20120812
Press TV
The UN Security Council (UNSC) has called on Mali junta to stop interfering in politics, urging the military forces to “return to their barracks.”

In a statement on Friday, the UNSC called on the country’s junta to cease its “continuous interference in the political process" and called on the armed forces to "return to their barracks and to refrain from any interference in political affairs and in the work of the transitional authorities."

The 15-member body also expressed grave concerns about the deteriorating human rights situation and insecurity in the African state.


According to the statement, the UN Security Council also encouraged the West African leaders to prepare the ground for a possible peacekeeping operation in the region to help Bamako take back the northern regions from the local Turaq rebels.

Earlier on Sunday, French Defense Minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian said that France will support African military intervention against rebels in the north of Mali.

"An African military intervention is desirable and inevitable," he said.

The Malian people have also expressed opposition to the ruling military and its involvement in the political process.

Holding rallies in the capital, Bamakoin in April, following the coup, thousands of Malians, denounced the military presence in the capital, accusing the military of being reluctant to protect the country’s territorial integrity and of arresting the politicians opposed to junta leader Captain Sanogo Amadou.

Mali’s northern regions have been under the control of Turaq rebels since the military coup in the capital in March 2012.

Following the coup, the West African regional bloc, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), declared that the Mali military junta had no legitimacy.

On March 23, Captain Sanogo led a coup that toppled the government of Toumani Toure a few weeks before a planned presidential election.

The military says it overthrew the former government because it had not done enough in the military campaign against separatist Tuareg rebels in the north.

This is while, the Sanogo troops have not managed to retake the northern regions from the local rebels.