A car bomb in northern Mali has wounded 15 UN peacekeepers, the United Nations said on Friday, in the latest attack in the war-torn Sahel state.

Assimi Goita, the Malian colonel who has overthrown two presidents in the past nine months, said he would oversee a transition toward democratic elections as he was sworn in as interim president on Monday.

At least 11 Tuareg civilians have been killed near Menaka in Mali's troubled northeast, a pro-government coalition of armed groups announced Saturday.

West African leaders will meet in Ghana on Sunday to discuss a response to Mali's second coup in nine months, with the new president Colonel Assimi Goita attending.

West African officials were on Tuesday heading for Mali, plunged into crisis after the military detained the president, prime minister and defence minister in what international bodies called an "attempted coup".

Two soldiers died in a militant attack in central Mali on Friday, several sources said, with UN peacekeepers fighting off gunmen in a separate incident towards the Algeria border.

A 2019 crash involving two French defence helicopters in conflict-torn Mali which killed 13 soldiers was due to miscommunication during a military operation, an official report published on Saturday said.

Suspected militants attacked several Malian and foreign military bases with mortars and rockets in the north of the country on Monday, military sources said.

Former Mali President Amadou Toumani Toure, an army general who won acclaim for pursuing democratic reforms before being toppled by a military coup in 2012, has died at the age of 72, an aide said on Tuesday.

Retired Colonel Bah Ndaw was sworn in on Friday as Mali's interim president, tasked with presiding over an 18-month transition back to civilian rule following the Aug. 18 military coup.

Qatar has participated in the extraordinary meeting of the Permanent Council of the International Organisation of La Francophonie on the situation in Mali ...

Mali's opposition coalition said security forces detained two leaders of anti-government protests and raided its headquarters on Saturday following violent demonstrations against the president in the capital.