In North Mali, Conflict Reignites Between Tuaregs, Troops, and Terrorists
A UN peacekeeper patrols Mali’s Mopti region, an area targeted by Tuareg separatists in their September 2023 offensive (Gema Cortes, Flickr)
A decades-old conflict in Mali’s north has flared up in recent weeks as state armed forces compete with ethnic rebels for territorial control. In a September 11th statement to the Associated French Press, the separatist group CMA (Coordination des mouvements de l'Azawad) declared itself at war with the Malian state. Attacks soon followed, with rebels striking army bases across the country’s north and center. In response, a Malian army convoy departed from the city of Gao to take Kidal, a stronghold deep in the rebel heartland.
Decades-old differences underlie the current conflict. A Berber group known as the Tuareg hold a demographic majority in some parts of the north and have spent decades fighting for territorial independence. After a 2013 rebellion, these separatists came together with the Malian government to agree on a peace deal. For years, the treaty held, propped up by international deployments from France and the UN. In May 2021, Mali’s government fell to a coup d’état, ushering in a military junta that called for the withdrawal of these international forces.
Subsequent UN withdrawals opened a power vacuum in areas of the north where peacekeepers had served as a buffer. A Tuareg group calling itself the CMA opposed the Malian government’s seizure of newly vacated peacekeeper bases. Bolstered by mercenaries from the Russian Wagner Group, the junta held its ground.
These Tuareg tensions coincided with a long-running war against Mali’s jihadists, who threaten large areas of the country and collaborated with ethnic separatists during the 2013 rebellion. These groups, including local affiliates of Al Qaeda and the Islamic State, took international withdrawals as an opportunity to step up attacks. On September 7th, the AQ-affiliated JNIM attacked civilian boats and a military camp along the Niger river. A day later, the same group attacked Mali’s Gao airport with multiple car-borne suicide bombs, leaving dozens of soldiers dead. Three days after that, as Malian security forces reeled from the jihadist assaults, Tuareg militants declared war.
Separatist attacks since the 11th have been bloody, successful, and well-documented, accompanied in each case by iPhone videos of grinning militants. A day after declaring war, the CMA seized Bourem in northern Mali. On the 17th, they overran an army camp at Léré. On the 29th, they uploaded videos of dead troops and burned buildings at Dioura, a base in Mali’s central region of Mopti. Just two days before, the UN had announced its complete withdrawal from Mopti, thanking Senegalese peacekeepers for their “commitment to peace and stability.”
October 1st saw the CMA’s gun-mounted trucks roll into Bamba, a camp Al-Qaeda had stormed three weeks prior. In response to this string of victories, the junta mobilized a convoy at Gao, a large city near many of the separatist attacks. From there, over a hundred military vehicles began a trek eastward to the Tuareg heartland, Kidal, where the army will seek a decisive end to this rebellion. As these forces moved north, the CMA seized Taoussa on October 5th, marking the 5th camp it had captured in just under a month of fighting.
At the time of writing, both the CMA and the junta have claimed victories on the road to Kidal. Rebel spokesman Attaye Ag Mohamed said on social media that the convoy was surrounded outside the town of Anefif. According to the army’s communique, it had broken through that town’s defenses. In the absence of proof from either side, these claims are all observers can go on, although heavy fighting will continue regardless of this battle’s result.