ILLUSTRATIVE: Reuters
On July 9, French President Emmanuel Macron announced that France would begin closing its bases in northern Mali before the end of the year.
“The shutdowns of these sections will start in the second half of 2021 and be completed by early 2022,” Macron said during a press conference following summit talks with the leaders of Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad, Mauritania and Niger, according to the France-Press Agency (AFP).
The step is meant to reduce the number of French troops fighting against terrorist groups in the Sahel region of West Africa. French service members will withdraw from key bases in Kidal and Tessalit et Tombouctou.
According to President Macron, France plans to maintain 2,500 to 3,000 service members in the Sahel region for the long term.
Last month, Macron said that France’s Operation Barkhane in Sahel would end with French troops operating as part of broader international efforts in the region.
France suspended joint military operations with Mali on June 3 after a coup d’état by Malian army Colonel Assimi Goita, who took power after overthrowing the second president in nine months. Paris reversed the decision on July 5 after talks with Mali’s transitional authorities.
More than six years into France’s intervention in Sahel, the situation in the region is still far from being stable. Several terrorist groups, some affiliated with al-Qaeda and ISIS, are still active there.
france continues to run a colonial era extortion scam on over a dozen central African nations. Research the franc cfa.
macron is obviously a mind controlled degenerate who married his grandmother. The french have a bizarre sense of humour fronting two imbeciles that any normal nation would be ashamed to even know.
It’s likely the other way around. Macron’s wife is the degenerate while Macron himself was an abused child.
I think civilised world has had enough and are leaving Muslims to their own fate 😶