Wednesday to extend the Minusma peacekeeping mission in the country for a year. However, this will be done without French air support as in the past, which could push European countries to leave this international force of 13,289 soldiers and 1,920 police.
“It’s a risk”, agrees a diplomat on condition of anonymity, in allusion to the maintenance of the commitment of Germany or the United Kingdom in this operation created in 2013, which has now become the deadliest of missions. of ONU.
Report expected in January
A resolution on the extension of Minusma until June 30, 2023, drafted by France, was adopted by 13 votes out of 15, Russia and China abstaining. Moscow explained its abstention by the “intrusive formulations” of the text in terms of human rights which would oppose Malian sovereignty.
The document provides for the maintenance of current troops and calls on peacekeepers to support the application of the 2015 Peace Agreement, a political transition, the return of state authority in the center, the protection of civilians and human rights. . A report is also requested from the UN Secretary General for January in order to possibly adapt the format of Minusma and study the evolution of its relations with the military junta in power.
At the beginning of June, Bamako had affirmed that there was no question, while the French army is in the process of withdrawing from Mali, of letting Paris continue to act on its territory with its planes based in Chad. On Monday, the head of Malian diplomacy, Abdoulaye Diop, reaffirmed that French air support for peacekeepers represented “a red line”. Taking note of this position, Paris withdrew from its initial draft resolution any mention relating to the maintenance of French air support.
Wagner hardly singled out
The adopted resolution includes only a small mention in its preamble on the controversial presence of mercenaries from the private Russian company Wagner, denied by Bamako which only admits help from “instructors” under an old bilateral agreement. with Moscow. The UN condemns “the use of mercenaries and the violations of international humanitarian law and the human rights abuses they commit”, indicates the text, without quoting Wagner by name as wanted by the United States and the Kingdom. -United.
The resolution maintains in the mandate the protection of human rights that the Malian authorities, supported by Moscow and Beijing, have sought to reduce. In recent months, NGOs have accused Malian forces and their Russian backers, including Wagner’s mercenaries, of atrocities.