There's a lot of criminality and transnational networks. Mali is on the route for smuggling contraband and drugs to Europe. There is a connection—and a difficulty related to the connection—between criminality and otherwise political groups, but it's part of people trying to get resources where there are no other resources to be found.
At the negotiating table, many of these groups ask the government to become the border police so that they could actually have stable jobs and move their people away from criminality. To me, that is the best sign that they are serious. Sadly, that was not an option accepted by the current government, but this doesn't mean that there isn't the potential. There is a potential in the country for these groups to be taken out of this bigger constellation of Islamist terrorist groups that have been operating elsewhere as well.