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injured in a strike near northern city. finland and sweden plan to submit their applications to join nato on wednesday. they are set to abandon their long-held neutral status because of russia's invasion to ukraine. turkey is threatening to block their membership bid because it says they support the kurdish pkk. u.s. president biden has met the families of those killed in saturday's mass shooting in buffalo. 10 african-americans died in the racially motivated attack. biden is calling it the mystic terrorism and wants congress to take -- is calling it domestic terrorism. the british foreign secretary says she intends to introduce new legislation to change its of what is called the northern ireland particle. the eu is warding the u.k. to try not alter the post exit trade deal with its own. french president macron has pushed for a rapid investigation

into the killing of veteran al jazeera generalist -- journalists. she was shot dead by is really forces. two u.s. congressman what the fbi to investigate her death. north korea's leaders accused officials of an immature response to its covid-19 outbreak. kim jong-un says inadequate strategies are making the situation work. pyongyang reported another 230,000 people with fever-like symptoms as well as six more debts. rescuers say they found no survivors month after a heavy rain flooded a mine. it hoped eight missing men might have been able to take shelter in an underground chamber inside the mine stocked with food and water. those are the headlines. coming up next, it is inside story. goodbye. ♪

who would look after security in west africa? mali was out, blaming a lack of progress and internal screenings. so is it time for a new strategy to confront armed groups? this is "inside story." ♪ hello and welcome to the program. i am mohammed jamjoom. a founding member of a multinational west african security alliance is pulling out. mali is part of the joint force fighting groups but the soldiers

have struggled to contain the violence. their military government lamed the withdrawal lack of progress. it also accused a country outside the region of trying to isolate mali without providing details. mali has come under international pressure since the army seized power in a coup in 2020. first, this report. reporter: mali says it no longer wants to be part of a losing force. 5000 soldiers are in the g5. it was formed five years ago to combat armed groups linked to isil and al qaeda. but it has struggled to reduce attacks because of lack of funding and disagreements among vendor spate -- states. opposition from member states angered its military rulers. >> the opposition of some g5 member states to mali's presidency is linked to

maneuvers of a state outside the region aiming desperately to isolate mali. reporter: mali's government accuses france of excluding it. once friends, now foes. the 5000 french troops deployed almost 10 years ago to protect mali's government from attacks are pulling out. after the military coup i -- in 2020, they hired russian mercenaries for protection. they are refusing to hand over power for another two years. as a result, neighboring countries imposed sanctions on the landlocked country, ceiling its borders and halting trade. >> prices have exploded. the price of soap has doubled in food is much more expensive. basic necessities have become unaffordable, and this is because of the embargo. if this continues, we will not be able to survive. this is unsustainable. reporter: state coffers are becoming empty, with just enough to pay civil servants for a few months.

togo has offered to moderate, while the u.n. peacekeeping force remains, he secretary-general warns of a debilitating effect mali's struggles are having on the rest of the region. molly is increasingly isolated, with russian mercenaries remaining to deal with a country on the brink. mohammed: let's look at the g5 joint force. it was formed in 2017 and has forces from mauritania, mali, niger, burkina faso, and chad. but it overlapped with existing mandates from the u.n., african union, and ecowas. it meant they all competed for limited resources. france supported the g5 and gave insubstantial nila and financial support but mali's military leaders have asked paris to withdraw all troops.

germany and the eu have reduced their involvement in mali, instead focusing on you and operations. -- on u.n. operations. let's bring in our guests. in mali's capital, malayan politician. in sierra leone, director of the research at the peacekeeping training center. and in france, senior research fellow at the global policy institute. a warm welcome to you all and thank you so much for joining us today. so, the spokesman for mali's transitional government says the opposition of some g5 member states to mali's presidency is linked to maneuvers by state outside the region aiming to isolate mali. could you elaborate on that statement? is the spokesman referring to france or another country?

