While fighting was mostly confined to guerrilla attacks and army counterattacks, large portions of the desert north of each nation were no-go zones for the military and civilians fled to regional capitals like Kidal, Mali and Agadez, Niger.

Niger saw heavy fighting and disruption of uranium production in the mountainous north, before a Libyan backed peace deal, aided by a factional split among the rebels, brought a negotiated ceasefire and amnesty in May 2009.

[9] The group said they were fighting for greater economic development and a share in the region's mineral wealth, an end to alleged pollution caused by and poverty surrounding the mining operations at Arlit.

Resumed diplomatic and military pressure, with the intervention of Algerian diplomacy, brought what appeared to be a final reintegration of the Malian rebel factions in July 2008, along much the same lines of the 2006 peace plan.

In December 2008, Ag Bahanga's faction of the ADC (Alliance Touareg Nord Mali pour le Changement, ATNMC) returned to conflict in a series of attacks and counterattacks in the far north.

Both conflicts were brought under increased international attention following the kidnapping in late 2008 in Niger of two Canadian diplomats and four European tourists by groups associated with Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb, who held their victims somewhere in northern Mali.

Libya, Algeria, Mali, and Niger pledged in March 2009 to cooperate to secure the Saharan borders where Tuareg rebels and AQIM militants, as well as smugglers and criminal gangs, operated.

The Nigerien rebels pursued a strategy of expanding the ethnic makeup of their forces, and attempted—with little success in the south—to broaden the insurgency into a social movement to replace the current government and provide the population with a share in Niger's growing mining sector.

Niger rebels claimed that their government failed to honor a 1995 peace deal, which ended the 1990s Tuareg insurgency and promised them a bigger share of the region's mineral wealth.

Niger's Tuaregs continued to watch the development and economic activities of the government closely, especially in regards the Aïr Mountains' burgeoning tourist trade, and Arlit's recovering uranium industry.

The government of Niger claimed that these attacks were the work of small-scale "bandits" and drug-trafficking gangs, and also suggested "foreign interests" (or the French mining company Areva, specifically) were funding the rebel forces.

Unlike the Niger ex-combatants, who appeared successfully integrated into national the Nigerien Armed Forces, small numbers of Malian Tuaregs remained restive, complaining of the Kidal region's poverty.

[24] Former Malian rebel leaders, notably the 1990s commander Lyad Ag Ghaly, denounced the 2007 violence and called on the Bahanga group to cease their attacks and offered to negotiate on behalf of the Bamako government.

The government of Niger had concluded a deal with a Chinese state owned company China Nuclear International Uranium Corporation (SinoU) to begin mining at Teguida, in the midst of the Tuareg winter pasturing lands and the fall Cure Salee festival at Ingall.

At the same time, former rebel commander—and father-in-law of Bahanga—Hama Ag Sidahmed announced the creation of a Niger-Mali Tuareg alliance (the Alliance-Touareg-Niger-Mali, ATNM), though this was denied by another group, claiming to represent the ARC.

The high-profile support of former rebel leader Iyad Ag Ghaly as a mediator by the Malian government led many to believe that low-scale fighting with those Tuareg factions who had renounced the 2006 accords might end completely.

Press speculation theorised a split in the already fractured movement, in which Toureg groups loyal to the Kel Adagh had fully participated in the eventual peace process, which seemed to have resolved the conflict since August 2008.

Doctors Without Borders claimed that no aid was being delivered by the government in the north, while 2,500 to 4,000 displaced people were estimated to have come to Agadez from the mostly Tuareg town of Iferouane,[68] with the entire civilian population apparently fleeing after the army and rebels started fighting in the area in mid-2007.

[92] In late August, the Nigerien government reported that a faction of the MNJ led by Toubou rebel commander from the 1990s Bocar Mohamed Sougouma had surrendered near Gouré (Zinder Region).

The government did, however, confirm that an MNJ raid on a convoy between Elmiki and Dabaga killed four soldiers, and that a landmine attack in the desert between Agadez and Bilma occurred later; both incidents were blamed on continued activity of so-called criminal gangs involved in smuggling and intimidation.

The aging Mohamed Awtchiki Kriska, a former spokesperson for the 1990s Coordination de la résistance armée (CRA) rebel front, was announced as the president of the new group, and Ag Boula was named as "Commissioner of War".

[120] The editor of Niamey's L'Evénement weekly was arrested on 30 July 2008 and charged with "divulging a defence secret" after reporting that an army officer had been linked to an arms cache that was discovered in the capital.

Ag Bahanga is the former leader of the 23 Mai (l'Alliance Démocratique du 23 mai pour le Changement, ADC) group and current leader of the last remaining faction of the group which had not signed the Algerian brokered peace agreement: The Alliance Touaregue Nord Mali Pour Le Changement (ATNMC)[126] This faction took credit in communiqués for a series of attacks in northern Mali beginning on 18 December.

[130] The Malian army quickly responded in January 2009 with an attack on a rebel camp just west of Aguelhoc (In the Adrar des Ifoghas, Kidal Region) in which it said it killed 20 fighters and took 8 prisoners, one of whom later died.

[131] El Khabar of Algeria reported that the initial assaults by the Malian Army in January were led by former ADC fighters and commanded by a former associate of Ag Bahanga's Colonel Mohamed Oueld Midou.

One editorial in Le Republican (Bamako) argued that this, along with the growing resurgence of former Ghanda Koy militia activities in Gao risked adding a greater ethnic dimension to the conflict.

Outside observers noted the weakness of Bahanga's position, with his surprise return to fighting in December resulting in political isolation from both the ADC and foreign mediators, military defeat at the hands of the army, and a string of defections which left his forces even weaker.

The tripartite Groupe Technique de Sécurité, set up under the 2008 accord, would negotiate the movement of rebel forces into disarmament, possible reintegration into security services, and final cantonment at a base near Agharous, 50 km (31 mi) south of Kidal.

The 2008 MNJ splinter, the FPR (Front of Forces for Rectification) headed by Rhissa Ag Boula and Mohamed Aoutchiki Kriska, later announced they would join with the new FPN peace initiative.

[167] The larger Tuareg conflicts were brought under increased international attention following the kidnapping in late 2008 in Niger of two Canadian diplomats and four European tourists by groups associated with Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb, who held their victims somewhere in northern Mali.