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Version 2 Version 3
French Troops in Mali Push On to Timbuktu With Fighters Gone, Malians Welcome Normal Days
(about 5 hours later)
PARIS — Malian forces backed by French troops were advancing on Sunday toward the crucial northern town of Timbuktu as they began to deploy in the rebel stronghold of Gao, French officials said. SÉVARÉ, Mali — Residents of northern Mali’s largest city poured out of their homes to celebrate the expulsion of Islamist fighters who had held their town for months, playing the music that had been forbidden under the militants’ harsh interpretation of Islamic rule and dancing in the streets.
Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault of France said in a statement that the French troops were “around Gao and soon near Timbuktu,” farther west. Timbuktu has been under the control of rebels and Islamist fighters for 10 months, though there are reports that many of the Islamists have moved farther into the vast desert. “Everyone is in the streets,” a Gao resident, Ibrahim Touré, said in a telephone interview. “It is like a party. There is music. There are drums. It’s freedom.”
The French are also expected to move on to another large town, Kidal, with the notion of clearing population centers of the rebels and garrisoning them with allied African troops before the rainy season starts in March. Their celebrations came as international forces trying to recapture northern Mali, which has been seized by a mosaic of heavily armed Islamist groups, deployed into Gao, one of the principal militant strongholds, French officials said Sunday. Malian forces backed by French troops also advanced toward another crucial northern town: the ancient city of Timbuktu.
The capture of the main strategic points in Gao on Saturday represented the biggest prize yet in the battle to retake the northern half of Mali. The French Defense Ministry spokesman, Col. Thierry Burkhard, said Sunday morning on Europe 1 radio that troops from Mali, Nigeria and Chad were now deploying in Gao after French special forces took the city’s airport and a strategic bridge on Saturday. Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault of France said French troops were “around Gao and soon near Timbuktu,” farther west. Timbuktu has been under the control of rebels and Islamist fighters for 10 months, although there are reports that many of the Islamists have moved farther into the vast desert to escape the advancing forces.
In Gao, people who had been under occupation for nearly a year by Islamist fighters flooded the streets in jubilation, weeping and shouting to welcome the Malian and French troops who arrived in force on Sunday, residents said.
If it can be held, the capture of Gao will be the biggest strategic victory in the battle to retake northern Mali, which began this month when French forces entered the fight to blunt a sudden militant push toward the capital, Bamako.
Gao is the most populous city in Mali’s north, and it endured months of repression under fighters aligned with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. The city’s residents were subject to strict rules and harsh punishment, including amputations for suspect thieves and public beatings or whippings for perceived violations of Islamic law.
Fatou Cissé, a Gao resident reached by telephone, said crowds were chanting “Vive la France!” and singing the Malian national anthem.
“I was out there with them,” said Ms. Cissé, who said she was wearing bright wax-print fabric with short sleeves, the kind of clothing that was banned when the city was under militant control.
“My head is not covered,” she said. “Girls are out of the house, and they are dancing.”
Several Gao residents confirmed that a joint French and Malian military convoy toured the city at around 4 p.m. on Sunday. Mr. Touré said heavy bombing began late Friday evening and continued into Saturday morning.
“The explosions were big,” Mr. Touré said, suggesting that the French were targeting rebel fuel depots and arms caches.
Mr. Touré, who grows vegetables for a living, recalled Islamist fighters stealing the small water pump on which his livelihood depended. He said he had been waiting for this day but thought it would be months — possibly years — before it arrived.
“I could not have asked for anything more,” he said. “But now, it is time to fix things, to rebuild our lives and our city.”
The French are also expected to move on to another large town, Kidal, with the notion of clearing the fighters from population centers and garrisoning them with allied African troops before the rainy season begins in March.
The Pentagon said over the weekend that the United States would provide aerial refueling for French warplanes and that it would transport troops from African nations, including Chad and Togo. The American military has already begun transporting a 600-member French mechanized battalion to Mali and is providing intelligence information, including satellite imagery. 
Journalists from France 24, a cable television network, reported that they were alongside French and Malian troops at the edge of Timbuktu, the fabled desert oasis and crossroads of ancient desert caravan routes.
With its delicate, mud-walled historic sites and narrow labyrinth of streets, Timbuktu presents challenging terrain for soldiers trying to secure the city. During the 10 months it has been under Islamist control, dire reports of destruction of the tombs of Sufi saints and other important monuments have filtered back through people fleeing the city. Timbuktu is a protected World Heritage Site, home to thousands of ancient manuscripts collected over centuries.
The French Defense Ministry spokesman, Col. Thierry Burkhard, said Sunday on Europe 1 radio that troops from Mali, Nigeria and Chad were now in Gao after French special forces took the city’s airport and a strategic bridge on Saturday.
“The taking of control of Gao, which has between 50,000 and 60,000 inhabitants, by Malian, Chadian and Nigerian soldiers is under way,” Colonel Burkhard said.“The taking of control of Gao, which has between 50,000 and 60,000 inhabitants, by Malian, Chadian and Nigerian soldiers is under way,” Colonel Burkhard said.
France had been pounding Gao with airstrikes since it joined the fight at Mali’s request on Jan. 11. Gao, 600 miles northeast of Bamako, the capital, had been under the control of the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, a splinter group of Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. Al Jazeera broadcast a statement from Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb in which the group said it had withdrawn temporarily from some cities it held, but would return with a greater force. Despite the northward advance of Malian and French troops, residents of northern towns continued to pour southward, seeking safety from fleeing Islamist militants and French airstrikes.
In Washington, the Pentagon said Saturday that the United States would provide aerial refueling for French warplanes. The decision increases American involvement, which until now had consisted of transporting French troops and equipment and also providing intelligence, including satellite photographs. Adiarratou Sanogo, a 30-year-old teacher from Niafounké, stepped off a ferry that arrived in the riverside town of Mopti on Sunday morning, having floated down the Niger River for two days to reach safety. “We were afraid of the bombs,” Ms. Sanogo said.
France intervened after Konna was overrun by Islamic fighters on Jan. 10, and a clearer picture of the fighting has begun to emerge. Residents and officials said that at least 11 civilians had been killed in French airstrikes. As a schoolteacher she was used to a certain amount of respect, but the Islamist militants who took control of her town demanded that she cover her hair. One afternoon they came upon her talking with her brothers outside her front door, her neatly braided hair brazenly showing.
Charred husks of pickup trucks lined the road into the town, and broken tanks and guns littered the fish market, where the rebels had appeared to set up a temporary base. “They shook a stick at me and said I must cover up or they would beat me,” she said. “I ran inside to find a scarf.”
Because of France’s sudden entry into the fray, the United Nations and the Economic Community of West African States, the regional trade bloc known as Ecowas, have been scrambling to put together an African-led intervention force that has been in the planning stages. The Malian Army, which has struggled to fight the Islamist groups, has been accused of serious human rights violations. For many residents of towns under Islamist control, it was the little things about their previous lives that they missed most.
It is easy to see why the Malian government pleaded for French help after the Islamist fighters took control of Konna. Just 35 miles of asphalt separate it from the garrison town of Sévaré, home to the second-biggest airfield in Mali and a vital strategic point for any foreign intervention force. “No smoking, no music, no girlfriends,” said Amadou Kané, a 26-year-old history student from Niafounké. “We couldn’t do anything fun.”
Residents said the town fell to the rebels when 300 pickup trucks of fighters, bristling with machine guns, rolled in and pushed back the Malian Army troops who had been guarding it after a fierce battle. The prohibition of music was particularly tough on Niafounké, Mr. Kané said, because it is the home of one of Mali’s most celebrated blues musicians, Ali Farka Touré.
Amadou Traore, 29, a tire repairman, said residents had heard that the Islamist rebels had surrounded the town before the attack, but he had been confident that the army would keep them at bay. “After praying in the mosque, it was our habit to play a little music,” Mr. Kané said. “They took that away from us.”
“We thought there was no way for them to enter into the town,” he said. “But they came in the night. They told us, ‘Tomorrow we will go to Sévaré.’ ”

