Mali in the press (June)

The president of the Senate, David Mark, on Monday said the activities of Boko Haram insurgents had compelled government to withdraw its peacekeeping troops from Mali.

He made the remark at a two-day retreat on Nigeria's foreign policy jointly organised by the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs in Lagos.

The Senate president said Boko Haram insurgency had become a major challenge to Nigeria's efforts at forging relationships with her French-speaking neighbours.

"The activities of Boko Haram insurgents are beginning to affect Nigeria's foreign policy," said Mark, represented by his chief of staff, Sen. Anthony Manzo.

He held that any government's foreign policy was an extension of its domestic policy.

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Acquisition-hungry miner B2Gold Corp. has struck another deal, agreeing to buy Australian firm Papillon Resources Ltd. for US$570-million in stock.

The deal, which was rumoured last week, gives B2Gold the Fekola project in Mali, which is expected to produce an average of 306,000 ounces of gold a year over an initial nine-year mine life.

"We believe this merger will bring great value to all shareholders and we congratulate Papillon's strong technical team on advancing the impressive Fekola project to a robust prefeasibility study and look forward to working together to advance the project to production," B2 chief executive Clive Johnson said in a statement.

(…) This year’s OCO [Overseas Contingency Operations] request will also include up to $5 billion in a “counterterrorism Partnerships Fund” that would go toward US training and partner-building of foreign troops, Obama announced last week.

“[T]hese resources will give us flexibility to fulfill different missions, including training security forces in Yemen who have gone on the offensive against al-Qaida; supporting a multinational force to keep the peace in Somalia; working with European allies to train a functioning security force and border patrol in Libya; and facilitating French operations in Mali,” Obama said in his May 28 speech. (...)

There was a protest march in the northern part of Mali, more precisely in the town of Menaka, which is near the border with Niger, this morning [1 June].

Women and youths staged a demonstration in front of the MINUSMA [UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali] camp, the international peacekeeping force. The aim was to demand the departure of Malian soldiers from the town.

According to some residents of Menaka, who were contacted by RFI, some elements of the MNLA, the Tuareg separatist movement, were very visible among the demonstrators.