MALI
Click here to sign up for free weekly email
Email recaps are sent every Thursdays.
Sign up today
Sahel: Swedish soldiers headed to Mali in yet another French operation
Stockholm, March 16, 2020 - The Swedish government plans to send up to 150 soldiers to Mali to support a French military initiative combining special force troops from different countries. "The government has decided to put a bill to parliament... for Swedish...
Sahel: Couple kidnapped in Burkina Faso in 2018 regains freedom
Bamako, March 14, 2020 - A Canadian woman and her Italian partner kidnapped in Burkina Faso in 2018 have been found alive in the northwest of Mali by UN peacekeepers, diplomatic and UN sources said on Saturday. "UN blue helmets found an Italian citizen and a Canadian...
Sahel: The forced depopulation of central Mali
Mopti, Mali, March 14, 2020 (By Amaury Hauchard) - After years of ethnic massacres and unrelenting jihadist attacks, central Mali has been left a harrowed area of deserted villages and displaced people. An Islamist insurgency erupted in the north of the vast west...
Sahel: Africom commander speaks of ineffective European strategy in the Sahel
Washington, March 10, 2020 - European anti-jihadist efforts in the troubled Sahel region are "insufficient" and "uncoordinated," a senior US military official said Tuesday. "I think that Europe can and should do more before America should do more in this part of the...
Sahel: More killings in Mali
Bamako, March 11, 2020 - Unidentified gunmen killed 10 people and burned down a village in central Mali, local officials said Wednesday, the latest bloodshed in a region wracked by jihadist and inter-ethnic violence. The attackers raided the village of Kourkanda near...
Sahel: US appoints new Sahel representative
Washington, March 8, 2020 - The State Department announced Sunday it had nominated J. Peter Pham, the envoy to Africa's Great Lakes region, as the first US special envoy for the Sahel crisis. Pham's nomination comes amid fears that the jihadist threat in the region is...
Sahel: US mulling more engagement in the Sahel
Washington, March 3, 2020 - The United States is planning to appoint a special envoy for the Sahel crisis amid fears that the jihadist threat is spreading, a senior official said Tuesday. "That is one area where the situation is getting much worse by the day," said...
Sahel: Central Mali riven by communal violence
Mopti, Mali, March 4, 2020 - Less than a year after more than 160 Fulani civilians were massacred at dawn in Ogossagou in central Mali, terror returned to the small village. Eight witnesses gave AFP their account of the latest attack on February 14 in which at least...
Sahel: Mali soldiers killed by rocket attack in Mondoro
Bamako, March 2, 2020 - Six Malian soldiers died and 10 were injured when militants armed with rocket launchers attacked a checkpoint in a central region of the conflict-torn nation, the army and a local official said Monday. The attack on Sunday night at Mondoro...
Sahel: France angry at Mali envoy over remarks on “rowdy behavior of French troops”
Feb 27, 2020 - France on Thursday summoned Mali's ambassador after dismissing as "false" and "unacceptable" his claims of rowdy behaviour by French soldiers helping the West African nation combat an Islamic insurgency. Toumani Djime Diallo was summoned to the foreign...
Sahel: The African Union to the rescue
Addis Ababa, Feb 27, 2020 - The African Union confirmed Thursday that it expected to send a temporary deployment of 3,000 troops to West Africa's Sahel region, where regional forces are struggling to respond to a nearly eight-year-old onslaught by armed Islamists. The...
Sahel: With insurgents several steps ahead, Sahel leaders are disoriented
Nouakchott, Feb 25, 2020 - A summit of Sahel states heard appeals Tuesday to step up the fight against jihadists whose offensive across three countries has claimed thousands of lives and inflicted crippling economic damage. "More than ever, the Sahel requires...
Sahel: French army says it killed some 50 insurgents in Mali’s Mopti region
Paris, Feb 21, 2020 - French soldiers "neutralised" around 50 in a series of operations in Mali this month, the army said Friday as it seeks to quell a years-long insurgency in the West African nation. The operations were carried out near Mopti in central Mali, where...
Sahel: Malian troops re-enter Timbuktu
Bamako, Feb 18, 2020 - A Malian army battalion comprising regulars and former rebels has entered the northern city of Timbuktu, the army said Tuesday, as part of a long-anticipated peace deal in the war-torn country. The move follows the return last week of similar...
Sahel: Turmoil in central Mali
Bamako, Feb 14, 2020 - Twenty people were killed in an attack overnight on a village in central Mali, local officials said Friday, in an apparent spate of ethnic violence in the deeply troubled region. The attack occurred in Ogossagou, a village mainly inhabited by...
Sahel: Second deadly attack on a Fulani village in Mali’s Mopti region
Bamako, Feb 14, 2020 (By Kassim Traore) - Twenty people were killed in an attack overnight on a village in central Mali, local officials said Friday, in an apparent spate of ethnic violence in the deeply troubled region. The attack occurred in Ogossagou, a village...
West Africa facing Jihadist contagion from the Sahel
Cotonou, Feb 14, 2020 (By Josue Mehouenou with Sophie Bouillon in Lagos) - An attack on police in the far north of Benin has spurred fears that a country struggling with political problems is now at threat from jihadism sweeping down from the Sahel. The authorities...
Sahel: With failure of foreign forces in Mali, president forced to seek negotiations with insurgents
Bamako, Mali, Feb 11, 2020 (By Amaury Hauchard) - Mali's President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita has opened the door to talks with jihadists to defuse mounting violence in the West African country, in a break with long-held tradition. Despite the presence of foreign troops,...
Sahel: War rages in Mali, France’s air force neutralizes scores on insurgents
Paris, Feb 7, 2020 - French forces have put 30 jihadists "out of action" during Mali operations in a zone bordering Burkina Faso and Niger, a military spokesman said Friday. Colonel Frederic Barbry said an armed drone, a Mirage 2000 jet and two helicopters had...
Mali government seeks to assert control over restive north, to send troops to Kidal
Bamako, Feb 7, 2020 - Malian troops are due to redeploy before February 10 to the northern town of Kidal, long a symbol of the government's lack of control over the strife-torn north. Rebels captured much of the West African state's north in 2012, triggering a war...
Connect
You can find us on a few social media platforms. Feel free to connect with us there.