Three UN troops killed in roadside bomb attack in Mali

Three United Nations soldiers from Chad have been killed in Mali when their convoy hit a roadside bomb, according to officials.

The blast in the northern region of Aguelhok left four more soldiers seriously wounded, the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, known as MINUSMA, said in a statement on Sunday.

“We will have to make every effort to identify and apprehend those responsible for these terrorist acts so that they can be brought to justice,” said Mahamat Saleh Annadif, MINUSMA mission head.

“I bow before the remains of these brave Blue Helmets who died in the service of peace in Mali”.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also condemned what he described as a “cowardly” attack.

Guterres called on the authorities in Mali to spare no effort to identify those responsible “so that they can be brought to justice swiftly”, according to his spokesman Stephane Dujarric.

The statement from his office also said attacks targeting UN peacekeepers could constitute war crimes under international law.

Security crisis

Established in 2013, the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali has some 13,000 troops, drawn from several nations, deployed across the vast semi-arid country that has been facing a worsening security situation in recent years.

What began as a localised revolt in Mali’s north in 2012 soon spread to the centre of the country and then to neighbouring Niger and Burkina Faso.

The UN peacekeeping force, a French military intervention and military campaigns by national armies have failed to stem the violence, which killed 4,000 people in the three countries last year and displaced hundreds of thousands, according to UN figures.

The conflict has exacerbated ethnic tensions and local grievances over poverty and the absence of the state, giving rise to ethnic militias and bolstering support for armed groups, some of which are linked to the al-Qaeda and ISIL (ISIS) armed groups.