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338 EPILOGUEkeep the peace as much as possible. In all 22 arrests were made to bring themurders to justice and to quell Ganda Djio before the spiral of ethnic killingswould start. This did not mean, however, that Touré did not respond militarilyto Bahanga’s offensive. In June, Algeria and Mali agreed to organise communalborder patrols to intercept both the fighters of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Lands ofthe West (the former Algerian GSPC which had formally joined al-Qaeda in2007) and Ibrahim Bahanga. 44 That same month, Touré ordered large-scaleoperations to intercept Bahanga and his men and to chase them out of theirbases in Mount Tigharghar. Colonel Elhajj Gamou led these operations. Histroops did not only include regular soldiers of the Malian Armed Forces.Gamou had formed a militia of former ARLA fighters of imghad origins –ironically called ‘Delta Force’ after the US Special Forces – that was equippedwith tecnical vehicles carrying heavy arms. 45 The motifs behind the formationof this imghad militia and its success in fighting Bahanga’s ATNMC are easy toexplain at the very end of this epilogue at the very end of this book: egha overtheir loss in 1994 and the subsequent humiliation and degradation the Ifoghasforced them into. Gamou’s forces managed to drive Bahanga from his bases,leaving 20 of his fighters dead, but although the operations dealt a heavy blowto the ATNMC, the fight would take another half year. New negotiations inSeptember 2008 led to the release of 44 military hostages and a short period ofcalm, but in December 2008 Bahanga attacked the army base at Nampala. Inretaliation, Gamou’s troops of Malian Armed Forces, largely consisting of KelTamasheq soldiers from outside the Adagh and solely led by Kel Tamasheq andBidân officers; and completed by Gamou’s ‘Delta Force’, decisively oustedBahanga’s ATNMC from their bases in Mount Tigharghar on 21 January2009. 46 As an irony of history, Bahanga’s last fight, which he decisively lost,took place at Toximine, the place where he had battled the Malian Army andwon in 1990. It is less ironic that his defeat was brought about by his formercomrades in arms who had given up the idea of resistance to the Malian state in444546Berschinski, R. 2007.Kone, Ousmane. ‘Accrochage à la base de Tin-Assalek: Le colonel Gamou a matéhier Bahanga et ses troupes’, Malijet, 05/06/2008.http://www.malijet.com/rebellion_au_nord_du_mali/accrochage_a_la_base_de_tin_assalek_le_colonel_gamou_a_mate_hier.html.‘L’armée annonce avoir pris “toutes les bases” du groupe d’Ag Bahanga’, JeuneAfrique, 12/02/2009.http://www.jeuneafrique.com/Article/DEPAFP20090211T172332Z/-defense-armeetouareg-Ibrahim-Ag-Bahanga-L-armee-annonce-avoir-pris--toutes-les-bases--dugroupe-d-Ag-Bahanga--.htmlThe main commanders of the Malian Armed Forces inthe North apart from Colonel Elhajj Gamou were Colonel Sidi Ahmed Kounta, aKounta as his name indicates; Commander Barek of unknown origins; and ColonelTakni of Kel Adagh origins.