North to South and back again – Bangladesh to Australia

New flight plans are set – a few hours ago we received our permit to land in Dakar for Feb 20 so tomorrow we will fly to the Canary Islands and to Senegal the following day and then onward to Togo. We are adding Senegal to our stops because of a NOTAM stating that we are not permitted to overfly Mali. As this adds a number of miles to an already long flight and so we will need to stop for a night in Senegal.

I read up a bit on the conflict in Mali and the reason for the NOTAM. From my understanding France and its allies in a European force are withdrawing their troops from Mali. They have been involved in the fight against Islamic militants since 2013. Mali is one of the poorest countries in the world. There has been a breakdown in diplomatic relations and growing hostility from Mali’s governing military junta and in response to the demand from Bamako’s ruling junta to leave immediately. Mali’s army seized power in a coup in 2020.