Mali's Military Just Made a Shocking Power Move After Devastating Coordinated Attacks

Mali is in freefall. Seven days after coordinated attacks by Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) and the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) shook the country to its core on April 25, the military government is tightening its grip in ways that are alarming human rights watchdogs.

Assimi Goita, Mali’s military leader, just appointed himself defense minister following the death of Sadio Camara, who was killed by a suicide bomber who drove an explosives-laden vehicle into his residence. Now Goita holds the presidency AND the defense portfolio simultaneously. It’s a consolidation of power rarely seen in peacetime.

But here’s where it gets darker. The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) is documenting extrajudicial killings and disappearances carried out by Mali’s security forces in retaliation. Lawyer and politician Mountaga Tall was abducted from his home by hooded men on May 2. His wife was beaten when she tried to film the kidnapping. Three relatives of exiled politician Oumar Mariko vanished a day earlier. Their whereabouts remain unknown.

Al Jazeera reported that officers, policemen, and lawyers are being systematically rounded up. Critics are calling it a witch-hunt. The government claims “traitors within” enabled the attacks, but the pattern looks increasingly like vengeance.

Meanwhile, at least 23 people died in the fighting, including civilians and children. UNICEF confirmed kids were among the casualties. Then there’s the humanitarian catastrophe brewing: villages are blockaded and starving. Diafarabe in the Mopti region pleaded for emergency aid within 48 hours or people would begin dying of hunger.

On the ground, approximately 130 Malian soldiers have been captured by FLA forces in Kidal after Russian mercenaries apparently abandoned them. Exclusive footage obtained by Al Jazeera shows the prisoners stripped of uniforms, held as prisoners of war. About 2,000 Africa Corps mercenaries (Russia’s replacement for the withdrawn Wagner Group) are now protecting Mali’s military leadership, but clearly not every soldier.

FLA and JNIM control Kidal now and are targeting Gao, Menaka, and Timbuktu to establish their self-declared Azawad state. Despite ideological differences, these groups are coordinating an existential threat to Mali’s government.

UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk is demanding an immediate ceasefire and warning all parties to respect international humanitarian law. But Mali’s government appears more focused on crushing dissent than ending the bloodshed.