PARIS: Mali’s Tuareg rebels declared that the country’s ruling junta “will fall” and that they intended to conquer the north, in an interview with AFP Wednesday just days after carrying out large-scale attacks targeting the nation’s military government.
Over the weekend the separatist rebels as well as extremists launched the largest assault on the country in nearly 15 years, attacking the military junta and its Russian paramilitary backers.
Acknowledging the situation was “of extreme gravity,” junta chief Assimi Goita, who had not been seen for three days, said in a speech on TV late Tuesday that the situation was “under control.”
But a spokesman for the Tuareg-dominated separatist Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) told AFP during a visit to Paris on Wednesday that “the regime will fall, sooner or later.”
The clashes have pitted the army against the FLA and its Al-Qaeda-linked jihadist allies from the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM).
Their coordinated dawn offensive on Saturday against strategic junta positions, including areas around the capital, Bamako, killed at least 23 people, with the toll expected to rise.
The two days of fierce fighting also killed Defense Minister Sadio Camara — seen as the mastermind behind the junta’s pivot to Russia. His funeral is planned for Thursday.
‘No respite’
The separatists and extremists were able to capture the key northern town of Kidal, but the Malian army fought back Wednesday, waging a series of airstrikes.
“We intend to give these enemies no respite,” a security source told AFP, affirming that the strikes had targeted the military camp and fighters at the city government building.
The attacks were confirmed by an official from the FLA.
Tuareg rebels additionally attacked a small military camp in Gourma Rharous, a locality in the Timbuktu region, a security source told AFP.
Over the weekend the rebels and extremists had also targeted Gao in the mostly desert north along with Mopti and Sevare in the center.
FLA spokesman Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane told AFP on Wednesday that the rebels intend to take control of Gao, Timbuktu and Menaka following their success in Kidal.
In the Gao region, the Malian army has already abandoned some of its positions, local sources said.
Russian withdrawal
Since 2012, the west African nation has faced a profound security crisis fueled in particular by violence from groups affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, as well as local criminal gangs and pro-independence groups.
The latest assaults raise questions about the junta’s ability to tackle the security crisis, despite its insistence that its strategy, foreign partnerships and increased military efforts have stemmed the jihadist threat.
Mali’s junta government, like its military counterparts in neighboring Niger and Burkina Faso, have severed ties with former colonial ruler France, moving closer politically and militarily to Moscow.
Russia’s mercenary Wagner Group, which fought with Malian forces against extremists since 2021, was replaced last year by Africa Corps, an organization under the direct control of the Russian defense ministry.
Following what he said were “good discussions” with Goita, Russia’s ambassador to Mali, Igor Gromyko, said in a video posted to Facebook Wednesday that he had assured the leader that “Russia and its armed forces, the Africa Corps, together with the Malian army, will fight together against the treacherous attacks of international terrorism.”
Although JNIM and FLA have different goals, according to experts, they are united against a common enemy — the military junta that has ruled since 2020 and the Russian paramilitary backers.
FLA spokesman Ramadane told AFP Wednesday that his group’s “objective is for Russia to withdraw permanently from Azawad and beyond, from all of Mali.”
In addition to Tuaregs, the FLA is made up of Fulani and Arab rebels who want independence for Azawad, a territory in northern Mali.
Fairweather friends
A historically nomadic people, Tuaregs, who are spread across Mali, Niger, Algeria, Libya and Burkina Faso, have waged an armed struggle for decades against marginalization, with action centered in particular around the key city of Kidal.
The most recent attacks are reminiscent of a crisis that rocked Mali in 2012, when Tuareg rebels joined forces with extremist to capture strategic hubs in the vast, remote north.
That offensive was repelled by forces from France, which has since left the Sahel country.
The alliance between the extremists and Tuareg rebels eventually unraveled when they turned on each other and the extremists drove the Tuareg separatists out.
The latest attacks are the result of a new alliance forged a year ago.
