Airstrikes attributed to the Malian army have killed at least fifteen civilians, including seven children, according to a rebel alliance spokesman and local sources, in what appears to herald a wider battle for Kindal, a stronghold of Tuareg-dominated armed groups and major stake for the sovereignty of the central state.

The Permanent Strategic Framework (SSP), an organizational structure of an alliance of Tuareg-dominated armed groups, spoke through its spokesman about 15 dead, including seven children and four local officials, in strikes by Turkish-made army drones, it said.

Residents and eyewitnesses, most of whom spoke on the condition that they not be named for their safety, spoke of six, or seven, or nine dead, without however having the full picture.

The Malian army confirmed through X (the former Twitter) that it launched strikes, but emphasized that they were targeting “terrorists” at a base where until recently a detachment of the UN peacekeeping mission, MINUSMA, was stationed, and that open semi-trucks were destroyed in particular.

He called on citizens not to believe “terrorist propaganda” aimed at tarnishing “the reputation of the Armed Forces of Mali”.

“Six people, including children, were killed in army airstrikes. We have injured people in a hospital,” said a worker at a health facility.

Video seen by AFP shows six bodies lined up side by side.

Mali’s army announced on Saturday that it had “neutralized” the previous number of “targets” from the air, rebels who it said were preparing for operations, inside the camp from which a detachment of MINUSMA left a few days ago.

Yesterday’s hostilities, the first reported deaths in Kindal since separatist rebels resumed operations against the central government in August, confirm long-held concerns among residents of the city – historically a cradle of insurgency and a crossroads on the road to Algeria.

The situation in and around Kindal, where the army suffered humiliating defeats between 2012 and 2014, has long been a source of irritation in Bamako.

The colonels who seized power in the 2020 coup constantly repeat that their goal is the restoration of national sovereignty.

Kindal is now again controlled by rebels who, after rising in 2012 and agreeing to a ceasefire in 2014, took up arms again this year.

The separatist uprising of 2012 coincided with the emergence of jihadist organizations. These latter never stopped fighting against the central state and any foreign presence; their action plunged Mali into a multidimensional crisis, security, political and humanitarian, which spread to neighboring states, Burkina Faso and Niger.

Appeal to Turkey

The northern part of the country has again since August turned into a theater of hostilities between various sides — the regular army, separatist rebel organizations, jihadists. The withdrawal of the UN mission, pushed out by the military junta, has led to a race for control of the region, with the central state seeking to take control of bases and rebels and jihadists trying to take advantage.

The withdrawal of MINUSMA from the base in Kindal seems to be a catalyst for developments.

Pending the departure of the blue-collar workers, a large army convoy left on October 2 for the city. But the contingent of the UN force, amid a rapidly deteriorating security situation, hastened the timetable, leaving its base in Kindal last week. Separatists took control of it, overtaking the army.

MINUSMA’s hasty departure further angered the junta, which wanted to coincide with the arrival of the army force.

Obstacles from the regime forced the blue-collar workers to destroy some of their material, so that it would not fall into anyone’s hands, but some material was left behind.

According to a resident who had worked for MINUSMA, among the victims of yesterday’s strikes were his fellow villagers who had gathered in front of the camp in the hope that they would manage to get some of the material.

The DSP, for its part, complained that a drone hit a group of students in front of a school, a short distance from the camp. He added that he is asking the Turkish authorities to “review their policy of selling drones to the junta” and to the Russian private military company Wagner, with which the military regime works.

MINUSMA, whose personnel had reached up to 15,000 military and police officers – more than 180 of its members have been killed in hostile action since its deployment – ​​will in theory have left the Sahel country on December 31. Since July, it has withdrawn some 6,000 of its members, uniformed and non-uniformed, from Mali.