By Wagner fighters have been operating in Mali since the military seized power in coups in 2020 and 2021, expelling French and UN troops
A CSP-DPA fighter secures the perimeter during a meeting of Tuareg rebels army leaders in Tinzaouaten, Mali November 27, 2024. REUTERS/Abdolah Ag Mohamed.
Nine civilians, including women and children, were killed in an attack on a vehicle in Mali’s Segou region last week, according to a civil society group and a coalition of Tuareg rebels. Both groups accused Malian forces and Russian mercenaries of being responsible for the incident.
The vehicle was travelling from the town of Niono to a refugee camp in Mauritania on Thursday, January 2, when it came under fire, Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane, a spokesperson for the Tuareg rebel coalition seeking an independent homeland in northern Mali, said on Saturday, January 4. Ramadane and the local civil society group Kal Akal alleged that Malian armed forces and fighters from Russia’s Wagner Group, a private military contractor, carried out the attack.
In a separate statement, the leader of Kel Ansar, one of the largest Tuareg groups, called for an investigation into the killings but denied any involvement by Malian troops.
File pic of French special forces deploying by helicopter in Mali. image: @EtatMajorFR/Twitter
Wagner Group and Malian Army’s Human Rights Record
Wagner fighters have been operating in Mali since the military seized power in coups in 2020 and 2021, expelling French and UN troops. The group has been supporting Malian forces in their fight against Islamist insurgents and Tuareg separatists.
In December, Human Rights Watch accused Mali’s armed forces, with support from Wagner, and Islamist armed groups, of committing serious abuses against civilians, violating international laws of war. “Since May 2024, Malian armed forces and the Wagner Group have deliberately killed at least 32 civilians, including 7 in a drone strike, forcibly disappeared 4 others, and burned at least 100 homes in military operations in towns and villages in central and northern Mali,” HRW said in a recent report.
The organization also claimed that two Islamist armed groups, the Al-Qaeda-linked Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wa al-Muslimeen (JNIM) and of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS), have executed at least 47 civilians and displaced thousands of people since June 2024. The JNIM has also allegedly burned over 1,000 homes and looted thousands of livestock.
Mali has struggled to regain stability since 2012, when ethnic Tuareg rebels and loosely aligned armed groups seized the northern two-thirds of the country.
