According to Human Rights Watch: "Human Rights Watch documented nine incidents that followed a similar modus operandi: dozens of security force members, travelling on both motorcycles and vehicles, mounted large operations on local market days. After surrounding scores of people who were conducting business at the market, the security force members detained up to 14 men and allegedly executed them, according to witnesses who found their bodies hours later, usually along the side of a road. Witnesses to these incidents described members of the security forces being accompanied by a few men in civilian dress whose faces were completely covered and who ‘indexed’ or identified, the men who were detained and later allegedly executed. The operations described by the witnesses occurred in the administrative communes of Arbinda, Tongomayel, Koutougou and, in one case, Baraboulé, and were: the alleged execution of 10 men in Petagoli on September 24 [2018]; [...] On September 24, the security forces allegedly killed 10 men in and around the town of Petagoli, in Baraboulé Commune. This is one of two operations documented by Human Rights Watch that occurred outside the 50-kilometer radius of Arbinda town. Three witnesses described the operation which involved dozens of security force members on motorcycles and in vehicles, and a few in civilian attire. Of the victims, three were reportedly Malians, of Dogon ethnicity, who had come for market day and whose bodies were repatriated by their family members. A witness who observed parts of the operation from his shop and later helped bury the victims said: It was an odd operation: first, a motorcycle with men in turbans and boubous drove into market; we thought they were jihadists; then two minutes later, a second one dressed the same way. Then minutes later several vehicles and many motorcycles of soldiers flooded the market area, firing in the air, blocking exits. The first to be killed were Djibril and two Dogon men from Mali near where the women sell tea and beignets. Then they shot people near the animal market and two on the road between Petagoli and Baraboulé. I didn’t see any weapons confiscated. It seems so unfair to kill people like that without even saying why. The dead were from around 30 to 69-years-old, that was Al Haj Saidu, killed next to the cattle market. One was a man with mental disabilities, who tried to run, another was a man who sold phone credit. I helped bury seven. Nearly all had been shot in the head and the other three bodies were taken home to Mali by their people. A woman who witnessed the killing of three men detained during the operation said: A group of soldiers surrounded the cafe, asking for the ID cards of the men drinking tea. One soldier had a list. After studying the names, they picked out three of them; a Peuhl, a Dogon and another one. A soldier ordered them to sit down, then another one yelled, “no we’re taking you, get up!” They walked away with them and just minutes later, I saw them shooting one, then the second, and then, beat and twisted the neck of the third one, like the soldier was a commando. As they left, this group of soldiers turned to us, the women, then waved, and said in English, “bye, bye” as if to mock us. I saw a small plane flying overhead, but before leaving, they called the small plane down, and left. [...] Witnesses to all but one of the incidents described above said the alleged perpetrators were dressed in dark yellow and brown camouflage uniforms which, as noted, is worn by members of both the gendarmerie and army. “It can be confusing; the gendarmerie and the army use the same uniform in some theaters of operation,” one security force officer noted." However, on the basis of interviews with the witnesses, security sources, and community leaders representing the major ethnic groups present in Soum Province, Human Rights Watch believes the majority of incidents described above were perpetrated by a detachment of gendarmes who, in August 2018, had been deployed to the town of Arbinda to respond to the growing number of armed Islamist attacks, including many of those which targeted civilians and are described above." ^[+]