The United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday urged Mali’s ruling junta to announce an election timetable as it expressed great concern at their recent announcement delaying next month’s elections for five years, reported France 24.
“It is absolutely essential that the government of Mali present an acceptable election timetable,” Guterres told reporters.
The UN chief said he spoke to the presidents of Ghana, Senegal, and Nigeria, the foreign minister of Algeria, and the president of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, and is hoping to get in contact with Mali’s military junta about the election delay very soon.
“I am working with the ECOWAS and the African Union to create conditions which can allow the government of Mali to adopt a reasonable and acceptable position to accelerate a transition which has already been underway for a long time,” Guterres added, referring to the Economic Community of West African States.
On Sunday, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) member countries severed links and imposed tougher economic and political sanctions on Mali for delaying elections following a 2020 military coup.
The move came after Mali’s interim government defied international demands to respect a promise to hold elections on February 27 and proposed staying in power for up to five years before staging elections.
The sanctions have led to escalating tensions between Mali and its partners including France and the European Union (EU). On Thursday, EU warned that it will impose sanctions on Mali in line with measures already taken by the ECOWAS.
Emanuela Del Re, the EU special envoy for the Sahel, backed sanctions by the West African bloc but said that the world needed to keep Mali engaged and not isolated.
On Wednesday, Russia and China blocked the UN Security Council from supporting ECOWAS’s decision to impose new sanctions.
