| abstract | - Attacks beginning in February 2007 by the Niger Movement for Justice (MNJ) targeted outposts of the Nigerien Armed Forces and foreign economic interests. The group said they were fighting for greater economic development and a share in the region's mineral wealth, an end to alleged pollution caused by and poverty surrounding the mining operations at Arlit. The area of Niger affected is home to some of the world's largest uranium deposits, and the French operated uranium mines of the desert town of Arlit account for a fifth of the world's uranium deposits and most of Niger's foreign exchange income. In September 2007, fighting shifted to Mali, with a portion of the Tuareg groups which had come under a 2006 ceasefire returning to combat. A swift Malian military response, coupled with the diplomatic intervention of other Malian Tuaregs, led to a new, unofficial ceasefire in December 2007. In April, with the help of Libya, a formal ceasefire was declared, though it was quickly followed by new, retributive attacks from both sides. Resumed diplomatic and military pressure, with the intervention of Algerian diplomacy, brought what appeared to be a final reintegration of the Malian rebel factions in July 2008, along much the same lines of the 2006 peace plan. After both Libyan and Algerian sponsored peace talks, Malian rebel leader Ibrahim Ag Bahanga relocated to Libya and the remaining Malian rebels and government concluded a settlement to the conflict. In December 2008, Ag Bahanga's faction of the ADC (Alliance Touareg Nord Mali pour le Changement—ATNMC) returned to conflict in a series of attacks and counterattacks in the far north. This splinter group, despite a series of daring raids deep into populated areas, were decisively defeated by the Malian Army during January 2009, supported by an increasing number of former rebels. In February 2009, elements surrounding Ag Bahanga again fled Mali for Libya, while both Libya and Algeria pledged support to end rebel attacks and support negotiations. ADC fighters negotiated a return to the disarmament agreed in 2008, and began being processed for integration into the Malian Armed Forces in camps near Kidal. Both conflicts were brought under increased international attention following the kidnapping in late 2008 in Niger of two Canadian diplomats and four European tourists by groups associated with Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb, who held their victims somewhere in northern Mali. Libya, Algeria, Mali, and Niger pledged in March 2009 to cooperate to secure the Saharan borders where Tuareg rebels and AQIM militants, as well as smugglers and criminal gangs, operated. In Niger, fighting flared after a Ramadan truce in 2007, with land-mine attacks and incursions reaching areas in the south and center of the nation previously unaffected. The Nigerien government, rejecting any negotiations, pursued a crackdown on rebel forces and declared a state of emergency in the north which by December 2007 threatened to spark a humanitarian crisis. High profile arrests of domestic and foreign media, the expulsion of European NGOs from the area, and the reported human rights practices of the Nigerien Armed Forces in the Agadez Region have led to criticism of the Nigerien government abroad, and continued fighting in the north. Despite government military victories in early 2008, and condemnation for a hostage seizure and land-mine attacks (for which the rebels deny responsibility), the MNJ appeared no closer to either defeat or overthrow of the Nigerien government as the rainy season approached in August 2008. The return and then splintering away from the main rebel group of factional leaders from the 1990s conflict complicated the situation in 2008. One group joined the rebels, only to be expelled and sign a peace deal with the government of Niger. Another faction, which seemed to have been involved in the political front, appeared and quickly split in early 2008. Irregular fighting and raids occurred throughout late 2008, but these were mostly limited to the rebel strongholds in the Aïr Mountains. Suppression of domestic and international press access, as well as the expulsion of aid agencies from the Agadez Region by the government has meant that there was little independent confirmation of the situation in northern Niger throughout 2008. The Nigerien rebels pursued a strategy of expanding the ethnic makeup of their forces, and attempted—with little success in the south—to broaden the insurgency into a social movement to replace the current government and provide the population with a share in Niger's growing mining sector. By the beginning of 2009, rebel attempts to impinge upon Nigerien uranium production had, according to mining officials, little effect. The effects on the population of the north has been pronounced, with the regional capitol of Agadez hosting thousands of refugees, economic activity outside the towns grinding to a halt, and the destruction of a burgeoning foreign tourist industry in the north of the country. The 2009 peace in Mali was seen as a model for a February civil society conference in Niamey. In March 2009 a dramatic split of much of the MNJ leadership resulted in the former MNJ head fleeing to Libya, who aided delivering Nigerien Armed Forces prisoners home. The new Nigerien Patriotic Front (FPN), which contained much of the MNJ's fighters and leadership, called for a negotiated peace. They, along with an earlier splinter, entered into four-party talks with the Nigerien government under Libyan auspices from March to June 2009. All sides pledged an immediate ceasefire in May 2009, while pursuing talks for a permanent peace and an amnesty for all former rebels.
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