Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks and answers to media questions during a joint news conference with Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation of the Republic of Mali Abdoulaye Diop following their talks, Moscow, February 28, 2024

Good afternoon,

We are glad to welcome a delegation of our Malian friends in Moscow. It is headed by Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation of Mali Abdoulaye Diop and also includes Defence Minister Sadio Camara.

We discussed our efforts to develop bilateral ties in various spheres based on the agreements between the leaders of Russia and Mali, including during their meeting on the sidelines of the 2nd Russia-Africa Summit and a series of telephone conversations between President Vladimir Putin and Interim President of Mali Assimi Goïta.

We agreed to take additional practical steps to expand our trade and economic cooperation. So far, it has been falling short compared to what we have achieved in terms of trust-based political dialogue. We went on to reaffirm our interest in holding a meeting between the corresponding economic agencies in order to explore specific steps we can take to follow up on the two visits by Malian expert delegations to Moscow in 2023. This includes involving Russian companies in specific projects in geological exploration, developing mineral deposits, as well as working together in transport, infrastructure, energy, agriculture, IT and in many other sectors. We have already designated joint projects during our preceding contacts. Today, we want to focus on making sure that these projects can get off the ground as early as this spring.

We took note of the positive momentum in developing our military cooperation and military-technical ties.

On an equally positive note, we discussed our cooperation in humanitarian affairs, including the fact that Russian educational institutions have been training Malian specialists. More than 10,000 Malians who graduated from Soviet and Russian higher education institutions live and work in Mali for the benefit of their country. We will perpetuate this approach by renewing the expanded quotas for Malian students. Every year, they are entitled to 290 government-sponsored scholarships.

Our Malian friends briefed us on the current situation in Mali and what its government is doing to promote a peace process including through the so-called direct inter-Malian dialogue, as initiated by Interim President Assimi Goïta in January 2024. Our friend, Minister Diop, emphasised Russia’s special role in combatting terrorism and improving the combat capabilities of the Malian army and law enforcement agencies, including by training army personnel and police officers.

We discussed Mali’s requirements for humanitarian assistance. Our friends thanked us for sending 50,000 tonnes of wheat to them in 2023, 25,000 tonnes of fertilisers in December 2023 and 17,000 tonnes of diesel fuel in January 2024. We will certainly continue to give this assistance to them.

We also exchanged views on Africa’s main problems. We agree that international relations must be made really democratic, above all on the basis of strict compliance by all countries with the provisions and principles of the UN Charter as an interrelated whole. The fundamental principle that this universal organisation is based on respect for the sovereign equality of states is not respected by our Western colleagues, not in the slightest. The West has not shown respect for the fundamental UN principle of equality in any situation that ever occurred in international relations.

We are grateful to our Malian friends for supporting our initiative at the UN and other multifaceted platforms. In most instances, Mali becomes a co-author of the draft resolutions proposed by the Russian delegation. We have agreed to continue to strengthen our foreign policy coordination in all spheres.

We also held an in-depth discussion on the situation in the Sahara-Sahel region with a focus on neighbouring Burkina Faso and the republics of Niger and Chad.

I listened with appreciation to Foreign Minister Abdoulaye Diop characterise efforts taken in Bamako, Ouagadougou and Niamey to build up the Alliance of Sahel States they have created.

We were briefed on the situation in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). We hope that problems in relations between regional countries will be settled on the basis of the principle of neighbourliness. We have always supported the idea of African solutions to African problems. We firmly believe that the Sahara-Sahel countries will find common ground if nobody interferes in the process.

We are ready to continue to provide assistance to all regional countries based on the solutions, formats and quantities that are optimal for them and do not undermine their interests.

We are paying considerable attention to the follow-through on the results of the second Russia-Africa summit, which I mentioned above. It was held in St Petersburg in 2023. One of its decisions was to set up a Russia-Africa forum at the level of foreign ministers. The forum will hold its first meeting in Sochi this autumn. I hope that our friends will attend this event.

We discussed tasks related to reforming the UN so that its structure would better reflect the interests and influence of African countries on the world stage. We also focused on the fight against terrorism, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and Yemen.

I reiterated Russia’s praise of the responsible and balanced approach Mali has taken to the Ukraine crisis. Mali clearly understands our views. We talked about this again today.

The talks were useful, and will be followed up in the next couple of months on the trade and economic track.

I am sincerely grateful to our friends for their cooperation.

Question: In your opening remarks, you said that Russia continues to actively provide humanitarian aid to Mali, supplying wheat and fuel. How does Russia plan to assist Mali in further overcoming its socioeconomic problems?

Sergey Lavrov: Regarding our assistance for Mali’s socioeconomic development, my colleague Abdoulaye Diop and I have both mentioned the two visits by Malian experts to Russia in 2023 where they met with their counterparts from our government’s economic bloc. They agreed on a number of areas of mutual interest for implementing joint projects.

Russia’s Ministry of Economic Development and the Malian Ministry of Industry and Trade have signed a Memorandum of Cooperation that provides for establishing a relevant working group, which will handle further work in the areas we have discussed: natural resources, energy, agriculture, transport, information technology, and others.

The working group will meet for the first time in April 2024. Today, our colleagues have confirmed the timeframe, so the process is underway. We would prefer to expedite it because currently, trade between Russia and Mali obviously falls short of its potential or mutual interests.

When it comes to security, we are making active progress on military and defence industry cooperation. We see Mali’s defence capabilities growing stronger thanks to our military instructors who are training personnel for the Malian armed forces in Russia, not to mention Russian-supplied equipment.