Michele Cattani, AFP | Malian soldiers on patrol in the central region of the country in October 2018.

Unidentified gunmen on motorbikes attacked two villages in central Mali, killing at least 41 people in a part of the country where ethnic reprisal attacks have surged in recent months, a local mayor told FRANCE 24's correspondent in Bamako.

The attacks on Monday evening on the villages of Yoro and Gangafani compound a dire security situation in central Mali, where ethnic militias have stepped up attacks on civilians from rival groups and Islamist militants are also active.

The victims of Monday's raids were mostly ethnic Dogons, said Issiaka Ganame, the mayor of Yoro, where 24 people were killed. Another 17 died in Gangafani, the mayor told FRANCE 24's Christelle Pire.

An unnamed military source quoted by AFP gave a lower toll of at least 20 killes.

The tit-for-tat violence in recent months has largely pitted Dogon hunters against Fulani herders.

Last week, gunmen raided a Dogon village in central Mali, killing at least 35 people according to a government toll and more than twice as many according to local officials.

In March, suspected Dogon militiamen killed more than 150 Fulani in two villages in central Mali, one of the worst acts of bloodshed in the country's recent history.

Last month, the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, MINUSMA, announced it had recorded "at least 488 deaths" in attacks on Fulanis in the central regions of Mopti and Segou since January 2018.

Armed Fulanis "caused 63 deaths" among civilians in the Mopti region over the same period, it said.

The Fulani are primarily cattle breeders and traders, while the Bambara and Dogon are traditionally sedentary farmers.

Located in the heart of the Sahel, Mali is one of the world's poorest countries.

Unrest in the volatile central region coincides with an ongoing jihadist campaign that the Mali government is struggling to contain, despite military support from France and UN peacekeepers. </s> BAMAKO — Unidentified gunmen on motorbikes attacked two villages in central Mali, killing at least 41 people in a part of the country where ethnic reprisal attacks have surged in recent months, a local mayor said on Tuesday.

The attacks on Monday evening on the villages of Yoro and Gangafani 2 compound a dire security situation in central Mali, where ethnic militias regularly slaughter civilians from rival groups and Islamist militants are also active.

The victims of Monday’s raids were mostly ethnic Dogons, said Issiaka Ganame, the mayor of Yoro, where 24 people were killed. Another 17 died in Gangafani 2.

“About 100 unidentified armed men circulating on motos all of a sudden invaded Yoro and fired on the population,” Ganame told Reuters. “Then they descended on the village of Gangafani 2, which is about 15 km (9 miles) away.”

The tit-for-tat violence in recent months has largely pitted Dogon hunters against Fulani herders. Attackers believed to be Fulani raided a Dogon village last week, killing at least 35 people.

In March, suspected Dogon militiamen killed more than 150 Fulani in two villages in central Mali, one of the worst acts of bloodshed in the country’s recent history.

President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita’s government has vowed to disarm the militias but has struggled to do so. The groups are looked to for security by local communities who do not trust the government to protect them.

On Tuesday, two labour unions representing civil servants called on state adminstrators in the Mopti region, where most of the attacks have occurred, to leave their posts and decamp to the regional capital due to death threats.

“President Keita said he was going to disarm all the militias. We take note and await the disarmament of the militias and implementation of protection measures,” said Ousmane Christian Diarra, secretary-general of the National Syndicate of Civil Administrators.

French forces intervened in Mali, a former French colony, in 2013 to push back a jihadist advance from the north. But the militants have since regrouped and use northern and central Mali as launchpads to stage attacks across the region and stoke tensions among different communities. </s> Dozens of people are reported killed after a new attack on two villages in central Mali, a part of the country experiencing a dire security situation amid an increase in tit-for-tat ethnic violence.

A local mayor told Reuters News Agency on Tuesday that unidentified gunmen on motorbikes attacked the villages of Yoro and Gangafani 2 the previous evening, killing at least 41 civilians.

The victims of the raids were mostly ethnic Dogons, according to Issiaka Ganame, the mayor of Yoro, where 24 people were killed. Another 17 died in Gangafani 2.

"About 100 unidentified armed men circulating on motos all of a sudden invaded Yoro and fired on the population," Ganame said.

"Then they descended on the village of Gangafani 2, which is about 15km away."

