The U.S. Embassy is urging citizens to immediately leave Mali on commercial flights because the blockade is making daily life more dangerous.
Parts of the Malian capital have been virtually paralyzed as an al-Qaeda-affiliated group imposes an economic siege on the country by blocking roads used by oil tankers, in a bid to turn the screws on the military government.
As the Sahel country sinks deeper into crisis, the U.S. Embassy in Mali on Tuesday urged U.S. citizens to “leave immediately” as the fuel blockade makes daily life increasingly dangerous.
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Long queues have formed at gas stations in the capital Bamako this week, with anger reaching boiling point as the blockade tightens. The lack of supply has pushed the price of fuel up 500 percent, from $25 to $130 per liter, according to Al Jazeera’s Nicolas Haque.
The armed group Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), which imposed the blockade last month in retaliation for the army’s ban on fuel sales in rural areas, appears to be succeeding in turning public anger away from the country’s leaders, Haque noted.
“It’s up to the government to fully play its role and act to… discover the real reason for this shortage,” Omar Sidibe, a driver in Bamako, told Al Jazeera.
Haque said al-Qaeda fighters were burning fuel trucks as supplies ran out.
Schools and universities were also closed for two weeks and airlines are now canceling flights from Bamako.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Embassy warned Americans to immediately leave Mali using commercial flights rather than traveling by land to neighboring countries, due to the risk of “terrorist attacks along national highways.”
He advised citizens who choose to remain in Mali to prepare contingency plans, including sheltering in place for an extended period.
Yet, Haque said, military leaders insisted that “everything is under control.”
The military first took power in a coup in 2020, moving to bring a growing security crisis under control involving armed groups affiliated with al-Qaeda and ISIL (ISIS), but years later the crisis has only intensified.
“Empty” tanks
Amid tense scenes at a refueling stop in Mali’s neighboring country Senegal, truck drivers ready to cross the border did not want to speak to Al Jazeera’s camera. Haque said some transport companies had been accused of paying al-Qaeda fighters to move their trucks.
“They are waiting here not for days, but for months, their tanks empty. A dangerous road awaits them or a journey to Al-Qaeda territory,” Haque said from Dakar.
Meanwhile, in Bamako, citizens are becoming more and more desperate. “Before, you could buy gas everywhere in cans. But now there are none,” gas dealer Bakary Coulibaly told Al Jazeera.
“We have to come to gas stations, and even if we go, it’s not certain that there will be gas available. Only a few stations have it.”
JNIM is one of several armed groups operating in the Sahel, a vast strip of semi-arid desert stretching from North to West Africa, where fighting is spreading rapidly, with large-scale attacks.
Under military control, the country severed ties with its former colonizer, France, and thousands of French soldiers involved in the fight against armed groups left the country.
The fighting has left thousands dead, while up to 350,000 people are currently displaced, according to Human Rights Watch.
