Tuareg separatists in northern Mali have accused the Malian army and the Russian paramilitary group Wagner of being responsible for the deaths of seven civilians from Chad and Niger in drone strikes near the Algerian border.
The Malian army has not yet responded to requests for comment from media regarding the allegations made in a statement by the Permanent Strategic Framework (CSP), an alliance primarily comprising Tuareg armed rebel groups.
Overnight Tuesday to Wednesday, “a Wagner-FAMA (Malian armed forces) terrorist coalition carried out drone strikes on a fuel sales outlet in Talhandak”, a crossroads village in the vast desert expanse of Mali’s far north close to the shared border with Algeria and Niger, the alliance said in its statement.
“This umpteenth attack on innocent people resulted in the deaths of seven people of Chadian and Nigerien nationality, as well as other victims who are still under the rubble.”
The CSP condemned “with the utmost rigour these repeated acts of terrorism by the Bamako junta, which targets only innocent people and civilian infrastructure”.
Tensions between separatists and Mali government troops erupted in August, ending eight years of relative calm as both sides sought to fill the void left by the withdrawal of United Nations peacekeepers (MINUSMA), ordered out by the ruling junta in Bamako.
While the military leaders who seized power in 2020 celebrated symbolic success, rebel groups in the northern desert region did not lay down their arms. The rebels and local officials claim that Malian forces received support from Wagner mercenaries, an assertion denied by the junta regarding the presence of the Russian security group in the country.
The offensive in northern Mali has been marred by numerous allegations of civilian abuses by Malian forces and their alleged Russian allies, consistently denied by Malian authorities.