BAMAKO: Suspected Islamist fighters attacked a town in western Mali near the border with neighbouring Mauritania before dawn on Saturday, leaving up to 11 people dead, including three soldiers and eight attackers, an army nurse said.

A senior army officer said military intelligence and initial witness accounts indicated the attackers were Islamist fighters mainly from the Peuhl ethnic group.

The raid took place a week after a Tuareg-led northern rebel alliance signed a peace deal with the government aimed at ending their uprising and allowing the authorities to focus on fighting Islamist militants.

Gunfire erupted at around 5am in the town of Nara, around 30 km south of border with Mauritania.

A resident of Nara said gunfire could be heard several hours after the clashes began and town residents locked themselves inside their homes. Heavy fighting flared again around midday before ending in the early afternoon.

Malian security forces based in the town repelled the attack, army spokesman Colonel Souleymane Maiga said.

He had no immediate information on casualties. But a military nurse working in Nara said that three members of Mali’s security forces had been killed along with eight assailants.

A second resident said he had seen bodies lying in the streets.

“I saw four bodies of the people who came to attack and one of a Malian soldier,” said resident Issa Traor. “The last few days we’ve informed the military authorities about the presence of strange men in the town.”

A senior army officer said the attackers were Peuhls infiltrated by Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

“For two days intelligence has indicated the presence of small groups of Islamists travelling in several pick-ups,” he said.

Published in Dawn, June 28th, 2015

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