Mali has become 'Sahelistan' or is at risk of becoming so? Well if this report is accepted this is not a matter of "black or white". Sounds more like the Yemen, Pakistan and a few others places the West is entangled with. Hostages ransoms shared with the government, sorry persons in the government.

Note this is December 2012 report.

For years Malian Tuaregs have been complaining that their government was in bed with al-Qaeda, but their cries fell on deaf ears. According to numerous northern residents, AQIM fighters have been circulating openly in Tuareg towns, not for the past year, but for the past 10 years; shopping, attending weddings, and parading fully armed in the streets, in front of police stations and military barracks.

Colonel Habi ag Al Salat, a Malian army commander who defected in 2011 to join the MNLA, was one of the first to notice the Algerian fighters from the Salafi Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) entering Tuareg towns of the far north such as Aguelhoc, which was under his command.

But when Habi warned his army superiors they told him to stand down and leave the men alone because they were "not enemies" of Mali. When the GSPC changed its name to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, following a pact announced by Ayman Al Zawahiri, that policy did not change.
Link:http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/spo...157169557.html

The conclusion, with my emphasis:
The one armed force that has both the numbers and local knowledge to credibly expel al-Qaeda from a wide swath of the Sahara and keep them out over the long term would be the region's indigenous Tuareg fighters.

But giving them a mandate to do that would mean recognising and empowering them as a force with legitimate demands, which neither Mali, nor any neighbouring country wants to do. Meanwhile the Tuaregs have a sinking feeling: The fear that they are the ones who will be killed in any coming war, in the name of fighting al-Qaeda.