Plans are underway by Germany to withdraw its troops from the UN’s peacekeeping mission in Mali by May 2024’.
This is according to a government spokesman making it the latest country to announce its pullout from the troubled country.
Spokesman Steffen Hebestreit in a statement on Tuesday said the government will propose to parliament that Germany’s commitment to the MINUSMA operation be extended “in May 2023 for the last time by a year, in order to bring this mission to a structured end after 10 years,”
Furthermore, Hebestreit said the decision had particularly taken into account Mali’s planned elections in February 2024, he added, following talks between Chancellor Olaf Scholz and his coalition partners the Greens and liberal FDP.
Recall that since 2013,the German military has been in Mali operation with a presence of up to 1,400 soldiers as part of the MINUSMA mission, mostly based near Gao in the north.
But they faced increasing difficulties in recent months, repeatedly having to suspend reconnaissance patrols after being denied flyover rights by the military government.
There have been growing tensions between the UN mission and Mali’s military rulers following the alleged arrival of Wagner operatives from Russia to bolster government forces.
