In a statement, the army said that seven Malian soldiers had been killed on Friday in simultaneous raids on two military outposts near the village of Boni, in the centre of the country.

The army had initially reported that six soldiers died in the attack.

Mali has been struggling to contain an Islamist insurgency that first erupted in 2012, and which has claimed thousands of military and civilian lives.

Despite the presence of thousands of French and UN troops, the conflict has engulfed the centre of the country and spread to neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger.

Central Mali has become the epicentre of the Sahel-wide conflict, where ethnic killings and attacks on government forces are frequent.