Malian Soldiers Wounded in Grenade Attack in Rebel Bastion

Two men threw hand-grenades at Malian troops in the ethnic-Tuareg northern rebel bastion of Kidal on Friday, wounding two soldiers, a local government official told Agence France Presse.

The incident, which left one of the troopers seriously hurt, came after after Tuareg and Arab rebels claiming autonomy for northern Mali announced the suspension of negotiations with the government, dealing a blow to hopes of a durable peace in the troubled west African nation.

"I was in the Malian Solidarity Bank when I saw two turbaned men throw two grenades at Malian soldiers guarding the bank. One grenade exploded. I saw blood on both soldiers," Moctar Maiga told AFP.

The incident was confirmed by a source in the governor's office in the town, the birthplace of Mali's Tuareg rebellion and the center of a number of uprisings since the 1960s.

Soldiers from the French-led Operation Serval mission combating Islamists in northern Mali and United Nations peacekeeping troops arrived on the scene to defuse one of the grenades which had not exploded, an African military source in Mali told AFP.

The Tuareg National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) took control of Kidal in February after a French-led military operation ousted al-Qaida-linked fighters who had piggybacked on the latest Tuareg rebellion to seize most of northern Mali.

The al-Qaida-backed militants had chased out their former MNLA allies and imposed a brutal form of Islamic law.

The Malian authorities reclaimed the city after signing a ceasefire deal with the MNLA in June but the situation has remained tense.

The June 18 Ouagadougou accord between the rebels and the government allowed the Mali military to return to Kidal to prepare the way for presidential elections in July which brought Ibrahim Boubacar Keita to power.

Under the deal signed in Burkina Faso, the government and rebels agreed to respect the country's territorial integrity and to hold peace talks, focused on the status of northern Mali, which the Tuareg movements call Azawad.

But the rebels said on Thursday the government had not kept to its commitment under the deal to start prisoner releases, and announced they were pulling out.

The central government is unwilling to discuss autonomy for northern Mali and there have been sporadic clashes between Malian troops and local populations in the desert region since the deal was signed.

The Tuareg and Arab rebel groups released a statement from Ouagadougou on Thursday saying they had suspended their participation in the accord following "multiple difficulties" in its implementation "caused notably by the Mali government's failure to respect its commitments".

The three movements involved dated the decision from September 18, the date of the second meeting of the joint committee set under the ceasefire accord.

The rebels seized control of northern Mali in the chaos that followed an army rebellion which overthrew the democratically-elected government of president Amadou Toumani Toure on March 22, 2012.

The rebelling army officers were angry at the level of support they had received to combat the separatist Tuareg rebellion which was already under way in the north.

The Tuareg seized control of an area larger than France before being ousted by al-Qaida-linked groups that imposed a brutal interpretation of Islamic law on the local population, carrying out amputations and executions.

Their actions drew worldwide condemnation and their march south prompted France to launch a military offensive in January at Mali's behest to oust the Islamists.