AVOID MUSLIM MALI 

Mali military camp is attacked a day after 49 civilians and 15 soldiers were killed in assaults


A military camp in Mali’s restive north has been attacked a day after two separate assaults by al-Qaida-linked insurgents killed 49 civilians and 15 government soldiers


ByBABA AHMED Associated Press
September 7, 2023,


BAMAKO, Mali -- A military camp in Mali's restive north was attacked Friday, a day after two separate assaults by al-Qaida-linked insurgents killed 49 civilians and 15 government soldiers, the military said.


“Response and evaluation in progress,” the armed forces said in a brief statement about Friday's attack on a Malian military camp in the Gao region.


Thursday's attacks targeted a passenger boat near the city of Timbuktu on the Niger River and a military position in Bamba further downstream in Gao, the military junta said in a statement read on state television. It said responsibility for the attacks was claimed by JNIM, an umbrella coalition of armed groups aligned with al-Qaida. The group issued a statement Friday saying it also attacked the military camp.


The Niger River serves as an important transportation route in Mali, where roads are inadequate.


Mali is ranked the sixth least developed nation in the world, according to the United Nations human development index. Nearly half of the West African country’s 22 million people live below the national poverty line. The situation is worse in rural areas where deadly jihadi attacks have threatened subsistence farming — many peoples’ only real option for making money.


Thursday's attack targeted a triple-decker passenger boat near the village of Zarho, about 90 kilometers (55 miles) east of Timbuktu. The statement said the government killed about 50 assailants while responding to the attacks. It declared three days of national mourning to honor the civilians and soldiers killed in the attacks.


Malian army spokesman Souleymane Dembélé attributed the high death toll to the inability of some of the boat's passengers to swim, suggesting some might have drowned.


“When the boat was attacked, the soldiers on board exchanged fire with the terrorists. Unfortunately, many civilians who couldn’t swim jumped into the water,” Dembélé told The Associated Press.


Al-Qaida-affiliated and Islamic State-linked groups have almost doubled the territory they control in Mali in less than a year, the United Nations said in a report last month, as they take advantage of a weak government and of armed groups that signed a 2015 peace agreement.


The stalled implementation of the peace deal and sustained attacks on communities have offered the IS group and al-Qaida affiliates a chance “to re-enact the 2012 scenario,” the report said.


That’s the year when a military coup took place in the country and rebels in the north formed an Islamic state two months later. The extremist rebels were forced from power in the north with the help of a French-led military operation, but they moved from the arid north to more populated central Mali in 2015 and remain active.


In August 2020, Mali’s president was overthrown in a coup that included an army colonel who carried out a second coup and was sworn in as president in June 2021. He developed ties to Russia’s military and Russia’s Wagner mercenary group whose head, Yevgeny Prigozhin, was killed in a plane crash in Russia on Aug. 23.


Timbuktu, a fabled desert city and a UNESCO World Heritage site, has been blockaded by armed groups since late August, when the Malian army deployed reinforcements to the region. The insurgents are preventing the desert city from being supplied with basic goods.


Over 30,000 residents have fled the city and a nearby region, according to an August report by the United Nations' humanitarian agency.


The number of those in Mali who are affected by the violent attacks and are in need of humanitarian aid has grown by 17% over the last year to more than 8.8 million people, one million of whom require immediate food and health assistance, according to Whitney Elmer, deputy regional director for West and Central Africa at Mercy Corps, which has been assisting those in need. “It is a worsening situation, and it is hard to see things getting better in the immediate future,” Elmer said.


The deadly attacks come as the U.N. prepares to withdraw its 17,000-member peacekeeping mission, MINUSMA, from Mali at the government's request. The pullout is scheduled to be completed by the end of the year.


The U.N. deployed peacekeepers in 2013 and MINUSMA has become the most dangerous U.N. mission in the world, with more than 300 personnel killed.


Growing insecurity in Mali has increased instability in West Africa’s volatile Sahel region. The military vowed in the two coups since 2020 to stop the jihadi violence.


ISIS-affiliated terrorists kill at least 17 civilians in northern Mali


Attacks result of conflict between 2 major terrorist groups, says local official


Sidonie Aurore Bonny
29.06.2023
DOUALA, Cameroon


At least 17 people were killed and several others were wounded in two simultaneous attacks in the Gao region of northern Mali, a local mayor said Wednesday.


The villages of Gaena and Boya were the targets of the attacks late Tuesday perpetrated by the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS), a terrorist group affiliated with Daesh/ISIS.


The information was provided by Hamido Mohamed Bello, the first deputy mayor of Gabero, the commune where the victims' villages are located.


Armed men belonging to the ISGS attacked Boya with random gunfire, killing 14 people "around sunset," said Bello.


The second attack, in Gaena, left three people dead and several wounded and up to six people were also abducted, he added.


Bello said the local population began to flee the villages towards larger, more secure towns as they were threatened with reprisals by the assailants.


The tragedy is said to be linked to a clash between the ISGS and the al-Qaeda affiliated Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), one of whose wounded traveled to Boya, where he succumbed to his injuries, he added.


At least nine killed in triple suicide bombing in central Mali


April 22, 2023


BAMAKO, April 22 (Reuters) - At least nine people were killed and more than 60 wounded when a triple suicide bomb attack destroyed about 20 buildings in the central Mali town of Sevare early on Saturday, a spokesperson for the regional governor said.


All of those killed and wounded in Saturday's blasts were civilians, Yacouba Maiga, the spokesperson, told Reuters by phone. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.


Mali is the epicentre of a violent insurgency that took root in its arid north following a Tuareg separatist rebellion in 2012, and Sevare is home to a major Mali military base and troops from the U.N. mission in Mali.


Since the rebellion, militants with links to al Qaeda and Islamic State have spread to countries in the Sahel region south of the Sahara and more recently to coastal states, seizing territory, killing thousands and uprooting millions in the process.


Images shared on social media showed several buildings including a petrol station destroyed by the blast, as well as injured people being given assistance. Reuters could not independently verify the images.


The attack comes two days after the chief of staff of Mali's interim president, and three others were killed in an ambush.


Earlier on Saturday, the West African country's government said in a statement read on national television that "a terrorist attack" had been stopped by the army in Sevare.


"Three vehicles filled with explosives were destroyed by army drone fire," the statement said, without giving further details on casualties.


Separately on Saturday, the Malian army said in a statement that a military helicopter returning from a mission had crashed in a residential neighbourhood in the capital, Bamako, and that it was assessing the crash site.


3 UN peacekeepers killed, 5 wounded by roadside bomb in Mali


The United Nations says three of its peacekeepers were killed and five others wounded by a roadside bomb in Mali


By BABA AHMED

Associated Press
February 21, 2023


BAMAKO, Mali -- Three United Nations peacekeepers were killed and five others wounded by a roadside bomb in central Mali on Tuesday, according to the U.N.


The bomb struck a supply convoy near the village of Songobia, the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali known as MINUSMA said in a statement.


The U.N. Security Council and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres strongly condemned the attack in separate statements that also said attacks against U.N. peacekeepers may constitute war crimes under international law.


Council members called on Mali’s transitional government to swiftly investigate the attack with the support of MINUSMA and bring the perpetrators to justice.


The council expressed concern about the security situation in Mali and the transnational dimension of the terrorist threat in the Sahel region. It underlined that peace in the region won’t be achieved without a combination of political, security, peacebuilding and development efforts that benefit all regions of Mali as well as implementation of the 2015 peace agreement.


Earlier, El-Ghassim Wane, the head of MINUSMA, said: “I strongly condemn this attack and present my heartfelt condolences to the families and brothers in arms of the late blue helmets.”


The incident illustrates the complex environment in which the peacekeepers are working, he said.


Jihadi violence linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group has wracked Mali for a decade and left thousands of people dead. The war-torn West African country is one of the world’s most dangerous places with a peacekeeping mission.


For the ninth consecutive year, Mali had the most peacekeepers killed while deployed there, the U.N. reported in January. Including the peacekeepers from Tuesday, 168 have been killed in the country since 2013, according to the U.N.


Since Mali’s military seized power in two coups starting in 2020, a junta led by Col. Assimi Goita has had tense relations with the international community and constrained the mission's ability to operate.


Countries such as Benin, Germany, Sweden, Ivory Coast and the United Kingdom have announced troop withdrawals, according to the International Crisis Group.


An internal review of the mission in January said restrictions imposed by the junta have exposed personnel to security risks. The loss of participating countries will put the mission under additional pressure, as it will lose more than 2,250 troops, the report said.


