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Stern warning by Mali leader as Tuareg rebels free hostages

– Foreign troops criticized –

Following a June peace deal that paved the way for presidential elections, the Tuareg separatists evacuated the governor’s offices in November last year after a nine-month occupation.

But the process deeply divided the MNLA, whose ultimate goal is the independence of Azawad, the minority Tuareg name for their homeland in northern Mali.

Up until the agreement, the Tuareg group had refused to allow any government soldiers or civil servants into the desert town.

The country descended into crisis in January 2012, when the MNLA launched the latest in a string of Tuareg insurgencies in the north.

A subsequent coup in Bamako led to chaos, and militants linked to Al Qaeda overpowered the Tuareg to seize control of Mali’s northern half.

A French-led military operation launched in January 2013 ousted the extremists, but sporadic attacks have continued, and the Tuareg demand for autonomy has not been resolved.

Foreign troops in Mali have come in for some criticism since Saturday, with Twitter users wondering under the #MINUSMerde hashtag why peacekeepers had seemed unable to repel the rebels.

“We demand that you leave Kidal. Your agenda is not that of Mali. We refuse the de facto partition of the country,” a tweeter identifying himself as an architect named Harouna Traore said.

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At a protest in Gao, Mali’s largest northern town, demonstrators in their hundreds chanted “down with MINUSMA” and “Free Kidal”, witnesses told AFP.

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