MOSCOW, August 22. /TASS/. Supporters of armed military extremists have sieged the city of Timbuktu in northern Mali, Al Arabiya reported, citing local sources.

According to them, militants have blocked all the roads to the city. The TV channel did not disclose details about the organization the radicals belong to.

On August 16, France’s RFI Radio said that militants from the Islamist group JNIM with links to Al-Qaeda (terrorist organization outlawed in Russia — TASS) had taken control of the city. Local officials refused to comment on the report, while several dozens of families have decided to flee the city.

Mali has been living through a political crisis following two military coups since the summer of 2020. In mid-June, the country’s Foreign Minister Abdoulaye Diop said that the government had asked the United Nations Security Council to immediately withdraw peacekeepers of the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA), claiming that the peacekeeping force, more than 15,000 strong, had failed to ensure the country’s security.

MINUSMA was established in the spring of 2013 by a UN Security Council resolution to help Malian authorities strengthen security in the country.