French and Malian forces retook Timbuktu and Gao this week, removing control of the Niger River Bend from jihadist militants. The population greeted the development with joy, Italian RAI2 television reported. The French army forced the Islamists out of north Mali but hundreds of thousands of refugees won't be able to go home for some time. Russian RTR television reported on them. The main market of Gao is very near the spot where the Islamists whipped people or staged public amputations, for transgressions of their reading of the Koran. French television France2 reported. Troops from Chad have come to Mali to take up the tasks performed by the French, among those with a mission that has become even more difficult in that the jihadists have faded out of sight, a concern for Niger, Swiss TSR television reported. More about: Armed conflicts, France, Islamists, Mali