Mali ALERT: Soldiers disrupt Television station’s broadcast; journalist in hiding

Abdoulaye Barry, a journalist with Africable, a Bamako-based Pan-African Television channel has fled into hiding following a warning he received from armed soldiers believed to be from the national army shortly after they stormed the station on June 12, 2012.

“More than 10 armed Malian soldiers came this morning to surround the offices of our television station. They banned the broadcast of an interview of a Tuareg rebel scheduled for Tuesday evening”, Barry told the Media Foundation for West Africa’s (MFWA) correspondent.

“I am now in hiding, particularly because they said they would come back if the interview was aired” emphasized Barry.

The station had for several days advertised the broadcast of an exclusive interview with Mohammed Lamine Ould Ahmed, Deputy Secretary-General of the Azawad National Liberation Movement (MNLA).

The action by the soldiers has led the station to cancel the broadcast of the interview. A source told the MFWA correspondent that the decision not to broadcast is as a result of “security reasons”.