The civilian death toll in Mali has quadrupled since the arrival of hundreds of Wagner PMC mercenaries in December 2021.
A panel of experts from the UN Human Rights Council has called for an independent investigation into possible war crimes by the Malian army and mercenaries from the Kremlin-linked Wagner PMC. Bloomberg reported this.
Experts justify their call by “continuous and disturbing reports of horrific executions, mass graves, torture, rape and sexual violence, robbery, selective detentions and enforced disappearances perpetrated by armed forces of Mali and their allies.”
Mali’s military junta and the Russian government say the foreign troops in the country are “unarmed military trainers helping fight the decade-long jihadist insurgency.”
However, Western countries, including the United States and France, claim that the militants are mercenaries of the Wagner PMC, which has also been deployed in Ukraine, Libya, Syria and the Central African Republic.
The experts expressed particular concern about “credible reports” that Malian soldiers and “military personnel believed to belong to the Wagner group” killed hundreds of people in the village of Moura in central Mali .
The number of civilian deaths in Mali has quadrupled since the arrival of hundreds of Wagner PMC mercenaries in December 2021 to more than 2,000 in 2022 from around 550 the previous year.
Earlier, the Lower House of the Parliament of Canada unanimously supported a resolution on the government’s proposal to officially recognize PMC Wagner as a terrorist organization. Representatives pointed to the organization’s violation of human rights and attacks on civilians in Ukraine, as well as in other parts of the world.
The United States imposed new sanctions against PMC Wagner and at the same time declared it a transnational criminal organization.
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Source: korrespondent
I am David Wyatt, a professional writer and journalist for Buna Times. I specialize in the world section of news coverage, where I bring to light stories and issues that affect us globally. As a graduate of Journalism, I have always had the passion to spread knowledge through writing.