An improvised explosive device (IED) blast in northern Mali has hit a UN blue helmet vehicle, killing one member of the mission and seriously injuring four others on Saturday, the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said in a statement.
The mission did not specify the nationality of the fallen soldier, but hours later the spokesman for the Secretary-General of the Organization clarified that he was a member of the Egyptian armed forces.
The incident, near the town of Tesalit in the Kindal region near the Algerian border, follows an ambush in which five members of the Mali gendarmerie were killed in the south earlier this week, for which an al-Qaeda-linked group claimed responsibility.
Attacks by jihadists and other armed groups continue to be frequent in vast areas of Mali and neighboring states, Burkina Faso and Niger, despite the presence of thousands of foreign troops for years. Thousands of civilians have been killed and millions more displaced.
The incident was described as a “tragic reminder of the continuing danger to our blue helmets,” said El Gassim Wane, head of MINUSMA, the UN mission, which has about 13,000 members.
In a statement issued by his office in New York, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres “strongly condemned” the bombing, expressed “his deepest condolences to the family, government and people of Egypt” and wished “a speedy recovery.” recovery “in the injured. He acknowledged that attacks on blue helmets “could constitute war crimes under international law” and called on the Mali authorities to “spare no effort” to identify the perpetrators so that “they can be brought to justice immediately”.
MINUSMA has suffered 255 casualties since 2013, more than any other of the organization’s ten or more peacekeeping missions worldwide.
A French soldier from the Barhan mission in Mali was killed last week.
In April, four blue helmets, members of Chad’s armed forces, were killed in a jihadist attack on their base in Angelok, northeastern Mali.
Since 2012, when a clash broke out between government forces on the one hand, separatist rebels and jihadists in the north on the other, Mali has entered and is still in an endless storm with thousands of dead, civilians and fighters, despite the support of the international community and interventions by UN forces, other African countries, as well as France.The situation is extremely dangerous in the country, where a transitional government is in power after two consecutive coups.
