Why The Mali Coup Threatens All Of West Africa 
 
 Following the March 22 coup that ousted President Amadou Toumani Touré, the north of Mali is in the hands of a Tuareg rebellion. It is a rolling series of events that has leaders across the region worrying about similar threats. 
 
 by: admin Tuaregs, like this man in Algeria, live in several different countries in North and West Africa (Garrondo) 
 
 LE MONDE/Worldcrunch 
 
 The very existence of the West African country of Mali is currently under threat. The whole of the north of the country is in the hands of a Tuareg rebellion, which nothing seems able to stop. 
 
 President Amadou Toumani Touré was ousted on March 22 by a junta of captains calling themselves the National Council for the Recovery of Democracy and the Restoration of the State (CNRDRE). Taking advantage of the ensuing power vacuum in the capital Bamako, the rebels have gained possession of northern Mali at lightning speed. 
 
 The rebels, the majority of whom are members of the nomadic Tuareg people, refuse to be called Malian, and they want to establish an independent Tuareg state called Azawad. 
 
 Currently the rebels only hold the northern part of Mali, but with potential reinforcements arriving from other areas of the Sahel, a transition zone between the Sahara in the north and the savannahs to the south, and in particular from neighboring Niger, that could all change. In the meantime, the Malian army is falling apart. 
 
 The captains who overthrew the president justified their actions by claiming to be working to end the decline of Mali. However, the coup has had precisely the opposite outcome. Despite the fall of city after city in the north over the past few days, the CNRDRE has not sent any troops north to defend the country from the rebels. 
 
 Quick response, deep concerns 
 
 West African leaders are responding quickly to try and avoid an outright collapse of the Malian state, and they have reacted with commendable promptness. At the impetus of, in particular, Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara, a diplomatic emergency committee has been formed that is threatening the junta with heavy sanctions if it does not relinquish power. 
 
 However, none of the heads of states involved is entirely blameless. Some, like Burkina Faso President Blaise Compaoré, have faced mutinies in their own countries. The desire of the presidents of the region to return constitutional order to Bamako is therefore influenced by a certain degree of self-preservation. Who can blame them? Only recently emerging from the Ivorian crisis, with Guinea still fragile and Senegal only just managing to avoid serious upheaval following its electoral turmoil, West Africa could do without the collapse of Mali. 
 
 In Bamako, regional pressures run counter to public opinion; Mali has developed a strong dislike for its neighbors’ interference. But at this stage the only options left are likely to be hard to implement, not least the junta stepping down as Sanago, president of CNRDRE, holds tight to power. 
 
 The West African heads of state will need plenty more energy to achieve their joint objectives: firstly, getting the Malian military back to their barracks; and secondly, helping them to launch a counter-attack. If this doesn’t happen, the North will quickly be lost and the division of the country becomes an ever-growing threat. 
 
 Until now, West Africa’s efforts have met with relative indifference from the international community. It is imperative that the outside world offers its support and realizes that the situation in Mali will have significant consequences for the whole of the Sahel region. 
 
 Read more from Le Monde in French. 
 
 Photo – Garrondo 
 
 All rights reserved ©Worldcrunch - in partnership with Le Monde ||||| Image copyright AFP Image caption Timbuktu's mud and wood architecture is unique 
 
 The fighting in northern Mali could damage the World Heritage Site of Timbuktu, the UN's cultural agency Unesco has warned. 
 
 Timbuktu's "outstanding architectural wonders" must be safeguarded, it said. 
 
 Separatist Tuareg rebels joined forces with Islamist fighters to take the town on Sunday, and residents have told the BBC that Islamic law is being imposed. 
 
 The African Union has joined West African nations in imposing sanctions on Mali after a recent coup. 
 
 Meanwhile, representatives from the new military leadership are in Nigeria for talks with the authorities. 
 
 The military junta overthrew Mali's government nearly two weeks ago, saying the campaign against the recent Tuareg rebellion had been poorly run. 
 
 Junta head Capt Amadou Sanogo has said the army is not leaving power, but has promised to consult local political forces to set up a transition body "with the aim of organising peaceful, free, open and democratic elections in which we will not take part". 
 
