Malian Army Says 80 Terrorists Killed After Al-Qaeda Attacks Malian Army Says 80 Terrorists Killed After Al-Qaeda Attacks

Mali has spent decades suffering under terrorist action by groups linked to ISIS and Al Qaeda, as well as Tuareg insurgency.

Rabat – Mali’s armed forces have said that they eliminated 80 al-Qaeda linked militants in response to recent attacks. This follows a highly coordinated simultaneous terrorist attacks on posts across the country, taking place on 2 June.

Officials have stated that these attacks on military posts across several towns and cities around the country. The border towns of Diboli, Kayes and Sandere near Senegal had been targeted.

As well as this several locations to the North of Bamako including the Timbuktu airport and border towns with Mauritania were affected. These attacks resembled other recent attacks carried out by the organisation across the Sahel.

These individuals were part of the Al-Qaeda affiliated organisation Jama’at Nursat Al Islam Wal-Muslimin which was responsible for the attacks. The JNIM celebrated on social media calling it a “coordinated attack and high quality.”

In retaliation to the recent terrorist attack, the government’s military fought back against the militants on June 3 and says that it killed 80 of the militants. “The enemy has suffered significant losses in every location where they engaged with the security and defence forces,” the spokesman of the national army, Souleymane Dembele, stated in a bulletin broadcast on the state’s national news channel.

Residents of the border town of Kayes related how terrified they were during the night of the operation. “We woke up in shock this morning. That’s gunfire, and from my house I can see smoke billowing towards the governor’s residence,” recalled one local, noting that this continued throughout the assault.

Mali has been governed by a military junta following a coup d’etat in 2020. The junta has recently been restricting democratic freedoms and suspending political organisations and political parties.

The state has also suffered from extensive terrorist activity in recent decades with both organisations affiliated with ISIS and Al Qaeda, as well as northern rebel Tuareg insurgents. In May the head of the US Africa Command warned that the Sahel has become the “epicentre of terrorism across the globe.”