As Mali’s military government battles to reassert control, a spokesperson for Tuareg rebels says it will fall ‘sooner or later’.
Mali’s Tuareg rebels, involved in a continuing uprising, including the assassination of the country’s defence minister, have said they want to drive the military government’s Russian backers out of the country. Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane, a spokesperson for the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA), told the AFP news agency during a visit to Paris to meet French security and defence officials that his movement’s “objective” was for Russia’s Africa Corps to “withdraw permanently” from the country. “We have no particular problem with Russia, nor with any other country. Our problem is with the regime that governs Bamako.”
Russian fighters backed the military government of President Assimi Goita, as it came under coordinated attack from an alliance of Tuareg separatists, Fulani and Arab rebels, and al-Qaeda-linked fighters, who entered the capital Bamako and made gains across several northern and central cities, including Kidal and Sevare.
