French officers handed over the keys to a military base in Timbuktu, Mali on Tuesday, after a nearly nine-year deployment.
The ceremony took place near the city’s airport, with Malian army officers, officials from the local government and the United Nations attending.
The French flag was lowered and the Malian flag was raised in its place on the base, where a force of about 150 soldiers have remained after Paris began withdrawing troops having liberated the city from Islamists in 2013.
Head of France’s Operation Barkhane anti-jihadist campaign in Mali, General Etienne du Peyroux, shook hands with the new camp commander and offered him a large wooden key as a French military plane made a low flyover.
The highly symbolic departure comes after French forces already left bases in the northern towns Kidal and Tessalit this year, even though the jihadist-driven violence in the Sahel state shows no signs of easing.
France “will be present in a different way”, said du Peyroux. “This is ultimately the aim of Operation Barkhane to allow Mali to take its destiny into its own hands… but always in partnership.”
Former French President Francois Hollande formally declared the start of France’s military intervention, in February 2013, designed to root out jihadist insurgents.
Since 2013, Paris has deployed around 5,100 troops across the Sahel region which includes Mali aiming to support local governments and their poorly equipped forces fighting an ever-growing Islamist insurgency.
However, jihadist attacks have grown more frequent. An insurgency that began in Mali has spilt over into neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger
