PARIS: French soldiers killed or captured about 20 terrorists in Mali’s restive north where a French soldier was killed on April 5, the French chief of staff said Sunday.
Troops from Operation Barkhane, a French counter-terror operation whose mission is to target militant groups operating in the Sahel region south of the Sahara Desert, launched the operation on Saturday south-west of the city of Gao.
“Since Saturday, the Barkhane force has been engaged in an operation which led to the neutralization of nearly 20 jihadists in the forest of Foulsare near the border between Mali and Burkina Faso,” a statement said.
They were either killed or captured, spokesman Col. Patrik Steiger told AFP without giving a breakdown.
French Mirage fighter jets bombed several arms depots in the forest, a sanctuary for armed terrorist groups.
Set up in 2014, the operation comprises around 4,000 soldiers who are deployed across five countries — Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Chad and Burkina Faso. In Niger, it operates four Mirage 2000 fighter jets and five Reaper drones for gathering intelligence.
Mali’s north fell under the control of terrorist groups linked to Al-Qaeda in 2012 who hijacked an ethnic Tuareg-led rebel uprising, though the militants were largely ousted by a French-led military operation in January 2013.
But militants continue to roam the country’s north and center, mounting attacks on civilians and the army, as well as French and UN forces still stationed there.
20 terrorists killed in Mali’s north
20 terrorists killed in Mali’s north
Rubio says technical talks with Denmark, Greenland officials over Arctic security have begun
- US Secretary of State on Wednesday appeared eager to downplay Trump’s rift with Europe over Greenland
WASHINGTON: Technical talks between the US, Denmark and Greenland over hatching an Arctic security deal are now underway, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday.
The foreign ministers of Denmark and Greenland agreed to create a working group aimed at addressing differences with the US during a Washington meeting earlier this month with Vice President JD Vance and Rubio.
The group was created after President Donald Trump’s repeated calls for the US to take over Greenland, a Danish territory, in the name of countering threats from Russia and China — calls that Greenland, Denmark and European allies forcefully rejected.
“It begins today and it will be a regular process,” Rubio said of the working group, as he testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “We’re going to try to do it in a way that isn’t like a media circus every time these conversations happen, because we think that creates more flexibility on both sides to arrive at a positive outcome.”
The Danish Foreign Ministry said Wednesday’s talks focused on “how we can address US concerns about security in the Arctic while respecting the red lines of the Kingdom.” Red lines refers to the sovereignty of Greenland.
Trump’s renewed threats in recent weeks to annex Greenland, which is a semiautonomous territory of a NATO ally, has roiled US-European relations.
Trump this month announced he would slap new tariffs on Denmark and seven other European countries that opposed his takeover calls, only to abruptly drop his threats after a “framework” for a deal over access to the mineral-rich island was reached, with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte’s help. Few details of the agreement have emerged.
After stiff pushback from European allies to his Greenland rhetoric, Trump also announced at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week that he would take off the table the possibility of using American military force to acquire Greenland.
The president backed off his tariff threats and softened his language after Wall Street suffered its biggest losses in months over concerns that Trump’s Greenland ambitions could spur a trade war and fundamentally rupture NATO, a 32-member transatlantic military alliance that’s been a linchpin of post-World War II security.
Rubio on Wednesday appeared eager to downplay Trump’s rift with Europe over Greenland.
“We’ve got a little bit of work to do, but I think we’re going to wind up in a good place, and I think you’ll hear the same from our colleagues in Europe very shortly,” Rubio said.
Rubio during Wednesday’s hearing also had a pointed exchange with Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Virginia, about Trump repeatedly referring to Greenland as Iceland while at Davos.
“Yeah, he meant to say Greenland, but I think we’re all familiar with presidents that have verbal stumbles,” Rubio said in responding to Kaine’s questions about Trump’s flub — taking a veiled dig at former President Joe Biden. “We’ve had presidents like that before. Some made a lot more than this one.”
