BAMAKO, Mali
A commander in a Russian mercenary group has been killed in Mali following an attack by rebel fighters during a sandstorm, the group said.
The military regime in the
West African state had turned to the notorious Wagner group in 2021, seeking
support in fighting jihadist and separatist forces.
On Monday the Russian outfit -
which has now morphed into a group named Africa Corps - said it had joined
Mali's military in "fierce battles" against separatist rebels and
jihadist militants last week.
However, the separatists
launched a major attack, killing an estimated 20 to 50 mercenaries, sources
close to Africa Corps told our reporter.
Similarly, several Russian
military bloggers reported that at least 20 were killed in the ambush near the
north-eastern town of Tinzaouaten.
In an official statement
posted to Telegram, the Russian mercenary group did not specify how many of
their troops had died, but they confirmed suffering "losses". This
included a commander, Sergei Shevchenko, who was killed in action.
The mercenaries initially
"destroyed most of the Islamists and put the rest to flight", the
statement said.
"However, [an] ensuing
sandstorm allowed the radicals to regroup and increase their numbers to 1,000
people," it added.
The Permanent Strategic
Framework for Peace, Security and Development (CSP-PSD), a separatist group
dominated by the Tuareg ethnic group, claimed responsibility for the attack.
"On Saturday, our forces
dealt a decisive blow to the enemy columns," AFP quoted the CSP-PSD's
spokesperson as saying.
Prisoners were taken and
"a large amount of equipment and weapons were damaged or captured",
the spokesman added.
The rebel group has shared
video unconfirmed footage which shows numerous white men in military fatigues
lying motionless on a sandy plain.
Another shows a group of
mostly black men wearing blindfolds with their hands tied behind their backs.
Jamaat Nusrat al-Islam
wal-Muslimin (JNIM), an al-Qaeda affiliate, has also claimed sole
responsibility for the attack.
The Islamist militants said
they killed 50 Russian mercenaries in a "complex ambush".
More than a decade ago, Mali's
central government lost control of much of the north following a Tuareg
rebellion, which was sparked by a demand for a separate state.
The country's security was
then further complicated by the involvement of Islamist militants in the
conflict.
When seizing power in coups in
2020 and 2021, the military cited the government's inability to tackle this
unrest.
The new junta severed Mali's
long-running alliance with former colonial power France in favour of Russia in
a bid to quell the unrest.
But the Wagner mercenary group
was in effect dismantled after a mutiny by its leader Yevgeny Prigozhin last
year, leading to its replacement in West Africa by Africa Corps.
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