Mali and French troops have met with little resistance in their offensive against Islamist rebels
French-led troops in Mali have taken control of the airport in the key northern city of Timbuktu, French military officials say.
The troops encountered no resistance as they headed towards the city, a senior officer with the Malian army told AFP news agency.
French and Malian troops have been pushing north in their offensive against Islamist rebels.
On Saturday, they seized Gao, the most populous city in northern Mali.
Thousands of people in Gao poured out into the streets to celebrate the arrival of the troops.
Islamists seized the north of the country last year, but have been losing ground since French forces launched an operation earlier this month.
Most militants appear to have fled into desert hideouts, says the BBC's Thomas Fessy in the capital, Bamako.
The advance comes as African Union (AU) leaders are meeting to discuss sending more troops to Mali.
Last stronghold
"We control the airport at Timbuktu," a senior Malian army officer told AFP. "We did not encounter any resistance."
A military spokesman in Paris told AFP that the French and Malian troops now control access to the city as well as the territory between Timbuktu and Gao.
Our correspondent says ground forces units and paratroopers have been despatched around Timbuktu and it is believed that these troops are cautiously trying to find a way into the city.
Timbuktu Mayor Halle Ousmane Cisse, currently in Bamako, told the BBC that he had very credible accounts of Islamist militants burning ancient manuscripts that have been kept in the desert city for centuries.
He said that the homes of several civil servants had been burnt down during the last week and a young man killed for celebrating the approach of the French-led forces.
Once Timbuktu is secured, the French-led troops are expected to focus on the last rebel stronghold, Kidal, near the border with Algeria.
Kidal - home of the head of Ansar Dine, the main militant group in northern Mali - was bombed overnight by French forces, Malian officials say.
Once Kidal is taken, the first phase of the French operation will be over, our correspondent says.
The second phase will be to track down the militants to their desert hideouts, which could prove a much more difficult task, he adds.
French officials said they now had 2,900 troops in Mali, backed by 2,700 African forces in Mali and neighbouring Chad.
The African contingent is expected to be bolstered to 7,900, including 2,200 troops promised by Chad, AP news agency quotes a Nigerian military official, Col Shehu Usman Abdulkadir, as saying.
At an AU meeting in Ethiopia on Sunday, which is continuing on Monday, outgoing AU chairman and Benin's President Thomas Boni Yayi criticised the slow response of African states to the Malian conflict.
France's intervention was something "we should have done a long time ago to defend a member country", he said.
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