Tensions growing in border area between Mali, Mauritania

The border area between Mali and Mauritania is experiencing increasing security deterioration.

This comes against the background of the spread of terrorist elements in that inflamed area.

The vast desert bordering this area helps terrorist elements in carrying out their armed operations and determining the list of their targets.

Government statement

In the same context, the Malian government revealed on April 20 that a terrorist ambush was set up in Koulikoro Region in western Mali to target Oumar Traore, director of the office of the interim president of Mali, and three other people.

It added that the director of the office of Malian interim president, Gen. Assemi Goetta, was one of four people killed in an attack targeting them on April 18, near the Mauritanian border with Libya.

The government in Mali announced on April 19 that an official delegation and a Malian government official fell in the ambush.

However, it did not reveal the identity of the victims.

According to AFP, the director of the office of Gen. Goetta, who was accompanying a delegation from Mali, was ambushed in the town of Nara, which is witnessing attacks by terrorist elements.

Insecurity and widespread terrorism

For his part, a local official confirmed to AFP that the area where the terrorist operation was carried out reels under security deterioration, as a result of the spread of a large number of terrorist elements in it.

Mali has been experiencing a significant proliferation of terrorist elements and an increase in violent operations of all kinds since the outbreak of insurgencies in the northern part of the in 2012.

Despite the presence of regional and international forces in that region, terrorist elements have spread to the centre of the country, then to neighbouring countries, such as Burkina Faso and Niger.

The terrorist trend is expanding towards the southern region of Mali, while this security unrest is accompanied by a deep humanitarian and political crisis.

Removal of the army

African affairs specialist, Mohamed Ezz Eddin, said terrorist elements are currently pursuing a new strategy.

"They want to distract the Malian army away from the northern part of Mali as well as its southern part," he told The Reference.

He added that terrorist groups are trying to coordinate between each other in the centre, north and south of the country, in the framework of following the policy of spatial control over a large area of land located in that security-free area.

Control by these groups, he noted, especially the so-called Nusra of Islam and Muslims, allows them to expand and spread between Mali and Burkina Faso, and also towards Benin and Togo.