Mali’s transitional leader, General Assimi Goita, has granted a presidential pardon to French national Yann Christian Bernard Vezilier, who was serving a 20-year prison sentence for undermining the West African country’s security.
The Malian government announced the move in a decree issued on Thursday, saying it requires Vezilier’s “immediate removal” from the West African country.
The authorities stressed that the clemency “does not call into question the facts established” by the court during a trial in which “all the rights of the defense were respected.”
Vezilier was arrested in Bamako in August 2025 alongside several Malian military officers, including two generals. Bamako accused him of working for French intelligence and recruiting political figures, civil-society representatives, and military personnel for activities intended to destabilize the transitional government.
A Malian court convicted him in June of “undermining the external security” of the state. He was also reportedly fined 3.6 million CFA francs (about $6,400) and barred from Mali for 22 years.
France confirmed after his arrest that Vezilier worked at its embassy in Bamako but rejected the accusations as “baseless.” The French Foreign Ministry argued that he held diplomatic accreditation and was protected from arrest under the Vienna Convention.
On Thursday, Bamako said an unnamed “brother country” whose “good offices, exercised discreetly and in scrupulous respect for Mali’s sovereignty,” helped secure the pardon. It described Goita’s decision as a gesture reflecting his commitment to “peace and dialogue,” as well as Mali’s traditions of “forgiveness, hospitality, and greatness.”
The case further strained already fraught relations between Mali and its former colonial ruler. Ties between Bamako and Paris deteriorated after the military seized power in coups in 2020 and 2021. Mali and its allies Niger and Burkina Faso have since expelled French forces, accusing Paris of supporting terrorism to undermine their military-led governments. The three Sahel states have turned to new partners, including Russia, to combat a protracted jihadist insurgency they say French troops failed to quell during a decade-long counterterrorism mission.