Mali’s military-led government says Ukraine helped rebels set a trap for Russian forces, and it has cut diplomatic ties as a result.
Colonel Abdoulaye Maiga, the government spokesman, announced the break in a televised statement on Sunday. “The transitional government of the Republic of Mali condemns the hostility of the authorities of Ukraine who do not observe that Mali has always called for a peaceful settlement of the crisis between the Russian Federation and Ukraine,” he said.
The trigger was a July ambush on Wagner Group forces. Andriy Yusov, described in the report as a representative of Ukraine’s Security Service, said on Ukrainian television in late July that “the rebels received necessary information, which enabled a successful military operation against Russian war criminals.”
A Tuareg rebel group and JNIM, the al Qaeda affiliate in the Sahel, both claimed the attack. The two are known for ad hoc cooperation, and they appear to have worked together to catch the Russian convoy.
Competing death tolls
JNIM described a “complex ambush” that wiped out the convoy and killed 50 Russians and several Malian soldiers. It published videos showing several burning vehicles and dozens of bodies on the ground. A spokesman for the Tuareg group said some Malian troops and Russian fighters had been taken prisoner.
Some unofficial Russian Telegram channels put the number of Russians killed at as many as 80. If that is accurate, it would be by far the worst loss for Russian paramilitaries in several years of operating in Africa. The Kremlin has used proxy forces there to challenge Western influence across the Sahel and central Africa and to prop up unstable regimes.
Sources
- Mali severs diplomatic relations with Ukraine for providing intelligence to rebels for Wagner ambush
