1er REG: Legionnaire killed in Mali | French Foreign Legion Information

On July 14, 2014, French Foreign Legion legionnaire Dejvid Nikolic, of Serbian origin, was killed during Operation Serval in the Al Moustarat region of northern Mali, West Africa. A member of the 1st Foreign Engineer Regiment (1er REG), he became the third legionnaire to be killed in this African country since 2013, after Staff Sergeant Harold Vormezeele and Sergeant Marcel Kalafut.

nikolic-dejvid — ADC **Dejvid Nikolic**; *Photo credit*: SIRPA

Adjudant-chef (ADC; Warrant Officer) Dejvid Nikolic was killed in a suicide attack that injured seven legionnaires, three of them seriously, including Nikolic himself. He died a few hours later in a military hospital near Gao, Mali.

By coincidence, legionnaires from his regiment were parading in Paris that same day, during the 2014 Bastille Day Military Parade.

Dejvid Nikolic was born in Belgrade, Serbia, in 1969. He joined the Foreign Legion in 1988, at the age of 19. After basic training, he was posted to the 2e REI. In 1992, he moved to Djibouti in the Horn of Africa to join the 13e DBLE, returning in 1994 to be posted to the 1er RE. Already an NCO by then, he was transferred to the 6e REG in 1998; the regiment became the 1er REG a year later.

ADC Dejvid Nikolic took part in numerous missions and operations, including deployments to Chad (1990), Djibouti (2002, 2008), New Caledonia (2009), the former Yugoslavia (2007), Afghanistan (2005, 2006, 2010), Lebanon (2012–13), and Mali (2014). He served in the Legion for more than 25 years. He was posthumously promoted to the rank of Major.

UPDATE: On July 22, 2014, the 1er REG paid homage to Major “Niko” Nikolic.

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