Islamist militants in Mali kill hundreds, displace thousands in eastern advance


By:Reuters
Updated: Oct 14, 2022


By Tiemoko Diallo BAMAKO (Reuters) – Islamist militants have advanced further into eastern Mali in recent days, seizing territory, killing hundreds of civilians and forcing thousands to flee, regional Malian officials and analysts said.


The gains by the militants highlight Mali’s struggle to fill the vacuum following the departure of French and other European forces, while relations with neighbouring Niger have deteriorated, preventing joint military operations near the Niger and Burkina Faso borders.


Heavy fighting between Tuareg separatists and the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) group has been reported in Menaka region, where Malian forces took over a French military camp in June.


While the offensive started in March, France’s pullout “left a vacuum and lifted a lot of pressure”, said Heni Nsaiba, senior researcher at the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), a U.S.-based crisis monitoring group.


Hundreds have been killed since March, mainly civilians, as jihadists have battled their way into Menaka and the neighbouring Gao region, according to ACLED data, Nsaiba added.


Islamic State-linked fighters are the major perpetrators of that violence, according to the U.N. Secretary General’s report to the Security Council released on Thursday.


This month, Islamist militants took over the rural Ansongo district, near the border with Niger, a local official and pro-government militia said.


“Jihadists stopped several buses and forced drivers to make women sit at the back and men in the front,” Yacouba Mamadou Maiga, the deputy mayor of Ouattagouna, one of Ansongo’s seven municipalities told Reuters via telephone on Monday.


Towns under pressure


Thousands of people have fled to towns in Menaka and Gao, home to another military base from which Malian troops are battling the insurgency with the help of hired Russian fighters.


“Hundreds have died,” Maiga said, unable to provide a precise figure.


A coalition of ethnic Tuareg militia groups mobilised its own forces this month to prevent mass killings, looting and economic destruction in Menaka and surrounding regions, it said in a statement.


The U.N. has also reinforced peacekeeping patrols in and around Menaka city, where over 25,500 displaced civilians have sought refuge, putting pressure on food, water, farmland and medical supplies.


Mali has faced instability since 2012, when Islamist militants hijacked a Tuareg rebellion in the north.


France intervened to help Malian forces push them out in 2013, but the militants have since regrouped and spread across the Sahel and further south towards coastal states, threatening their political stability, western interests in the region.


Growing acrimony between Western powers and military leaders who seized power in a 2020 coup pushed France to move its counter-insurgency operations to Niger this year.


Other European countries have withdrawn troops, often citing Mali’s collaboration with Russian mercenaries.


In Menaka and Gao, Malian troops and the few remaining international forces that back them are increasingly confined to the towns that host their bases.


“They carry out an operation… then they withdraw,” said Nsaiba. “ISGS have really expanded, they continue to gain influence.”


Suspected Islamist Militants Kill 132 Civilians in Central Mali


June 21, 2022 9:32 AM
Annie Risemberg
VOICE OF AMERICA
BAMAKO, MALI —


Mali's military government says Islamist militants have massacred 132 civilians in the central Mopti region, in one of the deadliest attacks of the decade-long militant insurgency.


Mali has declared three days of mourning after gunmen suspected to be Islamist militants killed 132 villagers in the central Mopti region.


The attack on three villages the evening of June 18 is one of the deadliest since Mali’s conflict began in 2012.
A government statement was read on state TV ORTM Monday night by presenter Mariam Koné.


She says the government condemns with the utmost rigor the attacks and abuses perpetrated against peaceful populations. Kone says the government reassures that all measures will be taken to find and bring the perpetrators of these criminal acts before the court.


The attack in Mopti is the latest in a wave of attacks on civilians in Mali and neighboring Burkina Faso.


Last week in Burkina Faso, militants killed 86 civilians in an attack in the northern Seytenga area.


The U.N. mission to Mali, known as MINUSMA, in a statement Monday night condemned the attacks in central Mali.


The statement noted recent attacks also took place in several areas of Gao region, causing the deaths of dozens of civilians.


Local officials told AFP this week that 24 civilians were killed in Ebak, Mali, 35 kilometers north of the regional capital.


A local political movement reported that Islamist militants killed 22 men in Izingaz in Menaka region on June 12.


Mali’s military government has not commented on the growing insecurity and violence in the country’s northern regions.


The rise in violence comes as the French military is in the process of withdrawing from the region over Mali’s working with Russian mercenaries.


Human Rights Watch and news reports quote locals saying Mali’s army and Russian mercenaries killed hundreds of civilians in Moura, in central Mali, in March.


The military denies killing any civilians, says there are only Russian “instructors” in Mali, and says the Moura attack killed more than 200 Islamist militants.


ISIS terror strikes: Militant group claims responsibility for massacre in Mali – 33 dead

 

ISIS has claimed responsibility for an attack which killed 33 soldiers in Mali, in a clear illustration of Africa's rising terror threat.

 

Express

By CIARAN MCGRATH

March 21, 2021

 

France 24 journalist Wassim Nasir tweeted: "#Mali the #EI claims the attack on #Tessit#Ansongo "33 dead" in the area of the three borders." The attack, which happened on March 15, involved 100 suspected Islamic extremists on motorcycles which ambushed the Malian military convoy in the country's volatile north, killing at least 33 people in the deadliest attack since the overthrow of the country's president in a coup last year.

 

Fourteen other people were hurt in the attack near the town, which is about 37 miles southeast of Ansongo in the Gao region, according to a military statement.

 

Up to now no group had claimed it carried out the attack, but Islamic extremists with links to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group operate in the region.

 

Islamic State said in a statement that its fighters captured three vehicles as well as weapons and ammunition, according to SITE.

 

The group has claimed responsibility for previous attacks on either side of the border that have killed dozens of Malian and Nigerien soldiers.

 

It also carried out the 2017 ambush in the Nigerien village of Tongo Tongo that killed four American special forces troops and five Nigerien soldiers.

 

Earlier this week Mali's military said that the UN peacekeeping mission referred to as MINUSMA had helped evacuate injured soldiers.

 

Helicopters from France's mission in Mali, known as Operation Barkhane also assisted.

 

In 2013, Islamic extremist rebels were toppled in Mali’s northern cities with French military assistance.

 

However, the insurgents quickly regrouped in the desert and have since launched frequent attacks on the Malian army.

 

They have expanded their operations well into the country's intertior, inflamin tensions between ethnic groups in the area.

 

President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita was forced from office in August after his home was surrounded by soldiers who then fired their guns into the air.

 

Facing international pressure, the junta that seized power then appointed a civilian-led government tasked with leading the country through an 18-month transition to new elections.

Mr Nasr subsequently tweeted: "This puts an end to the one-year “containment” parenthesis imposed by the surge.#Barkhane (period between the Pau - N'Djaména meetings) & the conflict between #JNIM /#AQMI -#EI."

 

Speaking last month, French President Emmanuel Macron ruled out any immediately scaling-back of France's 5,100-strong Barkhane forces.

 

He told reporters in Paris: “Changes that are likely to be significant will be made to our military deployment in the Sahel when the time comes, but they will not be made immediately.

 

“They will result first of all from a collective discussion with our Sahel partners and with the partners who have accepted to help us, and they will be based on the results obtained and the degree of engagement from our partners.”

 

He added: “In the coming months, we will not change our presence.

 

"We will launch other important operations, and we will above all be reinforced by the Chadian battalion, by the Malian mobilisation, and by contributions from Mauritania.”

 

 

Dozens of Malian troops killed in jihadist ambush on military convoy

 

15/06/2020 

France 24

 

A weekend ambush on a military convoy in central Mali left 24 soldiers dead and an unspecified number missing, the army said Monday, blaming the assault on jihadists.

 

In posts on social media, the army did not enumerate the missing but said eight soldiers escaped the attack on around a dozen vehicles Sunday at Bouka Were, around 100 kilometres (60 miles) from the border with Mauritania. 

 

It was the latest in a string of assaults by jihadists who unleashed a revolt in northern Mali in 2012 that has spread to Burkina Faso and Niger despite the presence of thousands of French and UN troops.

 

A senior military official said earlier that some of the vehicles were able to extricate themselves from the ambush, but that of the 64 troops who had been in the convoy, only about 20 were present at a roll call, the source said.

 

"A search is under way to determine the fate of soldiers who have been listed missing," he said on condition of anonymity.

 

Another military officer and an official in the nearby town of Diabaly, who also asked not to be named, confirmed his account.

 

The Islamist insurgency, mainly led by groups linked to Al-Qaeda or the so-called Islamic State group, has claimed thousands of military and civilian lives and forced hundreds of thousands from their homes.

