United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon is demanding an end to attacks on U.N. peacekeepers in northern Mali, after a bomb blast killed five peacekeepers on Thursday.

In a statement, the secretary-general said he is “outraged” by the roadside bomb attack near Aguelhok, in the Kidal region, that killed the five Chadian peacekeepers and injured three other soldiers.

A similar attack in the same area killed four U.N. peacekeepers earlier this month.

The secretary-general called on Malian rebel groups to help prevent terrorist attacks, in line with a commitment the groups made in a declaration signed Tuesday.

The rebels and Malian government are holding talks in Algiers aimed at clinching a lasting peace agreement.  

Torn by ethnic rivalries, a Tuareg rebellion and an Islamist insurgency in its vast desert north, Mali has struggled for stability and peace since a military coup in 2012.  

The U.N. says bomb attacks have killed 21 peacekeepers and wounded another 84 in Mali since the U.N. mission began there in July 2013.

 
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