DAKAR (Reuters) – Troop rotations for the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali will resume on Monday, a mission spokesman said on Saturday, a month after Malian authorities suspended them and charged foreign soldiers from entering the country without permission.
Mali’s ruling junta suspended troop rotations for the nearly 12,000-strong mission on July 14 after arresting 49 Ivorian soldiers it said had arrived in the country without permission. Côte d’Ivoire has denied these allegations.
She said rotations would resume after discussions with representatives of the mission, known as MINUSMA, on how to coordinate troop deployments.
The July arrests highlighted friction between the junta, which seized power in a coup in August 2020, and international partners, who criticized the postponement of elections and security cooperation with Russian mercenaries.
Ivory Coast says the soldiers were deployed under a support agreement signed with MINUSMA, created in 2013 to provide security against Islamist rebels. The Ivorian soldiers are still in detention.
A MINUSMA spokesperson said the mission and Malian authorities had agreed on a simplified rotation procedure and that the mission’s request to resume rotations on Monday had been granted.
Mali’s foreign ministry could not immediately be reached for comment.
Relations between Mali and countries providing military aid remain tense. On Friday, Germany said it was suspending its military reconnaissance mission, which provides intelligence to MINUSMA, after Malian authorities refused a flight permit.
The Malian foreign minister denied on Twitter that the government had done so and called on Germany to join the new mechanism for approving troop rotations.
(Report Aaron Ross; French version Jean-Michel Bélot)
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