.Reuters journalists join French troops in central Mali on a rare reporting trip and saw first-hand why a five-year-old mission - initially planned as a short-term stopgap to hand over to local forces - may have many more years left to run.
. Ndaki, Mali. Reuters/Benoit TessierBut as the multi-week operation wore on in Gourma district, where 400 French troops and 100 allied Malians searched for 50-odd jihadists they estimated were hiding in the shadows, the obstacles kept piling up.
"We're not going to resolve this in a day," said David, the commander of the French forward base near the town of Gossi. French military rules permit publication only of his first name. "This is going to take some time." In Gossi, a haven for Islamic State fighters next to the borders with Burkina Faso and Niger, the town's local government councillor had fled after being threatened and was now sleeping in the Malian base, the French base Commander, David, said.French soldiers of the Belleface Desert Tactical Group set up a temporary forward operating base.
"We have a dogged adversary, who is tough, drawing from a breeding ground that is favourable to him because the population is isolated," Colonel Nicolas James, Commander of Desert Tactical Croup Belleface, told Reuters at its base in Gao.French soldiers of the 2nd Foreign Engineer Regiment search a metal case during an area control operation.
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