Tuareg separatists claim to have killed 84 Wagner mercenaries and 47 Malian soldiers in northern Mali. Mali accused Ukraine of involvement and cut diplomatic ties on August 5, 2024.
Russia on Wednesday (August 7, 2024) said Ukraine was opening a “second front” in Africa after Mali and Niger broke off diplomatic relations with Kyiv, accusing it of support for “terrorist groups”.
“Unable to defeat Russia on the battlefield, the criminal regime of Volodymyr Zelensky has opened a second front in Africa,” Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told the RIA Novosti news agency.
Zakharova accused Ukraine of “pandering to terrorist groups in countries on the continent friendly to Moscow”.
Tuareg-led separatists have said they killed 84 fighters from Russia’s Wagner mercenary group and 47 Malian soldiers in an attack last month in northern Mali.
Mali accused a senior Ukrainian official of having admitted Kyiv’s role in the attack and broke off diplomatic relations on August 5.
Government spokesman Colonel Abdoulaye Maiga said the government had been shocked to learn of remarks by Andriy Yusov, spokesman for Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, the HUR.
Yusov had “admitted Ukraine’s involvement in a cowardly, treacherous and barbaric attack by armed terrorist groups” that had led to the deaths of Malian soldiers, Maiga’s statement added.
Niger said Tuesday it too was cutting diplomatic ties with Ukraine “with immediate effect”.
Ref: AFP, Kyiv Post and wire reports.
