U.S. pushes for peace in Mali

The U.S. ambassador to Mali has called on the Malian government to sever alleged ties with an armed militia and put more effort toward implementing a peace deal signed over a year ago.

“The Malian government should put a stop to all ties both public and private with Gatia, a group of armed militia who does not contribute to bringing peace in northern Mali,” Ambassador Paul Folmsbee said in a statement delivered at a conference this week.

Gatia is an armed group of mostly ethnic Tuareg militia members who oppose pro-independence fighters in the northern part of the country. Mali faced an uprising after Islamist groups used ongoing ethnic Tuareg clashes in 2012 as an opportunity to seize the country’s northern region. French forces led an intervention in 2013 that pushed back the armed groups, but the instability and attacks continue.

The government and a coalition of several militias signed a peace deal last June, but little has changed. International donors have begun pressuring the country to cut ties with Gatia and move forward with the peace agreement. The U.S. government has pledged more than $1 billion in aid to Mali since 2013.

Folmsbee said the Malian government should step up its presence across the country and begin implementing elements of the peace deal, including creating mixed patrols of both the army and the coalition signatories. He also called on all armed groups within the country to comply with their obligations under the agreement.

“The continuous warmongering behavior of armed groups … threatens the lives of innocent civilians,” Folmsbee said. “Such behavior must stop if we want to have peace.”

In a statement published on the Malian news site aBamako, Gatia denied any affiliation with the government, saying the state did not create the armed group and it acts with its own resources. The group said it still stands fully committed to the peace deal.

“(We) ask the ambassador to work constructively and impartially like other members of the international community in the peaceful settlement of a dispute between the groups, rather than increasing by his attitude frustrations of a large segment of the population in northern Mali,” the statement said.

At a meeting on Mali’s peace agreement last week in New York, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power called for more concrete action from the country’s government. Power said the Malian government needs to cease its support for any armed group, noting one current Malian general still directs a northern militia: “These are actions that hearken back to policies aimed at dividing northern groups, which failed in the past and will only make it harder to promote a united and democratic future for Mali.”