UN Security Council Votes To End Mali Peacekeeping Mission
The United Nations Security Council unanimously voted on Friday to end its peacekeeping mission in Mali, after the ruling military junta abruptly demanded for UN peacekeepers to depart the West African country in mid-June.
The French-drafted resolution calls for the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali, or MINUSMA, to begin “the cessation of its operations, transfer of its tasks, as well as the orderly and safe drawdown and withdrawal of its personnel, with the objective of completing this process by Dec. 31, 2023.”
The resolution authorizes MINUSMA to respond to imminent threats of violence against civilians in the “immediate vicinity” of peacekeepers and assist the safe, civilian-led delivery of humanitarian assistance until September 30. MINUSMA peacekeepers are also authorized to provide security for United Nations personnel, facilities, convoys, installations, equipment, and associated personnel until December 31. The peacekeepers additionally are permitted to conduct operations to extract UN personnel and humanitarian workers in danger, as well as providing medical evacuations until the end of 2023.
MINUSMA was deployed in 2013 to aid the implementation of a peace plan aiming to quell a separatist insurgency in northern Mali. However, implementation of the peace plan stalled, with Malian government forces losing territorial control in the north as attacks by Islamist fighters mounted in recent years.
Following two military coups in 2020 and 2021, the military junta controlling Mali has taken an increasingly hostile stance towards MINUSMA, and has previously blocked rotations of peacekeepers. The junta has also hired the Russian Wagner group to aid Malian forces, with Wagner mercenaries believed to have jointly carried out the Moura massacre of at least 500 civilians with the Malian military.
White House national security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters on Friday that Wagner head Yevgeny Prighozin had helped engineer the departure of MINUSMA to “further Wagner’s interests”.”We know that senior Malian officials worked directly with Prigozhin employees to inform the U.N. secretary-general that Mali had revoked consent for the MINUSMA mission”, said Kirby.