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Mali Repeals Decrees Supporting National Reconciliation


FILE— Leader of the coalition M5-RFP and now current Prime Minister Choguel Kokalla Maiga (C) speaks to the press in an undated photo.
FILE— Leader of the coalition M5-RFP and now current Prime Minister Choguel Kokalla Maiga (C) speaks to the press in an undated photo.

BAMAKO—Mali's ruling military junta has signed the death knell of a national reconciliation accord with northern separatists, the government said on Wednesday.

The 2015 Algiers Accords ended three years of war in Mali between government forces and various separatist groups in the north, including Tuaregs and Arab nationalists.

The government in January abruptly announced "the end, with immediate effect" of the accord that was seen as key to stabilizing the country.

Prime Minister Choguel Kokalla Maiga has now "informed the council of ministers of the repeal of the decrees relative" to the institutions put in place to apply the agreement, the council of ministers said in a statement.

"This repeal is proposed following the government's decision to end the accord with immediate effect," added the statement.

While this announcement officially kills the accord, it had effectively been rendered obsolete when hostilities broke out again last year after the junta pushed out a UN peacekeeping mission.

The decision comes at a time of worsening relations between Mali and its neighbor Algeria.

Since seizing power in 2020, the junta has brought to an end several alliances, including with the European Union and former colonial power France.

Mali has instead fostered closer ties with Russia.

The junta has also come in for criticism by the United Nations for the dissolution of several civil society organizations.

The outbreak of war with Tuareg separatists in the north in 2012 opened the way for jihadist groups to conquer swathes of territory, provoking an intervention by France and sparking a bloody war in the Sahel.

Despite the 2015 accord, jihadists have continued to fight the state under the Islamic State group and Al-Qaeda banners.

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