EU cuts Mali aid
March 23, 2012
The EU's executive arm, the European Commission, had planned to allocate 583 million euros ($772 million) in development aid to the West African nation between 2008 and 2013.
"Following [the] coup d'etat in Mali, I decided to suspend temporarily European Commission's development operations in the country until the situation clarifies," said EU Development Commissioner Andris Piebalgs.
The EU stressed that direct support to the Malian population would continue, as would humanitarian aid. Long-term drought has threatened food supplies in the country of around 14.5 million people.
The World Bank and African Development Bank have also suspended development aid.
In a statement in Brussels, EU ministers "firmly condemned attempts to seize power by force in Mali."
They also "called for an immediate end of violence and the release of state officials, the protection of civilians, the restoration of civil, constitutional government and for the holding of democratic elections as planned."
The African Union, meanwhile, has suspended Mali from the 54-member bloc and sait it would send a joint team with the West African ECOWAS bloc to urge a return to constitutional order.
Chaos continues
Mali's president, Amadou Toumani Toure, fled his official residence on Thursday, a day after disgruntled soldiers stormed the capital, Bamako, took control of the state broadcaster and overran the presidential palace. There have since been reports of looting by soldiers in the city of just under two million inhabitants.
French foreign ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said Friday that attempts by the French government to make contact with Toure had so far failed.
"We don't have precise information about where the president is," Valero said, calling on coup leaders not to harm him. France - Mali's former colonial ruler - called on the soldiers to allow elections, which had been scheduled to take place in April.
The soldiers' mutiny began Wednesday over what they said was the government's failing attempts to counter a nomadic rebel insurgency in Mali's north.
The northern Tuareg rebels said Thursday they would take advantage of the chaos caused by the coup to press ahead with their own goal of establishing an autonomous state.
dfm/ng (AFP, Reuters)