Mali, 2012–2026: fourteen years of insecurity

On 22 September 1960, Modibo Keïta proclaimed the independence of the Republic of Mali. In 1963 a first Tuareg rebellion, the Alfellaga, broke out in the Kidal region. The army crushed it harshly until 1964, and many people fled into exile.

The droughts of the 1970s and 1980s drove more people away. Many young Tuareg went to Algeria and Libya, where some joined Gaddafi’s forces. Several of them would lead the next rebellion.

On 28 June 1990, Iyad Ag Ghaly’s movement (MPLA, later MPA) attacked the garrison at Ménaka. The Tamanrasset accords (6 January 1991) and then the National Pact (11 April 1992) tried to end it, but the violence returned.

1994 was the deadliest year of the period, and civilians were its first victims. On 27 March 1996 in Timbuktu, the “Flame of Peace” saw weapons burned and marked the end of the rebellion.

The violence did not go away: Arab groups clashed around Gao and Timbuktu, and in 2002 UCDP recorded a first deadly clash between Dogon and Fulani in the centre. On 23 May 2006, former rebels attacked Kidal and Ménaka. The Algiers accords were signed on 4 July.

From 2007 to 2009, Ibrahim Ag Bahanga rejected them and carried out attack after attack, before going into exile in Libya. In January 2007, Algeria’s GSPC became al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and settled in the north, where it kidnapped foreigners. In August 2011, heavily armed Tuareg were reported arriving from Libya.

On 17 January 2012, the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA), a mainly Tuareg separatist movement, attacked Ménaka, already targeted in 1990, then Aguelhok and Tessalit. Its ranks had grown with fighters back from Libya after Gaddafi’s fall.

On 24 January, the fall of the army camp at Aguelhok was followed by the execution of captured Malian soldiers. The MNLA denies responsibility. The massacre shocked the country and fuelled anger at the government.

On 22 March 2012, soldiers led by Captain Amadou Sanogo overthrew President Amadou Toumani Touré, weeks before the presidential election.

In the confusion, rebels and jihadist groups (Ansar Dine, AQIM, MUJAO) took Kidal, Gao and Timbuktu in three days, from 30 March to 1 April. The MNLA declared the “independence of Azawad” on 6 April; the African Union called it “null and void”.

In late June, the jihadists drove the MNLA out of Gao and Timbuktu and imposed their rule. In Timbuktu, mausoleums on the World Heritage list were destroyed; the International Criminal Court convicted one of those responsible in 2016.

On 10 January 2013, jihadists seized Konna, 70 km from Mopti, and threatened the south. The next day, at the request of interim president Dioncounda Traoré, France launched Operation Serval.

With the Malian army and African troops, French forces retook Gao on 26 January and Timbuktu on the 28th, then fought in the Adrar des Ifoghas mountains near Tessalit.

On 1 July 2013, MINUSMA, created by the UN Security Council, took over from the African force. Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta was elected president in August, with 77.6% of the vote.

On 17 May 2014, Prime Minister Moussa Mara’s visit to Kidal turned into fighting. On 21 May, the army’s offensive on the town failed: according to the government, some fifty soldiers were killed, and Kidal stayed in the hands of armed groups. On 1 August, Operation Barkhane replaced Serval, across the Sahel.

The Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation, known as the “Algiers agreement”, was signed in Bamako on 15 May 2015 by the government and the Platform groups, then on 20 June by the Coordination of Azawad Movements (CMA).

The jihadist groups, left out of the deal, kept attacking. In the centre, Amadou Koufa’s Katiba Macina emerged. On 20 November 2015, a hostage-taking at the Radisson Blu hotel in Bamako killed 20 people, not counting the two attackers.

On 18 January 2017, in Gao, a suicide attack claimed by al-Mourabitoun hit a camp shared by soldiers and former rebels: between 54 and 77 killed, depending on the count.

On 2 March 2017, Ansar Dine, Katiba Macina, al-Mourabitoun and AQIM’s Saharan branch merged into the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM), led by Iyad Ag Ghaly, who led the 1990 rebellion. Around Ménaka, the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara took root.

