Islamic state has claimed responsibility for an attack in northeastern Mali that killed at least 53 soldiers, the group’s Amaq news agency reported on Saturday without citing evidence.
Mali government said that the soldiers and one civilian had been killed in an attack on an army post in northern Mali, in one of the deadliest strikes against the West African country’s military in recent memory.
“The dispatched reinforcements found 54 bodies including one civilian, 10 survivors, and found considerable material damage. The situation is under control,” government spokesman Yaya Sangare said on Twitter in the early hours of Saturday.
The authorities first reported the attack by armed men on the army post in Indelimane, Menaka region, on Friday, but gave a lower provisional death toll.
