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Mali: ECOWAS leaders call for U.N. mandated mission
(Reuters) – West African leaders on Thursday called for a regional military operation against al-Qaeda-linked rebels in north Mali to be transformed into a U.N. peacekeeping mission as quickly as possible to secure desperately needed funding.
Meeting in Ivory Coast’s city, Yamoussoukro, presidents from West Africa’s regional bloc – the economic community of West African states (ECOWAS) backed calls from France, the United States and Mali itself for the mission to receive a U.N. peacekeeping mandate.
“This shouldn’t distract from ongoing operations on the ground,” ECOWAS commission president Kadre Desire Ouedraogo told reporters.
“It’s simply an indication that, once peace has returned, we need the support of the United Nations system both for logistical and financial support.”
Some two thirds of the 8,000 troops of the African-led mission (AFISMA) have deployed to Mali.
After struggling for months to secure funding for its deployment, international donors pledged over US$455 million for Mali at a meeting in Addis Ababa last month.
With the number of troops more than doubling since deployment plans were first hashed out last year, ECOWAS projects the cost of the mission at nearly US$1 billion this year.
Transformation to a peacekeeping mission would ensure funding from the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations and facilitate the deployment of air assets essential for moving troops in Mali’s vast northern desert.
However, a decision by the U.N. Security Council remains weeks, if not months, away. The Security Council would ask Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to report by end-March on the possibility of creating a peacekeeping force.
French and Chadian forces are currently hunting die-hard Islamists holed up in the Adrar des Ifoghas mountains. Algerian television reported on Thursday that the combined force of Chadian and French troops there had killed Abdelhamid Abou Zeid, a leading al-Qaeda field commander.