Faced with a loss of influence in the Sahel, Algeria feels openly challenged and threatened at its borders. According to Algiers, the military coups carried out in three countries in the region which have neither a powerful army nor material capacities, raise fears of porosity at the borders. She also fears the consequences of Mali’s withdrawal from the Algiers peace agreement signed in 2015.
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The Algerian government is hardly reassured and no longer hides its unease in the face of the radical changes surrounding it in the Sahel. After the resumption of hostilities on its border, Algiers seeks at all costs to avoid the outbreak of a civil war in the north of the Mali. It fears in particular that these clashes will lead to an influx of refugees and a possible infiltration of certain terrorist elements into its territory. The presence of Malian army auxiliaries among the Wagners and the pro-Turkish Syrians on its border also worries him at the highest level.
These developments have also pushed him to discreetly redeploy his army to his borders with Mali and Morocco. Algerian diplomats see these changes as a reconfiguration of alliances in the region. This is the case of former Algerian minister Abdelaziz Rahabi who considers that the three Sahel countries which have experienced military coups are in the process of establishing a new order in the region which “ exceeds their capabilities and their current political discourse “.
Seen from Algiers, the objective of the great powers aims, according to the former diplomat, to “ reduce its influence and put its army under pressure on the southern border » for the benefit of several countries seeking to extend their influence in the area. The former minister evokes a distribution of roles between Washington which decrees the strategies withIsraelthe Emirates which finances this strategy and Morocco which executes the agenda imagined for this region.
Accused of interference in Mali, she takes every opportunity to explain that she has no hidden agenda and that the Algiers agreement was reached following the appeal of the government in place in Bamako in 2015.