The UN says it has pulled its peacekeepers out of a camp in northern Mali earlier than planned, because “their lives were in danger”.
It says its last convoy left the camp in Tessalit on Saturday. Mali’s military leaders, who ordered the withdrawal of all UN and French troops earlier this year, says the Tessalit camp is now in its control.
Saturday’s withdrawal happened “in an extremely tense and degraded security context putting in danger the lives of personnel”, said the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, Minusma, in a statement seen by AFP.
With fewer international troops on the ground in Mali, it is feared that the country will be subject to worsening violence from powerful armed groups – including Islamist militants and Tuareg militias.