- By Paul Melly
- West Africa Analyst
1 hour ago
The outcome of Friday’s UN Security Council vote on the future of the peacekeeping force in Mali is unquestionable: they have no choice but to end the deadliest UN operation to date.
Around 187 peacekeepers have lost their lives during the more than ten-year deployment.
However, it is not the number of victims that the UN is driving out of Mali. It is the country’s military regime that insists the 12,000 international troops must be withdrawn – despite a desperate security crisis that shows no signs of abating.
Once the UN peacekeeping forces leave, Mali will depend even more heavily on the Russian mercenary group Wagner, which has an estimated 1,000 fighters in the country, for security support.
Armed jihadist groups regularly carry out attacks in the northern and central regions of Mali, a vast country stretching from tropical West Africa to deep in the Sahara.
Despite Wagner’s formidable reputation, there must be doubts about his effectiveness in fighting the militants, even as the manpower is bolstered by additional fighters drawn from the war in Ukraine.
The recent dispute between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of the mercenary force, could raise questions about the exact arrangements under which these forces will be deployed.
For the Russian president, their presence is a useful tool to poke fun at France and the US and strengthen Russia’s footprint in West Africa.
Image source: Getty Images
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The presence of the Russian Wagner forces was welcomed by some Malians
But Wagner will not have the scale of air attack power, armored units and logistical support backed by US satellite reconnaissance that was available to French force Barkhane – which withdrew last year after the collapse of trust between Mali and the former colonial power .
Wagner units seem more concerned with holding a few key bases from which to raid and patrol than with a general strategic push.
In the 11 months that Mali has relied on Wagner rather than French support, jihadist groups have intensified their activities and expanded their reach.
Once the United Nations also leaves, this trend could accelerate, while the tough stance of mercenaries could further alienate the Tuareg and Peulh (aka Fulani) pastoral communities.
Tensions between farmers and ranchers have already fueled violence in parts of central Mali, where the fertile Niger inland delta should be the rice basket of West Africa.
Amid the uncertainty, more than 1,500 schools have been closed and local economies have been severely impacted. In many parts of the north, the Malian state and basic public administration and basic services are completely absent.
Monitoring group Acled reports that 1,576 people have been killed in 682 incidents so far this year.
Conditions are particularly dire in the north-east, where thousands of civilian villagers have now taken refuge in camps around the small desert town of Ménaka. It is more the communities in the north that will suffer from the departure of the UN mission.
The army has had some recent successes, but in reality is struggling to come to terms with them. Even the outskirts of the capital Bamako, hundreds of kilometers to the south, were attacked.
Mali’s military ruler, Colonel Assimi Goïta – who took power in a coup in August 2020 – has demanded that the UN force, known as Minusma, take on a much more aggressive role in fighting terrorism and supporting the national army.
But the UN forces had a peacekeeping mandate — to protect civilians from militant attacks, support essential public services and humanitarian assistance, and underpin a 2015 accord. Under this deal, ethnic Tuareg separatists in the north agreed to remain in unified Mali in exchange for power being decentralized to the local level.
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It is more the communities in the north that will suffer from the departure of the UN mission
The aggressive anti-terrorist fight was indeed the task of France’s Barkhane force, whose withdrawal last August was largely due to Mali’s decision to invite Wagner into the country.
Still, Mali is still frustrated that Minusma is unwilling to support its strong agenda and has now decided that the UN force must also withdraw “immediately”, although France’s draft resolution suggests this will take six months.
But there is more to this argument than that. Colonel Goïta is also angered that UN forces will not join his determination to restore national sovereignty to the central government and that he has no interest in properly implementing the decentralization promised under a 2015 peace deal with northern Tuareg rebels Fought for Azawad, an independent homeland in the Sahara.
In addition, relations not only with the United Nations, but also with several western governments and also with many of Mali’s regional neighbors have been marked by distrust and resentment over the past two years.
In September 2021, Prime Minister Choguel Maïga accused France at the UN General Assembly of abandoning the country “in the air” even as French troops continued to die in the campaign against the jihadists. Within months, the government had turned to Wagner instead.
Colleagues at the regional body Ecowas were already angered that Colonel Goïta had delayed a timeline for restoring democracy and denounced the mercenaries’ presence as a threat to the security of the entire region.
Then, over the next 18 months, the government imposed more and more obstacles to the deployment of the UN force, such as delaying authorization for troop rotations and restricting the UN’s flight rights – apparently to prevent oversight of the areas in which it is stationed war Wagner’s men were active, even where the lives of injured troops were in danger.
In addition, after the withdrawal of the French combat troops, the peacekeepers were also more vulnerable to attack.
Last July, amid an ongoing dispute with Ecowas over the transition period, Mali arrested 49 Ivory Coast soldiers who had entered under a long-standing agreement to guard UN compound and accused them of espionage. All but three remained in detention until January, when they were finally released after lengthy negotiations.
As operating conditions for the UN force became increasingly difficult, Ivory Coast, Germany, the United Kingdom and Sweden announced plans to withdraw their contingents.
Although the junta refused Minusma to visit the site, UN forces managed to reach surrounding communities, interview survivors and obtain proof of the identities of 238 victims.
The verdict was devastating: more than 500 people were killed in Moura in March 2022 by the army and allied “foreign” fighters – a clear allusion to Wagner.
The government reacted furiously and threatened a judicial inquiry against the members of the investigative team. They were accused of espionage, conspiracy and threats to state security.
After that, calls for a speedy disbandment of the UN force could hardly come as a complete surprise.
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The vast majority of those working with the UN force are from Africa
In addition, anti-Minusma sentiment had been mobilizing for months.
“It is the whole Malian nation that is rediscovering itself,” said one author in a recent TV discussion program.
The TV show’s host himself described the campaign, which urged the withdrawal of UN troops, made up largely of African soldiers, as “another fight against the oppressor and the West.”
Colonel Goïta has just secured support in a referendum for a new constitution that will increase presidential powers and allow military leaders to run in next year’s elections. With the UN out of the way, he will have a freer hand to advance his agenda.
However, ordinary Malians, particularly in the fragile center and north, may miss the UN force. Although it proved unable to stop jihadist attacks, it did provide a measure of containment and provided a necessary modicum of calm and stability in key cities, allowing basic services, administration and social welfare to function.
And his presence at least kept the deal alive with northern groups that have lost all faith in military rule.
With the departure of UN peacekeeping forces, parts of the North where the army and Wagner are struggling to assert themselves could drift even further towards de facto autonomy.
Away from the heated city politics in Bamako, everyday life will only become more difficult for many communities.
Paul Melly is a consultant to the Africa Program at Chatham House in London.