Second Battle of Timbuktu According to French authorities, three Malian soldiers were killed in the fighting and a dozen more were wounded. Second Battle of Timbuktu The Battle of Timbuktu was a phase of the Northern Mali conflict, taking place in late March 2013, in which two Islamist attacks targeted the Malian army in Timbuktu. With help from the French, both attacks were prevented from capturing any significant sites in the city. On the night of March 20, French and Malian forces repelled two groups of Islamist militants - one attempting to infiltrate Timbuktu regional airport and the other attempting to forcibly enter the
University of Timbuktu scholars and manuscripts. It acquired a reputation for learning and scholarship across the Muslim world. According to African scholar Shamil Jeppie in "The Meanings of Timbuktu": ...Timbuktu is a repository of history, a living archive which anybody with a concern for African history should be acquainted with. Timbuktu may be hard to get to but it played an essential role as a centre of scholarship under the Songhay state until the invasion from the rulers of Marrakesh in 1591, and even thereafter it was revived. After Timbuktu was occupied because of the 1591 Battle of Tondibi, the university went into