Tuareg rebellion (2012): 2012 coup Internal conflict in Azawad: Foreign intervention: 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 On the evening of October 30, 2020, a French army operation was launched against a group of jihadists of JNIM while the latter were preparing an attack on the Malian locality of Boulikessi, near the border with Burkina Faso.

While the combatants on motorcycles regrouped and hid under trees, an airstrike was carried out by two French Mirage 2000D fighters.

Several dozen Special Forces soldiers from Operation Sabre then intervened on the ground with the support of drone and helicopter strikes.

[1][2] On November 2, the French Minister of the Armed Forces, Florence Parly, announced that more than 50 jihadists had been neutralized in the operation.

General Lecointre, Chief of Staff of the armed forces, for his part gave the same day an assessment of about sixty neutralized jihadists.