Mali: Tuareg MNLA rebels launched an offensive to retake Gao from MUJAO islamists
Malian Tuareg MNLA rebels launched an offensive to retake the strategic region of Gao in northern Mali on Friday, waging battle against the Islamist rebels who seized the region in a bloody battle against the MNLA in June.
New fighting Friday and a crackdown on women for not wearing veils by Islamist militants in the Malian city of Timbuktu marred peace moves by two of the groups controlling the desert north who said they were ready for peace talks with Bamako.
A Tuareg warlord said his National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) had launched an “offensive” to retake the key north-central region of Gao from Islamist rebels.
“Fighting broke out Friday morning near Ansango between fighters of MNLA and the MUJAO (the Al-Qaeda-linked Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa) as part of an offensive aimed at recapturing the Gao region,” Moussa Ag Assarid, a high-ranking member of the group in charge of communication, told AFP.