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French news channel I>Tele on Tuesday (January 29) showed pictures of inhabitants of Timbuktu rejoicing as French and Malian troops entered the northern Malian town a day earlier.

The images showed French armoured personnel carriers being cheered on by people lining the streets as they re-took control of Timbuktu from Islamist rebels that had controlled it for the last nine months.

One man held a flag on which was written 'Thank you Hollande', a gesture to France's President Francois Hollande who ordered a large-scale military intervention in Mali to prevent rebels advancing on the capital Bamako in the south.