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The landlocked West African country has closed educational facilities and universities countrywide due to a acute fuel scarcity resulting from a embargo on petroleum supplies imposed by Islamist insurgents.

Minister of Education stated on state television that all education institutions would be inactive until the ninth of November, explaining that the movement of employees and students had been affected by the imposed limitations.

He asserted that the authorities were “making every effort” to end the crisis so that educational activities could resume on 10 November.

For a number of weeks, Mali has been facing a energy deficit, particularly in the capital Bamako, after armed groups from an al-Qaeda affiliate imposed a blockade by striking fuel trucks on primary roads.

Mali is without coastal access, so all energy resources are brought in by truck from bordering countries such as Senegal and the neighboring nation.

Long queues have been forming around fuel outlets in Bamako in recent weeks, and the city's typically busy streets have now apparently fallen quiet.

The military government had earlier this month assured the public that it was only a temporary issue, but the crisis has continued.

Last week, the United States diplomatic office in the capital announced that non-essential diplomatic staff and their relatives would evacuate Mali amid the intensifying fuel shortage and increasing security concerns.

It said that the energy interruptions had disrupted the supply of electricity and had the “capacity to affect” the overall security situation in unexpected forms.

Mali is currently ruled by a military junta under the leadership of Gen Assimi Goïta, who seized power in a coup in 2021.

The ruling council had public backing when it took power, promising to address the long-running security crisis prompted by a autonomy movement in the northern territories by ethnic Tuaregs, which was then taken over by jihadist fighters.

The international UN troops and European soldiers had been sent in a decade ago to deal with the growing rebellion.

The international troops have departed since the junta took over, and the ruling council has contracted private military contractors to combat the violence.

However, the militant uprising has continued and significant areas of the northern and eastern zones of the state remain outside government control.