Mali

At least 18 civilians were killed in two related attacks this week in central Mali, the United Nations MINUSMA peacekeeping mission said on Saturday, as the death toll from fighting between local hunters and herders continues to climb.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel started her tour of West Africa on Wednesday, a trip that will see her visit Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger for key talks over the next three days. The bulk of Merkel's visit will focus on security and supporting counter-terrorism efforts in the restive Sahel region.

Mali President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita appointed finance minister Boubou Cisse as prime minister on Monday, days after the government resigned following pressure to respond to the vigilante massacre of about 160 Fulani herders which shocked the nation.

While international actors, through different mandates, pursue shared goals regarding the stabilization of Mali and the region and the implementation of the peace process, they have all tended to overlook the protection needs in central Mali, where intercommunal tensions have been aggravated by terrorism and counterterrorism dynamics.

Thousands rallied in the Malian capital Bamako on Friday to protest at the failure of the government and international peacekeepers to stem rising ethnic and jihadist violence, notably the massacre of around 160 villagers last month.

More than 60 civilians died in tit-for-tat clashes between communities in northern Burkina Faso recently, government said, the latest inter-communal violence afflicting West Africa’s Sahel region. Burkina and neighbouring Mali have seen a spike in ethnic clashes fuelled by Islamist militants seeking to extend influence over the Sahel, an arid region between Africa’s northern Sahara desert and its southern savannas.

Appearing before the Security Council on Friday, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said that the only way to prevent increased violence and instability in Mali is to tackle root causes such as grinding poverty; climate change and competition for resources; underdevelopment, and a fundamental lack of opportunities for young people.

The United Nations has dispatched human rights experts to central Mali to investigate a weekend massacre of at least 157 villagers seen as one of the worst acts of bloodshed in a country beset by ethnic violence. The attack, in which women and children were burned in their homes by gunmen, escalated a conflict between Dogon hunters and Fulani herders that killed hundreds of civilians in 2018 and is spreading across the Sahel, the arid region between the Sahara desert to the north and Africa's savannas to the south.

Mali’s authorities have been urged by the UN to provide justice for the victims and survivors of attacks by so-called self-defence groups, responsible for horrific intercommunal violence in central Mali, after a weekend assault that claimed the lives of more than 150 people, including some 50 children.

The brutal massacre over the weekend of 154 Fulani men, women and children in central Mali once again drew the world's attention to a once peaceful state now dogged by ongoing violence. The massacre took place as a delegation from the United Nations Security Council visited the unstable Sahel region to assess the security situation amid the threat of Islamic extremist groups.