 

Violence in recent months has engulfed central Mali, an ethnic mosaic where the state exercises little control and jihadist atrocities feed tit-for-tat assaults among rival communities.     

 

The al-Qaeda-linked group Katiba Macina, led by an ethnic Fulani (Peul) called Amadou Koufa, is recruiting among the Fulani herding community, which has long been at odds with the Bambara and Dogon farming groups. These groups, in turn, have created their own "self-defence" organisations.

 

On Saturday, two Egyptian soldiers with the UN peacekeeping force MINUSMA were killed when their convoy came under attack in northwestern Mali, the United Nations said.           

 

Keita under pressure        

 

The violence has weakened the hand of President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who is facing a rising clamour of protest and demands for political renewal.

 

Tens of thousands of people rallied in the capital Bamako on June 5 on the heels of demonstrations in May over the outcome of parliamentary elections, which the president won, as well as over coronavirus restrictions.

 

More protests have been scheduled for this Friday.

 

Keita, who has been in power since 2013 in the former French colony, on Sunday reached out to the coalition behind the protests, saying, "My door is open and my hand always extended."

 

After jihadist attacks surged in February, Keita broke with precedent to say that he was seeking to forge a dialogue with certain rebel leaders.

 

"The number of deaths in the Sahel is becoming exponential and it's time that certain paths be explored," he said in an interview with French media. 

 

However, Keita said at the time of his announcement that he had not received a response from jihadist leaders, and indications have yet to emerge that any such dialogue has developed.

 

 

27 killed, some burned alive in jihadi attacks on predominantly Christian villages in Mali

 

By Samuel Smith, CP Reporter

Christian Post

JUNE 04, 2020

 

Suspected Islamic radicals killed at least 27 people, some of whom were burned alive, in a series of attacks that spanned from last Tuesday to Wednesday evening in three villages that advocates say are predominantly inhabited by Christians in Central Mali, officials said. 

 

As escalations in communal violence have plagued the West African country in recent years, local officials told Reuters that attacks in the villages of Bankass, Koro and Tillé were carried out by armed men on motorcycles whom they believe to be jihadists that claim to protect Fulani herders from Dogon farmers.

 

"We were surprised by the attack on the village of Tillé,” Doucombo Deputy Mayor Yacouba Kassogué told the news agency. “Seven were killed, all Dogons, some of them burned alive.”

 

At least 20 additional people were reported to have been killed in neighboring villages of Bankass and Koro. 

 

According to local officials, most of the victims in those two villages were shot or burned to death. 

 

According to the interdenominational Christian aid agency Barnabas Fund, the attacks carried out last week in Central Mali victimized “mainly-Christian Dogon villages.”

 

“Since 2016, jihadists have been waging a war to occupy north and central Mali with the declared aim of establishing Sharia (Islamic law) throughout the country,” a statement from the aid agency reads. 

 

“Mali suffered its worst year of extremist violence in seven years in 2019. Jihadi militants carried out murderous attacks in the north and central area, laying waste to Christian villages and causing hundreds to flee with only the clothes on their backs.”

 

Dozens were reportedly killed during a suspected Fulani attack in the mainly-Christian village of Sobame Da, a village in the Mopti region of central Mali, in June 2019. 

 

Although initial reports suggested that over 100 were killed in Sobame Da, officials later revised the death toll to 35, including 24 children, on grounds that officials had earlier confused missing persons with those killed. 

 

However, some community leaders argued that the initial death toll was accurate and that investigators did not uncover everybody in homes burned by the perpetrators, according to The Washington Post. 

 

Mali, a predominantly Muslim country in West Africa, ranks as the 29th-worst country in the world when it comes to Christian persecution on Open Doors USA’s 2020 World Watch List. 

 

According to the Joshua Project, the Dogon community has traditionally celebrated animistic religion but are increasingly turning to Islam “for lack of an alternative.” Today, the majority of Dogon communities are Muslim but about 11% believe in Jesus. 

 

“In the few villages where Christianity has been lived out by missionaries, or locals who have become Christians elsewhere, one can indeed see the growth of the Christian faith,” the Joshua Project reports. 

 

According to an Open Doors dossier on Mali, Islamic militants in the country “have been busy attacking the country's security forces and Christians.” The document reports that “Christian villages were targeted and destroyed, with the attacks sometimes having both ethnic and religious elements.” 

 

"With the increasing attacks in the Mopti region and other areas, church schools and churches have been burned down, hundreds of schools (including Christian schools) have been closed down in 2019,” an Open Doors field researcher was quoted as saying. 

 

In recent years, Mali has seen escalations in violent attacks between Dogon farmers and Fulani herders. 

 

In March 2019, Dogon militias were blamed for carrying out an attack that killed as many as 150 Fulani herders in Ogossagou. Another attack against Fulani in Ogossagou in February reportedly killed 31. Both Dogon and Fulani militants have been accused of carrying out reprisal attacks.

 

 

Militants kill 54 in attack on Mali army post, ISIS claims responsibility

 

"Heavily armed unidentified men attacked around noon. The attack started with shellfire," government spokesman Yaya Sangare said.

 

Nov. 3, 2019, 12:36 AM PDT

By Reuters

 

BAMAKO, Mali  At least 53 soldiers and one civilian have been killed in an attack on an army post in northern Mali, the government said, in one of the deadliest strikes against the West African country's military in recent memory.

 

Islamic state claimed responsibility for the attack via its Amaq news agency on Saturday, without providing evidence.

 

The militant group has posted dozens of claims of responsibility for attacks in several countries since U.S. special forces killed its previous leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi last weekend.

 

The authorities first reported the attack in Indelimane, Menaka region, on Friday, but gave a lower provisional death toll.

 

"Heavily armed unidentified men attacked around noon. The attack started with shellfire ... Then they retreated toward Niger," government spokesman Yaya Sangare told Reuters on Saturday.

 

He added the death toll remained provisional as corpses were undergoing identification, and that the army was undertaking a combing operation on the ground with support from international forces, including French troops from the Barkhane operation and U.N. peacekeepers.

 

"The dispatched reinforcements found 54 bodies including one civilian, 10 survivors, and found considerable material damage," Sangare said on Twitter earlier on Saturday.

 

 

Prime minister and entire government of Mali resign as Islamist violence surges

 

By Agence France-Presse

19 APRIL 2019

 

Mali's prime minister resigned along with his entire government on Thursday following criticism over their handling of an upsurge of violence in the centre of the country and a massacre last month that left 160 people dead.

 

A statement from President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita's office said he had accepted Soumeylou Boubeye Maiga's resignation and that of his government two weeks after mass protests erupted over the rising tide of violence.

 

Lawmakers from both ruling and opposition parties had submitted a motion of no confidence against the government on Wednesday, blaming Maiga and his administration for failing to clamp down on the unrest.

 

"A prime minister will be named very soon and a new government will be put in place after consultations with all political forces" from both the ruling and opposition sides, the statement from Keita's office said.

 

The president had on Tuesday said in a televised address that he had "heard the anger", without explicitly naming the prime minister.

 

The government had come under mounting pressure over its handling of violence in the restive Mopti region and especially a massacre on March 23 in which 160 people were killed in the village of Ogossagou near the border with Burkina Faso.

 

Members of the Dogon ethnic group - a hunting and farming community with a long history of tensions with the nomadic Fulani people over access to land - were blamed for the mass killing.

 

An AFP reporter at the time said many homes in the village had been burned down and the ground was littered with corpses.

 

The Fulani have also been accused of supporting a jihadist preacher, Amadou Koufa, who rose to prominence in central Mali four years ago.

 

So-called self-defence groups emerged in the Dogon community with the declared role of providing protection against the insurgents.

 

But the militia, called the Dan Nan Ambassagou, also used its powers to attack the Fulani, and was ordered to be dissolved after the village massacre.

 

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Bamako on April 5 to protest against the upsurge of violence, accusing the government of not doing enough to stop it.

 

The protest was called by Muslim religious leaders, organisations representing the Fulani community, opposition parties and civil society groups.

 

Mali has been struggling to restore stability since Islamist extremists linked to Al-Qaeda took control of the country's vast desert north in early 2012.

 

While the jihadists were largely driven out in a French-led military operation that began in January 2013, huge areas are still in the grip of lawlessness, despite a 2015 peace agreement with some armed groups that sought to definitively stamp out the Islamist threat.

 

Since then, militants have shifted from the north towards the more densely populated centre of the country, where they have sharpened ancient rivalries and ethnic conflicts that date back years.

