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Mali has suspended educational facilities and higher learning institutions countrywide due to a acute fuel scarcity triggered by a embargo on fuel imports enforced by Islamist insurgents.

The Education Minister announced on national broadcast that all learning centers would be inactive until November 9th, clarifying that the movement of employees and students had been affected by the restrictions.

He stated that the authorities were “making every effort” to end the emergency so that academic sessions could continue on November 10th.

For a number of weeks, Mali has been grappling with a petrol crisis, notably in the main city, after insurgents from an jihadist network imposed a blockade by targeting fuel trucks on primary roads.

The country is surrounded by land, so all energy resources are transported by land routes from neighboring states such as Senegal and Ivory Coast.

Long queues have been snaking around fuel outlets in Bamako in the last several days, and the city's usually crowded streets have now reportedly become deserted.

The ruling military council had in recent days reassured the public that it was only a short-term problem, but the emergency has persisted.

In the past few days, the US Embassy in the capital declared that secondary diplomatic employees and their relatives would evacuate the country amid the worsening energy crisis and growing protection worries.

It said that the energy interruptions had impacted the supply of electricity and had the “ability to disturb” the overall security situation in unpredictable ways.

The West African nation is currently ruled by a armed forces administration under the leadership of Gen Assimi Goïta, who assumed authority in a military overthrow in recently.

The junta had public backing when it assumed control, committing to address the protracted safety emergency triggered by a separatist rebellion in the north by the Tuareg population, which was then hijacked by Islamist militants.

The UN peacekeeping mission and European soldiers had been sent in 2013 to address the escalating insurgency.

Both have departed since the new administration came in, and the military government has hired Russian mercenaries to address the violence.

Nevertheless, the Islamist rebellion has continued and extensive regions of the northern and eastern territories of the country remain beyond state authority.