Mali’s armed forces and the allied Russia-backed Wagner Group have committed dozens of summary executions and enforced disappearances of ethnic Fulani men since January 2025.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a report on Tuesday accusing the Malian army and its Russian allies from the Wagner Group, now known as Africa Corps, of executing and forcibly disappearing dozens of Fulani civilians since January.
Titled Mali Army and Wagner Group Executed and Disappeared Fulani Civilians, the report details a series of summary executions and enforced disappearances, highlighting the ongoing abuses committed during joint military operations.
It shows that Mali’s armed forces and the allied Russia-backed Wagner Group have committed dozens of summary executions and enforced disappearances of ethnic Fulani men since January 2025.
The Malian army and the Wagner Group have carried out joint operations against Islamist armed groups over the past 3 years, HRW reports. And they appear to have executed at least 12 Fulani men and forcibly disappeared at least 81 others since January, in the context of counterinsurgency operations across several regions of the country against the Al-Qaeda-linked Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wa al-Muslimeen, JNIM).
Witnesses said Malian soldiers and Wagner Group fighters carried out abuses against people belonging to the Fulani ethnic group, whom they accuse of collaborating with the JNIM.
“Mali’s military junta is ultimately responsible for the summary killings and enforced disappearances by the army and allied Wagner Group fighters,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Sahel researcher at Human Rights Watch.
“The junta needs to end the abuses, make the whereabouts of those detained known, investigate and hold those responsible to account.”
Islamist armed groups, implicated in numerous grave abuses, have long concentrated their recruitment efforts on the Fulani community, the report shows, and successive Malian governments have conflated the Fulani community with Islamist fighters, putting them at grave risk.
Human Rights Watch also said that the African Union (AU) should press Mali’s military junta to investigate these serious allegations, fairly prosecute those responsible, and provide redress for victims’ families.
The AU should ramp up its engagement in Mali to help protect civilians from abuses by all the warring parties, including by assisting in investigations of abuses and pressing for fair prosecutions, the report reads.
This is particularly urgent following Mali’s withdrawal from the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) regional bloc in January, which deprives victims of abuses of an avenue for redress in the West African regional court.
Human Rights Watch interviewed 29 people with knowledge of the incidents by phone between February and May 2025, including 16 witnesses and 7 community leaders, activists, journalists, and international organisation representatives.
It has documented widespread abuses by the Malian army and the Wagner Group during counterinsurgency operations across Mali since 2021.
The NGO also wrote to Mali’s justice and defence ministers in June, with its findings and questions, but has received no replies.
On 6 June, the Wagner Group announced that it was withdrawing from Mali after having “accomplished” its mission.
Wagner fighters were then replaced by the so-called Africa Corps, a paramilitary group under the direct control of the Russian government, created after the Wagner Group founder, Yevgeny Prigozhin, died in 2023.
The announcement shows that the reframing of the Russian presence in Mali coincided with a string of major attacks by Islamist armed groups and Tuareg separatist groups in June that killed scores of Malian soldiers and some Africa Corps fighters.
“Senior Malian and Russian officials should recognise that they can be held responsible for the crimes committed by their soldiers and fighters,” Allegrozzi said.
“Whether the African Union finally presses the Malian authorities to investigate and prosecute abuses, or the International Criminal Court steps in, those linked to current atrocities may face future trials,” she concluded.
(With newswires)