This is a question at the heart of the disagreements between France and the transitional authorities: should we negotiate with the jihadist groups that are rampant in the north and center of Mali?
Bamako is in favor of it, while Paris sees it as a red line not to be crossed.
“We cannot carry out joint operations with powers that decide to discuss with groups that, alongside that, shoot at our children.
No dialogue and compromise”, summarized Emmanuel Macron, during the announcement in June of the recalibration of Operation Barkhane.
But with the announced end of the French presence, a new chapter could open in these negotiations.
In any case, the context has never been so favorable to an acceleration of this process, which many experts consider inevitable.
“Currently, there is an alignment of interests between the junta, the jihadists and the Russians who all want the French to leave”, analyzes the specialist in jihadist movements, Wassim Nasr, present last week at a conference for peace in Nouakchott, in Mauritania, in which several senior Malian officials participated, such as the Minister of National Reconciliation, Colonel Ismaël Wagué, the Minister of Religious Affairs and Worship, Mahamadou Koné, or the influential Imam Mahmoud Dicko.
“Everything suggests that in the corridors of this conference, contacts have been established with a view to going further in this option of negotiations”, slips the columnist of France 24.
Secret negotiations
The idea of dialogue with jihadist groups is far from new.
Since President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, successive authorities in Bamako have always wanted to apply the recommendations made by the National Conference of Understanding in 2017, then by the Inclusive National Dialogue in 2019.
These recommendations notably suggested starting talks with the jihadist leaders Amadou Koufa and Iyad Ag Ghali.
The first leads the Katiba Macina group, while the second is at the head of the GSIM, the Support Group for Islam and Muslims, affiliated with Al-Qaeda.
The Malian junta is therefore in line with its predecessors, believing that weapons alone will not be able to put a stop to the spiral of jihadist violence.
At the end of October, several media had moreover announced the opening of negotiations under the aegis of the High Islamic Council (HCIM), mandated by the government of Bamako, which had finally denied the information.
“The Malians have always continued to negotiate secretly with the GSIM, if only to set up local agreements”, explains Wassim Nasr.
In March 2021, an inter-community agreement made headlines in the circle of Niono, in central Mali.
In exchange for the wearing of the veil for women and permission to preach in the villages, the jihadists had agreed to release the prisoners and let the hunters circulate with their weapons.
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However, a sign of the fragility of this type of agreement, the ceasefire was shattered during the summer.
Last week, a large convoy of Malian soldiers was even deployed to secure the area and provide humanitarian aid to the population, reports RFI.
“Last card to play” for the junta
Subject to strong international pressure, weighed down by massive sanctions from ECOWAS, the junta, which barely controls a third of Malian territory, would have every interest in moving up a gear.
Its first objective could be to obtain a period of truce.
The principle of a ceasefire had already been accepted in April 2020 by the local branch of Al-Qaida at the instigation of Imam Dicko, the former president of the High Islamic Council of Mali.
For the junta, it would be a question of rapidly lowering the level of violence at the very moment when Operation Barkhane is packing up.
"It would be a last snub to France and in the current context, it's their last card to play," said Wassim Nasr.
“Even if the negotiations fail, the junta can boast of having favored the return of displaced populations or of having allowed such and such a village to no longer be surrounded by jihadists and that is what counts for the local populations” .
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The departure of the French and their allies from Mali could be recorded on Wednesday, on the eve of a European Union-African Union summit in Brussels.
Neighboring Niger should play a central role in the new military apparatus.
Paris could also offer its services to other West African countries to help them counter the spread of jihadism towards the Gulf of Guinea.
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