The alacrity with which the United Nations Security Council approved
the financing of a 12,600-strong peacekeeping force for Mali on 26
April shows France’s residual
diplomatic clout. In mid-December, the
UNSC turned down a similar request for money from the African Union. A
month later, France sent some 4,000 troops to drive out jihadists from
northern Mali in response to a request from Bamako. The AU rais...
The alacrity with which the United Nations Security Council approved
the financing of a 12,600-strong peacekeeping force for Mali on 26
April shows France’s residual
diplomatic clout. In mid-December, the
UNSC turned down a similar request for money from the African Union. A
month later, France sent some 4,000 troops to drive out jihadists from
northern Mali in response to a request from Bamako. The AU raised
nearly US$500 million for some 8,000 African soldiers to fight
alongside the French.
Now Paris wants an exit strategy and the UN has
provided one, with no serious opposition from the Permanent Five or the
three African members, Morocco,
Rwanda and Togo. Russian Ambassador
Vitaly Churkin cautioned the UN
about taking more combative stances and
foregoing attempts at neutrality.
The Mission
intégrée
des Nations unies pour la stabilisation au Mali is to start
operations
on 1 July: with a budget of $800 million it will be the UN’s third
biggest peacekeeping force after Congo-Kinshasa
and Sudan’s Darfur.
However, in deference to Russia and China,
the UNSC stipulated that the
force should have a peacekeeping not peace enforcement or
counter-terrorism role. In much of Mali’s north, there is no peace to
keep. Although the jihadists have been chased out of the main towns,
they have launched an insurgency against French and the African troops.
That will not change soon, certainly not by July, when President
Dioncounda Traoré’s
government is due to hold elections.