 

Jihadist attacks have also spread to Burkina Faso, Chad and Niger, forcing tens of thousands of people from their homes.

 

March's attack was the deadliest in Mali since the 2013 French-led military intervention.

 

In the aftermath of the massacre, Keita visited the village and vowed to beef up security and enforce justice.



Mali attack because of Chad-Israel relations

 

Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists claim attack on UN peacekeepers in Mali, say it was response to Chad’s renewal of diplomatic ties with Israel.

 

Elad Benari, 

21/01/19
Israel National News

 

Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists on Sunday claimed an attack on a United Nations peacekeeping base in Mali, saying the attack was in response to Chad’s renewal of diplomatic relations with Israel.

 

At least 10 peacekeepers were killed in the attack and 25 wounded, the UN mission in Mali said, according to The Associated Press. The dead peacekeepers were Chadian nationals.

 

The Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimeen group claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement posted on the Telegram messaging service, according to AP.

 

The attack came as Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu visited Chad, where he met President Idriss Deby and the two announced that the countries would renew their diplomatic relations.

 

Mali is under threat from a number of extremist groups affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (ISIS) organization, and attacks have moved from the north to central Mali.

 

French forces intervened in Mali in 2013 to drive back fighters who had hijacked a Tuareg uprising a year earlier, and some 4,000 French troops remain there. The UN Security Council then deployed peacekeepers, which have been targets of jihadists.

 

In 2015, terrorists affiliated with Al-Qaeda attacked a hotel in the Mali capital of Bamako, taking more than 170 people hostage.

 

During the attack, 20 hostages were killed, among them an Israeli, 58-year-old Shmuel Benalal.

 

 

Mali car bomb attack kills four civilians, wounds 31

 

1 JUL 2018

TRT World

 

The ambush, which involved a car bomb explosion followed by gunfire, took place two days after militants killed at least six people during a raid on a military headquarters in central Mali.

An attack on a military patrol in northern Mali on Sunday killed four civilians and wounded 31 other people including eight French soldiers, Mali's security and defence ministries said.

 

The ambush, which involved a car bomb explosion followed by gunfire, took place two days after militants killed at least six people during a raid on a military headquarters in central Mali, a country where French troops are helping combat militant activity across its vast desert reaches.

 

The deteriorating security situation one month ahead of presidential elections points to the difficulty international partners face restoring peace in Mali, which has become a launchpad for attacks by groups linked to al Qaeda and Daesh across West Africa.

 

"From hospital sources, the provisional record after the suicide attack against a Barkhane patrol in Gao today...was 4 civilians dead and 31 seriously injured, including 8 from Barkhane," Mali's security ministry said on Twitter. Barkhane is the name of the near 4,000-strong French force stationed in its former colonies across the Sahel region.

 

A spokesman for the defence ministry confirmed the figures.

 

"I confirm that it was a car bomb that drove into a joint Barkhane/Malian army patrol," Boubacar Diallo said.

 

No claim of responsibility

 

Photos posted on social media showed black smoke billowing from an armoured vehicle surrounded by debris on a sandy road.

 

No one has claimed responsibility for the attack. But violence by Islamist militants has spread across the sparsely-populated Sahel in recent years, slowly taking back control lost when French forces knocked back an uprising by Tuareg rebels and militants in 2013.

 

Western powers have provided funding to a regional force made up of soldiers from Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mauritania combating jihadists. But the so-called G5 force has been hobbled by delays disbursing the money and poor coordination between the five countries.

 

French President Emmanuel Macron, who last year complained that G5 was taking too long to set up, is due in Mauritania on Monday to discuss security in the region.

 

France's army spokesman, Patrik Steiger, confirmed that civilians had been killed on Sunday and the army was assessing the state of the 30-strong French patrol that came under attack.

 

He said the explosion happened near three French vehicles.

 

 

At least six dead in Mali after attack on regional anti-terror force base


Suicide bomber tried to enter HQ of five-state force fighting jihad in the Sahel, source says


Agence France-Presse in Bamako

Fri 29 Jun 2018


Islamist militants have attacked the Malian headquarters of a regional anti-terror taskforce, killing six people and leaving many injured, according to a provisional toll.


A suicide bomber tried to penetrate the base at Sévaré in central Mali, according to a security source. A local orange seller, Haoussa Haidara, said “there was a huge blast” followed by exchanges of gunfire. Gunshots could still be heard an hour later.


It is the first attack on the headquarters of the joint G5 force, set up in 2017 to combat jihadist insurgents and criminal groups in the vast, unstable Sahel region of Africa. It came three days before a meeting in Nouakchott, Mauritania, between the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and the heads of the G5 Sahel states to discuss progress made by the force.


Six people were killed in the attack, according to a hospital and a military source, giving an interim toll.


We transported the bodies and the injured to the hospital, but we don’t know whether some of the injured have died in hospital. There are six dead on the ground,” the military source told the news agency Agence France-Presse.


Residents of Sévaré hid inside their homes, according to Bouba Bathily, a trader who sheltered from the gunfire in his house.

Launched with French backing in 2017, the G5 Sahel aims to pool 5,000 troops from five countries Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger. It was projected to be fully up and running in March, but its deployment has been subject to delays and equipment worries.


France intervened militarily in Mali in 2013 to help government forces drive al-Qaida-linked jihadists out of the north. But large tracts of the country remain lawless, despite a peace accord signed with ethnic Tuareg leaders in mid-2015 aimed at isolating the jihadists. The violence has spilled over into Burkina Faso and Niger.


Earlier on Friday, the French military headquarters said troops from its so-called Barkhane mission in Mali had killed or captured 15 jihadists on 22 June in a joint operation with local forces.


The clash took place in a woodland area of the Inabelbel region, south-east of Timbuktu, it said in a statement. A group of about 20 jihadists were attacked via helicopters and jet-fighter support after they were spotted by Malian commandos.



20 killed in suspected jihadist attack in Mali


AFG
5-28-18

At least 20 people, including civilians, were killed in a suspected jihadist attack in northeastern Mali near the border with Niger, sources said.


The deaths came after more than 100 people including many civilians, particularly from the Fulani and Tuareg communities, died in recent months as a result of attacks by rival armed groups in the region.


A local official in the town of Talataye - where Saturday's attack took place - said late on Sunday that the assailants arrived in three vehicles and on a motorcycle.


Khalil Toure, a teacher, added: "They opened fire on a group of people resting under a tree, killing five people on the spot and wounding two."


Jihadists have also ramped up their activities in central Mali in recent months, targeting domestic and foreign forces in violence once confined to the country's north.


France intervened militarily in Mali in 2013 to help government forces drive al-Qaeda-linked jihadists out of the north.


But large tracts of the country remain lawless despite a peace accord signed with ethnic Tuareg leaders in mid-2015 aimed at isolating the jihadists.


The violence has also spilled over into both Burkina Faso and Niger.


The French military has said the jihadist group Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) is using the border region as a haven.



Mali Church leader voices alarm as Islamists attack parishes


by Jonathan Luxmoore

posted Friday, 6 Oct 2017

Catholic Herald


Militants told Christians they would be killed if they were seen in church


Catholic leaders in Mali have warned that parishes face a growing assault by Islamic militants despite attempts to enforce a peace deal in the north African country.


Our churches and chapels are now being targeted by extremists, who’ve told Christians not to gather to pray, said Mgr Edmond Dembele, secretary-general of the Malian bishops’ conference.


The authorities are trying to reimpose control, and we may learn more about what kind of strategy is being followed, he told Catholic News Service. But we’re also alarmed the attacks are being mounted by isolated Islamist groups, acting in their own name.


Tensions were running high in September and early October in Mali’s central Mopti region after several Catholic churches were ransacked and torched, forcing parishioners to flee.


Mgr Dembele said it was unclear which groups were involved and what their motives were.


We have no security programme of our own and we rely on the authorities to provide protection and find solutions, Mgr Dembele said.


On previous occasions, the government has deployed military units in our parishes. But this still hasn’t been done against these new attacks.


The attacks occurred as the Malian government is attempting to implement the 2015 peace deal with rebel fighters. The agreement called for the rebels to be integrated into the national arm.


Under a 2015 peace deal with the government of President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, rebel fighters are to be integrated into the national army.


However, attacks by Touareg separatists and Islamist insurgents have continued, delaying the return of displaced Malians from neighbouring Niger, Mauritania and Burkina Faso. Rights groups have reported summary executions and the destruction of schools and forced recruitment of child soldiers.


