Mali has asked the Security Council to relieve France of its functions at the UN as coordinator-drafter of resolutions on Minusma or on the sanctions regime concerning the country. Since December 2012 and the inclusion of Mali on the Council’s agenda, Paris has officially held this position of “pen” among the fifteen members. Bamako issued this new request considering that in August 2022, its airspace had been violated by French army planes. A charge dismissed on the French side, arguing the existence of bilateral agreements.
This is not the first time that Bamako has seized the Security Council by putting forward this pretext. But this is the first time that Foreign Minister Diop has asked outright that France be divested of its function of “pen” on Malian files in the Council.
From the memory of a UN observer, it is above all a first for a country to officially challenge the right of a member of the Council to hold this position. Mozambique, which is chairing the Council this month, has also refrained from communicating on this request. Perhaps precisely because the system for assigning coordination of files between the fifteen members is very informal, and no real rule governs it. It will be all the more difficult to dispute it at once.
However, many elected members as well as Russia regularly call for a review and supervision of this distribution, believing that it is not transparent enough. France has not reacted officially – and it is expected to adopt its usual position since the coup of not responding to the junta’s repeated attacks at the UN.