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A Malian police commissioner was killed on Thursday by a mob that accused him of links with bandits, the security ministry said.

Protesters besieged a police station in the central town of Niono, accusing the police commissioner of abuses.

“A horde of people armed with projectiles of all kinds ransacked the station and attacked the staff,” the ministry’s statement said.

As police withdrew, Issiaka Tounkara was “caught and killed by protesters”, it added.

A protester also died and a number of people on both sides were injured.

“Since his appointment, there have been more motorcycle thefts, robberies and looting,” protester Issiaka Sanogo alleged.

The killing came as the UN mission in Mali, Minusma, said in a statement it was greatly concerned by a resurgence of violence since Wednesday evening in areas of Timbuktu in northern Mali.

Two girls travelling in a car were killed by gunfire in the town on Thursday, amid ongoing inter-communal tensions, a source close to the local government said.

Northern Mali fell into the hands of jihadists in 2012 before the militants were forced out by a French-led military intervention.

But much of the region remains chronically unstable and despite a 2015 peace deal with rebels, violence has spread to the multiethnic centre of the country. — AFP