This article is from the source 'nytimes' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.

You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/12/world/africa/mali-islamist-rebels-france.html

The article has changed 13 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.

Version 9 Version 10
France Sends Troops into Combat in Mali to Counter Islamist Advance France Battling Islamists in Mali
(about 3 hours later)
BAMAKO, Mali — France sent armed forces into combat in Mali on Friday, answering an urgent plea from the government of its former colony in West Africa to help blunt a sudden and aggressive advance into the center of the country by Islamist extremist militants who have been in control of the north for much of the past year. BAMAKO, Mali — The international standoff with Islamists controlling northern Mali took a decisive turn on Friday, as French forces engaged in an intense battle to beat back an aggressive militant push into the center of the country.
French officials confirmed that the French forces, which included paratroopers and helicopter gunships, had engaged in fighting with the Islamists after landing at a major airfield in the central Mali town of Sévaré. Responding to an urgent plea for help from the Malian government, French troops carried out airstrikes against Islamist fighters, blunting an advance by hundreds of heavily armed extremists, according to French officials and Gen. Carter F. Ham, the top American military commander in Africa. One French helicopter had apparently been downed in the fighting, he said.
It was not immediately clear how many French troops had been sent or from where, but a Western diplomat in neighboring Niger said the Islamist forces numbered between 800 and 900 fighters, with about 200 vehicles. The Pentagon is now weighing a broad range of options to support the French effort, including enhanced intelligence sharing and logistics support, but it is not considering sending American troops, General Ham said.
“French forces brought their support this afternoon to Malian army units to fight against terrorist elements,” President François Hollande of France said in a statement to reporters in Paris. “This operation will last as long as necessary.” The sudden introduction of Western troops upends months of tortured debate over how — and when — foreign nations should confront the Islamist seizure of northern Mali. The Obama administration and governments around world have long been alarmed that a vast territory roughly twice the size of Germany could so easily fall into the hands of extremists, calling it a safe haven where terrorists were building their ranks and seeking to extend their influence throughout the region and beyond.
Gen. Carter F. Ham, the head of the American military’s Africa Command, who was traveling in neighboring Niger at the time of the French assault, said he understood that the Islamists had been prevented from advancing further south, and that one French helicopter gunship may have been downed, but there was no confirmation. Yet for months, the Islamists have appeared increasingly unshakable in their stronghold, carrying out public amputations, whippings and stonings as the weak Malian army retreated south and African nations debated how to find money and soldiers to recapture the territory.
“If there was an intent by the bad guys to continue the attack,” General Ham said, “that appears to be been stopped, maybe even slightly reversed.” All of that changed this week, when the Islamists suddenly charged southward with a force of 800 to 900 fighters in 50 to 200 vehicles, taking over a frontier town that had been the de facto line of government control, according to General Ham and a Western diplomat. Worried that there was little to stop the militants from storming ever further into Mali, France — for the second time in less than two years — intervened with guns and bombs into a former African colony rent by turmoil.
He emphasized that initial combat reports were sketchy and incomplete. “French forces brought their support this afternoon to Malian army units to fight against terrorist elements,” President François Hollande of France said in a statement to reporters in Paris on Friday, noting that the operation would “last as long as necessary.”
General Ham also said the French assault had not been coordinated with the United States, but that the Pentagon was now weighing a broad range of options, including providing enhanced intelligence sharing and logistic support. He said there were now high-level discussions between Washington and Paris, and other Western and African capitals, about further steps. “The terrorists should know that France will always be there,” he added.
Mr. Hollande has been especially outspoken in his animosity toward northern Mali’s Islamist occupiers and their harsh practices, which rights activists say include arbitrary killings, stonings, amputations, forced marriages, the destruction of non-Islamist cultural shrines and several kidnappings of French nationals. Sanda Ould Boumana, a spokesman for Ansar Dine, one of the Islamist groups that controls northern Mali along with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and its allies, insisted in a telephone interview that the militants had held their ground.
Thousands of Malians have sought to flee the north, which Western intelligence officials say has also become a refuge and training ground for affiliate extremist groups including Al Qaeda in the Islamist Maghreb. “Some planes came and bombed some civilians,” he said. “A woman was killed. It’s a well-known scenario. There wasn’t even combat. Planes bombed a mosque. That’s it.”
“Mali is dealing with terrorist elements form the north, whose brutality and fanaticism are now clear to the entire world,” Mr. Hollande said. “The very existence of the friendly state of Mali is at stake, as is the security of its people and that of our citizens. There are 6,000 of them there.” Mr. Boumana called the intervention “illegal,” saying the French had “come to support a bunch of murderers. That’s France, and that’s the West. We are not surprised.”
The French president was responding to an urgent request received the day before from Mali’s interim president, Dioncounda Traore, who said Malian government forces were in dire need of help to stop the Islamists, who have turned the northern half of the country into a militant haven since seizing the territory, about twice of the size of Germany, last April. Malian officials in the capital, Bamako, called the French military strike a welcome shift in the standoff.
