BAMAKO, June 7 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Twenty-six people were killed in an
attack on a village in central Mali, officials said, in the
latest violence to hit the West African nation.
Friday’s attack targeted a Fulani village named Binedama in the
volatile Mopti region, said Aly Barry, an official from Tabital
Pulaaku, a Fulani association in Mali.
Two other local officials confirmed the attack and the death toll.
Mali has been struggling to quell a jihadist revolt that first
broke out in north in 2012, before spreading to the centre, as well as
neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger.
Thousands of soldiers and civilians have been killed in the
conflict, while many more have been forced to flee their homes.
Central Mali — an ethnic mosaic — has become one of the
flashpoints of conflict in the country, with regular jihadist attacks
on military targets and occasional intercommunal fighting.
The pastoralist Fulani people are often accused of being close to
jihadists, a perception which has led to tit-for-tit massacres between
them and other ethnic groups.
A local government official in Koro, a subdivision of the Mopti
region, that the attack on Binedama occurred on Friday
afternoon.
Two women, and a nine-year-old girl, were killed in the attack, he said.
Friday’s attack also comes at a time of increasing insecurity in Mali.
Prominent opposition figure Soumaila Cisse was kidnapped in central
Mali on March 25 while campaigning for a parliamentary election.
The region has also seen several massacres recently, including a
militant attack on rural villages which left 12 people dead in April. — NNN-AGENCIES