On April 25, 2026, several localities in central and northern Mali, including the capital, Bamako, were targets of simultaneous and unprecedented attacks. These attacks, which seem to have caught the Bamako authorities off guard, bear the hallmark of the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) and the Support Group for Islam and Muslims (JNIM). The immediate consequence of these incidents was the death of the Minister of Defense, the capture of Kidal by the attackers, and continued attacks in the subsequent days.

These incidents drew international attention to the critical situation in the region as a whole. Mali and some of its neighbours are ranked among the countries most affected by terrorism, according to the Global Terrorism Index (GTI).

Historical, political, and economic perspectives on the crisis in Mali may help us understand how we arrived at this current situation of instability. An examination of these perspectives is the purpose of this article.

Administrative buildings of the Mali government, Bamako (Photo: DemarK / Shutterstock.com)

Overview

The Republic of Mali, which covers 1,241,238 square kilometers in West Africa, is a landlocked country bordered by the Republic of Niger, Algeria, Mauritania, Senegal, Guinea, Côte d’Ivoire, and Burkina Faso. As of 2024, the country’s population is estimated at 24.5 million, and is comprised of various ethnic groups, such as the Soninke, the Dogon, the Fulani, the Tuareg, the Bambara, and the Malinke. Nearly 80% of Malians speak Bambara, even though each ethnic group has its own language. As a result of French colonialism, French is the working language.

Mali’s economy long rested on agricultural exports. Recently, the economy has been supported by gold exports: it is now the third-largest producer of gold in Africa. Its GDP was nearly 22 billion USD in 2025, and GDP per capita was around $900. The percentage of people living under the ethical poverty line (measured at 7.4 USD per day) was 85% in 2021. The Sahara Desert in the North occupies a significant portion of the territory. Living conditions in this area are more difficult than in the center and the South.

Precolonial history

The territory that is now Mali was part of various empires and kingdoms. The western Sahel as a whole was a major political and commercial region. The first known empire in this region was Ghana, also known as the Wagadou Empire. Around the 3^rd century, the Soninke people established this empire, whose power was primarily derived from control over the gold and salt trade and a well-functioning taxation system. Due to attacks from the north and escalating internal rivalries, the Ghana Empire declined in the 11th century.

At the Battle of Kirina in 1235, Sundiata Keita defeated the Sosso monarch Sumanguru Kante and united several kingdoms to form the Mali Empire. The Kurukan Fuga Charter (Manden Charter) resulted from this victory. The charter is one of the earliest declarations of human rights in world history.

Depiction of Mansa Musa in the Catalan Atlas (Photo: Gallica Digital Library / Wikimedia Commons [Public domain])

The Mali Empire under Mansa Musa in the 14^th century reached its zenith. The Songhai Empire succeeded the Mali Empire in the late 1400s. The Songhai Empire’s heart was the city of Gao on the Niger River. The Songhai became the biggest kingdom in Africa, but it collapsed in 1591. Successor kingdoms included the Bambara kingdoms of Segou and Kaarta, the Massina Empire, and the Toucouleur Empire. It is against this backdrop that French colonizers arrived.

Colonization

The annexation of the French Sudan, presently known as Mali, was a long and violent process. The area was fully integrated into French West Africa by 1892. The colonial era was characterized by economic exploitation, the establishment of new infrastructure, and profound cultural and social transformations. The introduction of cotton farming as a cash crop for France’s interests adversely affected the region’s economy. In addition to compelling farmers to grow cotton, the French colonial system imposed taxation and forced labour.

In the 1910s, Tuareg groups, who were semi-nomadic herders and traders living in the Sahel desert, were already challenging French colonial control in the northern French Sudan. This early rebellion was shaped by drought, poverty, and rival local alliances. French forces suppressed these uprisings severely with the support of rival Tuareg and Arab groups.

The growing number of educated people, and French losses in World War II, gave rise to a push for independence. Early West African elites created the Pan-African Democratic Gathering Rassemblement (RDA). Modibo Keita, a teacher, led the Mali independence movement under the Sudanese Union-RDA, the French Sudan branch of the RDA. Keita, a socialist and Pan-Africanist, wanted a unified West African federation to gain economic and political independence from France.

In 1959, French Sudan and Senegal founded the Mali Federation and secured independence on June 20, 1960. However, political differences between Keita and Senegal’s Leopold Sedar Senghor led to a rapid collapse. When Senegal left the federation, the remaining territory declared independence as the Republic of Mali on September 22, 1960, with Modibo Keita as its first president.

Post-independent Mali

The independence of Mali, like its neighbours, was incomplete, due to strong French influence. This could be seen in use of the CFA franc, the currency created in the 1930s by France for its African colonies. After independence, most of its former colonies continued to use this currency. Under Keita’s rule, Mali temporarily left the CFA franc currency zone. His goal during this Cold War era appears to have been to reduce his reliance on France and to develop a broader range of diplomatic connections, including with China and the Soviet Union.

