PARIS (Reuters) – French President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Friday everything had to be done to
prevent a “terrorist or Islamic state” emerging in northern Mali after rebels seized vast tracts of the desert
north.
takes part in the television programme near Paris, April 12, 2012. REUTERS/Thomas Samson/Pool
A March 22 coup emboldened Tuareg nomads to seize the northern half of Mali and declare an
independent state there. Al Qaeda-linked Islamist fighters are among the rebels, and analysts fear the desert zone could
become a haven for al Qaeda agents and a destabilising “rogue state” in West Africa.
Sarkozy said he supported some
form of autonomy for the Tuaregs in the former French colony.
“We have to work with the Tuaregs to see how they can
have a minimum of autonomy and we must do everything to prevent the establishment of a terrorist or Islamic state in the
heart of the Sahel,” Sarkozy told i<Tele television.
France is Mali’s fourth-largest aid donor – a vital source of
income in one of the world’s poorest countries. France also trains and equips government forces.
Mali’s former
parliament speaker Dioncounda Traore took over as interim president on Thursday as part of a deal to restore civilian rule
following the coup.
He called on the separatists to pull back from the northern towns they occupied, which include the
desert trading post and seat of Islamic learning Timbuktu and the garrison town of Gao.
Traore has said he would wage
war if the rebels did not pull back, and the 15-state ECOWAS grouping of West African countries, which pressured the coup
leaders to give up power, is preparing an intervention force of up to 3,000 troops.
When asked if France could
intervene militarily to remove the rebels, Sarkozy said it was first up to Mali’s neighbours, the African Union and
ultimately the U.N. Security Council to make those decisions.
“I don’t think it’s up to France to do
it,” he said. “France is ready to help, but we cannot be the leader of this (operation).”
France has said it is ready
to provide logistical support to ECOWAS.
France has advised its 5,000 citizens living in Mali to leave. The escalating
crisis also concerns Paris given that Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is holding six French hostages in the region.
