PARIS, FranceThe last French armed forces convoy from Operation Barkhane leaves Gossi, Mali on April 18, 2022.
The French army on Thursday
rejected accusations by Mali of espionage and violation of the West African
nation's airspace.
Mali had
on Tuesday accused the French army of "spying" and
"subversion" when it used a drone to film what France alleged were
mercenaries burying bodies near a military base.
The drone
"illegally" flew over the Gossi base on April 20, the day after
French forces handed the site back to Mali, the ruling junta said in a
statement.
The following day, the French
army shared a video it said showed Russian mercenaries covering
bodies with sand to falsely accuse the departing troops of war crimes. Two
soldiers could be seen filming the half-buried corpses.
French army spokesman Pascal
Ianni told reporters in Paris on Thursday that "we were in our right since
Gossi was not in the temporary prohibition zone," for overflying.
Ianni noted that the temporary
no-fly zone had been extended to include Gossi on Wednesday.
France, Mali's former colonial
power, is winding down its almost decade-long, anti-jihadist military operation
in the West African state.
But in February, it decided to
pull out its troops after falling out with the military junta, especially over
its rapprochement with the Kremlin.
France officially handed control of Gossi to Mali last week as part of
the staggered withdrawal.
But under the existing
agreement to station French forces in Mali, concluded in March 2013, they
"have total freedom of movement and action in the fight against armed
terrorist groups," Colonel Ianni stressed.
Responding to the espionage
accusation, the army spokesman said the French action had "avoided a major
informational attack".
"If we had not managed to
capture these images, French forces would have been accused of war
crimes," he said.
France and the United States have
accused mercenaries from the Kremlin-linked security firm Wagner of
deploying in Mali, where the junta claims the Russians are just military
instructors helping to restore order.
Vast swathes of Mali lie
beyond government control because of the jihadist insurgency, which began in
2012 before spreading three years later to neighbouring Burkina
Faso and Niger.
The impoverished and
landlocked Sahel state has been ruled by a military junta since an August 2020
coup that was propelled by protests against the government's handling of the
war against the jihadists.
The conflict was said to have
led to thousands of military and civilian deaths and forced hundreds of
thousands of people to flee their homes.
The junta initially promised
to restore civilian rule, but it failed to meet an earlier commitment to West
African bloc ECOWAS to hold elections in February this year,
prompting regional sanctions. - AFP
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