At the Security Council, Mali Acknowledges its Powerlessness: An Admission from a Military Regime on Its Last Legs.
By Mohamed AG Ahmedou, journalist and civil society activist in Mali, and specialist in Sahel-Saharan political and security dynamics.
On November 18, addressing the United Nations Security Council, the Malian ambassador, who has become the spokesperson for the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), delivered an unexpected speech. Under the guise of an appeal for financial resources for Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, he painted an exceptionally grave picture of the security and humanitarian situation in the Sahel. For many observers, this is less a warning than an admission of weakness: that of a Malian military regime running out of solutions, lacking legitimacy, and now almost running out of controlled territory.
Five years after the first coup d’état on August 18, 2020, followed by another on May 20, 2021, Assimi Goïta’s junta appears more incapable than ever of ensuring the country’s security, despite the massive reliance on Russia, Turkey, and foreign mercenaries. This is a paradox for a regime that came to power in the name of fighting terrorism.
An illegal and illegitimate military power that has taken the country hostage:
Since 2020, the Malian junta has ruled by decree, without a popular mandate, without operational institutions, and without checks and balances. “Transition” has become an empty word, devoid of all political meaning. In reality, Bamako lives under the control of a sham military regime whose priority has been ensuring its own survival, not that of the state.
Under Assimi Goïta, the political scene was dismantled:
Parties suspended, media and opposition figures repressed, civil society neutralized, and the justice system manipulated.
In this climate of repression, the Malian state gradually disintegrated. “The people have been taken hostage by a regime that promises them stability but delivers chaos,” sighs a West African diplomat stationed in the region.
Wagner, an opaque partnership that paved the way for mass violence:
In 2021, Mali signed a secret agreement with Wagner, the Russian paramilitary group that became Africa Corps after the death of its founder, Yevgeny Prigozhin. The cost was staggering: $10,000 per month per fighter, for a contingent exceeding 1,000 men.
Never before has the Malian army delegated its security to foreign actors to such an extent.
Never before have civilians paid such a high price for this dependence.
In the regions of Mopti, Gao, Ménaka, Timbuktu, and Nara, thousands of people have fled their villages, which have been razed, bombed, and arbitrarily searched. Testimonies gathered by NGOs describe:
Extrajudicial killings, Enforced disappearances, Fabricated accusations, Targeting of Tuareg, Arab, and Fulani communities, and a complete lack of investigations.
The government’s response has been consistent: silence and denial.
The surge in Turkish drones: a war now being waged from the sky:
Starting in 2022, Ankara became the second pillar of Mali’s security strategy. Its drones—TB2, AKINCI, and other long-range aircraft—are presented as the symbol of a dramatic modernization of the army.
In Bamako, former Prime Minister Choguel Kokala Maïga adopted this as a slogan: “The army is gaining strength.” A phrase repeated ad nauseam between 2021 and 2023, to the point of becoming a talking point for the junta.
But on the ground, reality contradicts the official enthusiasm. Far from weakening jihadist groups, drones have multiplied erroneous or indiscriminate strikes against civilian populations in the northern and central regions. Local associations report destroyed camps, civilian vehicles hit on the road, and markets targeted by mistake.
“It’s the civilians who are dying, not the terrorists,” laments a Tuareg notable from the Timbuktu region. Drones have strengthened the army’s firepower, not its capacity to wage war.
A fragmented country, abandoned strategic roads, a suffocating capital:
Despite the combined support of Russia, Turkey, and thousands of soldiers and mercenaries, the Malian army is retreating. The JNIM have increased their attacks over the past two years and gradually imposed their rule on areas that were once strategic.
Since September 3, 2025, several major roads have been blockaded:
Bamako – Nioro du Sahel,
Bamako – Kayes,
Bamako – Sikasso,
these three vital corridors for the supply of hydrocarbons and essential goods.
Furthermore, the city of Nioro du Sahel has been under embargo since the beginning of September, and several associates of the marabout Bouye Haidara have been abducted by JNIM, including drivers of his close associates.
The result:
Bamako is experiencing fuel shortages, prices are skyrocketing, trucks are no longer arriving, markets are emptying, gas stations are rationing gasoline, and households are sinking into uncertainty.
The capital, long spared the direct effects of the conflict, is now on the verge of economic collapse.
For the first time, according to several sources close to the intelligence services, JNIM may be attempting to encircle Bamako.
“The danger has never been so close,” confides a retired Malian officer in exile.
“And yet, the regime continues to talk about regained sovereignty.”
The Timbuktu Boat Incident, or the Temptation to Manufacture an Internal Enemy:
One of the most controversial operations of recent years remains the Timbuktu boat incident in September 2023, which has never been claimed by any terrorist organization. Presented as a terrorist attack, as the Malian coup leaders themselves chanted in their speeches, it served as a pretext for a series of violent reprisals by the army and Wagner Group against the Tuareg and Arab populations in the regions of Timbuktu, Taoudéni, Gao, and Kidal.
For several specialists on the region, this operation marked a turning point:
The junta shifted the bulk of its military effort from jihadist groups to civilian populations, who were accused without evidence of complicity or inaction.
“By creating an internal enemy, the regime sought to mask its strategic setbacks, but it exacerbated the conflict,” analyzes a Sahelian researcher based in Nouakchott.
In New York, a speech that sounded like a confession:
It was in this context of widespread crisis that the Malian ambassador appeared before the Security Council on November 18. His intervention, far from the usual triumphalist rhetoric, took the form of an admission of failure.
The diplomat described:
The scale of the humanitarian crisis,
the expansion of armed groups, the disorganization of public services, the economic fragility of the three AES (Alliance of Sahel States) countries.
The implicit message is clear: without foreign aid, the Malian regime can no longer hold on.
For a government that, for the past five years, has built its power on rejecting the UN, ECOWAS, and traditional partners, this reversal is spectacular.
A regime collapsing under its own weight:
Mali is currently experiencing a tragic paradox:
Never has the country been so militarized, and never has it been so vulnerable.
Despite:
Russian mercenaries, Turkish drones, foreign instructors, pronouncements of sovereignty, and billions spent, Mali has not regained an inch of lasting security.
Jihadists control entire swathes of the territory.
Civilians are targeted by those who claimed to protect them. The economy is suffocating.
And the state is crumbling.
Assimi Goïta’s junta, born from the promise of restoring security, now faces a stark reality:
It has lost the war it started while pretending to win it.
A country at a crossroads:
The speech delivered in New York marks the end of an illusion: that of a military power capable of “saving” Mali by isolating itself from the world. Five years after the first coup, the junta has neither stabilized the country nor effectively combated terrorism. On the contrary, it has exacerbated divisions, intensified violence, and multiplied strategic errors.
The central question remains: Who, today, can bring Mali back to peace?
The junta? That no longer seems credible.
Foreign partners? None seem capable of replacing a collapsed national sovereignty.
The Malian people? They are already paying the heaviest price.
At the Security Council, Mali did not simply request resources. He acknowledged, between the lines, the total failure of a regime which, after promising security, delivered the country to its worst contemporary chaos.
23-11-25