The Keita government experienced its first major Tuareg revolt in 1963-1964. It began around Kidal and was crushed by the Malian army through harsh counterinsurgency operations, driving many people into exile in Algeria and other neighboring countries.

In 1968, army officer Moussa Traore ended Keita’s government with a military coup. He ruled as a military leader before organizing a presidential election in 1985, which he won. The same year, a war broke out between Mali and Burkina Faso over the disputed possession of the Agacher Strip, reputed to be rich in minerals. The war ended in 1986, and a final settlement was reached.

In 1990, Mali witnessed another Tuareg rebellion, which the government once more crushed. The intensification of the conflict near Gao and other northern cities prompted civilian relocation. The Tamanrasset Accords, mediated by Algeria in 1991, established a cease-fire, demilitarization, and greater autonomy for the northern areas. Poor economic conditions, droughts, and the democratic aspirations of the Malian people fueled student and union strikes that rocked the country, prompting the military, led by General Amadou Toumani Toure, to depose Traore in March, 1991.

Tuareg fighters, northern Mali, 2012 (Photo: Magharebia / Flickr [CC BY 2.0])

A transitional committee organized parliamentary and presidential elections in 1992. In the second round, Alpha Oumar Konare, a former historian, was elected as president. During his mandate, tensions related to Tuareg groups’ insurgencies had progressed beyond the Tuareg uprising and included intercommunal violence between the sedentary Songhai and Arab groups by 1994. The Accords of Bourem, signed in 1995, helped to halt inter-ethnic violence. The “Flame of Peace” event, held in Timbuktu the following year, involved the burning of weapons, and marked the dismantling of the Tuareg and Songhai armed groups.

Konare was re-elected for a second term in 1997. In 2002, former coup leader Toumani Toure stood for president and emerged victorious as a civilian candidate.

Conflict and ‘democracy’

From the 2000s, in addition to several Tuareg rebellions, the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), emerged in Algeria. The group operated in the Sahel from its Malian base since 2003, and evolved into Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).

Given the recurring conflict in the north sustained by a feeling of abandonment by the government, and exacerbated by harsh climatic conditions, Toure’s administration established the North Mali Development Agency (ADN) in 2005. It focused investment in Gao, Timbuktu, and Kidal to address northern underdevelopment. However, the Alliance for Democratic Change (ADC), another breakaway faction of the Tuareg movement, reignited the insurrection in 2006. After a month of fighting, the Algiers Accords were signed, with the aim of restoring peace, security, and prosperity in Kidal while also boosting northern economic growth.

During Toure’s second mandate between 2007 and 2012, some Tuareg groups rejected the Algiers framework and continued attacks on army bases. After a fierce counterinsurgency battle in 2009, hundreds of guns were handed over during a peace ceremony in Kidal, but some forces remained outside the peace process. The same year, the government’s difficulty in controlling the north was underscored by the report of the landing of a cargo plane filled with cocaine in the Gao region. Mali had become part of trafficking nexus for drugs being transported from south America to Europe.

Swearing-in Ceremony President Keita, 2018 (Photo: UN Mission in Mali / Flickr [CC BY-NC-SA 2.0])

Despite the precarious situation in the north, Mali was regarded as a model of democratic governance and stability in West Africa between 1992 and 2012. This so-called democratic and stable period was also the one in which the current security situation gradually took shape.

The democratic advancements of the 1990s and 2000s were compromised by several issues, including corruption and poor governance, which gradually diminished citizens’ trust. Some associations urged, unsuccessfully, successive administrations to establish and implement the “26 March 1991 Foundation” to mitigate the suffering of victims of various forms of repression from 1968 to the present.

In Mali, as in several other West African nations, ‘democracy’ and ‘good governance’ are, in many cases, highly lucrative for the individual gain of political actors. Engaging in politics in Africa mostly involves appeasing donors and investors focused on formal metrics of ‘good governance’ and stability for investors in the economic domain. This sometimes at the detriment of the populace, and has contributed to the failure to cultivate a mature and genuine opposition capable of contributing to political progress. Political parties have likely minimal influence over economic and social policies, which seem determined by external factors. But political participation can serve as a means of acquiring power and wealth.

The 2012 crisis and its aftermath

In 2012, two events ushered in a new era of uncertainty for Mali: a resurgent Tuareg separatist movement, and the ousting of Toure’s government. In 2011, a Tuareg insurrection emerged in the aftermath of the toppling of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya. Thousands of well-armed and experienced Tuaregs who had fought for Gaddafi in Libya returned to Mali and formed the national movement for the liberation of Azawad (MNLA). In January 2012, the MNLA, in collaboration with some radical jihadist groups, quickly gained control of major northern cities such as Kidal, Gao, and Timbuktu.