Mgr Dembele said armed men had smashed their way into a church at Dobara, 500 miles north of the capital Bamako, in late September, throwing out crosses, altar furnishings and a statue of Mary, which they burned outside. Assailants also drove Catholics out of a church at Bodwal, warning they would be killed if seen praying in the church, he said.


Local parishioners were currently very afraid but not panicking, the priest said, as they urgently awaited help from government and UN forces seeking to restore order.


Christians aren’t the only ones threatened and attacked. Mali’s whole population is being victimised, Muslims included, Mgr Dembele said.


The Church official also said he and others remained confident the peace deal would succeed.


We know there’s been some prevarication, he said, and while this isn’t necessarily the fault of the state or any particular group, it’s made the situation more difficult.



Mali attack: Gunmen kill five at tourist resort


19 June 2017

BBC News


Five people were killed when gunmen stormed a tourist resort in Mali on Sunday, officials say.


The EU said a Portuguese soldier and a Malian woman who worked for the bloc's mission in Mali were among the dead.


A Malian soldier and two other civilians, one Chinese and the other Gabonese, were also killed.


An al-Qaeda-linked group said it carried out the attack near the capital Bamako. Mali has been fighting a jihadist insurgency for years.


Islamist fighters are roaming the West African country's north and centre.


"It is a jihadist attack. Malian special forces intervened and hostages have been released," Mali Security Minister Salif Traore told AFP news agency after Sunday's attack.


Four assailants were killed by security forces and four others were arrested, he said.


"We have recovered the bodies of two attackers who were killed," he said, adding that they were searching for the bodies of two others.


One of them left behind a machine gun and bottles filled with "explosive substances", he said.


The ministry said another two people had been injured.


A security ministry spokesman told Reuters news agency that 32 guests had been rescued from the Le Campement Kangaba resort, east of Bamako.


Malian special forces intervened, backed by UN soldiers and troops from a French counter-terrorism force.


Witness Boubacar Sangare was just outside the compound as the attack unfolded.


"Westerners were fleeing the encampment while two plainclothes police exchanged fire with the assailants," he said.


"There were four national police vehicles and French soldiers in armoured vehicles on the scene."


He added that a helicopter was circling overhead.


The European Union training mission in Mali, EUTM Mali, tweeted that it was aware of the attack and was supporting Malian security forces and assessing the situation.


Earlier this month, the US embassy had warned of "possible future attacks on Western diplomatic missions, other locations in Bamako that Westerners frequent".


BBC correspondent Alex Duval Smith says many expats and wealthy Malians go to Kangaba at weekends, to enjoy the pools, cocktail bar, canoeing facilities and activities for children.


A spokesman for the Portuguese armed forces, Helder Antonio da Silva Perdigao, said that the location is used by soldiers in the EUTM Mali as a place to relax between operations.


He added that soldiers from several countries were there at the time of the attack.


The Portuguese soldier who died was part of the EUTM Mali, he said.


In November 2015, at least 20 people were killed when gunmen took guests and staff hostage at the Radisson Blu hotel in Bamako.


Al-Qaeda's North African arm, Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), said it was behind that siege.


Mali has been in a state of emergency since the Radisson Blu attack. It was extended for a further six months in April.


The country's security has gradually worsened since 2013, when French forces repelled allied Islamist and Tuareg rebel fighters who had seized control of much of the north.


French troops and a 10,000-strong force of UN peacekeepers have been battling to stabilise the former French colony.




Dozens killed in suicide attack on Gao military camp in northern Mali


At least 47 people including five suicide bombers were killed when a vehicle packed with explosives detonated inside a military camp in the northern Mali city of Gao on Wednesday, the government said.


Reuters
January 18, 2017


A Reuters reporter who arrived at the camp soon after the blast, which occurred at about 9am (0900 GMT), said he saw dozens of bodies lying on the ground alongside the wounded.


Ambulances rushed to the scene as helicopters circled overhead.


It’s terrible, Gao resident Kader Touré said. The attack happened while they were having an assembly. I’ve just left the hospital where there were bodies ripped to pieces and bodies piled up.


The camp was home to government soldiers and members of various rival armed groups which jointly patrol Mali’s restive desert north in line with a UN-brokered peace accord.


The attack marks a significant setback for efforts to achieve peace in the long-tumultuous region. The UN Security Council was expected to discuss Mali on Wednesday.


A French-led military intervention in 2013 drove back Islamist militants, including al Qaeda-linked groups, which had seized northern Mali a year earlier.


However, Islamist militants still operate in the region and insecurity is aggravated by tensions between local rebel groups and pro-government militias.


French Interior Minister Bruno Le Roux described the blast as a major and highly symbolic attack in an area visited only days ago by French President François Hollande.



Extremist Pleads Guilty in Hague Court to Destroying Cultural Sites in Timbuktu

 

By MARLISE SIMONS

AUG. 22, 2016

The New York Times


PARIS - An Islamic extremist pleaded guilty on Monday at the International Criminal Court to destroying shrines and damaging a mosque in the ancient city of Timbuktu, Mali, in the court’s first prosecution of the destruction of cultural heritage as a war crime.


Prosecutors said that Ahmad al-Faqi al-Mahdi, a member of a jihadist group linked to Al Qaeda, took part in the smashing of a number of venerable centuries-old mud and stone buildings holding the tombs of holy men and scholars.

 

Mr. Mahdi, a teacher who was born in or around 1975 near Timbuktu and who studied Islamic law in a Saudi-sponsored school in Libya, was also accused of leading a morality brigade that meted out punishments like public floggings for minor infractions.


It is with deep regret and great pain that I had to enter a guilty plea on all the charges brought against me, Mr. Mahdi told the court on Monday. Begging for forgiveness, including from the people of Timbuktu, he said, I would like them to look at me like a son that has lost his way, and to accept my regrets.


Mr. Mahdi added that he was influenced by a group of deviant people from Al Qaeda and Ansar Dine, a Qaeda offshoot in Mali, and said that he hoped his punishment would serve as a purging of the evil spirits I got involved with.


He faces a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison, but prosecutors will request a sentence of nine to 11 years as part of a plea agreement.


Fatou Bensouda, the court’s chief prosecutor, said that it was Mr. Mahdi “who identified the sites to be destroyed and who provided the means to do so, including pickaxes and crowbars.


Mr. Mahdi is suspected of committing other crimes, but legal experts said the case was narrowly focused to highlight how cultural and religious buildings are deliberately singled out for destruction to obliterate an enemy’s history and identity.

The courts have been slow to recognize this, but there is a clear link between crimes committed against people and attacks on their cultural heritage, said Andras Riedlmayer, a scholar of Islamic art and architecture at Harvard.


The ethnic cleansers in the Balkans, like the jihadis in Iraq, Syria and Timbuktu and other places, are keenly aware of the significance of this, which is why they devote so much personnel and resources to the destruction of religious and cultural landmarks, Mr. Riedlmayer said.


If Mr. Mahdi had not pleaded guilty, his trial would probably have been a lengthy one, with witnesses brought to The Hague from Timbuktu and other West African desert cities. Instead, the court can now turn directly to sentencing, with a few days of hearings to help the judges assess the case.


The case comes at a time of heightened international concern about the fate of many cultural and religious monuments in the Middle East and North Africa. Places of worship, artworks and archaeological remnants, libraries, museums and other treasured sites have been destroyed by extreme Islamist groups who call them pagan or heretical, including the giant Buddha statues at Bamiyan, Afghanistan, in 2001, and more recently Nimrud, Palmyra and other pre-Islamic sites in Iraq and Syria.


No international court currently has jurisdiction over crimes in those countries, or over the continuing cultural devastation reported in Yemen.


The Mali case has its roots in 2012, when armed rebels and homegrown Islamic jihadists allied with Al Qaeda established a breakaway ministate in the northern half of the country. The jihadists imposed a harsh form of Islamic law on the population and recruited local people, including Mr. Mahdi, to help them enforce it.


After a French-led military force recaptured Timbuktu the next year, some of the jihadists disappeared and others appeared to receive amnesty under a peace deal. Mr. Mahdi, who was later arrested in Niger when French troops intercepted an arms-smuggling convoy, was the only one to end up in court in The Hague.


Most of the destroyed tombs in Timbuktu have been rebuilt using traditional masonry methods, financed by foreign donors. But tensions still run high in the city, and many residents who fled from the jihadists have yet to return notably women. Human rights activists have said that women and girls were particular targets of the extremists abuse in Timbuktu, including rape, forced marriage and sexual slavery, and that Mr. Mahdi’s brigade was complicit in that abuse; they have requested that the court expand the charges against him accordingly.


