France Withdraws Its Military Mission From Mali

France decided to remove its military mission from the Gao military base in northern Mali on Monday. Although France was invited to fight terrorism, and French troops were on a counterterrorism mission for nine years, relations between Pris and the African country deteriorated.

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"Today at 13:00 Paris time, the final contingent of the Barkhane force still on Malian territory crossed the border between Mali and Niger," said a document issued by the French military, alluding to Operation Barkhane, the codename of its Malian mission.

Emmanuel Macron, the French head of state, announced the end of the mission in Mali last summer, begging for the withdrawal of its troops in February. French troops were first deployed to Mali in 2013 in response to the request of the Malian government. A year later, once the French military banished the Islamist forces from the country, they started Operation Barkhane, covering  Burkina Faso, Chad, Mauritania, and Niger.

Contrary to the initial mission, the success did not accompany the rest of the French mission in the country. All through 2016 and 2017, the Jihadist attacks increased in the country, and terrorism became common in the following years, with growing anti-French feelings among Malian people.

The departure of the last French soldiers from Barkhane to Mali, France "remains attached to the Sahel."

After the 2021 coup d'état in Mali, Colonel Assimi Goita came into power, ordering the French military to leave the country, sealing the fate of the French operation.

In the scenario of the apparent failure of the operation launched by FranceFrance'ss in fighting terrorism, the ongoing Malian administration invited a Russian paramilitary group to support BamakoBamakos'