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“I was at the market when the shooting started,” said a 28-year-old man describing events in the village of Ouenkoro, Mali.

“I saw three military helicopters flying low, one of them firing. People fled in all directions. I took my motorbike and rode as fast as I could. I saw two people falling on the ground behind me, shot from the helicopters.”

Malian armed forces are committing serious abuses like this in village after village in their military operations against Islamist armed groups. The military has summarily executed and forcibly disappeared civilians, as well.

They are not acting alone, however.

Foreign fighters are assisting Mali’s armed forces in these operations – and taking part in the abuses, too. They’re white men who don’t speak French, and witnesses to their destruction describe them as “Russians” or “Wagner.”

Yes, Moscow’s malevolent military machinations apparently reach all the way to Mali. A new HRW report offers further evidence of the Russia-linked Wagner Group operating in the country.

The mercenary outfit under Yevgeny Prigozhin is, of course, better known both for its long-running brutality in Ukraine and a short-run insurrection against Moscow in June. But Prigozhin has acknowledged Wagner’s presence in Africa, and Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has a admitted at least twice the Wagner Group “provides security services” to Mali’s government.

What these “services” look like can be seen in the assault on the village of Séguéla, Mali, in February. Survivors describe how a large number of “white” foreign fighters in uniform carried out the attack, which resulted in beatings, looting, and the arrest of 17 men. Eight of their bodies were later found.

The overall situation in Mali is made more worrying by the impending withdraw of the 15,000-strong UN peacekeeping force, at the request of Mali’s government. One part of the UN mission has been to monitor human rights violations.

The future absence of that international attention may please both Mali’s forces and its Russian allies – and also their enemies, the abusive Islamist armed groups. But it will do nothing to help Mali’s long-suffering people.

When a horrific video emerged last week showing an ethnically motivated attack on two women in India’s Manipur state, Prime Minister Narendra Modi called the incident a “disgrace for the entire country.” Manipur’s chief minister announced arrests.

But where have these two key politicians – both from the ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party – been for the past two months?

Since May, Manipur state has been wracked by ethnic violence between Kuki tribal groups (generally Christian) and the majority Meitei community (generally Hindu). More than 100 lives have been lost, and tens of thousands of people have been displaced.

But the top leadership did nothing significant until the video from May 4 went public last week, showing a Meitei mob stripping and parading two Kuki women.

What’s more, the government had failed to act in this case, even though police witnessed the violence. The complaint filed with the police said officers had rescued two men and three women from the mob, but they were then snatched away. The mob killed the men and then sexually assaulted the women, one of whom reported being gang-raped.

Manipur’s chief minister tried to defend the police’s delay in responding to the complaint by saying, “hundreds of similar cases have taken place.”

It’s a bizarre statement but also a damning admission. If horrific violence is commonplace and not getting proper police attention, what does that say about the political leadership?

Anti-trans hatred is the hysteria du jour in many parts of the world, and we’re seeing anti-trans laws emerge from Russia to the US. Now, Hungary’s authoritarian ruling party is keen to join in the scapegoating of a vulnerable minority.

The Hungarian government has proposed a bill that excludes transgender women from a women-only pension scheme. It may seem a bit of an obscure battle to fight, but it comes on the heels of a court ruling that received a lot of attention, in which a local authority was obliged to recognize the plaintiff, a transgender woman, as a woman.

That decision caused a meltdown in Hungary’s ruling party, Fidesz. The party’s deputy faction leader publicly criticized the judge, and party-controlled mass media regurgitated transphobic and homophobic messages.

And, as it has done with previous unfavorable rulings, the government is proposing new legislation to sidestep the courts. The proposed bill blatantly discriminates against trans women who have legally changed their gender marker.

The bill is another stark example of how the government abuses its power by eroding the rule of law.

(compiled by Lisa Maier)

• Spain: Specter of right-wing entering government fades after inconclusive national election (AP) 
• Ukraine updates: Russian attack destroys Odesa grain depot (DW) 
• DR Congo: Deadly militia raid on Ituri’s displaced (HRW) 
• Why Brazil should urgently ban cluster munitions (O Globo, Portuguese; HRW, English) 

Here in Europe, our beloved summer down-tools is fast approaching, and the Daily Brief team will take a much-needed break in August.

But before we get there, I thought it might be nice to share some ideas about summer reading. What books are you taking on vacation with you and what would you recommend for other Daily Brief readers?

I’ll gather suggestions and post them here in the coming weeks. Let’s keep it short and simple: title, author, and a line about why you enjoyed the book and why other Daily Brief subscribers might like it.

Right now, for example, I’m reading Claudio Magris’s Danube. I’ve just started, and I’m doing my best to keep up with the literary references in this ode to the European river, but it seems worthy.

Please email me or contact me on Twitter or Mastodon with your book suggestions.