The country’s transitional government has declared three days of national mourning to honor the victims among civilians and members of the armed forces in the recent terrorist attack committed in the city of Tesit.
The military regime in Mali declared yesterday three days of national mourning after confirming the death on Sunday of 42 soldiers in an attack attributed to jihadists in the northeastern part of the country, near the borders with Burkina Faso and Niger, while assuring that they were “neutralized” (p. p.: killed) also “37 terrorists”.
The army “reacted vigorously to a complex and coordinated attack” in Tessit, during which losses in its ranks reached “42 dead and 22 wounded”, while “37 terrorists were neutralized” and much of their equipment was “abandoned ” in the “first hours of the battle,” according to the transitional government’s latest account contained in a press release obtained by AFP.
A previous official casualty count had 17 military and 4 civilians dead.
The transitional government declared three days of national mourning to “honour the victims among civilians and members of the armed forces in the terrorist attack committed in Tessit” in a separate press release.
The Tessit sector, in the part of the so-called tri-border zone located in Mali, is a vast area with low vegetation, outside the control of the state, which often turns into a theater of conflicts and attacks.
The community and the camp located there have been repeatedly attacked. In March 2021, 33 soldiers were killed in an ambush by fighters of the Islamic State in the Sahara (ISIS).
Mali has been mired in a major crisis since 2012. The activity of jihadist groups, initially confined to the north of the country, has now spread to its central and southern regions, as well as neighboring countries, Burkina Faso and Niger.
RES-EMP
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