Talk:Tuareg rebellion (2012)/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Article sources (and some other notes)

I've been meaning to contribute to this article for a while, but never seemed to find the time to do so. Many of the sources I collected are already used here, but some other useful sources aren't. So I'll list them here and hope one of you guys takes a stab at them:

• [1] (French) These document rebel raids on Youwarou and Hombori on 17 feb. Not mentioned in the article.
• [2] (French) This is an "idiot's guide" to the crisis. Worth checking out to see if we're messing anything.
• [3] (Arabic) Early interview with Bilal Ag Sharif.
• [4] (English) This is a useful study by Aljazeera Center for Studies done at the beginning of the rebellion.
• [5] (English) This is another source for the pact between MNLA and Ansar Dine. Is there a reason it's only mentioned in the lead?

Other missing details that I don't have sources readily for:

• Negotiations: there is no mention of the Nouakchott meeting between representatives of the Malian government and the MNLA on 15 April. It also seems that MNLA delegates were in Burkina Faso on 9 June, followed by Ansar Dine on 18 June, who are also heading to Nouakchott.
• I can remember Mossa Ag Attaher (MNLA spokesman) saying on a 5 April interview with French media that Douentza had fallen two days earlier (i.e. 3 April). I'm unable to find the specific interview but will keep looking.

I appreciate any help on these. Cheers! -- Orionist ★ talk 09:29, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Destruction in Timbuktu

Shouldn't the destruction of Islamic sites in Timbuktu be mentioned? Or should that go in another article (such as the Timbuktu article)? 99.133.182.239 (talk) 09:02, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

It is mentioned in Battle of Gao article and it also has its own article. --78.0.199.52 (talk) 10:23, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Two phases

This conflict clearly consists of two phases:

• 1st phase: conflict between Military of Mali on one side and MNLA, Ansar Dine, MUJAO and Boko Haram on the other side which ended in April.
• 2nd phase: conflict between secular MNLA on one side and islamist Ansar Dine, MUJAO and Boko Haram on the other side which started after disappearance of the common enemy after the 1st phase and is still ongoing. This phase might be separate conflict, perhaps "Azawadi civil war", but not necessarily.

Infobox should be changed to reflect this. Any thoughts? --78.0.252.150 (talk) 15:48, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

I agree that this seems like a reasonable way to reorganize this article a bit. Right now we have disproportionately little on MNLA's losses to the Islamists. Khazar2 (talk) 16:06, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

For the start, at least the infobox could be arrange to reflect this. --78.0.221.233 (talk) 19:35, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Agree, article is also long per WP:Article length. Concerned the civil war term may be OR and controversial (as is Azawad). But lets brainstorm a bit.Lihaas (talk) 14:43, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Indeed it is an controversial name but it is an internal conflict within Azawad and there is no "official" name for this (phase/part of the) conflict, so maybe the name "Azawadi civil war" could be used as an article name at least temporarily until the better name is found. --93.139.32.206 (talk) 08:15, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

I would strongly disagree with putting a controversial name on the article while we can use the simple and neutral "MNLA-Ansar Dine conflict" or some variation. Khazar2 (talk) 09:18, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Agreed, this is more neutral name. Perhaps something like "MNLA-Islamists conflict" would be even better, because it would include the allies of Ansar Dine. --78.0.205.166 (talk) 12:23, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps split this article between the first and second phases? That seems to be fairly logical, as the situation involved are quite different. The current infobox for example splits the combatants into three sides, but this wasn't the case for the 1st phase of conflict. CMD (talk) 16:20, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Split

So, will this article be split and tidied up accordingly? --93.142.205.88 (talk) 11:47, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

We hav' two choices. We could hav' one article for the "first phase" (under the current name) and one for the "second phase". Or we could deal with both "phases" in the one article and giv' it a new name (something like "2012 conflict in Azawad"). If we pick the latter we could either make two infoboxes or try to split the current one in half (like Yugoslav Wars but simpler). ~Asarlaí 22:38, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

It seems to be simpler to split the article into two, so each part could be dealt with separately. Also, this would prevent (or at least postpone) the article(s) from growing too large and being too cluttered, so it would be easier to view and read. --93.142.239.193 (talk) 10:25, 23 July 2012 (UTC)

Well? Any thoughts? --93.139.185.91 (talk) 08:40, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. I don't think we should have two articles. This is essentially one conflict (although you have shown above that different phases can be identified). That the article is growing too long and too cluttered should only remind us of editing and shortening the article. It is a typical example of WP:Recentism, showing a lot of journalistic day-to-day information, and does not have a long-term, historic perspective (which any encyclopedic article should have). There is a lot of detailed information that won't interest anyone in one, or even two years. --RJFF (talk) 12:37, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

How would you suggest the article be structured then, given that their is a very clear difference between the two phases, with one belligerent (Mali) no longer involved and another (Ansar Dine et al) switching sides)? CMD (talk) 14:24, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

• Wait Technically, there are clearly two different conflicts going on, regardless of when physical conflict breaks out- one is between those who want a united Mali and those who want to separate Azawad off, then there is a separate ideological conflict between secularists and Islamists. Actual fighting in the second conflict broke out after the fighting in the first conflict died down, but doesn't deny that sometime in the future, fighting in the two could happen simultaneously, and be rather intertwined. I would say we should wait some time, for now at least. Though, in theory, I prefer two separate articles, at least at the moment.--Yalens (talk) 15:04, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
• Spin-off I agree that the current version is too detailed and unwieldly, but I hate to see sourced information deleted; while most readers don't need the highly detailed version, some may be interested. Perhaps the information on the first stage of the conflict can be renamed as a phase and made into a spinoff article. The current article can then be a briefer summary of the conflict, while linking to more detailed articles on the first phase, the Battle of Gao, etc. Khazar2 (talk) 15:10, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
  • I support spin-off idea, after some consideration. --Yalens (talk) 21:03, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

