It was around 5 a.m. (7 a.m. in Paris) when a series of attacks began which affected the Malian localities of Gao, Anéfis, Aguelhok (north), Sévaré (center), as well as the Kéniéroba prison 70 kilometers south of Bamako, according to the army, residents and security sources cited by AFP.
These fighting come a little more than two months after large-scale attacks carried out on April 25 and 26 by Jnim (affiliated with Al-Qaeda) and the separatists of the FLA (Azawad Liberation Front) which dealt a considerable blow to the junta in power in Bamako and killed the defense minister.
In Anéfis, the FLA separatists took “several positions” and “the fight (was) still in progress inside the city”, according to a spokesperson for the rebels, Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane. “The armed groups are in the city, but the army is still resisting them. The camp has not yet fallen,” said a resident contacted by AFP. Anéfis and Aguelhok are the last places where the Malian army is present in the Kidal region, since the attacks of April 25 and 26.
After the fall of Kidal, Gao targeted
Kidal, a strategic town in northern Mali, came under the control of the FLA Tuaregs during these offensives. In Gao, a strategic key to controlling the north, several shots and “loud detonations” were reported to AFP by residents near an army camp.
In the center of the country, in Sévaré, explosions rang out around 5 a.m. “Shortly after, several aircraft were spotted flying over the area,” says a security source. This large city in the center of the country is home to a major army base and an airport.
A few dozen kilometers from the capital Bamako, the large Kéniéroba penitentiary center, where jihadists are notably detained, was attacked. “We are under our beds, the shooting continues,” a prisoner contacted by telephone told AFP. Since then, communications appear to have been cut inside the prison.
The Malian army supported by the former Russian militia Wagner
In a statement, the Malian army affirmed that “these attacks were vigorously repelled” and that “the situation is completely under control”. However, sources consulted by AFP indicated that the fighting was still in progress at midday.
On their Facebook account, the Africa Corps paramilitaries also confirmed the attacks: “African Corps units, in coordination with the Malian Army, are successfully carrying out combat operations to repel the assault on these peaceful towns. »
Objective: capture and protect the north of the country
“All these operations, which are intermediate operations while waiting for a more spectacular assault, contribute to weakening and isolating power,” indicates Bakary Sambe, director of the Timbuktu Institute based in Dakar. “For the moment, the objective seems to be the capture and protection of the north, before going further south,” underlines a researcher associated with the strategic research institute (Irs) of the International Academy for the Fight against Terrorism (Ailct), based in Abidjan.
Since 2012, Mali has faced a deep security crisis fueled in particular by violence from groups affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (IS) organization, as well as community criminal groups. This security crisis comes on top of a serious economic crisis.
The ruling junta has failed to restore security
Since two successive coups in 2020 and 2021, Mali has been led by soldiers who came to power on the promise of restoring security and maintaining the territorial integrity of this vast desert country in the grip of a jihadist insurgency and the independence demands of Tuareg groups.
The junta of General Assimi Goïta has turned its back on France, the former colonial power, to move closer to Russia, now its greatest ally, with whom Bamako cooperates in the fields of energy, defense and higher education. Supported by the Russian paramilitaries of the Wagner group, which has since become Africa Corps, the Malian army recaptured the town of Kidal from the Tuareg rebels in November 2023. The recapture of this large northern city by the FLA during the offensive at the end of April constitutes a snub for the central power.
