State TV in Mali says a senior Islamic State commander who had a $5m (£4m) US bounty on his head has been killed by a force including troops from Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger.
Abu Huzeifa, who was also known as Higgo, was described by the report on Mali’s state TV as a Moroccan national and a commander in IS’s self-styled Sahel Province.
It said he was killed on Sunday in an operation in the northern town of Indelimane in the Menaka region, describing it as “a victory against a bane of evil”.
The US government said Hufeiza was wanted in connection to an attack on a US Special Forces team in Niger in 2017 which led to the deaths of four American and four Nigerien soldiers.
[May 16 2020 LTC Oumar Abba Soumaré shot dead ]
The head of the regional office of the Mechanism of Operations and Coordination (#MOC), Lieutenant-Colonel Oumar Abba Soumaré was shot dead by unidentified armed men, on the night of Thursday, May 14, 2020 in the fourth district of #Gao in 18 hours.
[May 5 2020 Mali: 1CL Kévin Clément dead, Brigadier Dmytro Martynyouk dies from IUD ]
[August 9 2019 RAF helos in Mali for 6 more months ]
Gao, Mali
The region is often perceived as filled with jihadists linked to the Islamic State or al-Qaida. There are no reliable estimates of their number, but they are likely to be far outnumbered by those fighting them. Nevertheless, the efforts of West African governments and international partners to defeat them by force have not worked thus far Ruth Maclean, Dan Sabbagh
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/aug/08/britain-to-join-uns-mission-in-mali-in-effort-to-quell-violence
[July 16 2019]
LONDON—Britain is extending the deployment of Royal Air Force (RAF) Chinook helicopters in support of French troops in Africa by at least six months. Three of the helicopters and 100 British personnel have been deployed to Gao, Mali, since July 2018 in support of French operations in the region.
The RAF Chinooks form 1310 Flight RAF and are commanded by Squadron Leader Matthew Wight-Boycott. The Flight is based at Gao in Mali and has recently been operating in the Homborix Mountains region in Mali. 01 Mar 2019
[July 10 2018 BARKHANE: Inauguration of Gossi temporary base ]
Updated: 10/07/2019
On June 26, 2019, the temporary base of Gossi, in the Gourma, was officially inaugurated by General Frédéric Blachon, commander of the Barkhane force, in the presence of sappers who contributed to build the right of way.
This inauguration marks an important step in the realization of a project spanning several months. Until 2018, this platform located north of Gossi was occupied by a detachment of MINUSMA. It is only since last January that French soldiers have settled in this essential base for the deployment of Barkhane in Gourma. If the walls were already in place, however, important work had to be conducted by the sappers Barkhane in a very short time to make the camp functional. The result reflects their technical know-how and their hardiness
No less than 25 specialized machines were needed for the works, such as bulldozers, bucket loaders, graders, backhoe loaders, etc … This development operation now allows the new temporary base to accommodate several hundred soldiers to mark the extension of the fight against armed terrorist groups from Liptako to Gourma.
Led by the French armies, in partnership with the G5 Sahel countries, Operation Barkhane was launched on August 1, 2014. It is based on a strategic approach based on a logic of partnership with the main countries of the Sahel-Saharan strip ( BSS): Burkina-Faso, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, and Chad. It has around 4,500 military members whose mission is to fight against armed terrorist groups and to support the armed forces of partner countries so that they can take this threat into account.
There is “ relatively small footprint of intelligence and special operations troops in Mali, who are primarily assisting French military forces in a counterterrorism operation known as Operation Barkhane.” Kyle Rempfer
[June 22 2019 French in action 113 km from Tongo Tongo ]
Ménaka
JUNE 21, 2019 Eighteen Islamic State fighters were killed in a joint operation involving U.S., French and Niger troops near the border with Mali, U.S. says that U.S. forces were “not involved.”
113 km Tongo Tongo Niger to Ménaka
20/06/2019 – 16:59 “Islamic State West African Province (ISWAP) totally controls Lake Chad,where the porous borders of Chad, Nigeria, Niger and Cameroon come together. None of its leaders have been arrested and none of its camps dismantled,” including in the districts of Duguri, Marte, Kukawa and Ngala where the main commanders live. After years of conflict, its long-time leader, Abubakar Shekau’s Boko Haram have been left weakened by a lack of resources and men — with a force between 1,500 to 2,000, compared to ISWAP’s 3,500 to 5,000 force, according to ICG estimates. A generation of young men, drawn mainly from nomadic communities, especially Tuareg, Dossaak and Fulani, earn their living with guns.
A French soldier fires a machine gun mounted to a Panhard VBL light armoured vehicle during the France-led Operation Aconit, which targeted Islamic State militants in Mali and Niger between between June 7 and 19, 2019.
Crescent Shift 