Videos allegedly show dozens of fighters from the Russian Wagner Group killed in Mali after fighting with Taureg rebels.

Johannesburg — In a rare recognition, Russia’s private Mercenary Army PMC Wagner said on Monday it had suffered heavy losses fighting a Tuareg rebel alliance in the north of the African country of Mali. The state-funded “private military company” did not disclose how many of its fighters were killed in a days-long battle near the Mali-Algeria border, but videos circulating on social media showed dozens of bodies, mostly of white men.

The mercenary group has been active in Mali for several years. It was hired by the leaders of the military junta that seized control of the country in a coup in 2020. Since the coup, Malian soldiers and their hired partners from Wagner have been trying to gain control of parts of the country that remain in the hands of separatist Tuareg groups, while also fighting an Islamist insurgency.

Wagner said in a statement on the messaging app Telegram that his forces fought alongside the Malian army near the town of Tinzaouaten for five days starting on July 22. Wagner said his forces “wiped out most of the Islamists before a sandstorm caused the militants to regroup and return with more than 1,000 men.” Amid this massive firepower, Wagner said there were “casualties,” but gave no figures.

The Russian state news agency TASS reported on Monday that only three of the Russian fighters are believed to have survived the battle and that their commander, Sergei Shevchenko, was among those killed in action.

The Malian army and Wagner fighters are believed to have been conducting operations to gain control of the country’s border with Algeria for several months. The Taureg militias continue to control parts of the border region, but militants linked to JNIM, an alliance of al-Qaeda-affiliated groups, are also active there.

Videos posted on social media show the bodies of men, most of them white, lying in the sand. In the background, Tuareg rebels can be seen chatting and looting personal belongings. There are also destroyed vehicles and a crashed helicopter.

Mali’s army confirmed it suffered “significant” losses during two days of fighting with Tuareg rebels. The umbrella organization JNIM claimed its fighters killed 50 Wagner fighters and 10 Malian soldiers in the clashes near the border with Algeria.

The region’s Tuareg rebel alliance – known as the Permanent Strategic Framework for Peace, Security and Development (CSP-DSA) – said in a statement released on Saturday that it had captured armored vehicles and tanks during fighting near Tinzaouaten on Thursday and Friday.

Spokesman Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane said in a Facebook post that after two days of heavy fighting, the CSP-DSA had “inflicted heavy casualties with dozens of dead and injured” and that its forces were still “pursuing enemy troops on the road” to nearby Kedal.

CBS News could not confirm the number of Wagner soldiers killed in the attack. The Malian army issued a statement confirming the deaths of two of its soldiers and saying that 10 others were wounded in the battle.

Russian mercenaries have been working as contract killers on the African continent since 2017. At that time, they were first deployed in the Central African Republic.

Images and videos posted on social media accounts of the Tuareg, Wagner and other local militias suggest that a convoy of the Malian army and allied Wagner forces may have been ambushed by Tuareg rebels, who used an explosive device to stop the group, followed by a fierce small arms attack. A sandstorm appears to have added to the chaos of the battle.

According to reports, the retreating government and Wagner troops were then attacked again and suffered further losses.

One of those killed in the attack, according to widely shared posts on pro-Wagner social media accounts, was Nikita Fedyanin, a 29-year-old Wagner activist who ran a popular Telegram channel for the group called “The Gray Zone.”

CBS News has seen a photo on another Wagner Telegram channel that appears to show his body.

Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger have all experienced military coups in recent years. After expelling French troops, they turned to Russian mercenaries to reinforce their own forces. They provide security for the ruling juntas and help in the fight against Islamist groups such as al-Qaeda and ISIS offshoots.

Last month, Mali’s army and Wagner mercenaries were accused of killing dozens of civilians in northern Mali.

“Malian and Wagner soldiers executed old men and herders and stole everything they found in the camps, such as money and valuable jewelry,” local official Hamadine Driss Ag Mohamed told the Associated Press, claiming that a total of 46 people were killed by the forces.