Armed gunmen killed at least 23 people and wounded 12 in an attack on a village in central Mali, officials said Sunday.
Sidi Mohamed El Bechir—governor of the Bandiagara region where the attack took place—said unidentified men killed dozens of people and set fire to several homes in the village of Yarou on Friday.
Communities across central and northern Mali have been in the grips of protracted armed violence since 2012. Extremist rebels were forced from power in the West African nation’s northern cities the following year, with the help of a French-led military operation. But they regrouped in the desert and began launching attacks on the Malian army and its allies.
Friday’s attack in the central Mopti region took place on the same day that the Malian army accused armed extremists of aiming a rocket at the western city of Timbuktu.
The recent uptick in insecurity in the area likely stems from the departure of a UN peacekeeping mission from its base in Ber, which has been under the control of separatist rebels since they signed a peace deal with the Malian government in 2015.
Analysts fear the 2015 peace deal—mediated with help from Algeria and the UN mission known as The United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali—may fall apart after the peacekeepers leave.
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