The French government has decided to send French troops to Mali.
After the Ivory Coast and Libya, now it is Mali. This is a decision that involves France in a war in a former French colony.
This option was the only one that has been used since northern Mali has been in the hands of armed Islamist groups.
Since the beginning, [French President] Francois Holland asked the UN to give the green light to an international military intervention, in which the French General Staff and diplomacy would organise the concrete arrangements.
Men like Ouattara, put in place in the Ivory Coast by military intervention in which France played the lead role, Compaore, the head of Burkina Faso, who has continued to serve the interests of French imperialism in the region, regardless of the government in Paris, or Yayi Boni, an autocrat in Benin, serve as an ‘African’ screen for this military intervention. Who can believe that ECOWAS would be able to set up a military force independent of the French army? On the contrary, it is clear today that the whole of the French military deployed in Africa has been mobilised for this intervention.
The justification for this French military intervention is the fight against armed Islamist groups who control part of the territory of Mali. They threaten the integrity of Mali and carry out a reign of terror in the areas they control. But their presence and the ease with which they are deployed reflect the existence of profound social, economic and political problems that the ruling regimes in Mali have not resolved, when they are not aggravated by their management of the country. This means that a military solution, let alone a foreign military intervention, will not resolve any of these problems, quite the contrary.
The Malian forces have denounced this situation and have from the beginning rejected a foreign military intervention; they stated that the question of the territorial integrity of Mali should be the responsibility of the Malian army. They were not listened to.
The military operation is complicated and can take time to mobilise the greatest resources. The victims are mainly Malian civilians caught in the crossfire.
The reinforcement of the ‘Vigipirate’ plan is part of the strategy of tension and conditioning to convince the people of our country that they may be the target of attacks, whose perpetrators are linked directly or indirectly to Islamist groups acting in Mali. It is part of the government's desire to create a climate of national unity, while it is carrying out an aggressive policy of austerity that strikes the masses.
Behind this intervention is the control of an area rich in strategic raw materials, particularly uranium that [the French company] Areva is exploiting in neighbouring Niger and is also found in the subsoil of Mali.
For all these reasons, and because the war in the Ivory Coast, Afghanistan and Libya have amply shown that their justification by the fight against terrorism and the defence of democracy is a big lie, we express our total disagreement with the military intervention of France in Mali.
We reaffirm the need to put an end to the policy known as the ‘French-Africa', a policy of economic domination and political and military intervention.
We affirm that it is up to the people of Mali, its democratic and patriotic forces, to find ways for a political solution to the crisis in their country.
Paris, January 12, 2013
Communist Party of the Workers of France