An al Qaeda branch has said it beheaded 50 Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group and 10 Malian soldiers in north Mali’s Kidal region close to the border with Algeria on Saturday, the SITE Intelligence Group reported.
On the same day, the Tuareg rebel group, the Permanent Strategic Framework for Peace, Security, and Development (CSP-PSD), claimed to have killed and wounded dozens of soldiers for Mali and Wagner mercenaries, during the battle for the border town of Tinzaouaten.
This ambush can be regarded as one of the practical losses of Wagner since the time when they started to act in Mali supporting the junta against Islamist insurgents in the Sahel area a year and a half ago.
The Malian authorities have said that the Russian military present in Mali is not the Wagner Group mercenary but rather a training one that helps the Malian military with the equipment purchased from Russia. However, in a rather unusual move on Monday, Wagner said that their fighters, including their commander Sergei Shevchenko, lost many in a battle with the militants near Tinzaouaten while assisting Malian troops from July 22 to 27.
Many military bloggers in Russia claimed at least 20 Wagner killed. SITE listed on Sunday that the local al Qaeda branch Jama’a Nusrat ul-Islam wa al-Muslimin (JNIM) said its militants’ laid an intricate ambush, targeting a convoy of the Malian army and Wagner mercenaries, south of Tinzaouaten.
This ambush happened after the military group that included Malian and Wagner pulled back from Tinzaouaten which they had tried to capture from Tuareg-led separatists. Two security sources confirmed that they were in a secluded area when it was ambushed by both separatists and JNIM, although further interaction between the two is still questionable. Malian authorities accused both groups of Tuareg and jihadists of conspiracy.
The Malian army said on Monday that it began a “stabilization operation” in the restive area on July 19 and began an assault on July 25. Nevertheless, sandstorms benefited their enemies who could rally around the convoy and engage in ferocious combat accompanied by heavy casualties.
Working for independence of northern Mali, the Tuareg who are an ethnic group of people that inhabits the Saharan regions of the country have always complained of marginalisation by the central government. It was in 2012 that their rebellion was briefly defeated and pushed back into northern Mali, but recaptured by Islamist militants.