Ukraine training militants in Africa – slain Russian military blogger

Kiev has reportedly been training Tuareg insurgents in Mali

A purported Ukrainian instructor pictured in Mali. © RT

Evidence of Ukrainian involvement in Mali has been uncovered by the administrator of the Russian military Telegram channel GREY ZONE, which is believed to be affiliated with the Wagner private military company, RT has learned.

Photos obtained by the blogger and supplied to RT purport to show Ukrainian instructors, allegedly linked to Kiev’s military intelligence agency, the GUR, working in the African country.

The instructors have allegedly been training local Tuareg separatist militants, as well as covertly bringing at least two groups of them to Ukraine to teach them to use FPV drones.

While the blogger, Nikita Fedyanin, best known under the alias ‘Beliy’ (‘The White’), had been preparing a report to shed more light on the affair, he ultimately ended up being killed in an ambush by the Tuaregs over the weekend.

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Fedyanin had reportedly been traveling with a private military company and Malian army convoy in the vicinity of the village of Tinzawaten, close to the country’s border with Algeria. The area has recently seen hostilities between Tuareg insurgents and the country’s military, the latter of which is reportedly supported by the Wagner Group.

Gruesome footage circulating online shows scores of bodies and several burned-out vehicles in the aftermath of the ambush, while the militants are seen celebrating their success. During the fight, a military helicopter that had been trying to provide cover for the ambushed group was damaged and had to make an emergency landing, footage suggests. Several fighters, some of whom were presumably with the private military company, ended up taken prisoner by the Tuaregs.

The Wagner Group has been active in several African countries for years. Moscow has previously claimed that the company’s actions on the continent were its “private business” and did not represent the Russian government.