One year after Russia’s arrival, the level of violence in Mali rises

Alou Diallo claims that last month, as he was having tea with his family, groups of “white soldiers” raided his town in central Mali, torching homes and killing people they believed to be Islamic radicals. His kid was shot and wounded while running, then killed while he lay on the ground. He managed to escape by hiding in the bush, though.

In the capital of Mali, Bamako, where he resides in a temporary camp for displaced people, Diallo told The Associated Press, “I witnessed my 16-year-old son die.” The 47-year-old former cattle producer made little effort to conceal his rage toward the forces, whom he assumed to be Russian mercenaries, who turned his world upside down as he relived that terrible Saturday in his village of Bamguel.

He stated, “I genuinely want peace to return and things to return to normal.” “I live a life I didn’t choose here in Bamako.”

Western sources say that for more than a year, hundreds of militants from the Wagner Group, a questionable Russian military contractor, have been working with Mali’s armed forces to stop an Islamic extremist uprising in the West African country.

Diplomats, analysts, and human rights organisations, however, claim that since the mercenaries arrived, indiscriminate violence against civilians has increased, and extremists affiliated with al-Qaida and the Islamic State group have only grown more powerful. There is also concern that the Russian presence will further destabilise the already unstable region.

According to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, a nongovernmental organisation, more than 2,000 civilians have been killed since December 2021, compared to roughly 500 in the previous 12 months. The information gathered by ACLED indicates that attacks involving the Wagner Group were responsible for at least a third of the fatalities reported last year.

According to Michael Shurkin, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and director of global programmes at the consulting firm 14 North Strategies, “they are killing civilians and, by their sheer presence, giving Malian security forces a green light to act on their worst tendencies.”

Moscow’s forces have been bolstered by military contractors from Wagner, a company headed by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a wealthy businessman with connections to Russian President Vladimir Putin. However, according to analysts, they also operate in a few African nations.

Relations between Mali’s military junta and the international community have been difficult ever since the military took control of the country in two coups beginning in 2020.

In 2013, France sent soldiers to Mali to assist its former colony in driving out Islamic terrorists from the country’s northern regions. However, as ties soured and anti-French sentiment increased in the populace, France withdrew its forces in August. The West says that Mali is getting more and more security from Moscow, but the junta says that all it has done is take on military instructors.

The junta’s head of communications, Alassane Maiga, asserted that Wagner was not conducting business in the nation. When asked about the attacks on civilians, Maiga said that Mali’s government takes care of its people and their property.

He said that “human rights and international humanitarian law are respected in the protection and security tasks of the army.”

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When contacted for comment, The Wagner Group did not provide one. Russian Deputy Ambassador Anna Evstigneeva rebuffed attempts by other nations Tuesday at a U.N. Security Council discussion to “besmirch Russian assistance to Mali,” where Moscow has a bilateral arrangement to support the transitional government. The Wagner Group was not mentioned by her.

According to a report from the U.S. Military Academy’s Combating Terrorism Center, which studies extremist violence, up to 1,000 mercenaries have been sent in to provide security and training. The Wagner Group is paid about $11 million per month to do this.

According to the report, Wagner’s forces are finding it difficult to make substantial advancements as terrorist violence rises. According to the report, over 90 attacks against civilians and the military were carried out by an extremist group linked to al-Qaida during the rainy season between June and September, as opposed to six during the same period last year. Also, at least 42 Malian soldiers died in an attack on a barracks in August by a group with ties to the Islamic State.

Human Rights Watch reported that in the deadliest raid, 300 men were reportedly gathered up and executed in the village of Moura in March by the Mali army and foreign troops believed to be Russian. Most were civilians, although others were thought to be Islamic radicals. 27 people were named in the probe, including witnesses, traders, local authorities, diplomats, and security analysts.

When a similar incident was reported, Mali’s defence ministry announced that 203 “terrorists” had been killed and 51 others had been taken into custody.

U.S. Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland said of the Wagner mercenaries: “There are widespread complaints of human rights abuses across the region where they are working.” We are concerned that these forces are more concerned with enriching themselves, destabilising the country, and escalating the terrorism problem than they are with the safety and security of Mali’s citizens.

Russia is not very credible when it comes to counterterrorism in Africa, according to Samuel Ramani, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, a defence and security think tank.

Ramani cited their limited understanding of the terrain, strained relationships with low-ranking officers, and a rigid command and control structure as reasons for this. “What we’ve seen repeatedly is that Russia and the Wagner Group forces are much better at strengthening the hold of authoritarian regimes in power than actually combating rebels and terrorist groups,” Ramani said.

Many Malians accuse the military, as well as the white soldiers who assist them, of arbitrarily detaining people who were just going to the market, farming, or herding livestock. The majority of them are Fulani ethnic people, who are being increasingly targeted by security authorities, who believe they are aiding Islamic extremists.

Rights organisations claim that these reported violations support the radicals, who use popular complaints as a recruiting tool.

Hamidou, a 29-year-old cattle herder, claimed that he and two other people were detained at their homes in the central Mali town of Douentza in November and charged with being Islamic militants.He was kept in a room and subjected to beatings and questioning by “white soldiers.”

We received brutal beatings every day. For fear of retaliation, Hamidou requested to only be recognised by his first name. He said that the majority of those arrested shared his Fulani ethnicity. “We didn’t think we’d survive,” he said. Arbitrary detentions and killings of Fulani civilians have significantly increased since Wagner arrived in Mali.

The AP couldn’t independently verify his claims, but a human rights researcher who also asked to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation said he saw wounds on Hamidou’s forehead and back after he was set free.

According to the International Crisis Group, Mali’s government has limited the ability of the thousands of United Nations peacekeeping troops there to protect civilians from violence. Additionally, nations like Benin, Germany, Sweden, the Ivory Coast, and the United Kingdom have announced troop withdrawals.

According to US envoy Nuland, the Wagner Group urged the junta to prevent peacekeepers from entering areas where it had a duty to investigate violations.