UNITED NATIONS, Jun 4 (NNN-XINHUA) – UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, yesterday condemned the killing of two Egyptian members of the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, a UN spokesman said.
Another peacekeeper was injured, when their armoured personnel carrier hit an improvised explosive device, outside of the town of Douentza, in the Mopti region, said Stephane Dujarric, chief spokesman for Guterres. “They were going from Douentza to Timbuktu. They were escorting … from what I understand … civilian trucks.”
Since May 22, there have been six attacks on UN mission convoy, the spokesman said. A terrorist assault on a convoy near the town of Kidal, in the northern part of Mali, killed a Jordanian peacekeeper and injured three colleagues on Wednesday.
The secretary-general wishes a prompt recovery to the injured peacekeeper, Dujarric said, adding that, the peacekeepers are fulfilling the Security Council mandate in extremely challenging conditions.
“The head of the UN mission in Mali, El-Ghassim Wane, also condemned the new attack,” Dujarric said.
“He also condemned the attack in the Kayes region earlier this week, in which two members of the Malian Red Cross were killed.”
The spokesman said, despite the deadly attacks, “UN colleagues are continuing their mandated work. As an example, the UN peacekeeping mission helped to rehabilitate two bridges in the Mopti region, which had been destroyed in earlier attacks. The restoration of these two bridges will bring relief to the people of the region and will facilitate the resumption of travel, commerce and activity, including between Mopti and Bandiagara.”
He added that, in the Kidal and Gao regions, peacekeepers assisted the populations of Anefis and Tanbankort towns, as part of their ongoing support in the North.
MINUSMA, the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, was established on Apr 25, 2013, by the Security Council Resolution 2100, to stabilise the country after the Tuareg rebellion of 2012. With more than 200 peacekeepers killed since its deployment on July 1, it has become the UN’s most dangerous peacekeeping mission.– NNN-XINHUA