Separately, local judicial official Boubacar Sidiki Samake told the AFP news agency that Monday's attacks in the two villages near the border with Burkina Faso had left "14 people dead according to a provisional toll".

A Malian military source said as many as 40 people may have been killed.

No other information was immediately available.

The attack on the two villages compounds a desperate security situation in central Mali, where ethnic militias regularly slaughter civilians from rival groups.

The tit-for-tat violence in recent months has largely pitted Dogon hunters against Fulani herders. Attackers believed to be Fulani raided a Dogon village last week, killing at least 35 people.

In March, suspected Dogon militiamen killed more than 150 Fulani in two villages in central Mali, one of the worst acts of bloodshed in the country's recent history.

At least 488 Fulani civilians died in attacks carried out in the central regions of Mopti and Segou between January 1, 2018, and May 16, 2019, according to the United Nations mission in Mali (MINUSMA). In the same period, armed Fulanis had "caused 63 deaths" among civilians in the Mopti region.

President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita's government has vowed to disarm the militias but has struggled to do so.

On Tuesday, two labour unions representing civil servants called on state administrators in the Mopti region, where most of the attacks have occurred, to leave their posts and decamp to the regional capital due to death threats.

"President Keita said he was going to disarm all the militias. We take note and await the disarmament of the militias and implementation of protection measures," said Ousmane Christian Diarra, secretary-general of the National Syndicate of Civil Administrators.

Central Mali has in the past few years been overrun by fighters with links to al-Qaeda.

Violence by fighter groups has worsened almost every year since it first started in Mali in 2012 when rebel fighters and allied Tuareg rebels took over the north and advanced towards the capital, Bamako, until a French-led intervention pushed them back the following year.

Groups linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL or ISIS) used central and northern Mali as a launch pad for growing numbers of attacks across the Sahel region and stoke tensions among different communities, despite the presence of thousands of French and regional troops, as well as UN peacekeepers. </s> Alwaght- Scores of people have been killed and many more wounded in attacks on two ethnic Dogon villages in central Mali, the government said Tuesday.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for Monday's attacks but Mali has seen a spate of massacres this year between ethnic Dogon and Fulani communities.

"The terrorist attacks on Monday evening targeted the villages of Gangafani and Yoro... not far from the border with Burkina Faso. The official provisional toll is 38 dead and numerous people wounded," the Malian government said in a statement.

"Defense and security forces have been dispatched to the location to protect the population and their property and to track down the assailants of these attacks," the statement added, revising upwards an earlier toll of 14 dead..

Goundjou Poudiougou, a local community official, said around a dozen bodies had been counted in both villages.

"They are terrorists because they killed and then disemboweled some bodies and burned crops," Poudiougou said.

Earlier this month, a massacre on another Dogon village, Sobane Da, killed 35 people, stirring fears of tit-for-tat attacks in a region with an ethnic patchwork.

"This time is the same as Sobane Da: People and animals targeted," said Adama Dionko, a spokesman for Mali's Dogon association.

"We demand the state give us more security."

Mali's armed forces also reported, on Twitter, that an army patrol Tuesday was ambushed at Gossi in the north of the country and suffered both "human and material losses".

President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita has appealed for an end to the revenge attacks after he visited the site of the Sobane Da massacre.

But despite military help from France and the United Nations, Mali's government is struggling to calm violence that began in the north of the country in 2012, sparked by radical Tuareg militias.

Earlier this year, in the bloodiest raid, 160 Fulani were killed in an attack on a village by suspected militiamen from a rival ethnic group.

Ethnic violence in central Mali surged after a predominantly Fulani extremist group led by preacher Amadou Koufa emerged in 2015.

The UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, MINUSMA, said in May it had recorded nearly 500 deaths in attacks on Fulanis in the central regions of Mopti and Segou since January 2018.

Armed Fulanis caused 63 deaths among civilians in the Mopti region over the same period, it said.

The Fulani are primarily cattle breeders and traders, while the Bambara and Dogon ethic groups are traditionally sedentary farmers.

Unrest in the central region coincides with an ongoing jihadist campaign that the Mali government is struggling to contain. </s> At least 38 people were killed and several others sustained in an attack carried out by unidentified gunmen in Gangafani and Yoro villages in central Mali, authorities said on Tuesday.

