The Algerian regime continues to export instability to its neighbouring countries by supporting separatist and terrorist groups in a bid to weaken its rivals to maintain geostrategic leverage.
Algeria is hosting and funding radical Malian Imam Mahmoud Dicko, an opponent of the Malian military junta. The Imam has joined the Coalition of Forces for the Republic (CFR), an alliance of Malian dissidents pooling forces against the regime led by Transitional President Colonel Assimi Goïta.
The CFR was crafted in Algiers, where many of its members reside. The move is seen as another evidence of Algerian interference in Mali’s domestic affairs.
Moscow has accused lately the Algerian junta of facilitating the transfer of military equipment to terrorist groups operating in the Sahel countries.
Mali, a landlocked country in Western Africa, is rocked by the turmoil shaking Sahel countries for more than a decade, including Islamist insurgencies, political instability, and a decline in their relationship with France, a former colonizer.
Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger withdrew from the West African grouping ECOWAS and set up their own bloc, the Alliance of Sahel States (AES).