At least 50 soldiers killed in jihadist attack in Mali

“The preliminary results of the attack are extremely serious: more than 50 soldiers were killed and at least 24 captured,” the politician told the AFP news agency. According to the information, the convoy was on its way to the northern Malian city of Gao. There had been fierce fighting over Anefis in the past few weeks.

At the beginning of July, the group for the support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM), linked to the extremist network al-Qaeda, and the separatist Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) temporarily took over the city in a large-scale joint offensive. They surrounded the military camp defended by the Malian army and Russian paramilitaries of the so-called Afrika Korps. JNIM and FLA claimed responsibility for Saturday’s attack.

Malian army speaks of executions

“Some of our men were literally executed,” said a source in the Malian army about the current attack on the convoy. It is being investigated which tactical errors led to the serious defeat. “We’re trying to figure out what actually made our men so vulnerable.” According to several sources, the Russian paramilitaries had already reached Gao at the time of the attack and suffered no casualties. “There was a coordination problem between the Russians and the army,” said a regional politician.

The Malian army said on Saturday that its convoy had “fallen into an ambush set by armed terrorist groups,” but did not initially provide a number of casualties. Tuareg separatists and jihadists announced an alliance against the Malian military junta in May.

Mali has been rocked by armed conflict since 2012. In addition to groups linked to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (IS) jihadist militia, Tuareg separatists and armed criminal groups are active in the country. Mali has been ruled by a junta since two military coups in 2020 and 2021. This ended cooperation with France and other Western partners and is relying primarily on Russian forces in the fight against the insurgents.