In the centre, jihadist violence merged with local conflicts. Self-defence militias, the Dozos and Dan Na Ambassagou, fought the jihadists and attacked Fulani civilians they accused of supporting them.

On 23 March 2019, in Ogossagou, gunmen identified as Dozo hunters killed at least 157 Fulani villagers, according to MINUSMA. On 9 June, Sobane Da, a Dogon village, was attacked in turn: 35 dead according to the revised official toll.

In late 2019, the army suffered heavy losses: at Boulkessi and Mondoro in late September (at least 38 soldiers killed according to the government, in an attack claimed by JNIM), then at Indelimane on 1 November (49 soldiers killed, in an attack claimed by the Islamic State).

After months of protests led by the M5-RFP movement, soldiers arrested President Keïta on 18 August 2020; he announced his resignation that night. The soldiers formed the National Committee for the Salvation of the People (CNSP), led by Colonel Assimi Goïta.

On 24 May 2021, Assimi Goïta had the transitional president and prime minister arrested, then took the presidency himself. Relations with France and some of Mali’s partners quickly broke down.

From late 2021, Russian forces linked to the Wagner group deployed in Mali. Bamako denied it and spoke of Russian “instructors”.

From 27 to 31 March 2022, in Moura, the Malian army and “foreign military personnel” carried out an operation. According to the UN human rights office, at least 500 people were killed, the vast majority summarily executed.

In May, Mali left the G5 Sahel. On 15 August 2022, Barkhane’s last soldiers left the country.

On 16 June 2023, Bamako asked MINUSMA to leave “without delay”. The Security Council ended its mandate on 30 June; the peacekeepers left before the end of the year.

The withdrawal set off a race for the bases and renewed war with the former rebels. On 7 September, JNIM attacked the “Tombouctou” boat on the Niger river near Gourma-Rharous, and an army camp at Bamba: the government reported 49 civilians and 15 soldiers killed.

On 14 November 2023, the army, backed by Wagner, entered Kidal, outside state control since 2012. Meanwhile, Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger had formed the Alliance of Sahel States (AES).

On 25 January 2024, the transitional authorities ended the Algiers agreement “with immediate effect”.

In late July, at Tinzaouatène near the Algerian border, an army and Wagner column suffered a heavy defeat against CSP rebels and JNIM. Tolls differ; Wagner acknowledged “heavy losses”.

On 17 September 2024, JNIM attacked the gendarmerie school and the military air base in Bamako. More than 70 people were killed according to a security source quoted by AFP; no official toll was published.

On 29 January 2025, the withdrawal of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger from ECOWAS took effect. In May, a decree dissolved the political parties. In June, Wagner announced its departure; Africa Corps, under Russia’s defence ministry, stayed.

On 1 July, JNIM attacked several western towns at once, including Kayes, Nioro du Sahel and Diboli, near the Senegalese and Mauritanian borders. The army said it killed 80 attackers, without giving its own losses.

In September, JNIM imposed a fuel blockade: convoys were set on fire, Bamako ran short of petrol and, in late October, schools and universities closed for two weeks.

On 25 April 2026, JNIM and FLA rebels jointly attacked Bamako, Kati, Sévaré, Mopti, Gao and Kidal. In Kati, the defence minister, General Sadio Camara, was killed. Kidal fell to the FLA and JNIM, and JNIM announced a blockade of Bamako.

The attacks went on: at least 50 soldiers killed near Anéfis on 18 July, about a hundred at the Dioura camp on 10 September, according to several sources. The UN and Human Rights Watch also document executions and air strikes killing civilians, attributed to the army and Africa Corps.

On 6 October, the army and Africa Corps retook Kidal, which the FLA left without a fight. The map data stops on September 30, 2026 and is still provisional.

Put together, these dots trace a crisis that started in the north, took hold in the centre, and now reaches the west and the capital.

These are minimum estimates: only documented episodes are counted. Kidnappings, closed schools or displacement don’t appear here.