For a foreign correspondent in Mali, the assignment seemed like a dream: as Islamic extremists upended the region, Olivier Dubois, a French journalist, secured a rare interview with a leader of JNIM, an al-Qaida’s affiliate in the Sahel.
Or so he thought. En route to the interview in Gao, northern Mali, in April 2021, Dubois, a correspondent for Libération and Jeune Afrique publications, was kidnapped.
