UN Initiates Unprecedented 6-Month Withdrawal of 13,000 Peacekeepers from Mali, Following Orders of Country’s Military Leader

According to UN Secretary-General António Guterres, the UN is currently in the midst of an “unprecedented” six-month withdrawal from Mali at the request of the West African nation’s military junta, which has recruited mercenaries from Russia’s Wagner Group to assist in combating an Islamic insurgency.

On Monday, El-Ghassim Wane, the United Nations’ special envoy for Mali, gave the United Nations Security Council an overview of the operation: by December 31, all 12,947 U.N. peacekeepers and police must return home, 12 camps and one temporary base must be turned over to the government, and 1,786 civilian staff must be terminated.

Issa Konfourou, Mali’s ambassador to the United Nations, has stated that the country’s administration is working with MINUSMA (the United Nations Mission in Mali), but that it would not provide a deadline extension.

Approximately 5,500 sea containers’ worth of equipment and 4,000 cars’ worth of vehicles belonging to the United Nations and the nations that supplied people to MINUSMA, the fourth largest of the United Nations’ dozen peacekeeping missions, need to be moved out, Wane said.

The United Nations will maintain police in Bamako, Gao, and Timbuktu, the three hubs where the equipment is being gathered, throughout the “liquidation” phase, beginning on January 1, 2024 and lasting for 18 months.

Since a 2012 military coup, Mali has experienced turmoil, with rebels in the north forming an Islamic State two months later.

The army colonel carried out a second coup in August 2020, overthrowing Mali’s president. He was then sworn in as president in June 2021. He developed ties to Russia’s military and the Wagner group, whose head, Yevgeny Prigozhin, reportedly died in a plane crash on a flight from Moscow last week.

The U.N. deployed peacekeepers in 2013, and MINUSMA has since become the most dangerous U.N. mission in the world, with over 300 personnel killed.

Guterres circulated a 13-page letter to Security Council members on Monday, stating that “the mission’s withdrawal is unprecedented in terms of timeline, scope, and complexity.”

He stated that the mission’s withdrawal within a six-month time frame is extremely challenging due to the landlocked country’s vast terrain, hostile operating environment in certain regions, and climate.

Guterres stated that “terrorist armed groups” and the recent military takeover of Niger, a key transit country, further constrain the logistics of moving troops and equipment.