Bamako, Mali – At least 18 people have been killed in an air attack in the north MaliA separatist group said. The army said he had set up an attack aimed at armed militants.
The group of defense of the rights of the people of Azawad, which is part of a Tuareg Separatist coalition, he said on Monday that the Malian army bombarded a 50 km (30 miles) market north of Lerneb, in the Timbuktu region.
Seven people were also injured in the strike on Sunday, the group said in a statement, denouncing a “barbarian act of another age” and a “violation of flagrant human rights.”
The Mali Army said Monday in a statement on X that carried out air attacks in a “refuge” in the same area cited by the separatist group, killing 11 “terrorists.”
Mali, along with his neighbors Burkina Faso and Niger, has fought for more than a decade in an insurgency fought by armed groups, including some allies with Al-Qaida and the Islamic State group.
After the military blows in the three nations in recent years, the ruling boards have French forces expelled And he turned to Russian mercenary units for security assistance instead.
Since he took power in 2021, Colonel Assimi Goita has fought to stop violence in the center and northern Mali, while the army has been accused of attacking civilians.
Last month, the Front for the Liberation of Azawad, the coalition of separatist groups of Tuareg, accused the Malian army and the Russian mercenaries of the Wagner group of “cold execution” “. At least 24 people In northern Mali.
Last year, the human rights group Rights Watch said in a report that the Army and the Russian mercenaries killed at least 32 civilians, including seven in a drone strike, four others kidnapped and burned at least 100 homes in cities and towns in the center and north of Mali between May and December.