The United Nations Security Council, which has repeatedly condemned the Islamist takeover of northern Mali, decided last month to authorize an African-led force to enter the country to help drive the Islamists out, but Security Council diplomats had said at the time that such a force would likely not be deployed until next September or October. “It was evident that the Malian army would never have been able to handle this,” said Tiébilé Dramé, a leading opposition politician. “The French intervention goes beyond what was hoped for. No one was expecting things would go this quickly. France had said it wouldn’t intervene, and Malians were hoping for a rapid intervention.”
It was unclear how the French assault on Friday may have affected that timetable. But the Security Council, which met in emergency session on Thursday, said it was closely monitoring events in Mali and may take additional steps. Mr. Hollande is also to meet with the Malian president next week. Why the Islamists provoked a military strike by capturing the village of Konna on Thursday, a possible prelude to attacking bigger towns on their way to the capital, more than 300 miles away, remained unclear. They were not facing a military intervention for many months, and even then it was not expected to include Western forces.
France has maintained extensive relationships with its former Africa colonies and has a long history of expeditionary military actions in them. But both Mr. Hollande and his predecessor, Nicolas Sarkozy, had sought to turn away from intervention in Africa in a post-colonial fashion — only with the sanction of the United Nations and African countries. Mr. Hollande had said that France would not send troops into combat in Mali but instead would support African troops — until Friday, when it seemed that the government in Bamako might collapse. The French had, however, prepositioned military contingents near Mali, with deployments in Senegal, Burkina Faso and the Ivory Coast, for example, and had been engaged in coordination with American forces, especially for airborne surveillance of the vast region and intelligence. There were also persistent reports that French special forces were on the ground in Mali. “Was this a move by AQIM toward Bamako? Were they making a move to simply strengthen negotiating position, to gain a little more territory?” General Ham said. “The real question is, now what?” he said, adding that discussions were now under way between Washington, Paris and African governments in the region.
The French intervention came after two days of clashes between the Malian Army and militants around Konna, a sleepy mud-brick village that for months had marked the outer limit of the Malian Army’s control after it lost half of the country to the Islamists and their allies eight months ago. The big prize the Islamists evidently sought — capturing the major Malian government airfield nearby in Sévaré, which is vital for any military intervention in the north of Mali — seemed to be outside their grasp on Friday.
“It’s a very serious situation, very dangerous,” said a Malian officer here in Bamako, the capital, who was not authorized to speak publicly. But while senior Malian officers heralded their new military “partners on the ground,” some warned that the Islamists remained strong and could still press forward. “It’s temporary,” said one officer, who was not authorized to speak publicly. “They have the means to advance.”
The Islamists had been threatening a major airfield 25 miles away from Konna in Sévaré, also the home of a significant army base. And 10 miles from Sévaré is the historic river city of Mopti, the last major town controlled by the Malian government, with a population of more than 100,000. Holding off the Islamists, moreover, is a far cry from retaking the north. While tens of thousands of civilians have fled the area, many others remain in the ancient city of Timbuktu and other towns under Islamist control, leaving them highly vulnerable in the event urban warfare breaks out.
“There were hard fights, but we lost,” the officer said. Beyond that, extremists in the north, who finance themselves in part by kidnapping and ransoming foreigners, are still holding more than a dozen hostages and have sometimes threatened to kill them if an attack takes place.
A spokesman for the Islamists, Sanda Ould Boumana, said Thursday from rebel-held Timbuktu: “We have taken the town of Konna. We control Konna, and the Malian Army has fled. We have pushed them back.” Still, Western and Malian officials said the French assault had changed the dynamic of the conflict, accelerating plans for a broader military strategy.
This week’s clashes were the first time that the two sides had fought since Islamists and their Tuareg rebel allies conquered the north of Mali last spring, splitting the country in two and leaving the Malian Army in disarray. "What’s sure now is that things will not happen as we thought they would a month ago,” said a Western diplomat, who was not authorized to speak publicly. “We’ve told ECOWAS countries to accelerate preparations to send troops,” he added, referring to the 15-member Economic Community of West African States, which has agreed to provide an intervention force.
For months, the United Nations and Mali’s neighbors have been debating and planning a military campaign to retake the north by force, if necessary, an international push that is supposed to be led by Malian forces. Analysts had previously said that the outcome of this week’s fighting at Konna would be a significant indicator of the army’s fitness to undertake the reconquest of the north. France has a long history of expeditionary military actions in its former African colonies. Mr. Hollande had said that France would not send troops into combat in Mali until Friday, when it seemed that the government in Bamako might collapse. But the French had positioned military contingents near Mali, with deployments in Senegal, Burkina Faso and the Ivory Coast, for example. There were also persistent reports that French special forces were in Mali.
Malian politicians reacted with shock to news of Konna’s loss. Under Mr. Hollande’s predecessor, Nicolas Sarkozy, France also carried out airstrikes to dislodge Ivory Coast’s strongman, Laurent Gbagbo, in 2011, bringing a quick end to a bloody four-month civil war precipitated by Mr. Gbagbo’s refusal to leave office after an electoral defeat.
“This is a very disagreeable surprise. Terrible. A dagger blow,” said Fatoumata Dicko, a deputy in Mali’s Parliament in Bamako. “People are fleeing Sévaré. They think there is nothing to hold the Islamists back.”

Adam Nossiter reported from Bamako and Eric Schmitt from Niamey, Niger. Rick Gladstone contributed reporting from New York, and Scott Sayare from Paris.

Adam Nossiter reported from Bamako and Eric Schmitt from Niamey, Niger. Reporting was contributed by Cheick Diouara from Accra, Ghana; Rick Gladstone from New York; and Steven Erlanger and Scott Sayare from Paris.

 Adam Nossiter reported from Bamako and Eric Schmitt from Niamey, Niger. Rick Gladstone contributed reporting from New York, and Scott Sayare from Paris.