The presence of Russian paramilitary mercenaries in Mali, where the authorities have been engaged in a ten-year conflict with jihadist insurgents, made headlines worldwide in early April after NGO Human Rights Watch reported their suspected involvement alongside the Malian army in the massacre of around 300 people in the town of Moura, in the centre of the country.
Officially, the Russian paramilitaries are described as “instructors” by the Malian authorities, who insist that they do not take a direct part in combat in anti-jihadist operations. France and other western countries, as well as numerous NGOs active in the country, have formally identified them as being from the Wagner Group, a private paramilitary network closely linked to the Kremlin and mostly made up of Russian army veterans. It has been active in Ukraine, beginning with Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea in 2014 and reportedly now in the current war, as well as in Syria, in Libya and in the Central African Republic (CAR).
Widely regarded as acting as a proxy force for the Kremlin, and notably in several African countries, the Wagner Group is reportedly financially managed by businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Prigozhin, who positions himself as a virulent critic of western countries, has denied the claim, and has even suggested that the group did not exist.
The toll of the massacre in Moura, which had been under the quasi-control of jihadist groups for almost six years, is the worst known atrocity of its kind since the conflict in Mali began in earnest ten years ago. A Malian human rights activist, whose name is withheld, told Mediapart that information he received indicated “more than 600” people were killed in the operation, of which “a large majority” were civilians.
It was in 2012 when jihadist groups, including al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, took control of the north of the country, and threatened to advance on the south and the capital Bamako. France, at the request of the interim government, intervened militarily in January 2013 and successfully pushed back the jihadist advance.
But ever since the French and Malian forces became bogged down in constant battle with regrouped jihadists in the West African country, as also in the wider Sahel region. Since the Malian military first seized power in a coup in 2020, relations between France and the junta rapidly deteriorated, notably over the latter’s resistance to a return of civilian government.
In February this year, Paris announced the withdrawal of its around 2,400 French troops stationed in Mali, together with a back-up force of several hundred military personnel from other European countries. That force, as part of "operation Barkhane" targeting armed jihadist groups in the Sahel, is transferring to neighbouring Niger, a move due to be completed by the end of the summer. A large United Nations (UN) peacekeeping force, the MINUSMA, remains headquartered in Bamako. Meanwhile, the Malian junta earlier this month announced it was ending its defence agreements with France and which were initially inked in 2014.
It is in the context of the collapse in relations with France that the Wagner Group were invited into the country, apparently beginning in November last year.
Enlargement : Illustration 1
The Malian authorities claim the army, with the help of its Russian allies, have killed more than 700 “terrorists” since the beginning of the year. Local media regularly trumpet a new-found success of the country’s armed forces, the FAMa, in combatting jihadist groups present in the centre and north. But the details of those operations are obscure.The alleged incidents of serious violations of international law by the junta and its Russian “instructors”, involve accusations of massacres, summary executions, forced disappearances and arbitrary arrests.
Approached by Mediapart for comment, the FAMa declined to be interviewed.
Operation “Kélétigui”
In a video that first began circulating on social media on March 4th this year, the burnt bodies of 35 people, some with their arms attached behind their backs, others showing signs of being shot, can be seen lying on the ground in parched bushland. The location was reportedly close to the town of Diabaly, north of Niono, in west-central Mali.
“Some of these people, 21 of them, were arrested at the exit of the Niono [agricultural] fair by the FAMa, accompanied by white military, on Sunday February 20th,” said a local municipal representative, whose name is withheld. “It took place in the municipality of Diabaly,” said a senior Malian army officer, also speaking on condition his name was withheld. “I have heard it said that our troops are behind that, and that if whites were accompanying them, they are Russians for certain.”
Last December, the FAMa launched a counter jihadist operation called Kélétigui – which means “He who wages war” in Mali’s dominant Bambara language – deployed in the south and centre of the country. It has been notably active in the central regions since the beginning of February, and it was as part of this that the massacre in Moura took place over five days at the end of March.
In what is called the Niono Cercle, a zone made up of 12 municipalities which borders Mauritania, two local municipal representatives told Mediapart that whites had been seen operating with the Malian military. “Several white soldiers have been seen on motorbikes or accompanying the Malian [soldiers],” said one. Mediapart has seen the notes written up by one representative who recorded reports of such events. They include five operations in which arbitrary arrests were carried out between February 14th and March 2nd. According to one entry, “In the village of Diadia, Malian troops accompanied by white soldiers set fire to dwellings, beat up women and arrested ten people”.
One local councillor added: “Before, the FAMa used to patrol around the municipalities, but since they have become accompanied they don’t hesitate in entering villages in search of jihadists.” According to him, some village chiefs had been visited by “white men” who warned them about operations underway, telling them that “after a certain time, they will make no distinction between, terrorists and civilians”.
‘They shot at everyone in sight’
The massacre in Moura, whose population of around 10,000 live amid a largely isolated area in the central Mopti region of Mali, was carried out between March 27th and 31st when Malian military, joined by what local witnesses said were white soldiers who spoke a language they were unfamiliar with, took over the small town.
Moura is known to be a fiefdom of the Macina katiba (battalion), part of the Nusrat al-Islam jihadist coalition which brings together the principal armed Islamist groups in the region linked to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). They ordered the closure of schools, and imposed strict rules on the population, including the order that men must grow beards and wear short trousers, in the image of the jihadists.
