![]() Moura, where the alleged massacre of hundreds took place in March, is a village in an inaccessible swampy area of the floodplain of the Niger River which has been controlled for many years by militants from the al-Qaida-linked Group of Support for Islam and Muslims (GSIM). Malian authorities denied the allegations. Many victims had been tied and blindfolded, then shot, according to Human Rights Watch. Local witnesses accused both Malian and Russian fighters of killing civilians. In early March, more than 30 bodies were found burnt in the town of Niono in central Mali following operations by Malian forces supported by Wagner. Pilots supplied by Wagner now fly Malian army helicopters and the group has also provided fighters who have led Malian forces on bigger operations, notably a major push against Islamist insurgents that began in late February. Photograph: CSIS/High Resolution/Maxar 2022Ĭommunity leaders, diplomats and officials have told the Guardian that Wagner fighters have been seen on joint patrols with Malian armed forces along the restive border with Burkina Faso and Niger, on the western frontier with Mauritania, and also in towns in northern Mali, including Timbuktu. The group set up a headquarters near the capital’s international airport in December, satellite photographs shared by the Center for Strategic and International Studies and flight records reveal, before moving out to forward operating bases across a swath of territory in the centre of Mali in January and February.Ī satellite image of President Modibo Keïta International Airport in Mali. ![]() The country’s new rulers hired Wagner for an estimated rate of $10m a month to be paid both in cash and through rights to extract minerals, experts believe. “Just as the presence of Russian mercenaries drove an increase in human rights violations and abuses in the Central African Republic in 2021, the same is now being seen in Mali,” one UK diplomat said. ![]() The group has also taken part in the invasion of Ukraine and been linked to atrocities there.īritish officials have expressed concerns at “a significant deterioration in the human rights situation” in Mali in recent months, which they noted coincided with the arrival of between 600 and 1,000 Wagner fighters. On Tuesday a Human Rights Watch report alleged that forces in the Central African Republic identified as Russian appear to have killed and tortured civilians since 2019, echoing similar findings from a group of UN experts last year. Wagner has been active in a dozen countries across Africa, and it has been repeatedly accused of human rights abuses on the continent. Twelve other people – who may have been extremists – are also thought to have died. Details of “enemy losses” were “unavailable for the moment”. ![]() “Provisional losses” amounted to “two dead – one FAMA and one Russian – and 10 wounded – six FAMA and four Russians”, said the memo, sent some hours after the incident. It has also denied killing any civilians and said 18 terrorists had been “neutralised” during “vigorous” security operations.Īnother internal memo described a clash on 23 April between militants and “a joint patrol of FAMA and Russian instructors” between the villages of Mondoro and Boni. The army – sometimes know by the abbreviation FAMA – has denied a Russian was killed on 19 April and said the casualty was one of their own soldiers. Mali’s military rulers, who took power in a coup in May last year, have said the Russians in the country are instructors and not deployed in combat roles. A medical official in Sevare described the man as a Russian in his 30s.įollowing the ambush, Malian soldiers fired on a crowded marketplace. According to an internal Malian military memo, a “Russian instructor” was injured by an improvised mine and died after being airlifted to the town of Sevare. Aid workers, experts and human rights campaigners said one attack came after a military patrol was ambushed on the outskirts of a village at about 9.30am on 19 April.
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