APA-Bamako (Mali) – In his New Year’s speech, the head of Mali’s transitional government had told his compatriots to engage in dialogue.
In a statement broadcast on national television on Thursday evening, the Malian authorities announced the “end, with immediate effect, of the Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation in Mali resulting from the Algiers process, signed in 2015.”
This announcement comes a few months after the resumption of hostilities between the signatories to the agreement, notably the Malian army and the rebels grouped within the Permanent Strategic
Framework for Peace, Security and Development (CSP-PSD).
The transitional authorities condemned “the change in position of certain groups that signed the agreement for peace and reconciliation in Mali resulting from the Algiers process, ”which have become terrorist actors
and are being prosecuted by the Malian justice system after committing and claiming responsibility for terrorist acts.”
The Malian government also pointed to “the inability of international mediation to ensure compliance with the obligations binding the signatory armed groups.”
Algeria was the lead country in international mediation following its role in the signing of the 2015 peace agreement between the Malian government and armed groups with a Tuareg majority.
However, after an eight-month lull, the belligerents in the 2012 security crisis once again clashed as the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) began to withdraw from the country in August 2023, ending on 31 December.
The rebels, grouped within the ‘Coordination des Mouvements de l’Azawad’ (Coordination of Azawa Movements, CMA), had already accused the transitional authorities of “abandoning” the agreement, which provided for the integration of former rebels into the Malian defence forces and greater autonomy for the country’s regions.
In his statement, government spokesman, Colonel Abdoulaye Maiga noted “the absolute inapplicability of the Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation in Mali resulting from the Algiers process, signed in 2015, and consequently announces its end, with immediate effect.” He also denounced “acts of hostility and instrumentalisation of the agreement by the Algerian authorities.”
Consequently, the government “announces its end with immediate effect,” he said of the agreement. He went on to invite “the other signatory groups of the outdated peace agreement, who are not involved in terrorism, as well as Mali’s partners, to join in the spirit of direct inter-Malian dialogue” announced by the President of the
transition in his New Year’s speech.
Reacting to this move by the government, the CMA, through one of its leaders, declared that it had “left the honour to the authorities to declare the agreement null and void.”
In his view, this reaction by Mali’s transitional authorities “was to be expected after they ousted Barkhane and MINUSMA and replaced them with Wagner.”
The announcement of the end of the agreement opens a new chapter in the conflict in Mali. Even though they have been driven out of the main towns they controlled, such as their stronghold of Kidal, it is difficult to declare the end of the rebellion in Mali.
MD/ac/fss/as/APA