The Transitional military government of Mali has ended the 2015 Algiers peace deal with Tuareg separatist rebels in a move that observers say could further destabilise the conflict-torn West African nation.
In a statement read on state television, the military authorities said its decision was motivated by three serious facts: The change in posture of certain groups and signatories to the agreement, who have become terrorist actors and pursued by the Malian justice system. A second reason was the inability of international mediation to ensure compliance with the obligations incumbent on the signatory armed groups. It also stated as another reason acts of hostility and exploitation of the agreement on the part of the Algerian authorities, leader of the mediation.
Tensions between the country’s military leadership and the Tuareg separatists had resurfaced since the military consolidated power in two coups in 2020 and 2021. Signs of the junta’s frustrations with what it described as the failure of international mediators to address bon-compliance with agreements reached with the rebels were evident when it called for the withdrawal of French forces and the United Nations (UN) peacekeeping mission, Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in Mali (MINUSMA), and teamed up with Russian military contractor Wagner Group as its new partners to fight the separatists.
In an apparent move to establish a new internal peace process, the junta’s decree outlined the structure of a committee and the steps it should take to prepare talks. It did not give a timeframe or say which groups it wanted to include in the dialogue.
The junta’s call for a national dialogue to find new paths to peace had been consistently rejected by the Tuareg separatist who had always voiced their suspicions that the junta was working to abolish the peace agreement.
The Coordination of Azawad Movements (CMA), an alliance of rebel groups formed by Mali’s semi-nomadic Tuareg people, reaffirmed that it was not surprised by the decision.
“We have been expecting it since they brought in Wagner, chased out MINUSMA (the U.N. peacekeeping group) and started hostilities by attacking our positions on the ground,” said CMA spokesperson Elmaouloud Ramadane.
“We knew that the aim was to terminate the agreement,” he told Reuters.
The Tuaregs signed the peace accord with the Bamako government in 2015, but the militant groups linked to al Qaeda and Islamic State took control of vast areas that were supposed to be under Tuareg control, killing thousands of civilians in their wake while the UN peacekeeping mission appeared powerless to halt the rampage.
The Tuareg peace agreement had recently come under increasing strain. Fighting between the two sides picked up again since last August as they jostled for control of areas that had been vacated after the gradual withdrawal of U.N. peacekeepers.
In early January, the U.N. Security Council warned of the importance of sticking with the 2015 peace deal and called for all parties to resume dialogue.
The decision to end the peace accord, observers say, will lead to an escalation with the separatists and this would pile extra pressure on the Malian army in its efforts to defeat both the Islamists and separatists. However, Malian authorities point to a number of successes, such as the recapture of the strategic northern town of Kidal and a number of other former major strongholds of the Tuaregs and Islamists as proof that it is winning the war with the help of its Russian partners.
The Algerian response
In its response to the Malian government’s decision, the Algerian government released its own statement in which it said that the claim made by the Malian authorities “does not correspond absolutely, neither closely nor remotely, to the truth or to reality.”
It added that “their almost total withdrawal from the implementation of the Agreement, their almost systematic refusal of any initiative tending to relaunch the implementation of this Agreement, their challenge to the integrity of international mediation, their designation of signatories to the Agreement, duly recognised, as terrorist leaders, their request for the withdrawal MINUSMA, the recent intensification of their weapons programs financed by third party countries and their use of international mercenaries… carefully prepared the ground for the abandonment of the political option in favour of the military option as a means of resolving the Malian crisis.”
The Algerian government stressed that it had “never failed to work towards the implementation of the Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation in Mali, resulting from the Algiers process, with sincerity, good faith and unwavering solidarity towards brother Mali.”
With the end of the Algiers peace accord, analysts insist that new steps would need to be taken to find alternative measures to address the Tuareg question and to establish a new platform for negotiations to resolve the political crisis.
If this is not done, they say, Mali would have to prepare itself for a long drawn out battle with the Tuareg separatists.
