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188 CHAPTER 4difficulties in pressing further when confronted with reluctance to revisit theevents I was interested in. The fact that I was a stranger could also have playeda large part in form and content of (non-)communication. However, those whohad witnessed Alfellaga and wanted to speak about the subject invariably toldme the story of Paul Ahmed Nardy ‘the Frenchman’. Nardy was actually ofmixed Algerian and French origins. After independence, he stayed in Maliwhere he worked as administrator of the customs service in Gao. He was, rightlyor not, accused by Commandant Diby Sillas Diarra of being the head of theresistance movement’s information network in Gao. Nardy was arrested inMarch 1964.(...) but he had nothing to do with the revolt, he was an innocent type. He wasimprisoned together with my older sister who survived. They let him die of thirst.He asked someone to moisten the tip of his veil so he could have some water, but itwas refused. When he died after three days there was a bright light on the spot werehe was, like a lamp. Only it wasn’t a lamp, it was a miracle. That was because hewas a good Muslim and a perfectly innocent man. He had nothing to do with therebellion. They only killed him because he was French, and they thought he hadspied for the rebels. He was a brave person. 82Nardy’s story was not only told because of our presumedly shared French(European) origins. To those who told it, somehow, it was an outstandingexample of the barbarisms of the Malian Armed Forces. As mentioned above, inthe Tamasheq concept of honourable war – aqqa – certain social categoriesshould be left unharmed: women; children; the free unprotected craftsmen; religiousgroups (ineslemen); and strangers. Nardy fitted the last two categories. Hewas a Frenchman who had converted to Islam, and he was apparently reputedfor his piety. He was certainly not the only victim of the Malian Armed Forceswho, according to the rules of aqqa, should have been left unharmed. Thepublic execution of the Adagh’s men of religion still provokes resentment.The imprisonment of women and children in the towns and the labour theywere forced to carry out constitutes another source of bitter recollection. In KelAdagh memory, many of the arbitrary acts committed against the populationand their chiefs after the rebellion are now placed within the context of therebellion, or they are believed to have taken place in those days. The arrest andhumiliation of Bissaada ag Khakad, Hamzata ag Sidi and Ebeug ag Elmouackin 1967, described in Chapter 3, is now remembered as having taken placeduring the rebellion as well. The whole Keita period is seen as not only one ofgreat suffering, but also one of continued resistance and rebellion. It is as ifAlfellaga did not take place between 1963 and 1964, but between 1960 and1968, from the coming of Mali to the coup d’état by Moussa Traoré. The im-82Conversation with Keyni ag Sherif. Kidal, 05/05/1999.