Militants kill 9 soldiers in attack in central Mali

By James Tasamba

KIGALI, Rwanda (AA) - At least nine soldiers were killed and 11 others wounded Wednesday when militants launched an attack on troops in central Mali, the army said.

The late morning attack occurred near the village of Bodio in the Mopti region.

The army said the attackers, which used improvised explosive devices (IEDs), also suffered casualties.

Mali’s troops repelled a “complex IED attack,” the army said in a statement.

But some local sources who spoke to the media put the death toll at 16.

Initial reports had put the death toll at five with eight wounded before being revised later in the day.

Central Mali is one of the deadliest spots in the Sahel region, where ethnic killings and attacks on government forces are regularly reported.

Wednesday’s attack was the deadliest on Malian troops since a convoy was attacked on Aug. 19 on the road between Boni and Douentza, also in central Mali, in which 17 people were killed.

In late September, five Malian gendarmes escorting a convoy of a mining company were killed in an attack between Sebabougou and Kwala in western Mali.

An ambush on Sept. 12 in Macina Circle in the same region left five soldiers dead.

In addition, a French soldier was killed last month in a clash with a militant group near Mali's border with Burkina Faso.

Mali has been battling an insurgency linked to al-Qaeda and Daesh/ISIS since 2012, when unrest erupted in the north of the country. The violence, which has killed thousands of civilians and troops, has since spread to neighboring Niger and Burkina Faso.