British military to train African 
defence force for Mali conflict

The Prime Minister’s official spokesman said the troops would be in addition to the up to 40 personnel that Britain is offering to contribute to a European Union training mission to build up the the Malian army.

In addition, the UK has offered to supply a roll-on, roll-off ferry to help transport heavy equipment to the French intervention force currently spearheading the fight against the Islamist militants.

It will also allow allies such as the United States to fly air-to-air refuelling missions from British airbases in support of the French operation.

With around 90 UK personnel already committed in the region with the RAF Sentinel surveillance aircraft and two C-17 transport aircraft already operating in support of the French mission, it could take the numbers involved to more than 300.

However the spokesman said David Cameron remained adamant that British troops would not be involved in combat operations against the militants. “We have been very clear with everyone about our position of no combat role. That remains entirely unchanged,” the spokesman said.

The mission to train a West African force known as Afisma –which has been under consideration since late last year – was being discussed at a donor conference for Mali being orgainsed by the African Union in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa.

British personnel with be involved in training troops from Anglophone countries, such as Nigeria.

The spokesman said it was yet to be decided whether the personnel would be based in the countries of the forces they are training or in Mali itself.

In the Commons, Defence Secretary Philip Hammond insisted that Britain was not being sucked into a new conflict in Africa and strongly defended the support for the French mission.

“The UK has a clear interest in the stability of Mali and ensuring it’s territory does not become an ungoverned space available for al-Qaida and its associates to organise attacks on the West,” he said.

Tory backbencher John Baron, warned that UK troops could be drawn into a much wider deployment and former Foreign Secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind, who currently chairs the parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee, said there was “every probability” of years of “asymmetrical conflict” in Mali.

Veteran Tory backbencher Sir Peter Tapsell said: “The more frequently Western forces intervene in Muslim countries, the greater will be the spread of jihadism throughout the whole Islamic world and the higher the threat of terrorism in this country.”

For Labour, Shadow Defence Secretary Jim Murphy expressed concern at the way the mission had expanded so rapidly.

“The UK commitment to Mali has grown from lending the French two transport aircraft to the deployment of perhaps hundreds of troops to the region,” he said. “UK trainers may be non-combat but that does not mean they are without risk.”

Meanwhile, French and Malian soldiers have won control of the desert city of Timbuktu following the retreat of Islamist extremists, while Tuareg fighters claimed that they control the strategic city of Kidal and other northern towns.

The National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad – the Tuareg group’s name for northern Mali – appears to have taken advantage of a French campaign to dislodge al-Qaida-linked Islamist fighters.

The Tuareg movement said it was ready to work with French troops but would refuse to allow Malian soldiers in its territory.

There was celebration among the thousands of Timbuktu residents who fled the city rather than live under strict and pitiless Islamic rule and dire poverty.

However, the mayor of Timbuktu said Islamists set fire to a library of some 20,000 irreplaceable manuscripts, many detailing early science studies in Africa and dating to the 12th century. They were said to be the most important find since the Dead Sea Scrolls.