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Russia has accused France of escalating terrorism in Africa, identifying its overthrow of the Libyan government of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 as the “starting point.”
Moscow said the “tragedy” backfired and affected all regional nations, causing the growth of Islamist ideology in the Sahel, the appearance of terrorist groups, and the spread of violence and arms trafficking.
“Paris did not think about the future of the region when it pressed that trigger,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stated at a briefing.
Zakharova slammed the French media campaign to “discredit” Russia’s efforts to combat the terrorist threat in the Sahara-Sahel region, advising them to analyse the real causes of the security crisis.
The diplomat called the “deliberate information operation” a calculated attempt to devalue Russia’s contribution to ensuring peace and security in parts of Africa facing terrorism.
Moscow reminded France of its “failure to improve security in Sahel”, saying local people regarded French forces as “a colonial occupation army” during the 8-year counterinsurgency.
According to Zakharova, Operation Barkhane (2014-2022) eventually ended in “total failure and led to a dramatic reduction of France’s military presence in Africa.”
She cited recent reports alleging French special services “support terrorist groups in the hope of destabilising the governments of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, which have broken free from French paternalism.”
“There is no smoke without fire in this case,” Zakharova said, accusing Paris of developing relations with regional countries on political and economic rules rooted in the 19th-century neo-colonialist policy.
The spokeswoman added that France, unsettled by African nations’ severance of ties, was encouraging misinformation to shift its responsibility for regional security problems onto others.
On Mali’s fuel crisis, Zakharova said the situation eased this month with support from the Russian Defence Ministry’s Africa Corps, which is also assisting Malian forces in joint operations against banditry.
Moscow described its cooperation with the Alliance of Sahel States as “mutually beneficial” and vowed to strengthen the regional security architecture on a bilateral basis and through UN mechanisms.
France’s overthrow of Gaddafi fueled terrorism in Africa – Russia
