The attack was committed “by armed men who arose on a motorcycle” and who “opened fire without summation” on a vehicle of the humanitarian organization.
Le Monde with AFP
Two employees of the Red Cross in Mali were killed in the attack on their vehicle on Wednesday 1
The vehicle driver and an expatriate delegate of the Dutch Red Cross were killed in this perpetrated attack, according to the first testimonies collected by the Red Cross, “by armed men who arose on a motorcycle” and who ” opened fire without summons “. The driver was Malian and the Senegalese delegate, Nouhoum Maïga, secretary general of the Malian Red Cross, joined by phone.
told AFP.
The Red Cross said that the team, which was “on a humanitarian mission aboard one of its vehicles sporting the emblem of the Malian Red Cross”, was attacked on Wednesday around 6 p.m. Koussané-Kayes axis. “The other two team members – the project coordinator and the accountant – were deeply affected by this drama,” added the press release.
“It is not the Red Cross as such which was targeted,” said Mr. Maïga, speaking of a probable act of “brigandage” and not jihadism. “We have had robberies in the past, vehicle kidnappings, but no man death” in recent years, he added. The authors of the attack left with the vehicle and equipment, he said. They abandoned the vehicle later, according to the information transmitted to it.
jihadism and crime
The Malian Red Cross condemns “with the greatest firmness” this incident which “undermines the humanitarian mission towards vulnerable populations”.
“This is terrible news and it touches us deeply. First, our thoughts go to family members and all those who knew the humanitarian workers concerned,” said Marieke Van Schaik, director of the Dutch Red Cross, in a press release. The organization is said to be “shocked and slaughtered”. “Humanitarian workers should never be the target of violence, they are there to help people,” continues M me van Schaik.
In a distinct press release, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (FICR) claims to be “shocked and sad”. She says she is “deeply worried about the deterioration of the security situation in the Sahel. This violence and the targeting of humanitarian workers make the assistance of the Red Cross teams with vulnerable populations in the region”. Data-format = “inread” aria-hidden = “true”>
Mali, a vast Sahelian country, a large part of the territory of which has escaped the control of the State, undergoes not only the spread of jihadism since 2012, but also a strong crime, in particular on its roads. The Kayes region, a border of Senegal, passes for relatively more preserved of violence than the center, the North or the so -called three borders with Burkina Faso and Niger.