African Union calls for urgent action in insurgency-hit Mali

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BAMAKO (Reuters) -The African Union has called for an urgent international response, including intelligence-sharing, to address worsening security conditions in Mali, where insurgents are imposing a fuel blockade and kidnapping foreigners.

An Al Qaeda-linked jihadist group active in West Africa’s Sahel region has blocked fuel imports since September, attacking convoys of tankers and creating a shortage that forced schools and businesses to shut.

The latest show of force by the group, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin, has raised concern that it might eventually try to impose its rule over the landlocked country. Western countries including the U.S., France, Britain and Italy are urging their citizens to leave.

In a statement on Sunday, Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, chairperson of the African Union Commission, expressed “deep concern over the rapidly deteriorating security situation in Mali, where terrorist groups have imposed blockades, disrupted access to essential supplies, and severely worsened humanitarian conditions for civilian populations”.

He said there should be “enhanced cooperation, intelligence-sharing and sustained support” for countries in the Sahel affected by violent extremism.

He also called for the immediate release of three Egyptian nationals he said were recently kidnapped.

JNIM has targeted foreign nationals for kidnapping to finance its operations in West Africa.

Reuters reported in October that a deal was reached to free two citizens of the United Arab Emirates in exchange for a ransom payment of roughly $50 million.

Schools re-opened in the capital Bamako on Monday, a Reuters witness said, after being suspended for two weeks because of the fuel shortage.

(Reporting by Mali newsroom and Bate Felix; Writing by Anait Miridzhanian; Editing by Robbie Corey-Boulet and Alex Richardson)