Baku-APA. Suspected Islamists on motorbikes killed nine United Nations peacekeepers from Niger on Friday in northeastern Mali, in the deadliest ever attack on the mission, military sources said, APA reports quoting AFP.
An officer from Niger with the MINUSMA mission told AFP the ambush had been staged by the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO), an al-Qaeda-linked militia behind numerous attacks in the restive west African nation.
"This is the deadliest attack against the UN mission in Mali," a statement from MINUSMA said, adding that aircraft had been deployed to secure the area.
The ambush brought to 30 the number of deaths in the mission since its deployment in July last year.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement he was "outraged" by the attack, which he described as "a serious violation of international law".
MINUSMA and a senior military official from Niger said the convoy of peacekeepers were on a supply run in the northeastern Menaka-Asongo corridor when they were ambushed by men on motorbikes.
The Nigerien MINUSMA source said MUJAO had formed an alliance with militants from the Fulani ethnic group in the Gao region where the attack took place.
"The terrorists had threatened to carry out attacks in the run-up to the feast of Tabaski. They've just carried them out," added a Malian military source, using the west African name for the Islamic festival of Eid al-Adha taking place on Sunday.
The deaths mark the first losses suffered by Niger's 600-strong force, deployed to Mali in January last year.
"I condemn this attack without reservation. Attacks on representatives of the UN are unacceptable and unjustifiable," said Britain's Africa minister James Duddridge.
"My thoughts and sympathies are with the families and colleagues of those killed and injured in the attack, and with the governments and people of Mali and Niger."
Menaka, an isolated Sahara desert town in eastern Mali crisscrossed by seasonally dry riverbeds, is used mainly as a temporary home by nomadic Tuareg tribes.
It was the scene of heavy fighting between the Mali government and the three main separatist rebel groups in May.
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