Assault on Mali Hotel, Fragile Peace in Divided Country Further Undermined

Armed men stormed an upscale hotel in central Bamako on November 20, killing 19 and temporarily holding over 100 others hostage. According to Al Jazeera, Jihadist group al-Mourabitoun has claimed credit for the attacks on the Radisson Blu hotel, which took place while a peace conference aiming to end a multi-year conflict in the fractured Sahelian country went on inside. The gunmen, who CNN reports arrived at the hotel’s compound in at least one car with diplomatic plates, seized the building around 7 a.m., using several grenades and bursts of gunfire against guards at the main entrance.

In addition to killing 19 people, the perpetrators held hostages inside the hotel, totaling between 140 and 170 people, as reported by The Guardian. Malian and French security forces responded to the emergency, driving back the gunmen and freeing the hostages.

The attacks come in the context of an Islamist insurgency that has gripped Mali since al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and associated groups like al-Mourabitoun took over the territory of Azawad in the northern two thirds of the country and declared an independent state under their interpretation of Sharia law in 2012.

France, which colonized Mali for 68 years until independence in 1960, intervened militarily in 2013, retaking the territory held by Islamist forces in 23 days.

The Guardian has reported a series of smaller attacks by groups previously in control of Azawad that have plagued Mali since then, including a siege that killed nine at a hotel in Sevare in the central part of the country and an attack on a restaurant in Bamako in March that killed five. Al-Mourabitoun claimed responsibility for both of these acts.

All told, the New York Times estimates that 55 people have been killed in seven terror attacks across Mali this year alone, most of which were claimed by AQIM, al-Mourabitoun, or Ansar Dine, another Islamist group that helped to establish the short-lived Azawad state.

Two of these attacks and 24 of the deaths have occurred since the Malian Government and Islamists signed a peace deal in June. The deal’s fragility was one of the factors that led to the conference that was taking place at the Radisson Blu on Friday.

Globally, the siege comes on the heels of several high-profile terror attacks, including the bombing of a Russian plane over the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt, twin blasts in a suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, and a coordinated series of bombings and shootings in Paris.

The attack is a blow to Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, who was elected in 2013 on promises to restore peace to the country that the New York Times once considered one of the region’s most stable. Instead, the 70-year-old’s reign has been marred by insurgency and continued fighting, leading to doubts about his continued ability to rule the fractured country.

Al Jazeera cites al-Mourabitoun’s main demand as the release of prisoners in France and Mali taken in the war against the insurgency, though no releases have taken place. Furthermore, the group claims to fight for a cessation of intervention in Azawad.