When French soldiers stormed into northern Mali in January 2013 to chase out militants aligned with Al Qaeda, Malians throughout the country stood to gain. The French, aided by the Chadian and Malian Armies, swiftly took back most of the territory controlled by the extremists. Their mission, Operation Serval, was held up as a rare example of a successful Western intervention against terrorist groups.
In February, the president of France, François Hollande, visited Timbuktu, an ancient center of Islamic education, and a boisterous crowd that had suffered nine months of brutal jihadi rule hailed him as a savior. Later, in Bamako, Mali’s capital, Mr. Hollande declared his triumphal visit the “most important day in my political life.”
Two years on, Mali’s optimism has frayed amid a more somber atmosphere.
The French left a contingent of over 1,000 troops stationed in the northern city of Gao. The force has been in charge of counterterrorism operations in France’s former West African colony, but it has failed to fully dislodge Qaeda militants. In fact, the jihadists remain the strongest fighting force apart from the French in northern Mali.
The United Nations mission, known as Minusma, has been no more effective, despite having a budget of $629 million — about a quarter of the size of the Malian government’s. It has suffered at least 49 dead and more than 150 wounded since it began in April 2013. Attacks on the multinational force in the north, which occur almost daily, have recently spread to Bamako itself. To bolster the flagging counterinsurgency effort, Mali’s president, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, has backed an ethnic militia group known as Gatia.
With this deteriorating security situation, Mali is in danger of becoming a failed state. If that were to happen, the consequences could be felt far beyond its borders. In 2012, fighting in the north displaced some 46,000 Malians, who fled to Burkina Faso. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees reports that renewed fighting in the Timbuktu region has forced some 57,000 people to flee their homes. Widespread conflict could create tens of thousands more refugees, some of whom might eventually attempt the Mediterranean crossing to Europe.
Mali’s weak army does not have the capacity to control the north of the country. It cannot, for example, take back Kidal, a sparsely populated desert area near the Algerian border. Yet the Malian military refuses to cede administrative control to its main rival in the region, a coalition of Tuareg and Arab rebel groups known as the Coordination of Movements for Azawad.
In 2012, the C.M.A. forged a temporary alliance with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb to take over the north of the country, before the jihadists seized control. Some C.M.A. groups are also suspected of drug trafficking, a major problem throughout this part of the Sahel, which serves as a way station for Latin American cocaine and other drugs on their way to Europe.
Despite this, the international community has tacitly legitimized the C.M.A.’s claim to an ethnic homeland by working with secular Tuareg elements as a bulwark against hard-line Islamists in Kidal. To the disgust of the Malian government, Minusma has fostered contacts with the C.M.A., while peace talks mediated by Algeria have focused on getting the rebel group to sign a peace accord. France has also drawn the ire of Bamako by refusing to help the Malian Army reconquer Kidal.
This explains why Mr. Keita has thrown in his lot with the Gatia, which is another militia comprising mainly ethnic Tuareg and Arab fighters. This force emerged last year as the C.M.A.’s main military adversary. The militia includes some former soldiers and has logistical support from the Malian Army.
In April, the Gatia forced the C.M.A. out of the northeastern town of Ménaka — one of several military advances that have made the Gatia popular in Bamako. International pressure to rein in this irregular army is thus seen as an affront to Mali’s sovereignty.
This is a mistake for Mr. Keita and his supporters; the Gatia is no nationalist savior for Mali. The group’s ultimate allegiance is to its particular Tuareg ethnicity, and its competition for control of the north threatens to ignite tribal-based fighting with the C.M.A.
Ménaka is a microcosm of how, with a weak central government and a proliferation of armed groups, the conflict could spiral out of control. The Gatia occupies the town militarily, but this month Mali agreed with the C.M.A. to transfer responsibility for security to Minusma and the regular Malian Army.
The Gatia, however, refused to hand over the town. This means either that Bamako no longer controls the group or that Bamako is playing a double game of signing peace deals while supporting the militia that undermines them.
Either scenario is ominous, but the latter is especially dangerous. The C.M.A. is expected to sign the Algiers Accord this week, but continued Malian support for the Gatia — itself supposedly a signatory — would render the peace agreement meaningless. And if the deal falls through, the C.M.A. could chose to revert to a tactical military alliance with Al Qaeda.
The completion of the Algiers Accord is critical, but its terms must be enforced. Above all, the Malian government needs to ensure that all armed groups, including the Gatia, withdraw from their positions and begin integrating into the army. The primary responsibility for this lies with Bamako, but France, too, must use its influence. Reducing the number of belligerent parties would apply pressure to the C.M.A. to keep its end of the bargain.
Only a unified Malian Army under the command of the state can guarantee peace and security in the country. The record of past efforts to integrate rebel fighters into the army is not encouraging. But the alternative is unthinkable.
Abdoulsalam Hama and Joe Penney are co-founders of sahelien.com, a French-language news website covering Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger.