Medical charity MSF on Wednesday said it had suspended its activities in the central Malian town of Nampala following an attack on its staff and health workers in the area plagued by violence.Mali has for more than a decade been ravaged by jihadists and other armed groups, with the centre of the west African country becoming a hotbed of violence since 2015.The Malian army and the Russian paramilitary group Wagner have for months undertaken operations against armed jihadist groups in the area, including the Al-Qaeda-linked Katiba Macina.MSF said in a statement that its team and community health workers on the outskirts of Nampala had on October 14 been “violently attacked and robbed by armed men who regularly carry out military operations in the area”.”This violence against the civilian population and humanitarian workers is unacceptable,” it added.Abuses committed against civilians in central Mali have been attributed to a range of armed actors, mainly jihadists, but also the army and its Russian allies, which the Malian authorities deny.”Two of our staff were assaulted, beaten up, their equipment vandalised”, said Aissami Abdou, MSF’s West Africa operations coordinator.He said it was the first time an MSF team had been attacked in this way since it began working in the area in 2022.The charity says it is the only international NGO active in the area, where it provides “vital free medical care” to the local population and those displaced by conflict.- ‘Everyone has left’ -“MSF has had to take the difficult decision to temporarily suspend its medical activities in the Nampala area, depriving the population of essential care,” Doctors Without Borders (known by its French acronym MSF) said in its statement.With 18 staff including doctors, nurses, midwives and support staff operating across two sites in the Nampala area, MSF provides care to a large population who would not otherwise have access to it, Abdou said.Some patients said they hadn’t seen a doctor for seven years when MSF arrived, he added.The ongoing security crisis has led to heightened health needs, he said.”Everyone (other international NGOs) has left because of the deterioration in the security situation and the intensification of military operations,” he explained. “We have a large population of displaced people who have arrived in Nampala in recent weeks”, he added.MSF said it was in discussions with “various parties to the conflict and the relevant authorities… to ensure that such violence does not occur again and to enable MSF to resume providing essential care to the population as soon as possible”.The charity announced 10 days ago that it had suspended work in the north Burkina Faso city of Djibo as jihadist groups step up attacks in the area near the border with Mali and Niger.
