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Tuareg rebels seize control of Mali's northern town of Kidal

Tuareg rebels seize control of Mali's northern town of Kidal

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Jihadists and Tuareg separatists seized the northern town of Kidal after launching coordinated attacks on key junta positions. The two‑day clash involved the Malian army and the rebel forces, and was accompanied by dawn offensives targeting strategic towns around Bamako. The fighting has intensified uncertainty about the stability and future of Mali’s junta‑led government.

Ulf Laessing
Konrad Adenauer Foundation
1. I don't think Europe or France will be willing or even welcome to put boots on the ground to help stabilise the situation, which is probably beyond a military solution anyway.
2. Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso are on a nationalist, anti-Western course and it is not clear who will want to engage with them.
3. In fact, they (the Russian mercenaries) made the conflict worse by being brutal and not distinguishing between civilians and combatants, which has made it easier for jihadists to recruit fighters.
4. The French never really had a chance to pacify this vast country and the Russians even less so.
5. The jihadists eventually got rid of the Tuaregs back then, so this is a very shaky, ad hoc alliance, and not something that can run Mali.
6. They both know they can't really force regime change on their own – that's why they are teaming up the way they did in 2012.
7. JNIM fighters don't have the capacity to take and run a city like Bamako. What they are trying to do is to target major regime figures, destabilise the junta and perhaps spark an uprising.
8. Burkina Faso and Niger don't really have the capacities. They're busy themselves fighting off jihadists. They might help a bit with drone attacks, but I don't think that Burkina and Niger will send troops.
9. But there's no indication that's happening. Most people are unhappy with the situation in Mali, but they still back the government because they don't want to be run by by jihadists.
10. They don't have the capacity to run a large city. They want to spark an uprising, hoping to pressure the government into negotiating with them, or that they get a new government.
11. They staged an attack together in 2012 and took over northern Mali. Later, the jihadists got rid of the Tuareg.
12. Remarkably, there has been a coordination between jihadists and Tuareg rebels, which have nothing in common, but they have a joint enemy.
Kommersant
1. Largely thanks to the fighters of the Russian armed forces' Africa Corps stationed in Mali, most of the attacks were repelled.
Wassim Nasr
France 24
1. There is a clear coordination to resume fighting against the Malian junta, but also against the Russians.
2. The aim was not to bring down Bamako, but to tie down the army in order to cut off the north and gain control of it.
3. We now have proof that there is genuine coordination across the country: all these attacks took place simultaneously.
Nina Wilen
Egmont Institute for International Relations
1. The second reason is that Camara has been the leading figure establishing relations with Russia. So attacking him can also be a way of saying that we do not want the Russians troops here anymore.
2. He's a very symbolic figure for the military junta.
3. The fact that the Malian military intelligence has not been able to detect that these attacks were about to take place is a major failure for them.
Djallil Lounnas
Al Akhawayn University
1. There are very strong bridges between them. They're all from the same tribal backgrounds. They fought together.
2. It's very small. I don't think the Russians could do more. Besides that, they are stuck in Ukraine. They didn't participate much in Iran, so I don't expect much Russian participation in Mali.
3. However, we are talking about only 600 to 1,000 fighters.
4. The Malian army is extremely weak. In the past few years, it just was controlling the urban centers. But whole rural areas were out of control. So the Malian army was isolated in Kidal.
Andrew Leibovich
Clingendael Conflict Research Unit
1. The fact that they were able to assemble so many fighters, particularly in and around Bamako and Kati, without detection and without the government being able to stop them, indicates how tenuous the security situation is, even around the capital.
2. This is a dramatic setback for the Malian government and a new phase in the ongoing insurgency in the Sahel.
Ibrahim Yahaya Ibrahim
Sahel Project
1. It would have been much more catastrophic for the military regime if the Russians were not stationed in the big cities.
2. Losing Kidal after first recapturing it is a major symbolic setback for the Russians.
3. Questions will be raised now over whether the Russians can provide the kind of solution that African nations facing insurgencies are looking for.
4. This crisis is definitely affecting the credibility of Russia's interventions in the region.
Marat Gabidullin
Wagner Mercenaries
1. Morale is low, commanders are often not qualified, and the soldiers are poorly trained.
2. Africa Corps is nowhere near as good at its work as its predecessor.

sources

1.France 24
2.Le Monde
3.Hindustan Times
4.The New York Times
5.The Guardian
6.DW News
7.Agence France-Presse
8.Kommersant
9.Office de Radiodiffusion-Télévision du Mali

Tuareg rebels seize control of Mali's northern town of Kidal

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