Mali junta leader, Captain Amadou Sanogo (C) surrounded by his fellow soldiers in Bamako
AFP
The U.N. Security Council on Thursday endorsed West African political efforts to end unrest in Mali but stopped short of backing military intervention in the West African state where al Qaeda-linked militants control significant territory, reports Reuters.
Ansar Dine and its Salafist allies have hijacked a separatist Tuareg uprising in northern Mali and now control two-thirds of its desert north, which includes the regions of Gao, Kidal and Timbuktu where historic and religious sites have been destroyed in recent days.
The destruction of the holy sites has drawn international condemnation and Muslim leaders in the capital Bamako led a protest on Thursday.
Mahmoud Dicko, the influential head of Mali's Islamic High Council, called for calm and told a crowd of about 1,000 protesters that the destruction was carried out because of ignorance and with the intention of provoking the populace.
Mali's neighbours have been seeking U.N. backing for armed intervention to stabilize the country and take back the north. In June, the Security Council asked the African Union and West African group ECOWAS to explain more precisely what kind of resolution they wanted.
Thursday's resolution did not give them the backing they sought, but did not rule it out in future. It also expressed full support for ECOWAS and AU mediation efforts in Mali.
The French-drafted resolution said the council "expresses its readiness to further examine the request of ECOWAS once additional information has been provided regarding the objectives, means and modalities of the envisaged deployment."
France and Morocco have been among the most enthusiastic supporters of the idea of the Security Council backing ECOWAS intervention in Mali, though a number of other council members have been more reluctant.
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said: "The international community must do everything it can to fight terrorism in Mali and the Sahel, which is threatening to destabilize the whole region."
He said France urged countries in the region to intensify cooperation in fighting al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.
The resolution also calls upon U.N. member states to submit the names of al Qaeda-linked individuals, groups or entities connected to Mali's unrest to the Security Council's al Qaeda sanctions committee for inclusion on a U.N. al Qaeda blacklist.
Kadre Desire Ouedraogo, president of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Commission, told the 15-nation council his group had decided to "speed up the deployment of the ECOWAS stand-by force in Mali."
He said ECOWAS would press ahead with mediation efforts. If those failed, Ouedraogo said, ECOWAS would help Mali's army "restore the territorial integrity of the country."
Leaders of the West African bloc are expected to meet in Burkina Faso with bickering Malian political leaders over the weekend to work out a broad-based transitional government which will lead the effort to take back the north from the Islamists.
Some of the Muslim leaders who gathered in a conference centre in Bamako on Thursday urged military action to free the north. Others threatened to start enlisting volunteers to go and fight if nothing is done.