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Mali has temporarily halted schools and higher learning institutions across the nation due to a acute petrol shortage caused by a blockade on fuel imports implemented by Islamist insurgents.

The Education Minister declared on national broadcast that all academic facilities would stay shut until November 9th, noting that the travel of personnel and students had been affected by the restrictions.

He asserted that the authorities were “working tirelessly” to alleviate the emergency so that educational activities could continue on November 10th.

For several weeks, the nation has been facing a petrol crisis, especially in the capital Bamako, after insurgents from an al-Qaeda affiliate enforced a blockade by targeting tankers on major highways.

The country is landlocked, so all energy resources are brought in by road from neighboring states such as its western neighbor and Ivory Coast.

Long queues have been forming around gas pumps in Bamako in recent weeks, and the city's usually crowded streets have now reportedly fallen quiet.

The junta-led administration had in recent days promised the public that it was only a passing concern, but the situation has persisted.

Last week, the American diplomatic mission in the capital declared that secondary diplomatic employees and their families would leave the country amid the intensifying fuel shortage and escalating security concerns.

It said that the petroleum supply issues had affected the supply of electricity and had the “ability to disturb” the general safety conditions in unpredictable ways.

The West African nation is presently governed by a military junta led by Gen Assimi Goïta, who assumed authority in a military overthrow in two years ago.

The junta had popular support when it took power, vowing to tackle the protracted safety emergency triggered by a separatist rebellion in the northern region by Tuareg communities, which was then co-opted by extremist groups.

The international UN troops and French forces had been sent in a decade ago to combat the growing rebellion.

The international troops have left since the junta took over, and the military government has hired private military contractors to address the instability.

Nevertheless, the Islamist rebellion has persisted and significant areas of the northern and eastern territories of the nation remain outside government control.