Steven Erlanger contributed reporting, from Paris and Elisabeth Bumiller from Washington.

A woman who lived in his compound was hit by a bullet, he said. They tried to take her to the town clinic, but the doctor had fled. “After two days, she died,” Mr. Traore said.
Baro Coulibaly fled her house along the main road into town, moving with her husband and six children to the relative safety of the town center, where they stayed with her in-laws for days. They heard French bombs and rebel bullets ricocheting around the mud-walled dwellings.
“Nobody could get in or out,” Ms. Coulibaly said. “We were so afraid we barely ate or slept.”
Residents said they heard that Iyad ag Ghali, the fearsome Tuareg leader of the Islamist group Ansar Dine, had led the attack, but no one saw him. The rebels spoke many languages, the residents said. Some were light-skinned Arabs and Tuaregs, a nomadic people, while others were dark-skinned people who spoke the languages of Niger, Nigeria and Mali.
Boubacar Diallo, a local political leader, said that only a few rebel fighters came at first. Later, hundreds more joined them, overwhelming the Malian soldiers based here. He said he never saw them pray and scoffed at their assertion that they would teach the Muslim population a purer form of Islam.
“They say they are Muslims, but I don’t know any Muslim who does not pray,” Mr. Diallo said.
The fighters took down the Malian flag and raised a banner of their own, a white piece of paper printed with words in Arabic — “Assembly for the Spiritual Ideology to Purify the African World” — and pictures of machine guns.
After the Islamist fighters fled, Mr. Diallo took it down and replaced it with the Malian flag.

Lydia Polgreen reported from Konna, and Steven Erlanger from Paris. Elisabeth Bumiller contributed reporting from Washington, and Scott Sayare from Paris.