The European External Action Service headed by Josep Borrell reportedly wrote to Malian Foreign Minister Abdoulaye Diop on March 9 asking for guarantees with a view to maintaining the EUTM mission to train soldiers from the Malian Armed Forces.
With our correspondent in Brussels, Pierre Benazet
The Europeans would like to be sure that the approximately 16,000 Malian soldiers trained by the EUTM do not one day find themselves under the Russian mercenaries from the Wagner group. This is the purpose of this letter that would have sent the head of European diplomacy to the Malian Minister of Foreign Affairs.
In Brussels, the European External Action Service does not confirm the content of Josep Borrell’s letter to Abdoulaye Diop. Such a letter is ” by nature confidential “, according to European diplomacy, which also sees a good reason not to dwell on its content, namely the fact that ” the decision has not yet been made “.
The EU wants guarantees
The maintenance of the two European missions in Mali and especially of the EUTM military training mission has always been linked by Josep Borrell to the presence of the Takuba and Barkhane forces. Corn the announcement of the departure of the latter now raises the question of the future of the European training operation.
The date of dispatch of this letter is, in any case, after the return of the mission sent in Mali to assess the maintenance of EUTM, ” under current political conditions “. It is therefore here, on the part of European diplomacy, a request for guarantees on the use of the Malian armed forces trained by European soldiers.
For the moment, consultations are going well between the countries of the European Union on the advisability of maintaining the missions in Mali. Seeing Malian soldiers trained by European soldiers finding themselves placed under the orders of Wagner’s Russian mercenaries is the great fear of Europeans who have rightly suspended their EUTM mission in the Central African Republic for identical reasons.
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