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Demonstrators supporting Mali’s transitional government take to the streets after the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) imposed sanctions in Bamako, Mali, January 14, 2022. Photo/REUTERS/Paul Lorgerie
NEW YORK – All UN sanctions against Mali will end on August 31, after Russia vetoed a proposal by France and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to extend the sanctions.
Russia’s UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said the draft completely ignored the concerns of Bamako and Moscow.
The France-UAE plan would extend sanctions and the mandate of the UN Group of Experts tasked with monitoring Mali until August and September 2024 respectively.
This agreement received 13 votes in the UN Security Council, but failed because Russia rejected it. China abstained.
The UN Security Council rejected Moscow’s alternative draft, which would have immediately ended the mandate of the Group of Experts and provided a “final” extension of sanctions for 12 months. Japan voted no, and 13 other members abstained.
According to the AP, Moscow attacked the Expert Group because its latest report criticized the Russian private military company Wagner and accused it of “violence against women, and other forms of gross violations of human rights and international humanitarian law to spread terror among society.”
Bamako has justified its approach to the Wagner Group by saying Russia’s security advisers were far more effective against the jihadist rebels unleashed in the Sahel following NATO’s 2011 regime change intervention in Libya, than France or the UN.
“The France-UAE plan does not at all take into account the concerns of the Malian side and the position of the Russian Federation,” Nebenzia said after the vote, explaining his veto.
Nebenzia reminded the UN Security Council that Mali itself requested sanctions against eight people in 2017, as part of the peace process.