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An estimated 35,000 internally displaced people, of whom 10,000 are living in official camps, have arrived in the Mopti region alone since the government lost control of northern Mali, one security source told the Guardian.Many, like Sissiko, have joined militias, prompting fears that the ranks of independent trained and armed northerners could create further problems for the country.

Military action – which an official source insists is being pursued alongside the possibility of negotiations – is likely to begin in the new year. But civilian authorities in Mopti are already gearing up for war in the north, and are preparing emergency plans to merge the police, gendarmerie, national guard and emergency services.

"Militia members are in their thousands, and their numbers are multiplying," said the source. "I fear the impact of their existence on the country – they are regional and ethnocentric organisations that can only further divide Mali."If people want to liberate the north they should integrate into the national forces, otherwise it risks creating a whole new problem when this war is over."

Despite reports that the ranks of the Islamist groups – Mujao in Gao, Ansar Dine in Kidal, and al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb in Timbuktu – are filled by insurgents from neighbouring Algeria and Mauritania, people from those towns say that their numbers have been bolstered by Malians who have joined the groups as a means of survival.