The government responded to the incident by sending a military unit to the area to track down the perpetrators and investigate the incident, reported

According to media reports, the victims of the attacks on two villages belonged to ethnic Dogons group.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack. However, members of the ethnic groups in the country often clash over access to land and water.

In a similar attack recently, at least 95 people were killed by unidentified gunmen in a village inhabited by the Dogon ethnic group in

The Dogans accuse of having ties with local jihadist groups, while claim that provides arms to Dogans to attack them. </s> At least 14 people were killed in an attack on two ethnic Dogon villages in centre of Mali, local officials said Tuesday, in the latest in a cycle of violence in the fragile Sahel country.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for Monday’s attack but Mali has seen a spate of massacres this year between ethnic Dogon and Fulani communities.

The attacks on Ganfafani and Yoro villages near the border with Burkina Faso left “14 people dead according to a provisional toll”, said local judicial official Boubacar Sidiki Samake.

A Mali military source said as many as 40 people may have been killed.

Goundjou Poudiougou, a local community official, said around a dozen bodies had been counted in both villages.

“They are terrorists because they killed and then disembowelled some bodies and burned crops,” Poudiougou said.

Earlier this month, a massacre on another Dogon village, Sobane Da, killed 35 people, stirring fears of tit-for-tat attacks in a region with an ethnic patchwork.

“This time is the same as Sobane Da: People and animals targetted,” said Adama Dionko, a spokesman for the Mali’s Dogon association.

President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita has appealed for an end to the revenge violence after he visited the site of the Sobane Da massacre.

But despite military help from France and the UN, Mali’s government is struggling to calm violence that began in the north of the country in 2012, sparked by radical Islamist and Tuareg militias.

Earlier this year, in the bloodiest raid, 160 Fulani were killed in an attack on a village by suspected militiamen from a rival ethnic group.

Ethnic violence in central Mali surged after a predominantly Fulani jihadist group led by preacher Amadou Koufa emerged in 2015.

The UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, MINUSMA, said in May it had recorded nearly 500 deaths in attacks on Fulanis in the central regions of Mopti and Segou since January 2018.

Armed Fulanis caused 63 deaths among civilians in the Mopti region over the same period, it said.

The Fulani are primarily cattle breeders and traders, while the Bambara and Dogon ethic groups are traditionally sedentary farmers.

Unrest in the volatile central region coincides with an ongoing jihadist campaign that the Mali government is struggling to contain. </s> (CNN) Dozens of people were killed and many others were injured when armed men attacked two villages in central Mali, the government said Tuesday.

In what the authorities are calling a "terrorist" incident, gunmen attacked the villages of Gangafani and Yoro in the Mopti region of Mali near the border with Burkina Faso, killing at least 38 people, according to an early government estimate.

The government responded to the Monday attack by sending a military unit to the area to investigate the incident and track down the perpetrators.

In a separate attack, a military patrol was ambushed by armed men in Banguimalam, according to the government statement. </s> Bamako, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 19th Jun, 2019 ) :At least 14 people were killed in an attack on two ethnic Dogon villages in central Mali, local officials said Tuesday.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for Monday's attack but Mali has seen a spate of violence this year between ethnic Dogon and Fulani communities.

The attacks on Ganfafani and Yoro villages near the border with Burkina Faso left "14 people dead according to a provisional toll", said local judicial official Boubacar Sidiki Samake.

A Mali military source said as many as 40 people may have been killed.

Goundjou Poudiougou, a local community official, said a dozen bodies had been counted in both villages.

Earlier this year 130 people were killed in an attack on a village by suspected militiamen from a rival ethnic group.

Jihadist raids remain a persistent threat in Mali, but in the centre of the country, an ethnic mosaic, attacks have had a bloody impact on groups that have a history of rivalry. </s> Earlier in the day Reuters reported citing a local mayor that unidentified gunmen on motorbikes attacked two villages in central Mali, killing at least 41 people.

At the same time, according to AFP report citing unnamed local officials, at least 14 people were killed in attacks against two Dogon villages.

The attacks on Ganfafani and Yoro villages left "14 people dead according to a provisional toll", local judicial official Boubacar Sidiki Samake said as cited by AFP.
Forty one people are killed in an attack in the Yoro and Gangafani villages in Mali, one week after 35 are killed in another attack. The attackers, riding motorcycles, targeted primarily Dogon villages.