(Paris) The French army has filmed what it claims are Russian mercenaries burying bodies near the Gossi base in northern Mali, in an attempt it says to accuse the French of leaving behind a mass grave, which was discovered a few hours later by Malian soldiers.
Posted yesterday at 6:49 p.m.
The Malian army said it had discovered “remains in a state of advanced putrefaction” near this base, which the French army returned to it on Tuesday, and announced the opening of an investigation.
In a video taken by drone to which AFP had access, and which the French general staff describes as an “informational attack”, we can see soldiers busying themselves around corpses which they cover with sand. In another sequence, we see two of these soldiers filming the half-buried bodies.
The staff assures that they are white soldiers that it has identified on videos and photos taken at other places. Some photos also show vehicles leaving a base whose structure and environment correspond to the grip of Gossi, where an AFP team has already visited twice.
The keys to this hold, which housed 300 French soldiers, were handed over to the Malian armed forces (FAMa) on Tuesday as part of the French disengagement from Mali, announced in February.
This is the first time that the French army has broadcast military drone images in such a short time to counter an informational attack, while the struggle for influence is now raging on social networks.
The Malian staff announced, for its part, to have discovered “a mass grave, not far from the camp formerly occupied by the French force Barkhane”, named after the French anti-jihadist operation in the Sahel.
This “mass grave” was discovered by a reconnaissance patrol in the immediate vicinity of the base, after shooting occurred shortly after the departure of the French soldiers, he said.
“The state of advanced putrefaction of the bodies indicates that this mass grave existed long before the handover. Therefore, the responsibility for this act can in no way be attributed to the FAMa,” he said in a statement. The Ministry of Defense was “seized for the opening of an investigation with a view to establishing all the light on the said mass grave”.
“Maneuver”
The Malian army said it “deplores” being “maliciously the subject of communications aimed at misleading [sa] ramp up and alter [son] image” as well as that of Mali.
At the start of the case, images broadcast Thursday on the Twitter account of a man named Dia Diarra, who proclaims himself “former soldier” and “Malian patriot”. This account was created in January 2022, AFP found.
After warning Wednesday of the imminent publication of a video showing abuses committed by the French, he published the next day a photo of blurred corpses buried in the sand, with the comment: “This is what the French left behind them when they left the base at #Gossi […] We can’t keep quiet about this! “. The same account later posted a short video of the half-buried bodies.
“We are witnessing a structured informational maneuver”, based on the “upscaling of a first tweet”, commented Friday the spokesperson for the French general staff, Colonel Pascal Ianni.
The Dia Diarra account “is most likely a fake account created by Wagner”, the Russian private military company, estimated the French staff. “This maneuver to discredit the Barkhane force seems coordinated. It is representative of the multiple informational attacks to which the French soldiers have been subjected for many months”.
According to the French army, “the comparison of the photos published on Twitter and the images collected by the specialized sensor makes it possible to make a direct link between what Wagner’s mercenaries are doing and what is falsely attributed to the French soldiers”.
According to her, these “exactions testify to the modes of action implemented by Wagner’s mercenaries, which have been observed in the Central African Republic since (his) deployment and which have been denounced by many international organizations and NGOs”.
Paris decided in February its military withdrawal from Mali, in a degraded security context and against a backdrop of tensions between France and the military junta in power, accused by Westerners of using the services of the Wagner group. Bamako evokes for its part simple Russian advisers.
On Tuesday, the French general staff had warned to expect informational attacks on the occasion of the handover of the Gossi base.
His spokesman, Colonel Pascal Ianni, had specified that a “documented” inventory of the base had been drawn up to protect France from possible accusations.