| Mali wedding massacre | |
|---|---|
| Part of Mali War | |
  Bounti Location of Bounti | |
| Location | Bounti, Mopti Region, Mali |
| Date | 3 January 2021 |
| Target | AQIM fighters |
Attack type | |
| Deaths | 22 (UN) |
| Injured | Unknown |
| Victims | civilians |
| Perpetrators |  French Air and Space Force |
On 3 January 2021, the French Armed Forces carried out a massacre targeting a wedding claiming that terrorists were killed without any collateral damage. A UN report later revealed that out of the 22 people killed, 19 were civilians. [1]
On 2 January 2021, in coordination with the militaries of Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger the French military launched Operation Éclipse in and around the city of Boni. [2]
On 3 January 2021, Islamic extremists confronted a wedding in the village of Bounti in Mopti Region, central Mali, ordering the attendees to separate by gender. An airstrike, carried out by a French Mirage 2000 aircraft and MQ-9 Reaper drone, then killed 22 people, including children, according to witnesses and local officials including the mayor. [3] [4] [5] [6]
According to the French and Malian authorities, the bombing had targeted a group of about forty jihadists. However, the local Fula organisation Tabital Pulaaku provided another version: 19 men had been killed, all of whom were civilians attending a wedding. The majority of them were elderly. [7] The injured were taken into charge by Medicins Sans Frontieres, who confirmed that most of them were elderly civilians. [8] [9]
Residents also said a helicopter opened fire on the ceremony. [10] The French Armed Forces said they had killed "dozens" of militant Islamists in Hombori, a few kilometers away, on that day, but that a connection between the strike and a wedding party "does not correspond to information collected prior to the airstrike". [3] [4] [5]
On 30 March 2021, the MINUSMA United Nations peacekeeping mission in Mali concluded that the strike killed 19 unarmed civilians and three armed men. [11] They said the strike was on a wedding attended by about 100 civilians and five armed men, presumably members of a group affiliated with al-Qaeda. [11] [12]
The French authorities maintained their version of events; the head of the French armed forces called the UN report "biased". [12] [13] [14] [15]
The Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa or the Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa, was a militant Islamist organisation that broke off from Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb with the intended goal of spreading jihad across a larger section of West Africa, as well as demanding the expulsion of all French interests that operate in West Africa, which they regard as "colonialist occupiers".
The Mali War is an ongoing conflict that started in January 2012 between the northern and southern parts of Mali in Africa. On 16 January 2012, several insurgent groups began fighting a campaign against the Malian government for independence or greater autonomy for northern Mali, which they called Azawad. The National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA), an organization fighting to make this area of Mali an independent homeland for the Tuareg people, had taken control of the region by April 2012.
Operation Serval was a French military operation in Mali. The aim of the operation was to oust Islamic militants from the north of Mali, who had begun a push into the center of Mali.
The Battle of Konna was a battle in the Northern Mali Conflict in the town of Konna in central Mali. Various Islamic fundamentalist rebels fought with the government of Mali, the latter of which was supported by French soldiers participating in Operation Serval. This battle was among the first French engagements in their intervention in the Mali War.
The Battle of Diabaly was fought between government forces of Mali, against groups of Islamists militants such as the AQIM and Ansar Dine. The Islamists held control of Diabaly for no longer than a week until Malian forces with the help French air strikes recaptured the town.
The following is a timeline of major events during the Northern Mali conflict.
The United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali was a United Nations peacekeeping mission in Mali. MINUSMA was established on 25 April 2013 by United Nations Security Council Resolution 2100 to stabilise the country after the Tuareg rebellion of 2012, and was terminated over a decade later on 30 June 2023. Officially deployed on 1 July 2013, MINUSMA was the UN's deadliest peacekeeping mission. While UNIFIL, the mission in Lebanon, has lost more peacekeepers overall, by incident type the majority of those deaths at 135 are officially listed as "accidents." At 175 deaths by "malicious act," MINUSMA was officially the deadliest Peacekeeping mission of all time.
Al-Mourabitoun was an African militant jihadist organization formed by a merger between Ahmed Ould Amer, a.k.a. Ahmed al-Tilemsi's Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, and Mokhtar Belmokhtar's Al-Mulathameen. On 4 December 2015, it joined Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). The group sought to implement Sharia law in Mali, Algeria, southwestern Libya, and Niger.
Operation Barkhane was a counterinsurgency operation that started on 1 August 2014 and formally ended on 9 November 2022. It was led by the French military against Islamist groups in Africa's Sahel region and consisted of a roughly 3,000-strong French force, which was permanently headquartered in N'Djamena, the capital of Chad. The operation was led in co-operation with five countries, all of which are former French colonies that span the Sahel: Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger. Mali was a part of the operation until August 2022. The countries are collectively referred to as the "G5 Sahel". The operation was named after a crescent-shaped dune type that is common in the Sahara desert.
Jama'at Nusrat ul-Islam wa al-Muslimin is a Salafi Jihadist organisation in the Maghreb and West Africa formed by the merger of Ansar Dine, the Macina Liberation Front, al-Mourabitoun and the Saharan branch of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. Its leaders swore allegiance to Ayman al-Zawahiri.
On 18 June 2017, gunmen attacked Le Campement Kangaba in Dougourakoro, east of Bamako, Mali, a luxury resort frequented by tourists. Hostages were reported to have been taken and at least 5 people are reported to have been killed, including a Franco-Gabonese civilian, a Chinese citizen and a Portuguese soldier. According to an eyewitness, the attack began when a man on a motorcycle arrived at the compound and fired at the crowd. He was followed by two other assailants. Security forces stationed at the resort held off the attack for several hours while awaiting reinforcements. Once arrived, the United Nations troops managed to rescue around 60 people staying at the resort. Some residents hid in a cave near the resort and managed to avoid the attackers.
On March 23, 2019, several attacks by gunmen killed a reported 160 Fulani herders in central Mali. The violence came in the aftermath of the Malian government cracking down on Islamic terror cells in the country. Two villages, Ogossagou and Welingara, were particularly affected.
Events in the year 2021 in Mali.
Since 2015, the border area between Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger has been a hotbed for jihadist forces originating from Mali. The insurgency has taken place in two distinct regions of Niger. In southwest, the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara and the Nusrat al-Islam have carried out attacks in the tri-border area with Burkina Faso and Mali. Meanwhile, in the southeast, the Islamic State in the West African Province has established control in parts of southern Niger.
Opération Éclipse was a joint French, Malian, Burkinabé and Nigérien military operation during the Mali War, as part of the larger French-led counterinsurgency campaign. It took place between January 2 and 20, 2021. According to a UN investigation, a French airstrike on January 3 killed 19 civilians in the village of Bounti in Mali.
An Islamist insurgency has been ongoing in the Sahel region of West Africa since the 2011 Arab Spring. In particular, the intensive conflict in the three countries of Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso has been referred to as the Sahel War.
Events in the year 2022 in Mali.
Events in the year 2023 in Mali.
On January 26, 2020, jihadists from the al-Qaeda linked Jama'at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM) attacked a Malian military base at Sokolo, killing over 20 Malian soldiers.
Events in the year 2024 in Mali.