EXECUTION OF TWO TUAREGS IN KIDAL SETS MALI ON EDGE

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BAMAKO 000366

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/14/2018
TAGS: ASEC PINS PINR PHUM ML
SUBJECT: EXECUTION OF TWO TUAREGS IN KIDAL SETS MALI ON EDGE

REF: A. BAMAKO 00364

B. 07 BAMAKO 01255

Classified By: Political Officer Aaron Sampson, Embassy Bamako, for
reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)

1.(C) Summary: Two members of the Tuareg rebel Alliance for
Democracy and Change (ADC) were executed on April 10-11 near
the perimeter of the Malian military base in Kidal. The
victims bodies' were found with their arms and legs bound and
their throats cut. Each had also been shot seven times.
Kidal Tuaregs, including the ADC and Ibrahim Bahanga's
Northern Mali Tuareg Alliance for Change (ATNMC),have
accused the Malian military of carrying out the executions.
Remaining ADC forces have left Kidal, although there is no
indication these forces have aligned themselves with Bahanga.
Citizens are also reportedly fleeing the town. The Malian
Minister of Security was scheduled to fly to Kidal on April
12 to attempt to calm the situation but did not leave Bamako.
Meanwhile, Minister of Foreign Affairs Moctar Ouane has
traveled to Algiers to smooth over relations with Algeria and
re-start the peace process that failed last week in Tripoli.
On April 12 the Minister of Territorial Administration,
General Kafougouna Kone, appeared on Malian television to
provide the Malian government's view of the Algiers Accords
implementation process. A dozen Kidal Tuareg leaders
currently in Bamako will meet with President Amadou Toumani
Toure and perhaps General Kone this afternoon in what may be
a last-ditch attempt to prevent Mali from, in the words of
one member of the Tuareg delegation, "going past the point of
no return." End Summary.

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Two Tuareg ADC Members Executed in Kidal
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2.(C) Commandant Barka ag Cheikh and Mohammed ag Moussa were
killed on April 10-11 outside the Malian military base in
Kidal. Graphic photographs of their bodies, with bound hands
and feet, have been posted to numerous Tuareg websites and
were reprinted by several Bamako based newspapers on April

14. Theories of who carried out the killings abound.
Tuaregs believe that ag Cheikh and ag Moussa were summarily
executed by the Malian military. An April 13 statement
issued by the ATNMC blamed a Malian army Captain named Toure
and a Lieutenant Douda for ordering the "assassinations."
Non-Tuaregs have speculated that the killings were the result
of internal Tuareg feuds or staged by the ADC or ATNMC to
bring tensions to a boil.

3.(C) Commandant ag Cheikh served in the Malian National
Guard. He was assigned to one of the mixed military units,
which exist largely in name only, created under the 2006
Algiers Accords signed by Mali and the ADC and wounded while
participating in the ADC's May 26, 2006, attacks against
Malian military outposts in Kidal and Menaka. Ag Cheikh was
apparently buried on April 11-12 in Kidal without the
military honors normally accorded to a fallen member of the
Malian military - a point which has further inflamed tensions
in Kidal. Mohammed ag Moussa was the brother of Hama Moussa,
an ADC officer and well-known illicit trafficker. Various
reports also describe Mohammed as an Imam or a Marabout.

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Kidal in Turmoil
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4.(C) Following the killings, several hundred members of the
ADC led by Moussa Bah left Kidal, presumably for the
mountains of Tigharghar (not to be confused with the ATNMC's
base in Tinzawaten) where the ADC camped following the March
2006 attacks. Many Kidal civilians are also reportedly
fleeing the town, uncertain of the future and fearing attacks
from the Malian military. The only ADC members reportedly
still in Kidal are ADC spokesman Ahmada ag Bibi, National
Assembly Deputy Alghabass ag Intallah and one or two others.
On April 12 ag Bibi reportedly told the Governor of Kidal,
Alhamdou ag Illyen, that by cutting the throats of ag Cheikh
and ag Moussa, the Malian military had also cut the throat of
peace. Ag Bibi also called for a credible investigation into
the killings. Ag Bibi has been in Kidal for two months to
keep the ADC from leaving the town (Ref A). On April 14 he
told the Ambassador that he was returning to Bamako at the
request of President Toure for consultations on the crisis.
ATNMC spokesman Hama ag Sid'Ahmed (Bahanga's father-in-law)
issued a call for a credible investigation and urged the
involvement of the international community.

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5.(C) The Malian Minister of Security Sadio Gassama was
supposed to fly to Kidal on April 12 to calm the situation
and start the inquiry process. A source from within the
Malian presidency reported that Gassama was unable to leave
Bamako due to mechanical problems with his plane. Ag Bibi,
however, told the Embassy on April 14 that Gassama had called
to convey his condolences to the ADC and explain that he had
decided not to travel to Kidal for fear that someone would
fire on his plane.

