BAMAKO, Mali
Recent attacks by jihadi
rebels in central Mali have killed 132 civilians, the government announced
Monday.
The killings happened when
several villages in the Bankass area were attacked on Saturday and Sunday, the
government said in a statement Monday.
Three days of national
mourning starting Tuesday have been declared by the head of the ruling junta,
Col. Assimi Goita.
The government said the
attacks were carried out by jihadi rebels of the Katiba group.
The attacks had earlier been
reported by Moulaye Guindo, the mayor of Bankass, the biggest town near the
attacked villages.
The attacks show that Islamic
extremist violence is spreading from Mali’s north to more central areas like
Bankass.
For several weeks extremist
rebels in central Mali have been blocking the road between the northern city of
Gao and Mopti in central Mali.
The United Nations
peacekeeping mission in Mali issued a
statement about the attacks on Twitter saying it is concerned by
“attacks against civilians in the Bandiagara region (the area of central Mali)
perpetrated by extremist groups. These attacks have reportedly caused
casualties and displacement of populations.”
In a separate incident, a U.N.
peacekeeper died on Sunday from injuries sustained from an improvised explosive
device, the U.N. mission to Mali said in a statement.
The head of the U.N. Mission
to Mali, El-Ghassim Wane, said that since the beginning of 2022, several
attacks have killed U.N. uniformed peacekeepers.
He said that attacks on
peacekeepers can constitute war crimes under international law and reaffirmed
the mission’s commitment to supporting peace and security in Mali.
Since the beginning of the
year, several hundred civilians have died in attacks in central and northern
Mali. The attacks are blamed on jihadi rebels as well as the Malian army,
according to a report by the human rights division of the U.N. mission in Mali,
known as MINUSMA.
The U.N. peacekeeping
mission in Mali began in 2013, after France led a military
intervention to oust extremist rebels who had taken over cities and major towns
in northern Mali the year before. The mission now has about roughly 12,000
troops in Mali and an additional 2,000 police and other officers. More than 270
peacekeepers have died in Mali, making it the U.N.’s deadliest peacekeeping
mission, say officials.
No comments:
Post a Comment