The UN mission for stabilization in Mali (Minusma) indicated on Wednesday August 31 that a joint operation by Malian soldiers and "foreign military personnel" caused at least 50 civilian deaths in April - out of a total of 96 civilians killed during the second quarter during army operations.
On April 19 in Hombori (center of the country), after the explosion of a device at the passage of a convoy of Malian forces, the latter, accompanied by "foreign military personnel, carried out a military search operation in the locality during which at least 50 civilians (including a woman and a child) were killed and more than 500 others arrested,” Minusma said in its quarterly report on human rights violations.
The Minusma does not provide any details on these foreign fighters.
Several Western countries accuse the junta in power in Bamako since 2020 of having added the services of the Russian security company Wagner to the controversial actions.
The junta denies and speaks of the presence of Russian army instructors in the name of old military cooperation.
The UN gives reason to the French army on the affair of the mass grave near the base of Gossi
The Malian military has completely turned away, since 2021, from the former French ally, which has just completed its military withdrawal from Mali after nine years of engagement.
The Minusma document also gives a version favorable to France of a case of corpses in which Bamako accused Paris of manipulation.
The French army said in April that it filmed and released the images of what it claims were Russian mercenaries burying bodies near the Gossi base (north of the country), from where the he French army had just withdrawn.
The purpose would have been to accuse the French of leaving a mass grave behind them.
>> Mali: the French army claims to have filmed Russian mercenaries burying bodies
The Malian authorities accused, in return, the French of having fabricated these mounted images "from scratch in order to accuse (the Malian soldiers) of being the perpetrators of the killings of civilians".
The Minusma says it has opened its investigation.
According to her, the remains buried in Gossi were transported there on April 20, the day after the handover of the Gossi camp by the French to the Malians and "came from Hombori".
With AFP
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