Final UN camp transferred to Mali control
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The former UN mission in Mali on Friday handed over its last camp to the junta-led authorities, who pushed the peacekeepers out of the crisis-racked country last year, an AFP journalist said.
The United Nations stabilisation mission (MINUSMA) had been in place since 2013 but ended on December 31 after Mali's military leaders ordered it to leave amid deteriorating relations.
It had previously maintained around 15,000 soldiers and police in the fragile and poor West African nation, which is in the grip of jihadist and separatist violence.
The UN flag was lowered on the 37-hectare (91-acre) camp on the outskirts of the capital Bamako which served as MINUSMA's main operational base and home to its headquarters.
The camp "has played a crucial role in achieving the objectives of MINUSMA", said UN Under-Secretary-General Atul Khare at the ceremony.
Malian Foreign Minister Abdoulaye Diop reiterated the junta's grievances against the mission.
"The mission was not in a position to meet the pressing, existential expectations of the Malian people, who had placed so much hope in it," he said, but expressed gratitude towards the peacekeepers.
Diop criticised the mission for encouraging "the instrumentalisation of human rights issues by certain powers for political and destabilisation purposes".
MINUSMA was, in part, tasked with protecting civilians and human rights.
Its regular reporting of abuses committed by all actors, including Mali's armed forces, riled the junta, who seized power in back-to-back coups in 2020 and 2021.
The military rulers insisted the mission leave the country, leading the UN Security Council to terminate MINUSMA's mandate.
Under a so-called liquidation phase due to end on December 31, the last equipment will be handed over to the authorities or evacuated, and final contracts wrapped up.
More than 180 MINUSMA members were killed in attacks, mostly blamed on armed groups linked to Al-Qaeda or the Islamic State group, making it the hardest-hit UN mission in recent years.
Many UN agencies remain active in Mali.