Though the case against Mr. Mahdi was a first for the International Criminal Court, another court, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia has handed down war crimes convictions for cultural destruction, specifically the shelling of architectural monuments in Dubrovnik, Croatia, and Mostar, Bosnia.


The Mali case is useful because it could help persuade other nations to pursue similar charges relating to Syria and Iraq, where no international court has yet jurisdiction, said Stephen J. Rapp, a former prosecutor and former United States ambassador at large to tribunals handling cases of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. This is not about a foot soldier killing or smashing things, but about an ideologue, someone who was given authority and who gave legal advice to the local Islamic court.


At the end of his prepared statement to the court on Monday, Mr. Mahdi said, I would like to give a piece of advice to all Muslims in the world not to get involved in the same acts I got involved with, because they will not lead to any good for humanity.



Islamist militants kill 17 soldiers in attack on Mali army base


BAMAKO | BY ADAMA DIARRA AND TIAMOKO DIALO

Reuters
July 19, 2016


Islamist militants killed 17 Malian soldiers and wounded 35 when they attacked an army base in the center of the country, firing on troop positions, burning buildings and pillaging shops, the government said.


The attack is the biggest for months on the army in Mali, a country that faces a growing threat from Islamist groups based in the desert north.


"We lost 17 men and unfortunately 35 were also wounded and these have all been transported for medical care in the region of Segou," Defence Minister Tičman Hubert Coulibaly said on state television.


"We will make sure that this coordinated terrorist attack ... is met with an appropriate response," he said, adding that the army controls the town and is hunting the militants.


Army spokesman Souleymane Maiga told Reuters the raiders briefly took control of the base in Nampala, which is set in semi-desert scrubland close to the Mauritanian border. He said Malian troops retreated to nearby Diabaly to regroup.

 

 

Mali Hotel Attack: US Citizen Among 21 Dead, American Govt. Looking for Others

 

By EMILY SHAPIRO, 
JOSH MARGOLIN, 
ANTHONY CASTELLANO, 
EMILY KNAPP


Nov 21, 2015

ABC News

 

At least 21 people died Friday -- including a U.S. citizen, the State Department said -- after 170 people were taken hostage at the Radisson Blu Hotel in Mali in West Africa, according to the Mali Ministry of Interior.

 

The attack, conducted by at least two people, began in Mali's capital city of Bamako, with gunmen storming the building. The United Nations reported Friday at least 27 were killed, including the two attackers, though Mali's government reduced that number Saturday.

 

U.S. officials were still trying to account for other Americans "who may have been at the hotel," President Obama said.

 

The president called the attack "appalling" and extended his condolences to the family of the American killed, Anita Datar, 41, vowing to be "relentless" in pursuing those responsible.

 

"On behalf of the American people I want to extend our deepest condolences to the people of Mali and the victims and families, including at least one American," he said. "These were innocent people who had everything to live for, and they’ll be remembered for the joy and love that they brought to the world."

 

A family member said Datar was in Mali "doing what she loved -- strengthening public health."

 


"She dedicated her life to her work," the family member said.


Datar was a founding board member of the non-profit Tulalens, which aims to "connect under-served communities to quality health services to improve lives," the group's website says.

 

According to her biography on the site, she was a Peace Corps volunteer in Senegal the late 1990s, went to school for public health and had a decade of experience in HIV policy.

 

Mali has declared a 10-day state of emergency in the wake of the attack. The U.S. Embassy in Bamako has lifted its "shelter in place," but still urges Americans to limit their movement around the city and be vigilant.

 

Two attackers died in the incident, said Olivier Salgado of the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Mali, though the total number of attackers was not immediately clear.

 

"They came to kill, not to take hostages.

 

A Belgian member of Parliament, Geoffrey Dieudonné, was among those killed, Belgium’s regional Parliament said. Dieudonné was training officials from Mali’s Parliament. The Parliament said the precise circumstances of his death are not yet known.

 

Three Americans made several trips into the hotel to help save others who were trapped, according to a U.S. government official.

 

A State Department Diplomatic Security Special Agent was near the hotel when he learned of the attack and rushed to the scene, according to a U.S. Government official, where he met up with two Department of Defense personnel who were part of the State Department Chief of Mission Staff.

 

A first-floor room was on fire when the trio arrived and the halls were filling with smoke. After getting in touch with the U.S. Embassy, the three learned that several U.S. State Department personnel were trapped inside the building and one was believed to be near the burning room, said the U.S. official.

 

The Americans went into the hotel, according to the U.S. official, but could not see through the smoke. They called out to a trapped person on the first floor, and in the darkness, they pulled him to safety, said the U.S. official.

 

The three Americans went back into the building several times to remove trapped Americans who were part of the Chief of Mission staff, the official said, adding that all Chief of Mission personnel are safe and accounted for. They were armed but never fired, according to the official.

 

There were 22 military and civilian U.S. Defense Department personnel in Bamako, including five at the hotel at the time of the attack, according to a defense official. Everyone was accounted for and there were no reports of injuries, the official said.

 

Some of the five U.S. military personnel in the hotel, including civilians and service-members, hid and avoided being seized by the gunmen, a defense official said.

 

One U.S. servicemember outside the hotel stepped in to help first responders move civilians from the hotel to secure locations, as Malian forces worked to clear the hotel of hostile gunmen, the defense official said, adding that U.S. forces did not directly participate in the operation.

 

Another U.S. servicemember helped at the Joint Operations Center, which was set up to respond to the attack.

 

Six U.S. citizens were rescued from the hotel, according to the U.S. Africa Command.

 

National Security Council spokesman Ned Price said the U.S. is continuing to coordinate with U.S officials to verify the location of all American citizens in Mali.

 

Price said the U.S. stands with Mali "and others in the region fighting the terrorist groups that seek to undermine Mali’s efforts to build a durable peace following the crisis in 2012 and 2013." Price said the U.S. is prepared to help Mali investigate "this tragic terrorist attack."

 

The hotel said in a statement, "Our highest concern is the safety of all our guests and employees in the hotel. We are in constant contact with the authorities there and will share further information with you when we have it."

 

Radisson Blu receptionist Tambacouye Diarra told ABC News that he was at the reception desk surrounded by special forces. He said the gunmen were also surrounded by special forces in the hotel.

 

A gunman shot in his direction approximately 10 times, Diarra said. He said a gunman ran after him, but he was able to escape. Diarra said he saw people getting shot and some injured people being evacuated out of the hotel.

 

Among those in the hotel were three U.N. personnel, who are now safe, according to Salgado, and Air France and Turkish Airlines crew members, who are also safe, according to the airlines.

 

France, the former colonial power in Mali, launched airstrikes in Mali two years ago to prevent the establishment of a terrorist state after armed groups linked to al Qaeda took over vast stretches of Mali. French involvement in Mali eventually morphed into a larger operation that involved ground troops and French special forces. At its height, 4,000 French soldiers were largely successful in helping Mali push the al Qaeda-linked rebels out of the country.

 

 

10 soldiers killed in attack on Mali camp: military

 

Troops killed in terrorist ambush on National Guard unit based in Gourma-Rharous

 

August 03rd 2015

I24 News

 

At least 10 soldiers were killed Monday in a "terrorist" attack on their camp in the Timbuktu region of northern Mali, the military.

 

"The provisional death toll is 10 dead on the army side," said Souleymane Maiga, head of the army's information office, without giving further details.

 

"This morning at Gourma-Rharous we pushed back a terrorist attack which caused 10 deaths in our ranks," a military source added.

 

Another military source confirmed the ambush, saying it had targeted a unit of the National Guard based in Gourma-Rharous.

 

The second source said the attackers were believed to be "jihadi elements" linked to Islamist group Ansar Dine.

 

The attack comes two days after two Malian soldiers were killed and four others injured in an ambush in the center of the west African country.

 

Jihadist attacks have long been concentrated in Mali's north but began spreading at the beginning of the year to the center of the country and, in June, to the south, near the borders with Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso.

 

The north came under the control of Ansar Dine - which is Arabic for Defenders of Faith - and two other jihadi groups, al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb and the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, in April 2012.

 

A move south towards the capital by the extremists, who imposed a brutal version of sharia on inhabitants, prompted Mali's former colonial master France to intervene in January 2013, pounding their positions in the north.

 

 

Police in Mali Nab 20 Suspected Islamist Militants on Bus Bound for Capital

 

By Pierre Longeray

July 15, 2015

Vice News


Police in Mali arrested 20 suspected Islamist militants on Monday in the southern town of Zegoua, near the border with Ivory Coast, after the men crossed the border on a bus bound for Mali's capital Bamako and the northwestern town of Gogui. Malian security sources said the 20 men were taken to Bamako for questioning.


