BAMAKO, Oct 8 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita rejected as speculation talk of a military coup after recent militant attacks left dozens of soldiers dead near the border with Burkina Faso.
Keita said lessons would be learned after 38 soldiers were killed in two
attacks last week, a death toll that observers say is probably an
underestimate.
“No military coup will prevail in Mali, let it be said,” the president said
in remarks released on Sunday. “And I don’t think this is on the agenda at all and cannot worry us,” he added.
Also on Sunday, the UN mission MINUSMA said one peacekeeper was killed and five others were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded in the northeast of the former French colony.
The peacekeepers were carrying out a security patrol near the town of
Aguelhok when the device detonated, spokesman Olivier Salgado said on
Twitter.
Keita said after the attacks last Monday and Tuesday in the central towns
of Boulkessy and Mondoro that the semi-desert country was “at war”.
“What happened at Boulkessy could unfortunately happen again,” Keita said of the attacks, which evoked memories of a 2012 army coup in Mali.
The assailants used heavily armed vehicles in the raids on the two military
camps, during which the government said troops killed 15 militants.
The militants made off with a large quantity of arms, ammunition and
equipment — local media said about 20 vehicles were captured, including some mounted with machine guns.
Sources said Malian special forces and foreign allies, including French
warplanes and helicopters, helped to quash the attacks.
The head of MINUSMA, Mahamat Saleh Annadif, “strongly condemned the recent increase in these kinds of attacks, especially in the centre” of the country, the UN mission said.
MINUSMA has lost more than 200 peacekeepers since it was set up in 2013,
according to its website.
Northern Mali fell into the hands of militants in 2012 before they
were forced out by a French-led military intervention.
But much of the region remains chronically unstable and militant-led
violence has spread to the centre of the country, often sparking bloodshed
between ethnic groups. — NNN-AGENCIES
