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Mali has temporarily halted educational facilities and colleges across the nation due to a acute energy crisis resulting from a blockade on fuel imports enforced by Islamist insurgents.

The Education Minister stated on state television that all education institutions would stay shut until the ninth of November, clarifying that the travel of personnel and pupils had been disrupted by the imposed limitations.

He asserted that the government officials were “making every effort” to resolve the crisis so that academic sessions could continue on the tenth of November.

For several weeks, the nation has been grappling with a fuel shortage, especially in the administrative center, after insurgents from an al-Qaeda affiliate initiated a blockade by striking tankers on key routes.

Mali is without coastal access, so all petroleum products are brought in by truck from bordering countries such as its western neighbor and Ivory Coast.

Extended lines have been forming around petrol stations in Bamako in the last several days, and the city's usually crowded streets have now allegedly become deserted.

The junta-led administration had previously reassured residents that it was only a passing concern, but the emergency has endured.

Recently, the United States diplomatic office in Bamako declared that non-essential diplomatic staff and their families would evacuate the country amid the worsening fuel shortage and growing safety issues.

It explained that the energy interruptions had disrupted the power distribution and had the “capacity to affect” the general safety conditions in unforeseen manners.

The West African nation is presently governed by a army council headed by the military leader, who assumed authority in a takeover in two years ago.

The ruling council had popular support when it came to authority, vowing to address the ongoing instability triggered by a independence uprising in the north by the Tuareg population, which was then co-opted by jihadist fighters.

The international UN troops and European soldiers had been stationed in a decade ago to combat the growing rebellion.

These forces have withdrawn since the junta took over, and the ruling council has contracted foreign fighters to address the insecurity.

However, the jihadist insurgency has endured and significant areas of the northern and eastern territories of the nation remain outside government control.