French minister to chair Sahel talks aimed at curbing insurgency
France’s foreign minister was to chair a meeting in Mauritania yesterday aimed at galvanising international support for the mission to defeat the world’s fastest-growing insurgency in the Sahel region of Africa.
Jean-Yves Le Drian was to chair the first meeting of the general Assembly of the Sahel Alliance, the group set up in 2017 to support efforts of five Sahel nations trying to combat groups seeking to establish an Islamic state in the region.
France sent troops to Mali in 2013 and now has more than 5,000 military personnel across the huge area of central Africa as fighting has intensified and left more than 4,000 people dead last year, according to United Nations figures. Hundreds of thousands have been forced to flee their homes because of the fighting.
France fears that the conflict could drive migrants fleeing the conflict north, increasing financial and political pressures on Europe and risking further instability from the conflict close to its southern borders.
Paris has requested help from European allies to support its mission but has been largely rebuffed.
The Spanish foreign minster Arancha Gonzalez and Jutta Urpilainen, an EU commissioner, will both attend to hand over seven armoured personnel carriers, the French foreign ministry said.
The meeting will “underscore the concrete support of France and the EU” for the forces of the G5 Sahel Joint Force, comprising Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger.
The meeting was arranged after an ambush on a police patrol in Burkina Faso on Monday in which four people were killed. The dead included three police officers, and another five people were injured.
Under-equipped and poorly trained, the country’s security forces have not been able to counter the deadly raids in their territory, despite the help of French troops.