BAMAKO: Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Tuesday pledged assistance to West African states battling militants, as Moscow seeks to expand its influence on a continent in a diplomatic tug-of-war between global powers.
"We are going to provide our assistance to them to overcome these difficulties. This concerns Guinea, Burkina Faso and Chad and the Sahel region generally and even the coastal states on the Gulf of Guinea," he said. France says the Russian operatives are Wagner mercenaries - a private military group that Moscow has deployed in Syria and now Ukraine, experts say.
Sporadic cross-border attacks have also taken place in Togo, Benin and Ivory Coast in recent years, spurring fears that the militants are seeking to push southwards to the Gulf of Guinea.After France wound down its long-running military presence in Mali, similar tensions have broken out with the Burkina Faso junta.
While Moscow woos African leaders - some of whom have refused to publicly condemn the war in Ukraine - the United States has launched its own diplomatic offensive on the continent, which is also being courted by China.At their joint press conference, Lavrov and his Malian counterpart Abdoulaye Diop said junta leader Colonel Assimi Goita would attend a Russia-Africa summit in Saint Petersburg in July.
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