According to a security source cited by Reuters, most of the suspects are Mauritanian, with some also hailing from Mali and France. Authorities are currently trying to determine the authenticity of two French passports seized during the arrest. The same source said that the men were "all Islamists, all bearded."


When contacted by VICE News, the French embassy in Mali and the French Foreign Affairs Ministry could not confirm the nationality of the two individuals found carrying French passports.


A local source said that the group's leader, a Mauritanian man identified as Samir Enrique, was also arrested. The Malian Defense Ministry did not respond to a request for comment from VICE News.


The arrests come just one day after Malian police detained a man identified as Saouty Kouma in the central town of Melo. Kouma is the suspected mastermind of a March attack on a restaurant in Bamako that killed a Frenchman, a Belgian, and three Malians. The Islamist militant group al-Mourabitoun later claimed responsibility for the attack.


Police in Mali have redoubled their counter-terrorism efforts in the south of the country following a recent wave of attacks across the south and west, including the capital Bamako, which was formerly considered safe.


Last week, police arrested two men, including an envoy of Iyad Ag Ghali — the leader of militant Islamist group Ansar Dine as they were headed into Bamako. During the arrest, police seized several recent propaganda videos in which Ghali urges his followers to mobilize in Mali's north and south.


Police also seized a message from Ghali to one of his accomplices in the south that reportedly included details of future attacks. According to Reuters, six other people including two women were detained for questioning in connection with the arrest.


According to intelligence gathered during questioning of Ghali's presumed messenger, Ansar Dine is currently looking to the south as a potential target for attacks. The group has claimed responsibility for several recent attacks against Malian troops and UN peacekeepers stationed in the center and south of the country, including in Bamako.


"The aim of the attacks is for jihadist groups to flaunt their presence and get people talking about them," Pierre Boilley, director of the Institute of the African Worlds (IMAF), told VICE News. "[Insurgents] want to show that they can strike anywhere, north or south."


French radio channel RFI and news outlet Jeune Afrique have both alluded to a new coalition of four Islamist militant groups in the south of Mali, along the border with Ivory Coast. Ansar Dine is rumored to be heading up the coalition as a means to expand its operations in the south. According to local media, including news site Mali Actu, the new southern jihadist front plans to settle in the border forest of Sama.


In January 2013, France launched operation Serval, a military operation to rid northern Mali of militants. In July 2014, Serval was replaced by Operation Barkhane, a counter-terrorism campaign across Africa's Sahel, a region that includes Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Chad, and Burkina Faso.


According to French military sources, the fighting in the north between weakened militant groups and Operation Barkhane forces has been a game of "hide and seek." Speaking to the Associated Press on Tuesday from the former Islamist stronghold of Gao, French Colonel Luc Laine said that the security situation in the north was "different," with operations that are "highly reliant on intel gathering, research, with lots of waiting around and isolated actions."

 

 

Mali's Islamist groups united by war threat

By David Lewis

DAKAR | Tue Jan 15, 2013


DAKAR (Reuters) - A powerful southern offensive by Islamists in Mali last week, halted only by French air strikes, showed that a loose alliance of rebels from al Qaeda's North African wing and local groups has been united by the threat of foreign intervention.


When the coalition of Islamists swept across northern Mali last year, massacring army troops and carving up the vast desert zone, ties between Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and local groups Ansar Dine and MUJWA had looked opportunistic, and regional mediators believed they could prize them apart.


Some fighters imposed strict Islamic law and recruited foreigners and locals hungry for jihad, others framed the conflict around local Malian tribal politics and religion, while criminal networks smuggling drugs and contraband joined the fray, earning them the title "gangster jihadists".


With Mali's army crippled by political divisions and a series of defeats to rebels that led to a March coup, West African mediators tried to divide the rebels by offering talks to local Islamists while excluding foreigners, extremists and criminals.


U.N. backing in December for an African-led intervention due later this year changed the picture.


"People in the north don't have any choice now but to stand together," said Algabass Ag Intallah, a senior member of Ansar Dine, a group that only last month had committed to peace talks with Mali's government. "This is an aggression. We all have to defend ourselves."


"Al Qaeda helped us, but we are the ones who are leading," he added.


Residents in the north-eastern Malian town of Gao, MUJWA's stronghold, confirmed pick-up trucks carrying its turbaned fighters had also joined the rebel offensive.


The seizure by Islamists of the northern two-thirds of Mali, for decades one of West Africa's most stable democracies, sowed fears that its desert dunes and craggy mountain ranges could become a base for terrorist attacks on Europe.


Yet as Islamists severed limbs, silenced music and smashed traditional Sufi shrines in the ancient caravan town of Timbuktu - acts reminiscent of Afghanistan under the Taliban - Malians and foreign powers wavered throughout 2012.


Much of the delay was due to confusion over the nature of the Islamist alliance, experts say.


Some governments advocated dialogue to tackle the long-standing political grievances of those living in Mali's under-developed north. Others, led by France, called for swift military action to stamp out a security threat, finally winning U.N. backing for an African-led operation.


DIVISIONS EVAPORATED


These divisions evaporated lat week with the united rebel advance on the central town of Konna, a gateway toward the southern capital Bamako, deemed so dangerous that Paris reversed pledges not to intervene directly. The African force, which had not been expected until September, is being hastily rolled out.


Even Algeria, which had previously hoped to unravel the coalition by enticing Ansar Dine into peace talks, dropped its opposition to military intervention, allowing French Rafale jets to fly via its airspace to pound the rebels.


"Ansar Dine, MUJWA and AQIM worked together and coordinated their push on Konna," said France's military chief Admiral Edouard Guillaud, whose jets and helicopter gunships have strafed rebel columns, training camps and fuel depots.

Behind Mali's reputation for stability, Al Qaeda's presence there has worried regional powers and Western nations for over a decade. The United States has led efforts to train national armies and improve security coordination within the region.

Until last year, AQIM had struggled to break from its Algerian roots and activities focused on the multi-million dollar business of taking hostages for ransom, including eight French citizens it still holds captive. Its numbers were limited to a few hundred mobile fighters in the remote desert.


However, last year's rebellion - launched by Tuareg separatists but quickly hijacked by Islamists - changed all that.


In Iyad Ag Ghali, a veteran of previous Malian Tuareg rebellions who had acted as a negotiator in hostage releases, AQIM found an ally to expand their local presence in return for arms and funding, diplomats said.


Ag Ghali, described in U.S. diplomatic cables as an expert at "playing all sides", had sought to lead the Tuareg separatists. When he failed, he split from them to found Ansar Dine, with AQIM's backing. Previously known for his love of the high life, Ag Ghali has over the last decade became a convert to fundamental Islam.


After routing Mali's army and sidelining MNLA Tuareg separatists, Ansar Dine occupied Ag Ghali's fiefdom around Kidal in the far north.


MUJWA emerged in late 2011 as a splinter from AQIM, establishing itself by recruiting among Arab and black African communities in Mali and elsewhere in the region. Tapping into fears of dominance by the minority Tuaregs, the group was able to wrest control of Gao - northern Mali's largest town - from the separatists in June.

 

Al Qaeda fighters have since drifted between these groups but been more present in Timbuktu, experts say.

 

Washington estimates the core of the combined Islamist force to be 800 to 1,200-strong. A military plan drawn up by West Africa's ECOWAS bloc estimated the rebel fighting ranks just over twice that size.

 

With Mali's army in tatters and neighbouring African states needing time to pull together an intervention force, hopes for regional mediation had focused on Ag Ghali's Ansar Dine.

 

"Ansar Dine had all the opportunities to talk. We wanted to bring Ansar Dine to the table. I don't know why they made the other choice," said a senior West African official involved in the negotiation process. "In this war, they are all together."

 

A former senior Malian intelligence officer said Ag Ghali's commitment to fundamentalist Islam - cultivated during years spent in the Gulf and through connections in the proselytising Muslim movement Tabligh - had been underestimated.

 

FOREIGN FIGHTERS

 

Mali and other countries in the region say scores of fanatical foreign fighters have flocked to the north. Independent reports on their numbers and their origin vary wildly.

 

"The numbers I have heard range from 100s to 1,000s, so it is clear that no one has much of a clue," a senior Western security official told Reuters.

 

A Reuters correspondent travelling in Gao in the weeks before the French intervention reported at least three white Westerners in the Islamist ranks there.

 

French officials have said about 10 of its citizens have been arrested trying to reach Mali to join the rebels. Late last year, the FBI arrested two U.S. citizens they said were planning to travel to West Africa to carry out jihad.

