On August 8, 2009, at approximately 7:00 pm local time, a suicide bomber detonated an explosive device on a sidewalk between the French embassy and the Embassy of Libya in Nouakchott, the capital of Mauritania. The attacker, described as a young man wearing a boubou (a traditional West African garment), wore an explosive belt. The blast killed the bomber and wounded three other people. The French embassy was not damaged in the attack. This was the first suicide bombing recorded in Mauritania's history.
Two employees of the French embassy, identified as paramilitary gendarmes, were jogging near the site at the time of the blast. Both were hospitalized overnight with minor injuries. A third person was also slightly injured.
The bombing occurred against a backdrop of prior terrorist attacks against Western interests in Mauritania. In 2007, four French tourists were kidnapped and murdered. On June 23, 2009, an American teacher, Christopher Logest, was shot and killed in Nouakchott. Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) claimed responsibility for both of those earlier attacks. The August 2009 bombing also came shortly after significant political events in Mauritania: Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz had claimed victory in the contested 2009 presidential election roughly three weeks earlier, and his inauguration took place on August 5, 2009, just three days before the bombing.
Following the attack, the French government announced it would investigate the bombing and issued a statement pledging support to Mauritanian authorities during the inquiry. Mauritanian police identified the suicide bomber as a Mauritanian man born in 1987, and authorities stated he had been "formally identified as a member of the Jihadist movement."
In the aftermath, the French Foreign Ministry condemned "with the greatest firmness the attack ... in Nouakchott near the French embassy." Mauritania's Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs issued a statement wishing the injured a speedy recovery and expressing "wholehearted solidarity" with Mauritanian authorities in the face of the attack, while France reaffirmed its determination to fight terrorism alongside Mauritanian authorities and its people.
The bomber died in the attack, and no additional accomplices or co-conspirators have been named.
