Mali Junta Leader Takes Charge As Regional Bloc Considers Sanctions

(Bloomberg) -- Mali’s military Vice President Assimi Goita will be in charge of the West African country until a new leader can be named or elections are held next year.

Goita resumes the functions of the president and will lead the transitional government, an adviser to the army colonel said hours after soldiers released the country’s civilian leaders from detention. Goita will manage “daily affairs” and “assure the transition,” but stays vice president for now, Commander Baba Cisse said by phone from Bamako.

Bah N’Daw resigned as interim president and Moctar Ouane stepped down as prime minister on Wednesday while in military detention at an army barracks just outside the capital. They were released in the early hours of Thursday after the United Nations Security Council, the U.S., France, and regional authorities demanded that they should be let go.

The U.S. State Department said it would halt all military cooperation with Mali’s army while France threatened targeted sanctions against the junta over their detention.

READ: Mali President Resigns After Second Military Coup in a Year

The political upheaval that is rocking Africa’s third-biggest gold producer, still reeling from the overthrow of President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita in August, threatens to further destabilize a nation that’s a linchpin in an international effort to contain a mushrooming insurgency by Islamist militants in the Sahel region.

The Economic Community of West African States called for an extraordinary heads of states’ summit on May 30 to deliberate on Mali’s latest political crisis.

©2021 Bloomberg L.P.