 

But the most serious threat could stem from closer to home.

 

Officials and residents say MUJWA, based in the eastern town of Gao, has succeeded in recruiting black Africans from Mali and elsewhere in the West African region in a way AQIM never did.

 

The West African official involved in the mediation process called it a "gangrene" that had been underestimated.

 

Marc Trevidic, France's top anti-terrorism judge, warned that Mali was the first case of jihad in sub-Saharan Africa.

 

"For the first time there is a 'black jihad': a jihad done for blacks by blacks," he told Reuters, saying its militants were both West Africans and dual nationals able to move freely in and out of France.

 

Paris is concerned at the ability of African Muslims, some of whom have dual nationality, to move between France and the region.

 

"That is the number one potential threat. It is the number one enemy to France," he said.

 

 

Violence in Mali leads Tuareg refugees to flee the country, coming Islamic law

 

Published 29 May, 2012

PRI

Tuaregs in Mali united with Islamic militants against the Mali government and successfully drove the government out. But they didn't realize they'd be getting a new home under Islamic law. Now, Tuareg civilians are fleeing the violence of the revolution and the newly instituted Islamic law.


Mali is in the grip of an unprecedented political crisis.

 

It’s one of the most serious crises since the landlocked West African country gained independence from France in 1960. Soldiers staged a coup in March but cannot agree on a way forward for the country.

 

Meanwhile, Mali’s Tuareg rebels have taken control of the north of the country, in alliance with Islamic militants.

 

Many Tuaregs have taken shelter from the violence in neighboring Burkina Faso. The Sahel reserve stretches from Mali into the Northern tip of Burkina Faso, a land of dry bush, bare trees and patches of sunburnt grass giving way to sand. Shacks made of sticks and a patchwork of drapes and carpets dot the yellow horizon.

 

Tuaregs fleeing fighting between Tuareg rebels and government forces in north Mali have flocked here by the tens of thousands. They’re among the 300,000 people who have been displaced by the conflict since January, according to the U.S. State Department and the United Nations refugee agency.

 

Many Tuaregs who fleed to this stretch of Burkina Faso have been here before, and they’ve settled back into what has become a forced second home once again.

 

A 69-year old Tuareg says he moved back under the same tree where he spent almost three years in the mid-1990s.

 

Another Tuareg, Yaya Ag Mohamed, was a kid the last time his family fled violence in north Mali.

 

I started elementary school here in Burkina Faso he said. Today, I’m a father of two, and here I am again, a refugee once more. We’re pulled back into the same situation, at every stage of life.

 

Four Tuareg rebellions have broken out since Mali gained independence 52 years ago. Each time, scores fled the military crackdown against Tuareg fighters and civilians. But in April, Tuareg rebels drove Mali’s authorities out and proclaimed independence for the Azawad, the Tuareg name for Mali’s Northern region.

 

Tuareg fighters didn’t manage this on their own. They joined forces with a loose coalition of Islamist groups. They shared a common enemy, but not the same long-term goals. Tuaregs fought for a state, Islamists for the imposition of Sharia law.

 

Idoual Ag Bala, a veterinarian at the refugee camp, calls the Islamists attempt to impose a radical form of Islam colonial.

 

What Islam are they going to teach me? I’m already a Muslim, and that’s enough, thanks God! he said. We don’t want Sharia law. Our culture is steeped in a moderate and tolerant Islam. Their Islam is an import from Pakistan and Afghanistan, and we don’t want it.


Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb has thrived in the region in the past few years. Now, the Al Qaeda franchise operates unopposed amidst North Mali’s chaos. New Islamist groups have emerged there as well.

 

In Gao, North Mali’s most populous city, young people demonstrated against a new ban on watching TV, listening to music or playing video games. Locals say armed groups opened fire on the protesters.

 

Tuareg refugees say there’s a lot of confusion over where the extremists come from and how many they are. But Idoual, the veterinarian, says what they do know about them is alarming enough to keep refugees from returning home.

 

Americans are scared about Islamists. The French are scared about Islamists. Everybody is scared about these groups! he said. So why would we, poor African citizens, be any less scared? I’m scared!

 

Refugees who’ve just arrived at the camp bring stories that stoke the fears. Mohamed ag In Tahma crossed over the border last week with 20 relatives and two other families. He says they left their village because of the new rules imposed by Islamists. They brought clothing with them, he says. A burka-like covering for the women, long clothes that cover elbows for the men.

 

Men can’t greet women on the street, he said. No one dares go out any more. If you’re caught doing something wrong, or wearing something inappropriate, they threaten to beat you if they catch you again.

 

Mohamed says Tuareg rebels, who support a secular republic, are starting to speak out against Sharia, but they aren’t strong enough to fight back. He says most locals believe a clash between Islamists and seculars is coming yet another reason for civilians to flee.

 

Fatoumata Oylet Aybala, a women’s leader at the refugee camp, says the best way for the international community to help defeat the Islamic militants is to recognize a Tuareg independent state.

 

Once our leaders are in charge, once we have a country, a government and allies, then we’ll be able to fight for the traditions and values of the Tuareg people.

 

But so far not a single country has recognized the breakaway state, and Mali could soon request help from West African countries to regain control of the lost territory.

 

Refugees in Burkina Faso know they might be here for a long time. Sitting on a bench in the afternoon heat, a group of young men listen to Tuareg music on a cell phone.

 

They say at least here they’re safe ...  and they can still indulge in some cherished tribal tunes.

 

 

13 killed in violence between Kountas and Arabs in eastern MALI

 

9-16-2004

 

BAMAKO, 16 September (IRIN) - A fresh outbreak of fighting between the Arab and Kounta tribes in the semi-desert of eastern Mali has left 13 people dead, according to residents in the nearby town of Gao.

 

They told IRIN that the clash took place on 11 September at a well near Bamba, a small town on the river Niger, 220 km west of Gao.The incident followed a jailbreak in Gao five days earlier by 16 Arabs and Kountas who had been imprisoned in connection with a previous outbreak of fighting between the two communities, they noted.

 

Banditry and violence have been on the rise in eastern Mali for several months and have begun to affect the work of humanitarian agencies operating in the area. Last June, two four-wheel-drive vehicles of the Malian Red Cross were hijacked near Bourem, another town on the River Niger in the same area. And on 12 September, the day after the latest fighting between Arabs and Kountas, another vehicle belonging to the Canadian non-governmental organisation SUCO (Solidarity, Union Cooperation), was stolen by two armed men wearing turbans in Gao itself.

 

The vehicle was attached to a micro-credit scheme that helps poor people to establish their own small businesses, SUCO officials said. 

 

The Kounta are fair-skinned people of Arabic descent who are known for their religious learning. Many are marabouts - Islamic religious leaders who also practice magic and traditional medicine.

 

The people known as Arabs in eastern Mali are similar in appearance, but are mainly traders and nomadic herdsmen.

 

Both communities inhabit the desert wastes between Timbuktoo and Gao on the river Niger and the town of Kidal in the Adrar des Iforahs mountain range further north, near the Algerian border.

 

There has been sporadic fighting between the Arabs and Kountas in this area for the past five years. This has often resulted in heavy casualties. President Amadou Toumani Toure intervened personally in 2003 to try to stop the feud, whose origins are much older. 

 

Government officials in Gao refused to comment on the latest incident, but the Malian state news agency reported that a group of heavily armed Arab fighters travelling aboard four four-wheel drive vehicles attacked the Kounta marabout Kounta Ould Haital and a group of his followers at a desert well.

 

Eastern Mali has long been a lawless area plagued by bandits and smugglers. The Islamic fundamentalist group which kidnapped a group of European tourists in southern Algeria last year, took refuge in the Idrar des Iforahs mountains of eastern Mali before releasing its 14 remaining hostages there in August 2003.

 

One retired soldier who formerly served in the troubled area blamed the Malian government for withdrawing its security forces from too many remote outposts following a 1992 peace agreement which marked the first step towards ending a rebellion by Touareg nomads in the region.

 

Mohamed Baye, the parliamentary deputy for Bourem, where the latest clash took place, echoed this sentiment. "Given the situation, only the return of garrisons and security posts can contribute to the return of stability and put an end to the carnage between the communities," he told IRIN.

 

The US government, worried about the possible infiltration of Muslim fundamentalist terrorists into northern Mali, sent military instructors to train the Malian army in anti-terrorist warfare techniques in Gao earlier this year. Washington also provided the Malian army with all-terrain vehicles and other equipment specially designed for desert warfare.

 

 

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