Mali

The number of internally displaced people in the Sahel has quadrupled in just two years and is rising.

Against the backdrop of a rapidly deteriorating security situation in Mali and the wider Sahel region, the UN peacekeeping chief concluded a visit to the restive northwest African nation on Thursday.  … He also visited the new G5 Sahel Joint Force headquarters, which MINUSMA built with financial backing from the European Union.  

Malian security forces fired tear gas at dozens of demonstrators in the capital Bamako on Wednesday, AFP journalists said, during an unauthorized rally against France’s military role in the country.

President Emmanuel Macron opened the door on Tuesday to withdrawing some troops from Africa’s Sahel region, saying France could “adjust” its operations after successes against Islamist militants and the arrival of more European forces.

The UN Secretary-General António Guterres has strongly condemned another fatal attack carried out against a peacekeeping convoy that left a ‘blue helmet’ from Egypt dead, and another seriously injured on Friday.

Four United Nations peacekeepers were killed and five wounded in central Mali on Wednesday after a convoy struck an explosive device and came under fire, the U.N. said. It was not clear who carried out the attack about 20 km (12 miles) north of the town of Bambara-Maoudé in the Timbuktu region.

The Council has decided to extend the mandate of EU civilian mission EUCAP Sahel Mali until 31 January 2023 and has allocated it a budget of over €89 million for the period from 15 January 2021 to 31 January 2023. The Council has also decided to adjust the mission's mandate to enhance its ability to assist and advise the Malian internal security forces by supporting a gradual redeployment of Mali's civilian administrative authorities to the centre of Mali.

A group of jihadists close to Al-Qaeda has emerged as the West’s most formidable enemy in the Sahel, taking over from the Islamic State as the region’s major threat. The Group to Support Islam and Muslims, also known by its Arabic acronym JNIM, is a sworn enemy of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS).

In a sign that the Sahel mission could become a domestic political football, some opposition politicians have already begun to question the wisdom of staying the course.

More than 20 civilians were killed by an unidentified helicopter gunship in Mali this weekend, on top of mounting French army casualties, according to reports.