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Youth from north Mali stage a protest against the occupation of north Mali by Tuareg rebel fighters in Bamako yesterday |
Mali’s Tuareg rebels declared independence yesterday in the north, a move shot down by insurgents and the international community, as fears loomed of a humanitarian disaster.
Africa and Europe roundly rejected the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad’s (MNLA) declaration of independence as a chorus of calls mounted for a solution to the crisis which has split the coup-wracked nation in two.
Britain said it was temporarily closing its embassy in Mali due to the “unstable” situation and “lack of constitutional rule”.
A democratic success since its last coup 21 years ago, Mali is now roughly divided into a rebel-controlled north and junta-controlled south and a group of radical Islamists have exploited the chaos to swoop in and install Shariah.
The Islamist group, Ansar Dine, moved in alongside the MNLA but has given short shrift to their independence plans.
“Our war is a holy war. We are against rebellions. We are against independence. We are against revolutions,” Ansar Dine military chief Omar Hamaha said.
He was speaking in a video obtained by this agency and France 2 television filmed on Tuesday and Wednesday after the Islamists’ takeover of the fabled city of Timbuktu.
The video showed one group of rebels loitering outside a military camp, with their black flag draped over the name of the barracks above the entrance.
In other scenes in the video, small groups of women walked along the city’s streets. Some wore full face veils but most simply covered their hair with scarves.
He said they had “more than 120 prisoners” including thieves.
“We have tied them up and taken their weapons. We beat them well and it’s likely we will slit their throats,” he added in unedited footage, while it was not clear if this threat was aimed at all prisoners.
In the city of Gao, Ansar Dine kidnapped seven Algerian diplomats, according to witnesses and the Algerian foreign ministry. While the Islamists appeared to have the upper hand, the separatist MNLA yesterday morning declared the independence of their desert homeland which they call Azawad, where several rebellions have played out in past decades.
The latest has been fuelled by a haemorrhaging of weapons from Libya following Muammar Gaddafi’s downfall.
“We solemnly proclaim the independence of Azawad as from today,” Mossa Ag Attaher, a Paris-based MNLA spokesman said on France 24 television, confirming a statement on the group’s website.
He also said the group was ready to help fight the “terrorism” of Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, which he said was fostered by the “lack of action by the Malian state and the lack of hope for the people of the north who were mistreated or abandoned for decades.”
The international comunity swiftly rejected their proclamation of independence.
The African Union dismissed it as “null and of no value whatsoever.”
The European Union also rejected any break-up of Mali and called for talks to resolve the crisis.