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Mali has suspended schools and higher learning institutions countrywide due to a critical petrol shortage resulting from a embargo on fuel imports implemented by jihadist fighters.

The Education Minister declared on public media that all learning centers would remain closed until the ninth of November, explaining that the movement of staff and pupils had been affected by the imposed limitations.

He stated that the authorities were “making every effort” to alleviate the emergency so that classes could restart on the tenth of November.

For a number of weeks, Mali has been grappling with a petrol crisis, particularly in the capital Bamako, after insurgents from an jihadist network initiated a restriction by striking fuel trucks on key routes.

Mali is surrounded by land, so all energy resources are delivered by road from neighboring states such as its western neighbor and Ivory Coast.

Lengthy waits have been forming around gas pumps in the main city in the last several days, and the city's usually crowded streets have now reportedly grown silent.

The junta-led administration had previously promised citizens that it was only a short-term problem, but the emergency has persisted.

Recently, the US Embassy in the capital declared that non-essential diplomatic staff and their families would evacuate the country amid the deteriorating fuel shortage and escalating security concerns.

It noted that the fuel disruptions had affected the supply of electricity and had the “ability to disturb” the broader protection environment in unforeseen manners.

Mali is now led by a army council led by Gen Assimi Goïta, who assumed authority in a military overthrow in two years ago.

The military government had popular support when it assumed control, committing to deal with the protracted safety emergency triggered by a separatist rebellion in the north by Tuareg communities, which was then hijacked by Islamist militants.

The UN peacekeeping mission and France's military had been stationed in 2013 to address the escalating insurgency.

Both have departed since the junta took over, and the current administration has employed private military contractors to address the insecurity.

Nonetheless, the Islamist rebellion has persisted and extensive regions of the northern and eastern zones of the country remain outside government control.