 'Bars ransacked' 
 
 Correspondents say long lines have formed at petrol stations in the capital, Bamako, in response to sanctions. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Timbuktu mayor Halle Cisse: "We don't know who's in charge" 
 
 A farmer, who was filling up 15 jerry cans with diesel, told the BBC that he was worried about not being able to irrigate his crops with a generator once fuel reserves run out. 
 
 Landlocked Mali has to import all its fuel - and reporters say the country will struggle to survive an economic blockade. 
 
 But the Tuareg rebels have taken advantage of the political situation and made rapid advances in the past few days - and now control of a third of the West African country, including the key northern towns of Gao, Kidal and Timbuktu. 
 
 Timbuktu's literary patrimony... reveals a continent with an immensely rich literary and scientific heritage Writer Lydia Syson Why do we know Timbuktu? 
 
 The rebels are divided into two groups - the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA), which wants independence for the northern Tuareg homelands, while Ansar Dine, which is linked to the North African branch of al-Qaeda, wants to remain part of Mali but impose Sharia. 
 
 Residents in Gao and Kidal told the BBC that Islamist fighters have ransacked bars serving alcohol and banned Western music on local airwaves. 
 
 In Timbuktu, people told the BBC that Ansar Dine members are going from door-to-door telling occupants that they now have to live by the principles of Islamic law. 
 
 The BBC's Alou Diawara in the capital, Bamako, says some civilians are fleeing the central town of Mopti, fearing a rebel advance further south. 
 
 According to the UN refugee agency, since January the violence has uprooted more than 200,000 people, including around 100,000 who have fled the country. 
 
 Tourist attraction 
 
 Timbuktu - on the edge of the Sahara desert - is littered with impressive architecture, using mud and wood in a unique style. 
 
 Structures include the great mosques of Djingareyber, Sankore and Sidi Yahia and 16 cemeteries. 
 
 "They are essential to the preservation of the identity of the people of Mali and of our universal heritage," Unesco head Irina Bokova said, calling on all parties to fulfil international obligations to safeguard heritage in times of war. 
 
 Once an important centre of Islamic study, Timbuktu is home to about 700,000 ancient manuscripts, held in approximately 60 private libraries. 
 
 "At its zenith in the middle of the 15th Century Timbuktu was known all over the world as a repository for all sorts of knowledge, including Arabic Islamic writing, science, maths and history," Lydia Syson, an expert on Mali, told the BBC. 
 
 Today, Timbuktu is poor and parts of it are sinking under the encroaching desert sands. 
 
 Nevertheless, in recent years a lot of money has been invested in trying to preserve Timbuktu's manuscripts, some of which have already been destroyed. 
 
 Many collections have been digitised and local scholars trained in how to interpret the literary treasures, most of which are family collections that have been handed down from generation to generation. 
 
 Image copyright AFP Image caption Ancient family manuscripts have been handed down from generation to generation 
 
 The rebel takeover could disrupt these efforts and prevent access to the manuscripts. 
 
 "What is so important about Timbuktu's literary patrimony is that it is a challenge to Western ideas that Africa is a land of song and dance and oral tradition," Ms Syson said. 
 
 "It reveals a continent with an immensely rich literary and scientific heritage," she said. 
 
 The UN Security Council is due to hold an emergency meeting on the crisis in Mali later on Tuesday. 
 
 The coup and Tuareg rebellion have exacerbated a humanitarian crisis in Mali and some neighbouring countries, with aid agencies warning that 13 million people need food aid following a drought in the region. ||||| Malians lined up outside gas stations holding jerrycans, water bottles and plastic jugs, as the landlocked West African nation braced itself Tuesday for sanctions imposed overnight as a consequence of a coup last month. 
 
 In an effort to force out the soldiers that seized control of the country on March 21, Mali's neighbors decided at an emergency summit Monday to impose an embargo, shutting their borders and freezing its account at the regional central bank. The nation roughly twice the size of France imports all its fuel, which is trucked in overland from neighboring Ivory Coast and Senegal, both located on Africa's Atlantic Coast. 
 
