Mali War

The Mali War is an armed conflict in Mali that began on 16 January 2012 with a Tuareg rebellion in the north of the country and has not formally ended. The rebels included the secular National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad, which sought independence or greater autonomy for a region it called Azawad and which was at first allied with jihadist groups such as Ansar Dine and al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. A coup in March 2012 left government forces in the north weakened, the rebels took Timbuktu, Kidal and Gao, and the movement declared independence on 6 April 2012, a claim the African Union and the European Union rejected. The jihadists then turned on their former allies. French forces intervened in January 2013 and, with African and international support, government forces regained most of the lost territory. Peace agreements in 2013 and 2015 did not end the fighting, which spread into central Mali. Later coups, the arrival of Wagner Group mercenaries and the withdrawal of French and United Nations forces reshaped the war.