ADC ATTACKS MILITARY POST NORTH OF SEGOU

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 BAMAKO 000419 C O R R E C T E D C O P Y (CORRECT TEXT) SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/26/2018 TAGS: ASEC PINS PINR ML SUBJECT: ADC ATTACKS MILITARY POST NORTH OF SEGOU REF: A. BAMAKO 00414 ¶B. BAMAKO 00385 ¶C. BAMAKO 00415 BAMAKO 00000419 001.2 OF 002 Classified By: Political Officer Aaron Sampson, Embassy Bamako, for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) 1.(C) During the early morning hours of May 6 Tuareg rebels opened fire on the Malian military post in the village of Diabali, which is about 175 KM north of Segou in central Mali. One Malian soldier was killed and another wounded. According to Deity ag Sidamou, who is the National Assembly Deputy from Tessalit and the "Finance Secretary" of the Tuareg rebel Alliance for Democracy and Change (ADC),the ADC carried out the attack. If correct, this marks the first ADC attack since May 2006. 2.(U) This is the first time since the 1990s that Tuaregs rebels have attacked an installation located in the central region of Segou. It is not, however, the first time Diabali has been attacked by rebels. During the rebellion of the 1990s rebels attacked the Malian military posts in Diabali and Nampala, which is along Mauritanian frontier. 3.(C) According to ag Sidamou, the May 6 attack was led by two ADC Commandants, Haroun Said and Mohamed ag Intifedou. The ADC selected Diabali because it is an old military post with a significant cache of weapons and little security. After firing on the post, the rebels filled an unknown number of vehicles with arms and ammunition. Any remaining weaponry that could not be jammed into the rebels' vehicles was apparently burned on site. Ag Sidamou said the commander of the Diabali post, who happened to be a Tuareg from Timbuktu, was not involved in the attack despite many rumors to the contrary. 4.(C) We will provide a more in-depth report on our meeting with ag Sidamou septel. On May 5 a number of Malian newspapers published ag Sidamou's picture under headlines describing the May 3 attack on a Malian military convoy destined for Tessalit (Ref A). Ag Sidamou has subsequently made the rounds of Mali's political and military establishments to prove that he was not involved in the May 3 incident, which he attributed to a newly-formed third rebel faction led by Merzouk ag Acherif. 5.(C) It is unclear who, if anyone, within the ADC ordered the attack on Diabali. It does not appear that the attack was organized by ADC spokesman and National Assembly Deputy Ahmada ag Bibi given that ag Bibi telephoned ag Sidamou, during a meeting with Embassy officers, to ask for details of the attack. As reported previously, Lt. Col. Moussa Bah may be filling the vacuum left by ADC leader Iyad ag Ghali whose presence in Mali is increasingly ephemeral (Ref B). Ag Sidamou said he believed Moussa Bah was currently commanding the ADC. 6.(C) When asked why the ADC decided to hit Diabali now - after nearly two years of peace with the Malian government - ag Sidamou went back to the April 10 executions of two Tuaregs in Kidal. He said that the ADC had a falling out with Ibrahim Bahanga following the executions after some ADC members urged Bahanga to break the truce agreement reached in Tripoli and declare war on the Malian government. According to ag Sidamou, Bahanga instead told the ADC that it was in no position to give orders. The ADC, which formally disarmed following the signature of the July 2006 Algiers Accords, subsequently decided it was at a disadvantage vis-a-vis both Bahanga and the Malian government and needed to rearm to reinforce its negotiating position. 7.(C) Ag Sidamou noted that recent peace negotiations spearheaded by Libya and the "good-faith" commission led by presidential advisor Acherif ag Mohamed and former Minister Mohamed ag Erlaf (Ref C) bypassed the ADC and involved only Bahanga. He said the cease-fire agreements reached by Libya and the good-faith commission applied only to Bahanga and not the ADC. 8.(C) Comment: There now appears to be three Tuareg rebel groups operating in northern Mali: the ADC, Bahanga's ATNMC and the band led by Merzouk. News of an arms race between the ADC and Bahanga is not encouraging. When asked what concrete steps the Malian government could take immediately to reduce tensions in the north, ag Sidamou returned to the same formula provided by a range of Tuareg interlocutors from Timbuktu to Gao to Kidal: a reduction of Malian military BAMAKO 00000419 002.2 OF 002 forces in northern Mali and Kidal in particular, the creation of mixed military units, and a credible inquiry into the April 10 executions. There is little to no hope that the official murder inquiry will produce results acceptable to anyone. Ag Sidamou recognized this and said that if Mali could at least meet the first two requirements, it would bring tensions down several notches. The Malian military, however, is actively expanding its footprint in northern Mali and President Amadou Toumani Toure and other key decision makers continue to oppose training or providing hardware to Tuareg soldiers for fear they will use them against the Malian government. That said, there remains a cadre of loyalist Tuareg and Arab members of the Malian military who could be hand-picked to serve in special unit forces. Like other Tuareg leaders, ag Sidamou warned that the situation in northern Mali was rapidly unraveling. Should things fall apart, he said, the violence will be far worse that it was during the 1990s because today's rebels have more guns, more cars, more satellite telephones and more distrust of the Malian government. MCCULLEY