The armed forces in Mali announced on Saturday the kidnapping of three Chinese and two Mauritanians working for construction companies in the Sahel region, not far from the border with Mauritania.
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An attack by assailants, whose identity or origin has not been indicated, occurred on a work site some 55 km from the town of Kwala, in the south-west of the country. Construction equipment was also destroyed, the army said without further details. "
The release of the hostages is our priority,
" said a military official who requested anonymity. Mauritanian news agency Al-Akhbar reported that the attackers, who arrived on motorcycles, set fuel tanks on fire before fleeing with the hostages. AFP could not verify this information from an independent source.
Mali is working to contain an insurgent Islamist movement that first erupted in the north of the country in 2012 before spreading in the center of the country as well as in Niger and Burkina Faso.
Thousands of people have been killed and hundreds of thousands have fled their homes, while the economic impact on one of the world's poorest countries has been devastating.
Kidnappings, both of Malians and foreign nationals, are commonplace.
French journalist Olivier Dubois was kidnapped in northern Mali on April 8.
46-year-old freelance journalist living and working in Mali since 2015, he is the only known French hostage in the world.
He himself announced his kidnapping in a video posted on social networks on May 5, explaining that he was kidnapped in Gao (north) by the Support Group for Islam and Muslims (GSIM), the main jihadist alliance in the Sahel. , linked to Al-Qaeda.