By Ali Rıza Taşdelen
United World International has held an international online conference last week, on January 24. The event was titled “Mali at the crossroads of sanctions and multipolarity”, presenting the Malian Minister for Refoundation, İbrahim Ikassa Maiga and Vatan Party Deputy Chairman Prof. Dr. Semih Koray.
Press members from many countries, including myself, attended the conference. As someone who closely follows Africa in recent years, especially the former colonies of France, I have drawn attention to the following matter: Africa is an important part of Eurasia, just as Latin America. Geography is not what defines Eurasia. Eurasia is the name of a new world being born. It is true that Asian countries such as China, Russia, Turkey and Iran lead Eurasia. But what they propose is an entire new world and an entire new era, the Asian Age, where civilization, peace, sharing and the independence of states are defended.
The U.S. threatens and undermines the independence of the state in oppressed countries with its neoliberal globalist policies, and it creates, supports, arms international terrorist organizations on ethnic and religious bases, paving the way for the massacres of millions of innocent people. Eurasia is the power that stands against this Atlantic camp led by the USA.
The USA has been defeated from Afghanistan to Kazakhstan, from Iraq to Syria, to turkey in Central and West Asia. Few exceptions aside, it cannot control the countries that form the core of Europe.
The truth is: the USA has been defeated and the Western civilization has collapsed. Asia is now the center of civilization in the economy, the military and also in humanity.
That’s why Algeria, Mali, Guinea, Central African Republic, Ethiopia, Chad, Burkina Faso and other African countries that will follow them are natural allies of Eurasia.
The end of neocolonialism in Africa
The sun of Asia is also shining and warming the oppressed countries of Africa. We cannot understand Africa without seeing this changing strategic alignment in the world. At the beginning of July 2021, I wrote three articles in a row: “End of French colonialism in Africa”, “Chinese Age in Africa” and “Russia’s return to Africa” and of course “Turkey’s support to Africa worries France” (https://aydinlik.com.tr/yazarlar/ali-riza-tasdelen).
French invasion of Mali
When the interests of the France in Africa were in danger, they manipulated elections and organized military coups. When these methods failed to achieve success, France would invade the countries directly.
As in Syria and Libya, France was supporting and training terrorist organizations, causing internal chaos, which it then used to intervene in these countries militarily, sending soldiers and establishing bases. This was the case in the Ivory Coast, the Central African Republic and in Mali.
We have followed these developments closely. But listening to the Malian Minister of Refoundation İbrahim Ikassa Maiga directly provided a deeper insight. He explained one by one how France harmed the country in last 10 years: The French Special Forces, who attacked Libya to overthrow Gaddafi in 2011; the jihadists that were armed by NATO and were directed to the north of Mali to attack the Capital Bamako after Libya, where the French soldiers tried to purge the so-called terrorists without adhering to the UN resolution. They almost invaded Mali on behalf of the UN. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the African Union, the USA and European countries supported France’s intervention.
Mali created a model
Malian Minister Maiga summarized the process leading up to August 18, 2020 with the following chapters: the 2012 coup was followed by the election of Ibrahim Boubacar Keita as president in 2013, who was re-elected in 2018. France was pleased with this re-election. On the governments of this period, Maiga said; “As they could not solve the crisis, it got worse and spread all over the country. There was no security of life and property in the country. Institutions were not working, corruption was rampant and the state had gone bankrupt.”
The independence struggle of Mali, which was resisting against imperialism, started with group of small-ranking soldiers’ coup in Mali on August 18, without the initiative of France. The people supported this stand of the army against imperialism and neo-colonialism. Mali showed how important the army is in defending and ensuring the independence and security of the state with the support of the nation. Ibrahim Ikassa Maiga is now a minister of this movement’s government.
The government did not give in to the pressure of the West, especially France, to “act as soon as possible and pass on to civilian rule”. “As a sovereign country, we told France that they decide when to go to elections”, said Maiga. The Malian government even announced that there would be no elections within the next 5 years.
We can summarize the minister’s response to the Western election pressure as follows: “There is no security in two-thirds of the country. How do we make healthy elections? First, we will ensure the integrity and security of the country, we will restructure the institutions that make up the state, we will make our constitutional reforms, we will ensure that our citizens who left the country due to terrorism, return to the country, we will review and re-establish our diplomatic relations, we will review the military agreements with France, we will create our economic program, and our infrastructure. We started these and together with China, Russia and Turkey, we will overcome these challenges.”
France activated ECOWAS
The ECOWAS decided to apply sanctions against Mali. Neighboring countries’ borders are closed. Although called sanctions, the decision resulted more in a complete blockade of Mali. In the minister’s words, the sanctions were “illegal, illegitimate and inhumane”. The President of Mali did not give in. The Minister said, “We have once again declared our struggle for the ‘New Independence’, ‘New Sovereignty’ against imperialism with the ‘People’s Movement of 14 January’.” He also added, “Mali made his final decision: no to France and the institutions that France uses!”
We have a joint fate with Turkey
The Malian Minister also said, “We know the Great Atatürk, he sets an example for all of us. Turkey and Mali are two countries with historical similarities with imperial tradition. Turkey, which was exposed to Western imperialism and colonialism, has recently entered the process of getting rid of this dependency.” He emphasized that Mali got rid of colonialism by 2020.
On the day of this conference, news came from Burkina Faso that soldiers intervened in the administration. The Minister had foreseen these developments as positive and stated they would continue. Next week, we will cover developments in Burkina Faso.