France announced Monday August 15, having completed the withdrawal of its troops from Mali with the departure of the country of the last soldiers of the operation “Barkhane”.
Le Monde With AFP and Reuters
German helmets observed Monday August 15 the presence of dozens of members of the Russian security forces at Gao airport in northern Mali, even though the French army completed its withdrawal from the country, according to A document written by the command of the German Federal Defense Force that Reuters was able to consult.
of German and British soldiers belonging to the peacekeeping force of the United Nations (Minusma) noticed the presence of two planes at Gao airport, including an L-39 Albatros. “Two hours later, 20 or 30 people dressed in uniforms not belonging to the Malian army have been seen, discharging equipment from a Malian plane,” said the document.
“They were most certainly members of the Russian security forces, the L-39 having probably been piloted by Russian soldiers, the Malian forces not being able to do so,” he added.
France announced Monday that it has completed the withdrawal of its troops from Mali with the departure of the last French soldiers from “Barkhane”, a military operation aimed at fighting in the Sahel against Islamist movements.
A French military presence divided by two
Pushed towards the exit by a hostile Malian junta, the French have transferred all their hold to the Malian army in the past six months. In total, France had to get out of Mali some 4,000 containers and a thousand vehicles, including hundreds of armored vehicles, while the Sahel experienced a flambé of violence, that the Russian paramilitary group Wagner, new ally of Bamako, struggles to stem.
French side, the military presence in the Sahel will be divided by two by the end of the year, at 2,500 soldiers. Niger has accepted the maintenance of an air base in Niamey and the support of 250 soldiers for its military operations on the Malian border. Chad will continue to host a French hold in N’Djamena and France hopes to keep a contingent of special forces in Ouagadougou, the Burkinabé capital.
On the other hand, the French forces will no longer carry out missions – and will no longer chase armed activists – in Malian territory once the withdrawal has been completed, had specified these French officials.
More than 2,000 civilians have been killed in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso since the beginning of the year, according to AFP calculations from a compilation of the specialized ACLED NGO. In nine years of presence in the Sahel, the French army has lost 59 soldiers.