>> i would say for myself, of course in mali here we do believe that these maneuvers from the french government to isolate mali, and who knows the history of the creation of the g5, we do know that france has been a big instigator of the former of this organization, and also advocating for funding. so when we say that there are no member states influence, chad has been assuming residency for the past weeks and their term ended in february. as a rotating presidency, mali is assuming presidency starting in february. following a meeting that never happened. so we see this as a plot of the

french government to continue to isolate mali. mohammed: would mali pulling out of the g5 joint force, what does this mean for security in west africa, and who ultimately will look out for security in west africa? >> i think there has been some sort of confusion about what should be done relating to securities faced by west african states. we see a napoli, a -- a cornucopia seeking to respond to, prevent, and degrade the president we are facing. mali's decision to withdraw from the g5, for me, it's a natural continuation of the

africa-centric, mali-centric policy they seek to implement. now, i do not think this is going to be the last step. after the dismissal of the french from mali and other european troops, who have really never succeeded in bringing security to mali. this is the bottom line we need to make clear. those who sought to bring peace and stability to mali, never did so. they blame it on the junta as failing. as contributing to the instability, i think is truly a very weak argument. but it's not just come out of the doldrums. it's the collective fear ouf --

to cut relating to governments that voluntarily signed on to our protocols. it found its priciples that previous government violated and they kept quiet. so mali has become a collective failure of these multilateral institutions. and because of the africanist agenda from some sections of the populace, they have a deliberate force to undermine mali. what is critical about mali's increase of independence is we're seeing separatists in chad .

mohammed: i am sorry to interrupt you, let me get back to the point you are making in a moment. were you surprised by mali's decision to leave the g5 joint force, and from your perspective, is it time for some kind of new strategy to confront armed groups? >> i was not surprised at all. because the g5 was brain-dead, really. if mali stopped coordinating with french. mali is at the core of the geographical and military center of this region where they need cooperation between the five states. this is in order to combat terrorism. now that mali is no longer cooperating with the french, it meant that the g5 had not much of a role anymore.

the role of the g5 was to coordinate international help to the region, and also to help military armies of the region in their fight against terrorism. now, when mali decided to go it alone, it became almost impossible to achieve and we can see that now the cooperation mali has suffered from it and is probably benefiting less than other regions. we see that mali, the position of mali is very hard to understand for some people. they claim it is because france was not successful against terrorism, but actually france was fairly successful, did not manage to bring peace in the area but that was just due to the french, it was due to a failure of governance on the part of the authorities within the north of the region in the

state of really very poor administration and great insecurity and military, physical and economic insecurity. and therefore, at some point mali decided it seems to the french that maybe mali sees its role as a leader of a movement fighting the old colonial path. especially the presence of france. seems to be wanting to fight an anti-imperialist fight in which it will be helped by russia. the division which is more there to protect the mali junta. so no surprise at all to see that mali is carrying on in its

approach to the situation. mohammed: i am sorry. i am sorry to interrupt you, but i want to get reaction. you were reacting quite a lot to what he was saying, so i want to get your take. go ahead and jump in. >> you know, i just invite jacque and like-minded people to understand we are not fighting imperialism or anything. we are just claiming our sovereignty. we just want respect in our relationship with other nations, following the convention. we don't want any other nation to dictate. we want to quit being the -- of any nation. mali wants to look straight in the eyes of the rest of the world as equals. those who want to keep us in the

complex -- the time has gone. we have to consider mali as a nation. we have to respect our sovereign decisions to fight terrorism. this has come because the current strategy and the military doctrine, the colonial military doctrine that has been implemented for nine years, has miserably failed. today, within less than five months, mali breaking population with french military and asking for partnership. security situation has significantly improved. this has been acknowledged by the secretary-general of the united nations and other observers. so we have to come to an understanding. france is not an enemy of mali. we want to stand up straight. we want to assume our sovereignty, and we won't

respect. -- we want respect. any partner that would like to work within the framework of our respect is welcome to mali. having said that, i think that we should put things into context. mali has rightly and with the support of the people of mali, withdrawn from g5, which was to begin with, an absolute organization that was never able to function because of lack of funding and lack of support of whose -- they pledged money but it was never mobilized. g5 was dysfunctional. let's be clear. what we are doing is just stating we want to reclaim our role. mali has a presidency in february, and the conference of the heads of these g5 were support to meet here and

