DAKAR, Senegal
Troop rotations by the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Mali will resume on Monday, a mission spokesperson said on Saturday, one month after Malian authorities suspended them and accused foreign soldiers of entering the country without permission.
Mali's ruling junta suspended
troop rotations for the nearly 12,000-strong mission on July 14 after arresting
49 soldiers from Ivory Coast who it said had arrived in the country without
permission. Ivory Coast denied this.
It said they would resume following
discussions with representatives from the mission, known as MINUSMA, about how
to coordinate troop deployments.
The July arrests highlighted
friction between the junta, which seized power in an August 2020 coup, and
international partners, who have criticised election delays and security
cooperation with Russian mercenaries.
Ivory Coast says the soldiers
were deployed as part of a support contract signed with MINUSMA, which was
created in 2013 to provide security from Islamist miltants. The Ivorian troops
remain in detention.
A MINUSMA spokesperson said
the mission and Malian authorities had agreed on a streamlined rotation
procedure and that the mission's request to resume rotations on Monday had been
accepted.
Mali's foreign ministry could
not be immediately reached for comment.
Relations between Mali and
troop-contributing countries remain strained. On Friday, Germany said it was
suspending its military reconnaissance mission, which provides intelligence to
MINUSMA, after Malian authorities withheld a flight clearance.
Mali's foreign minister denied
on Twitter that the government had done so and called on Germany to adhere to
the new mechanism for approving troop rotations.
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