So, it's been a while since we had further comment on this. There seems to be general consensus that the current article is too unwieldly. Is there be any opposition to my SPINOFF proposal--that is, moving the day-to-day fighting details of the January-April battles to a subarticle, while allowing this to give an overview of the northern Malian rebellion from January to the present? If I don't hear any objections, I'll boldly try to put this into practice over the weekend. Khazar2 (talk) 19:08, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

So, when will it be? --31.45.207.88 (talk) 10:56, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the reminder. I keep meaning to get to it when I have several uninterrupted hours to work, but with a newborn in the house, it's tricky. Perhaps I can convince Mrs. Khazar to take an extra-long shift today and get this done. In the meantime if anyone else wants to tackle it, they're of course welcome to.Khazar2 (talk) 12:15, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

• I back the spinoff proposal. All the in-depth info about the "first phase" should be moved to a page of its own named "Tuareg rebellion (2012)". Why that name? Because the "first phase" was a Tuareg-led rebellion with the goal of setting-up an independent state of Azawad, but, since fighting broke-out between the Tuaregs and Islamists, the Tuareg's hav' forsaken their goal of an independent state. It is no longer a "Tuareg rebellion". This page should then be an overview of the whole conflict since January. I suggest we name it "2012 conflict in Azawad". ~Asarlaí 01:02, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

New overview article: 2012 northern Malian conflict

Per the split discussion above, I've drafted a new overview article for the conflict. You can find it in my sandbox. There appears to be a small consensus for putting a new article up to cover this full year (I've tentatively titled it "2012 northern Malian conflict", since the newspapers continue to describe the region as "northern Mali" rather than "Azawad"), so take a look at my draft; unless there are major objections, I'll move it to the article space, and then reduce this article to cover only the months January-April. I also intend to further trim some of the fat from this article, which still has an absurd amount of redundancy, daily minutiae, and (now outdated) speculation. I'll continue to check in here at the talk page, though, so if I ever overstep myself, please just give me a good trouting. Cheers, Khazar2 (talk) 03:08, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

Nice work!

However, first part of this conflict (January-April) was belligerent1 vs. belligerent2 and belligerent3 combined while second part (April-ongoing) is belligerent2 vs. belligerent3 than either the main infobox should be complicated a bit to show this changes or there should be two separate infoboxes for each part. Second option seems reasonable, because this conflict consists of two sub-conflicts.

Also, this will be the main article for this situation in Mali, and first part has separate article, perhaps there should be separate article for the second part, but maybe it will be better to wait for some time until more information accumulates. However, it would be nice to have at least the separate infobox. --93.139.197.219 (talk) 19:08, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

Good job Khazar, but I think "2012 northern Mali conflict" would be a better and more neutral name. ~Asarlaí 19:34, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

Agree--title changed. As for the infoboxes, I think I agree there, too, but am not sure how best to set that up. If anyone feels like experimenting in my sandbox, please feel free; otherwise we can finetune that when it gets to article space. Khazar2 (talk) 20:56, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

All right, I've now uploaded the new main article into article space. I've also taken a first pass at trimming this one down a bit, removing a good deal of misc content from the aftermath section. Some of this is now in the NMC main article, but the more trivial stuff (e.g., a report that a single soldier for one side was killed by the other side) I'm simply pruning.

This article could still use some serious restructuring. For example, about half the analysis/background has ended up down in a "media" section, while half is under "background". It also contains a fair amount of redundancy and now outdated speculation. I'm going to try to restructure this tomorrow or the day after; as always, if I overstep myself, just give me a good talking-to and I'll try to undo any damage I cause. Thanks, Khazar2 (talk) 04:26, 1 September 2012 (UTC)

You could use the Yugoslav Wars infobox as a model. -Kudzu1 (talk) 17:59, 1 September 2012 (UTC)

I agree with all of this, but would like to say that I am going to close the Tuareg rebellion (2012) part of the conflict because it ended back in April. Since than it has been hijacked by the Islamists and this is a totally new conflict but part of the overall 2012 Northern Mali desert conflict or 2012 Northern Mali conflict or whatever, for which you created an article. But don't change the name of this article, Tuareg rebellion (2012), because, per the previous discussion, this conflict from January-April, was primarily Tuareg-led, the Islamists came in after the fact. Although most of the Ansar Dine guys are also, per sources, Tuaregs, just of the radical Islamic faith. In any case, the new 2012 northern Mali conflict should be the main article from here on out, being the main overview article. As far as this one goes, it has ended. The Tuareg rebellion portion has ended back in early April. After that there was almost no fighting for three months until conflict erupted between the nationalist Tuaregs and the Islamist ones. That created a totally new conflict for which a new page should be created or at least enough information be added to the main article on the 2012 northern Mali conflict. EkoGraf (talk) 12:02, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Good change, agree with EkoGraf. The Islamists are still expanding control, so an article focused on their rule would be useful. CMD (talk) 13:45, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

I agree, too. Khazar2 (talk) 13:48, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Great. :) EkoGraf (talk) 14:33, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

??? =

Where is France in the infobox ?? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.73.144.39 (talk) 17:57, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

This is a subarticle to the larger ongoing conflict--see link in the first sentence. -- Khazar2 (talk) 18:20, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Ceasefire ended

Can someone please edit the title and contents to show that the ceasefire has ended and the MNLA has once again declared war?

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/africa/2013/11/mali-tuareg-fighters-end-ceasefire-2013113093234673103.html http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-25161049 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.38.186.92 (talk) 08:55, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

Links

>> Orphans of the Sahara: Return (Lihaas (talk) 17:12, 24 January 2014 (UTC)).