Mali’s court on Friday sentenced 46 Ivorian soldiers to 20 years’ imprisonment for conspiring against the government. Three female soldiers have been sentenced to death in absentia, reported The Africa News.
In a statement, Prosecutor General Ladji Sara said the soldiers were also fined more than $3,000 and convicted of carrying and transporting weapons. She said the Ivorian soldiers were found guilty of an attack and conspiracy against the Mali government and seeking to undermine state security.
In July, forty-nine Ivorian soldiers were arrested at the airport in Mali’s capital Bamako in July, three of whom, all women, were later released. The detention of the soldiers by Malian authorities sparked a diplomatic row between the two countries.
Mali’s military administration said the soldiers were acting as mercenaries. Ivory Coast and the United Nations, on the other hand, said the troops were flown in to provide routine backup security for the German contingent of the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali.
They were charged with attempting to undermine state security in August. The trial of the 46 Ivorian troops wrapped up on Friday after opening in the capital Bamako on Thursday.
The court proceedings came in the run-up to a January 1 deadline set by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the region’s main political and economic bloc, to release them or face sanctions.
Ivory Coast said its troops were being held hostage, and has made repeated pleas for their release. The country announced last month that it would withdraw its remaining soldiers from the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali (MINUSMA).
The matter escalated in September, when diplomatic sources in the region said Mali’s military junta asked Ivory Coast to acknowledge its responsibility and express regret for deploying the soldiers. Bamako also called on Ivory Coast to hand over people who had been on its territory since 2013 but who are wanted in Mali.
Ivory Coast rejected both demands and was prepared for extended negotiations to free the soldiers.
