Malian Prime Minister Choguel Kokalla Maiga accused France on Monday of having worked for the partition of his country through its military involvement, in a new virulent charge before diplomats in Bamako.
Mr. Maiga, head of the government installed by the junta that came to power in two successive putsches in August 2020 and June 2021, attacked France for more than 45 minutes, in front of diplomats gathered at his request at the Prime Minister’s Office, without going so far as to explicitly ask for the withdrawal of the anti-jihadist force Barkhane led by Paris.
“After (a) time of elation” in 2013 when French soldiers liberated northern Mali, which had fallen under the control of jihadist groups, “the intervention turned in a second phase into an operation of de facto partition of Mali, which (consisted in) the sanctuary of a part of our territory, where the terrorists had time to take refuge, to reorganize themselves to return in force from 2014,” he said.
In a context of high tension between Paris and Bamako, he recalled the Second World War: “Didn’t the Americans liberate France? (…) When the French judged that (the American presence in France, editor’s note) was no longer necessary, they told the Americans to leave, did the Americans start insulting the French?” he asked.
Since the Organization of West African States (ECOWAS) imposed sanctions on Mali on January 9, supported by France and various partners of the country, the junta has clung to the sovereignty of the territory.
The Malian authorities accuse France, a former colonial power, of having used ECOWAS as a tool.
The objective is “to present us as a pariah, with the unavoidable and unmentionable short-term objective of asphyxiating the economy in order to achieve on behalf of whom we know and by proxy the destabilization and overthrow of the institutions of the transition,” said Maiga.