General Assimi Goita, the head of Mali’s military junta, spoke for the first time on Monday about the country’s fuel crisis.
The crisis stems from a jihadi group’s blockade of fuel tankers entering the landlocked West African nation.
He was attending a meeting with Bougouni regional authorities during a trip in the south of the country to inaugurate the opening of a lithium mine.
Militants from the JNIM group announced a ban on fuel imports from neighboring countries into Mali in early September, after authorities said early this year they were cutting down fuel supplies to remote areas as a measure to squeeze the jihadis in their hideouts.