The death toll from an attack on Mali soldiers has risen to 42, according to the army.
The army said Wednesday that 42 Malian soldiers were killed in an attack by suspected jihadists over the weekend, revising an earlier figure of 21 dead.
The death toll is one of the highest in Mali’s decade-long insurgency, which has spread from the north to the center and south of the country, as well as into neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger.
The attack took place on Sunday in Tessit, in the troubled “three-border” region where the three nations’ borders converge.
The army announced on Monday that 17 soldiers and four civilians had died.
According to the statement, seven attackers were killed, believed to be “probably members of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) and benefiting from drone and artillery support as well as using explosives and an explosives-laden vehicle.”
Tessit and its nearby military base have been targeted numerous times.
In March 2021, 33 soldiers were killed in an ISGS ambush in the Country.
The insurgency that has swept the three Sahel countries has claimed thousands of lives and forced more than two million people to flee their homes.
Sporadic cross-border attacks have also occurred in Ivory Coast, Togo, and Benin to the south, heightening fears of a Jihadist Push toward the Gulf of Guinea.
