Malian Armed Forces (FAMa) — JNIM

Summary

JNIM was formed in March 2017 from the groups the army had been fighting since 2012, and the relationship has run through three phases. Until 2022 the army fought with French and UN forces beside it and lost outlying posts while holding the towns. From 2022, with Russian personnel integrated at the point of main effort and armed drones arriving from Türkiye, it went over to hub defence with intervention columns — the model that retook Kidal from the CSP in November 2023. From September 2025 JNIM changed what it attacks: the declared fuel blockade, the burning of tanker convoys on the corridors and the April–July 2026 offensives against Kayes, Sévaré and the western belt aim at the roads, the economy and the columns between the hubs rather than at the hubs, and no overrun outlying camp has been documented as re-established since mid-2025 — Boulikessi in June 2025 and Dioura in September 2026 are the cases. Both sides have a documented civilian-harm record: JNIM's blockades and mass-casualty assaults, and the army's joint operations with Russian partners, of which Moura in March 2022 remains the gravest documented case. Neither side has offered the other terms the other will accept, which is the state-level record's subject rather than this one's.

Why it matters

It is the relationship every other Sahel record runs through. The fuel blockade, the Russian presence, the AES joint force and the humanitarian access problem are all consequences of how these two forces fight, and a reader who takes the state's refusal to negotiate as the whole story misses that the army's method — hold the hubs, relieve by column — is what JNIM's 2025–26 campaign was designed to exhaust.

Related events

• The war moves to central Mali 2015 – 2019

  Military · Humanitarian

• Formation of JNIM 2 Mar 2017

  Military · Political

• The army retakes Kidal 14 Nov 2023

  Military · Territorial change

• Boulikessi is overrun twice and abandoned 1 – 6 Jun 2025

  Military · Territorial change

• JNIM declares a national fuel blockade Sep 2025 – ongoing

  Economic · Military · Humanitarian

• April 2026 offensive — Kidal falls, the defence minister is killed 25 Apr – May 2026

  Military · Territorial change · Leadership change

• July 2026 nationwide attacks and the battle for Anéfis 4 – 10 Jul 2026

  Military

• A contested garrison attack at San, and two irreconcilable accounts of it 9 August 2026

  Military

• The camp at Dioura is overrun, and is not re-established 10 Sep 2026

  Military

Organisations

Structures through which this relationship operates. Not parties to it — the parties are the two actors above.

Systems it depends on

Canonical logistics records. They carry the corridors, nodes, dependence and disruption history that this relationship rests on and does not restate.

Places

Markers this module already publishes. This record adds no geographic precision of its own.

What remains unknown

• Neither force publishes strengths, losses or an account of individual engagements; casualty and materiel claims from both sides are carried as claims in the event records and not reconciled here.
• Whether the non-re-establishment of overrun camps since mid-2025 is inability or a deliberate consolidation is not established in public.
• JNIM's internal command relationship between the central-Mali and northern components is described in analysis rather than documented, and this record does not assume a single decision-maker on the JNIM side.