Then in March, discontented troops ousted the Toure administration in Bamako, ending nearly two decades of democracy. The Republic of Azawad was proclaimed in the north, and Sharia law came into force in these northern regions from April 2012. Yet the MNLA and Ansar Dine, a jihadist group, pursued different agendas: the former was fighting for independence, while the latter was fighting for more religious purposes.

Aftermath of an attack on a UN vehicle, 2019 (Photo: UN Mission in Mali / Flickr [CC BY-NC-SA 2.0])

International interventions aimed at freeing the northern cities from armed non-state actors and restoring Mali’s state authority followed. In response to a Malian government request, France initiated Operation Serval in January 2013. After retaking Gao and Timbuktu, French and Malian troops seized Kidal. In August, the United Nations Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA), which would become one of the deadliest UN operations, was deployed. By the end of the year, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, a former prime minister in the late 1990s, became president after elections.

Fighting continued in the north, and in 2014, the Barkhane Operation replaced Serval. While the government and northern separatist insurgents struck a peace accord in 2015, Islamist violence and intercommunal conflicts persisted. AQIM-affiliated jihadist groups formed the JNIM in 2017 with Iyad Ag Ghaly as its leader. The JNIM has claimed responsibility for most of the attacks in this region, but competes with a rival group known as the Islamic State in the Greater Sahel (ISGS). In response, France helped five Sahelian states to form the G5 Sahel force to enhance counterterrorism efforts.

Military rule and regional realignment

By 2020, frustration with the handling of the deteriorating security situation led to protests against President Keita. This culminated in a coup d’etat in 2020, and again in 2021, led by Assimi Goita, who established a military government. Behind support for these coups was distrust between among the people in what were seen as ‘incompetent’ political elite. There was also dissatisfaction with the incapacity of foreign partners, mainly France and the regional organization, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), to contribute to curbing the rising insecurity.

In this context, the Goita regime used a call for sovereignty to justify and strengthen, and generate support for, its policies. The military government argued that France was playing not only an ineffective role in Mali’s security agenda, but also a disruptive one. ECOWAS was portrayed in a similar light, due to its misreading of the security situation, the sanctions it imposed on the new government, and its demand for a rapid return to civilian rule. Among other things, the new government expelled the French troops of Barkhane, which had been present since 2014, and requested the withdrawal of MINUSMA.

Mali’s neighbours Burkina Faso and Niger experienced coups and the introduction of military rule under similar circumstances. Together, the new governments in these countries established the Alliance of Sahel States (AES). The three states later left ECOWAS. These decisions were supported by a rapprochement with Russia, which helped Mali take control of Kidal after MINUSMA’s withdrawal in 2023. The success of Kidal was celebrated as a sign of a beneficial partnership with Russia and cited by Bamako as an example of its ability to reestablish territorial sovereignty and stability.

Heads of state of Mali and Russia, 2023 (Photo: President of Russia, Kremlin / Wikimedia Commons [CC BY 4.0])

The rule of the new government in Mali, like its neighbours, has been marked by the suppression of dissent, restrictions on civil liberties, and the suspension of political party activity. Exiled politicians from Mali and the AES countries, who are calling for a return to democratic rule, formed the Alliance of Democrats of the Sahel in early April 2026.

Insecurity continues

Despite Russia’s commitment to support Mali, and the creation of the Unified Force of AES, insecurity appears to be worsening in the county. In the second half of 2025, armed groups began increasing pressure on the regime and its Russian partners by obstructing Bamako’s oil supply. As noted in the introduction, the April 2026 coordinated and simultaneous operation, led by the FLA, a new alliance of Tuareg separatist armed groups created in 2024, in collaboration with JNIM, resulted in the death of the defense minister, and compelled the Russian forces to withdraw from Kidal.

Events appear to have cast doubts on the junta’s stance that strengthening relations with Russia would yield better security outcomes, despite the government’s ongoing portrayal of the conflict as a matter of sovereignty and foreign interference. Sources indicated that France, indirectly through Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, has aided the FLA. This suggests that there are elements of a proxy conflict between Russia and Ukraine in Mali, with France also seeking to mitigate Russian influence.

In April, the FLA announced its intention to capture Gao and Timbuktu. Meanwhile, the government in Mali announced it was initiating a crackdown against rebel groups and their accomplices. This crackdown is already facing extensive criticism related to possible human rights abuses. Moreover, President Goita, who is now the Minister of Defense, could concentrate authority around the presidency rather than institutionalizing military rule. In this environment, the humanitarian condition is deteriorating. Tightening road blockades by armed groups have compelled several transport services to curtail their operations.

Mali’s government does not have any plan to engage in talks with any of the armed factions it has designated as ‘terrorists’. How this conflict will end remains uncertain.

Writer: Gaius Ilboudo

Graphics: Sara Matsumoto