APA-Bamako (Mali) Thursday 2 November marks the tenth anniversary of the murder of RFI’s two special correspondents, Gislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon.
Since 2013, 2 November each year has been dedicated to the International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists. This is the result of a resolution adopted by the United Nations to pay tribute to the two RFI special envoys killed in north-east Mali in 2013. Since then, the investigation over how they were killed has stalled, to say the least.
And yet, all the documents previously classified as “secret” have been declassified by the French army, and several French investigators have even travelled to the Malian capital. However, the current diplomatic tensions between Paris and Bamako are making it difficult for the investigation to progress.
Although most of the members of the commando who abducted and then executed the two journalists were neutralised during Operation Barkhane in Mali, there remains at least one who is considered to be the No. 2 of the ‘Groupe de Soutien à l’Islam et aux Musulmans’ (JNIM) – the Sahelian branch of al-Qaeda – namely Sedane Ag Hita, a soldier who deserted the Malian army before becoming a jihadist leader.
At the time of his release last March, the former hostage and French journalist Olivier Dubois, said that he had met him at least once and that he seemed to know everything about the operation. However, with the withdrawal of Barkhane from Mali in August 2022 and diplomatic tensions between Paris and Bamako heightening, it will be difficult to get to the bottom of this affair.
Its commemoration comes at a very particular time, when arms have started to crackle again in the north of Mali, particularly in the Kidal region, where the transitional authorities intend to do everything possible to bring it back into the control of the state as part of reasserting its authority throughout the country. This makes it difficult to cover the news in that part of the country.
Despite the celebration of this day, impunity against journalists has never ceased. Last April, a Malian journalist named Aliou Touré disappeared for nearly a week after speaking at a press conference calling for the release of polemicist Ras Bath.
Bath has been under arrest since 13 March, although his trial is scheduled for mid-June 2023. The polemicist had described the death of former Prime Minister, Soumeylou Boubeye Maiga, more than a year ago in Bamako, as an “assassination.”
Malian journalist Birama Toure has not been heard from since January 2016, although investigations have been opened and arrest warrants issued, including for Karim Keita, the son of the late former president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who was deposed in August 2020. Two other Malian journalists, Hamadoun Nialibouly and Moussa M’Bana Dicko, have also remained unaccounted for since their abductions in 2020 in the Mopti region.
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