One UN peacekeeper dead, four others injured in north Mali attack

By William On Jun 9, 2023

Since the start of the mission in Mali in 2013, more than 300 peacekeepers have also been killed in MINUSMA.

At least one UN peacekeeper was killed and four others seriously injured when their patrol was attacked in northern Mali on Friday, the peacekeeping mission MINUSMA said.

The incident took place near the town of Ber, in the Timbouctou region, an area that has become a hotbed of violent activity over the past decade.

MINUSMA – the United Nations multidimensional integrated stabilization mission in Mali – said on Twitter that the patrol first encountered an improvised explosive device and was then hit with a direct fire attack.

It did not name perpetrators, but said it was a “complex attack” and updates on victims would follow.

Armed groups, some with links to al-Qaeda and ISIL (ISIS), have been waging war in northern Mali since taking control of a 2012 Tuareg insurgency.

Violence has spread across the sub-Sahel region and beyond, despite international military interventions to help local forces fight back.

Thousands have been killed and more than six million displaced by the fighting, the UN said.

MINUSMA currently has about 12,000 military personnel in the country.

Since the mission began in 2013, more than 300 of its peacekeepers have also been killed, making it the deadliest UN peacekeeping mission in the world.

Malians initially celebrated the arrival of the UN peacekeeping force, but now say that UN soldiers are the problem and not the solution. They blame it for failing to protect the population and intervene in massacres near UN compounds.

Outside the capital, in the northern and central parts of the country where government is sparse, millions of Malians still depend on the UN mission for security.

But in recent months there have been repeated frictions between the Malian military government and the mission, in part because Mali’s military has sought help from the Kremlin-affiliated Wagner Group, a private Russian mercenary company.