14 Malian soldiers killed by explosives in multiple attacks

Coordinated attacks by Islamic extremists have killed 14 Malian soldiers and wounded nearly a dozen, the army said.
Col. Souleymane Dembele, the director of public relations for the army, said in a statement, multiple improvised explosive devices detonated between Dia and Diafarabe villages as well as between Koumara and Macina towns in central Mali.
Dembele said, during the same attacks, which occurred earlier this week, Mali’s forces killed more than 30 “terrorists.”
The West African nation has been riddled with violence linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group for a decade. Thousands of people have been killed.
Mali’s ruling junta, which seized power in two coups starting in 2020, has been struggling to beat back the jihadis, especially since French troops pulled out of the country in August amid frayed relations with the junta. France has been in the region since 2013 when it sent in troops to Mali to push back extremists encroaching on the capital, Bamako, but the jihadis have since regrouped.