Timbuktu residents say 'Thank you God' that rebel Islamists are gone (+video)

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. Mali conflict: Timbuktu celebrates end of Islamist rule

"We can now dance and do whatever we want: We can walk together with women, we can shout, we're the young people of Timbuktu, this is what we like doing."

Music was banned under the strict Islamic law that militant Islamists imposed when they took over the ancient desert city last year.
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They can also dress the way they want to. Women have swapped the full black niqab, or full-face veil, for colourful local pagnes, a piece cloth wrapped around the body to form a skirt.
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Dozens of people were out in the streets breaking into shops owned by ethnic Arabs and Tuaregs, whom they accuse of having collaborated with the militant Islamists.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-21274341