transfer the presidency to mali. it never happened and there was no expo nation. so it has become -- so mali rightfully withdrew from g5. >> let me ask you, the g5 joint force has been fighting groups linked to isil in the region but they have struggled to contain the violence. why has it been so difficult? >> look, i think it is very basic. training, logistics, probability. and always big brother can down on members of the team and pulling the strings. let me go back a little bit and provide a historical context of why mali's decision to withdraw is critical. mali's behavior right now is

almost reminiscent of the behavior in ghana in the 1950's and early 1960's, leading to the cia coup. so that is what is happeningin mali. i will say this very clearly. leaving the g5 is going to be part of a continuum of specific actions of the junta will take to reclaim mali's sovereignty, its identity, its sense of agency. and some of the responses coming out of paris, particularly the statement by the defense minister about this disrespectful behavior, is simply not acceptable. and i think -- [indiscernible] the argument is silence is great

and the rest is weakness. those who seek to bring goods to mali must be humble enough to say, how do we listen tour sovereign states and ensure we can collaborate in a manner that maintains the interest of that partner at the center? the malian people.; it's not going to help. when people talk about it not good, the french legion much worse. private military companies have done worse. for me, an ahistorical discussion about mali is a disservice both to international law, the rule of law, and also what the malian people truly do

want. mohammed: what is the relationship likely between mali and france right now, and where does that relationship go from here? >> [exhaused -- [exhales deeply] it's a shame. there are so many malians in france who have links between the two countries. two countries with a shared history, even though it's a colonial history. lately france was more seen as a helper, an army of liberation, but eventually became to be seen as an army of occupation. but it's part of a campaign spreading through west africa. russian cybernetworks have had

some influence with whipping up anti-french sentiments. we have seen it in central africa since 2016. the russians are there, helping themselves to all the mineral resources, diamonds and gold, in north central africa. we can see that this move towards unsettlingly french is taking place in senegal. senegal, which is a -- it is not just the sahara. terrorism there is unsettling the whole region, going up to the gulf of kenya, to the ivory coast. it's an upsetting process. and some people argue that we can't know, but definitely -- africa is a treasure chest. everyone wants to be in on africa. all the countries want to be in

africa. china, russia, turkey, united arab emirates, everyone wants to be able to help themselves to the mineral resources of africa. and therefore, want to take the place of the colonizer, the colonialists, and in the case of west africa, france, and in nigeria and africa, it was britain. but france has remained, as we have close links with ex colonial dependencies. in spite of its efforts to break with this truth, france has been with africa for a long time. they have been trying to rebalance their relationship between the two countries. it is no longer the same as it was even 10 years ago. there have been big changes since macron. and therefore that is why the french are worried. mali is just a small piece in a

much bigger game, which is all about some countries wanting to exert influence on weak government. whatever they say, it's a very weak government. mohammed: i am sorry to interrupt you again, but we are starting to run out of time. let me ask you, it looks like you want to react. i will let you do that, but i want to ask you about the fact that mali's military government is saying its security forces thwarted an attempted coup supported by an unarmed western state. what more do you know about that and where is the investigation into its stand? >> well, it's beyond frustrating that many people have not come to the understanding that we are

leading to a new era, that we cannot continue to exploit people and countries like france has been doing. the time has come where the people are determined to assume their sovereignty. once you engage in the course of sovereignty, there is no way back. france will have to change its attitude to a partnership. an equal to equal partnership. the whole world is converting towards africa. 21st century is going to be africa's time. so france should position itself to be part of it instead of excluded from it, and stop this arrogant behavior, we did this for africa.

africa did this for france. but coming to answering a question, yes, there was an attempted coup. as i have always told the pres e dent, our number one has not been behind oh decisions for other nations, but behind our people. we love the way mali is being led today. we've never been so proud in our country to be standing tall, to be exerting our sovereignty. but we do believe that france has declared it would destabilize. we take france by their own words. their intent is to take down our military leaders. but they will fail. if they take one man out, 10

men replace them. this is a nation understanding and having a desire to free ourselves from french control, the colonial doctrine. mohammed: we have run out of time so we are going to have to leave the conversation there. thank you to all of our guests. and thank you for watching. you can see the program any time by visiting our website, aljazeera.com. and for further discussion, go to our facebook page. you can also join the conversation on twitter, @aji nsidestory. bye for now. ♪ acxñññññññññçñqñqñqñqññññ#ñ#ww

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