sentences:  Despite this, French officials following the Second World War reported that there were some 50,000 ""Bella"" under direct control of Tuareg masters in the Gao–Timbuktu areas of French Soudan alone.This was at least four decades after French declarations of mass freedom had happened in other areas of the colony.In 1946, a series of mass desertions of Tuareg slaves and bonded communities began in Nioro and later in Menaka, quickly spreading along the Niger River valley.