PARIS: French forces tried to use a journalist’s visit to northern Mali to track a militant leader but failed to prevent the reporter from being kidnapped by the militants, French media reported Wednesday.
The report comes amid an investigation into what happened to journalist Olivier Dubois, 48, who was abducted in the northern Malian town of Gao in April 2021.
He flew home to France in March, nearly two years after he was kidnapped by the Al-Qaeda-linked Group to Support Islam and Muslims (JNIM).
Based on French and Malian judicial documents from the probe, the report said a fixer working with Dubois had informed France’s anti-militant Barkhane force of his plans to interview a militant leader.
Barkhane planned to track the leader back to his base but then abandoned the operation because it was deemed “too dangerous for the journalist,” it said.
But they did not deploy the necessary means to prevent the journalist from being kidnapped, it added.
The report was published by newspapers Le Monde and Liberation as well as broadcasters RFI and TV5Monde.
A diplomatic source told AFP a letter was sent to Dubois the day he was kidnapped, formally urging him not to make the trip, after “a meeting the previous day with the embassy during which he had already been given the same advice.”
In addition, Liberation — for whom Dubois was writing at the time — had refused to back his plan to interview the militant in view of the risks.
Contacted by AFP, the French foreign ministry declined to comment due to the ongoing investigation.
The military general staff also declined to comment.
An internal army probe found in late 2021 that there had been “no personal fault within the Barkhane force” over the kidnapping.
But “the sensitivity of the topic was not sufficiently taken into account so as to allow... a dissuasive action with regards to the journalist,” it said.
Arnaud Froger, in charges of investigations at Reporters Without Borders, told AFP the French army’s plan had posed “a grave ethical problem.”
“They were going to endanger the life of a French journalist and citizen to reach a medium-level intelligence target, without planning any measures in case things took a bad turn, and also without passing on the information about the risk he was taking,” he said.
French forces withdrew from Mali last year following a fallout with the ruling junta.
French army in spotlight over journalist’s kidnapping in Mali
https://arab.news/yg53g
French army in spotlight over journalist’s kidnapping in Mali
- The report comes amid an investigation into what happened to journalist Olivier Dubois, 48, who was abducted in the northern Malian town of Gao in April 2021
- The report was published by newspapers Le Monde and Liberation as well as broadcasters RFI and TV5Monde
Foreign media group slams Israel for refusing to lift Gaza press ban
- Foreign Press Association expresses 'profound disappointment' with Israeli government’s response to a Supreme Court appeal
- Israel has barred foreign journalists from independently entering the devastated territory since the war started
JERUSALEM: An international media association on Tuesday criticized the Israeli government for maintaining its ban on unrestricted media access to Gaza, calling the move disappointing.
The government had told the Supreme Court in a submission late Sunday that the ban should remain in place, citing security risks in the Gaza Strip.
The submission was in response to a petition filed by the Foreign Press Association (FPA) — which represents hundreds of journalists in Israel and Palestinian territories — seeking immediate and unrestricted access for foreign journalists to the Gaza Strip.
“The Foreign Press Association expresses its profound disappointment with the Israeli government’s latest response to our appeal for full and free access to the Gaza Strip,” the association said on Tuesday.
“Instead of presenting a plan for allowing journalists into Gaza independently and letting us work alongside our brave Palestinian colleagues, the government has decided once again to lock us out” despite the ceasefire in the territory, it added.
Since the outbreak of the Gaza war in October 2023, triggered by an attack on Israel by the Palestinian militant group Hamas, the government has barred foreign journalists from independently entering the devastated territory.
Instead, Israel has allowed only a limited number of reporters to enter Gaza on a case-by-case basis, embedded with its military inside the blockaded Palestinian territory.
The FPA filed its petition in 2024, after which the court granted the government several extensions to submit its response.
Last month, however, the court set January 4 as a final deadline for the government to present a plan for allowing media access to Gaza.
In its submission, the government maintained that the ban should remain in place.
“This is for security reasons, based on the position of the defense establishment, which maintains that a security risk associated with such entry still exists,” the government submission said.
The government also said that the search for the remains of the last hostage held in Gaza was ongoing, suggesting that allowing journalists in at this stage could hinder the operation.
The remains of Ran Gvili, whose body was taken to Gaza after he was killed during Hamas’s 2023 attack, have still not been recovered despite the ceasefire.
The FPA said it planned to submit a “robust response” to the court, and expressed hope the “judges will put an end to this charade.”
“The FPA is confident that the court will provide justice in light of the continuous infringement of the fundamental principles of freedom of speech, the public’s right to know and free press,” the association added.
The Supreme Court is expected to issue a ruling on the matter, though it is unclear when a decision will be handed down.
An AFP journalist sits on the board of the FPA.
