Bamako slaughter

In the wake of the coup d'état in April 2012, after the Jihadists had taken Kidal, Gao and Timbuktu in the space of three days I decided to leave Djenné.  I stayed with my friend  Ann in Bamako  and we  went on a memorable night out in a deserted Bamako.(see blog April 11, 2012) We were the only ones in the the nightclub 'La Terrasse', where we  'danced on the vulcano' until the morning with the Lebanese nightclub owner who fêted  his only guests by joining us on the dancefloor and keeping our glasses filled to the brim.  

This morning this famous Bamako watering hole was the scene of a murderous attack in which five people died and more are seriously wounded.

Apart from a bungled attack on the French Embassy by a deranged person in 2011, Bamako has been free of incidents of this sort; but many has wondered for how long such a situation can  continue, fearing that ultimately some terrorist activity will take place. Despite the peace talks in Algiers which seem to be yielding certain results in that the larger part of the armed rebel groups have signed a ceasefire agreement with the government and the main agreement is now drafted, the MNLA, albeit increasingly isolated and with important defections from their ranks , are not in agreement, and Mali's peace is yet out of reach. It seems to be  unclear at this moment who orchestrated this attack, and no one group have claimed it. Some have even wondered whether it may be unrelated to the Malian crisis and the north, and simply a gangster settling of counts? Will we ever know? What seems certain is that the small signs of rehabilitation in the tourism industry we have seen in the last couple of months will now have taken a serious knock back once more.