Islamist militants and Tuareg separatists carried out coordinated attacks on several sites in Mali on Saturday, striking the capital and towns in central and northern regions in one of the country’s largest such assaults in recent years.
The al-Qaida-linked group JNIM claimed responsibility on its Az‑Zallaqa website, saying the strikes on Bamako’s Modibo Keïta international airport and in four other cities were conducted jointly with the Azawad Liberation Front, a Tuareg separatist movement. Mali has long faced insurgencies linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State, alongside a separatist rebellion in the north.
The Malian army said “unidentified armed terrorist groups targeted certain locations and barracks” in Bamako, adding that soldiers were “engaged in eliminating the attackers” and that the situation was later under control. An Associated Press journalist in Bamako reported sustained heavy-weapons and automatic-rifle fire near the airport, about 15km from the city centre, and saw a helicopter over nearby neighbourhoods. The airport sits beside an airbase used by Mali’s air force. A resident near the airport also reported gunfire and three helicopters patrolling overhead.
The US embassy in Bamako issued a security alert reporting explosions and gunfire near Kati and the international airport, urging US citizens to shelter in place and avoid travel to those areas. Kati, home to Mali’s main military base and where junta leader Gen Assimi Goita lives, was rocked by gunfire and blasts, a resident said. A shopkeeper told the AP the residence of defence minister Sadio Camara was heavily damaged by an explosion.
Social media footage showed convoys of militants in trucks and on motorcycles moving through Kati’s largely deserted streets as residents watched. Attacks were also reported in Sévaré and Mopti in central Mali.
In the north, videos from Kidal and Gao showed street exchanges of gunfire and bodies on the ground. Insurgents reportedly entered Kidal, seizing parts of the town and clashing with army units, a former mayor told the AP on condition of anonymity. Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane, a spokesperson for the Azawad movement, posted on Facebook that its forces had taken control of Kidal and some areas of Gao; the AP could not independently verify the claim.
Kidal had been a longtime separatist stronghold before Malian government forces and Russian mercenaries retook it in 2023, a symbolic win for the junta and its Russian backers. Azawad separatists have long sought an independent northern state.
A Gao resident said gunfire and explosions that began in the early hours continued into the late morning, shaking doors and windows and leaving people frightened. Ulf Laessing, head of the Sahel programme at the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, described the operation as the largest coordinated assault in Mali in years and expressed alarm at apparent coordination between JNIM and Tuareg rebels, noting jihadist–Tuareg collaboration in the 2012 offensive that precipitated the region’s wider security crisis.
Mali, along with Niger and Burkina Faso, has battled groups aligned with al-Qaida and Islamic State for years. Following coups, the juntas in the three countries have turned to Russia for assistance against militants, but analysts say violence has increased, with a record number of militant attacks and accusations that security forces have killed civilians suspected of colluding with insurgents. In 2024, an al-Qaida-linked group claimed an assault on Bamako’s airport and a military training camp that killed scores.
