Tag Archives: Ivan Ejub Kostic

Interview conducted by: Ivan Ayub Kostić & Relja Bobić
Translation form and to French: Branislav Glumac
Photographs: Branislava Mitić

On March 22nd, as part of the Todo Mundo Festival, a group of Tuareg musicians performed in Belgrade. For some time now, they are one of the best kept secrets of festival stages across Europe, America and the rest of the world. In this exclusive interview, the Balkan Center for the Middle East has talked to the musicians about their culture and the desert, but also their social engagement and current position of the Tuareg people across the Sahara.

One of the conflicts which have been lasting for decades in Africa – in the region of Sahel in the north of Mali and Niger, to be precise – is the fight between the Tuaregs and the forces loyal to the governments of Mali and Niger. The first serious violent encounters date way back from the ’60s, while the fights have reached a new peak in the period 1990-1995, during the so-called “Tuareg rebellion”. Over the course of the last decade of the 20th century, the Tuaregs have expressed demands for creating a “Tuareg zone” in the region of north Niger, as well as for the “liberation” of the Aswad region in Mali, where they felt they are entitled to have administrative control. Their leader of the times Mono Dayek, has been killed in a suspicious plane crash in 1995. In the last year or so, much has been said about the Tuaregs and their role in the recent events in Libya, as well as the death of Ibrahim al Bahanga, the popular leader of the Tuareg rebels who has been killed, similarly to Mono Dayek, under unclear circumstances last year.

We had the pleasure of talking to one of the frontmen of the most popular Tuareg music group Tinariwen – Eyadou Ag Leche – about the current position of the Tuaregs and the recent events in Mali. Continue reading →