France is appealing to President Trump not to cut off US military support to French forces fighting Islamist militants in Africa, warning that it could undermine efforts to counter a growing terrorist threat in the Sahel region.
But the French have faced mounting challenges in the Sahel, including the collision last year of two French helicopters in northern Mali that claimed the lives of 13 troops. Terrorism has dramatically increased in the region in recent years, with the number of attacks roughly doubling annually since 2016, according to the Africa Center for Strategic Studies.
The French president made the comment after a summit in southwestern France of leaders of a coalition of five Sahel countries — Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mauritania. The heads of state endorsed a continued French military presence, despite recent anti-French street protests, and also called on Washington to keep up its military support.
French Minister of Army Forces Florence Parly meets French officers of the Barkhane counterterrorism operation in Africa's Sahel region, at the Barkhane base near Niamey in Niger on July 31, 2017.Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle have pushed back over the Pentagon's proposals to scale back the U.S. military's presence in the Sahel and elsewhere in Africa, warning the move would open a vacuum that could be exploited by terrorist groups as well as Russia and China.
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