SUMMARY
The conflict between Ansar Dine and CMA (originally MNLA) was played out in the context of the overall struggle between Islamists and secular separatists in northern Mali that came in the wake of the Malian army’s forcible eviction from the region in April 2012. The mainly Tuareg rebel group MNLA had launched an armed conflict in January 2012, with the stated aim of creating the independent state of Azawad in the northern part of the country (see Mali: Azawad). Initially, in a tactical alliance with fellow Tuareg rebel group Ansar Dine, they were able to make large territorial gains, seizing nearly a third of the country's territory by mid-March and the main northern towns by the end of the month. On 6 April MNLA subsequently declared the formation of the independent state of Azawad, comprising the three northern regions Gao, Kidal, and Timbuktu.
However, at this point the tactical alliance between MNLA and Ansar Dine had started to crumble. The latter had a completely different aim with its armed struggle, favoring the implementation of sharia in the whole country to the creation of an independent Azawad. As the rebels pressed south, they had entered territory where people were more favorable to the message of Ansar Dine than to MNLA's separatist agenda, which was viewed as a strictly Tuareg enterprise among the ethnically mixed population. Furthermore, the presence of two other Islamists groups in the area, AQIM (at this point also containing what would late be Signed-in-Blood Battalion) and MUJAO, started to shift the balance of power in favor of Ansar Dine. During April and May 2012 it became clear that the Islamists had created a joint alliance against MNLA, and the latter was pushed out of most main towns. Besides some failed attempts at rapprochement between MNLA and Ansar Dine (see below), the Islamist alliance has remained largely consistent since then. During the rest of 2012 the latter former remained in control of the northern part of Mali, while MNLA attempted to re-group in the countryside. Armed clashes between the two camps occurred on numerous occasions, with different constellations on the Islamist side (see CMA-MUJAO, Signed-in-Blood Battalion and AQIM, Jama’atuAhlis Sunna Lidda’awati wal-Jihad, MUJAO-CMA). However, early 2013 saw France intervene on the side of the Malian government (Mali: Government) and in the ensuing offensive, the Islamist groups were pushed from all towns and villages in the north. MNLA, in contrast, seized the opportunity to ally with the French forces against the Islamists and return to the urban centers, especially Kidal.
Focusing more narrowly on the conflict between Ansar Dine and MNLA, the two groups have fought each other intermittently since 2 April 2012, the day after they together seized Tombouctou. In May, they made an attempt to patch up their differences through negotiations. A deal was even reached in late May, whereby the two groups agreed to merge and create the independent Islamic state of Azawad. MNLA had thus compromised on their outspoken secular stance, while Ansar Dine had conceded their goal of transforming the system of government in the whole of Mali. However, the agreement broke down almost immediately and Ansar Dine turned again to their Islamist allies. Despite scattered subsequent fighting between the two groups, it was not until in 2015 that the violence escalated to cross the threshold for inclusion in UCDP data.
The non-state conflict between Ansar Dine and CMA (originally MNLA) is first included in UCDP data in 2015. On 25 December of that year, clashes between the two groups in northern Mali’s Kidal region caused the conflict to cross 25 battle-related deaths threshold for the first time.
