In France, 13 European and Canadian countries have condemned Russia’s “military intervention” in West Africa in Mali as the government battles Islamist militants who have killed thousands and displaced millions in the Sahel.
Mu a coherent sentence released Thursday, the country also called on Russia to “return to normalcy and stability in the region”.
That is the security situation they were ruined in Mali since June while in France he announced the withdrawal of its troops there after seven years Operation Barkhane has failed to end the jihadist threat in the Sahel region.
French President Emmanuel Macron justified the decision by saying that French troops, who had killed 53 people in the region, would no longer be able to compensate for Mali’s “nonsense”. Two terrorist attacks have taken place in the Bamako capital in less than a year, which has increased difficult relationship between France and Mali, its former territory.
Malian officials have criticized France for its alleged escalation of the conflict and its decision to halve the force of 5,000 troops.
After the fall of the French army, Bamako began a conversation leasing mercenaries from the Kremlin Wagner Group, a Kremlin security group, under US and EU sanctions.
Wagner is not a legal entity but a group of affiliated companies affiliated with Evgeny Prigozhin, a Russian businessman known as “Putin’s Chef”. The militants have been accused of war and human rights abuses in Libya and the Central African Republic. Prigozhin refused to return the group.
France and other countries have said “they are deeply saddened by the decision of the Malian immigration authorities to use the state funds that have already been paid to foreign nationals instead of supporting the Malian military and government services to benefit the Malian people”.
The French operation of Operation Barkhane began in 2013 with the aim of removing al-Qaeda allies from Timbuktu in Mali. But the conflict has escalated in a number of countries, such as Niger and Chad, with al-Qaeda and Islamic State allies attacking civilians and the military.
After meeting with his Malian counterpart in Moscow last month, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the Kremlin had no alliance with the mercenary alliance but that Mali had the right to hire Russian military personnel. He said: “If they can sign agreements with the legitimate governments of the sovereign states, I do not see the problem.
The terms were provided by France, UK, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Italy, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania and Sweden.
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