Two peacekeepers from the United Nations mission (Minusma) in Mali were killed on Monday March 7 near Mopti (center of the country), and four others injured, by an improvised explosive device, according to the spokesperson for the UN mission.
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“This morning, a logistics convoy of (Minusma) hit an improvised explosive device north of Mopti. According to a first assessment, the explosion caused the death of two peacekeepers, four others were injured“wrote in a tweet the spokesman of the Minusma Olivier Salgado. The nationality of the victims had not been specified by the UN Monday at midday. But according to a security source, it would be Egyptian soldiers. The head of Minusma El-Ghassim Wane has “strongly condemned this attack“, in a statement Monday, calling the “Malian authorities to spare no effort to identify the perpetrators of these attacks“.
This incident comes at a time when the withdrawal of France and its European partners from Mali, announced in February, is leading the UN force to study the impact of this disengagement. Thursday, Stockholm had thus announced that the Swedish participation in the UN force will end a year earlier than planned, in 2023 instead of 2024. With its approximately 13,000 soldiers, the Minusma, created in 2013 to support the Malian political process, is the UN’s deadliest peacekeeping mission.
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Mali, a poor and landlocked country in the heart of the Sahel, was the scene of two military coups in August 2020 and May 2021. The political crisis goes hand in hand with a serious ongoing security crisis since 2012 and the outbreak of separatist and jihadist insurgencies in the North. The ruling military junta has reneged on its pledge to hold quick elections for the return of civilians to power and has claimed national sovereignty since the Community of West African States (ECOWAS) imposed heavy economic and diplomatic sanctions on Mali. January 9.