Coordinated attack strikes Mali as Junta loses control

As a coordinated attack rips through western Mali, the junta’s fading grip on the very conflict it vowed to contain could signal further destabilization.

Seven military outposts in western Mali came under simultaneous assault on July 1, marking one of the most wide-ranging strikes in the region in recent months. While no group has claimed the attack, according to France 24, signs point to the familiar al-Qaeda aligned culprits.

The attacks, some of which unfolded from the Senegalese border, struck towns from Nioro to Gogui to Diboli, the latter situated directly on Senegalese soil. Eyewitnesses in Kayes described waking to heavy gunfire and smoke rising from near the governor’s residence.

That attack came just a day after a bloody raid killed at least 30 soldiers in the center of the country. Armed groups, mostly linked to either al-Qaeda via JNIM (the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims) or to ISIS, have long destabilized the Sahel states. Mali’s military leadership rose to power via a coup in August 2020 on promises to quell the spiraling crisis; however, the realities of governing have considerably sobered those ambitions.

Now, operations seem to be intensifying not just in Mali, but across Burkina Faso and Niger, exploiting regional fragmentation and a vacuum in credible leadership.

Responding to the attacks, the Malian military issued a terse statement. They acknowledged the “coordinated attacks” on seven Western posts but offered few details and no casualty figures. The omissions reflect the growing pattern of silence from the Junta, which is struggling against a tide of increasingly brazen insurgency.

The attack also follows an offensive on an army base and the airport in Timbuktu, which are historically significant targets designed to humiliate the state and signal strength.

The military, for its part, insists it is monitoring the situation “very closely.”

France 24/ Maghrebi