Mali: Islamists Burn Timbuktu Manuscripts

A library containing rare and ancient documents has been torched by Islamic militants escaping from French forces in Timbuktu.

The Ahmed Baba Institute of Higher Islamic Studies and Research had reportedly been used as a sleeping quarters by the Islamists.

Speaking from inside the building, Sky's Alex Crawford, who is embedded with the French forces, said the empty boxes strewn around her had contained thousands of historic manuscripts.

"Some of the documents date back to the 13th century," she said. "The town dates back to the 11th century and this was all the documentation they'd built up over centuries of life in Timbuktu - all either burnt by the Jihadists or they have disappeared."

The city's mayor, Ousmane Halle, said: "They torched all the important ancient manuscripts. The ancient books of geography and science. It is the history of Timbuktu, of its people. It's truly alarming that this has happened."

During their rule, the militants systematically destroyed UNESCO World Heritage sites in Timbuktu, long a hub of Islamic learning.

Crawford said she had been to the site of tombs that date back centuries which had been razed to the ground. UNESCO says one that was destroyed was the tomb of Sidi Mahmoudou, a saint who died in 955.

A spokesman for the al Qaeda-linked militants has said the tombs of Sufi saints were destroyed because they contravened Islam, encouraging Muslims to venerate saints instead of God.

Ground forces backed by French paratroopers and helicopters took control of Timbuktu's airport and the roads leading to the town in an overnight operation - part of the French-led mission to oust radical Islamists from the northern half of Mali, which they seized more than nine months ago.

Crawford said: "In the centre of the town they are celebrating, they're going absolutely bonkers with flags, cheering and waving and saying thank you to the French."

The Timbuktu operation comes a day after the French announced they had seized the airport and a key bridge in Gao, a city east of Timbuktu, one of the other northern provincial capitals that had been under the grip of radical Islamists.

The French and Malian forces so far have met little resistance from the Islamists, who seized northern Mali in the wake of a military coup in the distant capital of Bamako, in southern Mali.

Timbuktu lies on an ancient caravan route and has entranced travellers for centuries, is some 1,000km (620 miles) northeast of Mali's capital Bamako.

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