Islamist militants attacked a military training camp and other targets in the Mali capital on Tuesday, triggering a deadly gunfight that briefly closed the nearby airport before the army neutralised the attackers, officials said. Details of casualties were not immediately released.
The militants tried to enter the Faladie gendarmerie school in the capital, Bamako, in an unprecedented attack for the country, and government forces launched a sweeping operation after which they were able to “neutralize” the militants, army chief Oumar Diarra said on state television, without giving further details.
Military-led Mali suspends all political activity until further notice
A security official told The Associated Press that the attack caused “loss of life and property damage” but did not give numbers or details. At least 15 suspects have been arrested, said the official, who was at the training camp at the time of the attack. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters.
The military later said militants had attacked other locations as well, but gave no details.
The al-Qaeda-linked militant group JNIM claimed responsibility for the attack on its website, Azaraq. A video posted on the site showed its militants setting the plane on fire at the airport. The group said it had caused “significant human and material losses.”
The video shows Malian security officers detaining a man after the Malian army said a military training camp in the capital, Bamako, was attacked in the early hours of Tuesday, September 17, 2024. (AP Photo)
An Associated Press reporter heard two explosions in the area early Tuesday and saw smoke rising from a site on the outskirts of the city where the camp and airport are located.
Malian authorities closed the airport soon after the attack, and transport ministry spokesman Mohamed Ould Mamouni said flights had been halted due to a gunfight nearby. The airport reopened later that day.
The U.S. Embassy in Bamako instructed staff to stay in their homes and off the streets.
Mali, along with neighboring Burkina Faso and Niger, has been battling insurgencies perpetrated by militias allied with al-Qaida and Islamic State for more than a decade. Following a series of military coups in the three countries in recent years, the governments have expelled French troops and instead turned to Russian mercenaries for security assistance.
Since coming to power, Col. Assimi Goita has struggled to halt a rise in jihadist attacks in central and northern Mali, including one in July when about 50 Russian mercenaries in a convoy were killed in an al-Qaida ambush.
The mercenaries had been fighting alongside the Malian army against mainly Tuareg rebels when their convoy was forced to retreat into jihadist territory and ambushed south of the town of Tinzawaten.
However, attacks in the capital, Bamako, are rare.
“Following the fighting in the north near the Algerian border, where Wagner suffered losses, I think JNIM wanted to show that it could also launch attacks in the south and in the capital,” said Wolf Lessing, director of the Sahel program at the pro-democracy Konrad Adenauer Foundation.
In 2022, gunmen attacked a Malian military checkpoint about 60 kilometers (37 miles) from the city, killing at least six people and wounding several others. In 2015, an al-Qaida-linked militant group attacked a hotel in Bamako, killing at least 20 people, including one American.
Click here to get the FOX News app
Wassim Nasr, a journalist and senior researcher at the Soufan Center, told The Associated Press that Tuesday’s attack was significant because it showed JNIM has the capability to launch large-scale attacks.
He also said this showed they were concentrating their efforts on military targets rather than indiscriminately attacking civilians.