 The country's electricity grid is also expected to falter in coming weeks. April is one of the hottest months of the year in the country located on the southern edge of the Sahara desert, and the nation's hydropower system is unable to carry the load because of low water levels. Fuel is used in the hot months to run diesel generators. 
 
 Mali's president was sent into hiding when a group of disgruntled soldiers started a mutiny at a military base located around 10 kilometers (6 miles) from the presidential palace. From the base, they decided to march on the palace. In a matter of hours, they succeeded in reversing more than two decades of democracy. 
 
 The Economic Community of West African States, representing 15 nations in the region, has been uncharacteristically harsh in their condemnation of the coup. They gave the putschists a 72-hour deadline to restore civilian rule, which expired Monday. When the junta failed to do so, they announced that sanctions would go into effect immediately. 
 
 Bathily Seye, the owner of a local chain of gas stations called Afrique Oil, said that if no new shipments are allowed in, his 15 pumps will run dry in days. 
 
 "We don't have our own gas. It's all imported," he said. "There is absolutely nothing here. We don't have any refining capacity. ... I don't have the stock. In two days, my pumps will run out of gas." 
 
 At a Shell pump in downtown Bamako, the line of cars was so long Tuesday that the vehicles were idling on the highway leading to the station. At the front of the queue, farm employee Baba Kounta had climbed into the back of his minibus, where he was filling 12 20-liter jerrycans. He said he needs the gas to power the generators that run the irrigation system at the orange farm outside Bamako where he works. 
 
 "We don't have a choice. We're obliged to make provisions," said Kounta, as he watched the gauge on the pump race past 73,700 francs (around $147). "In the hot season, the generator eats 40 liters (more than 10 gallons) per day." 
 
 Waiting his turn behind the minibus was 50-year-old computer tech Nouhoum Kamate, who was sitting in the suffocating heat of his unventilated old-model Mercedes. A government employee, he had come to the gas station with his March paycheck. It's unclear if the junta will be able to pay civil servants in April because the country's bank account is now frozen. 
 
 "I got my salary this past month, but next month? I don't think we will get to that point," said Kamate. "I think we will find a solution. They can't do this embargo forever." 
 
 The soldiers who grabbed power said they did so because of the former president's mishandling of an insurgency in the north by Tuareg rebels. Since the coup, however, the rebels have effectively seized control of the entire northern half of the nation, taking the three major towns of Kidal, Gao and Timbuktu over the weekend. 
 
 A former minister, Mohamed Ag Erlaf, identified himself as the chief negotiator for Mali's junta and said the main rebel group that seized the north is willing to hold talks on the future of the country. Reached by telephone, Erlaf said Tuesday that the rebel National Movement for the Liberation of the Azawad is open to discussions. 
 
 However, an NMLA spokesman in Paris told France 24 TV late Monday that the rebels have had no direct contact with the junta which toppled Mali's government. Moussa Ag Attaher said they do not recognize coup leader Capt. Amadou Haya Sanogo. 
 
 He said: "Neither the international community nor the population of Mali recognize him. If we are to negotiate, it needs to be with someone that is recognized." 
 
 ___ 
 
 Associated Press Writer Michelle Faul contributed to this report from Niamey, Niger.
– Since we last checked in, the situation in Mali following a soldiers' coup has spiraled, with rising concerns over food and gas shortages, violence, and indeed the country's "very existence," according to Le Monde. An update: The coup has driven more than 200,000 people from their homes to other parts of the region, the AP reports. The UN worries that major food shortages could be imminent, and "mayhem in these towns and cities is increasing," says a rep. Neighboring countries have established an embargo against the rebels who ousted the president; they've closed off their borders and frozen the country's regional bank account. That has prompted residents of Mali, which imports all its fuel, to rush to gas stations to collect fuel. The country's electricity grid may also be headed for failure. UNESCO is citing a threat to Timbuktu, a World Heritage Site full of "architectural wonders," notes the BBC. Mosques there are "essential to the preservation of the identity of the people of Mali," says the group. Yet "nothing seems to be able to stop" the Tuareg coup, Le Monde reports. West African leaders need to help Mali's military fight back before the instability spreads beyond the country's borders.