APA-Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso) The government in Burkina Faso, on Monday, expressed surprise at the content of a UN report accusing the Malian army and Wagner mercenaries of committing abuses against civilians in the town of Moura.
In early May, Bamako backed Ouagadougou, which was under fire from the international community for alleged abuses against civilians in the northern town of Karma.
A few days later, Burkina Faso authorities returned the favour to their Malian counterparts.
Burkina “expressed its skepticism about the conclusions” of the report by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, made public on May 12, 2023, which accused the FAMa and Wagner of having killed more than 500 civilians in the town of Moura, from March 27 to 31, 2022.
In a statement signed by Burkinabe government spokesman Jean-Emmanuel Ouedraogo and released Monday evening, the transitional authorities said the Malian fighting forces “successfully carried out a large-scale military operation in the area of Moura in March 2022, which allowed them to inflict a crushing defeat on these followers of the apocalypse by neutralising several dozen terrorists.”
For this reason, they expressed their “solidarity” with the government of Mali, “unfairly taken to task for alleged human rights violations,” Jean Emmanuel Ouedraogo said.
Burkina denounced what it called “a variable geometry approach to human rights”, which consists of the United Nations “observing a suspicious complacency” in the face of the exactions of terrorist groups and condemning the actions of the armies of Sahelian countries.
He added that the international community was not assuming “its duty of solidarity with the peoples of the Sahel, who are being violated and martyred in the land of their ancestors, when all they want is to live free, dignified and in peace.”
On May 12, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights released its “Report on the Events in Moura from March 27 to 31, 2022. It found that more than 500 civilians were killed by the
FAMa and foreign military personnel considered by Western nations to be members of the Russian private security company Wagner.”
The Malian government had doubts about the content of the report and announced the opening of an investigation against the UN reporters.
DS/ac/fss/as/APA