At least 50 Russian mercenaries were killed, wounded and captured in late July when Tuareg tribes attacked a Wagner convoy in northern Mali, near the Algerian border. By unconfirmed accounts, the fighting left some 80 Wagner people dead.

Media reports by AP, Reuters, Novaya Gazeta, and other outlets claim the status of the Wagner 13th assault regiment of several hundred men began worsening on 22 July and climaxed in five days as they were surrounded near the village of Tin-Zoutin. The local Tuaregs, who are ethnic Berbers preaching fundamentalist Islam, faked their retreat and split into four groups, making the enemy to pursue them and attracting a part of Wagner mercenaries and several Mali servicemen into a dead-end canyon, where the Russians were ambushed and slaughtered. It was an old Berber combat tactic.

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