According to a statement issued on April 1st by Mali’s defence ministry, the operation resulted in the deaths of 203 “terrorists” and the arrests of 51 others. It said its forces were acting on the basis of “quite precise information” about “a meeting” held in the town between different groups of jihadists. It added that “two hundred motorbikes were burned and seized” along with “large quantities of arms and munitions”, although no images of the claimed haul were produced.
Local witnesses tell a different story. They said the operation began at around 11am on March 27th, on the day of the weekly agricultural market, when between three and five helicopters, according to different accounts, flew above the town and shot at people trying to flee, followed soon after by the arrival in the town of ground troops.
“Helicopters dropped off white soldiers around the village [Moura],” said one eyewitness. “They then shot at everyone in sight before carrying out arrests.” According to four eyewitness accounts given to Mediapart, local men were rounded up to a spot outside the town, where they were held over the five-day occupation of Moura. The Malian troops and the suspected Wagner Group mercenaries subsequently carried out executions of several hundred according to how they were dressed and their apparent ethnic origin. “They put them into groups of ten or 20 before taking them to the sides of a mass grave, making them kneel down and shooting them in the head,” said one.
Another eyewitness interviewed by Mediapart shortly after the massacre (cited in this previous report in April) told a similar story. “The Malian soldiers and the whites accompanying them arrested all the menfolk and ordered those who were hiding to come out,” he said. “Then they began to pick them out according to their physical appearance and dress. All those who resembled Fulani [editor’s note, a largely pastoralist ethnic group; in French, Peuls] or who were dressed as jihadists, with short trousers, were put to one side. Some were shot dead in front of us. Others were taken further away, to be executed also.”
According to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), an NGO that researches and records data on conflicts worldwide, at least 456 civilians have been killed in Mali between January and mid-April in joint missions involving the FAMa and Wagner group operatives.
Photos posted on social media purportedly showing scenes of these operations include two which were vcirculated in late March. In one of these, the authenticity and circumstances of which are not established, the decapitated body of a man can be seen lying on the ground, his head placed on his chest. Close by is the uniformed arm of a white soldier, holding a mobile phone in his hand. The uniform is in the MultiCam camouflage pattern. A security source, who studied the photo, told Mediapart that the pattern is known to be used by Wagner Group mercenaries “in its Russian version”.
The FAMa systematically deny reports of abuses, which often concern events in isolated locations. In a confidential note dated January 13th and seen by Mediapart, the Malian authorities imposed a no-fly zone above an area where the FAMa and its Russian allies were involved in joint operations. A spokesperson for the French armed forces joint chiefs of staff commented that the no-fly zone “more or less corresponds with the deployment of the Wagner private military company on Malian territory”, and that “the idea was simply to prevent, to dissuade, international missions from going to fly over zones where its members are progressively deploying with the FAMa”.
Mass grave
The no-fly zone in question was subsequently modified on two occasions, and Mediapart obtained details of the last of these, contained in a confidential Malian defence document dated April 27th. It stated that “taking into account the large-scale military operations which include artillery fire in the no-fly zone, all flights outside of published aerial routes are formally forbidden, as well as drone flights”. The document announced that the zone was henceforth extended northwards to include the north-central town of Gossi.
On April 19th, as part of its withdrawal from Mali, France officially handed over to the Malian army its military base at Gossi, where around 300 troops were once stationed. On April 22nd, the Malian military announced it had discovered a mass grave four kilometres from the base which contained bodies “in a state of advanced putrefaction”, which it said was evidence that the bodies were already there before the French had left the base.
However, the French army, which said it had expected a disinformation campaign after its personnel had left the base, sent a drone up above the area on April 21st, when it captured images of what it said were “a group of individuals of Caucasian type” standing close to “around ten bodies” at the site in question, some of them shovelling sand over the corpses. The footage, which the French army passed on to news agencies AFP and AP, also showed two of the individuals filming the scene filming the scene.
Enlargement : Illustration 2
The French army released the images after a Twitter account under the name of Dia Diarra, self-described as a “former soldier” and “Malian patriot”, posted a pixelated photo of the mass grave, with the comment: “That’s what the French left behind them when they left the base at Gossi […] One can’t keep silent about that!”. That was followed soon after by a short video of the half-buried bodies.
The French army said the Twitter account was “very probably a false account created by Wagner”. It added that a comparison of the images posted on the account and those taken from its drone “allows a direct line to be made between what the Wagner mercenaries do and what is falsely attributed to the French military”.
The French army also released other images taken shortly after it left the base which showed white soldiers inside the camp. Two inhabitants from the town of Gossi said they had seen their arrival, one detailing that around 20 white soldiers “arrived a little more than 24 hours after the departure of the French”. According to the pair, rumours were circulating locally that the bodies in the mass grave may have been those of people arrested in the small town of Hombori, situated about 70 kilometres south-west of Gossi.
Locals in Hombori reported there had been as many as 18 people shot dead there following an ambush on April 19th against a joint patrol by the FAMa and Wagner Group operatives. Another rumour, they said, was that the corpses may have been those of goods transporters who were “attacked a short while ago” in the region.
Jelena Aparac, a member of the UN Working Group of experts on the use of mercenaries as a means of violating human rights, and who was the chair-rapporteur of the group’s report in 2021 on abuses committed by the Wagner Group in the Central African Republic, said that what was particularly concerning about the Russian mercenaries “is that they have no legal existence”. She added that if crimes allegedly committed by mercenaries were brought before a court, the perpetrators may never be brought to account because of a “reasonable doubt over the involvement of an individual, or even a country like Russia”.
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- The original French version of this report can be found here.