Mali

Mali is on the road to recovery — Francois Hollande

Mali (French: République du Mali) is a landlocked country in West Africa. Mali is bordered by Algeria to the north, Niger to the east, Burkina Faso and Côte d'Ivoire to the south, Guinea to the south-west, and Senegal and Mauritania to the west. Its size is just over 1,240,000 square kilometres (480,000 sq mi) with a population of 14.5 million. Mali's capital is Bamako.

Quotes

• Allow me to break down the facts of hunger as they stand right now. 811 million people are chronically hungry. 283 million are in hunger crises — they are marching toward starvation. And within that, 45 million in 43 countries across the globe are in hunger emergencies — in other words, famine is knocking on their door. Places like Afghanistan. Madagascar. Myanmar. Guatemala. Ethiopia. Sudan. South Sudan. Mozambique. Niger. Syria, Mali, Burkina Faso, Somalia, Haiti and on and on and on. The world has often experienced famine. But when has it ever been so widespread, in so many places, at the same time? Why? Three reasons. First, man-made conflict. Dozens of civil wars and regional conflicts are raging, and hunger has been weaponized to achieve military and political objectives. Second, climate shocks /climate change. Floods, droughts, locusts and rapidly changing weather patterns have created severe crop failures around the world. Third, COVID-19. The viral pandemic has created a secondary hunger pandemic, which is far worse than the first. Shutdowns destroyed livelihoods. Shutdowns stopped the movement of food. Shutdowns inflated prices. The net result is the poor of the world are priced out of survival. The ripple effect of COVID has been devastating on the global economy. During the pandemic, $3.7 trillion in incomes — mostly among the poor — have been wiped out, while food prices are spiking. The cost of shipping food, for example, has increased 3 – 400%. But in places of conflict and low-income countries, it is even worse. For example, in Aleppo, Syria — a war zone, where I just returned from — food is now seven times more expensive than it was 2 years ago. The combined effect of these three — conflict, climate and COVID — has created an unprecedented perfect storm.
  • David Beasley, Nobel Peace Prize lecture of World Food Programme, 10 December 2021

• We strongly condemn the terrorist attacks that targeted respectively a camp of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) in Kidal (Mali) and Malian soldiers in the Timbuktu region
  • Spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Abdelaziz Benali Cherif stressed in a communiqué on the terrorist attacks in Kidal, Timbuktu, quoted on AllAfrica (February 13, 2016), "Mali - Algeria 'Vigorously' Condemns Terrorist Attacks in Kidal, Timbuktu"

• It is the case of Mali whose very existence was threatened seven months ago by the barbarism of terrorism and which managed to find the strength to elect its new president.
  • French Foreign Minister, Laurent Fabius on Mali's peaceful voting, quoted on BBC News, "Rebirth of the rule of law in Mali?", August 16, 2013.

• Mali is on the road to recovery. It is recovering its territorial integrity, is actively preparing for the presidential elections in July and, with the international donor conference in Brussels, is making progress in its development.
  • French President, Francois Hollande, on Mali's recovery, quoted on BBC News, "Donors pledge $4bn for Mali's reconstruction", May 15, 2013.

• There is in particular an improvement of the security conditions in the big cities of the north which were freed from jihadi groups. As proved by the visit of the French President François Hollande in Timbuktu, which was greeted with joy by the people.
  • Fr. Dembele, quoted on ZENIT, "Although improving, crisis in Mali is far from over", February 4, 2013.

• They took Diabaly after fierce fighting and resistance from the Malian army that was not able to hold them off at that moment. About five [rebel] vehicles entered the town. Now they're stationed about 200m (650ft) from the military camp but they haven't taken the camp. They've killed a few soldiers.
  • French Defence Minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian on Mali Islamists capturing cities, quoted on BBC News, "Mali Islamists seize town amid French intervention", January 14, 2013.