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Foreign Minister to Algiers
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6.(C) Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Moctar Ouane left during
the weekend of April 12-13 for Algiers. Ouane's mission to
Algiers is twofold. He will attempt to patch up relations
with Algeria, which was angered first by President Toure's
decision to implicate Libya as a second mediator for northern
Mali and then by an article in a Malian newspaper reportedly
close to the presidency that alleged Algeria was actively
encouraging and supporting Bahanga and the ATNMC. He will
then seek to re-start peace talks with the ATNMC that failed
last week in Tripoli. Oumarou ag Ibrahim Haidara, the
president of Mali's second house of parliament, the High
Council of Collectivities (HCC),accompanied Ouane to
Algiers. Oumarou is a Tuareg from Timbuktu who likely has
little to no influence over Tuaregs from Kidal. The real
power-broker for Kidal Tuaregs, Iyad ag Ghali, is believed to
still be in Libya - perhaps in regard to on-going attempts to
secure the freedom of two Austrian nationals held by AQIM in
another region of northern Mali.

7.(U) On April 14 the Malian newspaper, L'Aube, responsible
for angering the Algerians last week, published a new article
wondering how, after such a prolonged war for independence
and so many years of civil war, Algerian diplomats could be
so thin-skinned. The article also noted that the Algerian
newspaper El Watan - which often publishes interviews with
key Tuareg rebels like Bahanga, Hassan Fagaga and others -
and an unnamed Algerian radio station often described Mali as
a "rogue state."

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Generals Kone and Coulibaly on TV
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8.(C) On April 13 the Minister of Territorial
Administration, General Kafougouna Kone, appeared on Malian
television along with President Toure's personal military
advisor, General Brahima Coulibaly, to give an accounting of
the talks in Tripoli and a resume of Mali's progress toward
implementing the Algiers Accords. Acherif Moulaye Haidara, a
Ministry of Territorial Administration official charged with
overseeing the Algiers Accords implementation process, and
Mamadou Nadio, the National Director of the UN supported
International Fund for Agricultural Development (FIDA) which
is very active in Kidal, also appeared. General Kone, who
was President Toure's commanding officer in 1991 when then
Col. Toure orchestrated a popular uprising that overthrew
former military dictator Moussa Traore, is one of the
President's most trusted military advisors. General Kone and
Haidara told the nation that Mali had already implemented 15
out of 18 aspects of the Algiers Accords. General Coulibaly
provided a brief rundown of the failed talks in Tripoli and
said Mali could not return to prior troop levels in the north
without a lasting cease-fire and peace agreement. Nadio then
related various development activities in Kidal undertaken by
FIDA and the Malian government.

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Comment: From Bad to Worse
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9.(C) The brutal murders of ag Cheikh and ag Moussa added a
new and explosive element to what was, until the night of
April 10-11, a smoldering tug-of-war between Bahanga's ATNMC
and the Malian military. It is unlikely that we will ever
know who is responsible for the executions. There is a
recent precedent for Malian soldiers killing enlisted
Tuaregs. In October 2007 Malian soldiers beat and murdered
at Tuareg gendarme in Gao (Ref B). To our knowledge, no
soldiers were formally charged in connection to this murder.
While the identity of the killers clearly matters for the
relatives of those murdered and also for Kidal Tuaregs,
absent a credible inquiry - which appears extremely unlikely

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given that even the Minister of Security is afraid to travel
to Kidal - northern Mali's stability may hinge on Tuareg
perceptions of who orchestrated the killings. On April 11
there was some debate within the Tuareg community over
whether ag Cheikh and ag Moussa were killed by Malian
soldiers or fellow Tuaregs. By April 12 Tuareg opinion had
clearly settled on the former. Postings to the main website
for Kidal Tuaregs since the killings, www.kidal.info,
reinforce this assessment. Normally a rather sleepy website
where Tuaregs post information about development projects,
the numbers of posts to Kidal.info exploded over the weekend,
with several urging fellow Tuaregs to prepare themselves to
take up arms against the Malian government as Tuaregs did in
1963 and 1991.

10.(C) President Toure's actions over the next few days will
likely be crucial. The executions may have opened a second -
or perhaps third if one counts the group that attacked
Aguelhoc on March 26 - Tuareg rebel front by shifting the ADC
back into the category of actively opposing the Malian
government. This does not mean that the ADC will align
itself with Bahanga and the ATNMC. Mali's 1990-1996
rebellion was characterized by an alphabet soup of Tuareg,
Arab and Songhrai rebel groups. A delegation of about a
dozen Kidal Tuaregs currently in Bamako expects to meet with
President Toure, and perhaps also General Kafougouna Kone,
during the afternoon of April 14. The delegation includes
National Assembly Deputy Mohammed Intallah, Abdurahmane
Ghalla, presidential advisor Acherif ag Mohamed and former
Minister Mohamed ag Erlaf. One member of the group, Acherif
ag Mohamed, told the Embassy on April 12 that the executions
of ag Cheikh and ag Moussa likely pushed Mali's Tuareg crisis
past the point of no return. The upcoming meeting with
President Toure may confirm or dispel Acherif's diagnosis.
MCCULLEY