Jihadist fighters have launched a collection of simultaneous assaults on navy posts throughout quite a few cities in Mali – the third main assault on the military during the last month.
Mali’s military mentioned it repelled Tuesday morning’s assaults, allegedly “neutralising” greater than 80 militants, with out saying if there have been another casualties.
Nonetheless, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM), an al-Qaeda-linked group who mentioned it was behind the assaults, mentioned it had taken management of three military barracks.
For greater than a decade Mali has been wracked by a lethal Islamist insurgency, in addition to assaults from separatist actions.
In an announcement broadcast on nationwide TV, military spokesperson Souleymane Dembele mentioned: “The enemy suffered vital losses in each location the place they engaged with the safety and defence forces.”
Col Dembele added that the military recovered weapons, autos and bikes from the assailants.
Earlier, the armed forces mentioned that the assaults had occurred throughout seven cities and cities, together with Binoli, Kayes and Sandere, close to the border with Senegal. There have been additionally assaults additional north, close to Mali’s frontier with Mauritania.
One resident in Kayes informed the AFP information company: “We awakened in shock this morning. There’s gunfire, and from my home I can see smoke billowing in direction of the governor’s residence.”
JNIM referred to as its assault “co-ordinated and top quality” in an announcement posted on social media. They didn’t element any casualties.
The group has additionally mentioned it carried out two different vital current assaults.
On 2 June, militants focused each a military camp and airport within the historic, northern metropolis of Timbuktu.
Only a day earlier than, a raid killed no less than 30 troopers within the centre of the nation.
The assaults, the newest signal of rising insecurity in Mali and the broader Sahel area, got here after america Africa Command warned about rising efforts by varied completely different Islamist militant teams which function within the Sahel to achieve entry to West Africa’s shoreline.
Throughout a press convention in Might, the commander of United States Africa Command (Africom), Gen Michael Langley, described current assaults in Nigeria, the broader Sahel, and the Lake Chad Basin as deeply troubling.
He warned that the teams’ entry to the coast would considerably enhance their capability for smuggling and arms trafficking.
